French Silk(117)

"Thanks. 'Bye."

Claire waited until she had crossed the warehouse floor. At the door, she turned and gave Claire a jaunty little wave. Even from that distance, Claire could hear her bangles jangling.

Upstairs, Claire checked on Mary Catherine, who was sleeping peacefully. As she was pulling her mother's bedroom door closed, the smell of smoke brought her to a dead standstill.

When she'd had the old building renovated, she'd paid dearly for a state-of-the-art sprinkler system and smoke detectors, knowing that a fire would be costly, in merchandise and possibly in lives. Even with that safeguard, she was paranoid about fire.

She traced the faint whiffs to Yasmine's bedroom. She hadn't been there recently, but before her breakup with Alister, Yasmine had rarely kept the door closed. Claire had no qualms about opening it now to check for the source of smoke.

As she stepped across the threshold and entered the room, she received a shock to her sensibilities and to her nervous system. Reflexively clapping her right hand over her nose and mouth, she moved forward, reluctantly approaching the makeshift altar that had once been an ordinary nightstand.

Encircling the perimeter were smoky, sputtering candles that cast wavering shadows onto the walls. Unidentifiable herbs and oils had been sprinkled over the surface of the nightstand. They accounted for some of the malevolent odors permeating the room. But only some.

In the center of the altar was a crude crockery bowl. It was filled with what appeared to be the entrails of a small animal. At one time, organs might have been discernible. Now it was a mishmash of gore. The odor made Claire gag behind her hand.

Blood had been painstakingly dripped onto the surface to form symbolic patterns. The small effigy of Alister Petrie, the doll that Claire recognized as the one Yasmine had shown her, had been decapitated and emasculated. Like a stake through the heart, a vicious pin thrust up from the center of its chest.

"My God," Claire moaned, backing away from the grisly sight. "Oh my God, Yasmine. No!"

As soon as Harry arrived in response to her frantic call, Claire raced to her car and headed for the exclusive neighborhood along the shore of Lake Ponchartrain where Congressman Alister Petrie lived with his wife and children. She hoped she wouldn't arrive too late.

* * *

"Want me to wait?" The cabbie slung one arm over the back of the seat and gaped at his stunning passenger.

"No, thanks." Yasmine passed him a twenty-dollar bill. "Keep the change."

"Thanks, miss, 'preciate it. Say, uh, do I know you? I mean, should I? Aren't you famous?"

"I was a model. Maybe you've seen my pictures in magazines."

He slapped his forehead with the heel of his hand. "Jesus H! I thought that was you." He grinned, revealing crooked, tobacco-stained teeth in the feeble dome light of his cab. "Who'd've ever thought you'd ride in my cab? The only other celebrity I've ever hauled was that cooking lady on TV. Julia somebody. Say, I'll be glad to come back for you later. I can give you my card. You can call when you're ready to be picked up."

Yasmine shook her head and alighted. "Thank you."

"Well, 'bye. It's been a pleasure."

He dropped the gear shift into drive, saluted her, and pulled away from the curb. Yasmine watched him drive way. She was smiling, glad she'd made his day. He would talk about her for months, maybe years, telling everybody he met that he'd had Yasmine in his cab the night she really made herself famous.

"Good luck to you, sugar," she whispered into the still evening air. Standing on the curb, she regarded the stately house across the street. It would have made a pretty picture for a postcard. Even the Spanish moss hanging from the branches of the live oaks was perfectly placed.

There was no blood on the dining room window, which was dark now. They'd washed it off the morning after she'd paid to have the dead chicken "delivered." She'd driven past the next day to see. There'd been no trace of the terror that she hoped her hex had caused the smug son of a bitch.

He didn't know what terror was. Not yet.

She stepped off the curb and started across the street. Reaching into her large leather shoulder bag, she took out the revolver. Even though she'd checked the cylinders a hundred times during the course of the long afternoon while she waited for nightfall, she checked them once again. All were loaded.

She started up the sidewalk that divided the front lawn into immaculately landscaped halves. Her stride was long and confident, as it had been for years on the runways of fashion houses all over the world. New York, Paris, Milan. No one walked like Yasmine. Her gait couldn't be imitated. Many had tried, but none had been able to combine that sensuous countermotion of hips and shoulders with elegance and grace the way she had mastered it.

She hesitated for only a heartbeat on the bottom step leading up to the porch, then strode to the wide front door and pressed the bell.

* * *

"Daddy, I've got a soccer game on Saturday. Do you think maybe you could come to this one? I'm playing goalie."

Alister Petrie reached across the corner of the kitchen dining table and ruffled his son's hair. "I'll try. That's all I can promise. But I'll try."

"Gee, that'd be great," the boy beamed.

Since the incident with the dead chicken, which had taken ten years off his life. Alister had turned over a new leaf. For days he'd lived in abject terror, venturing out of the house only when absolutely necessary and then only under the protection of the bodyguards Belle had insisted on hiring.