Mischief in Mudbug (Ghost-in-Law, #2)(15)

But her father had no past to speak of except a license that wasn’t even a year old. Skinny amount of data for an American, even for that day and age. After hours of searching boxes full of handwritten payroll records, Beau had tracked him to a warehouse job on the docks in New Orleans and had located the ancient building in a seedy part of downtown that used to house the apartments where her parents had lived. It had been condemned for years, so there was no information to be gained on that avenue.

The social security number he’d used for the application hadn’t matched the name on the license. In fact, the number belonged to a man who had died some ten years before Sabine’s father took that job. Beau had already figured the name on the license wasn’t the man’s birth name, but he had yet to discover why it had been changed. If he could discover anything at all. Even more interesting was the fact that no one had put out a missing person’s report for a man of his description at the time.

True, the father could have been from another state. Communication between police departments wasn’t anything like it was today, but still, surely someone knew that this man, his wife, and his infant child were in New Orleans and set off alarms. But according to Sabine’s research, no one had. Not in Louisiana anyway.

Beau rose from the couch, walked into the kitchen, and pulled a beer from the refrigerator. It was two a.m. and long past reasonable drinking time for most people, but then the great thing about being self-employed and independently wealthy was that you didn’t have to live like most people. Beau was a night owl, pure and simple. Even during his time at the FBI, he’d always requested and always received night surveillance on takedowns. Ten years and not even once had someone tried to slide into the vampire role with him.

And then the thought of vampires led him right back to Sabine LeVeche and her strange way of living. What exactly caused a seemingly normal woman to launch off into believing in tarot cards and ghosts and rubbing rocks together for luck? Beau understood the overwhelming desire to know where you came from, understood it personally, but talking to dead people was one avenue he’d never even thought for one second to explore. He walked back into the living room.

What was Sabine doing right now, he wondered? Was she eating catfish and throwing back beers? Was she sitting in her apartment pouring over the limited information she had on her parents for the millionth time? He shook his head. More likely she was sleeping. Which sent him off on a whole other line of thought.

The mental picture of Sabine lying on a giant canopy bed draped in white gauze flashed across his mind. Her tanned body in crisp clarity against the bright white background, a giant ruby in the center of a silver headband the only vivid color in the image. The headband was also the only clothing she was wearing. Well, except for all those dangly bracelets like she’d had on at the café.

He shook his head and grabbed the television remote, frustrated he’d allowed his imagination to run away with him. Undressing a client was a line Beau had never crossed, not even in his fantasies. Then a horrible thought crossed his mind. If there was any truth at all to this psychic mumbo jumbo, could Sabine see his thoughts if they were about her? Shit.

He flipped channels, looking for something worth watching. This was the huge downside of being a night owl—there was rarely anything good on TV. He was just about to give it up as a loss and log on to the internet when a History Channel special on war criminals caught his eye. The commentator narrated the background of the people pictured in the photos on screen, going into great detail about their many crimes against the American people. He started to feel a tickle at the back of his neck.

He stood stock still in the middle of the living room, staring at the television, but the picture was no longer clear. The photos on the screen began to blend together in a kaleidoscopic blur. The commentator’s words ran together into a single noise. And then, in a flash, it hit him…exactly where he’d seen the man in the photo.

In the FBI’s most wanted files for war criminals.

He dropped onto the couch and took a huge gulp of his entire beer. Jesus, his memory was a pain in the ass; sometimes it was on, sometimes off. But when it was on, it was usually a hundred percent. He’d known when he took this job that it was probably going to end badly. Innocent people normally didn’t make themselves disappear. But the guilty made a career of it. Granted, there was no way the man in the drawing could be the criminal he remembered. The age was all wrong. But he would bet anything they were blood relatives. He set his beer on the coffee table, the desire for it completely gone.

He glanced at his watch. One other person would still be up about now. Someone who had access to the FBI database and probably wouldn’t mind giving him a little help on this. He reached for his cell phone and pressed in a number.

“Turner,” the man answered on the first ring.

“Hey, it’s Villeneuve.”

“Villeneuve! How the hell are you?”

“Doing good, man. How ’bout yourself?”

“Can’t complain, and wouldn’t waste the time on it if I could.”

Beau laughed. “I hear ya.”

“So what the hell are you calling me in the middle of the night for? I know it’s not to discuss football, politics, or religion.”

“I wish. This case I’m on just took a turn that makes politics and religion look like better options for discussion.”