Mischief in Mudbug (Ghost-in-Law, #2)(41)

Sabine LeVeche was everything he didn’t want in his life. Her beliefs defied logic and science. She was smack in the middle of a huge family drama, and her family was a nightmare of old-school beliefs and even older money. God only knew what they had been hiding behind those stone walls for all these years, and Beau didn’t want to know. But Sabine would, and that’s where his dilemma came in. Sabine LeVeche would look for answers until there were no questions left.

Beau knew all too well that those questions just might unleash a nightmare.

The family had been polite enough and had seemed as if they were glad to learn of Sabine, but they were still guarded in the information they dispensed. He wasn’t even going to launch into the weirdness factor. It went without saying. If Sabine veered off into the wrong line of questioning, they’d close ranks in a second, complete with the attorney to back them up. The attorney had hovered over the group the entire afternoon. Always standing and studying the room like he was getting ready for a major coup. If Beau had been a lesser man, he might have found it unnerving. Instead, he’d just found it annoying.

And none of it is your problem.

Mind made up, Beau leaned over to untie his tennis shoe. He was going to get a good night’s sleep and first thing in the morning he was going to head back to New Orleans, send an itemized bill to Sabine, and try to forget everything he knew about this case. He couldn’t afford to get involved on a personal level. Already the dreams were starting to return. It had taken him years to get a good night’s sleep again. He wasn’t about to jeopardize that for a stranger who’d repeatedly made it clear she had no interest in getting to know him better.

He pulled one shoe off and had just started on the second when he heard the sirens. His heart leapt to his throat and the completely irrational feeling that something bad had happened to Sabine washed over him like rain. He jumped up from the bed and peered out the hotel window. The ambulance exited the highway and raced into town, sirens screaming. He hadn’t taken a breath since he’d leapt off the bed, but when the ambulance screeched to a stop in front of Sabine’s store, the air all came out in a whoosh. He didn’t even stop to grab his other shoe before he tore out of the hotel, almost knocking down the hotel owner as he ran across the street.

The paramedics had already burst in through the front door of the shop and Beau ran past the policeman standing at the door without bothering to identify himself. He dashed up the stairs, the policeman close behind him, yelling for him to stop. He ran into the apartment and, finding the front rooms empty, dashed into the bedroom. What he saw brought him up short.

The paramedics wheeled Sabine out on a gurney, an oxygen mask strapped to her pale face. She looked unconscious. “What’s wrong with her? What happened? Damn it, someone answer me!”

“We don’t know. You have to move, sir!” one of the paramedics yelled as they rushed past him with the gurney.

“Where are you taking her?” he called after them.

“Mudbug General,” the paramedic called back as they hurried down the stairs as fast as they could go.

Beau started to follow, but the policeman who had chased him upstairs hitched his pants up with one hand and put his other on Beau’s chest. “Buddy, you ain’t going nowhere until you tell me who the hell you are and how you know Sabine.”

Mildred, who had followed close on the heels of the officer, rolled her eyes at Barney Fife, then fixed a hard stared on Beau. “I’d like an answer to that question myself.”

Beau reached into his pocket, then remembered he’d dashed out of the hotel without one of his shoes, much less his wallet. This wasn’t going to go near as quickly as he’d like. So far, he was as unimpressed with the Mudbug police as Sabine was, but he’d bet money that the hotel owner could take him down if he failed to satisfy the two of them. “I’m a private detective, former FBI. I was hired by Ms. LeVeche to find her family. I’m staying at the hotel across the street and ran over here when I saw the paramedics enter Sabine’s building. My wallet is in my hotel room.”

“I’ll be needing to see that before you can leave town.” The officer stared at him for a moment. “So I can assume that when Ms. LeVeche is able, she’ll verify your story?”

“Of course. Jesus, I just had dinner with her here, in this apartment. I only left a little over an hour ago, max. What the hell happened? Why did the paramedics come?”

“There was a 911 call from the phone here, but no one spoke. When that happens, the rulebook says we have to assume a crime is happening or someone’s croaking, so the police and the ambulance have to pay a visit.”

“And since there was no sign of forced entry, you assumed a medical emergency and the paramedics entered,” Beau said.

The officer narrowed his eyes. “I didn’t have time to check for ‘forced entry,’ as you call it. Damned medics had broke the door down before I got here.”

Mildred looked at the cop in disgust. “For Christ’s sake, Leroy, you’re a block away and the hospital is ten miles up the highway. If you’d stop wasting taxpayer money looking at internet porn, you might be able to do your job. Although I still have my doubts.”

Beau’s opinion of the hotel owner went up a notch.

“I’ll check out your story, Mr. Villeneuve. And assuming Ms. Mildred will vouch for you staying at her hotel, I guess I’ll let you drop by with that identification. In the meantime, I’d prefer it if you stuck around Mudbug. At least until Sabine can verify what you’ve said.”