Bayou Moon - Andrews, Ilona [87]
Clara hacked the fish’s head off with a cleaver and filleted it with deft precise strokes. But Gustave was always pleasant, she had to admit that. Still, he was gone now, and nothing would bring him back. And even if it did, how many lives would it take to rescue him? Nobody was worth that much blood. No matter what that daughter of his thought.
The stock was close to a boil. She bent and scraped the fish bones off the cutting board into the garbage vat and saw feet in black boots in her kitchen.
Clara straightened very slowly, her gaze rising from the boots and black trousers to the jacket, to the wide shoulders, and then to the face above the dark collar. It belonged to a blond man of indeterminable age, somewhere between late twenties and early forties. The face was pleasant enough. She glanced into his eyes and froze. They were empty and stone-hard. Trouble eyes. Fear shot through her.
How did he get by Gaston? She’d heard no noise, no commotion.
“Limes,” the man said, offering her a handful of the bumpy citrus fruit. “You’ll need some for the fish soup, so I took the liberty of picking some up on my way through your storeroom. I understand the trick is to cut them paper-thin so they’ll float on top of the soup when you pour it into the bowls.”
Those eyes, they made her want to raise her hands in the air and back away slowly, until it was safe to run for her life. But there was nowhere to run. This was her house. In the next room Urow and the baby lay helpless. Clara kept her eyes firmly on the man’s face. Stay asleep, Sydney. Stay asleep, because if he gets you, I’ll do whatever he says.
“Well, are you going to take the limes or aren’t you?”
She opened her mouth, knowing that saying anything was a mistake and unable to help herself. The words came out hoarse. “Get out of my house.”
He sighed, put the limes on the counter, and leaned against the cabinet, like a black crow come to caw on her grave. “Two people came here less than eight hours ago. They brought a thoas with them and left him in your house. That thoas, who is he to you? Your husband, perhaps?”
“Get out,” she repeated, moving back. The cleaver in her hand was useless. He’d take it away from her and chop her to pieces with it.
“I see. A husband, then. He was hurt. My sympathies. I hope he recovers.” The man nodded gravely. “But he doesn’t interest me as much as the two who brought him. One of them was Cerise Mar. I’d like to learn about her companion. I want to know everything about this other person. Looks. Age. Accent. Anything that you might find helpful to contribute.”
He smiled at her, a bright dazzling smile. “If you tell me what I want to know, I’ll depart and let you get back to your cooking. That stock smells divine, by the way. So what do you say?”
He fixed Clara with his stare, and she hesitated, suddenly panicky, like a bird caught in a glass cage. The menace radiating from him was so strong that deep inside she cringed and tried to shield the gaping hole that sucked at the bottom of her belly.
“It’s an honest offer.” He leaned forward. “Tell me what I want to know and I’ll vanish.” He weaved his long fingers through the air. “Like a ghost. An unpleasant but harmless memory that will fade with time.”
His stare offered reassurance like a crutch, and Clara realized that he wasn’t bluffing. He wouldn’t harm her if she told him what he wanted to know. She felt the need to please him. It would be so easy . . .
But he had hurt Urow. The thought sliced through her hesitation. He or someone who worked for him almost took her husband away from her. He would take her children if she let him.
“I’m afraid that I’m rather pressed for time,” he said.
Clara took a deep breath and threw the cleaver at him. As he caught the wide spinning blade by the handle, she swiped at the stock pot off the