“That has got to be the all-time lamest-ass excuse for bad behavior. I’ve heard the expression, ‘The devil made me do it,’ but ‘God made me do it,’ that’s a new one.”
He shrugged. You have no idea, sweetling.
“Why would God, assuming there is a God, do such a thing?”
“Ours is not to reason why.” Did I really spout such nonsense?
She shook her head at him, equally unimpressed with his platitude. “Well, let’s get out of here before Tante Lulu and Charmaine do something outrageous, like stage a prison break, or something.”
“Uh, there’s one thing, sweetling. You must leave Leroy in my hands. Best you stay away from this prison, for the time being, at least. Evil forces are at work here. It is no place for an innocent woman.”
“How about an innocent man?”
“That, too,” he said.
“He didn’t kill that inmate.”
Ivak could argue that most inmates claimed they were innocent. “Just leave, and I will take over your mission.”
“Is that an order?”
“You could say so.”
“I beg your pardon. You don’t have the right to give me orders. Do you think a mere kiss gives you some authority over me?”
“There was naught mere about our kiss, and you know it. Perhaps I was less than adept in expressing my view; English is not my first language. Let me rephrase. Gabrielle, sweetling, it would be wise if you would step back from your efforts to help your brother, and let me handle things from here on.”
“Oh, that was much better.”
“Sarcasm ill-suits you, dearling.”
“Cut the endearments and unlock that door, Mr. Sigurdsson. I’m going to help my brother, no matter what you say.”
Only if I’m glued to your backside, he thought, then grinned at the image. He unlocked the door and they were walking down the hallway when he asked with a casualness that scarce hid his concern, “Where do you live, Gabrielle? Not near the prison, I hope.”
“No one lives near the prison, as you well know, or should know, except for a vast number of gators and snakes,” she said with more of the sarcasm he misliked. “Not that it’s any of your business, but I have a small apartment on Dumaine Street in New Orleans. It’s close to the Second Chances legal defense office where I work.”
Ivak’s heart began to race wildly and a cold sweat broke out on his skin. “Please tell me you are not anywhere near the restaurant Anguish.” The haakai demon vampire Dominique used the renowned eating place in the French Quarter as a front for her torture chambers.
Gabrielle glanced at him with surprise. “It’s right across the street. I hear they serve the most incredible dish.”
What? Grilled humans? Or soul food, literally?
“It’s called Blood Gumbo.”
Six
Something stinks in Angola . . .
Gabrielle continued to be confused, sitting next to Ivak as they were driven across the prison grounds by a taciturn guard who did little more than grunt yes or no to her questions. Angola covered a massive property, and, although many prisoners were marched double file every morning to the fields by guards on horseback, it was deemed too far for visitors to travel on foot.
Some of the fertile land was planted in various crops, some of it set aside as pasture for cattle or horses, and some was used to house the camp dormitories. It had been the site of a slave-breeding plantation long ago; in many ways the slavery continued. In fact, Angola was the name of the country from which many of those slaves had been taken. There was a sad irony in the fact that most of the inmates were black.
She walked now from the parking lot to the rodeo stands, side by side with Ivak, this strange man who had a strange hold on her. She even liked the way he walked, back straight, eyes ever alert to their surroundings.
Not that she would let him know that. His ego was big enough already.
She was even more confused when they approached the rodeo arena where Tante Lulu, Charmaine, and Rusty Lanier, the handsome husband of Charmaine, were leaning against a corral fence watching some inmates try to ride their resisting horses in tandem for the opening rodeo ceremony. Leroy was off near a shed, talking to another inmate, identifiable by his attire. Inmates wore jeans with either a white T-shirt or a blue work shirt, except for inmates being disciplined; they wore white jumpsuits. Several blue-uniformed prison guards stood nearby keeping an eye on them all, making sure no convicts approached them, or vice versa, she supposed.
That was when Ivak’s head shot up, he sniffed the air, shoved her toward the group ahead of them, then literally shot at what seemed to be warp speed off into the wooded area to their right.
“Did you see that?” she shrieked.
“What?” everyone said.
“Ivak . . . I mean, Mr. Sigurdsson . . . seemed to fly off into those woods over there.” She pointed to the forested area where not a leaf or blade moved on this breezeless day. Almost immediately, she felt foolish for having voiced such an observation.
“Well, whadja ’spect. He’s an angel, ain’t he?” Tante Lulu had made the same remark earlier about Ivak being an angel. A ridiculous idea, Gabrielle had thought at the time, but now with an image of those wispy blue things she’d witnessed in his office a short time ago, she wasn’t so sure. Of course he isn’t an angel. What am I thinking?
“There’s no such thing as an angel, Auntie,” Charmaine said.
My thoughts exactly.
“Next, you’ll be tellin’ me there ain’t no St. Jude, either,” Tante Lulu replied huffily.
Rusty rolled his eyes at Gabrielle. She’d gotten to know Charmaine’s husband as he drove them to the prison. Although he was a quiet-spoken man, the opposite of his effusive wife whom he obviously adored, he’d told them numerous stories of his wrongful incarceration years ago at Angola.
Leroy came over then and whispered in her ear, “Where did you disappear to?”
“I had some things to discuss with Mr. Sigurdsson.” She hoped she wasn’t blushing.
It wasn’t her cheeks, though, that Leroy’s eyes fixed on. It was her lips, which she suspected were bruised from Ivak’s kisses. “I’ll kill him for laying a hand on you.” Leroy scanned the area for Ivak, to no avail.
“Don’t even joke about killing someone,” Gabrielle chided him. “Besides, Ivak never laid a hand on me.” Well, hardly.
“What? You bit your own lips?” Something else seemed to occur to him. “Shit! He bit you.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake! The man thinks we’re soul mates. Why would he bite me, anyway?” Actually, some of his kisses had been a bit nibbling, but Leroy didn’t need to know that.
“Soul . . . soul . . .” Leroy sputtered, then burst out laughing. “Well, I’ve wanted you to get a life. I just never thought it would be with a weirdo prison chaplain.”
Tante Lulu overheard and remarked to Leroy, “Where’d you learn ta whisper? In a sawmill?” But then she let out a hoot of laughter and slapped her one thigh. “I knew it, I knew it. My matchmakin’ works, even when I ain’t done nothin’. It’s a miracle. You got a hope chest yet, girl?”
“Uh . . .”
“Not ta worry. I’ll whip one up quicker ’n spit. I gives ’em ta all my family and friends, even the menfolks.” She gave Leroy a considering perusal. “You get yerself outta the big house, and I’ll make you a hope chest, too.”
“That is just great,” Leroy muttered. When Gabrielle elbowed him for his rudeness, he added, “Thank you very much, Ms. Rivard.”
“Tante Lulu,” she corrected him.
They all turned then at the sound of an engine. A pickup truck drove up almost to the fence and out climbed Warden Benton and his assistant Selma Dubois, who was in charge of PR. Both wore business suits, Benton’s minus the tie in deference to the heat, Dubois’s with a few buttons undone. With wide smiles on their faces, they greeted everyone.
Tante Lulu and her family must have even more clout than Gabrielle had s
uspected.
Leroy whispered in her ear. “Who are these people? Celebrities or something? They must be to merit the top brass Welcome Wagon.”
“They may very well be your ticket out of here, so behave,” she whispered back.
Leroy nodded.
Just then, Gabrielle felt a warm finger trail down the back of her neck. She jerked around to see that Ivak had returned. His hair was disheveled, strands having escaped their ponytail, and his clerical collar was lopsided inside his muscle shirt. And—
“Sigurdsson! What is that god-awful smell?” Warden Benton asked, frowning at Ivak.
An odor resembling sulfur, or rotten eggs, emanated from Ivak.
“Oops! I must have touched a stinkleberry bush,” Ivak said.
Stinkleberry?
He winked at her and went over to a horse trough where he proceeded to rinse off his hands and arms up to the elbows, not at all flustered by everyone gawking at him. When he returned to Gabrielle’s side, the odor was gone. He told the warden then, as if he was in charge, “You can resume now.”
The warden looked as if he might like to throttle Ivak on the spot.
Ivak turned to the warden’s assistant. “Hi, Ms. Dew-bwah,” he drawled out.
The fortyish woman turned beet-red and giggled. She actually giggled. Good Lord, did the man have this effect on all women?
“Do you want Mr. Sigurdsson to return to the Main Prison?” Ms. Dubois asked the warden. “I could drive him back.”
She would probably take the long way back, Gabrielle thought meanly.
The warden hesitated for a moment before shaking his head, “We need him here to see how the LeDeuxs might help with the talent show. He’s not makin’ much headway on his own.” He gave Ivak a pointed look, which Ivak chose to ignore.
“Sounds like someone’s got a burr under his saddle,” Ivak said out of the side of his mouth to Gabrielle. Then he winked at Ms. Dubois. “Thanks anyway, Sel-ma.”
Sel-ma? The louse! No, no, no! I have no right to be possessive over him.
Leroy, on her other side, heard Ivak as well. He smiled. “Man, I’m startin’ to like this guy. Scary!”
Ms. Dubois was self-consciously fluffing her helmet hair and casting Ivak surreptitious glances.
He just smiled, knowing perfectly well the effect he was having. The louse!
“Do you flirt with every woman you meet?”
He seemed to ponder her question, then replied, “Probably.” Then, when no one was looking, he pinched her butt and added, “But I only kiss the pretty ones.”
There he went with the hokey lines again. “You are so not my type,” she avowed, rubbing a hand over her behind.
“That remains to be seen,” he countered with annoying self-confidence, as if he would be the one to determine whether they made love or not.
The warden and his assistant proceeded to give them the grand tour of the rodeo arena, stables, and barns. “Our arena seats ten thousand. I figure for the last rodeo in October when the talent show is put on, we can double or triple the admission price. With the LeDeux name attached to the show, it’ll be a sellout.” Benton preened at relaying that news.
“Where exactly will the show’s profits be allocated?” Ivak asked.
Benton bristled and Ms. Dubois flushed with embarrassment at Ivak’s blunt question.
“Tsk, tsk, tsk, Mr. Sigurdsson. All of the rodeo funds go to inmate programs, as you well know,” Ms. Dubois said, her head-to-toe survey of the Viking “chaplain” a contradiction of her testy words.
“But the talent show funds, the amount charged above the regular admission price, do you have plans for that money? I figure on any one day, at fifteen dollars a ticket, you bring in a hundred and fifty thousand dollars, give or take. If you double or triple the ticket price because of the talent show, we’re talking a huge profit, above your regular take.”
Ms. Dubois gasped at the word take. And Gabrielle could tell that Ivak was really annoying the warden, as well.
Tante Lulu, bless her heart, understood the undercurrents. “Now, dontcha go gettin’ all riled up, Pierce. Our preacher friend here is jist askin’ the questions we all have.”
Charmaine was quick to add, “While we LeDeux don’t charge for our talent shows, we like to think they’re for a good cause.”
“No one is saying you would do otherwise,” Rusty tried for the more diplomatic route.
“Where would you like to see the funds go?” Benton asked Tante Lulu.
She turned to Ivak. “Now’s yer chance ta speak, boy.”
Ivak didn’t even blink or hesitate. “Education, for one. Since government grants were cut, the only chance for higher education for inmates is through the ministry program, and while that’s a good thing, inmates should have other options.”
Since the ministry college program was Benton’s pet project, he was not happy with Ivak’s suggestion.
“The prisoner legal defense fund is almost laughable,” Ivak continued. “Then there’s the inmate vet program, hospice, and of course all the prison chaplain expenses, of all religious denominations. And thinking really big . . . how about accommodations for inmate visitors who have traveled a long distance and have no place to stay? Sort of a Ronald McDonald House for convicts, just outside the prison gates. We could call it the Little House. A play on the Big House.” He waggled his eyebrows at his own attempt at humor.
The warden was not happy, but he nodded. Ms. Dubois looked interested.
“We kin sit down and discuss all this before the show,” the shrewd Tante Lulu offered, not about to wait and leave it all in the warden’s hands.
When they were done examining the area where a portable stage would be erected with sound systems, Warden Benton turned on them and asked, “What does Leroy Sonnier and his sister have to do with all this?”
Gabrielle felt Leroy stiffen beside her at the rudeness of the question. She took his hand in hers, squeezing, as a warning to keep quiet and let her speak. “I went to Tante Lulu for help in my efforts to get my brother a pardon or clemency. She suggested we visit the prison and meet Mr. Sigurdsson. We figured if we could get Leroy involved in a project like the talent show that benefits the prison, it would look good on his record when he comes up for his next parole board hearing.” Well, that wasn’t exactly a lie, just a little stretch of the truth.
“Whaaat?” Leroy murmured and shot a glare at Ivak.
Ivak shrugged, as if he had nothing to do with this, but was obviously not unhappy. “Better polish up the horn, my friend.”
Leroy mouthed something at Ivak that was not friendly.
“And I understand Mr. Sonnier has somehow, miraculously, got another hearing in November,” the warden said, his voice reeking with malice. Not a happy camper.
“You got Jude ta thank fer that,” Tante Lulu said.
“Who?” both the warden and Ms. Dubois asked.
“St. Jude.” Tante Lulu reached into a pocket, pulling out two small St. Jude candles, similar to the one she’d given Leroy back in the visiting area, and gave them to the astonished couple.
They looked down at the candles in their hands with puzzlement.
“What you need here at Angola is more St. Jude. He’s the patron saint of hopeless cases, you know. Betcha got lots of hopeless folks here.”
“Um,” the warden stammered.
“Can we move things along? I have to be back at the ranch by five,” Rusty said.
The warden shook his head as if clear it. “I have a penitentiary to run here. While I suggested this talent show to begin with, and I still think it’s a good idea, I can’t have outside people running around inside the prison willy-nilly.”
“Willy-nilly?” Now Tante Lulu was offended.
Charmaine buried her face in her hands, suspecting what was coming next.
“Wait ’til I tell folks how you treated an ol’ lady,” Tante Lulu warned.
“Now, now, all I’m sayin’ is we need ta set some rules. First
of all, this is still an inmate talent show. I appreciate you LeDeuxs comin’ to entertain, but as for helpin’ Sigurdsson with the show, I’m gonna have to insist on only a couple people at one time. Even then, you can’t be comin’ in here every day.”
Ivak raised his hand for attention when everyone started talking at once. “I suggest, respectfully, Warden Benton, that you assign Leroy Sonnier as my assistant for the talent show. You may not be aware, but he’s a talented musician.”
Leroy started to protest, but Gabrielle dug her fingernails into his forearm.
Ms. Dubois made a gurgling sound that no one noticed except Gabrielle. She had probably been hoping to assist Ivak.
“I’m fine with one or two of the LeDeuxs coming once a week to help me with the talent show. Perhaps closer to the show date, you’ll agree to letting the LeDeuxs hold some dress rehearsals on the stage.” Ivak looked toward the warden with more deference than Gabrielle suspected that he usually showed.
Warden Benton nodded, tentatively.
“Uh, I want to be involved, too,” Gabrielle said.
Ivak shocked her by shaking his head fiercely. “This is no place for a woman like Miss Sonnier. Except for visiting her brother, I do not want her involved with the project.”
So much for soul mate! “Hey, just wait a minute here,” she said.
But Ivak ignored her and told Warden Benton, “That’s a deal breaker for me.”
The warden agreed, although he clearly didn’t like Ivak dictating terms to him.
“What’s that all about?” her brother whispered to her.
“I have no idea,” she said, “but I’m going to find out.”
As everyone proceeded to leave the arena area, Ivak held her back. “We need to talk.”
“Tell me about it, jerk. Besides, I’ve already had one of your talks, and there wasn’t much speaking involved.”
He grinned. The man had a death wish. But then when he saw she was about to walk away, he said, “I can explain.”
“I doubt it.”
“Gabrielle. Dearling.”
“Cut the bullshit. What do you hope to accomplish with those hokey endearments? I am not your soul mate. I’m not even your friend. I am not your anything.”