Throwing back his head, the Cajun laughed again. “He won’t hurt you, podnah. I’d trust my own daughda wit’ him.”
“Right. You wouldn’t leave me if it wasn’t safe.”
“’Course not. He a good man.”
A good man… He’d suffered a great deal, and he’d avenged his daughter’s death. That didn’t prove he was a good man. But it’d been her idea to come out here, and she decided she might have better luck getting Fornier to open up if they didn’t have an audience. What they’d both suffered wasn’t easy to talk about.
After waiting for her to pass, the old man turned around. She watched his taillights disappear in her rearview mirror before concentrating all her attention on that broad figure in the doorway.
Quit being a baby. It was only eight o’clock. She might as well get what she’d come for.
Fornier didn’t move toward her even after she parked and got out. He crossed his arms and leaned against the lintel, watching her skeptically. At least she thought he was watching skeptically. It was difficult to be sure. She could only make out his general characteristics. Tall, maybe six-two or six-three—a full ten inches taller than she was—he had a lean, muscular build and the hyperfocus of an animal who stalks its prey. His hair was on the long side, making him look a bit careless or perhaps reckless, but the rest of him seemed very…together. Right down to his clothes.
Once she reached him, she could tell his faded jeans and long-sleeved T-shirt were clean and smelled of woodsmoke. She could also tell she’d interrupted him while he was relaxing, because he wasn’t wearing any shoes.
“I suppose you have a reason for being here.” His lazy Southern drawl was almost as deceptive as his stance was casual.
“Ya-Ya Collins sent me.” She clasped her hands together to get control of her nerves. “From Mamou,” she added.
“I know where Ya-Ya lives.” His voice was as rough as tree bark, but now that Jasmine was close enough to see him better, she could tell that those pictures in the newspaper didn’t do him justice. He was much more attractive in person. “How’d you get past her?” he asked.
“I told her the truth about why I want to speak with you.”
With the shadows on his face, she couldn’t be sure but she thought his eyes wandered over her, sizing her up, drawing Lord knows what kinds of conclusions.
“Which is?”
“I’m not a reporter or a journalist.”
He didn’t seem particularly relieved. “The process of elimination could take a while. Maybe we should start with what you are.”
She ignored the sarcasm. “You’re as friendly as I expected.”
“I don’t remember inviting you here.”
“I came because I’m hoping you’ll answer a few questions.”
He lifted one shoulder in a careless shrug. “If it has anything to do with the last decade, I have nothing to say. I’ve put the past behind me.”
Obviously, he’d done no such thing, or he wouldn’t be living like a hermit.
“It’s about the man who killed your daughter.”
“Of course it is.” With a grimace, he rubbed his neck. “You should’ve left your engine running,” he said at length, then he shoved away from the lintel as if he planned to go back inside and leave her right where she was. He probably would have, if she hadn’t stopped the door.
His gaze traveled from her hand to her face, but he didn’t force her to move.
“A man took my sister from our house while I was babysitting sixteen years ago,” she said.
“I’m sorry that happened, but it has nothing to do with me.” Removing her hand, he closed the door with a click.
“She’s never been found,” she said, raising her voice so it’d carry through the wood panel. “But I received a package three days ago. It contained the bracelet she was wearing the day she disappeared.”
No response.
“That package came from New Orleans, Mr. Fornier. I think he’s here…somewhere.”
Still nothing.
“Mr. Fornier?” Beginning to lose her nerve, Jasmine wondered what she was doing standing in the middle of a swamp bothering a man who’d already suffered enough. But that strange coincidence, the similarity between her sister’s case and his daughter’s, meant something. She knew it did.
“There was a note with it—a note written in blood.” She waited a few seconds to let that sink in before continuing. “Just like your daughter’s name on the wall.
That kind of behavior is called a signature. It’s an unnecessary act driven by a perpetrator’s own compulsion or desires and it varies from criminal to criminal. So it’s highly unusual that two killers would do the same thing within the same time frame, and that they’d both have a tie to this area.”
When Mr. Fornier still didn’t respond, she rested her forehead against the lintel. Ya-Ya Collins had warned her, but she’d believed she could get through to him. “Are you listening, Mr. Fornier?”
A frog croaked somewhere off in the distance—and something much closer splashed into the water.
Chilled by the foreboding suggested by that sound, Jasmine glanced back at her rental car. She had a lot more to say—everything she’d been thinking about since reading those articles in the New Orleans paper—but it was no use. Fornier wouldn’t help her.
“Right. Thanks for nothing,” she muttered and trudged back to her car. She’d opened the door and was about to get in when he stepped out of the shack. He didn’t speak—just stood there watching her—which made it impossible to tell what he was thinking.
She gripped the window frame of her car door as she looked back at him. “I’m staying at the hotel in town if you change your mind.”
“Let’s do it here,” he said, and left the door open for her.
Chapter 5
Fornier’s shack was much nicer than Jasmine had anticipated. Though basic, it was clean and well-maintained. And he lived simply, but not as simply as she’d assumed. The light she’d noticed in the window wasn’t a candle. It was a television powered by a generator, judging by the rumble coming from somewhere behind the house.
Once she stepped into the living room, she could see a small kitchen off to one side and a short hall off to the other. A door that stood open at the end of the hall probably led to Fornier’s bedroom. With only the television for light, it was too dark to see much detail, but the neatness of the living room gave her the impression “T-Bone” made his bed each and every day with military precision.