Mardi Gras Mambo

I just stood there in the hallway, staring at my cell phone in disbelief.

Everything started to get a little fuzzy and my vision swam. I don’t know how to describe it, really. My entire mind and body went numb, and there was this awful buzzing in my ears. Somehow, I could hear my heartbeat over the buzzing. Then I couldn’t seem to catch my breath. My lungs seemed determined to gasp every last molecule of air in my lungs out and didn’t seem to want to take any back in. My eyes filled with tears. My legs wobbled and I grabbed for a Louis XVI decorative chair to keep myself from falling. I held on to the chair with all my strength, but my arms seemed to be made of limp pasta, and I kept sinking toward the floor until I was somehow able to take a deep breath. Finally, my blood started flowing again and I was able to right myself. My stomach clenched and unclenched, spasming with cramps, and I started gasping for air again. Spots began to dance before my eyes. This time I realized I was hyperventilating and bent over, putting my hands on my knees and consciously trying to slow my breathing. Tears were flowing out of my eyes uncontrollably as I huffed and puffed and tried to get control of myself again. With a conscious effort I shut down my mind and focused. I closed my eyes and thought about my happy place—one of the beautiful beaches of the Florida panhandle, where the sand is as fine as sugar and just as white, where the warm waves are a beautiful clear emerald green, turning blue as the water gets deeper farther away from the shore. I focused on the warm sun; the gentle, cool salty breezes blowing over me; the cry of the gulls; and the slightly fishy smell of the gulf. Finally, after a few moments, when I wasn’t completely sure I was going to be able to pull it together, my breath started coming more evenly and my heart rate slowed down.

All those years of teaching aerobics finally paid off.

I swallowed. The bad guys have Frank.

How in the hell had that happened?

My hands still shaking, I pressed the callback button, but it just clicked over to voice mail, a toneless voice telling me to leave a message. I dialed Colin’s number, but after one ring it too went to voice mail.

Okay, I have to get home, I thought crazily. How did Sasha know where Frank was? How had the bad guys known how to get him?

I knew something was wrong with Frank leaving. I’d been right. It wasn’t like Frank to run off with someone. I knew it. Wait till I saw Colin again....

I walked, a little shakily but okay, to the door to the parlor. Voices were still going—not arguing, but it was definitely a heated discussion. I don’t think I’d ever seen Maman quite so animated and passionate, so alive. If it weren’t so important I get the hell out of there, I would have just enjoyed watching. Of course, when my family gets going, you can’t just sit there quietly; you eventually get pulled in. There’s no such thing as passive observation. You can just be sitting there, minding your own business, trying not to be noticed as the conversation rages and boils around you, not saying a word, just enjoying yourself, and then someone sees you out of the corner of his or her eye and will turn on you. You can’t beg off, pretend not to have an opinion. No, there’s no avoiding it; they’re all looking at you then, and there’s not a damn thing you can do but join in.

As much as I would have loved to have voiced my opinion on all the secrecy and lying that had been going on within the family circle for just over two years—Storm was making that very point, and doing a very good job of it, judging by the redness of my mother’s face—I didn’t have time for that now. I managed to catch Rain’s eye and motioned for her to join me in the hallway. She rolled her eyes, got up, and walked out without anyone batting an eye.

“What?” she whispered once she joined me, her eyes still focused on the room. Mom was now defending herself passionately, jabbing her finger in the air as she made her points, Dad backing her with an occasional “Yeah” and by tightening his grip around her waist.

“I need you to take me home like five minutes ago,” I whispered back. “But I don’t want anyone to know. You up for it?”

“Sneak out of a family meeting?” She giggled like she used to when she was a teenager. “We haven’t done that in years.” She considered it for a moment. “I don’t know, Scotty. I hate to miss this.” She gestured back at the room, where now Maman was making the point she was hardly a delicate orchid who needed her family to protect her from the world. As she spoke, some of her hair worked out of place and I saw, for the first time, the strong resemblance my mother bore to her. Hell, Mom had to get all that spirit from someone; I just never dreamed it was quiet, ladylike Maman. Rain listened for a little while longer before giving me a broad wink. “Looks like Maman’s got everything under control.” She giggled again. “Let me get my purse.”

It’s relatively easy to sneak out of family meetings. The secret was to wait till the discussion got so heated and focused that the participants were completely unaware of anyone in the room who wasn’t participating. Of course, you ran the risk of being noticed as you made your escape and getting dragged in, but Rain was a master of the trick. I don’t know how she did it. I never could manage it without her assistance. She once told me she walked out of a particularly virulent one and not only got fifty dollars out of Maman’s purse, but had Dad give her his car keys without a second thought. As I watched her slip back into the room, grab her purse, and soundlessly walk back out, I believed it.

It was like she was invisible.

“Is this one of your little adventures?” she asked as she slipped the Range Rover into gear and we pulled out of the driveway. “I’ve always been so jealous of them.” She sighed. “They must be so much fun.”

“Well, in a way it is—but they’re hardly fun.” I closed my eyes as she pulled out way too fast in front of a cab to be able to stop and waited for the impact. When none came, I opened my eyes to see the cab swinging around us, the driver angrily giving Rain the finger as he honked his horn. She gave him a big smile and flipped him off with both hands. “I mean, being kidnapped and tied up isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, you know.” I sighed. Which is what’s happening to Frank right now. I didn’t say it out loud, although I was about ready to have a complete meltdown. “Did you know Misha was our uncle before today?”

“Well, yeah,” she said. “Maman told me after he married Aunt Sylvia. She didn’t tell me there were three of them, though.” She shook her head. “That was kind of a shock to find out. I mean, wow, it’s like something out of All My Children—you know, how long-lost relatives you never know you had show up? She got a thoughtful look on her face. “They’ve never done triplets, though.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” I looked out the window. “Why did Maman tell you?”

“Looks like the rain is letting up, so maybe Orpheus will roll after all,” she said absently. She was silent for a moment and then said, “Scotty, I’m sorry. Maybe I should have said something . . . maybe Maman should have. I don’t know. In hindsight, yeah, keeping these secrets maybe wasn’t a smart idea, but it’s easy to say that now. Maman had her reasons for keeping it quiet, and I had to respect that. She asked me not to say anything to anyone else, so I didn’t. I didn’t think it was that great of an idea, but it wasn’t my place.”

“What other secrets are there?” I sounded like a pouting little kid, but I couldn’t help myself. “What else don’t I know?”

She shrugged. “Hard to say, baby bro. I think that’s everything—but it’s a pretty big one, don’t you think?”

My mouth opened and closed. I braced my hands on the dashboard as she slammed on the breaks as the light at Louisiana turned red right in front of us. She glanced over at me. “You look pretty upset, boo.”

“Well, considering the fact that I just found out I have three uncles and two of them have been murdered in the last two days—one of them right in front of me—I’d say, yeah, I think I am a little upset,” I said crossly. “I mean, I know I don’t pay much attention when the family’s together so I miss things sometimes, but still. . . .” I tapped my hand on the window.

“Yeah, well.” She gave me a little smile. “We’re hardly a normal family, are we?”

“Define normal,” I grumbled. “I mean, really. Mom and the grands can’t stand each other, the grands are ashamed of me, Papa had an affair and triplets with a Russian ballerina—just your typical American family.”

A horn blared behind us. The light had turned green, but Rain ignored it. The car honked again, and Rain rolled her window down and waved it around her, putting on her flashers with her other hand. She turned back to me, frowning. “Where on earth did you get the idea that Mom and the grands hate each other?”

“Um, Rain, do you mind driving? I’m kind of in a hurry.”

“We’re not moving until you tell me.”

“Rain, the guys who shot Misha and Pasha have Frank, and I need to get home now!”

She looked at me for a moment, put the car in gear, and said, “Why didn’t you just say that?” She floored it and the Range Rover’s back tires spun with a loud squeal and the stench of burning rubber permeated the vehicle. The car leaped into the intersection after fishtailing a bit. I winced. “So this is one of your little adventures?” she asked, not taking her eyes off the road and passing a slow-moving Toyota with Oklahoma plates on the right. “What are you and Colin going to do? Go rescue him?”

I flipped open my cell phone and dialed Colin’s number again, but it still went to voice mail. “Damn it!” I swore, slamming it shut. “I can’t get hold of Colin. I don’t know where the hell he is. He went after the guys who shot Misha. . . .” I couldn’t help myself—I started crying. Anger, frustration, and helplessness flooded into my mind, taking turns controlling my mind, and my heart started beating faster again. I put my head down, knowing that the gasping would be right behind.

Rain started petting my head. “It’s okay, boo, don’t cry. I hate it when you cry.”

Rain had always hated it when I cried when we were kids. She was always trying to make me feel better, stop crying. Sometimes she would pet me and talk softly to me, telling me it was all right until I stopped; other times she would try to make me laugh. She’s a great sister—you couldn’t ask for a better one.

I heard another horn blare as she ran the light at Martin Luther King. She ignored a stop sign, then swung into a vicious left turn onto Calliope that I wasn’t sure she was going to make. She swung into the right lane and flew up to St. Charles, where the light was green, and she sailed through. Then she slammed on the brakes to avoid rear-ending a Porsche at the Carondelet light. “Okay, I’m not crying!” I held up my hands. “I’ve stopped, look! Now I am just in terror of my life!”

She looked at me and then grinned. “Frank’ll be okay, Scotty, you’ll see. He’s trained for these kinds of situations. And you’ll get hold of Colin, and you know he can do anything.”

I took some deep breaths. Stay calm and focused. Getting killed on the way home isn’t going to help Frank. Just be patient and you’ll be there soon enough.

Pray for a brave heart.

I closed my eyes and said a quick prayer for strength and patience, and when I opened my eyes we were moving again. I felt somewhat calmer. Of course Rain was right. I had to stay calm. Frank would be fine. If I panicked, I wouldn’t be any use to anyone. I tried calling Colin again, but no luck.

He can’t just be on the phone this whole time. He must have just shut it off.

Why would he do that? I wondered, and then realized Rain had said something I hadn’t heard and was waiting for me to answer as she turned onto O’Keefe. “I’m sorry, what did you say?”

“I was asking you again why you think Mom and the grands hate each other,” she replied. “I mean, that’s just crazy.”

“Well, I think it’s pretty obvious the way they talk to each other—”

She waved her hand. “Please. They just like to argue. Papa and Maman adore Mom. And Dad, too. They may not always agree—well, they never agree—but the grands are really proud of them.”

It was my turn to stare. I’m sure my jaw had dropped too. “You aren’t serious?”

“Scotty, who always bails Mom and Dad out of jail?” She laughed. “Maman and Papa, that’s who—and they never just send someone or a lawyer. They go, every time, and sit there in the waiting room until Mom and Dad come out, and then they all go out for dinner and drinks.” She gave me a wink. “Like you said, just your typical American family.”

“But Papa is always just so mean.”

“That’s just how he is. He’s like Storm. You don’t think Storm’s mean, do you?”

“Well, no. He’s just annoying—on purpose.” Storm was the most horrible tease. Sometimes he drove me absolutely insane. At least he’d stopped calling me “my queen.” But he still called my psychic power my “psycho gift.”

“Well, Papa is the same way. That’s how he shows affection. Is it how I’d prefer he be? No. I don’t particularly like being quizzed on a regular basis about why I’m not pregnant, but hey.” She shrugged, turning onto Esplanade. “Now, do you need my help with rescuing Frank?”

She was so completely earnest that I had no doubt she would be willing to strap a dagger to her leg, and I had this mental image of her in a commando outfit. I couldn’t help myself. It was all so absurd that my Uptown Mrs. Doctor sister was eager to help in a rescue mission that I started snorting with laughter.

“Don’t laugh at me! I’m serious.” She punched me in the leg as she pulled over at the corner of Decatur and Esplanade.

“You have no idea how much I love you right now.” I leaned over and kissed her on the tip of her nose.

“You sure you don’t need my help?” She frowned at me. “I never get to have any fun.”

She’d always said that when we were kids. I grinned back at her. “I know, it’s not fair.”

She laughed then and gave me another hug. “Oh, Scotty, don’t you remember?” She pointed her index finger at me and did a dead-on impersonation of Faye Dunaway in Mommie Dearest: “Ah, but nobody ever said life was fair, Tina.”

That made me laugh, and she laughed with me. She reached over and wiped the tears off my cheeks before planting a big, wet, sloppy, slurpy, noisy kiss on me. “I love you, little bro.”

“I love you, Rain.”

She twisted her face into her best grimace and rolled her eyes. “Even now you can’t call me Rhonda? What does it take in this family to get a little respect anyway?”

“I will never call you that.” I grinned back at her. “Rain was the little girl who always pulled me out from in front of cars.”

She gave me a long look, her eyes shiny with fresh tears, before blowing me a kiss. “Frank’s going to be fine.” And then I got out of the car.

I watched her negotiate the U-turn at Frenchmen and waved as she drove past. I kept watching—and waving—until the trees shielded the Range Rover from my sight. I took a deep breath and started walking up the sidewalk to my front door. I’ve got to find Frank, I thought, and felt the tension starting to build again. I started looking around for Sasha on the street. He wasn’t in front of my gate. Maybe he’d gone into the coffee shop to get warm; it was still a bit damp and chilly.

I glanced across the street and my blood ran a little colder.

The guy who’d been watching the house was there again.

I stopped dead in my tracks and took a better look.

I wasn’t sure if it was the same guy. They seemed to be of the same size, and the outfit was similar—baseball cap pulled down low to mask the top of the face, a grayish trench coat with the collar turned up, jeans and athletic shoes beneath. If it wasn’t the same guy, it was two guys with the same sense of style, at the very least. The street wasn’t as crowded as yesterday; some brave souls had ventured out from cover since the rain had stopped, although the sky was completely hidden by clouds running every shade of color between gray and black. I didn’t know if he was watching for me, per se, but if Frank had been kidnapped, they might have tracked him back here. They might be looking for the rest of us, if they didn’t have Colin. I casually pulled out my cell phone and dialed Colin again. Nothing. My heart was racing.

It wouldn’t be too hard to track us down; we were all three listed in the phone book with our addresses there for anyone to find. Even if he wasn’t watching for me, I didn’t like the looks of this. It was definitely not a good sign.

I waited for a crowd of tourists to walk across Esplanade and then fell into step alongside them as they headed up Decatur. They were jabbering and chatting away and didn’t notice me on their outer edge. My mind was working. The guy who’d watched the house before had reminded me of Frank. Frank had been a government agent. The plot of every single spy movie I’d ever seen rushed through my head. Maybe Frank had information on someone or something that made him dangerous from his days with the FBI. Frank never talked about his days with the FBI; his cases, the people he worked with, what kind of inside information he’d been privy to that certain people in the government might not want to be public knowledge. My imagination was certainly not helped by the mistrust my parents had sown into me my entire life about the Big Brother in Washington, watching and monitoring our every move. When we reached the door to the coffee shop, I ducked inside, worked up to a fine emotional turmoil of terror and paranoia.

And I wasn’t even stoned.

Nor was Sasha inside the coffee shop. Where the hell was he?

I walked over to the counter and casually ordered an iced mocha from a clerk I didn’t recognize. I gave her a good hard, long look. She was maybe twenty and everything about her screamed poor college student working her way through college—the dreadlocks dyed blue and scarlet, the exposed pierced navel, the row of posts running up the outer lobes of her ears, and the surly attitude. I kept watching her—the paranoia again—but finally decided she was exactly what she seemed. She was also pretty efficient at quickly making an iced mocha. Darcy, the usual daytime girl, was actually pretty slow, which sometimes was annoying if I was in a rush. I paid her, threw a dollar in the tips jar, took my drink, and headed to the hallway to the courtyard. I unlocked the door and slipped through, pulling it shut and locking it again. It’s nice, I thought, having a secret entrance into the house. I took a deep breath and felt relief flood through me. Once inside, of course, the paranoia left, like it was never there, and I felt kind of silly.

But the guy is watching the house. Again. You didn’t imagine that, Scotty.

Velma was sitting at the table, sparking a fat joint. She gave me a big grin and waved me over.

I glanced at the stairs and thought about just waving and heading up, but Sasha wasn’t anywhere to be seen, and there was nothing to do but sit there and wait for him. Besides, my aunts Millie and Velma aren’t the kind of women you can just ignore. They’re not really my aunts; they’re lifelong friends of my mother’s, and a long-term lesbian couple. They’ve been together longer than most straight couples I know. Velma was more than capable of getting pissed if I blew her off and storming up the stairs behind me. She once beaned Frank with a frying pan, something she now regrets terribly, but he’s never really been comfortable around her ever since. In her defense, he was holding a gun on me at the time, but still.... His head ached for days. So, if Frank had just escaped from abductors, the last thing he needed was for Velma to come storming into the apartment. Besides, she was not, despite my age, beyond grabbing me by the ear and twisting. Not to mention the great deal she and Millie had given me on the rent.

Basically, I’m pretty much their bitch.

I walked over and she offered the joint. I shook my head. I could still remember the self-induced paranoia; the last thing I needed was to enhance it with marijuana. “No thanks, Aunty.”

She shrugged and took another long hit. “Your loss, buddy. This is some primo shit.”

“Where’s Millie?” It was some strong stuff; I could tell by the smell of the smoke. I looked at it longingly, then at the stairs, then back at her. No, Scotty, it’s not a good idea, I told myself. Be strong.

She gestured upstairs and then the smoke exploded out of her in a racking cough that doubled her over. She kept coughing for a few seconds more before finally straightening up, her eyes red and watering, and said, “Whew,” as she reached for her bottled water. “She’s up there with some of her lawyer buddies—you know, the power dykes.” She winked at me. “There’s only so much of that talk I can stand. Where’ve you been?”

“At Maman’s,” I said. It wasn’t a lie; it was the last place I’d been. No sense in telling her what was going on, I figured. She’d tell Millie—Millie is a lawyer in the sharkiest sense of the word; she’s Storm’s role model—and I’d have to deal with that. Like I said, they aren’t the kind of women you can just trifle with. They’d want to help somehow, and if I was even able to convince them there was nothing they could do, they’d both worry themselves sick. Or drive each other crazy.

“Why’re you coming in through the coffee shop?” She narrowed her eyes a bit.

“Because the walkway roof drips,” I said, without even having to think. It does, badly. During a storm you have to keep your umbrella up or risk getting soaked. You’d think when the house had to be rebuilt, they’d have replaced that roof. Sometimes I think they didn’t because they enjoy listening to me bitch about it. I know it’s caused them amusement on more than one occasion to see me get soaked.

She rolled her eyes. “It wouldn’t have anything to do with the guy watching the house?”

“You know about that?”

She sighed. “Listen, pal, your aunt and I aren’t stupid people. And after what happened with the arson last summer”—that was when the house burned down—“we keep a close eye on what’s going on in the street. I don’t want to be uprooted again. Sooo, what’s going on?”

I looked at her and then sat down with a sigh. “It’s real complicated. Let’s just say two people are dead, I don’t know where Colin is, we think it might be the Russian Mob, and Frank—well, Frank is missing. I think the Russians might have him. I have no idea who the guy outside is.”

“You want me to get my frying pan?” Her eyes gleamed.

What is it with these women? I wondered. “No, I don’t think so. And the bad thing is, the guy who told me the Russians have Frank was supposed to meet me here, and he’s nowhere to be found.”

She got a weird, guilty look. “Um, there’s a guy in your apartment. Hot, all huge and muscular. I figured there was a story. . . .”

I kissed her on the cheek; said, “Save me some of that stuff ”; and ran upstairs. I got progressively wobblier as I climbed, finally having to grab hold of the rail tightly. My hands were shaking so hard I could barely fit the key in the lock, but finally the door opened and I ran down the hall to the living room. I could hear the television on. “Sasha?” I shouted.

He was sitting on the couch, slouched down in his jeans and a tank top I recognized as one of my dad’s—and it was waaaay too small for him. His face lit up when he saw me. He flicked off the television with the remote, jumped up, and came bounding over to me. He threw his arms around me, practically squeezing the breath out of me in the process. He picked me up off the ground and kept holding—until I finally was able to squeeze my hands in against his chest and push lightly. He didn’t let go, so I pushed harder. Finally, I had to say, “Sasha, I—can’t—breathe.”

“So sorry!” He set me down. “So glad to see Scotty!”

“Yeah, so I gather.” I gave him a weak smile. “How’d you get in here? And where’s Frank?” As I stared into his face, it dawned on me that he didn’t know Misha was dead, and my entire body sagged. Someone was going to have to tell him, and I had this horrible feeling it was going to have to be me. It was just a bit too much for me. He grabbed me before I could fall and propped me up.

“Parents gave spare key.” His ice blue–gray eyes examined me carefully. “Scotty all right?”

“I’m fine.” He let go of me and I looked at him. “And Frank? Where’s Frank?”

“I know where Frank is.” He gave me a big smile. “Now we have to go get.” He nodded his head happily. “Be easy—what you call piece of cake?”

“Piece of cake,” I said, nodding.

And everything went spinning and gray.