Eden's Shadow. Jenna Ryan
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reasons had more to do with a certain dark-haired cop than the family curse.
Mary snapped restless fingers. “I wonder if B.J. went back to the car.” Joining Eden on the path, she tapped her sister’s shoulder. “Uh, about this gorgeous guy you mentioned… You did say gorgeous, right?”
Had she? On her knees, Eden brushed dirt from the marble headstone. “Maybe,” she conceded. “I didn’t mean to.” Because it was too dark now to make out the worn letters, she abandoned her task and measured the distance between the veranda and the gallery by eye. “That wall up there is at least two feet wide, wouldn’t you say?”
“No idea. I was in and out like Speedy Gonzales. I don’t need to bump into a ghost with a bone to pick over something one of my ancestors did.”
Eden let it go. Where was Armand, and why hadn’t he come onto the gallery? “I’ll bet you drive a car with tinted headlights,” she accused under her breath.
“You’re acting a little weird, Eden,” Mary remarked.
Eden heard nerves beneath her sister’s irritation and lowered her gaze. “Someone in a car with blue-tinted headlights followed me out here tonight.”
“Okay, I’ll buy that. Just don’t go S.L. on me.” At Eden’s uncomprehending expression, Mary clarified, “Spooky Lisa. She has moments lately of, you know, going off to Mars. She’s done it before, it’s just that since Maxwell died, one wrong word and, bam, she’s in a funk.”
Not a prolonged one, but Eden knew what Mary meant. She’d seen them, too, those moments when Lisa appeared to put the world around her on hold.
Maybe in the end that’s all there was to Lisa’s sudden standoffishness. A major disappointment had led to the death of their natural father and a near murder charge. Who wouldn’t react to something so dreadful? One thing was certain, funk or not, Lisa simply wasn’t capable of committing the kind of violent act that had ended Maxwell Burgoyne’s life.
“This could be cool.” Dismissing her sister’s problems, Mary returned to the terrace.
Eden had to squint to see her. She was only twenty feet away, but darkness had pretty much settled. In fact, the shadows had grown so thick under the balcony that little more than Mary’s silver belt buckle remained visible.
“Coffin dirt,” Mary declared. The buckle dipped as she did. “I’ve lost the light, but you could hold a beam on it. We’ll make a body impression, spread the chunks of cement around.”
Eden called up to the gallery, “Armand, are you there?”
Mary’s heels clopped on the terrace tiles as she rearranged the fallen planter. “I’m no good at this. Stop shouting, Eden, and help me here. It’s incredibly… Ahh!”
Her sentence ended on a yelp. Her belt buckle vanished.
And a pair of hands seized Eden from behind…
EDEN’S REACTION was instinctive. She rammed both elbows into the stomach of the person holding her. She heard a muffled “Oomph,” and felt the hands on her shoulders tighten.
A man growled in warning, but he was cut off by the click of a trigger being drawn back.
“Let her go. Do it slowly, and move away. Now.”
Eden recognized Armand’s voice.
Whoever he was talking to released her slowly as instructed. The moment she was free, Eden spun—and did an immediate double take. A more superstitious person might have mistaken the man for a troll.
Deciding that Armand was the lesser of two evils, she backed across the uneven ground to his side. She found herself strangely fascinated by the man whose hairy arms and bushy beard appeared to be the color of a ripe tomato. “Something happened to Mary right before he grabbed me,” she said.
A break in the clouds allowed a three-quarter moon to illuminate the area. Eden started for the steps. The man opened his mouth, took a second look at Armand’s Magnum and promptly closed it.
“No problem here,” Mary called before Eden reached the terrace. “Don’t everyone rush to my rescue at once. I only tripped and gave myself a concussion.”
“Stay where you are,” Armand told her.
The redhead was downright squat, muscular to the max, but shorter than Eden’s height of five-eight by a couple of inches. Even so, his torso looked broader than a tree trunk and with arms like his, he could undoubtedly lift the front end of her car.
“Are you B.J.?” Eden asked.
“Bobby John Finnegan.” His gaze was fixed on the gun barrel aimed at his throat. “I heard voices. Reckoned one of ’em might be Mary’s.”
“Where did you come from?”
“Front of the house.” He pointed. “I used the driveway on account of I don’t like walking in tall weeds.”
“Afraid you’ll fall into Middle Earth?” Armand suggested.
“Snakes like weeds. I don’t like snakes.”
Mary strode over, probing the back of her head. “So, Eden, is this your gorgeous guy?”
Vague amusement sparked Armand’s eyes, but he kept his gun on B.J. “Do you know this man?” he asked her.
Mary shrugged. “We came here together. I didn’t know he had crawly-phobia.” She studied Armand’s features. “I guess you are sort of gorgeous, although it’s hard to tell in the dark with a weapon pointed in the general direction of my face.”
Armand tucked the gun into his shoulder holster. “Have you been inside the house?”
He directed his question at B.J. who appeared horrified by the thought. “Are you nuts? It’s bug central in there. I was looking for Mary. Saw you.” He nodded at Eden. “You were exploring down by the river and around those old shacks out back. Heard you call her name, so I knew you were looking for her, too. I’d have hollered, but you mighta wanted me to check out the shacks, and that wasn’t happening in this lifetime.”
“My hero,” Mary sneered. “Okay, I’m out of here, vampires be damned.”
Her cranky tone brought a smile to Eden’s lips. She gestured at the tangled garden. “Do you want Armand to walk you to your car?”
“My camera bag’s on the terrace.” Mary still sounded irked. “I brought a big flashlight. And B.J.’s got a second one stuck to his belt.”
“He can go, right?” Eden asked Armand.
“To New Orleans, yeah. We’ll have a chat at his place tomorrow.”
B.J. glanced at the holstered gun. “Sure, no problem. You, uh, need my address?”
“It’d help.” B.J. gave him the necessary information, cringed when Mary started along the garden path, then squared his shoulders and followed.
Arms folded, Eden stared at Armand and waited for him to speak.
“Go ahead,” she prompted when he didn’t. “I’m open to any and all explanations. Come up with a good one and I might even believe it.”
“Let me see your head.”
She slapped a palm against his chest to hold him off. “We’ve done this already, Detective. No more touching. You saved me from a falling planter and stopped B.J. from crushing my bones to powder. I’m honestly grateful for those things, but I still want to know why you followed me home last night and out here tonight.”
“I didn’t.” Smiling a little, he plucked a leaf from her hair. “You look a lot like your sister, Eden, but somehow your beauty’s more intriguing to me. Why is that?”
She smiled back. “Because I have a brother who taught me how to box in the third grade and at