Almost There, page 7
Her heart caught in her throat.
Tiana quickly looked away.
“Well, thank y’all for coming tonight,” she told her friends. “But I need to get back to the kitchen. Gotta keep the hot food coming if I want to keep people happy.”
“Tia!” Lottie called again.
But Tiana ignored her. She tucked the serving tray underneath her arm and rushed past the other tables and through the swinging door, desperate for the sanctuary the kitchen provided.
“Back so soon?” her daddy asked as soon as Tiana stepped into the kitchen.
She walked over to where he stood before the stove, tending to a large cast-iron skillet with several fillets of golden-brown catfish. Tiana picked up a spatula and nudged the catfish, causing the hot oil to sizzle even more.
“I can’t spend all night out there,” she said in a shaky voice. Goodness, how could simply seeing Naveen rattle her this much? “It’s unfair to leave you with all the work,” Tiana tacked on, hoping her daddy bought her excuse.
“I told you I have everything under control, baby girl,” he replied. “Go and enjoy yourself a little while longer.”
“I don’t think—”
“Tia!” Charlotte burst through the swinging door, whizzing around the kitchen like a tornado. She came upon Tiana and plopped a hand on her hip. “Didn’t you hear me calling you out there?”
“Oh! Lottie, hey!” Tiana forced as much false cheer into her voice as she could muster. “No, I didn’t hear you,” she lied. “It’s so noisy out there with the band and all.”
“Hello there, Charlotte,” James greeted. “Glad to see you could make it here tonight.”
“Hey there, Mr. James.” Lottie waved to him before grabbing hold of Tiana’s arm. “You don’t mind if I steal Tia for a spell, do you? I promise to have her back here before the second dinner rush.”
“No problem at all,” her daddy said. “I was just telling her to go out there and enjoy the band.”
“Yes, the music is fabulous tonight. And I have the best seat in the house, so come and join me.”
Tiana wanted to dig in her heels—literally—as Lottie tugged on her arm, but she stood no chance when pitted against both her best friend and her daddy. Instead, she braced herself for the impact of having to be near Naveen and pretend he had no effect whatsoever on her. She was no Evelyn Preer, but a few more months of this and her acting skills might get her all the way to Hollywood.
But when they arrived at Charlotte’s table, it was empty, save for two dishes that held the remnants of the pasta jambalaya both had eaten tonight. Tiana was confused by the unnerving mix of relief and disappointment that assaulted her at finding Naveen’s chair unoccupied.
“Where’s Naveen?” Tiana asked. “Did he leave?”
“He had better not have,” Charlotte said, looking around. She gasped and pointed to the center of the room. “Oh, my word! Look to the dance floor, Tia!”
Tiana swung around and did a double take. Was that Naveen dancing with her mother?
Goodness.
“Just look at Ms. Eudora out there cutting a rug.” Charlotte clapped excitedly. “Who knew your mama was such a hoot!”
“I sure didn’t.” Tiana had to admit it was nice to see her mother having a good time. She just wished it were with anybody else. Tiana had no doubt her mother was talking her up.
“You look great, by the way,” Charlotte said as she reclaimed her seat. “Did your mama make that dress?”
Tiana looked down at the simple yellow-and-white gingham sheath. It was one of her nicer dresses, but it was nothing compared to the creations Charlotte wore every day. Creations that Tiana’s mother had made with her own two hands.
“Actually, I made this one myself.” Tiana preened as she sat. “I guess I inherited skills from both Mama and Daddy.”
“Oh, Tia, you are just unbelievable! I wish I had half your talent.” Charlotte lifted her hands in the air. In a wistful voice, she said, “I’m still trying to figure out what I’m good at doing. I’m not sure I’ll ever figure it out.”
“Don’t talk that way about yourself, Lottie. You can do amazing things if you put your mind to it.” Tiana reached across the table and gave Charlotte’s hand a reassuring squeeze. “I know you can.”
“Maybe,” her friend said with a shrug. “I do have a knack for shopping. Maybe I can do that professionally one day.”
“That’s a…thought,” Tiana finished. She had never heard of such a job, but if there ever were a job out there for Lottie, that would be the one.
Suddenly Charlotte looked at her seriously, squeezing Tiana’s hand. “Hey, Tia, I miss you. I know you’re busy, but I feel like maybe you’ve been avoiding me?”
“Oh, no, no, I haven’t…” Been avoiding you, Tiana added silently.
“Good.” Charlotte suddenly brightened. “Then you can come to Maison Blanche with me tomorrow. Please? Ms. Eudora is making my dress for my Mardi Gras ball, but I have about a half dozen others to attend over the next five days and I need a different gown for all of them. I need your help picking them out. Maybe you can get something, too! I’d love for you to join me for some of these parties.”
Tiana hesitated. She’d never had time to go shopping with Charlotte before.
“Please, please, please?”
Charlotte looked so genuinely hopeful, Tiana felt a twinge of guilt for not spending much time with her friend this past year.
“Well, I don’t think I’ll have time for parties,” Tiana started. She watched her friend deflate a little. “But I’ll go with you tomorrow—as long as we’re done in time for me to get back here so that I can start prepping for our big Mardi Gras kickoff,” Tiana added.
“Eep!” Charlotte got up and threw her arms around Tiana. “Yes, all right, deal! Gosh, I still can’t believe you have Rudy Davis and the Allstars playing at your supper club! It’s gonna be so fabulous.” She moved to sit back down. “And speaking of, oh, Tia! Tia! Tia! How could I forget to tell you! I had an epiphany today.”
“Another one?” Tiana couldn’t help laughing. She had missed Charlotte’s unflappable energy.
“Yes, a real one this time. Are you ready for this?”
“Ready as I’ll ever be,” Tiana said.
“You know how much I love art, right? Naveen and I are always at the museum together.”
“Yes, I know,” Tiana said, praying her envy didn’t show on her face.
“Well, I’ve discovered that I love British art. And do you know the best place to see British art?”
“In England?” Tiana asked.
“That’s right!” Charlotte waved her hands in the air. “You see, if I tell Big Daddy that I want to study with the artists who live in London, then he has to send me there, because it’s educational. And while I’m educating myself on British art, I can search for my duke!” She squealed. “Isn’t my plan the best?”
“Uh…sounds like the bee’s knees to me,” Tiana said.
“It’s just brilliant, and I know it will work. Besides, I need to do something. Big Daddy has brought that dull Rubin Dubois around again.”
The band brought their song to a close, and Louis announced that they would be taking a ten-minute break. Panic surged through Tiana as the band members set down their instruments. She quickly glanced to the dance floor and spotted Naveen striding toward them, his charming smile as bright as always. Her heart immediately began to thump wildly within her chest. For a moment, she couldn’t breathe.
“Uh, Lottie, I need to get back to the kitchen.”
“But Mr. James said that you should sit and enjoy the band. They’ll be back to playing in just a bit.”
“No, really. I have to go,” Tiana said. She stood and moved swiftly through the maze of tables to the kitchen. Before pushing past the swinging door, she chanced a glance over her shoulder. Naveen had stopped in his tracks. The light had drained from his eyes, and a look of hurt and confusion had taken its place.
Tiana bypassed the cooking and serving areas and headed for the small storeroom. She closed herself inside of it and plopped down on an empty milk crate, sucking in several breaths as she tried to calm her erratically beating heart.
“Who knew you were such a coward?” Tiana whispered.
After agreeing to Facilier’s deal, Tiana had selfishly hoped that Naveen would return to Maldonia. It would have made things easier for her. But then, she knew that wasn’t true. It didn’t matter where he lived; this private agony of knowing what she had given up would remain.
It’s been a year!
She had to find a way to move on. She could not go on like this, feeling such heartache every time she saw him.
“Has anyone seen Tia?” Charlotte’s voice carried throughout the kitchen. Tiana closed her eyes and counted the seconds until her friend would find her. It didn’t take long.
Charlotte knocked twice on the door to the storeroom before opening. “Tia?” she called. “What are you doing in here? Why did you run away again like that?”
“I’m sorry, Lottie. I’ve got too much to do.”
“Really?” Charlotte drawled. She cocked her hip to the side and perched a fist on it. “I can tell. You’re so very busy right now, sitting in a closet.” She peered at Tiana. “Do you know what I think? I think maybe you’ve been avoiding someone after all. And maybe that someone is Naveen. The question is why?”
“Lottie, please.”
“I want to know, Tia. Is it because you’re—”
But before Charlotte could finish, Louis burst through the partially opened door. “We’ve got a problem.”
Facilier exploded out of the door to the supper club. His blood pounded in his ears as his mounting rage reached unprecedented levels. He shouldered past the line of patrons still hoping to make their way into Tiana’s restaurant, glaring at them, baring his teeth. But he didn’t take any satisfaction in the way they recoiled.
LaBouff wasn’t eating the gumbo!
That was why the potion he’d given to Tiana hadn’t worked on the sugar baron and his cronies. Because LaBouff had been eating that blasted étouffée this entire time. Facilier whacked at a pile of garbage with his cane, sending the refuse flying across the uneven cobblestone streets in this seedier part of the Vieux Carré.
Fury consumed him, rising in his throat until it unleashed with a raw scream into the dark, foggy night sky.
Once home, he ripped the fedora from his head and flung it onto the hat rack next to the door. He hadn’t needed much of a disguise tonight. With the number of people crammed inside Tiana’s little supper club, he’d gone unnoticed as he slipped inside and parked himself at the table near LaBouff’s.
Tiana thought she was so clever, but he was the brains of this operation. He had been visiting her little supper club for months now. Always cloaked in a different disguise, he’d been right there in the same room with them, observing from afar how she interacted with all her customers, especially those fat cats Eli LaBouff brought in. But he had never gotten close enough to notice that LaBouff wasn’t eating the gumbo.
Facilier peeled off his black gloves and tossed them aside as he made his way through the emporium to the back rooms of his home.
Disgust pooled in his stomach, recollections of the conversation he’d overheard tonight between LaBouff and those two from the city council swirling around in his head. The wealthy sugar baron had pledged to invest fifty thousand dollars in a new set of railroad tracks being added to those that already lined the riverfront as if it were play money.
What a ridiculous man with ridiculous ambitions. He didn’t deserve his fortune, nor his influence. The things Facilier would do with that type of wealth, with men bending over backward to heed his every word.…He snarled as he recalled an incident years ago when he’d encountered Eli LaBouff in Jackson Square. The sugar baron had not been nearly as wealthy and powerful as he was now, yet still carried himself as if the world were his to control. Facilier had held his hand out for a gentlemanly handshake, but LaBouff had walked past him without so much as a glance.
Well, LaBouff and his cronies would take notice of him. And soon. Facilier would make sure of it.
He squeezed the handle on his cane so hard it was a wonder the wood didn’t break under the strain. He tossed the cane aside and went to work, gathering everything he needed to create more of the potion he’d given to Tiana for her gumbo.
Before long he would be on his way to owning this city.
His arms brimming with the ingredients he’d collected from the shelves, Facilier turned and sneered at the dark, dank room. He was better than this musty hovel that was just steps above living in squalor. He should have been living in a mansion like the ones Eli LaBouff and those other fat cats lived in along St. Charles Avenue.
He had thought he would be satisfied with their wealth and power, but now Facilier decided he wanted more.
He wanted their envy.
He wanted them to seethe with jealousy when he walked by, to crave his attention. He wanted LaBouff to choke on his own bitterness and resentment. It was only right that he experience what Facilier had endured all these years.
And the only way to accomplish that was to take hold of the power they all had over this city. Once he was able to manipulate their minds, the rest would fall into place. He was sure of it.
A knock at the door jarred Facilier out of his fervent musings. He tilted his head toward it, waiting for the second double knock. When it came, he smiled.
He went over to the door and opened it with a flourish.
“Mr. Bruce, my dear friend. Back so soon?” He stepped aside. “Why don’t you step into my humble abode.”
The stout man barged into the room. He held up a bottle.
“Regina smiled at me yesterday!” Bruce exclaimed. His eyes were eager, but his pudgy jowls still sagged like the fish-filled nets the fishermen pulled out of the Mississippi River.
Facilier had been expecting him. The concoction he’d sold the cobbler just a few days ago should have lasted him well into next week, but Mr. Bruce’s infatuation with the war widow who frequented his shop grew stronger with each bottle he consumed. That was always a good sign for business.
“If you give me just a moment, I will provide everything you need,” Facilier said. He turned to the shelf stocked with neatly arranged jars and bottles of various sizes, each filled with assorted liquids and salves. He might not have the knowledge his dear mother had, having been taught by the Vodou spiritual leaders of her homeland, but he’d learned a trick or two in his day.
He emptied dried rose petals into a black marble mortar and crushed them into a fine powder with the pestle. He added a bit of honey, a little sage, and the juice of one red cherry. Then he mixed it up using a wand made of rose quartz.
Facilier motioned for the man to hand him the empty bottle he’d brought with him. “Let me have that there bottle,” he said. He slowly poured the concoction into it and swirled the bottle around. As he did so, Facilier mumbled gibberish. The words didn’t matter as long as Mr. Bruce believed they held the power to make sweet Mrs. Dupre fall in love with him.
“There,” Facilier said. “A few sips and your lady friend will be at your door.”
The bits of gravel Facilier had sprinkled at the widow’s doorstep would ensure her trip to the cobbler. The jagged stones were hell on shoe soles.
Mr. Bruce reached for the bottle, but Facilier pulled it out of his reach and stretched out his other hand, passing his thumb over his fingers.
“Ah, ah, ah,” he crooned. “I think you’re forgetting something.”
Bruce handed over several folded bills. Facilier fanned them out, counting the money before finally releasing the bottle into his customer’s stubby hand.
“Now, remember, you need only a small teaspoon of it in the morning. Of course, you can take more at night before bed, if you think Mrs. Dupre needs a bit more urging.”
The man nodded excitedly as he tucked the bottle into his pocket and exited the door, disappearing into the dark, foggy night.
Facilier smiled as he closed the door behind him, but his grin quickly turned into a glower.
He shouldn’t have had to peddle silly love potions to numbskulls like Bruce. Done were his days of performing two-bit schemes for pennies; he wanted bigger things for himself. His plans for LaBouff might have been stalled, but they weren’t completely thwarted.
“Wait. Wait a minute,” Facilier said.
He rushed back to the door and wrenched it open. The fog was even thicker than it had been on his walk home from the supper club.
Something strange permeated the air. Literally. Facilier had no idea what was behind this curious phenomenon, but he now realized that he could use it to his advantage.
His low, deep chuckle grew louder as he shut the door and returned to his laboratory.
His first plan might have failed, but this one wouldn’t. He searched the shelves until he caught sight of a large jar with a particularly potent ingredient—one that could stop a grown man in his tracks and make him wait for his fate.
He knew exactly what he had to do.
Trepidation thundered throughout Tiana’s bloodstream as she stared into Louis’s worried eyes. She was almost afraid to ask, but running away from a problem was never the way to solve it.
Of course, it would help to know exactly what the problem was.
“What’s the matter?” Tiana asked Louis.
He backed out of the way and motioned to the man standing behind him.
The bleeding man standing behind him.
Tiana scrambled up from the floor. She scurried out of the storeroom and into the kitchen, where the other four members of the Crawfish Crooners stood.
Charlie, their other trumpet player, held a dish towel up to his lips. Tiana took notice of the large splotches of bright red blood seeping into the towel and immediately knew they had more than just a problem on their hands. This was an emergency. And a disaster.
