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It was a line she walked every night, between legitimate businesswoman performing a service for the community of soldiers, sailors, merchants, and planters … and the grandchild of slaves, who could become a slave herself again simply by crossing the wrong state lines.
Louisiana wasn’t safe, not for her or any of her ladies. Maybe not for anybody.
But this was Josephine’s house, and she guarded it with all the ferocity and cunning of a mother fox. So when she heard the noise downstairs, she listened hard, willing innocent silence to follow, but suspecting the worst and preparing herself accordingly.
In the top left drawer of her battered, antique, secondhand desk, she kept a . 44-caliber Schofield—a Smith & Wesson revolver she’d nicknamed “Little Russia. ” It was loaded, as always. She retrieved it and pushed the desk drawer shut again.
It was easy to hide the weapon behind her skirts. People don’t expect a left-handed woman, and no one expects to be assaulted by anyone in a fancy gown—which was one more good reason to wear them all the time.
Out past the paneled office door she swept, and down the red-carpeted runner to the end of the hall, where a set of stairs curved down to all three lower levels, flanked by a banister that was polished weekly and gleamed under the skimming touch of Josephine’s hand. The commotion was on the second floor, or so her ears told her as she drew up nearer.
The location was a good thing, insofar as any commotion was ever good. Far better than if it were taking place down in the lobby. It’s bad for business, and bad for covering up trouble, should a cover-up be required. At street level, people could squint and peek past the gossamer curtains, trying to focus on the slivers of light inside and the women who lived within.
At street level, there could be witnesses.
Josephine was getting ahead of herself, and she knew it. She always got ahead of herself, but that’s how she’d stayed alive and in charge this long, so she couldn’t imagine slowing down anytime soon. Instead she held the Schofield with a cool, loose grip. She felt the gun’s weight as a strange, foreign thing against her silk overskirts, where she buried it out of sight. As she’d learned one evening in her misspent youth at the notorious pirate call of Barataria, she need not brandish a gun to fire it. It’d shoot just fine through a petticoat, and knock a hole in a man all the same. It would ruin the skirts, to be certain, but those were trade-offs a woman could make in the name of survival.
Down on the second-floor landing, she stepped off the stairs so swiftly, she seemed to be moving on wings or wheels. She brought herself up short just in time to keep from running into the Texian Fenn Calais.
A big man in his youth, Mr. Calais was now a soft man, with cheeks blushed pink from years of alcohol and a round, friendly face that had become well known to ladies of the Garden Court. Delphine Hoobler was under one of his arms, and Caroline Younger was hooked beneath the other.
“Evening, ma’am!” he said cheerfully. He was always cheerful. Suspiciously so, if you wanted Josephine’s opinion on the matter, but Fenn was so well liked that no one ever did.
With her usual polite formality, she replied, “Good evening to you, Mr. Calais. I see you’re being properly cared for. Is there anything I can get you, or anything further you require?”
Caroline flashed Josephine a serious look and a sharpened eyebrow. This was combined with a quick toss of her head and a laugh. “We’ll keep an eye on him, Miss Josephine,” she said lightly, but the urgent, somber gleam in her eyes didn’t soften.
Josephine understood. She nodded. “Very well, then. ” She smiled and stepped aside, letting the three of them pass. When they were gone, she turned her attention to the far end of the corridor. Caroline and Delphine had been luring Fenn Calais away from something.
From someone.
She could guess, even before she saw the window that hadn’t been fully shut, and the swamp-mud scuff of a large man’s shoe across the carpet runner.
With a glance over her shoulder to make sure the Texian was out of hearing range, she called softly, “Deaderick? That’d damned well better be you. ”
“It’s me,” he whispered back. He leaned out from the stairwell. “That Fenn fellow was passed out on the settee with a drink in his hand. I thought I could sneak past without waking him up, but he sleeps lighter than he looks. ”
She exhaled, relieved. She wedged Little Russia into her skirt pocket. “Delphine and Carrie took care of him. ”
“Yeah, I saw. ” He looked back and forth down the hall. Seeing no one but his sister, he relaxed enough to leave his hiding place.
Deaderick Early was a tall man, and lean like his sister, though darker in complexion. They had only a mother in common, and Deaderick was several shades away from Josephine’s paler skin. His hair was thick and dense, and black as ink. He let it grow into long locks that dangled below his ears.
“You’re lucky it was only Fenn. He’s easily distracted and probably too drunk to recognize you. ”
“Still, I didn’t mean to take the chance. ”
She sighed and rubbed at her forehead, then leaned back against the wall and eyed him tiredly. “What are you doing here, Rick? You know I don’t like it when you come to town. I worry about you. ”
“You don’t worry about me living camped in a swamp?”
“In the swamp you’re armed, and with your men. Here you’re alone, and you’re visible. Anyone could see you, point you out, and have you taken away. ” She blinked back the dampness that filled her eyes. “With every chance you take, the odds stack higher against you. ”
“That may be, but we need soap, salt, and coffee. For that matter, a little rum would make me a popular man, and we could stand to have a better doctor’s kit,” he added, looking down at an ugly swath of inflamed skin on his arm—caused, no doubt, by the stinging things that buzzed in the bayou. “But also, I came to bring you this. ”
From the back pocket of his pants, he produced an envelope that had been sealed and folded in half. “It might help your pilot, if you ever find one. ”
“What is it?”
