Chapter 2

The last time I was down this way was when I was doing a favor for Marie, The Voodoo Queen herself to help her recover her close and personal associate Lovey from the curse of the living dead. I had failed the Queen much to my discredit and she eventually turned the whole thing over to that cult freak Captain Lafitte and his band of sex-crazed vampires. Not too many of my former police co-workers knew of my contract with The Voodoo Queen and even if they did know they would pretend that they didn't because none of them wanted anything to do with the revered dispenser of spells and potions for a superstitious populace who revered her and her minions.

Of course, I spent most of my time on the previous case in the French Quarter and along the ragged coastline in deserted buildings and shuttered churches. I was reluctant to go too deep into the Bayou Country because outlanders were not very welcome especially those as dark-skinned as me. I was able to pass myself off as Puerto Rican in New York City and get away with it even though I couldn't speak a word of Spanish.

It was a benefit to me in my investigations in New Orleans because I had enough Irish blood in me to get by with the Puerto Rican gambit and my name was enough to get my foot in a lot of doors. The lusty crews of the Voodoo Queen were big guys with lots of muscle. She really got off on dark-skinned hard muscle and I have to admit they did look impressive. Their entire cycle of lifestyle revolved around the Mardi Gras and I could understand that because of the traditions of the entire region.

Marie was one of those "High Yellow" girls of mixed blood that had an exotic aura of sensuality that stirred most males below the belt. I knew she was a virgin as were her devoted hand maidens but that didn't stop her or the rest of them from celebrating the feast days and special incantations with spicy anal and oral sex that lasted all night.

She had enticed me into her circular red satin bed by raising her bottom high and looking over her shoulder with an encouraging smile. It was a ride that I remembered with great clarity but in retrospect I knew it was wrong and totally unprofessional of me. Her handmaidens sucked my spunk out and spat it into a chalice already half filled with blood from a source unknown to me. They all sipped from the golden vessel and cast eyes filled with lust in my direction as if my spunk was activating their pussies from inside their bellies.

It seemed so far away and strange to me now but you just don't forget experiences like that no matter how long you live.

I drove into the spit of dry land and stopped short of the shallow waterway that disappeared into the steamy swamp. There were three small boats holding three men in each waiting at the edge of the trace. Strangely, there were two white men and a black man in each boat and I wondered with idle curiosity if it was some sort of a ritual or just a random set of circumstances that played out in this deserted spot.

Nobody seemed to want to start the conversation so I broke the ice.

"You boys want to fill me in on what you know?"

It was the obese bald guy with the fire red beard that broke the impasse. He must have recognized me from my French Quarter days because he called me Lieutenant and told me that they were only sent to guide me into the lair of the Cajun clan that ran things in this neck of the woods. I could appreciate that because some yahoos that just took it in their own hands to head backcountry were never seen again.

I hoped that none of those good ole boys had gotten wind of me getting involved in the "Lovey" debacle because they were the kind of family that didn't take kindly to outside interference. The last time I saw that girl she was all stretched out in one of the Queen's coffins not alive and not dead but in need of blood on about a 72 hour cycle. Laffite and his lost boys and girls had plenty of that because they had a monopoly on the tourist trade up in the Quarter and only drained them a bit and released them with a memory gap that covered all bets.

She was a real pretty girl, vampire or no, but she was all virgin and belonged to the Queen to boot. The bayou bunch they have a policy of blood-feud so I was quite happy to stay in the background on that deal.

This caper was a straight forward kidnap deal that involved the daughter of a powerful local politician who was considering running for Governor the next election cycle. I was pretty effective on this sort of case because I was like a bloodhound when it came to finding missing people.

Her name was Lucinda Deverioux and her father was the famous King Deverioux from up around Pascagoula way. I was getting well paid and the expense sheet was also pretty generous. I had a nice file on the popular Lucinda that informed me she had a fiancée and about a half-dozen first string young studs that serviced her at her beck and call. There was even a thick packet of nude photos of eighteen year old Lucinda with obvious cream pie in the back bed of a crappy pick-up that had seen better days. I could only surmise the lovely young things had only recently lost her cherry in some good ole boy's ride bayou style.

My gut was telling me that the little tramp was probably scheming with her horny boyfriend to get cash from her stingy father or she was angling for more attention from the distracted politician on the campaign trail. My entourage of rough bayou boys was busy showing me exactly where "Miss Lucinda" was last seen and they repeatedly reminded me that the hounds had followed her trail into the waters of Pirate Cove Bay before it disappeared in a mangrove filled with alligators and some aggressive snakes not native to the swamps.