She opened the door a crack and peered out.
The man was gone. She was relieved.
And also disappointed.
She let out a sigh, irritated with herself for still feeling nervous.
She was so nervous, in fact, that she took her time, unwilling to go back out into the club right away. She splashed her face with water after she washed her hands, reminding herself that she was being ridiculous. When she finally left the restroom behind, there was no one in the hallway.
The bar had grown more crowded while she was gone. As she wended her way through the crowd, she could see that Heidi was alone at their table. Frowning, she noticed Deanna was at the bar, chatting with a tall dark man. For a moment her heart thudded.
Was it the same man?
No, not unless he had changed his shirt. The man she had met had been wearing a tailored shirt; this man was dressed more casually.
She started toward the bar and her friend. Deanna had definitely imbibed more than she had Tonight, and she wasn"t sure she wanted to let her friend get too close to a stranger in that condition.
On the other hand, Deanna wasn"t the one getting married. She was free to flirt if she chose.
Apparently she was simply worried in general tonight, Lauren thought. She headed for the bar, but as she did, the man turned and headed out to the street.
"Hey There," Deanna said as Lauren reached her. "Her majesty wanted more cherries for her drink," she said with a grin.
Lauren forced a smile in return. Deanna didn"t seem all that drunk, she thought. In fact, she seemed more pleasantly tipsy than anything else. "Cool," Lauren responded, then asked, "Who was that?"
"Who?" Deanna frowned and flipped back a length of her long dark hair.
"The guy who was just there."
"Oh. Just a guy."
"Cute?"
"Yeah, kind of."
"And?"
"I told him I was with friends tonight," Deanna said. And she laughed. "I"m a big girl, so don"t worry about me." "I wasn"t worried," Lauren lied.
"Yes, you were. And you still are. You"re still tense." Deanna looked at her and sighed. "We shouldn"t have made you go to that fortune teller."
"Don"t be silly."
"She was weird."
"She was striking, don"t you think?" Lauren said.
"A great face to sketch, yes, but weird. Come on. Let"s get back to the table. Heidi is going to want her fruit."
The band was playing exceptional jazz; it sounded as if they had been together forever. As she sat, Lauren let the music engulf her, and she smiled. She came from this state, after all. She"d been in New Orleans hundreds of times. She knew the city well. Why she was letting the antics of a Jackson Square fortune teller disturb her, she didn"t know.
"So are you ever going to tell us where the honeymoon is going to be?" Deanna asked Heidi.
Heidi shrugged. "I"ll tell you guys, but not Barry"s friends. A few of them are crazy enough to show up."
"Okay, where?" Lauren asked.
Heidi leaned forward, and her love for her soon-to-be husband was apparent in her gamine smile and powder blue eyes. "Fiji,"
she said.
"Fiji. Wow," Lauren said.
"You really think Barry"s friends might show up in Fiji?" Deanna asked.
"You never know," Heidi said. "I can guarantee you right now that we"ll all probably end up in the pool at the reception, and that they"ll tie cans to the car and do anything else ridiculous that guys can do. Most of those guys actually graduated from college, and some of them are even lawyers, like Barry, but honestly, they"re still like a bunch of kids."
"You"re not marrying them, you"re marrying Barry," Deanna reminded her.
"Because he"s wonderful," Heidi said, finishing the statement by biting the cherry at the end of her swizzle stick.
"He is a good guy," Lauren agreed.
"And he has some very attractive friends-silly, but attractive," Deanna added.
"I can set you up any time," Heidi promised.
"I like setting myself up. We"ll see what happens at the wedding," Deanna said.
Lauren let out a yawn, then quickly apologized. "Sorry."
"It"s late, isn"t it?" Heidi said.
"Not for New Orleans. And this is your party," Lauren a.s.sured her.
"I know, but I think I"d like to take my party back to our nice cushy cottage," she said.
"Cool. I"m your slave," Lauren said. They both looked at Deanna, wondering if she intended to protest.
She laughed. "Okay, I admit.i.t. I"m beat, too. But we"re pathetic. I guarantee you they"ll go all night at Barry"s bachelor party."
"Right, but his bachelor party is only one night. We have a whole weekend. We have days left to party," Heidi said. "And shop."
"For Fiji," Lauren said.
"Yep, for Fiji," Heidi agreed. She lifted her gla.s.s, and Deanna and Lauren followed suit, clinking their gla.s.ses in a toast. "Here"s to the world"s best friends."
"Here"s to you, too," Lauren said.
"Let"s not get maudlin," Deanna said.
"If she wants to be maudlin, we"ll be maudlin," Lauren reminded Deanna.
Deanna groaned. "Okay, but let"s walk in a maudlin manner and get back to the B and B."
"Sounds good," Lauren agreed.
As they headed for their cottage, they talked about the shops Heidi wanted to hit in the morning.
Along Bourbon Street, everything felt fine to Lauren. It was quieter than it had been earlier, but the bars were still open, and people were moving about. Groups still spilled out of the doorways of the clubs. Hawkers were handing out flyers for the strip joints. A group that appeared to be m ade up of retirees was moving along at a good clip. Most of the members seemed to be couples who had spent many years together, and who still enjoyed walking hand in hand. She had to smile. It didn"t seem quite the right place, but then again, who was she to say? They were definitely young at heart.
It was when they turned off Bourbon that Lauren first felt the strange stirring of unease.
The street wasn"t so well lit anymore.
And it wasn"t filled with people.
The sound of Heidi"s and Deanna"s voices seemed to fade. She wasn"t hearing them. Instead, she was watching. Watching the shadows.
They seemed to be moving too much. Houses and buildings, flush against one another, a few feet away, should have been still.
Instead, their shadows stretched, became too long, seemed to loom.
Then there was the breeze. She hadn"t felt it on Bourbon Street, but it was eerily noticeable now She quickened her pace.
"Hey!" Heidi"s protest broke through her sense of isolation.
"What?" Lauren asked.
"Do we really have to run back?"
"I think we should hurry, yes," Lauren said.
"You told me this was a safe area," Heidi protested. "It is. But...it"s late," Lauren said.
"Look. Up ahead," Deanna said.
"What?" Lauren said, her heart quickening.
"Mounted police officer," Deanna said dryly.
"Oh." Lauren slowed her pace a bit, as they pa.s.sed the officer, who touched his helmet and wished them goodnight, then rode on toward Bourbon Street. As soon as he was gone, she started hurrying again. She couldn"t help herself.
"Lauren, slow down," Deanna begged. "My legs aren"t working too well."
"That"s because they want to be stretched out in bed," Lauren said.
"You two are tall-I"m not," Heidi reminded her.
Gritting her teeth, Lauren forced herself to slow down. She was frightened, and she didn"t know why. And she was angry. She"d never been frightened here before in her life.
It was all because of that d.a.m.n fortune teller.
She made herself keep to a slower pace, but she couldn"t stop herself from watching the shadows. And no matter how hard she tried to tell herself she was being ridiculous, she was certain the shadows were doing things shadows weren"t supposed to do. She couldn"t help but feel they were watching her.
The bed and breakfast, with its lovely courtyard and cottages, was straight ahead. She had to forcibly stop herself from breaking into a run.
But then they were there and she let out a sigh, praying that it wasn"t audible. The cast iron gates, dating back to the eighteen- forties, were opened to the main manor and the old cottages surrounding it.
Theirs was the middle cottage, directly facing the pool. Lauren all but dragged her friends toward it.
"Honestly, Lauren," Heidi began to protest.
"See, we"re here. Your stubby little legs can get a rest."
"Stubby little legs!" Heidi objected. "Some slave you are."
"But we"re here. Aren"t you glad?" Lauren demanded.
Deanna yawned, pulling out her key and opening the door. "Yeah, yeah, great, we"re here." She turned around and said speculatively, "Look how good that pool looks."
"You want to go swimming-now?" Lauren demanded.
"Well, I"m sweating-since I ran back," Deanna said.
"We"d make a racket," Lauren said quickly.
"No one said that we couldn"t swim at night," Heidi said.
"We"ve all had a fair bit to drink. No one is going to save us if we begin to drown," Lauren informed them, longing desperately to go inside and lock the door."She"s right, you know. We have had too much to drink," Heidi said.
"Right," Lauren announced. She pushed open the door fully open and turned on the light. They"d left the television on. She was glad. She was even happier to realize that it was showing a 70"s sitcom, not some creepy horror show.
"How are we sleeping?" Heidi asked. There were two double beds in the bedroom behind the kitchen/living room area where they were standing. In the outer room, the bed was a pull-out sofa.
"I"ll take the bed out here, and you two can have the real beds," Lauren said. She would have taken a hard wooden floor at that moment, she was so relieved just to be back in their cottage.
"You sure? You can bunk in with one of us," Deanna offered.
"You snore when you drink," Lauren said, grinning for real at last. "I"ll be fine out here."
"I do not snore!" Deanna protested.
"You do," Heidi told her, grinning. "But only when you drink," she added quickly.
"Hmph," Deanna muttered, and started for the bedroom.
"I guess that means she"s taking first dibs on the bathroom," Heidi said, shrugging. "I"m getting into pajamas and crashing." She gave Lauren a hug goodnight. "Thanks-this is the best trip, ever."