Her fingers tightened around the neck of the bottle she held.

He reached into his pants pocket; she drew back, slamming the bottle against the wall.

He let out a sigh and stepped back again. “Man, that’s going to be a bitch for someone to clean up,” he said. “I was only getting my light. It’s finger-size but casts a glow big and strong enough to light up Pluto.”

He held up a small flashlight. To add insult to injury, he turned it on. It nearly blinded her.

“What were you doing in the tunnel?” she asked.

“Investigating, Ms. Anderson. That’s what you wanted, right? You think your grandfather was murdered. I’m here to investigate.”

She shook her head in denial. “No one paid any attention to me,” she told him. “And you just said you hadn’t been to the academy—”

“I haven’t been. Yet. I’m here on a trial basis.”

“I don’t understand.”

“At the moment, I’m a consultant. I’ve been asked to join the Krewe and we’re seeing if I work out as a Krewe member. Whether they like me enough—and whether I like the job enough to accept it.”

Wary, Abby said, “Mr. Gordon, you really need to leave. You haven’t been through the academy, so no one I know sent you. And I’ll see to it that the grating is locked. Thank you so much for letting me know it isn’t. Now...”

“Now—yes, now. Can we please have a discussion? A rational discussion. Look, you’re the one who sent for help!” he said irritably.

“Talk about what? I don’t know who you are or what you’re doing here if you don’t have the credentials—”

“I was sent here because you asked for help!”

“But—”

“I have a copy of your email, Ms. Anderson. I’ll show you, as long as you don’t drag the whole bar down if I reach into a pocket again. You wrote to Jackson Crow, from the Krewe of Hunters. Jackson Crow sent me. Take me or leave me, Ms. Anderson, but I’m your man. If I agree you’ve got the right kind of problem—and there is a strong possibility that your grandfather was murdered, possibly in connection with those murders you were just reading about—then more Krewe members will step in. For now, you’ve got me.”

Abby swallowed. There were a number of agents in the Krewes who’d been with the FBI for some time now. This man was saying he hadn’t even gone to the academy.

“You’re not an agent?” she asked in a whisper.

“Not yet.”

“Oh, Lord,” she said shaking. “Then...then what are your credentials?”

“Ah,” he murmured. “Well, I’m a private investigator legitimately licensed. At one time I was a detective with the New Orleans police. And now I’m legitimately on the books as a consultant to the feds. Perhaps most important, Ms. Anderson, I just had a conversation with an ancestor of yours. Calls himself Blue. Will that do for starters?”

3

Maybe he shouldn’t have mentioned the fact that he’d seen Blue Anderson, Malachi thought. But, then again, the young woman seemed to think he was a serial killer himself, so he had to say something.

It hadn’t occurred to him that the place would have emptied out by the time he came back. But the tunnel had fascinated him, and he’d followed it from the tavern to the riverbank and back more than once, marveling at the pirates who had constructed the escape—or kidnapping or shanghai—route. Once in the tavern again, he’d had no choice but to make himself known.

Or maybe he should just have told her he was an agent. Except that he wasn’t. Not yet. If he chose to accept an appointment with the Krewe of Hunters, then, yes, he’d have to go through a course at the academy. But he was still skeptical.

And neither had he expected to be sent out on his own. But, apparently, that was the way Adam Harrison, Jackson Crow and Logan Raintree felt it should be done.

Sort of like a baptism by fire.

Malachi was game, though. Especially after he’d read about the two bodies that were discovered on the riverbank. He hadn’t been convinced that the death of a man in his nineties was murder, but since the man’s granddaughter had just graduated from the academy and had written such an impassioned letter, someone needed to come out here. And these recent murders did give a degree of credence to her beliefs.

So it was a test. For them, and as he’d said, for him. A chance to find out if he was really willing to join a unit or “create his own,” as he’d been offered. They needed more units in Jackson Crow’s specialized area and apparently they thought he was a man who could head up another one.

Actually, it didn’t seem like a bad deal. Work with people who didn’t think he was crazy or that he was a psychic. Trying to convince some people that he wasn’t a psychic was as hard as convincing others that he did have certain...talents.

As Abby Anderson stared at him, Malachi tried to sum her up. She was tall, a stunning woman with a headful of the darkest, richest black hair he’d ever seen and eyes so blue they appeared to be violet or black. Her features were delicate and beautifully chiseled, and while she was lithe and fit, she was still well-endowed. Slim and yet curvy—hard to achieve.

She had to have ability and intelligence; he refused to believe she could have made it through the academy without both. What agents sometimes lacked, in Malachi’s opinion, was imagination and vision. Though not, he had quickly discovered, the agents who wound up in what Adam Harrison had created—the Krewe of Hunters or, as it was generally called now, the Krewes. There was the original Krewe and then the Texas Krewe, although even adding a second was proving to be insufficient. Adam Harrison had told him passionately that it wasn’t a calling that came to just anyone. No two ways about it, forming a new Krewe was difficult. Very few people had the talents they needed—and the ability to physically and mentally work in law enforcement.

She continued to stare at him as time ticked by. She seemed almost frozen, as if she were in a tableau. He feared she had to be in shock, although she didn’t reveal her emotions.

“Hello?” he said, somewhat awkwardly. “Look, Ms. Anderson, I know what I’m doing around a crime scene and I generally know what I’m doing around people. Alive and dead. No, I don’t see hundreds of ghosts walking the streets, but when someone’s hanging around a place like this the way your Blue Anderson seems to be doing, it’s usually for a reason, like safeguarding someone.”

Was he wrong? Had she never seen the ghost of the pirate? If not, he’d just shown himself to be a real quack in her eyes.

No, in her email to Jackson she’d stated there was a ghost at the tavern, a ghost reportedly seen through the centuries. She hadn’t come out and said she’d seen the ghost, but reading between the lines, he was certain she had.

And even if she did think he was a quack, so what? He still wasn’t completely sure he wanted to be here or be part of this. He’d spent the past five years working for himself and he liked it that way. Maybe he should’ve started off with the fact that he’d served in the military and been a cop in New Orleans for several years before Marie’s death from cancer, when he’d come home to his family property in Virginia. That was when he’d chosen to work for himself, getting a P.I. license.

Now...

“He spoke to you?” she whispered.

“Ah, there’s life behind those eyes!” he murmured. “Yes, it seems to take him a great deal of effort. I don’t believe he’s practiced at speaking.”

“Practiced?” she asked, sounding startled. “Practiced? Ghosts have to practice...being ghosts?”

Curious. She didn’t seem worried that he’d seen the ghost. She was worried—or maybe confused—about its being a practiced ghost.

Jackson Crow had been certain, reading her email, that Abigail Anderson was of their own kind. A communicator, as Jackson referred to people who saw more than others did.

“Ms. Anderson, in my own experience, those who remain behind meet the same difficulties we do in life. Some are shy and don’t do much more than watch. They never manage to speak to the living, move objects, even make a room cold. Some discover that they can learn to speak, to move objects—and they can even create a cold wind. Just like some of us on earth speak many languages while others are lucky to speak one. And some can barely walk, while others have athletic talent and prowess or perform in dance or join the Cirque de Soleil. Every ghost is an individual, just as each of us is.”

“And you...saw Blue. And spoke to him?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t believe you. He hardly ever appears. He’s never spoken.”

“Not to you, perhaps.”

“I’m his descendent!” she said indignantly.

He shrugged. “Well, have you ever tried speaking to him?”

She straightened, glaring at him with hostile, narrowed eyes.

No, Malachi decided, it didn’t seem he’d gone about this the right way at all.

“So, you’re old friends. Where is he now?” she asked.

“Certainly not old friends,” Malachi said. “And I haven’t met a ghost yet who appears on demand. I’m sure he’s around somewhere, though. I don’t think he leaves these premises. At least not often.”

“And you spoke with him where, exactly?” she asked.

“In the tunnel.”

“What did he say?”

“I didn’t know he was there at first. He put a hand on my shoulder and said, ‘This is where he died. He was strong of heart. His death was not so simple.’”

She stared at him with such incredulity, Malachi found himself growing irritated. She saw Blue herself.

“Mr. Gordon, even if you are for real, I wish you’d leave right now. My grandfather died. We buried him today. But you know that. You were watching.”

He stared back at her. “I can leave, or we can get started. Your grandfather called you because he suspected something or knew something—at least, that’s what you wrote to Agent Crow.” He tapped the newspaper. “So Gus is dead, possibly a victim, and there are three more—in a city where the murder rate is customarily quite low. Four victims in a short period of time. Do you want to sit there doubting me, or do you want to piece together what we know? Shouldn’t take long. It isn’t a lot.”