the man pleaded. “Please . . .”
“Okay, Dominic. Is there anyone else here on the property? Are you expecting anyone?”
“No.”
“Fine. Where are the girls?”
“Dead. But we didn’t kill them,” he panted. “The water went up and drowned them . . . during the storm.”
“Other girls are missing,” Dupree insisted. “The ones they took from NOLA the night after Katrina.”
The man squeezed his eyes shut. When he opened them, tears spilled out. “I oughtn’t to have got involved. Len convinced me. There was a lot of money. They got here and found the girls dead, Len got really mad, then they told him he had to clean up the mess. That’s why he came looking for me. I knew what Len was up to, I was always asking him to get me into it. There’s a lot of money, but they’re really dangerous, those fellas . . .”
“You mean Samedi?”
He nodded.
“Did you ever see him?” Dupree asked expectantly. “Know who he is?”
The man shook his head and responded with a grimace that was supposed to be a smile. “You got no idea, do you? It’s Samedi, man!” He said it reverently, as if speaking of a god.
“The girls from NOLA. Where they at?”
The man closed his eyes, shook his head, and sighed. “I can’t say.”
“You got enough problems already. Do yourself a favor. You help us, and we’ll help you.”
“You folks don’t understand. They’ll kill me.”
“You’re the one who doesn’t understand. I’m gonna be straight with you. You got a really ugly wound down there,” he said, pointing to the man’s belly and raising his head just enough for him to see the bunched-up rags holding his guts inside his body. “We’re miles from the nearest hospital; you gonna be dead in a couple hours if we don’t get help. And I’m not moving you out of here long as I think the girls are hidden somewhere in this big old plantation. We’re gonna search every container in every storehouse in the place, even if it takes days, and we’re not gonna leave here till we find ’em.”
Dominic’s lips tightened as he looked down at his belly.
Dupree gave a slight nod to the traiteur, who responded with a twitch of his hand. Dominic screamed in anguish, and beads of sweat popped out on his face.
“You help us, we get you out of here.”
“What they do to folks who cross ’em is a thousand times worse than dying.”
Dupree instinctively raised a hand to his chest. His face lost its color as his old scars burned and his heart skipped a beat. He sought to calm himself. “We’ll protect you.”
“Protect me? What kind of protection? Len says Samedi got people even in the police.”
Bull and Dupree glanced at one another. That thought had never occurred to them.
Dupree took out his badge and held it before Dominic’s eyes. “We’re not police, we’re FBI. We can put you in a witness protection program. New life, new identity, far away from here.”
Dominic squinted at the badge and thought about it. Dupree turned and nodded to the traiteur, who scarcely moved. Dominic howled in pain.
Dupree leaned forward. “They must’ve got here yesterday or, at the earliest, the day before. The girls upstairs have been dead since the hurricane. Where do they have the girls from NOLA?”
The traiteur moved his hands again. It was obvious from Dominic’s expression that the pain had lessened.
“You gonna take me away and give me a new name and place . . .”
“I give you my word.”
Dominic closed his eyes. “They over in the mansion.”
“Our guys went there,” Johnson told Dupree, “and it’s deserted.”
“In the pantry, off the kitchen,” Dominic whispered, “they built a false back.”
Johnson and Charbou dashed for the door with the two shrimpers close behind.
“Take the Zodiac!” Bull shouted after them.
Dupree studied Dominic. A white guy, more or less Dupree’s age, Dominic was getting paler by the minute. His eyes were beginning to take on that faraway look of those already halfway through death’s door.
“Samedi came here? Did he see what happened with the other girls?”
“No. He don’t come here.”
“Who’s the dead guy upstairs?”
“Pitt. Vince’s brother. S’posed to guard the girls. Said they didn’t give him time to get ’em out. Len was pissed off. Shot him.”
“And who’s that over there?” Dupree indicated the body floating face down at the bottom of the stairs.
“That’s . . . that was my friend Vince.”
“And your friend was happy enough to whistle while he worked, even after he saw Len shoot his brother?”
“They