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Trust only yourself!

The driver took her to the rental agency She was a wreck as she got into the Honda and checked the iven her She had been to New Orleans before, and she loved the city But she wasn’t that fa clearly! I’htened, and I may, after all, be really, truly, crazy

She forced herself to concentrate on the road She had already taken a wrong turn somewhere She was on the outskirts of the French Quarter, but she needed to find the road to the old plantations

She couldn’t drive and read the ht switch, but could not She stared around, then realized that she was outside the gates of one of the city’s faht iron, she could see winged angels, crosses, and the glowing shapes of a half dozen , creating strange, eerie shapes

She had to get out of here

She opened the driver’s door just a hair, and the lights popped on As she looked at the map, she was startled and then panicked by a knock at her

"Hey, lady, you got a dollar? Maybe you got a twenty? A five?" Theon to her door was filthy He was a white man with a thick beard, a horrendous scent, and so much dirt on him that he was the color of an islander "Hey, lady, I know I smell Hey, just cause there’s whiskey on o buy e?"

She saw his teeth Or what he had of the into soht before her

She screamed Her screaunned the car The automobile burst out on to the road with a shriek of tires

She didn’t knohich direction she was going in She just drove

Rudy Trenton stood on the street, watching the little red Honda drive off into the night He shook his head, then removed his baseball cap, and scratched his head

"Okay, lady, so I do want to buy more whiskey!" he muttered He shook his head "Crazy What the hell is this world co to? Maybe I shouldn’t have asked for the twenty Some folks just don’t know about inflation"

He stretched, thinking it was time to hop the fence and find himself a nice little nook in one of the mausoleums Lots of them were locked, but so corpses inside had no living relatives left in the vicinity, so it was easy enough to crawl in and get sorinned Folks were scared of ceerous than dead folk

Hell, no, dead folks couldn’t hurt you any

Rudy turned To his a out of the cemetery Or was he a ates were still locked; he hadn’t jumped over the fence, as Rudy intended to do

"Hey, buddy, you got a twenty, a five, a one, a quarter? I need soht, so I need a drink"

The man smiled, as if aet lucky This fellow looked as if he understood a fellow’s need for a drink now and then

"Yeah, I really need a drink," Rudy said

The fellow laughed out loud

"So do I," he told Rudy

Rudy started to grin

He was still grinning when theuntil he felt so

He started to screaular was slit and the sound was drowned out by the flow of his own blood

Jordan reached the house at last At least she thought it was the house It was a mansion, a beautiful old plantation, kept in top-notch shape The porch was expansive with traditional colulanced at the address she had written down, and at the nuot out of the car, fingering the cross at her neck, patting her purse to assure herself she had her vial of holy water handy

If this cop is legit, he’s going to think I’m crazy!

Still, she had come this far

Resolutely, she slammed the door of the Honda, strode across the lawn and up the steps, and knocked on the door

It was immediately opened by the woman who had been at the airport "Thank God!" she said earnestly

Jordan felt herself blush as she stood there aardly "I’ lately?"

"Yes, of course, I understand We were still worried Come in, come in" Even then, Jordan hesitated But she heard the reassuring cry of a young child in the background and she stepped over the threshold of the house A tall, dark-haired man shook her hand as she came in

"Mr Canady?" she murmured

"No, I’m Lucian DeVeau," he told her "Jade’s husband" He turned, indicating a woie Canady, and Sean is right through there in the office I was about to go out and try to find you Jade has been very upset since she lost you at the airport"

"Again, I’m very sorry"

"You’re here?it’s all completely understandable Coh the foyer, she noted the historic beauty of the house A grand stairway rose fro, there was an exquisite painting of a beautiful woman in mid-nineteenth-century dress