Butterfly Bayou (Butterfly Bayou 1)

A long silence stretched out and it took everything Lila had not to push. She had to be patient. She couldn’t overwhelm Carrie or she might lose. This had to be her choice.

Her head came up, her eyes lit with will for the first time since Lila had met her. “My husband hit me. He was angry that you talked to the sheriff. Apparently Armie has been asking questions around town, and he even got in touch with Bobby’s ex-wife. Bobby started drinking last night and that’s when he punched me. And two years ago he kicked me in the stomach and I lost our first baby. My baby. It was my baby, and this one is my baby, too, and I cannot lose it.”

Then again, some women found an iron will of strength when they realized they were going to be mothers.

“I always wondered about that,” Mabel said quietly. “I remember your first miscarriage. Doc didn’t ask, and I thought we should. He told me we had to keep our noses out of other people’s business. He was old school, but I think in this case he was wrong.”

He’d had a duty and he’d failed. She was not going to. It didn’t matter that it might not work, that she was putting herself in a position she’d been in before. There was right and there was wrong, and her own fear had no place here. “Let me get you to that shelter.”

Tears dripping from her eyes, Carrie nodded.chapter twelve“He’s already lawyered up,” Roxie said, her voice coming over his cell phone. “His brother found a lawyer from New Orleans who’s willing to work with them since Quaid turned them down.”

Armie sighed, but Roxie’s news hadn’t been unexpected. “He can’t post bail tonight. We’ve got at least until tomorrow morning.”

He stared down from the balcony. Bourbon Street was well warmed up for the night. He knew he should have picked a quieter hotel, but Lila had never been to New Orleans and he wanted to show it off to her.

They’d left Carrie at the nondescript house at the edge of the city that served as the women’s shelter for this part of Orleans Parish. It was a large home in a nice neighborhood. If a person wasn’t aware of what the home served as, he or she might think it was simply an upper-middle-class home where they took security seriously. It was peaceful, and damn he hoped it stayed that way.

He’d managed to talk Lila into staying in town for dinner. They’d checked into one of the nicer hotels in the Quarter, had dinner, and walked the streets, her hand in his. Still, he was worried about her.

“I will give it to the man. He’s good,” Roxie said. “He didn’t break character even once. Major and I were waiting for him when the fishing boats came in. Arrested him right there on the dock and all he did was ask about how Carrie was. He gave some song and dance about how weird she’d been acting lately. I think he’s setting it up to look like she’s crazy.”

“The medical records will disagree with him.” Lila had explained it all as he’d driven them from Papillon up here to New Orleans. She’d described how Carrie couldn’t have possibly given herself the injuries documented in her records. In this, the Petrie family’s desire to be isolated worked against them. There was no one else to blame the abuse on since Carrie rarely left the island. Or had been allowed to leave the island.

Why the hell hadn’t he seen it?

“Well, he’s locked up nice and tight for the time being,” Roxie assured him. “I’m going to stay overnight and Major’s here until midnight. Vince comes on for the night shift, so we’ve got this covered. Judge won’t be in until eleven tomorrow. I’ve been told he goes fishing every morning and no one is to disturb him.”

Ah, the joys of small-town living. “I’ll be back before then, but it’s late. We checked into a hotel for the night. Noelle is going to stay at Beth’s, and Mabel said she would take Peanut home with her. I think Lila needs a night away.”

“She probably saved Carrie’s life, but you have to know this fight isn’t over yet. Bobby, for all his calm, isn’t going to go down easy. He’ll try to get Carrie back.”

“But you didn’t have trouble bringing him in?”

“Not a lick,” Roxie replied. “Like I said, it was almost like he knew this would happen one day. He’s smooth, and that makes him more dangerous in my mind. There’s something dark in that one. He did ask about Lila.”

A chill went through Armie. “What exactly did he say?”

He turned and looked back into the room he’d found for them. He still had connections here in the city, and he’d managed to get them a table at Arnaud’s. She’d seemed to relax after two Sazeracs. He was fairly certain a lot of memories were playing through her head, and none of them good. If he’d taken her home, she likely would have insisted on going back to the clinic and updating files. She would have found an excuse, but he’d put her in a corner, telling her he was too tired to drive.