Chapter 25
madison
. . .
Shreveport who? Was I low-key sabotaging our chances to make it to the wine spritzer? Well, yes, I was. But I had many more reasons than a desire not to relive my son’s funeral and Bridget’s statement. Beignets. And farmers markets.
Who didn’t love a farmers market? Okay, maybe that was the genetic makeup that came from my bougie mommy.
She couldn’t resist the marches fermiers when in France.
A mercadillos in Spain. And an asaichi in Japan, which translates as a morning market.
However, I wondered if my mind had constructed that correctly.
If so, Duolingo had nothing on me when it came to recalling Mom’s many adventures and how she loved to Spanglish or Japlish it out wherever she traveled.
I would’ve called the mashup of languages thugging it out, but she would’ve slapped me and then snatched the annual subscription of truffle face mask she got me one year and forgot to cancel.
In my attempt to derail our actual plans, I’d done an online search and brought up every farmers market off Interstate-10.
So far, I’d dragged us through Sorento and Baton Rouge without getting us arrested or me a urinary tract infection.
Because I’d been on my best behavior, like first-date behavior where you share desserts and stuff.
Now we were in Opelousas. The sun was shining and a zydeco melody floated through the air.
The smell of powdered sugar drifted toward me, a trap for new couples. All that sharing and caring, so sweet. But I had loved this man too long to hurt his feelings. “Listen,” I blurted, “I can’t share these with you.”
Maybe I moaned the words in between bites of heavenly beignet goodness, but I tried to be kind about it. I cradled the brown paper bag, newborn-style.
Washington tilted his head. The sun caught his beard in a disrespectful way, glowing, showing off, and making his lips look too kissable for a public place. And I meant the type of kiss that pleased me the most.
Yet, my dead-serious face made those seductive lips part in a restrained sigh. He handed the vendor double the cash for his own bag of beignets. “They better be that damn good.”
Oh, they are.
We wandered through the market, weaving between tables stacked with homemade jams and jars of honey that looked sinful in the sunlight. The mounds of bright peppers made me want spice in life. Man, I loved Louisiana.
“Stop looking at me sideways, Wash,” I murmured, focused on a basket of strawberries while he stared a hole in the side of my face.
“At the rate we’re going,” he drawled, “we’ll arrive this time tomorrow.”
“Bite your beignet. It’ll make you happy.”
His long stride caught me off guard, and I had to snatch my baby beignets to the side to keep them safe. Cute frustration thickened those sexy thick brows.
“Maddy, I’m serious. This is our last stop. We’ll miss the entire wine spritzer.”
“Boy, what’s more important? Show face, then getting some later … or rubbing elbows with Gaston DuVall and Bridget all afternoon and evening. The choice is yours. A passionate release, or dry wine and judgment.”
“We’re showing face,” Washington declared.
I lifted my bag, and he lifted his. I bounced my shoulders and sang, “We showing face.”
Washington, my six-foot-something menace, did the same jig, his paper bag in hand, and completed the song with “Hell yeah, we is!”
Partners in crime, we did our dance and our chant until a little old lady glared at him over her walker. Face serious, he cleared his throat. Dang, her little Morton’s-table-salt face just shoplifted his joy.
My mouth firmed into a line. “Okay, Paint—”
“Madison.”
“Dry.” I patted his solid, perfect chest. My hands almost settled there.
Almost slid around. Instead, I remembered how I rubbed his bald head with his favorite oil.
I cleared my throat. That granite chest was mine.
I’d revisit it later. “C’mon, I’m comparing paint drying on every surface of a room to your facade.
Because in bed you are wild. Be enjoyable in the now, okay? ”
His grunt came out in a mist of apology and promise. So adorbs!
“Thank you.” I reached right into his bag, not mine, and popped a tiny beignet into my mouth.
At the Bentley, Washington went full James Bond.
The Idris Elba version the world would’ve gotten if Hollywood didn’t act like the addition of melanin was a weapons-grade liability.
He opened my door with MI6 swagger, bowed to the theme music playing in my head, then sprinted around the hood.
That action-movie slide made my ovaries do a standing ovation.
With the top down, he landed in the driver’s seat without bothering to open his own door.
The engine turned on. The radio blared, but somehow it disconnected from my Apple Music.
“Ugh, not this.” I reached for the touchscreen. “You and the damn news station.”
“Oh, hush, put on your crybaby-ass R&B, Madison. Who’s the dry one now?”
He stopped mid-clowning as the newscaster cut in. “Second female body found in Tremé. Mother of five. Newlywed—”
“What?” The bag in my hand flung itself into the universe. It flew right out and plopped onto the dirt. I opened the door, retrieved the now-open bag, put the dirty beignets inside, and laid it on the floor at my feet to throw away later.
“Madison, damn.” Washington threw the car into reverse and sped off. “You get two of mine. Just two. No negotiations.”
“Okay, I get it.” I cranked the news.
The report continued to play, and all at once the sunshine felt sharper, the air too thin.
The broadcast killed my vibe as our world narrowed to that grim report.
I popped a beignet into Washington’s mouth and then gifted myself with some emotional support carbs.
We used to be 20/20 junkies. We’d talk-eat straight through kidnappings, dismemberments, even that time the subject expert said, “And poof! They were toast!”
But then, the fun vanished, and we annihilated those beignets. Because the newscaster had said, “We’re waiting for confirmation from authorities, but I believe one more similar event constitutes a serial killer.”
Nothing says Oh, crap like realizing you’re out of pastries and someone is out there killing Black women in Louisiana.
We stared at each other when a guy called the radio station and complained about the cops doing nothing to find his wife when she went missing a week before Christmas.
“Have they found her?” the reporter asked.
“Two weeks later.” The man sobbed. “Strangled.”
“Okay, okay …” I gasped, lowering the radio while the newscaster went off about the lack of respect.
Too much to process. “If this Christmas Bride died in December. That makes the reporter wrong about the number of vics. That makes Vic Two the Valentine-ish Bride, since she died late February. Which makes the newlywed mother of five … the third victim.” I put the information into my phone. “Wash!”
“I’m listening.”
“Momma of five died in April. Weeks ago. You heard of this?”
“Nah. What does it say?”
“She was strangled with a veil too! The cops are all hush-hush. They’re Black women, that’s why. Oh, Wash, they’re all newlyweds! It says she and her husband had welcomed a little girl a week after they jumped the broom. So sad. Look at their social media post.”
He flicked a glance away from the road. “Young Black couple. Dude looks like he got his head on straight. Give him props for putting a ring on it after five kids, too.”
I stared at him wide-eyed, fingers shaking. “And, uh … so … I think I’m about to say something crazy.”
“Like Texas is a serial killer?” Washington asked.
“What?” Yep, this time his bag, now empty, went flying out of my hands. It swooshed into the air, and the driver behind us laid on their horn while zipping around us.
Washington matched their bravado, cussing, honking.
“Are you done sizing cojones?” I folded my arms, then planted my hand on my chest. Because, yeah, he took it there and commenced a honking argument. After the blare of both horns finished slap-boxing against my eardrums, I asked, “Why would you say that? He’s your brother!”
“The other woman died in late February, after being missing for two weeks. Texas didn’t come to Montana’s proposal. When have you known him to miss a meal?”
“He didn’t go? Not even for the lobster?”
“No. He went MIA on Valentine’s. Dude had no intention of popping up at Montana’s proposal party.
And if Momma hadn’t called him crying about how Montana rescued Zuri and Darius from her crazy-ass baby daddy that night, I doubt he would’ve shown up at the hospital after the proposal.
He could’ve been surveilling Bride Two. Maybe he waited to snatch her later, so he could finally support our family!
You told me he’s charming. Guess what, bébé?
Serial killers? They’re charming.” Washington shrugged.
I slugged him. “Excuse me, you’re the one who embodied Dahmer and Bundy when talking about tying me up instead of divorce. So, if anyone is homicidally meticulous, it’s you. You-you … are meticulous … And you went off the deep end when I left you and your body and your money!”
“Maddy, you know it’s not me.”
I shoved the bangs that the air kept whipping into my face. “Okay, then stop being rude to your brother.”
He huffed. “Texas always says he doesn’t need to hold cash but takes the hundreds I give him. Dude owes me a couple of grand.”
“He is not a serial killer, Wash, dang!” I shook my head at this man. No shame. “But I don’t think it’s safe to tie the knot again.”
“Too bad. We are getting married again, bébé. And I’ma lock you up for a couple of weeks. Seems the killer keeps them for two weeks, then leaves them dead somewhere in public with a wedding veil around their necks, right?”
“Yep.”
“Appreciate the clarification. I’ma quarantine all that ass and keep you safe. But before then, I’ma take you to my courtroom on Monday and officiate myself.”
“Not Monday.”