Marsala Maroon by Traci Andrighetti

Author:Traci Andrighetti
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Limoncello Press

12

The skeleton man ran along the bank with the boa coiled at his neck, shaking the staff and shouting in what I guessed was Haitian French. My brain screamed “Gas the motor,” but the words wouldn’t come out, partly because I wanted to know whether he was Angelo’s killer and because I was scared arm-bone stiff.

The door to the shack opened, and a phrase finally escaped my lips, “Holy Mambo.”

Odette Malveaux stood in the doorway, a ghastly, ghostly figure. She wore a muslin dress that matched her headwrap, her cheeks had sunk deep into her skull, and her cappuccino skin was a chalky color—as though she’d drunk the white drink of a bokor and turned into a zombie.

As I tried to make sense of the scene, the voodoo priestess raised her arm as slow as the undead and gestured to me. “Come, chile.”

Ladonna elbowed my ribs. “She sounds like Tia Dalma, that mystic from the Pirates of the Caribbean movies.”

“Shhht,” I hissed, stunned from my stupor. “Do you really want to offend these people?”

“Whaaat? It’s a compliment.” She gave her curls a defensive bump. “The actress who played Tia has a sexy voice, and I read that her Jamaican mother was her accent coach.”

I took a breath and turned my back on her. But in a way, Ladonna was right. Mambo Odette epitomized the common local sentiment that New Orleans wasn’t the deep south, but rather the northernmost point of the Caribbean.

“Good ting I bring ax,” Nadezhda said.

I turned to make sure she wasn’t wielding the thing and came eye level with Glenda’s phone.

“Could you move, sugar? I need a picture of this for Bob. This all-white look would make a fabulous influencer shot.”

I pressed the phone down. “This isn’t a swamp tour, all right? I think we’ve interrupted some sort of voodoo ritual, and we don’t dare disrespect it.” I motioned to Ladonna. “Pull up to the dock, so I can get out.”

She guided the boat toward the rickety platform, and I tried to find my courage. I had no reason to believe that Mambo Odette would hurt me, but I wasn’t sure about her creepy companion.

We reached the dock, and Ladonna’s jaw tightened. “You can do this, Franki. In Chicken Soup for the Soul: Tough Times, Tough People, they say that tough times don’t last, but tough people do. Remember that, no matter what happens in the shack.”

Easy for her to say from the safety of a motorboat. “Just don’t leave.”

“I wouldn’t think of it, hon.”

Given her maternal nature, I felt somewhat certain she wouldn’t. But Ladonna was unpredictable, much like Mambo Odette.

I rose and stepped onto the dock, and my legs wobbled like I was still on the water. As I walked up the creaky wood, I kept a side-eye on the semi-skeleton man. When I reached land, I realized he did, in fact, have flesh arms and teeth that he’d painted pitch black. But the discovery wasn’t the least bit comforting. The guy was still terrifying, and so was his slithering snake.

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