He slid his hands into the pockets of his trousers and wandered along a wall of leather-bound tomes. "Forgive me for being less than supportive in Kenner's office. I've learned the best way to handle him is not to handle him at all." He shot her a sideways look, taking her measure. "And I admit I wanted to see you in action. You're quite ferocious, Laurel. One would never suspect that looking at you-so delicate, so feminine. I like a paradox. You must have taken many an opponent by surprise."

"I'm good at what I do. If the opposition is taken by surprise by that, then they're simply stupid."

"Yes, but the plain fact is that people draw certain conclusions based on a person's looks and social background. I've been on the receiving end of such impressions myself, being from a prominent family."

Laurel arched a brow. "Are you trying to tell me you may be a son of the Garden District Danjermonds, the shipping Danjermonds, but at heart you're just a good ol' boy? I have a hard time believing that."

"I'm saying one can't judge a book by its cover-pretty or otherwise. One never really knows what might hide behind ugliness or lurk in the heart of beauty."

She thought again of Savannah, her beautiful sister, spinning around Frenchie's with Annie Gerrard in a headlock, smearing excrement on the wall of St. Joseph's Rest Home outside Astor Cooper's window, screaming obscenities in the moonlight. Sighing, she closed her eyes and rubbed at her forehead as if she could scrub her brain clean of doubt.

"I'll do what I can to influence Kenner," Danjermond said softly.

He was behind her now, close enough that she could sense his nearness. He settled his elegant hands on her shoulders and began to rub methodically at the tension. Laurel wanted to bolt, but she held her ground, unsure of whether his gesture was compassion or dominance, unsure of whether her response was courage or acquiescence.

"I can't make any promises, though," he said evenly. "I'm afraid he has a valid point concerning the information on Baldwin. Your sister has something of a credibility problem. Particularly as she's gone missing. You know all about credibility problems, don't you, Laurel?"

She jerked away from his touch and turned to face him, her anger blazing back full force. "I can do without the reminder, thank you, and all the other little snide remarks you so enjoy slipping into our conversations like knives. Just whose side are you on, anyway?"

"Justice takes the side of right. Nature, however, chooses strength," he pointed out. "Right and strength don't always coincide."

He let that cryptic assertion hang in the air as he opened a beautiful cherrywood humidor on his desktop and selected a slim, expensive cigar. "The courtroom more often resembles a jungle than civilization," he said as he went about the ritual of clipping the end of the cigar. "Strength is essential. I need to know how strong you are if we're going to work together."

"We're not," Laurel said flatly, moving toward the door.

He slid into his high-backed chair, rolling his cigar between his fingers. "We'll see."

"I have other things to see to," she snapped, infuriated by his smug confidence that she wouldn't be able to resist the lure of his offer or the lure of him personally. "Finding my sister for one, since the sheriff's department is obviously going to be of little help."

A lighter flared in his hands, and he drew on the cigar, filling the air with a rich aroma. "I wouldn't worry overmuch, Laurel," he said, his handsome head wreathed in fragrant, cherry-tinted smoke. "She may well have gone to N'Awlins, as her lover suggested. Or perhaps she's enjoying the charms of another man. She'll turn up."

But what condition would she be in when she did? The question lodged like a knot in Laurel's chest. If Savannah had gone off some inner precipice, what would be left to find? The possibilities sickened her. One thing was certain-Savannah wouldn't be the sister Laurel had always leaned on. The child within her wept at the thought.

Prejean's Funeral Home was typical in Acadiana. Built in the sixties, it was a low brick building with a profusion of flower beds outside and a strange mix of sterility, tranquillity, and grief within. The floors were carpeted in flat, industrial-grade, dirt brown nylon, made to last and to deaden the sounds of dress shoes pounding across it. The ceilings were low-hung acoustical panels that had absorbed countless cries and murmured condolences.

Prejean's had two parlors for times that were regrettably busy, and a large kitchen that, if people had known how closely it resembled the embalming room, may well have gone unused. But, as with every social situation in South Louisiana, food was served for comfort and for affirmation of life. Women friends of T-Grace's, neighbors, fellow parishioners from Our Lady of the Seven Sorrows Catholic church would be in the kitchen brewing strong coffee and making sandwiches. Laurel knew Mama Pearl had brought a coconut cake.

Those who had come to pay respects to the Delahoussayes gathered in the Serenity room. The casket was positioned at the front of the room beneath a polished oak cross. Closed, the lid was piled high with white mums and gardenias, as if to discourage anyone from trying to lift it. Candles flickered at either end in tall brass candelabras.

People stood in knots of three and four at the back of the room, distancing themselves from death as much as they could while still supporting the family with their presence. Up front, more serious mourners sat in rows of chrome-and-plastic chairs that interlocked like Lego toys. Enola Meyette led the chanting of the rosary, a low murmur of French that underscored whispered conversations and muffled sobs.

T-Grace sat front and center in an ill-fitting black dress, her face swollen, her red hair standing out from her head as if she had been given an electric shock, her eyes huge and bloodshot. She was supported on one side by a burly son. To her right, Ovide sat in a catatonic state, his mouth slack, shoulders drooping beneath the weight of his grief.

Laurel's heart ached for them as she made her way through the throng to pay her respects. She knelt before T-Grace and took hold of a bony hand that had to be at least as cold as that of the daughter lying dead in the casket.

"I'm so sorry, T-Grace, Ovide," she whispered, tears rising automatically. She had been schooled from childhood to keep her emotions politely concealed. Even at her father's funeral, Vivian had admonished her and Savannah to cry softly into their handkerchiefs so as not to make spectacles of themselves. But the day had been too long, and she was too tired and keyed-up for anything but a modicum of restraint.

T-Grace looked down on her, valiantly trying to smile, her thin mouth twisting and trembling with the effort. "Merci, Laurel. You're all the time so good to us."

Laurel squeezed the hand in hers and pressed back the emotions crowding her throat. "I wish I could do more," she whispered, feeling impotent.

She turned to Ovide, trying to think of something to say to him, but his eyes were on his daughter's casket, glazed with a kind of numb shock, as if he had only just realized how permanent Annie's absence would be.

As Mrs. Meyette began another decade of the rosary, Laurel rose and moved off toward the back of the room, restless and uncomfortable as she always had been with the rituals of death. She scanned the crowd, looking for Jack, but not finding him. She didn't know if she was more disappointed for T-Grace and Ovide or for herself. Stupid. How many times had he told her she couldn't count on him?

How many times had he made a lie of his own words?

He was a con man in his own right, playing a shell game with his personality. Distract the mark with the appearance of a rogue, while under one shell hid a heart filled with compassion and under another one compressed with grief and guilt. The shells swept and danced beneath his clever hands. Now you see it, now you don't. Which one held the real Jack? Would he ever let her close enough to find out?

She felt a little guilty, thinking about him during a wake, but in that moment she would have given just about anything to feel his arms slip around her, to hear his smoky voice murmur something irreverent in her ear. She was tired and worried, and she wanted very badly to share those fears with someone.

A call to Maison de Ville in New Orleans had assured her Savannah wasn't staying there. A call to Le Mascarade had gotten her nothing but a derisive laugh. Patrons names were confidential. She had tracked down Ronnie Peltier, who was hefting sacks at Collins Feed and Seed. He hadn't seen Savannah since Tuesday night. She had come to his trailer in a temper and left an hour or two later. He claimed he hadn't seen her since.

Laurel spotted him standing with a group of cronies across the room-Taureau Hebert and several other regulars from the bar. They looked young and uncomfortable in neckties. Their eyes avoided the casket at the front of the room.

"It's fascinating, isn't it?"

She jumped as Danjermond's voice sounded low and soft in her ear. He stood beside her, looking as perfectly pressed as he had that morning, his suit immaculate, tie neat. Laurel felt wilted and rumpled beside him even though she had showered and changed into a skirt and fresh blouse before coming. That effect alone was enough reason to avoid him, as far as she was concerned.

"All the different defense mechanisms people develop to deal with death," he said, frowning slightly as his gaze moved over the gathering of the faithful and the bereaved. "A dose of religion, gossip, and jokes served up with coffee and a slice of pie afterward."

"People take comfort in ritual," Laurel said, trying to sidle away from him, but he had her neatly trapped between himself and a potted palm.

"Yes, that's true," he murmured, his sharp green gaze taking in the tableau of grief at the front of the room. T-Grace had begun to sob again, and her children gathered around her. Mrs. Meyette raised her voice, but never broke cadence in the recitation of the Hail Marys.

"Are you here in an official capacity or just out of morbid curiosity?"

He arched a brow at her sarcasm. "Would you rather Kenner had come to represent Partout Parish?"

"Not even he would be that callous."

T-Grace let out a series of soul-raking, ear-piercing wails, and one of her sons and Leonce Comeau half dragged her from the room. They were followed by old Doc Broussard, toting his black bag, and Father Antaya, each of them ready to dispense his own brand of medicine.