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always concrete.”
    Rob slipped his shades on against the midday glare. “They
are for me. I live in a black-and-white world.”
    “Must be really boring.” Eris turned to the right and started
walking.
    “Intempo is this direction.” Rob pointed to the left and
waited for her to come back.
    “I know that.” Eris stopped and turned to face him. “Debra
didn’t go that way, she went this way.”
    “The bartender said she was headed to Intempo.”
    “I heard what he said and I’m telling you that he’s wrong.”
    The temperature felt as if it had risen another ten degrees
while they were inside. Beads of perspiration formed on his body, causing his
shirt to stick to his back. God, he wasn’t going to follow her around the
Quarter in this unbearable heat. “What are you planning to do? Wander the
streets until you stumble over a body or drop dead of heat stroke?”
    Her smile was sugar sweet but fire flashed in her eyes.
“Bite me.” With that, she turned and sashayed away from him.
    “I’m not going that direction, so don’t expect me to save
you the next time you walk headlong into trouble.”
    “Fine by me.” Her words were tossed over her shoulder at him
as she rounded a corner and disappeared from sight.

Chapter Three
     
    Eris kept her feet moving and refused to look behind her.
The man could go find a very high cliff and jump for all she cared. He was
stubborn, narrow-minded and controlling.
    She laughed at the thought of living in a black-and-white
world and then thought how cold and lonely that must be. She lost the thread of
Debra’s aura she was following and silently cursed herself for letting the man
distract her. After a few seconds of intense concentration and searching, she
picked it up again and continued down the street.
    The aura circled the block and before she knew it, she was
once again on Bourbon Street headed toward Esplanade. Several minutes later,
she crossed Esplanade and entered an older residential neighborhood that had
seen better times forty years ago. Twenty minutes later, Debra’s aura became
more and more confused as she approached a rather run-down house.
    Eris stopped on the sidewalk and studied the building. There
wasn’t a doubt in her mind this place was a crack house, and Debra was either
here or had been here recently. She lost the clear connection she had to the
girl as Debra’s essence became more confused and agitated. It was hard enough
tracing a person when they left a clean path to follow—this wasn’t one of those
times. There were a lot of factors that could muddle a person’s residual
spirit, not the least of which was drugs, she thought, studying the old house.
    She swiped at a bead of sweat running down the side of her
face. July was a scorcher in New Orleans, she thought absently as she finished
off her now-warm water.
    Opening her senses to the unseen world around her, she tried
to get a better, firmer fix on Debra. The onslaught of multiple feelings hit
her hard, causing her to stagger back. These personalities were jittery,
agitated, needy and hurting. Immediately she felt unbalanced and nauseated.
Taking deep, cleansing breaths, she bent over and placed her hands on her knees
for support. It was like being on a cup and saucer ride at the carnival with a
nasty hangover.
    Eris was on the verge of being sick when a warm, rough hand
touched the bare skin at the small of her back. Instantly she felt comforted
and the nausea subsided. For a moment, she let herself enjoy the rare feeling
of being calmed.
    “What’s wrong?”
    She jumped away from the gentle touch and the deep baritone
voice as if a hot iron had branded her. Whirling around, she faced the man
whose touch made her feel safe but whose presence made her want to pull out her
hair. “Let me guess, you couldn’t find Intempo and, being a male, refused to ask
for directions?”
    For a few seconds, his face showed genuine concern for her
discomfort, but her words sufficiently wiped that