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moment she realized she wasn’t going to find Dahlia, but she’d heard about a missing girl. Joy Chiasson. For some terrible reason she identified with the girl, was afraid someone like Whitney had her. It made no sense, but she thought she’d poke around a little and just make certain.
    Her throat was sore from singing so much in the last couple of weeks. She’d done three sets in a small club just a half-mile from the station where she’d gassed up her motorcycle and her vocal cords were feeling the strain. The idea had been to see if anyone was abnormally interested in her because of her voice, but that idea had been sheer idiocy. Too many people followed her from club to club to know if someone was fixated on her the way they might have fixated on Joy.
    Practically everything dirty in New Orleans led back to this place, this man. Kurt Saunders. He sold property and stole it back. He was behind most of the gambling, whores, and drug trafficking. His house was in the most elite part of the Garden District and he rubbed shoulders with politicians and celebrities. Men like Saunders didn’t come down easily, but it was just possible that while she was helping out a friend tonight, she might also stumble across something to do with Joy’s disappearance. It wouldn’t surprise her in the least.
    Flame focused back on the stalker. She felt him. Knew he was somewhere close to her, but couldn’t pinpoint his location. He couldn’t have a scope on her; she wasn’t visible from the ground. He had to be the man from the gas station. He hadn’t shown any interest in her at all. She tipped her thigh with her index finger, replaying the small moment over and over in her mind. She hadn’t gotten a good look at him; he’d seemed to blend into the night. What made him memorable to her? Nothing. Absolutely nothing . She sighed and rubbed at her temple. She was getting a killer headache, something that often happened when she used psychic talents for long periods of time.
    The splash of lights and a sudden flurry of activity at the gate, accompanied by the ferocious barking of the dog, had her crawling across the tower roof to peer over the edge. The guards had arrived, guns in plain sight, as the gate swung open allowing a black town car to sweep onto the circular drive.
    Flame narrowed her vision, studying the car. She’d seen it before. A photographic memory helped keep small details filed away until she needed them. She’d seen the car several times on the frontage road out by the houseboat where she was staying. She’d also seen it around several of the clubs where she sang. The car always had the same driver. He stayed out of sight except to open and close the door for his passenger, Emanuel Parsons. Parsons was an older man, whom Flame guessed to be some where in his sixties. He carried a silver-handled cane, but she doubted he really needed it. He seemed to like the distinguished look and the deference everyone gave him.
    She made a face as the driver opened the door and Parsons emerged wearing a long coat, his silver hair gleaming in the lights flooding the entryway. It didn’t surprise her in the least that the man knew Saunders. Emanuel Parsons was the head investigator for the DEA and more than likely investigating Saunders for laundering money while playing friends with him. In the clubs he held himself aloof from everyone else, insisting on extra attention. He brought his grown son with him a couple of times, but most of the time he surrounded himself with other businessmen hardly deigning to notice most of the locals. He and his son had sent her a drink twice. And his son had dated Joy Chiasson . That alone put them on her radar screen.
    She watched Parsons until he disappeared under the roof of the giant columned porch. With a little sigh she crawled back to the skylight. Why was it that in every town there were men who believed themselves above the law, men who had such a sense of entitlement? She didn’t get