Garner Read online

  GARNER

  Ann Voss Peterson

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  PRONOUN

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  GYPSY MAGIC

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  GYPSY MAGIC

  AUTHOR WEB SITES

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Other books by Ann Voss Peterson:

  Gypsy Magic

  Book Two: Garner

  Copyright © 2002, 2017 by Ann Voss Peterson Previously published under the title Gypsy Magic (3 in One): Sabina Cover and art copyright © 2017 by Patricia Pinianski This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from the author.

  GYPSY MAGIC

  It was all over now. Her only son, her beloved son, was condemned to death. For a crime she knew he could not have committed.

  She gathered her strength for what she must do. From the pocket of her long skirt the old Gypsy pulled the bandanna with the objects. The pen. The crumpled paper cup. The metal tack.

  None was of great value. But they held the power she needed. For each had belonged to one of the people she was going to curse tonight.

  Her hand clenched the pen. “Justice is blind,” she whispered, then joined the curse with the name of Wyatt Boudreaux.

  “Love is death,” she intoned as she crumpled the paper cup in her hand and said the name of Garner Rousseau.

  Finally she picked up the tack and said, “The law is impotent,” linking those words with the name of Andrei Sobatka.

  Pushing herself erect, she stood and shuffled to the edge of the bayou, smug in her satisfaction that she had evened the score.

  Part 1: Wyatt

  Justice is Blind

  An old murder case comes back to haunt Wyatt Boudreaux. Sent by his dad to make sure the gypsies don’t interfere with the conviction of Carlo Mustov, Wyatt runs into the woman he loved and lost, Alessandra King. She blames his father for Carlo’s conviction but she’s shocked to discover Wyatt is blind. Can they bury their differences and work together to find the real killer? And can the embers of passion smoldering between them flame to life again despite the gulf between their worlds?

  Part 2: Garner

  Love is Death

  Garner Rousseau’s father prosecuted Carlo Mustov, but when Sabina King tracks the district attorney down to beg help for her cousin, Garner tells her she’s too late. His father is dead, just like everyone else Garner has loved. Can Sabina heal Garner’s terrible curse? Or will their growing love for one another seal her fate?

  Part 3: Andrei

  The Law is Impotent

  Because his father testified against Carlo Mustov. Andrei Sobatka is cursed to never consummate his relationship with any woman. As Andrei tries to prove his cousin’s innocence, he reconnects with the daughter of the murdered woman. Elizabeth Granville was his first and only love…as he was hers. As they seek out the truth about the murder together, can they find their way back to each other? Can their love nullify a gypsy curse?

  Each of these compelling stories ends with an HEA for the hero and heroine. But only the full set will finally get to the bottom of the murder mystery. Be sure to read them all!

  Part 2: Garner

  (Love Is Death)

  Chapter One

  Sabina King stepped back from the opened hospital door before her sister and Wyatt spotted her. She had heard their words of love, spoken only for each other’s ears. She had seen the joy in their faces, happiness after years of pain and suffering and longing. And she wasn’t going to get in their way.

  Not this time.

  No matter what Alessandra had said about her reasons for sending Wyatt away all those years ago, Sabina knew she’d been at least part of the reason her sister had given up the man she loved. And now that Alessandra and Wyatt had found each other again, Sabina wouldn’t interrupt even a moment of their time together. They deserved time alone. Time to explore their feelings. Time to plan their future together. Time to heal.

  Blinking back tears of joy for her sister, Sabina forced herself to turn away and walk down the long, white corridor. The heels of her sandals clacked on the tile floor. The green and indigo gauze of her skirt danced and swirled around her legs as she walked. Nurses, orderlies and visitors alike turned to watch her pass. Their eyes narrowed with suspicion or curiosity or a mixture of both.

  Sabina could read the emotions in their faces and in the band of glowing light surrounding each person. The aura, which was her gift to see and interpret. She knew what they were thinking.

  The Gypsy.

  The fortune-teller.

  The thief.

  Of course, they were wrong about everything but the Gypsy part. She was no fortune-teller. That gift had been bestowed on Alessandra alone.

  And Sabina was no thief. Though some probably thought the simple healing spells and charms she sold at the carnival were a kind of thievery. Spells and charms Valonia had taught her after Sabina had returned to the carnival six years ago in shame. Taught her so she could make a living. And have a purpose.

  Sabina drew a deep breath, trying to purge the negativity from her thoughts. She knew what Alessandra would say. She’d say Sabina had a purpose. A purpose more powerful than seeing the future. More powerful than reading auras. More powerful than the simple spells she sold. A gift as powerful as life itself.

  Sabina looked down at her hands, swinging by her sides as she walked. Hands that could absorb another’s injury. Hands that could heal. Heat crept up her neck and spiraled through her mind. She raised her eyes and focused straight ahead, striding faster until she was nearly running down the corridor.

  What good was her gift if it couldn’t be controlled? If it couldn’t be used? What good was her gift if she couldn’t heal Wyatt’s injuries? If she didn’t dare try?

  Her fear wasn’t the only thing holding her back. There were other forces at work in Wyatt’s case. Forces she didn’t understand. Wyatt had told Alessandra he could see again. Valonia’s curse—the curse Alessandra had told her about—was broken. And Sabina couldn’t risk that her attempt to heal him of the injuries sustained in the accident would not only bring back his health, but the curse, as well.

  But with Wyatt lying in a hospital bed and Alessandra by his side, who would prove Carlo was innocent? Who would deliver him from that horrible Louisiana state prison in Angola, where he waited on death row? Who would save him from being strapped to a gurney in less than three weeks and having a fatal needle plunged into his arm?

  Sabina pushed open the wide glass door and walked out into the damp heat. She might not be able to heal Wyatt, but there was something she could do. She could continue what Alessandra and Wyatt had started. She could save Carlo.

  She would find a way.

  ______

  The windows of the once-grand house on the outskirts of Les Baux seemed to stare into the twilight, dark as soulless eyes. Sabina shivered despite the thick blanket of heat and humidity lingering from the day and forced her feet to move step by step up the winding walk. The stones tipped, uneven under her sandals. Birds flitting around the house and in the garden sang the end of the day, their music almost mournful in the stillness. Wisteria vines covered the house’s stone walls, their pendulous flowers long since wilted and dried by Louisiana’s summer sun. A hard knot of apprehension tightened in her stomach.
/>   She’d spent the entire day at the courthouse, trying to convince someone, anyone to listen to her about the photograph of the bloody fingerprint Alessandra had given her after Wyatt’s accident. The one Wyatt and Alessandra had found in Wyatt’s father’s files. But the only answer Sabina had heard was no. The only advice was to “go through proper channels.” The only response was the old familiar suspicion and mistrust.

  She shook her head and kept walking. How could she go through proper channels? Carlo’s public defender was long since dead. And although a law student here and a pro bono attorney there had helped him file appeals throughout the ten years he’d languished on death row, they had ceased returning Valonia’s phone calls long ago. And her calls to other attorneys had yielded the same response. They couldn’t handle another pro bono case. There was nothing they could do. Carlo had exhausted his appeals.

  Her cousin had run out of time.

  And that was what had brought her to this house. A search through the register-of-deeds office had provided the address of the district attorney who’d prosecuted Carlo ten years ago. Sabina only hoped he would listen. Only hoped he wouldn’t brush her off with talk of “proper channels” and narrowed eyes of suspicion. Because if he didn’t listen, she didn’t know where to turn.

  She stepped onto the wide porch, the wood thumping under her feet as loudly as her pulse thumped in her ears. Crossing the porch, she strode to the front door and seized the large brass knocker.

  The clack of brass against wood echoed through the house. She held her breath and strained to hear movement from inside.

  The sound of feet striking wood flooring reached her. The doorknob turned, and the door opened. Face shrouded in shadows, a man looked out at her. At first she could see only his eyes. They penetrated the shadows and seemed to look straight into her soul. Then the twilight’s glow fell on an angular face tapering to a strong jaw.

  Sabina’s heart jolted. She’d seen him before—she was sure of it—long ago, when he was just a gangly boy walking the carnival midway in search of fun on a summer evening. Their eyes had met across the crowd. And later, when a gang of town boys had been harassing her, he’d come to her aid, ordering them to leave her alone and backing up the order with an intense stare that sent the boys off to find an easier target.

  Although the contact had lasted but a few minutes, the brilliance of his aura told her everything. In a glance she’d known him better than she knew her own heart.

  “You’re from the carnival, aren’t you?”

  His voice didn’t carry the sneer of most townsfolks’ voices when they identified her as part of the carnival. But after hearing that sneer so many times and seeing the narrowing of their eyes and the way they clutched purses and fingered wallets, she couldn’t help raising her chin just a little in defiance and straightening her spine as if readying herself to fight. “Yes, I am from the carnival.”

  He looked at her now with eyes so intense, they seemed to drill into her. “I remember. You sold charms for your aunt. Healing spells.” The corners of his lips crooked up with the hint of a wistful smile. But there wasn’t anything wistful in the aura she read. No longer the brilliant glow, it was weak, uneven, the color subdued. He was wounded somehow. Crippled.

  What had happened to the boy who’d defended her all those years ago? The boy she’d thought about many times since?

  “Can I help you?” His voice startled her out of her thoughts.

  “I’ve come to speak to Claude Rousseau.” Her voice sounded weak and shaky, its volume barely rising above the pounding of her pulse. “This is Claude Rousseau’s home, isn’t it?”

  “Sure is.” The man pulled the door open wider and held out his hand. “The name is Garner.”

  “Sabina King.” She placed her hand in his. His grip was steady, his hand neither smooth nor overly rough with calluses. And as his skin pressed against hers, a warm feeling spread up her arm and curled inside her, low in her belly. So like the feeling she’d gotten years ago when she was still a girl, when her gaze had first met his across a crowded midway.

  He held her hand too long for a simple handshake, as if he was as reluctant as she to break the contact. And when he finally did release her, the lines around his eyes and mouth seemed to deepen with regret. “So why do you want to see my father?”

  His words jarred her like a splash of icy water. “You’re Claude Rousseau’s son?”

  “Unfortunately, yes.”

  The words of Valonia’s angry curse echoed through her mind. Justice is blind. Love is death. The law is impotent. So the boy she’d never been able to chase from her imagination was Claude Rousseau’s son. The son of Valonia’s curse. Was the curse responsible for his injured aura, the lines of worry and pain in his face?

  She bit the inside of her bottom lip and kept the question to herself. It wouldn’t do her any good to share it, that was certain. Even if Garner Rousseau believed her story about Valonia’s curse, telling him he was cursed by the mother of the man she was trying to save was a sure way to blow any chance she had to save Carlo. “I need to talk to Claude Rousseau. I’ll explain why I’ve come only to him.”

  “Only to him, chère?” Garner’s lips pressed into a bitter line. “Then I’m afraid you’ve come to the wrong place.”

  “Where can I find him?”

  “The family mausoleum. My father died of cancer two weeks ago.”

  Chapter Two

  Color drained from Sabina King’s beautiful face, leaving a gray cast to her skin. The shoulders she’d thrown back in defiance when he’d asked if she was from the carnival slumped in defeat. “I’m so sorry,” she said.

  Garner reached out and grasped one of her arms, ready to catch her in case she pitched forward onto the porch floor. Her arm felt delicate under his touch, fragile. For a moment he was afraid it would break, the way her spirit had seemed to break at the news of his father’s death.

  His father had always been good at breaking people’s spirits when he’d been alive. But never in a million years would Garner have thought the news of the old bastard’s death would affect someone this way. He would have been far less surprised had Sabina King jumped for joy. “Is there something I can help you with?”

  She shook her head, her dangling earrings tinkling with the movement. “I don’t know. I’m…I’m so sorry for your loss.”

  “Thank you.” Although she still seemed a bit disoriented, she seemed stronger, able to stand on her own now. Almost reluctantly, he released her arm. “Is there anything I can help you with? I’m trying to put his affairs in order.”

  She paused for a moment, worrying her bottom lip with her teeth. Finally she drew a deep breath. “I came to ask your father about a case he prosecuted ten years ago. My cousin was convicted of a murder he didn’t commit. He’s on death row. I was hoping your father could help.”

  “Help?” Garner nearly choked. “Unless you want to make absolutely certain your cousin gets the needle, my father wasn’t the one to come to for help.”

  Those delicious lips pursed. Obviously not what she wanted to hear. “I don’t know what to do. Your father was my last hope.”

  “Your last hope for what?”

  “To get the courts to listen to me. I have new evidence. And they say I have to go through proper channels, and Carlo has exhausted his appeals, and I can’t afford an attorney, and I don’t know what to do. If I go through proper channels, I’m afraid it’ll be too late. And then…” She stopped her rush of words, her breasts rising and falling under her loose dress. Her gold necklace jingled against the scooped neckline with each agitated breath.

  Something had her upset, all right. Something his father had been part of. No surprise there. Claude Rousseau had a talent for upsetting people. Good, decent people, at any rate. And if Garner was any judge of character, he’d say Sabina King was a good, decent woman.

  And a beautiful one, as well. Exotic. Colorful. So different from the monotonous gray his life had become. The monot
onous gray he’d carefully cultivated to dull the pain.

  He closed his eyes against her jade eyes and colorful clothing. He didn’t need this reminder of how exquisitely beautiful life could be—and how exquisitely painful. He liked his safe, gray life. He needed it.

  But he couldn’t just stand by while his father made innocent people suffer from beyond the grave. He’d caused enough suffering while alive. Garner opened his eyes and met Sabina’s gaze again. If he could help her, he would. And when she left, he would retreat into his monotone world and stow his memories of her in a safe spot in the back of his mind. “Slow down and tell me what this is about.”

  “A murder that happened ten years ago.” Her lips crooked into a cynical frown incongruous with the freshness of her face. “The Gypsy murder.”

  Recognition clicked in his mind. A person couldn’t live within a hundred miles of Les Baux without hearing about the Gypsy carny who’d murdered the mayor’s wife. The case had headlined newspapers and fueled the town gossip machine for months.

  “My cousin Carlo is innocent.”

  “I’m sure he is.” He was sure of no such thing, but it seemed a kind thing to say. If he remembered correctly, the carny had been in trouble before the death of the mayor’s wife. Bar fights. Petty theft. The kind of activities that reinforced stereotypes that had followed Gypsies for centuries. But under the force of Sabina’s sincerity, his doubts as to her cousin’s character didn’t mean much. He wanted to believe her. He wanted her to be right about her cousin. He wanted her cousin to live up to the faith she obviously put in him.

  “I have evidence. Evidence the police covered up.”

  Garner knew he shouldn’t ask. He should wish her well, bid her goodbye, and close the door.

  He looked into her eyes. “What kind of evidence?”