River Road Read Online Free PDF Page A

I’d already gotten the go-ahead from the Elders, along with some ideas on a possible territory settlement.
    He caught up with me and eased into his own steady pace, which meant I had to speed up. There’s a big stride difference between five-four and six-three, so I figured I worked harder than him and therefore could stop sooner. He only ran with me because he thought I wouldn’t do it otherwise. He knew if a beignet called my name, I’d leave the jogging trail in a dusting of powdered sugar and never look back.
    Neither of us spoke till we reached the point of the path that edged closest to the river. “I have to stop.” My breath rasped in and out like a bellows.
    Alex ran a few strides ahead, then circled back. “This is pathetic, even for you.”
    “Ha, ha.” I pulled the vials from my pocket and held them up. “I wanted to take some water samples here to compare with what we get at Pass a Loutre today. Baseline pollution. In fact, the water near the mouth of the river should be a lot cleaner than here.”
    “Good idea.” Alex knelt to retie his shoe. “Figured out how you’re going to test it?”
    I carefully walked downhill to the river’s edge, looking for a place where the bank looked solid and not slippery. “Not yet. I’ll run tests for standard pollutants before I start looking for anything that might be caused by a merman.” Whatever that might be.
    I paced back and forth. Had to find the right spot. A spot where there was no chance of me reaching over too far and falling in. A spot where I wouldn’t have to lie on my stomach in the mud and reach down the bank.
    “Oh, for God’s sake. Give me the vials.” Alex held out his hand and I forked them over. So I’m a little afraid of water. I’m a wizard. We don’t do water.
    He squatted and stretched a long arm over the bank’s edge, filling the vials and handing them back to me for stoppering. I held one up and looked through it at the sun rising over the river. It looked like a roux gone awry. “This is nasty stuff.”
    “Tell me about it.” Alex grabbed the hem of my T-shirt and dried his hands, getting a kick in the shins for his effort. He grinned. “See why I tell you not to drink the tap water?”
    “I never drink tap water.” I drank soda and juice and wine and, on really bad days, bourbon. I had nothing to fear from the river.
    I put the vials in the glove box of my Pathfinder and rejoined Alex at the nearest table. He’d stretched out on the concrete top, doing crunches. I peeled the wrapper off a chocolate bar and sat on the bench, enjoying the view—and I wasn’t looking at the river. Just because Alex and I had agreed to be friends without benefits didn’t mean I’d been stricken blind.
    He finished some ridiculous number of reps and moved to the bench next to me. “So we have mer troubles in Plaquemines Parish? Give me the details, or should I say the details according to Jean Lafitte.” He raked his hands through his thick hair and trained dark brown eyes on my face. His eyes were the same color as my Hershey bar, and equally melt-worthy. “He didn’t try anything with you, did he?”
    If Alex was jealous, I couldn’t tell it, even with my empathic abilities, and it wasn’t fair that part of me wanted him to be. Besides, his and the pirate’s hatred was mutual. Alex didn’t despise Jean because he might sully my honor or even because the man was a thieving pirate. Alex despised Jean because, as one of the historical undead, he was virtually immortal. My partner couldn’t kill him. Such indestructibleness placed Jean in a gray area, and Alex liked things sharp and structured and straightforward.
    Jean hated Alex for essentially the same reason. The short-term pleasure he’d enjoy from killing Alex wouldn’t be worth the problems it would cause with the Elders. My partner and the pirate were at a homicidal stalemate.
    I gave Alex an account of my conversation with Jean, omitting the little detail about the