Black Rose

By Jenna Ryan

New Orleans nightclub owner Mia LeMay’s protected Creole world shatters when she witnesses a murder and she’s forced to put her life in the hands of a man she’s never met. A man whose golden eyes hide as many dark, dangerous secrets as the killer who wants her dead.

Guilt twists like a knife in Agent Rick Ryder’s gut. He has a personal stake in keeping the black-haired beauty safe, and once his superiors figure out the stunt he pulled to make sure he’s the one protecting her, his life will be worth about as much as hers if he fails.

Deep in the Louisiana mangroves, the steamy bayou has nothing on the heat of desire surrounding them. But danger lurks in the shadows. Things that slither. Things that bite. And an evil determined to make sure Mia doesn’t live to see the light of another dawn…

Each book in The Shadow Sisters Series is a standalone story that can be enjoyed in any order.
Book #1: Black Rose
Book #2: Blood Orchid
Book #3: Scarlet Bells
Book #4: Dark Lily

• Language: English
• Publisher: Macmillan Publishers
• Release date: Aug 21, 2017
• ISBN: 9781640632936

Jenna Ryan

Growing up, romance always had a strong appeal for Jenna Ryan, but romantic suspense was the perfect fit. She tried out a number of different careers, but writing has always been her one true love. That and her longtime partner, Rod. Inspired from book to book by her sister Kathy, she lives in a rural setting fifteen minutes from the city of Victoria, British Columbia. She loves reader feedback. Email her at [e-mail] or visit Jenna Ryan on Facebook.

Book preview

Black Rose

The Shadow Series, Book 1

Jenna Ryan

Table of Contents

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter One

About the Author

Discover more suspense titles from Entangled…

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Secrets and Sins: Raphael

Reckless Honor

Double Jeopardy

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

Copyright © 2015 by Jacqueline Goff. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.

Entangled Publishing, LLC

2614 South Timberline Road

Suite 105, PMB 159

Fort Collins, CO 80525

[e-mail]

Select Suspense is an imprint of Entangled Publishing, LLC.

Edited by Heidi Shoham

Cover design by Fiona Jayde

Cover art from iStock

eBook ISBN 978-1-64063-293-6

Manufactured in the United States of America

First Edition October 2015

Republished August 2017

Dear Reader,

Thank you for supporting a small publisher! Entangled prides itself on bringing you the highest quality romance you’ve come to expect, and we couldn’t do it without your continued support. We love romance, and we hope this book leaves you with a smile on your face and joy in your heart.

xoxo

Liz Pelletier, Publisher

To my agent, Jill Marsal. You jumped on board without hesitation and did a great job. Thanks for everything.

Chapter One

Helene knew she’d had too much to drink. That wasn’t wise in a world so far removed from her own.

The Louisiana bayou was her home. Nothing of New Orleans lived there. The city was a viper, a red-lipped lady of the night. She crooked a sly finger at unsuspecting souls, then stood back and laughed as those who dwelled in her dark dens and shadowy cellars crawled out to commit their crimes.

It was overdone, Helene decided. The music, the noise, the lights. The masks so happily worn by so many of the crazed inhabitants. She needed air and a moment to calm her spinning head.

She needed help.

Drinking herself into a catatonic state wouldn’t bring her sister back, and it wouldn’t do her already damaged liver any good either. Despite the bourbon that clouded her mind and the layers of fog that shrouded the entire French Quarter, Helene wove an unsteady path through the back rooms of the seamy club that had lured her through its doors three long hours ago.

A small exit opened to a narrow alley. The brick walls and wrought iron blurred from the liquor she’d consumed. The air, cool and damp, slid like soothing fingers over the careworn lines of her face.

A stone archway to her right came and went at the whim of the thickening fog. Tiny balconies with stingy lights and bare, black railings peered down at her. Maybe empty, maybe not. The fog refused to keep still and let her see.

She tried not to stumble as she followed the music and traffic noise toward the street. There were answers to be had here about her sister Madeleine’s murder. Somewhere in this wicked city, there was one person who would listen to her, who would hear her. One person who’d believe.

A rift in the pavement almost sent her to the ground. Although something in the alley began to drag and scrape behind her, a faint glow of light ahead relieved her mind. So did a break in the fog that widened to reveal a single cheerful balcony. There, two levels up, blood-red petunias spilled from a shiny planter box. She smiled, delighted by the fluted heads that hung over the sides as if waiting to greet passersby.

Different music reached her now, a blend of smoky jazz and cabaret, heavy on the saxophone. Madeleine had loved saxophones, she recalled. And petunias.

A crunch of pebbles close behind her stopped the memory cold. Alarm feathered over her skin. She clutched her sweater tight and forced herself to turn. To look. To see with her eyes what her mind couldn’t make out.

I have no abilities, she said to the shadows that shifted and stirred. I’m not gifted with the sight as my sister was. I am unarmed.

So you say, old woman.

The man’s voice was distorted. It came from nowhere and everywhere. It chilled her blood and caused her flesh to prickle.

The knuckles holding her sweater whitened. My name is Helene, she said clearly. I mean no harm to anyone.

His chuckle seemed to crawl right inside her. That’s not the story I got, Helene.

She heard a sharp click, felt her heart thump and her organs turn to jelly. More pebbles crunched underfoot.

Not that I care, you understand. He chuckled again. I make it a point not to care.

She saw his right hand and gasped. Clawed fingers sank into her hair and gave a ruthless yank. A knife blade gleamed. For a moment, so did his eyes.

The fog ripped apart—a curtain snatched to one side. She spied the petunias again, their deep red color a perfect match for the blood that spilled from her throat onto her desperate fingers.

Those pretty hanging heads watched her slide to the ground. They were the last things her terrified eyes took in.

Except…

…

Just one glass of wine, Mia thought. Merlot, partly because she was in the mood for plums, but mostly because the undisputed expert at her club had given her a bottle of 1965 from his personal cellar.

The gift told her plainly he wanted a raise. Anticipating him, she’d authorized a fifteen percent salary hike that very afternoon. A wine connoisseur who did double duty as her assistant and excelled in both areas was simply too valuable to lose.

She took the carpeted back stairs to the second floor of her sexy French Quarter lounge. The Rose Noire had what she called layers. Mia had backlit over twenty subtle alcoves and niches, created atmosphere with lush plants, to-die-for seating and tossed in enough scented shadows to make her Creole aunts weep.

Mellow jazz trailed her up the staircase. Mia wore black because it suited her, but disliking severity, she dressed it up with scarlet nail polish, red lip gloss and a pair of ruby-red earrings that peeked out from the long, straight sweep of her dark hair. Razor-cut bangs, also long, framed eyes the color of a Caribbean mist and highlighted the slashing cheekbones she’d inherited from her bayou-born grandmother.

The Rose Noire Lounge, together with the Midnight Moon Tearoom next door, had been her grandmother’s vision. The dream, not quite realized in her lifetime, had been dismissed by her daughter and only child. Mia’s mother had married young to escape the swamp, produced a child of her own to seal the deal, put seven years of halfhearted effort into a loveless marriage and then traded her husband and daughter in for a lesbian affair that had drawn her cross-country from New Orleans to San Francisco.

Mia had no idea where she was now and, frankly, no longer cared. Her father and grandmother had raised her. Although they’d died several years ago, she still had five aunts, her French Quarter club, her tearoom and, currently, a glass of vintage Merlot in her hand. Life could be a great deal worse.

She spotted the fog the moment she entered her office. Pleased, she left the overheads off. A mauve bulb burned soft and low on a balcony that invited her to sip her wine in a cocoon of relative silence.

Opening the double French doors, she stood for a moment absorbing the night. It was like stepping into a film noir, a black-and-white world with a punch of red, courtesy of the petunias she’d coaxed from seedlings into a riot of beautiful summer blossoms.

Pleased with a green thumb she hadn’t realized she possessed, Mia took a savoring drink. Because the air smelled delicious, she slipped off her stilettos and gave her hair a liberating toss. Then she caught a muffled thud and lowered her gaze to the alley.

Time froze. The scene below condensed. A single black-and-white frame separated itself from the rest of the film. Nothing and no one moved. Until she blinked. Finally, slowly, the clock began to tick once again.

She saw blood, a fountain of it, pouring from an old woman’s throat. She spied the terror stamped on the woman’s face. She glimpsed a hand, a man’s. One of his fingers was missing. Her shocked mind realized so was most of his face.

No, not missing. Covered. Invisible in the darkness of the alley. He had a black cap pulled low over his forehead and a black scarf tied across his nose and mouth.

But his eyes… Now those were clearly visible. Deep gold and exquisitely shaped, they sharpened to a diamond gleam as they followed a line from the old woman’s dying gaze straight to hers.

…

Twenty-four hours later, Mia’s visitor knocked once. As a token, she imagined. She hadn’t had a moment of actual privacy all day.

Ms. LeMay? A man’s head appeared around the edge of the door.

Seated in her plush office chair, legs crossed and seemingly at ease, she met his chocolate-brown eyes. If you’re Crucible, come in.

He stepped inside, surprising her with his size. At six-five plus, he was large boned, broad shouldered and fit. African American, for the most part, and dressed head to toe in black. Not a flicker of concern registered for the Magnum she held in her lap.

She indicated a deep chair angled across from her. Have a seat.

A smile touched his lips. You’re keeping the desk between us, I see. In the event I’m not who or what I claim to be?

I know what you are. Who sent you is more of a mystery.

His gaze didn’t falter as he set what appeared to be a business card on her desk. He turned it so she could see the sketched outline of a man’s profile.

We believe this is the calling card of the person responsible for the murder of Helene Dubose, the woman you saw die last night. We have no name. We have no information at all, other than the fact that a card like this has been left at the scene of several murders.

How many murders exactly?

Including the one you witnessed, six.

"This was a serial killing then?

I would say yes to that and qualify it by adding that the killings have spanned two years and three states. The victims are generally unconnected. The one link we’ve recently established does connect two of the victims. They’re sisters. But even with that knowledge, we’re baffled. On the plus side, we located a witness after the fourth death, which occurred right here in New Orleans.

Mia’s eyes remained steady, though her gun hand threatened to tremble. Captain Martin told me about your witness. He was shot in the back of the head while climbing into the police car that would have taken him to the parish precinct. Guess that makes me luckier than him. Or maybe just less of a risk.

The man called Crucible sat back to study her. Do you really believe the murderer will assume you didn’t see his face, Ms. LeMay?

I didn’t see his face. He knows it, and so do you.

And yet you’re holding a gun.

I grew up in the bayou, she said simply. I’m not naive. Look, Crucible—is that what I’m supposed to call you? By a code name?

I’m a government agent.

Mia thought his smile had a definite gator-like quality.

I’m one of several agents, he explained. Collectively, you could call us an integrated group of uneasy allies.

"And as uneasy allies, you expect me to believe that whatever plan your integrated group has devised will keep me alive?"

Uneasy isn’t a synonym for inept, Ms. LeMay.

Obviously, you haven’t met my cousin Franklin. At Crucible’s mildly curious expression, she shrugged. He’s a chiropractor. He creates more spinal problems than he cures. He had a nervous breakdown three months ago. She swept a hand toward the door. Judging from the five police officers downstairs, the seven on the street and the three in the stairwell, are we talking about a safe house?

That would be standard procedure. Unfortunately, in situations like these, safe houses have a less-than-acceptable rate of success. Somewhere in the neighborhood of sixty percent.

Mia tipped her lips into a cool smile. Not the best odds, but possibly better than my chances of climbing in and out of a police car alive.

Yet you did both quite successfully last night. Twice in fact. Once going to the station, and again on the ride home. He sat forward in his chair. We have a somewhat different plan in mind for you, Mia. May I call you Mia?

It’s my name. She regarded him through her lashes. Does this plan involve me leaving New Orleans?

I couldn’t say.

Apparently, he wanted to dance. Obliging him, she relaxed her smile. Oh, I think you could, Crucible, if you put your mind to it. Don’t leave all the dirty work to whatever watchdog or dogs you’ve chosen to stick me with.

One dog, he said.