Magic and Macaroons by Bailey Cates

Still, I wanted to know.
    “He was a priest,” she said. “A hougan . He had an enemy who was very strong.” She licked her lips. “Stronger than he was.”
    And my father lost. The unsaid words hung in the air between us.
    I reached over and squeezed her arm. A quick glance at her face revealed eyes shiny with tears. I returned my attention to the road. “I’m so sorry, Cookie.”
    Her chin dipped. “As am I. This man we are going to see was a friend of his in Port-au-Prince.”
    I pushed my foot down on the accelerator.

Chapter 8
    Cookie directed me to turn right onto a private drive. We passed under an iron archway with a large sign over it. I turned to her in surprise. “Magnolia Park Senior Care? Your friend works here?”
    She smiled. “No. Though he probably does work here, now that you mention it. Poppa Jack will never stop working until his heart gives out, I suspect. He lives here.”
    Live oaks strewn with Spanish moss lined the winding driveway. We crested a hill, and a large, stately house came into view. It looked more like someone’s elegant home than a senior-care facility, and I suspected Magnolia Park’s historic origins had involved some kind of plantation. A gabled roof rose above the white-and-brick building. Iron trellises decorated—and protected—the lower half of the tall windows on each of three floors, some with ivy or roses climbing up them, others bare to reveal intricate scrolls and swoops of dark metal.
    I parked next to a gray van in the small lot in front, and we exited the car. I glanced at my watch. Almost two-thirty. The smell of new-mown grass and hot asphalt infused the muggy afternoon. We made our way up the front walk, and I pushed the button that automaticallyopened the impressive wooden door. Side by side, we entered. I paused to blink in the comparative darkness, but Cookie whipped off her ginormous sunglasses and marched up to the reception desk.
    As I joined her, the woman behind the desk—Gloria, according to her name tag—reached for a phone and punched in a few numbers. While she waited, her heavily mascaraed eyes assessed her manicure from behind blue-framed glasses. Her hair was twisted up into a French braid on the back of her head, and her matching cotton T-shirt and slacks were a light peach color. “Good afternoon, Jack. You have a visitor.” Her gaze flicked to me. “Are you with her?” she whispered.
    I nodded.
    “Actually, it looks like you have two visitors,” she said into the phone. “Ladies.” A few seconds, and then she nodded. “Okeydoke.” She replaced the receiver and pointed behind her. “Down that hallway, then turn left. Jack’s room is on the right.”
    I thanked her, and we began walking the direction she’d indicated.
    The inside of Magnolia Park was appointed with antiques and plush brocade draperies, but the floor was a dark Marmoleum; nice enough, but out of sync with the rest of the furnishings. Practical though. My thought was confirmed when a white-haired woman in a tailored track suit went whizzing by on a motorized scooter. A fifty-two-inch television took up part of the back wall of the room we were walking through, and the lobby morphed into a general living area. A group of five ladies and one gentleman sat on the sofas arranged in front of it, watching Judge Judy take someone to task. As we passed a doorway, I peered in to see the dining room. Tables laid with white cloths had already been reset for the evening meal, but the air still hinted at a savory lunch.
    Cookie’s heels clicked quickly down the hallway that the nurse at reception had directed us toward, and I hurried after her. She slowed at the end, where we were supposed to turn left, then stopped. I reached her side and put my hand on her arm.
    “You okay?”
    She shot me a look of defiance, but I could see the reluctance there, too. Sudden trepidation bloomed in my own chest. I was about to meet a voodoo priest, and I realized I had no idea what to