“Welcome to Antoine’s, mes amis. You new in town, yes? I haven’t seen you here before. But not tourists: Antoine’s is for locals. Mardi Gras partiers never seem to find me here.”

I shot a look at Jane. She’d been a regular here in her own world, but this Antoine didn’t know her. That meant there wasn’t another Jane running around this version of New Orleans. I wondered what had happened to her, and then I wondered if there was a me somewhere up in the Pacific Northwest. I still had my police-issue cell phone stuffed in a pocket. I stifled the impulse to pull it out and call the same number, just to see if one Joanne Walker, Seattle Police Department, would pick up.

“We asked around,” Jane said. “A woman called Evangelina Everhart suggested we try this place.”

Antoine’s expression did the same kind of flat dull thing his aura did, again for less than a blink. “Did she now. Master Amaury will have a thing or two to say about that.”

“Amaury?” That was me, wishing I’d kept my mouth shut when both Jane and Antoine gave me a look. At least Lazarus didn’t seem to recognize the name, either, which made me feel slightly better. This world was more like Jane’s than mine. Maybe it was more like Jane’s than Lazarus’s, too. Once we figured out why we were here—and how to get home—I kind of wanted to sit down and compare notes.

“The big man,” Antoine said after a pause just long enough to make me uncomfortable. Long enough to suggest he was looking for the right words rather than just having a casual conversation. “New folk ‘round here are expected to pay him a visit. Evangelina should’ve sent you there, not here. Mighty peculiar that she didn’t.”