New Orleans started out as a place to hide -- a refuge from the unfairness of the long arm of the law -- but now Nick is actually enjoying life again. There's his music, of course, which has kept Nick occupied for most of his life: as a youth growing up on the burgeoning jazz scene in his home of St. Louis and up through the turbulent years in Chicago, where is life changed forever.

It wasn't even Nick's fault - hell, Nick wasn't even supposed to be playing that night at the Royal Blues, a popular nightclub on Chicago's east side and a popular gangster hangout. In the middle of a set a fist fight broke out between two thugs, both white and (as most people thought) both gangsters. One of the men pulled a knife, and the other a gun, so Nick decided to intervene before the fight turned deadly, so he clobbered than man with the gun over the head with a chair while a friend did the same to the other thug. The fight abruptly stopped, and after coming to, the thug with the knife slipped out of the club. The hoodlum with a gun never woke up. Nick didn't think he hit him very hard, but the man was dead as a doornail. Joey, the nightclub manager, searched the man's pockets and discovered more bad news: he was a policeman! Nick new he should have remained on the scene and explained his case (he had plenty of witnesses), but common sense prevailed. This is a white man's world and a black man who kills a white man only has a noose in his future.

Nick ran fast and far. He first went back to St. Louis, where he changed his name. He then traveled onto Memphis, where he spent a few months playing on the scene before changing his name yet again and heading south to New Orleans.

Nick found work at a seedy club in the Harlem of Rampart Street, and settled into what he thought would be a lonely life away from his home. That was before he met Mona, the Mojo Queen of Rampart Street. Mona "adopted" Nick and helped him find a job at a better club, and also introduced him to Simoné, a sweet and fiery girl who sings some nights at the club where Nick plays. Nick has become quite close with Simoné, and they now share a suite of apartments near Mona's place.

Life looks pretty good to Nick right now, but he still feels insecure about his past, of which Simoné is aware and, he suspects, Mona has guessed. If only he could gain some extra cash to buy a home, marry Simoné and settle down in New Orleans for good.