A blonde receptionist who looked about 19 put me in a small square waiting room off the lobby of Clement Security even though Jerry Clement had told me to drop in around 1 p.m.
I’d donned a fresh blue shirt with the courtroom suit and a crisp new tie, red with little blue diamonds. Someone in the shop where I’d bought it had told me it should be good for job interviews. I’d been clean-shaven when I arrived. I wondered how much of a shadow I’d have before anyone saw me.
I’d never really liked Jerry. He talked faster than an auctioneer and louder than Al Hirt’s trumpet. He was showy and superficial, and somehow a lot of people failed to see through it. My curse was that I could, and he was still my last life preserver.
I read through a stack of issues of Security magazine and felt versed in the best software choice for physical security information management when I finished. All of it was exponentially more interesting than it would have been under other circumstances, even in my old bunk.
I was fighting the urge to yank the tie away from my throat and unbutton my collar when the receptionist stepped into the doorway, as cool, efficient and demeaning as any prison guard.
“Mr. Clement can see you now.”
I followed her back through the lobby and along a narrow hallway. The building had been a residence once upon a time, but renovations had given it an innovative feel, and a decorator had placed edgy still lifes in steel frames and other strategic items to make it feel cutting edge.
Behind his cherry wood desk, more shiny silver frames featured pictures of Jerry with New Orleans leaders and Louisiana governors, the ones without indictments or convictions. I suspected the wall would face more editing after the next round of grand jury sessions. We were in New Orleans, and in the bigger picture Louisiana. Huey Long once said the officials serving under him would wind up in the penitentiary if they were ever left unchecked with the power he’d given them. After he was assassinated, that proved true, and it always seemed to repeat. Katrina washed away a lot, but not the corruption.
The current iteration of Jerry sat at the desk in a lavender shirt he’d never have worn as a detective. He poured over an electronic tablet. His hair had been clipped into spikes on top to de-emphasize the thinning. A comb-over would’ve done the job in his cop days.
“Have a seat,” he said without looking up.
The guest chairs were covered in forest green vinyl. I managed to choose one that exhaled as I settled in.
“You’ve been on an interesting ride, Si.”
“That I have.”
“Technicalities are what it all turns on.”
“They wanted to make an example of me.” Speaking of trying to stop corruption post Katrina.
“I’m glad things turned around. My gut clenched when I read that first verdict in the Picayune. Then the sentencing. Jeeze.”
He lifted his head from the tablet. His long face bore a few more wrinkles than I remembered, mostly around the eyes, but he had a nice tan. He’d either found some time for Aruba or a tanning bed.
“All a big show.” He shook his head. “What are you looking for?”
“Something to keep me busy until I run for sheriff.”
That brought a chuckle, but after a while he shook his head again. It seemed to make him sad and tired. He wished I wasn’t there, but he didn’t want to throw me out.
“Half of what I do here is image.”
No shit, I thought, but kept it to myself.
“I didn’t think you’d put me on the marquee, but I can handle the stuff that’s not glamorous. I’m even ready to put on a uniform and stroll around warehouses.”
“Word would get around. Wouldn’t take long, I’d be the firm with the gunslinger on the payroll. Make some people nervous. Big clients.”
It was the same song with more specific verses. Had everybody I knew gone to the same choir rehearsal?
“Maybe it could be a selling point.”
That produced a little exhale that was part of a nervous laugh.
“Anything on the software side? I could get up to speed on the cyber. I did a lot of reading while I sat around my cell.”
“Then I got an ex-con behind their firewalls. I can’t do it. You know the drill. I would if I could.”
“Come on, Jerry. You’ve got people on your client list that have to keep their sleeves rolled up because they’re elbow deep in so many cookie jars.”
“Different kind of dirt, my friend. Best I can do is be a reference, say I’m confident you’re on the straight and narrow.”
“Where the hell else am I going to go with that rec?” If he referred me to Gilbert Lombardi, I was ready to throw a punch. “No offense, Jere, but you weren’t my first stop.”
“No offense, but that means I’m not the only one with regrets.” He stood and offered a hand. “Good luck.”
I let his hand stay open, waiting for a while, but finally I accepted and gave him a shake.
Then I thought about dialing Rose. To find my bottle of bourbon.
Chapter 5
I walked the Quarter a while instead, turning down shoe shine offers and looking for something to take my mind off my problems. I’m not proud of that fact, but that’s what I was doing when I noticed the guy on my tail.
Maybe the wraparound sunshades provided my first tip or maybe it was just instinct. I’d been a cop trying not to look like a cop a time or two in my other life. This guy had a bit of that tinge. To go with the shades, he wore a light black jacket in the Members Only style over a black tee with a tight little rope of stones around his neck just above the collar. The stonewashed jeans had a lot of white stitching. Maybe that had become the style while I’d been inside. I hadn’t had a chance to visit a GAP or whatever shop the kids were frequenting to figure out what the cool crowd was wearing.
Showy watch, rings. Silver band on the right wrist. Could have been bad taste or the kind of thing a cop might choose to accessorize. Same thing with the hair. Dark with iron grey encroaching, combed straight down in front, probably with too much attention and a bit of styling spray. Every time I looked back along Decatur, he was 300 feet behind me, taking an interest in something in a shop window or on the other side of the street. He had to be either working for Rose or one agency or another who wanted to catch me stepping out of line. Prosecutors tend not to like hangnails, and they’ve been known to keep picking at them.
I worked my way through the crowds over to the French Market. If he followed me there, I’d have a pretty good indication we weren’t just seeing the same sights. He didn’t look like someone in the market for garden vegetables. Maybe costume jewelry.
Once I’d moved through the market’s entry arch, I strolled a while under the canopy past purses on posts and alligator on a stick. I had to weave around guys in polo shirts and soccer moms in sun visors, but I’d soon found my way deep enough in to pause in front of a hot sauce display and take a look back.
He’d managed to keep about the same distance. He was testing the texture on a tote bag with New Orleans printed on the side and featuring a rendering of the Quarter by an artist imitating LeRoy Neiman. The guy acted as if a purchase might be imminent.
If he wanted a souvenir tote, it’d be to conceal a handgun.
I made my way along the path between the displays until I could get into the open again. Then I moved at a brisk pace onto the Decatur sidewalk, heading on around a corner of a narrow street called St. Philips. Casual pursuit on his part had ceased to be an option.
I had to hoof it further than I wanted to find a spot to slip into, moving up the street past little cafes, small businesses and residences with black ironwork along second floor balconies. Iron gates also covered a lot of doorways. That meant locked gates.
After a block and a half, I found an open alley between pale buildings and ducked in there, then peeked back around the corner. I’d managed to disappear in an instant the tough guy wasn’t looking my way. He strolled the sidewalk, turning his head fractions to each
side, the shades looking like a scanner gradually panning the perimeter.
A cell came out of a hip pocket, and he spoke to someone. I welcomed the distraction. I waited, leaning against the wall, my heart picking up speed beyond the exertion I’d expended to get here. I countered that with deep breaths and still had to wait a few more seconds before he neared my spot.
I didn’t catch what he was saying just before I grabbed handfuls of his jacket. That interrupted his thought, and he babbled a complaint just before I yanked him from the sidewalk into the space between the buildings.
As I slammed his back against the wall where I’d been pressed and leaned in on him, jamming a forearm against his throat, I noted the newness of his clothes. They were crisp and fresh and had been on the rack recently.
He tried to struggle against me, so I grabbed the cell and listened as I stepped back. I caught just a snippet of a woman’s voice before a sentence finished.
“Hello,” I said.
Whoever was on the other end didn’t respond to a new voice and the screen’s face logged the caller as unknown. A disposable cell like mine? I listened until the connection broke. Redial just got me a series of unanswered rings then a generic electronic voice mail message.
I tossed it back to him and stayed out of swinging range. If I’d wanted to fight him, I would have taken my coat off. I didn’t want to be slinging punches when and if his sidekick showed up. Effective surveillance usually requires two.
“Why are you watching every step I take?”
Maybe I’d plant a musical earworm that would annoy him all day if nothing else.
He grumbled something that trailed into: “…the fuck you’re talking about.”
“Buy any produce or hot sauce in the market?”
He just aimed the sunshades my way.
“Cop?” I asked.
That produced kind of an angry sigh, like I’d asked the inevitable question he didn’t want to answer. He slowly pulled out a badge case. Joseph Culler.
“I’m not on the job.”
“Take it from me, that can get you in trouble. Who asked you to follow me?”
“I work over in Destrehan.”
“Who?”
“Ronnie Lehto’s widow.”
“How long you been following me?”
“Part of yesterday, ’til you walked out of Gilbert Lombardi’s office and bought a bottle. Figured you weren’t going on another job interview with that.”
Wrong about that, but at least he hadn’t seen me being party to an illegal offer.
“What does Joy care what I’m doing?”
He shrugged. “She called Gilbert after you left. Wanted to make sure he didn’t hire you.”
“Same with Jerry Clement?”
“Don’t know if she called yet, but she knows where you went today.”
“What does she fucking care?”
“Her husband’s in the ground. You’re walking around.”
That wasn’t exactly my fault.
“What are you to her?”
He was a little chagrinned, probably for what he was doing and a little for getting caught. Fortunately, that was keeping his natural cop belligerence in check.
“Friend of her brother-in-law. Sister’s husband.”
The news gave me a sad, sick feeling. I was on the bad side of a cop’s widow. Ronnie had been on the wrong side of the line with me, but in the ground made a difference. That had a way of absolving sins.
Didn’t matter he was the one who came to me, pissed off that some muscle for a drug dealer named Rahel Nebay had fucked up his old partner in narcotics in an altercation. They’d slithered out of charges, so he’d come to me to ride shotgun as he kept an eye on them. He hadn’t bought any bubble gum. He imagined we’d be kicking some ass.
We’d been sitting in a personal car, watching the sidekicks and Nebay himself, who’d had a big transaction going down.
Turned out it was an intended show of force for Nebay. The other guys had anticipated that. Some black limos had pulled up at the secluded meeting place that was nowhere near our jurisdiction. All the cypress and hanging moss you’d expect.
Ronnie and I’d been dressed about like Culler, though the jeans showed a little more wear and the shoes had a few more scuffs. We hadn’t bought the outfits just for the occasion the way Culler had.
One of Nebay’s men made us, and suddenly all of the guys focused on us, and we were in a firefight.
Bullets sprayed. I’d pulled a service Glock. Ronnie had yanked his weapon from the spot on his belt he’d wedged it, trusting the safety a little more than I would have. At least it had been handy and let him go down looking heroic.
He got the guy holding the weapon that ended his life. I shot a greasy blond kid about 25 named Leo Maier from Nebay’s opposition. He’d been pulling out something that looked like a Howitzer. He’d had aspirations. My bullet went into his throat before I got a demo of how his weapon’s sound suppression worked.
When the smoke cleared, Ronnie’d been on the ground. I’d debated how to call it in while I got a wadded windbreaker pressed into his chest wound. There hadn’t been a way to spin it. It was what it was, and I still had hopes of keeping Ronnie breathing in the moment. I’d been conscious of his house note, his boat and his wife.
He died in the air ambulance they dispatched since we were in the middle of nowhere, and they found all kinds of interesting charges to throw at me shortly after the bagpipes played and uniformed officers folded the flag on his casket into a neat little triangle.
Photographers had snapped pictures as blue uniforms presented it to Joy, and I’d wound up dodging photographers, the vigilante cop who got his partner killed. It was in a moment the department was polishing its image, so the manslaughter charge stuck.
I tossed Culler back his credentials.
“I could hit you with an assaulting a police officer charge,” he said.
“You want to? When my name goes out, they’re going to come and take pictures of you in that getup. How’s that gonna play?”
He threw up a dismissive gesture.
“Good luck to you,” he said.
That made me feel like crap, this costumed wanna-be tough guy feeling sorry for me. Meanwhile, Joy, who I’d been thinking of, had done the damage she could. I guess she needed someone to blame. She was in pain. I was guilty of not being the one who’d died.
She didn’t need to know every move from here. She’d poisoned the sea. The tide would take her message where it needed to go.
Maybe it was time to think about a new town.
Chapter 6
If I had to rank the levels of hatred toward me by temperature—and why not, we’re talking New Orleans—Joy would have been in the range of 102. My ex-wife Sandra, I’d have to put at 120. Her mom, Charlotte, was a few degrees below that, maybe even the comfortably balmy 90s.
I made a few calls among other family members and listened to assessments of me that peaked in the mid-80s with currents of profanity cresting between minced oath and coarse trends about my parentage. For my trouble, I wound up with Charlotte’s phone number.
Her post-salutation greeting spiked into foul territory before she calmed and listened to my pleadings. Charlotte had trouble with her knees. Sitting still for a while probably didn’t require too much persuasion.
“She doesn’t want to see you,” she said after I’d babbled a couple of minutes. “But she probably needs to.”
I hadn’t quite expected that.
“What do you mean?”
“She’s seeing a character named Finn Alders. I don’t like him.”
After a while, I gleaned that the couple enjoyed recreational substances. I had to hold back my stomach’s contents when layered-on suppositions were articulated—Julianna neglected while they were high was the least of them.
It could have been Charlotte wanting to fuck with my head, but the real intentions of men drawn to single mothers with young daughters rang true enough to
concern me.
“Has anything happened yet?” I asked.
“I don’t think so. I just have a sense there are aspirations. Could be he’s just being good to her.”
Second dad was enough to make me psychotic. Someone named Finn laying hands on Julianna pushed me to the outer darkness.
“Does Sandy have any inkling?”
“Have you ever known her to listen to me? She wouldn’t listen about you. She never listens to anyone.”
“Even about concerns for Juli?”
“He can do no wrong. Isn’t a threat. It’s all my imagination.”
“Where are they, Charlotte?”
“She’d kill me if I told you. You know that.”
“I need to go check on things, at least get a look at the guy.”
“I promised.”
“If Julianna is in danger, that should override a promise. You’re her grandmother.”
“I’m sorry. I’m gonna have to think about it. How do I know you aren’t going to go there and hurt someone else?”
“I shot a drug trafficker in self-defense. Just happened not to be my job. Don’t be absurd on anything else. On the worst day I never did anything to Sandy. You know I’d never hurt the child.”
“Yeah, but I don’t know how much good it would do if you find them and go all Amber Alert on things.”
“Dammit, Charlotte….”
“I think I’m going to hang up for now, Si. I’ll give it some thought.”
“At least take my number.”
She acquiesced at that.
“Try to calm down,” she said after she’d written it down. “I’ll sniff around a little more. Maybe I’m overly suspicious. If I think Finn’s seriously a problem, I’ll get back to you.”
I shouted her name into my phone several times after she broke the connection. Didn’t do much good, and I was left with visions of negligent parents worse than every case I’d ever seen and every cautionary drug propaganda film or Dragnet episode on record.
I couldn’t just stare at the ceiling after that. I looked around the small room and found the folder with my rent agreement. There’d been a printout with a few of the extras I hadn’t really cared about when I’d been looking for a roof.
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