Kiss Them Goodbye

by Stella Cameron

  Louis’s neck had been slashed so deep his head rested at an impossible angle on top of his briefcase and the dark splotches she’d seen were his blood. Blood everywhere, blood that turned his shirt and jacket black.

  Across his chest rested a single white rose.

  Chapter 4

  Rain came through the windows in the kitchen ceiling. Spike waited for Charlotte to notice but she was busy making pastry, a hazelnut crust for a leek and Brie pie. He was used to simple meals, quickly prepared, and only Wendy kept him just about on the straight and narrow with the main food groups.

  He closed the windows.

  Vivian had been gone half an hour or more. It wasn’t his place to mention this to Charlotte.

  The vegetables he’d finished cutting up were in a pressure cooker and he’d cleaned the chopping block. Everywhere he looked he imagined Vivian there, doing whatever she did, and the feelings he got disturbed him. He wasn’t a man who moved fast when it came to women, not anymore. Once he’d made that mistake…no, not a mistake—his haste had given him Wendy.

  “Vivian goes off on her own like this,” Charlotte said without looking up. “Always has. She thinks a lot and likes a little time alone sometimes. She’s unusual in the kind of way that catches a person’s interest.”

  “I can tell she’s unusual,” Spike said with honesty.

  “She doesn’t have a temper, mind. Just never gets cross. Very easygoing, very reliable. A good mind, too, and creative.”

  Spike said, “I’m sure.”

  “Never a bad word about a soul,” Charlotte continued. “Heart of gold and the patience of a saint.”

  He crossed his arms and rested his chin on his chest. If he didn’t know better he’d think Vivian’s mother was giving a commercial message about her girl.

  From the corner of her eye, Charlotte saw Spike lean against a counter and seem deep in thought. She had good instincts where men were concerned. She’d always been able to pick out the good ones and she was sure Spike Devol was one of the best. David had been the best of all and she’d picked him for herself. Fortunately he’d picked her, too, and they’d made love at first sight a reality.

  She blinked back tears she rarely indulged and finished rolling out her crust.

  The silence grew too long for Spike. “Is Vivian your only child?”

  “One and only. We would have liked more but it just didn’t happen.”

  “Maybe there’s just one child meant specially for some of us?” he suggested, feeling awkward.

  “I’d like to meet your Wendy,” Charlotte said. “I hear she’s a sweet one. But you’re young, you’ve got plenty of time to have more beautiful children. Would you like more?”

  Charlotte Patin asked her questions easily so even the real personal ones didn’t sound out of line, not too much out of line. “I can’t think about that now. Between bein’ Deputy Sheriff and runnin’ a business—and keeping up with a busy little girl and an ornery, well, with my dad—there isn’t much time left over.”

  “But you wouldn’t mind having more?” The crust moved magically from a board to cover a full pie dish. “Sometimes more are easier, or so I’ve been told.”

  “I guess I wouldn’t mind,” Spike said with the sensation that he’d finally said what Charlotte wanted to hear, although if she was matchmaking he couldn’t understand why. Vivian could have any man she wanted and even if she were attracted to him, which he just thought she might be, she wouldn’t be interested in getting too close to his baggage.

  “Better get on with it, then,” Charlotte said. “It’s best to have your children when you’re young so you’re still young when they leave you. Then it’s time for the second honeymoon, the one that keeps on going.”

  Spike’s smile charmed Charlotte. She decided he made her feel a whole lot younger herself. Dimples like that, and those teeth. His children couldn’t help being handsome—any more than Vivian’s could.

  “I do believe you’re laughing at me, Spike Devol,” she said, tipping her head on one side.

  “Just smiling at the thought of beautiful babies,” he told her. “Now that’s a picture worth smiling about. When you hold your own baby for the first time—” he shook his head “—you feel the happiest you ever felt, then sad at the same time because that moment is too short. I like having the memory.”

  Well, Charlotte thought, if he wasn’t the nicest man she’d met in a long time. Not opposed to more children, either, and a hard worker. It was time Vivian married and had some grandchildren—children that was, grandchildren for Charlotte who was wasted without any. She decided not to mention Spike’s father. She’d already heard Homer’s reputation around Toussaint. Word had it that he was a bitter man with no time for women.

  “Everyone says your dad idolizes little Wendy,” she said. Couldn’t be any harm in saying that.

  “She’s the only one he gives a damn about.”

  Charlotte looked at him and smiled a little. He blushed easily and she liked that. “That must be what he wants you to think. I never did meet a parent who didn’t love their own child.”

  Spike wasn’t so sure about that but he kept his own counsel. “I can watch things here if you want to go check on Vivian.” That sounded nonchalant enough. He was beginning to worry she’d hidden herself away because she didn’t want to be around him.

  “No need,” Charlotte said lightly. “She probably decided to shower and change. The day kinda got away from us.”

  Spike spent a few satisfying moments considering Vivian in the shower, then rubbing her skin dry until it turned pink.

  The front doorbell rang and the heavy door opened, then shut with a reverberating thud. Eventually a voice he recognized as belonging to Cyrus called from the passageway into the behind-stairs area, “Charlotte, where are you?”

  “In the kitchen,” she called back. “Come on in.”

  Cyrus entered, his black hair plastered to his head and his shirt stuck to his shoulders and chest.

  “You’re soaked,” Spike said. “It must be tipping down to do that on the way from your car.”

  “Come stand by the oven,” Charlotte told Cyrus. “Let me guess, you won’t listen to reason because you know everything, so that beat-up Chevy of yours is parked out by the road yet again.”

  Cyrus looked sheepish. “Be nice to my Chevy,” he said of the maroon station wagon he’d driven for years and which several parishioners managed to keep running most of the time. “I park it there because it’s easier if I need a tow truck.” His shirt started to steam a little in the warmth from the oven. “Remind me to fill you in on Ozaire Dupre, Spike. He’s hopping mad about you taking food out of his family’s mouths…his words. Exaggeration, of course.”

  Spike ground his back teeth. “There’s enough boiling business for both of us in this town. He just thinks he should get it all. Okay, we’ll get to him later.” Ozaire was the custodian at St. Cécil’s and his wife, Lil, kept house for Cyrus. Spike didn’t know how anyone could put up with them.

  “Put your troubles aside, Father, you’re in plenty of time for a good, hot meal,” Charlotte said and grimaced. “We had company that didn’t want to go home and she made me late with dinner.”

  “I’ve eaten,” Cyrus said. “Thanks anyway. Madge made us muffulettas that must have weighed a pound apiece. That girl can make magic with a mess of oysters and mud-bugs.”

  “She surely can,” Spike agreed. Cyrus and Madge sometimes troubled him. The priest was married to his calling and his church and Madge served the man and his passions with cheerful efficiency, but Spike had known both of them too long not to have felt the bond between them, the unrequited love—at least on Madge’s part, and Cyrus’s affection and protectiveness toward her.

  “You hung up on me, Charlotte,” Cyrus said.

  Spike watched the woman’s facial expression with interest. He’d swear she had no recollection of hanging up on Cyrus.

  “I did not,” she said. “Well, maybe I didn’
t exactly say goodbye but you shocked me when you said Louis had come to Rosebank and left without seeing us.”

  “But you’re okay, just disappointed?”

  “Mad would be closer,” Charlotte said. “Just wait till I talk to that man.”

  This time it was the phone that jangled and Charlotte plucked a cordless off the wall. “Rosebank.” The look on her face put Spike on alert. Cyrus also watched her closely. “What’s wrong?” Her voice rose. “You sound as if you’re outside. Where are you calling from? Your cell phone’s here by the sink. No, I won’t put Spike on the line. Tell me what’s goin’ on right now.”

  She listened for not more than two seconds before thrusting the receiver at Spike. “She’ll only speak to you. I don’t know what’s happened.”

  “Hey, Vivian,” he said. There was no reason to be elated she’d asked for him but he was anyway.

  He could hear her teeth chattering but she didn’t answer him. Boa yapped in the background.

  “Vivian?”

  “Yes, sorry. Something awful has happened. I need help.”

  “Stay calm,” he said out of habit. “Where are you?”

  “In the grounds out front of the house.”

  He stopped himself from asking what she was doing there. “Are you hurt?” He headed for the front door, catching up his Stetson as he went.

  “I’m fine. No, I’m not fine, I’m scared. It’s Louis Martin. He’s been hurt.”

  “I’m on my way. Guide me to you. Hang on.” He turned back and said, “Cyrus, stay with Charlotte and be ready in case we need to get more help.”

  “Please hurry,” Vivian said. “It’s terrible. I can’t leave. You can’t leave someone like this.”

  “That’s right,” he said. “I’m coming to you. I’m outside the house now. Standing on the steps.”

  She gave him directions and he followed them, quickly getting drenched himself. Each time he looked at the ground, water ran from the brim of his hat. Edging between potted laurels, he saw the flashlight she’d told him she had. He still had to walk a winding track to where a couple more laurels blocked the way. Then he pushed through and saw a car. He turned his own flashlight on Vivian who leaned against the trunk of the vehicle, her head dropped forward and a phone pressed to her ear. She held a destroyed white rose in the same hand. He turned his phone off.

  “Hey, hey,” he said, running to her. A man’s leg extended from the open driver’s door. “Everything’s okay, sweetheart. Here, hold on to me. Let me use your phone to call for the local law then I’ll get you into the house.” He considered putting his Stetson on her but she’d only be more uncomfortable with her wet hair pressed to her head.

  Vivian fell into his arms. “You are the law.”

  “This isn’t my jurisdiction. One way to make sure you don’t get along with the guys in a neighboring parish is to interfere with their turf. And, unfortunately, I have some history in Iberia. I worked here once and managed to step on the wrong toes.”

  “You’re the law,” she repeated as if he hadn’t spoken. “Louis is dead. I checked. He doesn’t have a pulse. They slit his throat. There’s blood everywhere.”

  Spike held her face against his shoulder and bent to see inside the car. “You looked for a pulse?”

  “There isn’t one.”

  “You’ve got guts.” The corpse wasn’t a pretty sight. Spike wished he could have spared Vivian this. He eased back and looked into her face, what he could see of it. Her hair obscured all but the spaces she’d made to see and speak. “Your mama said your phone was in the kitchen.”

  “This is Louis’s.”

  He swallowed. “Where’d you find it?”

  “In his briefcase. I had to pull it from under his head. It was awful. I thought it was going to…fall off,” she finished in a whisper.

  “Hush.” All he could think of was how badly she’d interfered with evidence. “The thorns on that rose are going to mess up your fingers.”

  “They…I mean whoever did this left the flower on his chest.” She swallowed and swallowed as if she would vomit. “They—someone kissed him on the cheek. I don’t think they did it with lipstick. I think they put their mouth in his blood.”

  Shee-it. Sick bastard had set the scene all right. Too bad Vivian had been the one to stumble on it. He’d dealt with these situations before and he knew to expect her to have problems dealing with what she’d experienced. His next thought was about Errol Bonine, the lazy detective who would definitely be assigned to the case. Wait till he saw what had been done to his crime scene. And finding Spike in the vicinity would only make the slob’s night.

  Running with mixed water and blood, and obviously covered with Vivian’s prints, the victim’s phone was so contaminated Spike figured he might as well use it. If the instrument had been in the briefcase, with Martin’s head on top of it, chances were the killer never touched or even saw it. He held it between finger and thumb to call the police, was patched through to Bonine at home, and had to listen to the ass’s warnings not to put his nose into Errol’s business if Spike knew what was good for him. Officers would be arriving to make sure nothing was touched and nobody left the scene, Bonine told him, but Spike should fill in until they got there.

  He clicked off and turned back for the house, supporting Vivian and with her little dog running circles around them. “Cry if you need to,” he said. “Sometimes it helps. You’re in shock. Bound to be.”

  She didn’t answer him.

  “Whoever did that was trying too hard.”

  “What do you mean?” Her voice sounded faint and choked.

  “He—if it was a he and the chances are it was—he went overboard with the setup. Made it almost comic.”

  “Not funny,” she mumbled.

  “Not funny,” he agreed and tried to brush more of her hair out of her face.

  She clung to him fiercely enough to dig her nails into his flesh. “Like a serial killer. They do things like that, don’t they? Leave the signs each time they kill because they want people to know it’s them.”

  “Some do,” he said. “Although they don’t do much singing until they’re caught and want bragging rights behind bars. But let’s not think about this being a first killing with more to follow. Could be isolated and the perp tossed in the window dressing to throw us off.”

  “Spike.” She looked up at him. “I want you to do this, not a stranger.”

  If he had time for the luxury, he’d be flattered. “I’ll give you any personal help you’ll let me, but I have to defer to the local guys.”

  “Will you be with me when they come?”

  He groaned inwardly, anticipating Errol’s sneering displeasure. “If you want me, I’ll be there.”

  “I want you.”

  Timing had never been his friend. If he was going to be as much help as he could around here, he’d have to make sure he kept his head clear and his hormones under control. Hell, that shouldn’t be hard. He was a professional.

  He’d barely steered Vivian into the hall, and confronted Charlotte and Cyrus, when the sound of a siren reached them.

  Cyrus said, “Bad?”

  Spike nodded and said, “That’ll be a patrol car. The officers will start sealing off the—they’ll do their thing.”

  “Oh, Vivian.” Charlotte reached for her daughter, but if Vivian noticed she chose to ignore the gesture.

  What Spike felt was entirely too conflicted to be appropriate. That would change and quickly. “Let your mother help you get dry,” he said. “I need to speak with the police. Charlotte, I also need a plastic bag right now.”

  Vivian dropped her hands at once, but she shook her head, turning down any assistance from Charlotte, who didn’t waste time arguing. She sped away and returned with a self-sealing plastic bag and opened it for Spike to drop Louis Martin’s phone inside. He set it on a marble-topped demi-lune table and rested the mangled rose on top.

  “We could go into the kitchens maybe,” Cyrus said—ev
er the diplomat. “Get out of the hall so we don’t look like we’re hovering.”

  A young officer arrived at the door. Spike expected him to ask exact directions to the scene and to tell them they should all remain in the house. The man looked at Spike as if he knew him and said, “Detective Bonine said you’d make sure nobody leaves before he gets here.”

  He left and they turned to get out of the hall.

  They never made it to the kitchens before Errol Bo-nine clomped in without so much as a knock. “Detective Bonine,” he said, flashing his badge around. “Who found the stiff?”

  Errol watched too many big city cop shows and subtlety had never been his middle name. His partner, as slim and fit-looking as Errol was paunchy—and sloppy—looked vaguely apologetic. Spike figured Bo-nine had cowed the younger man into being no more than his errand boy.

  A few years earlier Errol had tried that on Spike and found out he had a maverick on his hands, a maverick with brains. From that day on, stomping on anyone who might make it easy for Errol to keep up his cozy arrangements with the local muscle had become Spike’s reason to live.

  Eventually Spike had taken a walk down an alley. He didn’t remember that alley so well when he woke up in hospital, beaten to a pulp. He’d been told he was fired for jeopardizing the reputation of the force, and pressured out of New Iberia.

  “Best get over the shock,” Errol said to the company, yanking his tightly cinched pants higher under his belly. He wore a heavy khaki duster which probably accounted for his redder than usual face and the sweat running from beneath his greased-back gray hair and down his shiny jowls. Errol had always loved his duster and apparently thought it turned him into a romantic figure, a cowboy cop, although he never let anyone forget he was a detective. “Givin’ in to weakness slows things down. Who found the body?”

  “I did,” Vivian said in barely a whisper.

  “You didn’t say who you were,” Spike said to Errol’s partner.

  The man fumbled to produce his badge. “Wiley. Frank Wiley.”