In the guard shack, Maureen could see Theriot’s jowly profile illuminated by a laptop computer. As he stared at the screen, he methodically fed potato chips one at a time into his pink mouth. From the look on his face, she guessed he wasn’t watching the video feed of the deserted construction site. Maureen had the impression that had a giant spacecraft descended from the night sky and airlifted away the new jail, Theriot would never have noticed. He didn’t react when she shouted his name. When she got closer, she saw the white wires of his earbuds dropping from the side of his head. She picked up a piece of gravel from the street and bounced it hard off the side of the guard shack. Theriot ducked at the crack of the stone on the metal shed, throwing his earbuds to the floor with a shout and looking around.
“Over here, Theriot,” Maureen said.
“That was you? What the fuck?” Theriot’s eyes widened as he recognized Maureen. “You.”
“Yeah,” Maureen said. “Me. You remember me. I’m the one who should be asking what the fuck. Guess why I’m here.”
Theriot closed his laptop and squeezed through the narrow doorway of the guard shack, meeting Maureen in the street, his keys jingling as he moved. “How should I know?”
“Guess where I’m coming from.”
Theriot shrugged. “Again, I should know?”
“How about LSU Public,” Maureen said, “where I watched video of you and some other toolbox dumping my arrest in the waiting room and disappearing like you’re pulling a high school prank. How about that? You told me you sent her over in an ambulance, but you took her over yourself. You left her in the waiting room and didn’t even tell anyone she was there, or what was wrong with her, or where she came from. How is that acceptable?”
“You don’t understand what had happened,” Theriot said.
“How did you think I wouldn’t follow up on this? That I wouldn’t find out?”
“Because you’re a cop?” Theriot said.
His answer, Maureen realized, was genuine, not a joke or a shot. She watched as the delayed understanding drifted across his face like daylight across a dirty room, the realization that Leary had gone missing, or maybe worse.
He squeezed his temples with one hand. “Shit. I knew it. Fuck. Man, I can’t catch a break. What did she do?”
“Yeah, shit,” Maureen said. The wind kicked up, swirling dust and grit around her legs. “It just so happens we need her now, as part of a homicide investigation, and now she’s fucking gone. I watched her walk out the fucking door.” She cut her hand through the air. “No trace.”
“I called for an ambulance,” Theriot said, wiping a big hand down his now-sweaty face. “It started out right.”
Whatever modest hopes he had for his future in the sheriff’s department, Maureen knew, he felt they were quickly disappearing. She let him keep thinking it.
“I did call,” Theriot insisted. “I swear, but they were gonna make me wait an hour at least. Unless somebody’s bleeding or having a violent seizure or something, they hate coming to the jail. Not for mystery shit like her. I’d have better luck with United Cab. A psych case like her, there’s no place to put her hardly. Our psych beds at the jail are full every night. Nobody wants her. It’s a major pain in the ass for everybody.”
“It’s your fucking job,” Maureen said. “It’s what the sheriff’s department is for. To take care of the jail and the prisoners. Did I miss a memo?”
“What do you think happens,” Theriot said, “if I put a stone-crazy broad like that in my holding cell? You know what that does to the other prisoners? To those other women? Then I got a whole night full of maximum crazy and nobody gets any help. Not me, not you, not her.”
“How is any of this my problem?” Maureen said. “You’re worried about your prisoners. What about the detective I have to tell is short one material witness in a homicide case? What about that? You think I’m gonna eat this shit for you? You think I’m gonna cover for you at my own expense?”
“I’m not asking for that, but have a heart, Officer. Most of our male general population is living in tents, like it’s a fucking war or something.” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “Try doing my job for a week. You’re breaking my balls over one crazy lady? The city’s infested with crime, and we don’t even have a fucking jail.”
“Look, Deputy,” she said, “whether or not I have a heart, you fucked up, and we have to do what we can to fix it. The woman’s name is Madison Leary, and how about you lay off calling her a broad, for starters.”
“Whatever you say, Officer.”
“Did Leary say anything, anything at all, that might indicate where she’s gone?”
Theriot shook his head. “She was mumbling some shit about rabbits, I think. Nothing that made any sense. And then she went blank and limp. I mean, I thought for a minute she’d up and fucking died on us.” He looked around, as if someone else, maybe Leary herself, could be eavesdropping on their conversation. “To be honest, she made me real nervous, she made us all real nervous, all the deputies. I’ve been doing this a while. I’ve seen some shit that’ll straighten your short and curlies. This was something new. We were afraid to touch her, like a wire lying in the street and you don’t know if it’s live or not.”
“But you touched her,” Maureen said.
Theriot raised his hands. “Nothing bad. Nothing inappropriate. We couldn’t leave her lying on the floor, drooling. Me and another deputy, we carried her out to the car, and laid her down in the backseat and drove her over to the hospital. It’s only six blocks. It was best for everybody.” Theriot licked his lips. “When she was lying there in the backseat, she was singing. All the way to the hospital. Real quiet, the words were hard to make out. Something about a butcher’s boy. And the devil. I swear. Gave me the shakes.”
An idea floated across the back of Maureen’s mind. According to what she’d learned tonight, Madison Leary had been on the streets when Gage was killed.
“I didn’t come here for a fucking ghost story,” Maureen said. “Jesus. Grow up.”
“If you saw the security video, you saw the shape she was in. It never even occurred to me that she would wander off. She didn’t seem hardly capable of it. Then some car dumped that shooting victim outside and all hell broke loose after that.”
“And you got caught up in helping the shooting victim,” Maureen said.
Theriot hesitated, thinking for a moment, Maureen knew, that she was throwing him a lifeline. He realized she wasn’t. “He was already at the ER. I don’t know what other help we had to offer. We came back here.” He shook his head, as if he couldn’t believe the situation had turned out as bad as it had, either for him or for Leary. “Listen, are you going to jam me up on this? Did this Leary woman, like, see somebody get killed? How important is she?”
Maureen shrugged. She lit a cigarette. “If it’s between me and you taking the fall, it ain’t gonna be me.”
She couldn’t pinpoint why she was making Theriot squirm the way she was. Because he whined, she thought. Because he whimpered and showed her his soft underbelly without a fight, a weakness that always brought out her claws, cop business or not. She’d hidden Leary’s existence from Drayton. Hidden the whole story of the traffic stop. She’d let Quinn make off with the Post-it note from Gage’s wallet. She was as guilty as Theriot of ass-covering behavior. Was she any better, any different, than this guy? She had no right putting the screws to him.
Theriot licked his lips again, blew out his breath. “C’mon, Officer, cut me a break. I need this job. I got alimony. I got a mortgage.”
“I can’t make any promises,” Maureen said. “You fucked up, that’s on you. You have to live with the consequences. If I have to answer for what happened to Leary, I’m pointing in your direction. I’m not gonna lie to anyone for your sake.”
“I was trying to make the best of a bad situation.”
“You mishandled a prisoner and then lied about it to me,” Maureen said. “You’re lucky you’re not up on charg
es right now. You realize the break I’m cutting you?”
“I wear a uniform, too, you know.” Hands on his hips, Theriot kicked at the gravel in the street. His eyes glistened with tears. “That’s the problem with you cops. You make everyone you talk to feel like a fucking criminal.”
* * *
When she reached the cruiser, Maureen unlocked the trunk and pulled out the jumper cables. She slung them over her shoulder, walking up the wooden ramp and into the intake and processing office. She got as far as the soda machines before she realized the family with the broken-down car was gone.
Alone in the lobby, the deputy reassembled the pages of an abandoned newspaper that had been spread over the chairs.
“The cousin finally showed up,” she said, not looking at Maureen. “How much you wanna bet they never come back for that piece-of-shit car and leave the city to tow it and take care of it, try and chase ’em down for the bill?” She stood, folding the paper and tucking it under her arm. “No wonder I can’t get a damn raise.”
Maureen said nothing, oddly upset and disappointed that the family had solved their transportation troubles without her help. She felt pretty fucking useless, in general.
She turned and walked outside.
As she tossed the cables in the trunk of the cruiser, her phone buzzed in her pocket. She slammed the trunk closed and answered the call. “Coughlin.”
“Where are you?” Preacher asked. Maureen could tell he was unhappy. Lovely.
“Following up on something,” she said.
“I been trying to raise you on the radio for ten minutes,” Preacher said. “You need to tell dispatch if you’re gonna be out of service.”
“Took longer than I thought,” Maureen said, pulling open the car door. “I’m sorry. I’m back at the car right now. What’s going on?”
“Drayton is here,” Preacher said. “Looking for you.”
Maureen’s insides froze. She tried to keep her voice relaxed. “And what did he want?”
“You. He’s hot, Coughlin. Breathing fire.”
“I’m guessing this isn’t a social call.”
“Are you not hearing me? He’s at the district. He didn’t call. He came to our shop for no other reason than to talk to you. Don’t take it as a compliment, it’s not.”
Maureen sat on the bumper of her cruiser, phone at her ear, forehead in her hand. “Is it about the Gage case?”
“He didn’t specify,” Preacher said. “But I can’t imagine another reason he’d be looking for you, can you?”
“No, no, I can’t.” Maureen moved the phone away from her face. She let out a long breath before returning it to her ear. “So he’s waiting there for me?”
“Yes, indeed,” Preacher said. “He’s waiting for you in the break room. But before you talk to him, you’re gonna come see me. I’ll be waiting for you in the parking lot.”
14
Maureen parked the cruiser in the motor pool lot behind the Sixth District building, among several other dinged and dirty units along the chain-link fence topped with razor wire, the cars waiting for washing and maybe touch-up repairs. She spotted Preacher right away, standing over by the trash cans, off to the side of the garage and the building’s back entrance. He gave her a silent nod when she got close. He held a lit cigar between his fingers.
“Give me another minute,” Maureen said. “I gotta pee.”
Another nod, his eyes away from her. Maureen hated it when Preacher didn’t talk.
In the bathroom, she spent a couple of extra minutes on the toilet, elbows on her knees, face in her hands, hiding in the stall. She took long, slow, deep breaths, visualizing her rib cage expanding and contracting, and trying to map out in her head what she’d say to Preacher.
She needed to protect herself, starting right now, from Drayton and whatever he had planned for her, but from Quinn, too, and possibly from Preacher, which may have been what worried her most. And Preacher, Quinn, and Ruiz, they’d be expecting her to protect them from Drayton. She was the buffer between him and whatever it was they were up to. She feared Drayton had somehow found out that she and her coworkers had withheld information from him about Gage and Leary, though she didn’t know how that could be the case. The fuckups at the jail and the hospital meant no paper trail existed of her traffic stop the other night. A few standard radio calls no one would remember. The witnesses involved, on the NOPD and in the sheriff’s department, none of them wanted the truth coming out. Preacher’s possible questions for her bounced around in her skull. She couldn’t settle her mind on one. She thought of what Quinn had said, that they had known each other long before she had arrived. That she should be careful about crossing Preacher, especially.
She thought of advice she’d heard public defenders give their clients, and that prosecutors had given to her before she faced a cross: answer only the question you are asked, offer nothing, anticipate nothing. Simply react. Calmly. Thoughtfully. She wiped, flushed, and stood. She reassembled her uniform.
Before heading back outside to meet Preacher, she washed her hands, taking a moment to study herself in a mirror. She had bags under her eyes, tiny wrinkles had appeared at their corners. Her lips were pale and dry. The edges of her nostrils were bloodless and white, as always when she was upset. She recalled the couple of times she’d testified in court, staring into the mirror like she was doing now, what little makeup she owned scattered on the restroom sink, unsure if it was better for the city’s case that she look like a cop or a pretty girl. Juries these days trusted pretty girls, even average to moderately attractive ones with New York accents, more than they trusted the police. They trusted anyone more than they trusted the police. Even the police didn’t trust the police.
Tonight, she felt more like the defendant than a witness for the prosecution. She considered putting on some makeup for the meeting with Drayton, she kept the basics in her locker, but decided against it. Wasn’t worth the trip down the hall. Not for him. She would give him nothing. Show him nothing. She needed more than lipstick could do for her. And Preacher had waited outside long enough.
She tucked stray strands of hair back up under her NOPD ball cap. She dampened a rough brown paper towel under the faucet and used it to polish her round, silver badge, wiping away the dust and coffee stains. With the palms of her hands, she tried to press and smooth out the bags under her eyes. She tossed the paper towel in the wastebasket and pushed out through the bathroom door.
Preacher stood under the eaves of the building. A light rain had started to fall. He had a particularly smelly cigar going. For a moment, Maureen had confused its aroma with that of the trash cans a few yards away. Preacher looked tired, his hooded eyes narrow and creased at the corners. Maureen lit a cigarette and leaned against the building beside him.
“Is Drayton gonna be okay with this?” she asked.
“Okay with what?”
“With you briefing me before the interrogation.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Preacher said. “Briefing? You’re on duty. I’m your duty sergeant. I’m having a cigar out by the garage like I often do. Your rolling back through the district on police business. We’re shooting the shit about another night in the Big Sleazy. I don’t see what’s suspicious about that.”
“So Drayton’s unhappy with us. Do we know what about?”
Preacher turned his cigar between his teeth, speaking around it and puffing smoke. “There isn’t much ‘us’ to it. He’s pretty focused on you. Something about the integrity of his homicide investigation. He wouldn’t discuss it with me. So I wouldn’t discuss you with him. I left him stewing. Integrity. It’s a funny word for that man to be using. I bet any one of his ex-wives would get a kick out of it.” He shrugged, a small, sly smile on his face. “He doesn’t seem to trust me. It’s an insult to me.” He lowered his cigar, serious now. “Do you trust me, Coughlin?”
Maureen blew out her breath. “I do, Preach. You’ve never given me a reason not to.”
“It’s a serious question.”
Preacher leaned forward, spitting shreds of tobacco onto the pavement. “I want you aware of the stakes. This conversation, in some form or another, the one you’re about to have with Drayton, might end up being discussed in front of a federal judge. With the decree signed, Her Honor has access to whatever and whomever she wants, whenever she wants it.” He paused, shrugged. “The cases that go sideways, the ones that stand out for the wrong reasons, the anomalies, as you like to say, those are the ones the judge will look into. This case cannot go sideways, Coughlin. I’m not having my district, or my platoon, being the first lambs to the slaughter. Let that happen in someone else’s shop. I won’t be a disgrace to the department. Believe that.”
“I did not do anything to fuck up that crime scene,” Maureen said. “Or my paperwork. Same as with Cooley at Magnolia Street. I did nothing to screw up any arrest that Drayton might make, or charges he might bring. And neither did anyone else on the scene. I promise you, Preach. I’d take that to the judge right now, tonight.”
“But you were not first to arrive,” Preacher said.
“I was not. That was Quinn and Rue.” She thought of Quinn, of the note to meet Heath. Evidence he’d secreted away from the crime scene, a small and quiet act that had made criminals of both of them when she’d looked the other way. What else had he done before she’d arrived? Anything? How deep in it was Ruiz? She took a deep breath. Pretend that brief moment with Quinn hadn’t happened, she told herself. Pretend. Fake it. She’d done it her whole life. “I have complete confidence in how they handled the scene. I’d vouch for them. It looked like it should have when I got there.”
Preacher wouldn’t play coy with her about Quinn, Maureen thought. If he knew what Quinn had done with the note, he would’ve said so. He wasn’t asking about that. The less Preacher knew, Maureen thought, the more protected he’d be if that judge came calling. She kept the secret note to herself.
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