Murder in the Garden District (Chanse MacLeod Mysteries)

by Herren, Greg

  Ignoring the parking meter, Abby locked the car and crossed the few yards of cement to join me. Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail, her face free of makeup. She was wearing a ratty Jazz Fest T-shirt; her cutoff jeans were just short of obscene.

  “Let me get some coffee,” she said.

  I sipped my own while she went inside. Somehow the caffeine and the nicotine, combined with Abby’s presence, calmed me, although the cigarette wasn’t as nasty as I’d hoped it would be. In fact, it was quite good, and I was wondering why I’d quit in the first place.

  I took another deep, grateful drag as Abby slid into the plastic chair opposite me. I blew the smoke away from her face. She reached over and plucked the cigarette from my fingers.

  “You don’t need that,” she said, taking obvious pleasure in grinding it beneath her boot.

  I started to protest, but stopped myself. Abby meant well—and the pack was in my car.

  “Sorry,” she said, her grin exposing the lie. “My grandmother died from lung cancer.”

  “I’m sure both of them would be interested to hear that,” I replied.

  Abby’s grandmothers were very much alive.

  “You’ve had quite a day, haven’t you, hon?” she said, changing the subject. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m not doing badly, all things considered.”

  It wasn’t entirely untrue. I’d been a cop for two years before leaving the NOPD to open my own business, and I’d been shot at more than once. I’d even killed a couple of thugs who wanted to put me in the ground. But you never get used to it. The adrenaline had worn off and I was exhausted. My joints ached and my mind was fatigued. And on top of all that I had to deal with another potentially devastating hurricane.

  Abby looked at my list of things to do.

  “Are you going to evacuate?” she asked.

  “I’ll decide Sunday morning,” I said. “What about you?”

  “We’re staying. Our neighborhood didn’t flood last time, so as long as Ginevra comes in the same way, in a worst-case scenario we’ll be all right. If it comes up the river… There’s an attic, and we have an ax to cut our way out.”

  “I wish you and Jeph would leave,” I said.

  “Where would we go? We won’t abandon Rhett and Greta, and no hotel will take us with two ancient golden retrievers. Besides, there’s no way we can get both dogs in the Oldsmobile, big as it. There’s no sense worrying about it until we have to. I’m freaked out enough already. Why court a nervous breakdown?”

  “I’d feel a lot better if I knew the two of you were going.”

  Abby grabbed my hands across the table.

  “It’ll turn, Chanse. Ginevra won’t come here.”

  “That’s what we said about Katrina.”

  “I know. But what can you do? After Katrina, I figured it wouldn’t happen again for a long, long time. It pisses me off.”

  She slurped her iced coffee noisily, as if trying to distract herself.

  “Florida gets pounded every year,” I reminded her.

  “It’s not fair,” she said. She sounded like a little girl.

  We sat quietly, absorbed in thought, oblivious to the racket of fleeing traffic and nails being pounded into boards. Despite all the odds, the city had been dragging itself back together since the last natural disaster. We were managing to live our lives day by day if not exactly triumph over the elements. Now it was all threatened again, and this time we might never recover.

  I had to get us out of this mood.

  “Did you have any luck with Jerrell’s family, Abby?”

  She welcomed the return to work.

  “Did I ever! I talked to his mother, Dinah Perrilloux. You’ll never guess who her aunt is—Vernita Jefferson.”

  “The Sheehans’ housekeeper?”

  “One and the same. Dinah used to work at the house whenever her aunt needed help. She couldn’t have sung the Sheehans’ praises higher. They paid for her to go to college, and now she’s an accountant. Apparently ‘Mister Wendell’ offered a twenty thousand dollar reward for information leading to Jerrell’s killer. It was almost sickening to listen to her go on about how wonderful they were. I asked her if Jerrell had any girlfriends. All she knew was he was dating some girl in Oxford, but not her name. Then Vernita showed up. She wasn’t happy to see me. She gave me the bum’s rush.”

  “Look into that reward offer, Abby. See if people wanting the reward go through the police department, or if they had to go through Wendell. If Wendell was behind the murder, he could stonewall.”

  Abby typed into her Blackberry.

  “I’ll see what I can find out.”

  “Any progress on Alais’s Myspace?”

  “Jephtha was breaking into her computer when I left the house. She had some credit card websites bookmarked. Once he figures out her passwords, finding her will be a snap. Alais is a rich girl. She didn’t run away to hang out with gutterpunks or go to a shelter, and she didn’t take her car with her. She’s checked into a hotel and it will show up on one of her cards. The hotels are giving their guests until tomorrow to get out. Alais will either have to go home or call someone.”

  “Put yourself in her place for a minute, Abby. You’re a few years older than Alais. You’ve been depressed all summer because your boyfriend died. Why would you run away now?”

  “I don’t have anything in common with her, but let me think.”

  She leaned her chair backward and closed her eyes.

  “How does this sound, boss? Alais was using the house as an escape, a kind of sanctuary where she could keep the world at arm’s length while she dealt with Jerrell’s death. Maybe she suspected that Wendell was responsible and on Monday night she found out for sure—and killed him.”

  Why hadn’t it occurred to me before? I’d been so certain it was Cordelia or Janna that it never entered my mind. Alais was in the house, and she had access to the gun. And it fit with what Carey had told me.

  “That would explain why Cordelia and Janna don’t want the police looking for her. I think Janna and Cordelia really don’t like each other—it’s not possible they faked it all these years—but they’ve been using their mutual loathing to distract everyone from the truth. Cordelia’s no fool. She had to know picking up the gun and firing it would focus the cops on her. She came up with the cover story when Wendell killed Roger Palmer… Can you get on the Internet with your phone?”

  Abby looked at me like I’d gone strange, probably wondering what that had to do with our discussion.

  “Of course I can, but…”

  “Find out what the hours for the Allegra Gallery are on Fridays.”

  She typed at her phone with her thumbs, obviously puzzled.

  “It’s open till nine today. What’s up, boss?”

  “I want to know if Cordelia had anything to do with the story about Grace Sheehan falling down a staircase to her death. I think Kenneth Musgrave might know the answer.

  “You go home now, Abby. See if Jeph’s made any progress on Alais’s computer. Check out her friends on Myspace.”

  “What are you going to do about your apartment? I thought that was why you called me. Did you get ahold of Venus?”

  “I left a message on her voice mail. Whoever shot at me isn’t going to give up after one attempt.”

  “Do you need a place to crash? You’re welcome to stay with me and Jephtha.”

  “Thanks for the offer. I’m staying with Paige. But I need to get things from my apartment. If the shooter is still watching, he probably knows my car. I’d be a sitting duck, waiting for the electric gate to open.”

  “Let me do it for you. He won’t recognize my Oldsmobile. You can give me the gate remote and I can go in through the back door.”

  “I don’t like sending you into danger, Abby. Besides, I know what I need. I can put my hands on it right away.”

  “I can handle it, boss. Just tell me what to get. It can’t be that much.”

  I thought out loud. “I ne
ed clothes, in case we have to evacuate. I can’t leave town with just what I’m wearing. I need to transfer everything on my computer to my laptop.”

  “Then ride with me and hide in the backseat. I’ll crouch in the driver’s seat, take you to the back steps, out of firing range, park where the fence blocks me from view, then back up your files onto a flash drive while you grab everything else.”

  Abby really likes covert operations. Maybe I was being paranoid and it wasn’t necessary, but it’s better to be prepared. And I had my extra gun with me.

  “Please, Chanse,” she said.

  “You go and work the case, Abby. I can handle this myself.”

  “But—”

  Bless her persistence.

  “No buts, Abby. If someone is trying to kill me, I can’t spend the rest of my life hiding in your backseat. But tell you what—why don’t you scope out the park and text me if you think the coast is clear. Pay particular attention to the house on the corner of Coliseum and Terpsichore. I’ll wait here until I hear from you. You can stay and cover me when I get there. If someone tries to shoot me, you can spot them.”

  “I wish I’d brought my gun.”

  “My extra’s in the armrest between the front seats. Help yourself.”

  I handed her my car keys.

  As she leaned into the car, what there was of her shorts rode up. I looked away until I heard the door shut.

  “Text you in a bit,” she said when she returned the keys.

  “Don’t shoot anyone, Abby,” I said with a smile, trying to lighten the mood.

  She blew me a juicy raspberry. “I’m not an idiot, boss.”

  She sauntered toward her Oldsmobile, then turned back.

  “I almost forgot. Wendell was at the Delacroix on Monday night. He had dinner with a Monica Davis. She got there first, had a few drinks she paid for with a credit card. They sat at a back table. The bartender didn’t know anything else. The place was busy and he didn’t pay attention.”

  “Good work, Abby.”

  I made a mental note to call Monica Davis, and watched until the Oldsmobile was out of sight, feeling a lot better. I wasn’t going to be stupid—it still made sense to stay at Paige’s for a day or two or until the evacuation, whichever came first—but at the same time I had work to do. And I had no idea whether someone was trying to kill me. There was no reason for anybody in the Sheehan family to get rid of me—none that I could figure, at any rate. Barbara was mad at me for looking into her past, but if she were angry enough to want me dead she wouldn’t have told me the truth about Roger’s death. She would have just fired me and showed me the door.

  It was probably some weird coincidence. What else could it be?

  I hated coincidences.

  My cell phone beeped. Abby’s message read: Coast lks clr 2 me.

  *

  I live in a two-story Victorian house divided into six apartments, built shortly after the Civil War. Alongside my fuchsia-colored building is a fenced-in parking area with a driveway that leads to an electronic gate. The fence is cinderblock. I hit the remote as I approached, and the gate began to rumble open. I could see Abby sitting on a low branch of a massive live oak tree, looking down at her phone with an odd expression on her face. I turned in to the driveway and the gate rolled shut behind me. The only other car in the parking area was a tired Corolla that belonged to my upstairs neighbor, Wendy. Some boxes and blankets and a suitcase stuffed the Corolla’s open trunk. As I inserted the key into my back door, I heard bumping noises on the curved exterior staircase that led to Wendy’s apartment.

  “Hey Chanse,” she said when saw me. She was dragging a suitcase behind her.

  Wendy was a senior at Loyola University, majoring in anthropology. She’d been living in the tiny studio apartment at the top of the staircase since her sophomore year. She’d dated a steady stream of young men during the time I’d known her, some of whom I’d met in passing. None of them ever seemed to last long. I liked Wendy. She had a good head on her shoulders, and studied and played hard. She worked in a coffee shop on Magazine Street.

  “Evacuating already?” I asked, pushing my door inward.

  “My parents hounded me until I agreed to come to Chattanooga. Loyola’s president canceled classes next week, and the coffee shop is closing, so I might as well go see them. I’d rather be boiled in oil, but I don’t want to be here if the hurricane hits, and I don’t have money to camp out in a hotel for a week. Gus told me you had some excitement this morning. Maybe it’s a good time for me to get out of here, anyway.”

  “Have a good trip, Wendy.”

  I heard the Corolla chug off as I set about gathering things in my silent apartment: a change of clothes, socks, underwear, T-shirts, jeans, batteries, my shaving kit. While the computer copied my files onto a flash drive, I put my important documents into a briefcase, including my Sheehan files and Wendell’s autopsy report. Wendell had been drunk. Janna hadn’t lied about that, at least. Everything just about fit in my car with my earlier purchases.

  I did an Internet directory search for Monica Davis’s phone number, hoping she hadn’t already left town. I was leaving my information on her voice mail when I heard knocking at the front door. I grabbed my gun from the desk drawer, crept along the side of the house to the gate and aimed at the two men standing on my front porch. I recognized one of them from Abby’s photo.

  “Who are you and what do you want?” I said threateningly.

  They raised their hands in the air.

  “Please put the gun down, Mr. MacLeod. We’re Federal agents.”

  They looked the part, with their dark suits over white shirts, buzz cuts and reflector sunglasses.

  “Toss me your ID,” I ordered.

  They glanced at each other, then reached inside their jackets and tossed their leather wallets at my feet. Keeping my eyes and gun on them, I picked one up.

  I lowered the gun. What had I done to warrant watching by U.S. Marshals?

  “Come on in, have a seat.” I unlocked the front door. “Can I offer you something to drink?”

  They shook their heads no.

  “I’m Special Agent Palladino,” said the one with dark hair. “This is my partner, Special Agent Harrison.”

  We shook hands.

  “I assume this isn’t a social call,” I said, sitting at my desk and tossing their badges to them.

  “I’m afraid not, Mr. MacLeod,” Palladino answered. “We’re here strictly as a courtesy. If our superior knew we were talking to you, we’d be in trouble.”

  Harrison, the red-haired agent, started to say something, but closed his mouth at a glance from Palladino.

  “I’m not following you,” I said.

  “Several years ago, you encountered a professional killer named Vinnie Castiglione. Do you remember him?”

  I’d known him as Zane Rathburn, and he’d been very good at what he did. He was a master of disguise, assuming other people’s identities and getting close to his victims. Once the victim was dead, he’d disappear without a trace. He’d been contracted to kill a New Orleans judge presiding over an organized crime case. I’d put the pieces together and proved he killed a member of the judge’s family. He had successfully passed himself off as a gay man in his early twenties, and fooled me and a lot of other people for a long time. There was no telling how many deaths he’d been responsible for during the course of his career. As I recalled, Federal prosecutors cut a deal with him, in exchange for his bringing down a bunch of organized crime figures. It had galled me at the time. No matter how hard they tried to convince me—and Venus and Blaine—that it was “for the greater good,” we hadn’t bought it. Vinnie Castiglione was a killing machine. If anyone deserved the death penalty, it was he. At the very least, Vinnie belonged behind bars.

  “I thought Vinnie was in the witness protection program,” I said.

  “He was,” said Palladino. “He disappeared several weeks ago.”

  “I suppose it’s too much to hope that
some bad guys tracked him down and fitted him for cement shoes.”

  “Some people never really adjust to the program,” Harrison said apologetically.

  “As I recall, at the time I told you people it was a mistake.”

  I didn’t try to hide my sarcasm.

  “I appreciate your attitude more than you know, Mr. MacLeod,” Palladino said blandly. “We didn’t make that decision. We just did our job. Castiglione didn’t fit the program at all. He complained constantly. He argued with one of his neighbors about the dog barking. The day Vinnie disappeared, the neighbor’s wife came home from shopping and found the dog—and her husband—dead in the backyard, killed execution style. And Vinnie was gone.”

  Palladino handed me a piece of folded paper from one of his jacket pockets. It was a computer printout of a wall covered with newspaper articles and photographs from the Times-Picayune and culled from online news websites—all about me.

  “He’s the one who shot at me this morning,” I said. “He’s in New Orleans and he’s after me. That’s why you’ve been watching my apartment.”

  “We had a tip that he’s in New Orleans, and we’ve been trying to keep an eye on you for the past few days. He has a grudge against you, Mr. MacLeod. A grudge that’s turned into an obsession. We found his fingerprints in a house on the other side of the park. He holed up there for at least a week.”

  My temper flared. “And you waited until now to warn me? I guess I should consider myself lucky he missed this morning!”

  “He’s been flushed out of his hiding place. He’s probably long gone.”

  “You think he’s evacuated?” I asked rhetorically. “He wouldn’t want to get wet in all that rain. Somehow, I don’t feel reassured.”

  “We’re going to catch him, Mr. MacLeod—you don’t need to worry about that. I’m sure you’re safe now. But we think it might be a good idea for you to lie low for a few days.”

  I opened the front door. “Get out of my house,” I said.

  I slammed the door behind them as they left.

  If I’d noticed the U.S. Marshals staking out my house, Vinnie couldn’t have missed them. They were camped practically beneath the windows where he was hiding. And if Abby could tell they were Feds, Vinnie sure as hell knew.