The door opened into a seven-foot-long entrance hall with a bar running the length of it on the right. The bar held a sink and a coffee-maker, and I noticed Justin had an open box of chamomile tea and several energy bars sitting there. The gift basket the hotel had supplied was unopened, probably because it was filled with pralines, beignet mix, Bourgeois Hot Sauce, and a bottle of Dixie Blackened Voodoo Lager.
The hall opened onto a large room, maybe 20 x 20. A desk, a Bauhaus-style sofa, two end tables and a matching chair in front of us on the left side of the room. There was a bureau with the requisite large screen swivel tv against the middle of the wall facing us and to the far right, two queen-size beds separated by a wide night stand. Each bed had a low bench at its foot.
A couple of scripts, a MacBook, and a DVD— a screener from the looks of the cover— were strewn across the bed closest to us.
Justin was strewn across the other.
He was on his stomach halfway off the bed, his head hanging over the side nearest us. As though he’d had too much to drink and somehow made his way to the far side of the bed, then thrown himself across it and passed out on the covers.
But Justin didn’t drink.
Peter was a step in front of me. We both started for the body. Cyphers’ man moved out of the bathroom area and blocked our way.
“I’m sorry, ma’am, Sgt. Cyphers gave orders. I can’t let you get any closer. You, too, Detective. Sorry about that.”
So once again we were viewing a dead body from eight feet away. Fortunately, I’ve got great eyes.
“Look at the discoloration on his neck, Peter,” I said under my breath. “And the tears on the back of his right hand.” His hand was dangling toward the floor. There was no blood, just two short jagged puncture wounds across his wrist.
“That’s probably what Sam Koh decided were snake bites. They don’t look like snake bites to me, but let’s check with SuzieQ. His neck, though… looks from here like someone wrapped something around his neck and tightened. Or something wrapped itself around his neck and tightened. Could be a snake, I suppose.” He pulled out his phone. “Hey, guys,” he said to the two officers who were squatting by Justin’s body scanning the carpet and the bedclothes for indications of what had happened, “would you mind snapping a shot of the bruises on his neck? I’ve got something in mind I’d like to compare them to. And grab one of his right hand, while you’re at it.” He turned to me. “Let’s let SuzieQ tell us if the M.E. needs to test for venom.”
There was such a crowd around SuzieQ’s booth that we couldn’t see her. We could hear her, though. That Texas twang cut through the entire convention, even without my ratcheting up my aural senses.
“Yer tellin’ me Justin Passenger is dead? And you think Anthony Weiner killed him? Have you got yer head up yer ass?” Suzie was yelling at Sam Koh. She had Edwin Edwards wrapped around her arm. As she charged toward Sam he took three steps back, right into the Bride of Frankenstein and a pregnant zombie Playboy bunny.
The bunny screamed. “Justin Passenger is dead? Oh, my God, Justin Passenger is dead! Oh, my God!” She looked down and screamed again. “Oh my God, my water just broke! Justin Passenger is dead and my water just broke! What am I gonna do??”
Frankenstein’s Bride grabbed her by the arm, yelling, “Where’s Dave? Someone get her husband Dave— he’s Hitler with the back of his head blown off!” They pushed past us towards the exit, the soon-to-give birth bunny dripping white zombie leg make-up down her black mesh tights.
One of the tattoo artists blocked their path just long enough to ask what was going on. I heard Frankenstein’s Bride tell him Justin had been killed. “They think some guy named Weiner did it,” she called over her shoulder.
Suzie continued to threaten Sam Koh with Edwin Edwards, although she obviously wasn’t doing it on purpose. I don’t think she even realized he was on her arm. “How dare you peckerheads accuse my baby of somethin’ like that?” Edwin’s tongue shot out and Sam jumped back another two feet.
Almost everyone in the crowd had his phone on video. The tattoo artist yelled, “Who’s he talkin’ about, SuzieQ? Who’s your baby? Were you doin’ it with Matthew Weiner?”
“Bloody hell, you guys,”— this from a fan dressed like Dr. Who— “the snake lady is shagging Matthew Weiner. He’s married, isn’t he? That’s a story TMZ will pay for, I’m bloody well sure.” He held his phone out in front of him and started taping.
Matty stepped between Suzie and Sam Koh, blocking Suzie from the camera. He looked past Sam to me. “Hey, Ms. O, who the f— is Matthew Weiner? I thought SuzieQ was makin’ it wit’ Justin. Ain’t that how the snake got in his room?”
I said, “Matthew Weiner won an Emmy for writing The Sopranos. And then he created Mad Men. He has nothing to do with snakes!” Or with the sleazy ex-congressman Suzie named her Australian milk snake after. Except that they share the same last name. “Peter,” I said, “this is getting out of hand. Do something.”
Peter flashed his badge— well, he cupped it so the top was barely showing. It bares no resemblance to the star and crescent unique to the NOPD. The authority in his voice was all he needed to break up the crowd. Fans drifted away slowly, their faces buried in their phones as they Instagrammed shots into the webisphere. Sam Koh and Matty came to stand beside me.
SuzieQ loosened the green boa from her arm and moved him into his cage. She was on the verge of tears. Peter put his hands on her shoulders and looked into her eyes. It was then that I saw the reality of Justin’s death hit her. She’d been so riled by Sam Koh’s accusations that she’d jumped to her snake’s defense before she could process anything else. Now grief replaced her rage.
“Oh, Peter, Justin’s dead? How kin that be? I was jest with him last night. We wore each other out, but he was fine when we finished. He was more than fine.” Tears started down her face.
“What time was that?” Peter asked.
“Well, it was nigh onto three-thirty this mornin’ when he went back to his room. Oh, Peter. Oh, no.” She buried her head against chest and he held her while she sobbed.
When she was quiet, he loosed his embrace. “Can you take a look at these pictures, SuzieQ? It might help us figure out what happened.” He pulled up the shots of Justin on his iPhone. She made a quick intake of breath. She pursed her lips together and looked away. Then she turned back slowly and took the phone from Peter. She used two fingers to expand the photos on the screen. She stared at them, tears running silently down her cheeks, her face immobile.
Peter asked, “If Anthony Weiner had his fangs in Justin and Justin pulled his hand away, would it leave gashes like that? Does the venom work fast? Could he have wrapped himself around Justin’s neck if Justin passed out?”
It took her a second to speak but when she did, her voice was driven by anger. “Shit, Peter. You got a hole in yer screen door. In the first place, I found my baby not thirty minutes after he got loose last night. Anthony Weiner was back in his cage in my room by one-thirty. And second, he’s an Australian Milk Snake; his fangs are half the size of those wounds and he doesn’t make any venom. And third, take a gander at him. He’s not strong enough to strangle a pencil. He’s just a skinny, puny little reptile with two penises— why do you think I named him Anthony Weiner?”
28. PETER
Two actors dead in two days. In the same location. What the fuck was going on?
From what Ovsanna told me, Justin Passenger was one of the good guys. The Mahatma Gandhi of the movie set. No drugs. No money problems. No malicious ex-wives. The guy never even got a bad review. No one had a reason to want him gone.
Except maybe Ash Rowley.
Not that Ash sounded like he had a hard-on against the guy. Or against either guy, really. But he did have something to gain with both Derek Connors and Justin Passenger stretched out on a slab. Is a role in a David Lynch movie worth killing for?
And then there were those taloned gloves he was wearing. Nails shaped like an X-Acto knife, and j
ust as sharp. Those could have made the wounds on Justin’s hands, no question.
I had his number on my phone from when he’d texted me the pictures of Cindy-no-name no panties. I dialed. The smiling mechanical voice asked me to ‘please enjoy this ring back tone while your party is reached’. Five choruses of Mozart’s Symphony Number 40 later, Ash answered.
At least I think it was Ash. His words were so slurred I wasn’t sure.
“Ash?”
“S’up, man?”
“Is this Ash Rowley?”
“Oh… yeah, man, s’mee. Who’z zis?”
“It’s Peter King. We met last night at One Eyed Jacks. I’d like to come over and show you something.”
“Oh, shure, man. You got stuff fer me? I can use alla what you got. C’mon over, I’ll be waitin’.”
Ovsanna had gone to the ballroom to continue signing autographs. The con was scheduled to go on until five today, but she’d finish at one. She had a private jet chartered to get her to Toronto for a midnight festival screening of Satan Gone Bad. With Derek and Justin dead, that probably wasn’t going to happen.
I texted her that I was on my way to talk to Ash. Then I pulled up the Olivier House on my phone and started walking.
Last night it had taken me twenty minutes to walk the six blocks from One Eyed Jacks to the hotel. I’d had to fight my way through the crowds jamming the streets. This morning, except for pools of vomit, there wasn’t much in my way: a few bar managers outside their bars, hosing off last night’s mess to make room for tonight’s; a couple of diehard revelers stumbling from street lamp to street lamp, dressed in t-shirts and shorts, trying to keep their skinny, alchohol-nourished bodies upright.
The Quarter on a Sunday morning looks like a ghost town in the late 1800s. It smells like a dog kennel— an odoriferous combination of piss and Pine Sol. I passed a drag queen on her way home from The Corner Pocket and two girls— obviously tourists— who’d probably been fully dressed when they left their hotel last night but had managed to lose most of their wardrobe since. No shoes. No shirts. A couple of really nice bras. They were clutching their handbags and giggling over the map app on their iPhones.
The Olivier House is on Toulouse, two blocks north of One Eyed Jacks. It was a mid-Nineteenth century Creole home that’s been converted into one of the more unique hotels in the Quarter. According to the reviews on TripAdvisor.com, you’ll either love it or you’ll hate it, depending upon what you’re looking for in a hotel.
Ash had to love it. The lobby is painted a nice shade of pink.
I didn’t realize it was the lobby at first. It was a long, high-ceilinged passageway leading from the front door on Toulouse to a courtyard in the back. Light pink walls, with thick, intricately carved white mouldings around the ceiling and doors. The matching baseboards at least a foot high. The floor was marbled tile, again pink, with red Oriental area rugs at each end. Potted ferns, ornately framed mirrors, narrow side tables and a red velvet sofa lined the walls.
The only thing that gave it away as a lobby was the young woman seated at a small antique desk that jutted out into the narrow room at the far end. She was facing me as I walked deeper into the passage. Sunlight coming from the open French doors behind her put her into silhouette, but as I got closer she came into focus, illuminated by the crystal chandelier hanging above her.
“G’mornin’, sir. Checkin’ in?”
“No, actually, I’m visiting Mr. Rowley in the Creole Cottage. He’s expecting me. Can you point me in the right direction?”
She hesitated. She made a short intake of breath, her mouth forming a small oh, and I could see she’d been schooled in maintaining the guests’ privacy. Before she could speak, I cupped my badge and flashed it just long enough to let her know I was a cop. And not long enough for her to know I wasn’t a New Orleans cop. “I understand your hesitation, but he is expecting me. I’m Detective Peter King, here on official business. Would you like to ring the cottage?”
“Oh, I’m sure it’s fine, Detective. Just head out the French doors into the courtyard, go through the archway on the right to the second courtyard, and if you keep on goin’ you’ll see an openin’ in the brick wall on the other side of the pool. That takes you to the private courtyard for the Creole Cottage. It’s one of my favorite suites.”
The first courtyard was lush with greenery. Hanging baskets, ferns, palms, elephant ears. A circular brick planter in the center of the patio held three tree trunks that topped out above the balconies of the upper floors. There were wrought iron tables and chairs scattered among the plants, but no guests taking advantage of the morning temperatures yet. No one in the pool in the second courtyard, either.
Ash had a courtyard all to himself. Lots more ferns and a scrolled, white iron patio table with a pink sunbrella in its center. Matching iron chairs.
The wood shingled cottage was the same light pink as the lobby— no wonder he chose it— with dark green shutters around two sets of pink French doors. And on either side of those doors was another set— painted deep red.
The red doors were open.
I walked into a living room with brick floors, high ceilings, and antique furniture. No Ash Rowley. No sounds coming from the other rooms.
“Ash? Mr. Rowley? It’s Peter King. You here?”
Nothing.
“It’s Peter King, Ash. We just talked on the phone. You mind if I come in?”
Still nothing. I walked further into the suite.
The bedroom and bath were on the left. He wasn’t in the bedroom. The bathtub had water in it, but no Ash. I walked back through the living room and opened the sliding door to the kitchen area. He was there, slumped over the dining table, half out of his chair. There was a thumb-sized mound of white powder in front of him, and one of those pedicure things that looks like an egg. And a prescription bottle of Oxy and an empty bottle of Iced Cake Vodka. No glass.
He was nude except for the bath towel around his waist. He was barely breathing.
I called 911 and waited. If he stopped breathing before the EMTs got there I’d do CPR. In the meantime I laid him down in the recovery position and covered him with the bedspread. Bad enough he was unconscious, I didn’t want him going into shock.
Well, no matter what, he wouldn’t be answering any questions for a while.
I didn’t want to mess up any prints on the house phone so I used my cell to call the girl in the lobby. I told her the paramedics were on their way and she needed to send them to the cottage. She didn’t sound surprised.
They didn’t take long. Twenty minutes after I’d walked in the door, Ash Rowley was on a gurney, rolling down the pink hallway and into an ambulance on his way to the Trauma Center. I wondered how long it would be before TMZ found out he was there.
I brushed the white powder into my palm and washed it down the sink. Threw the vodka bottle in the trash. Flushed the pills down the toilet. Put the empty bottle and the PedEgg in the Dopp kit that was sitting on the toilet tank. Wasn’t my business if the guy had a problem. Unless his problem was Derek Connors or Justin Passenger. But the way it was looking, I was less and less inclined to think he was our guy. I put the bedspread back on the bed, let the water out of the tub, and closed the doors behind me.
“Is he gonna be all right?” The receptionist had left her desk to hold the door for the paramedics. She met me in the hallway. “I’m Deb, by the way. I’m the one who checked him in a couple of days ago.”
“Nice to meet you, Deb.” I shook her hand. “Detective Peter King. You weren’t, by any chance, on the desk when Mr. Rowley came in this morning, were you? I know he had a show late last night.”
“I never saw him come in, but he must have been in his room when I got here ’cause his key wasn’t in the drawer. All our rooms still have the original doors from when the house was built in 1839, and the owners sure didn’t want to mess ’em up with those electronic key cards or anything. So every room has a big brass key that we keep in the drawer, just like
they do in France. When you’re leavin’, you drop the key off with me or Bobby, whoever’s on the desk, and then when you come back in, you pick it up again.”
“And is there any other way out from Mr. Rowley’s suite?”
“There’s not, for sure. He’s gotta come through the courtyards and out that front door. And he sure didn’t do that while I was here.”
“What time did you start work this morning?”
“Oh, I was here bright and early at 9:30 am. But if you want to talk to Bobby— he worked all night last night— I might could tell you where to find him. He’s a creature of habit, that boy. He leaves here every mornin’ when I come in and goes straight to the gym for two hours. Then he has breakfast at the Camellia Grill down on Chartres. If you hurry, he’s probably still sittin’ at the counter. Just look for shoulder length bleached blond hair, what there is of it, and biceps as big as a watermelon.”
* * *
There’s no place to sit at the Camellia Grill except the counter. No tables, no booths. Just one continuous slab of marble in the shape of two horseshoes sitting atop a stainless steel base. Stainless steel stools with green leather seats. Ash would have been happy here— the walls were light pink.
There were two people seated at the counter who matched the description Deb had given me. Since one was a woman, I was pretty sure I had Bobby picked out. He was wearing blue camouflage pants and a black Saints tank top. Deb was right about the hair. Shoulder length and bleached blond but thin and receding. Looked like too many years on the juice.
I introduced myself, told him I’d just spoken with Deb at the Olivier House, and asked if he’d been on the desk when Ash Rowley had picked up his room key in the middle of the night.
“I was. Yes, sir. Mr. Rowley was having himself a good time, I can tell you that. He came back to get me after he got to his room. He couldn’t get the key in the door. So I opened it up for him and left the key on his table and hustled on back to the desk. A lot of our guests come in late Saturday nights and I don’t like to keep them waiting for their keys. Especially not at three in the morning.”
Make Me Dead: A Vampyres of Hollywood Mystery Page 12