He kicked a nearby dumpster. The owner of the establishment appeared in the doorway.
“Hey, quit kicking my can. I’ll call the cops.”
He waved at the shop owner. “Sorry.”
No need to tell the guy he was a cop. That wouldn’t make the man any less hostile.
He made it all the way back to his car before his cell phone vibrated on his hip. One glance at the display caused him to groan. Ed was tracking him down. Like a dog on the hunt. Ed could smell the stench of his subordinate’s mistakes from miles away.
“Yeah, boss?”
“Where the hell are you?”
Lie or tell the truth. The truth. Lies had a way of coming back to bite you in the butt.
“I saw my prime suspect in the Ardoin murder on Bourbon, and I gave chase on foot.”
Ed’s heavy sigh rattled over the phone. “You lost him, didn’t you?”
Well, yeah, wasn’t that obvious? If he’d captured the guy, he would have told Ed that he was in the process of bringing him in.
“You need to work out more. You’re losing it, Nick.”
He grumbled under his breath, leaned his head back on the headrest, and sucked in humid summer air. He coughed when the moisture hit his lungs.
“Are you smoking again?”
“I haven’t had a smoke in years, boss. You know that.” Oh, but he wanted a smoke badly.
“What did you find out on your vacation to Nashville?”
Hardly a vacation.
“The identity of the photographer.”
He couldn’t have said anything that would have surprised Ed Moreau more. Nick smiled to himself in utter satisfaction.
Before Ed could nail him with the obvious question, Nick supplied the answer. “I asked Troy to dig into the guy’s background. If he has a Louisiana driver’s license, it’s in another name. So no known last address.”
“How are you gonna find him, then? When you do, you better take someone younger and faster than you.”
“Really, Ed? That’s all you got?” He moved on, in no mood to spar with his uncle. “He comes, and he goes. We’ve interviewed hundreds of people in the Quarter. No one knows where he lives. The guy is a ghost. I’m gonna put someone on viewing CCTV footage in the Quarter. Maybe we’ll get lucky.”
“Yeah, well, that’s about all you’ve got going for you on this one. Luck. You better find this guy before he kills again.”
Couldn’t Ed hear how irritated Nick was that he’d had the guy in his sights and then had lost him? It would do no good to organize a search. By the time he could have arranged for a number of uniforms to comb the area, the guy would probably be long gone.
“I’m headed back to the squad room. I’ll fill you in on my visit up north.”
He’d wait to tell Ed that he lost Jerilyn as well. Nick had no excuse, except that he’d gotten too comfortable with a person of interest. Truth was, he should have followed her to the women’s restroom and waited for her outside the door. He had been exhausted and sloppy and upset that she was upset with him. Not that any of that should have mattered.
The call disconnected. Ed wasn’t one for extended goodbyes. Speak your business and hang up. That was Ed’s abrupt way.
****
Just as he’d suspected would happen, Ed had chewed him up one side and down the other for losing Jerilyn.
In the squad room, he stood in front of the whiteboard that only showed one victim. Jeri had said there would be five. The thought that she might be right kept tickling his consciousness, nagging him to do something to prevent more deaths, but for the life of him, he didn’t know where to begin following up on her sketchy information. He had no evidence to suggest that she was right. Until he caught another lead or gained new information about either of the Devilles, he didn’t have much to work with. He was still waiting on the results from the CCTV footage they’d been able to capture.
A search of VICAP had turned up cases with similar aspects but none that were a spot-on replica of the case he was working, especially none in Tennessee where Deville might have started killing…if he was a serial killer.
He’d reviewed the background that had been collected on both Devilles, but the details were short on information and long on gaps in their history. Neither Jackson nor Sheldon Deville had a police record. Sheldon had served in the Army in Vietnam, but after his discharge very little was known about his movements. It was very possible that the older Deville had been suffering from PTSD.
The problem with working Ardoin’s death like it was a serial killing is that he didn’t have a second victim. If he dug deep enough into Ardoin’s background, maybe he could find the connection to Jackson Deville and possibly a motive for the murder, other than the whole Deville clan was psycho.
The other victims were all in Jerilyn’s head. He had to work the case as if it was a one-off. So the search had to proceed to connect Alison Ardoin to Jackson Deville. That was the only real lead he had left.
Nick scratched his chin and shook his head. Staring at such a pitiful amount of information on the whiteboard was getting him nowhere. He had to figure out a way to dig deeper or move on to something else. It wasn’t like his desk had been empty before the discovery of Ardoin’s body. The first forty-eight hours had come and gone. This case was not going to close anytime soon. In fact, if he didn’t catch up with the photographer and force a confession, the case would probably go cold.
He turned his attention elsewhere.
The St. Clair cold case was thawing and had all the markers of heating up. Nick was still convinced that Dylan Hunter had killed Audrey St. Clair and disposed of her body. It might be time to pay Hunter’s ex-girlfriend Sophia Cannon a visit. If Nick could get her away from Dylan Hunter, she might tell him something he could work with. The woman was angry enough with Hunter that she might talk after all these years. Sophia might remember something that she had forgotten. If he were lucky, he might finally be able to locate Audrey’s remains.
He hadn’t interviewed Sophia at the time Audrey went missing, eliminating Sophia as a suspect almost immediately. Sophia had a strong alibi even though she had a clear motive for getting rid of her ex-boyfriend’s new girlfriend. No, he liked the ex-boyfriend Dylan for the crime. Maybe it was time he put some pressure on Sophia.
Nick grabbed his jacket and headed out the door.
Chapter Seventeen
It hadn’t been easy ditching Nick. Although the logistics hadn’t been difficult, it was the emotional upheaval that had left her exhausted. Jeri didn’t want to say goodbye to him, but she knew what she had to do. Her sixth sense kept urging her to find her father. The blood that coursed through her veins pulsed with the knowledge that she was the only one who could prevent him killing again.
Her heart sank with the futility of trying to stop him. Her previous visions had already informed her that she’d failed. The anguish hit her. How could she be responsible for what she couldn’t control? Yet she felt the responsibility deeply.
She asked the cabbie to drop her off on Decatur and headed into the heart of the Quarter. Without a picture of Jackson Deville, it would be difficult to describe him. Yet she had to try. She hitched her backpack onto her shoulders and picked up her pace. Where to start? The place where Alison Ardoin was found, of course.
Once again, she found herself staring up at the façade of the building where Alison had died. Her heart leapt every time someone passed her. What if Jackson sneaked up on her again? The last time she’d been in the building, he had trapped her in a closet. Her own father had held her prisoner until he could decide what to do with her.
Had her father murdered her grandfather?
She pulled up the memory of Sheldon Deville’s death, searching for any clue or hint that his son Jackson had already known that Sheldon had been brutally attacked.
She closed her eyes to better pull up the memory.
Sheldon’s voice trembled. “I wasn’t sure at first…but now I know. You are the cho
sen one. You have to stop him.”
The photographer grabbed the weirdo by the shoulder and shoved him into a standing position, but the weirdo’s knees apparently gave out because he sank to the pavement. His kneecaps cracked when he hit the concrete. That might have been the most horrible sound Jeri had ever heard.
Still hanging onto her wrist, Sheldon grabbed her chin and whispered in her ear. “I give the gift to you. You have the gift now. Learn to use it wisely. Don’t waste it the way I did.”
The old man rattled one more gasp for life.
Jeri scrambled backward, away from him. “Is he dead?”
Jackson pushed her aside to get between them. “No. It can’t be like this. He shouldn’t have given you the gift. It doesn’t belong to you.”
The memory clawed its way deep into her psyche. Her father hadn’t been concerned about the death of his father. He’d been more concerned about who received the gift. In fact, he hadn’t gasped or flinched when Sheldon emerged from the shadows. Jackson seemed…angry. Yes, that was the emotion emanating from his spirit. Uncontrolled anger. Jackson had hated his father. He wasn’t a bit sorry that his old man was dying.
Did Jackson also hate his daughter? He’d said he didn’t want to kill her, but he’d also said he would if he had to. Why would he have to kill her?
The man seemed to lack empathy. That was it, the aura he cast off. Her biological father had no soul. No feeling for anyone. His motives were purely selfish. That was the vibe she’d gotten from him. That was why he’d made her uncomfortable.
Her guilty conscience dug its way up from the place where she’d buried it. She’d been selfish in the way that she’d handled Lance and Connie Bowman. In her anger, she’d only thought of her hurt feelings. She’d never given them time to explain their choices.
More than anything, she didn’t want to lack a soul…like her birth father.
What had happened to him to make him that way? No one was born without a soul.
“If you’re looking for that man, he ain’t come around here lately.”
She swirled to face a woman standing in the doorway of the shop on the ground floor of the building.
“What man?”
“The one that was here when the old man died.”
“You mean my…the photographer?”
The woman tilted her head. “Is that what you call him? The old man called him Jack.”
That was a shortened version of his name.
Jeri dared to get closer to the woman. “How many times have you seen him come around here?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. He used to come around here all the time before the old man died. He would stand across the street and stare at the building for hours. One time, someone called the cops on him, and they run him off, but he was back the next day.”
“So was he here every day?”
“Maybe three…four times a week.” She squinted at Jeri. “You’re looking for him, aren’t you? Who is he? Your daddy?”
Jeri pressed her hand against her chest. How did the woman know that? “What do you mean?”
“You look like him. You could be family.” The woman’s eyes narrowed. “Did he kill that girl?”
“What girl?”
Playing dumb was probably for the best.
“Don’t act like you don’t know. That’s why you’re here.” Suspicious registered all over the woman’s wrinkled face. “Did you help him kill that girl?”
Jeri’s breath escaped her in one big whoosh. “I’ve never killed anyone, lady. That’s a horrible thing to accuse someone of.”
She shrugged again. “Well, someone killed her.”
Don’t run. “Do you know where the old man lived?”
“Why you wanna know?”
Jeri decided on the truth. “Because I found out he’s my biological grandfather. I never knew him. You see…I’m adopted.”
“Well, I’ll be damned. You don’t say?”
“So I want to know what happened to him. You know? If I could find out where he spent the night, I might learn more about him.”
The woman grunted. “So you’re one of those that thinks you can figure yourself out by knowing where you came from? I know where I’m from and who my people are, and I still ain’t got no clue who I am. It don’t work that way.”
She didn’t want or need this stranger’s advice.
“I heard tell he camped out at the Haunted House.” The woman spoke with a conspiratorial tone.
Jeri held her amusement back. She doubted Sheldon had stayed at the LaLaurie mansion. The place was a highly guarded museum and a big draw among the more morbid-minded tourists. He’d have no privacy there.
“Uh-huh. You’re full of crap, lady.” Jeri turned to leave.
“He left something for you…if you ever came here.”
A chill ran up her spine. “Who?”
“He said you’d be here.”
Fear crawled across Jeri’s skin.
“He said you wouldn’t be able to stay away.”
“What did he leave me?”
The woman grinned without warmth. “I’ll go get it for you.”
When she returned, the woman handed her a chalice just like the one she’d had all her life, the one she couldn’t remember when she had gotten it.
Jeri almost refused to take it from the woman, but she held out her trembling hands anyway. When the woman placed the chalice in her hand, a sizzle of heat raced up her arm and into her shoulder, spreading throughout her body. A surge of power ripped through every nerve.
“He told me not to give it to anyone but you. He said you’d know what to do with it.”
Jeri swallowed hard as wave after wave of strong emotion passed over her psyche. Anger. Fear. Relief. Dread. Joy. Love. Doubt. It seemed every emotion in human existence roared through her heart and soul. Her eyes met the woman’s gaze.
“You wanted to know who you are. Now you know.”
No, she still didn’t know for sure, but her eyes were beginning to open.
****
Jeri had stood outside the LaLaurie mansion for at least fifteen minutes. No electric pulse ran through her. No hint of a connection with her past nagged at her psyche. No visions of future events blew through her mind. The place seemed benign to her, as if nothing traumatic or psychotic had ever happened at the location. But she knew that wasn’t true. The history of the house had fascinated her when she first moved to New Orleans.
She’d left there and borrowed a phone to call a cab. The cabbie seemed to take the streets with the most potholes, further nauseating her already tense stomach. Tickles of dread danced on her skin. She glanced over her shoulder every block or so, certain she was being followed. The last week of her life had created a deep well of paranoia. Jeri didn’t get nervous easily, but since she’d met Nick Moreau, she’d stayed on edge.
To be fair, her hyperaware state had nothing to do with Nick and everything to do with her new awareness of her place in the world. Her life had taken on a different, more complex meaning than she would have ever wished for herself. In the deepest reaches of her soul, she felt her responsibility to use her gift wisely. Could she stop horrible things from happening before they happened? Or was she doomed to foresee what was inevitable? What had Sheldon meant when he had said he wished he hadn’t wasted the gift?
Jeri had reached the apartment building before she could sort out all the jumbled thoughts pinging around her cranium. Even if she had untangled all her tangled thoughts, she couldn’t have put them back in any semblance of normalcy.
Once inside the apartment, she pulled the second chalice from her backpack and placed it on the shelf next to the first, the original. Without a doubt, Sheldon had given her the original piece when she was very young, but when and where they had met before colliding in New Orleans was a mystery, possibly shrouded in the shadowy reaches of repressed childhood memories. She had lived with her biological mother and father for a while before her mother had given her to th
e people she knew as her parents. No one had told her that; she just knew.
Guilt stabbed her conscience. The people she knew as her parents had raised her to adulthood, sheltered and protected her from what they had believed would harm her. Weren’t they still her parents? The realization dulled her anger towards them, but she wanted to remain angry, at least, for a while longer. The anger felt real. Every other emotion made her feel as if she were living a wide-awake nightmare. She needed to push the boundaries of reality, to find where the edges were, so that she could breathe again.
So she tackled the conundrum in front of her and stared at the twin chalices. Why were there two of them? The duplication had to be significant. She’d felt the power in the second chalice the moment she had first touched it. What would happen if she held them both at the same time, one in each hand?
Jeri stepped back from the display on the wall, not yet ready to find out what holding both chalices would do to her. Her hesitancy was futile. Like a magnet, the chalices drew her back to them. Her fingers wrapped around the base of first one and then the other. As soon as she lifted them from the shelf, her vision brightened with clarity, sharp edges and vivid colors. Not so much seeing but knowing.
Her vision filled with red, as if a curtain of blood had fallen and covered the scene in front of her. A shock of disgust ran through her. She dropped the chalices and stumbled backward from them. They clattered and rolled on the floor, banging against the trim at the bottom of the wall.
The only way to release the true power of the pieces was to hold them both in her hands.
She felt as if she were on the brink of understanding. The truth lay just beyond the outer edge of the light, just over the border in the darkness. She was scared of the potential power that understanding might unleash. No, scared was a too-lame description of how she felt. Petrified and horrified were better descriptives.
Jeri had to get away from the lure of the glass and metal in her collection. She’d told Nick that she liked her pieces because of their complicated design. Maybe she didn’t need that much complication.
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