Cajun Fire

by Rick Murcer

  “Good luck,” said Josh.

  “We might need more than luck,” said Sophie.

  Manny thought she might be right. Skill, intuition, and that enigma called luck only went so far. Maybe a little Divine intervention was in order. He’d take that.

  Ten minutes later, Sophie and he pulled out of the parking garage, this time Manny was driving the gray Escalade while Sophie worked her phone.

  “I could do both, Williams. You know that right?”

  “Maybe. But this way I know I’ll live a few hours longer. Besides that, I only brought so many pair of tighty-whities.”

  “Yeah, yeah. I’m driving when we leave though.”

  “Okay as long as you give me your phone.”

  She waved her small hand at him. “Whatever. Anyway, while Josh and you were getting everyone organized, I’ve been doing a little research of my own involving deaths and cruise lines over the last few years.”

  “Are you isolating the highest-profile incidents like death and injuries?”

  “Yep. It’s not as encompassing as Alex and Anna are going to do, but I can at least look at the high-profile stuff.”

  “So?”

  “There have been eleven known deaths involving Carousel ships, plus two on their loading docks that we know of. I say know of because those folks who end up in those creepy little morgues on board aren’t publicized, since those folks died of natural causes. Heck of a way to end a vacation.”

  “We’ve seen that up close,” said Manny.

  Sophie placed her phone in her lap, bowing her head.

  “Are you all right?”

  “Hell no. But I suppose I’ll live. I didn’t think I wanted to a few weeks ago. I guess that’s progress. I was just hit with that image of Liz Casnovsky on the autopsy table, that fake rose on her chest, mangled by that bastard Argyle. It’s the last true memory of her that I have. I remember the funeral, sure, but her body smack in the middle of that cold, steel table gave me more nightmares than almost anything we’ve gone through.”

  “Really? You never mentioned that to me.”

  “I know. I mean I was bopping her husband, and we were friends. How shitty was that? Throw in the fact that cruises are supposed to be beautiful and fun with dancing and sun and margaritas, not friends lying in morgues on those ships. It was that whole perfect storm of, what word do you use, dichotomies, that almost drove me nuts.”

  “All of that is true. But what can you do to change the past?”

  “That’s just it. I couldn’t, but my past didn’t go away, at least all of the time. Then along comes Mikus with that dumbass wardrobe and those deep-brown eyes and that whole on-his-knee . . . thing . . .”

  Manny touched her arm. “Then you’re suddenly saved, right?”

  “That’s it. Like Chloe and you,” she said softly. “Now, well now, aww piss, I’ve got to find a way to start over, sort of, and I worry if I can stay sane enough to do it.”

  “Like you told me, one day at a time.”

  “What the hell did I know? I was trying to make you feel better.”

  “It was the right wisdom though. Let’s get off that road for now, okay? Eleven deaths, right?”

  “Right. Three were from drunks diving off the ship and were never found. Four were apparent suicides. They took dives off the back. If the hundred-foot drop didn’t kill them, then they would have drowned.

  “Two more had to do with cruise-ship employees raping and then killing their victims. Nasty stuff there. But how do you know what you’re hiring? I don’t fault the cruise lines for that. People do what they do.”

  “What about the other two?”

  “Oddly, the other two had to do with food allergies. One older gentleman died from shellfish he ate, the other, an eight-year-old girl, died from peanuts inadvertently mixed into an entrée.”

  “The dock workers?”

  “Both crushed by loads of product or luggage that had fallen off some equipment. One malfunctioning overhead crane, the other apparently from workers horsing around and dumping a lift truck load squarely on a worker’s head.”

  Strange how life and death showed themselves. Vacations that ended in tragedy, no matter the circumstances. Manny wasn’t sure at all if he’d ever get his mind around the why.

  “There could be a situation or two there that needs digging into,” said Manny, then, “Yet, it seems like a long shot to me.”

  “Maybe. I’ll send the info to Alex anyway. Stranger things, as they say.”

  The phone was still resting in her lap when the screen lit up and then began to ring.

  It was Alex.

  “What?” asked Sophie.

  “Get your asses over to the Bayou Hotel. We’ve got another hit on our suspect.”

  CHAPTER-44

  Six hours to go. Right on schedule.

  He glanced over at the young man in the seat beside him. He had fallen asleep, his head on his chest, moving back and forth ever so slightly whenever the vehicle changed lanes or hit a minor bump on the freeway.

  The rearview mirror revealed that his mother and brother were out as well. As planned.

  “Miles to go before I sleep,” he whispered. He wondered if Robert Frost had ever made this much money, however.

  That was all the time he had to concern himself with. Then he’d be on his way to wherever the money he’d earned would take him. Then what?

  Glancing at Charlie again, he wondered if a family was in his future. Could he love someone else enough to marry and bring children onto this wretched piece-of-shit rock called earth?

  Moving into the passing lane, he drove by an old geezer in a blue sedan that was two sizes too large for him. The old fart could barely sit up far enough to see through the windshield. How long before he caused an accident and killed someone? Who knew? But it was a probability, from his point of view.

  He then steered back into the cruising lane, staying right at the speed limit. It wouldn’t be good to be pulled over. He’d hate to kill another cop, and so soon after the man in Corner’s house.

  One more glance at Charlie gave him reason to pause.

  Were kids the true legacy for men? To leave your mark in a set of genes handed down from generation to generation? He thought about that for a moment, then decided no. Legacies were left by actions, not children.

  Six hours.

  Then he’d work on his own legacy.

  Who could ask for more?

  CHAPTER-45

  Motioning for the trio of agents from the New Orleans FBI office to go to the rear exit of the hotel, Manny then pointed to the other two teams of three, sending them to each side entrance of the six-story building. There were four more agents at the front.

  Thirteen agents plus Josh, Braxton, Sophie, and himself—that would be enough to put this one in custody. Especially given the circumstances.

  “We’re going in the front?” asked Josh as they huddled near the hood of the SUV.

  “We do. We’ll go in when all the guests have been evacuated. Maybe another five minutes,” said Manny. “The manager doesn’t like it, but she’s reasonable and is cooperating. They were pretty much full because of today’s cruise, otherwise we’d be ready to go already.”

  “Let’s see it again. We have to make sure we know this man,” said Josh.

  “Dat be true,” agreed Braxton.

  Sophie reached through the window and pulled her pad from the front seat of the SUV, pushed the on switch, hit another button, and the elevator’s recorded feed came to life.

  The security footage clearly displayed the image of the same man Alex had found from the traffic system videos standing near Lucretia Doucett two weeks prior. His slim face easily recognizable, his hair and mustache the same. He appeared to be smiling.

  He’d checked in late last night and hadn’t left his room, according to security guards and the front desk. To top that off, the room keycard hadn’t been swiped again either. Although the hotel manager had said those imprint records c
ould be unreliable, the manager suspected the man hadn’t left his room either.

  “Do we really think this is him?” asked Sophie.

  “Hey, at the very least, he’s a person of interest. But my gut tells me he’s in this deep. Yeah, I think it’s him,” said Josh.

  “Manny?” asked Sophie.

  “Yes. I think he’s involved. And if we can determine if he killed Doucett, I think that seals it. Maybe he’ll have the knife on him, and we can match it to the knife tip Chloe and Alex found in Doucett’s body.”

  “What about whatever he took from the warehouse?” asked Josh. “I mean; I know the procedure. But what if this goes bad, and he uses whatever he has right here?”

  “The good thing is it’ll be in a hotel and not on a cruise ship. The bad news is it’ll be us inside,” said Manny.

  “Great. I haven’t even had any of those fried oysters at the Ocean Grill yet,” said Sophie.

  “Hungry again?”

  “Yeah, and I think I got to pee. This job makes me nervous.”

  “It should. Me too. But that’s the worst case, remember?” said Josh.

  “You’re right,” she answered.

  “Sophie, run it again,” said Manny.

  She did. Watching the surveillance video for the tenth time, Manny shook his head.

  “Why are you shaking your head?” asked Sophie.

  “It’s obvious, right? Why would this man risk being seen in a public place? He looked right at the camera.”

  “He might not know that much about security cameras and systems. Besides that, I know I look at the camera when I’m in an elevator,” said Josh.

  “You’re a cop though,” said Manny.

  He shrugged. “People look at cameras. We’ve all seen it.”

  Josh made sense. Not everyone knows about everything. Yet, if this was their man, he’d know, right?

  “You’re not totally convinced, are—”

  The manager emerged from the front, herding nine more people toward them. After the guests had been ushered off the block, she returned. The round, pleasant-looking woman was perspiring, the beads of sweat high on her ebony forehead.

  “It’s clear, y’all. He’s the only person left in the hotel. Room 202.”

  “Thank you. We won’t be long,” said Josh.

  The worried look on the manager’s face deepened. “You’re not going to shoot my hotel up, are you?”

  Manny smiled, despite the situation. “We’ve not done that yet. I think your hotel is safe.”

  “Okay. I don’t trust y’all, but what am I going to do?”

  “We’ll take care of your building. You can sit over there behind those four agents. You’ll be safe there,” said Josh.

  Josh nodded toward Manny and Sophie. “Braxton and I are going in first, you two will back us.”

  “Oh hell no,” said Sophie. “I’ve seen both of you shoot. Manny and I are going in first. We’ve done this way more times. If this goes haywire, I like our chances better with me getting a clear shot.”

  “She’s right,” said Manny.

  Josh opened his mouth. Sophie raised her hand.

  “Don’t talk. This ain’t up for debate. Let’s go, Big Boy.”

  Sophie took off for the double doors.

  Manny moved to her side, trying to pray away the uneasy feeling that they would get more than what they’d bargained for.

  CHAPTER-46

  Alex Downs rubbed his eyes then looked back to the thirty-inch screen positioned between the two smaller monitors. His lack of sleep was creeping up on him, but he’d be all right as long as the coffee and the energy drink held out. Josh and Braxton had headed off to the hotel from the safe house, taking every agent except four with them. They were as excited as he that maybe they’d located the man who was planning to . . . do what exactly?

  Fill a ship with toxins? Maybe they were off track, and he planned to blow up the ship. Maybe he was just going to kill the captain and crew. Hell, maybe he only wanted to kick the chef’s ass. Who knew for sure with these people?

  He drank more coffee from his University of Michigan travel cup, the aroma as good as the taste.

  Did it matter, at this point? With more than a dozen highly trained agents surrounding their suspect, he wouldn’t have time to take a leak when they went into motion, let alone carry out some misguided concept of revenge, as Manny called it.

  Alex couldn’t stop thinking about what Manny still wanted him and Anna to do. What was his friend searching for? Probably nothing, yet sometimes he wasn’t even sure Manny knew what he was looking for. That he would recognize it when he saw it.

  “Don’t overthink it, boy,” he whispered.

  Anna hadn’t found anything concrete about missing toxins or potential illegal shipments of Class A bioweapons. Even the CDC hadn’t been able to help much. Only to say they were certain that none of their stash was missing, but who knew about the rest of the world?

  She was still looking, however. She had expanded her search to include international sources and had even gotten a little help from INTERPOL.

  “It’s a big world, Alex,” she’d said as she hung up. She was right about that. People thought technology made the world smaller, but in a true sense, it revealed just the opposite to him. Seven billion people could generate an insurmountable pile of information. His searches were proof of that.

  He’d taken the information Sophie had sent him about the various cruise-related deaths and refined it. There were a couple of wrongful-death lawsuits settled in the cases she had found, as well as a few others he had found. Money talks, no matter the situation.

  He’d gone over each case and saw no connection to what was going on in New Orleans. None of the families associated with those deaths resembled their suspect, or Doucett, for that matter. There were no drawn-out, high-profile cases to dive into. Nothing that he could see that would draw attention to any of those cases.

  He thought that wise on the cruise line’s part. They had done the right thing, after the hell broke loose on the Ocean Duchess those years ago, and paid up. He was sure that they cared about their business, no question, but the cruise line had exhibited a concern for their guests and family members touched by murder and injury, and he respected them for that.

  After he rose and poured another cup of coffee, he plopped back down and studied the large screen again. He’d input parameters for situations in New Orleans over the last five years that had to do with serious crimes.

  The software had done its work, and he now had over two hundred cases to review. Alex sighed, then glanced down at his new left hand.

  It wouldn’t be his real hand, ever, but by the hour, he was feeling more comfortable with it and what it could do. The doctors said the nerve graft would take time to work, and it wouldn’t be complete, but it would allow him some feeling eventually. He still marveled at the progress in the medical arena and was grateful no matter what usage he regained.

  It didn’t look bad either.

  As he began scrolling down the long list of murders, robberies, and assaults that fit into his parameters, the small screen on his right flashed a message that he’d gotten a hit on another security-camera feed. He scowled.

  It must be something from an old file, because their suspect was in the hotel. But why guess?

  Leaning over, he hit the “enter” button.

  There he was again. His white fedora was pulled down on the left side, covering part of his face, but there was no mistaking the image of their unsub. It must have shown up after one of their camera sources updated their video files. Some companies and storefronts took weeks instead of hours to comply with security decorum mandated by law enforcement.

  The black banner on the bottom of the still image gave the location: Poydras Street and Convention Center Boulevard.

  Alex sat up so fast he almost fell from his chair. The time stamp was less than twenty minutes ago.

  CHAPTER-47

  Standing near the elevato
r, after ascending the two flights of steps, Manny watched, weapon raised, as Josh and Braxton stood on the left side of the red door with the gold 202 displayed.

  Sophie had taken a closer position, giving her a better angle to the front of the room. Given the narrow hallway, that made sense. Moreover, there was no stopping her when she got it in her head to go forward with what she saw.

  Yet, he didn’t see that as recklessness, rather her ability to size up the dynamics and angles of a situation like this. She was as good as anyone.

  They had agreed, if anything was remotely off, they’d shoot now and ask questions later. Josh thought it was the best way to ensure as many people as possible stayed alive. Manny reminded Josh that not every circumstance was identical. What if this wasn’t their man, as unlikely as that was? But Josh stuck with his first order. Kill the bastard if he looks cross-eyed, then let God sort out who was who.

  Braxton caught his attention, then nodded that they were ready, the big man’s face aglow with perspiration, matching his own. He remembered the old saying, “It’s not the heat but the humidity.” He almost laughed. Strange thoughts at strange times indeed.

  “Let’s kick some ass,” whispered Sophie.

  They moved silently along the blue and green carpet to the door, then they squatted down, one on each side.

  Their eyes met. Sophie’s were shining. The woman loved this part of the job. There was no denying that look on her face.

  Adrenaline rush for him, no doubt. Love? He thought not.

  He shifted, Glock in his left hand, keycard in the other.

  No reason to wait a second more.

  Manny rose from his crouch, raised a hand to swipe the entry card through the door sensor . . . just when the handle turned and the door swung open.

  The smallish man, dressed in shorts and a red t-shirt barely had time to widen his eyes before Manny grabbed the front of his shirt and pulled while Sophie took his legs out from under him. The metal traveling case he’d been carrying flew several feet down the dimly lit hall, past Sophie’s head, in the direction of Josh and Braxton.