A Thin Dark Line

by Tami Hoag

  She turned in at the Corners and parked in front of the store. Moments later, Fourcade drove past, flashing his headlights once. He didn't stop.

  She sat in the Jeep for a time, half listening to the radio —an argument about whether or not women should carry handguns in these dangerous times.

  "You think a rapist is just gonna stand back when y'all say, 'Oh, wait, let me get my gun out my pocketbook so I can shoot you'?" the male caller said in a high falsetto. "Marital arts—that's what women need."

  "You mean martial arts?"

  "That's what I said."

  Annie shook her head and pulled her keys. She climbed to the passenger seat and gathered her stuff, slinging the strap of her duffel over one shoulder and scooping the files Fourcade had sent with her into her other arm. She added the detritus of her dinner and a sandal that had worked its way out from under the seat.

  Overburdened, the duffel strap slipping on her shoulder, she climbed out of the Jeep and bumped the door shut with her hip. The load in her arm shifted precariously. As she came around the back of the Jeep, the shoe slipped off the pile and took the dinner garbage with it. The duffel strap fell, the weight of the bag jerking her right arm so that the files and other junk spilled to the ground.

  "Shit," she muttered, dropping to her knees.

  The sound of the rifle shot registered in her mind a split second before the bullet hit.

  36

  The bullet ripped through the plastic back window of the Jeep, destroyed the windshield, and shattered the front window of the store. All in less time than it took to draw a breath—not that Annie was breathing.

  She dropped flat on the ground, the crushed shell biting into her bare arms as she scooted under the Jeep, dragging her duffel bag with her. She couldn't hear a damn thing for the pounding of her pulse in her ears. The heat from the Jeep pressed down on her. Hands fumbling, she dug her Sig Sauer out of the bag, twitched the safety off and waited.

  She couldn't see anything but the ground. If she crawled out from under the Jeep at the front, she could make it up onto the gallery. Using the Jeep for cover, she could climb through the broken front window, get to the phone, and call 911.

  A screen door slapped in the distance.

  "Who's there?" Sos called, racking the shotgun. "Me, I shoot trespassers! And survivors—I shoot them twice!"

  "Uncle Sos!" Annie yelled. "Go back inside! Call 911!"

  "I'd rather unload this buckshot in some rascal's ass! Where y'at, chère?"

  "Go back in the house! Call 911!"

  "The hell I will! Your tante, she already called! Cops are on the way!"

  And if they were lucky, Annie thought, a deputy might arrive in half an hour—unless there already was a deputy right across the road with a rifle in his hands. She thought of Mullen. She thought of Stokes. Donnie Bichon came to mind. She considered the possibility of Renard. She had accused him of shooting into his own home. Maybe this was retribution.

  She adjusted her grip on the Sig and scuttled toward the front end of the Jeep. The shot had to have come from the road or the woods beyond. She hadn't heard or seen a car. A shooter in the woods at night would lose himself in a hurry. It would take a dog to track him, and by the time a K-9 unit arrived, he would be long gone.

  In the distance she could hear the radio car coming, siren wailing, giving all criminals in the vicinity ample warning of its imminent arrival.

  Pitre was the deputy. To Sos and Fanchon, he showed a modicum of respect. To Annie he remarked that he hadn't realized there were so many poor shots in the parish. He made a laconic call back to dispatch to advise everyone of the situation, which was nothing—they had no suspect description, no vehicle description, nothing. At Annie's insistence he called for the K-9 unit and was told the officer was unavailable. A detective would be assigned the case in the morning—if she wanted to pursue the matter, Pitre said.

  "Someone tried to kill me," she snapped. "Yeah, I think I don't wanna just drop that."

  Pitre shrugged, as if to say, "suit yourself."

  The slug had passed through the front window of the store, shattered a display case of jewelry made from nutria teeth, and slammed into the old steel cash register that sat on the tour ticket counter. The cash register had sustained an impressive wound, but still worked. The slug had been mangled beyond recognition. Even if anyone ever went to the trouble of finding a suspect, they would have nothing to match for ballistics.

  "Yeah, well, thanks for nothing, again," Annie said, walking Pitre to his car.

  He feigned innocence. "Hey, I came with lights and siren!"

  Annie scowled at him. "Don't even get me started. Suffice it to say you're just about as big an asshole as Mullen."

  "Ooooh! You gonna go after me now?" he said. "I heard you went after Stokes today. What is it with you, Broussard? You think the only way you'll get up the ladder is knocking everybody else off? What ever happened to women who slept their way to the top?"

  "I'd rather give bone marrow. Go piss up a rope, Pitre." She flipped him off as he drove away.

  After walking Fanchon back to the house, she used the phone in the store to call Fourcade. She chewed at a broken fingernail as she listened to the phone ring on the other end. On the sixth ring his machine picked up. He had asked her to stay the night, now the night was half gone and so was Fourcade. Where was he at one-thirty in the morning? Her mind worried at that question as she helped Sos board up the window to keep out looting raccoons.

  It bothered her that she wanted Nick here for emotional reasons and not just as another cop. If she was going to get through this mess with Renard and the department and Fourcade's hearing, she had to be tougher. She needed to learn to separate the issues. She could almost hear him in her mind: You're not dead. Suck it up and focus on your job, 'Toinette.

  And then he would put his arms around her and hold her safe against him.

  As they worked on the window, she answered Sos's questions as best she could without revealing too much about the situation she had become embroiled in. But he knew she was holding things back from him, and she knew he knew.

  He gave her a hard look as they walked out, his temper still up and bubbling. "Look what you got yourself in now, 'tite fille. Why you can't do things no way but the hard way? Why you don't just marry Andre and settle? Give your tante and me some grandbabies? Mais non, you gotta run off and do a man's job! You all the time beatin' on a hornet's nest with a stick! And now you gonna get stung. Sa c'est de la couyonade!"

  "It'll work out, Uncle Sos," Annie promised, feeling like a worm for lying to him. She could have been dead.

  He made a strangled sound in his throat, but cupped her face in his callused hands. "We worry 'bout you, chérie, your tante and me. You're like our own, you know dat! Why you gotta make life so hard?"

  "I don't mean to look for trouble."

  Sos heaved a sigh and patted her cheek. "But when trouble comes lookin' for you, you ain't hard to find, c'est vrai."

  Annie watched him walk away. She hated that this mess had touched him and Fanchon. If her life was going to stay this complicated, maybe she would have to think about moving away from the Corners.

  "If my life is going to stay this complicated, maybe I'll have to think about moving into an asylum," she muttered as she stepped down off the gallery and turned the corner to her stairs.

  A small box wrapped in flowered paper with a white bow sat on the third step from the bottom. Renard. Annie recognized the paper. It was the same as what had been wrapped around the box with the scarf in it. A too-familiar sense of unease rippled through her at the idea of him coming here as if he felt entitled to touch her private life.

  She stuffed the box into her duffel bag and went up to the apartment.

  The sense of violation struck her immediately. The feeling that someone had invaded her home. From her vantage point in the front entry she could see across the living room, could see that the French doors were shut, the bolt turned. The ai
r in the apartment was stifling and stale from an unexpectedly hot day with closed windows. A faint undertone of something earthy and rotten lingered. The swamp, Annie thought. Or maybe she needed to take the garbage out. She set her duffel bag on the bench and pulled out the Sig. With the gun raised and ready, she moved into the living room and hit the message button on the answering machine. If there was someone here, and he thought she was occupied listening to the machine, he might think to take advantage and attack her from behind.

  Images of Lindsay Faulkner flashed through her mind— lying on the floor like a broken doll; head swathed in bandages like a mummy.

  The messages rolled out of the machine. A Mary Kay lady who had seen her on the news and wanted to compliment her on her complexion. A distant Doucet "cousin" who had seen her on the news and wondered if she could help him get a job as a deputy.

  She moved out of the living room and around the perimeter of the kitchen. Nothing seemed out of order. The old refrigerator hummed and groaned. The alligator on the door grinned at her. The table was clean. She had swept her notes and files together before leaving this morning and stashed them in an old steamer trunk that sat in her living room—just in case.

  The answering machine continued chattering. A.J.'s psychologist sister-in-law, Serena, wanted to offer a friendly ear if Annie needed to talk. Two hang-ups.

  Back in the living room, Annie made the same slow, quiet circuit, looking for anything out of place, pausing at the French doors to double-check the lock. The gator coffee table seemed to watch her as she skirted past it.

  "What's the deal, Alphonse?" Annie murmured.

  Silence. Then Marcus Renard's voice spoke to her.

  "Annie? This is Marcus. I wish you were home. I wanted to thank you again for coming over last night." The voice was too sincere, too familiar. "It means so much to know you care." More silence, and then he said, "Goodnight, Annie. I hope you're having a pleasant evening."

  The skin crawled on the back of her neck. She crossed the room and started down the hall as the machine reported two more hang-up calls.

  The bathroom was clear. Her workout room appeared undisturbed. The tension ebbed a bit. Maybe she was still just reacting to the shooting. Maybe she was just projecting her feelings of violation at Renard having left another gift for her. He should never have been able to get into her home. The doors had been locked.

  Then she turned the corner and opened the door to her bedroom.

  The stench of decay hit her full in the face and turned her stomach inside out.

  Nailed to the wall above her bed in a position of crucifixion, its legs broken and bent, hung a dead black cat. Its skull had been crushed, its entrails spilled out of the body cavity onto the pillows below. And above it one word was painted in blood—cunt.

  "People should get what they deserve, don't you think? Good or bad.

  She deserves to be confronted with the consequences of her sins. She deserves to be punished. Like the others.

  Betrayal is the least of her crimes.

  Terror is the least of mine."

  37

  He lay in wait like a panther in the night, anger and anticipation contained by forced patience. The glowing blue numbers on the VCR clicked the minutes. 1:43. 1:44. The low purr of an engine approached, passed one end of the house, and slipped into the garage.

  The rattle of keys. The kitchen door swung open. He waited.

  Footfalls on tile. Footfalls muffled by carpet. He waited.

  The footsteps passed by his hiding place.

  "Quite the night owl, aren't you, Tulane?"

  Donnie bolted at the sound of the voice, but in a heartbeat, Fourcade materialized from the gloom of the living room and slammed him into the wall.

  "You lied to me, Donnie," he growled. "That's not a wise thing to do."

  "I don't know what you're talking about!" Donnie blubbered, spittle collecting at the corners of his mouth. His breath reeked of scotch. The smell of sweat and fear penetrated his clothing.

  Nick gave him a shake, banging his head back against the wall. "In case you haven't noticed, Donnie, me, I'm not a patient man. And you, you're not too bright. This is bad combination, no?"

  Donnie shivered. His voice took on a whine. "What do you want from me, Fourcade?"

  "Truth. You tell me you don't know Duval Marcotte. But Marcotte, he called you on the telephone tonight, didn't he?"

  "I don't know him. I know of him," he stressed. "What if he called me? I can't control what other people do! Jesus, this is the perfect example—I did you a good turn and look how you treat me!"

  "You don't like the way I treat you, Tulane?" Nick said, easing his weight back. "The way you lie to me, I was tempted to beat the shit out of you a long time ago. Put in the proper perspective, my restraint has been commendable. Perspective is the key to balance in life, c'est vrai?"

  Donnie edged away from the wall. Fourcade blocked the route to the kitchen and garage. He glanced across the living room. The furniture was an obstacle course of black shadows against a dark background; the only illumination, silver streetlight leaching in through the sheer front curtains.

  Nick smiled. "Don't you run away from me, Donnie. You'll only piss me off."

  "I've already managed to do that."

  "Yeah, but you ain't never seen me mad, mon ami. You don't wanna open that door, let the tiger out."

  "You know, this is it, Fourcade," Donnie said. "I'm calling the cops this time. You can't just break into people's homes and harass them."

  Nick leaned into the back of a tall recliner and turned the lamp beside it on low. Donnie had traded the Young Businessman look for Uptown Casual: jeans and a polo shirt with a small red crawfish embroidered on the left chest.

  "Why are you wearing sunglasses?" Donnie asked. "It's the middle of the damn night."

  Nick just smiled slowly.

  "You sure you wanna do that, Donnie?" he said. "You wanna call the SO? Because, you know, you do that, then we're all gonna have to have this conversation downtown— about how you lied to me and what all about Marcotte sniffing around the realty, wanting that land what's tied up there.

  "Me,"—he shrugged—"I'm just a friend who dropped by to chat. But you..." He shook his head sadly. "Tulane, you just got more and more explaining to do. You see how this looks—you dealing with Marcotte? I'll tell you: It looks like you had one hell of a motive to kill your wife."

  "I never talked to Marcotte—"

  "And now your wife's partner is attacked, left for dead—"

  "I never laid a hand on Lindsay! I told Stokes, that son of a bitch—"

  "It's just not looking good for you, Donnie." Nick moved away from the chair, hands resting at the waist of his jeans. "So, you gonna do something about that or what?"

  "Do what?" Donnie said in exasperation.

  "Did Marcotte contact you or the other way around?"

  Donnie's Adam's apple bobbed in his throat. "He called me."

  "When?"

  "Yesterday."

  Nick silently cursed his own stupidity. "That's the truth?" he demanded.

  Donnie raised his right hand like a Boy Scout and closed his eyes, flinching. "My hand to God."

  Nick grabbed his face with one big hand and squeezed as he backed him into another wall. "Look at me," he ordered. "Look at me! You he to God all you want, Tulane.

  God, He's not here gonna kick your ass. You look at me and answer. Did you ever have contact with Duval Marcotte before Pam was killed?"

  Donnie met his gaze. "No. Never."

  And if that was the truth, then Nick had drawn Marcotte onto the scene himself. The obsession had blinded him to the possibilities. The possibility that Marcotte's interest would be piqued by Nick's ill-fated visit, and that Marcotte would be drawn to the scene like a lion to the smell of blood.

  "He's the devil," he whispered, letting Donnie go. Marcotte was the devil, and he had all but invited the devil to play in his own backyard. "Don'tcha do business with the
devil, Donnie," he murmured. "You'll end up in hell. One way or another."

  He dropped his gaze to the floor, reflecting on his own stupidity. There was no changing what he'd done, nothing to do but deal with it. Slowly Donnie's muddy work boots came into focus.

  "Where you been tonight, Tulane?"

  "Around," Donnie said, straightening his shirt with one hand and rubbing his cheek with the other. "I went to the cemetery for a while. I go there sometimes to talk to God, you know. And to see Pam. Then I went and checked a site."

  "In the dead of night?"

  He shrugged. "Hey, you like to go around in sunglasses. I like to get drunk and wander around half-finished construction sites. There's always the chance I'll fall in a hole and kill myself. It's kind of like Russian roulette. I don't have much of a social life since Pam was killed."

  "I suppose an unsolved murder in your past puts the ladies off."

  "Some."

  "Well ... you watch your step, cher," Nick said, backing toward the kitchen. "We don't want you to meet an untimely end—unless you deserve it."

  He was gone as quickly and quietly as he had appeared. Donnie didn't even hear the door shut. But then, that may have been due to the pounding in his head. The shakes swept over him on a wave of weakness, and he stumbled into the bathroom with a hand pressed to his burning stomach. Bruising his knees on the tile, he dropped to the floor and puked into the toilet, then started to cry.

  All he wanted was a simple, cushy life. Money. Success. No worries. The adoration of his daughter. He hadn't realized how close he had come to that ideal until he'd blown it all away. Now all he had was trouble, and every time he turned around he screwed himself deeper into the hole.

  Hugging the toilet, he put his head down on his arms and sobbed.

  "Pam ... Pam ... I'm so sorry!"

  Annie dreamed she caught a bullet in her teeth. Tied to the bullet was a string. Pulling herself hand over hand along the string, she flew through the night, through the woods, and came to a halt with a rifle barrel pressed into the center of her forehead. At the stock end of the gun stood a shimmering apparition with an elaborate feather mask covering its face. With one hand the apparition removed the mask to reveal the face of Donnie Bichon. Another hand peeled away the face of Donnie Bichon to reveal Marcus Renard. Then Renard's face was peeled away to reveal Pam Bichon's death mask—the eyes partially gone, skin discolored and decomposing, tongue swollen and purple. Nailed to her chest was the dead black cat, its intestines hanging down like a bloody necklace.