Coleman wasn’t judging her, he was merely stating facts.
“When is she going back to New Orleans?”
“Sunday morning,” he said.
“Can I get a copy of all of this?”
“Stop by the office early Sunday. I understand LeMont is coming personally to pick her up. It’s a smart move on his part if she decides to spend the drive talking. Anyway, be at the office at eight. You can at least talk to LeMont. I’ve left word that you’re to be allowed to see Doreen anytime you wish.” He grinned. “I just love to make Rinda’s butt pucker.”
6
SUNDAY MORNING I WAS AT THE COURTHOUSE AS SOON AS IT opened. Coleman wasn’t in yet, but to my surprise, Rinda was. She left me standing at the counter. Just to spite her, I lifted the countertop and walked into what she now considered her domain. I went straight to the coffeepot and poured the last cup, listening with glee to the shortness of her breathing.
The back door opened and Coleman stepped inside, followed by a handsome man in a navy suit. He was shorter and stockier than Coleman, and his dark gaze was quick, moving over the room and landing on me.
“Sarah Booth Delaney,” Coleman said, “this is Detective Arnold LeMont. He’s in charge of the case, and he’s come to take Doreen to New Orleans.” He turned to the detective. “Sarah Booth is a private investigator. She’s been hired on Ms. Mallory’s behalf.”
LeMont rolled his eyes. “Everybody’s got to earn a living, I suppose. Me, I got no real use for private investigators. Most of them are parasites.”
“Sarah Booth is the worst kind of parasite. She latches on to another woman’s—” Rinda started.
“Sarah Booth is a friend of mine,” Coleman said, overriding Rinda and causing the detective to look at him with speculation.
“Yeah, I see,” LeMont said, giving me a more thorough assessment.
The implication was unflattering to both me and Coleman, but Rinda was eating it with a spoon.
“As my friend, Sarah Booth will be treated with courtesy, won’t she?” Coleman asked softly.
LeMont thought about it a moment. “No skin off my teeth.”
“Rinda, make a fresh pot of coffee,” Coleman said in a tone I’d never heard him use to speak to an employee. “Arnold, did you happen to bring your case file with you?”
LeMont was slow to answer. “As a matter of fact, I did. Why do you ask?”
“If it isn’t too much trouble, Sarah Booth would like to look over your reports.”
LeMont wasn’t quick to jump into anything. He thought it through. “The defense will see them eventually, so I don’t see what harm it would do for her to see them now. I left my briefcase in the car. But I got to be headed back to New Orleans soon.”
“Rinda, would you go outside and get Detective LeMont’s briefcase?” Coleman asked without looking at her. I had no doubt that next she’d be cleaning toilets. She had really pissed Coleman off.
He showed LeMont into his office and I followed. When Rinda brought the briefcase in, I took the files that LeMont handed me and sat down in a chair in the corner.
“Do you always help the local PIs?” LeMont asked Coleman. “Or is this one special?”
I listened with one ear, hearing Coleman explain that we’d gone to high school together and that I was a woman of integrity. I didn’t look up. I didn’t dare. And in a moment my attention was riveted to the papers I held in my hand.
The autopsy photos were graphic. Rebekah Mallory’s abnormalities were gut-wrenching. The infant was better off dead. My judgment was instant and harsh, rendered on the basis of my own preferences. I tried to swallow the dryness in my mouth. Why had such a thing happened to an innocent child?
I thought of the woman in the jail cell. Doreen had not shown any grief for her baby. Nor had she shown horror or pity, though the birth defects were grotesque. I realized I understood nothing about the woman who was my client.
The autopsy report was clinical and clear. The cause of death was listed as barbiturate overdose. Traces of Seconal—a prescription drug I recognized from reading Jacqueline Susann’s Valley of the Dolls—were found mixed in the undigested formula in the baby’s stomach. There was no room for doubt. The coroner’s ruling of homicide was factual and correct.
I put aside the autopsy and read the remaining reports, which included Doreen’s statement. Doreen had told LeMont that she’d followed her routine schedule. She fed Rebekah and put her in her bassinet around nine o’clock. Doreen had remained awake for several hours after that, working on her sermon and drinking a single glass of wine. Rebekah was normally a sound sleeper, and Doreen checked and changed her again at midnight before she went to bed. Doreen arose at five A.M. and discovered that Rebekah wasn’t breathing. She called 911 and an ambulance arrived. Rebekah was pronounced dead at the scene.
There was a sketch of the apartment, which showed that Rebekah’s bassinet was in the first bedroom from the door. Doreen’s bedroom was at the far end of the apartment, connected to the infant’s room by a bathroom. I took note that Doreen’s bedroom windows opened onto a balcony over Dumaine Street. From LeMont’s notes I could tell Doreen’s second-floor apartment was part of a large house that had been broken up. There was a central courtyard that gave access to the stairs.
LeMont had done an excellent job of detailing the scene. I couldn’t help but wonder why—initially the baby’s death had been ruled a natural death or SIDS—but I had the man in front of me and I asked him.
“The morning of the death we figured the baby was so sick that she just died in her sleep,” LeMont said. “SIDS is always a questionable death, though, so we strive for a professional job at the scene, just in case something else shows up.”
“Why was an autopsy ordered?” I asked.
“Police aren’t coroners. The baby’s death couldn’t positively be determined by us. Autopsy is routine,” LeMont said. “We went by the book, but we assumed the case was a natural death. It wasn’t until the blood work got back from the coroner that we had any suspicions that the infant was murdered.”
“Did you have any suspects other than Doreen?” I asked.
“In other words, did we rush to judgment?” LeMont asked.
I waited for his answer. LeMont wasn’t going to be an easy man to work with. I lifted my eyebrows, inviting his response.
“At the scene we checked for forced entry; there was none. We asked Ms. Mallory if anyone else had a key to the apartment and she said only the maid. We also asked about the father, and she wouldn’t even tell us who he was, much less where he was. Then we find out the baby died of an overdose of pills. When I go back to re-interview Ms. Mallory, I discover she’s left town to come up here to talk to her mother’s grave.”
He put his coffee mug on the desk and stood. “Now I have to get back to New Orleans.”
“Could I have a few moments with Doreen before you go?” I asked.
LeMont looked at his watch one more time. “Hurry it up.”
COLEMAN CLOSED THE door to the jail behind me. I ignored the drunks and petty thieves as I walked back to Doreen’s cell. She’d changed her blouse and now wore a red slipover that intensified her dark hair and fair skin. Arlin McLain was right. Doreen was stunning.
“They’ve come to extradite you,” I said.
“Do you think they’d let me stop by the cemetery?”
I shook my head. “I seriously doubt it. The officer would have to assume too much personal risk. Besides that, he seems like he’s in a big hurry to get home.”
“Even if I make bail, they won’t allow me to leave New Orleans,” she said. “This may be my only chance to talk to Mama.”
I shook my head. “Forget it, Doreen. But there are some questions I need to ask you before you go, and we don’t have much time.”
“Okay.”
“Who is Rebekah’s father?”
My question caught her totally by surprise. She started to say something, then stopped. “What difference does
that make?” she asked.
“A lot. If it is proven that someone murdered your baby, the next logical choice after you is the father.”
She was having trouble processing what I was saying. “That’s ridiculous. Why would Rebekah’s father want to hurt her?”
“For the same reasons the police think you hurt her. And possibly one more—to hide the fact of his paternity.”
“This has no bearing on the case. I’m not going to tell you or anyone else. Rebekah’s birth was a contract between me and the Divine. It had nothing to do with the father.”
Patience had never been one of my virtues. “Don’t be a fool,” I snapped. “I’m not interested in your claims of divinity or immaculate conception. I need the father’s name and I need to check on him now.”
“No.”
She was as stubborn as a mule. “This isn’t optional, Doreen. If I’m going to help you, I need this information.”
“It has no bearing. You have to trust me on this.”
A terrible suspicion was forming in my brain. “Do you know who the father is?”
She looked straight into my eyes without the least bit of shame or remorse. “It could be one of several people.”
I didn’t care what Doreen’s sexual habits were, but I could see that this wasn’t going to make her very sympathetic to a jury. It was one more little indication that a baby with multiple birth defects would have a negative impact on her lifestyle. Doreen’s habits were going to make her trial a public nightmare for her lawyer. “Give me the names,” I said, pulling a small notebook from my pocket.
“No.”
Her chin was up and out. I wondered for a moment if sexual behavior was hereditary. She hadn’t known anything about her mother, yet she’d followed in her footsteps.
“Doreen, I saw the autopsy report. There’s no doubt that someone killed your baby. Now, do you want that person to get away with it?”
Pain crossed her face. “You really believe someone killed Rebekah? Who would do such a thing? And why? She wasn’t going to live very long. Why would someone kill her?”
Here was the shock and grief and anger I’d expected to see when I first met her. Perhaps Tinkie was right. Doreen had never believed her baby was murdered.
“Tell me the names of the men you were sleeping with,” I said.
She sighed. “None of them even thought they were the father. I never wanted them to think about my baby as anything to do with themselves, and they were glad not to. They all assumed the baby belonged to someone else.”
“The list,” I said relentlessly. If stubborn defined her, tenacity would be my prominent trait.
“These men have no idea they might be the father.” She gripped the bars. “They really aren’t involved.”
I held my pen over the pad and waited.
“What you’re asking me to do is violate a type of confidence. I was helping these men.”
She had my attention. “Helping them?”
Her gaze never wavered. “Love is the most powerful of all the weapons given a healer. Some men aren’t capable of love. They link sex and love together so tightly that the only way to reach them is through sex.”
My expression must have registered my incredulity, because she shook her head and walked away, giving me her back.
“I know it sounds like I’m making excuses or rationalizing my actions. That isn’t the case. I was working with these men and making progress. In order to love, you first have to believe that you can be loved. Some men—and some women, too, but it’s more often men—have never experienced the true intimacy of love. Sex is an access to intimacy. If I reveal the names of these men to the police, I’ll break the fragile bond of trust that I’ve been able to establish. I may do more damage than you can ever imagine.”
I sighed. “Give me the list. I’ll investigate them.”
“And you won’t share the names with the police?”
“Not at this time. Not unless there’s some indication that one of the men is involved in murdering your child.”
She nodded. “Thaddeus Clay.”
I didn’t even start to write. I looked at her. “Senator Thaddeus Clay? United States Senator Thaddeus Clay?”
“Yes. He lives in New Orleans.”
I wasn’t a maven of current events, but even I had heard of Thaddeus Clay, the head of the Senate Environmental Committee as well as cochair of Ways and Means. He was serving his fourth term. He was also married to a former New York model, Ellisea Boudet, known throughout the fashion world as El.
“I was also sleeping with Michael Anderson. He’s in charge of the financial aspects of my ministry,” Doreen said. “And Oren Weaver.”
Once again the name stopped me. “The televangelist?”
She nodded.
Oren Weaver hailed from my neck of the woods. He’d come up hardscrabble, poor as dirt, but with a powerful ability to orate.
“Oren could be a great healer,” Doreen said. “He hums with energy. Literally. But with all of this talent, he lacks the ability to love.”
“He loves money,” I pointed out. He’d been the subject of several television newsmagazine investigations. He’d made millions with his television ministry, rooking those desperate for healing and faith into sending in donations, promising that fifty-dollar prayer handkerchiefs could heal. Of course, when the prayer cloths didn’t work, it was always because the buyer lacked faith.
“Yes, Oren loves money. But he has the capacity to truly love. And if that is ever unleashed in him, he could help thousands of people.”
“And what is the senator’s gift?” I asked. I could clearly see what an advantage it would be for Doreen to align herself with two such powerful men.
“If he were truly to love himself,” she said softly, “it would influence our government, the policies that are made. He would look at the world, our natural world, as a place to cherish rather than rape.”
“And Michael Anderson? What does he offer?”
“Michael offers hope. Beneath his mild manners, he’s the angriest man I’ve ever met. He doesn’t believe in love at all. He isn’t a powerful or public man, but that isn’t important. I don’t select the men I help, the gods, or God if you prefer—it doesn’t really matter what you call the Divine—put them in my path. I only know that given time, I can reach Michael. I can make a difference for him, and there is no telling the impact of one man who believes in the power of love.”
I hadn’t committed a single name to my notepad. I didn’t need to write a list. The names were branded into my brain. “Is there anyone else?”
She smiled with a hint of a secret. “Not at this time. And you promised that you wouldn’t reveal these names to the police, remember.”
“At this time, I don’t see a need. You’re positive none of these men believed he was the father?” I could see motive a mile high with the senator and the minister. Both men would lose a lot if it became public knowledge they’d fathered a child by a woman who professed to use sex as a therapeutic tool. I’d have to dig a little deeper into Michael Anderson to find a motive for him, but I hadn’t forgotten that he held the purse strings to Doreen’s ministry. Baby Rebekah could certainly be bad for the faith-healing business if some of Doreen’s followers ever began to ask why Doreen didn’t heal her own child.
“Each of the men knew I had other . . . patients. That’s an improper word, but the best one I can come up with. I led each one to understand that another was the father. And none of them knew the other men in my life.”
“Were you in love with any of them?” I asked.
Again, the secret smile touched her lips. “All of them,” she said. “Love is what I do. It is my special gift.”
7
IT WAS NEARLY ELEVEN O’CLOCK WHEN I WALKED OUT OF THE courthouse and into the most gorgeous October morning that had ever been created. My mind was whirling with the angles of my new case, and for the first time in weeks, I felt as if my life was moving forward.
> Doreen was on her way to New Orleans, and I was headed to the bakery to pick up some cheese Danish and coffee. Lucky for me my close personal friend, Cece Dee Falcon, society editor of the Zinnia Dispatch, was a workaholic with a looming deadline. I needed to talk to Cece, but I also needed access to the newspaper files. Sunday was the perfect time to look—without the scrutiny of the rest of the newspaper staff.
Bribe in hand, I went to Cece’s office window and peeped in. The pale light of her computer screen highlighted her classic profile and tawny hair. Her perfect nails were a blur on the keyboard.
Before Cece became society editor and long before she became my source for historical Sunflower County facts, Cece was Cecil. We’d gone to high school together. The weather put me in mind of a few Friday night football games where we’d huddled beneath the bleachers drinking Wild Turkey and Coca-Cola, talking about our futures. I had wanted to be an actress, and Cecil had wanted to be a girl. My trip to New York was daring, but Cecil’s trip to Sweden was the bravest single act I knew.
I tapped on the window and then walked around to the front door as she unlocked it.
“Dahling,” Cece said, reaching for the bakery bag. “These are so fresh they’re still warm.” We walked back to her office.
I put a cup of coffee in front of her. Three creams, two sugars. Just the way she liked it.
She took a bite of the pastry, revealing her strong white teeth, and I had time to identify the Little Red Riding Hood nail polish that was the hit of the season. She was dressed in a mocha turtleneck and brown suede pants that hugged her lean hips perfectly. I frowned at her. “If you were a real woman, you’d have wider hips.”
She licked a bit of frosting off her perfect lips and smiled. “Don’t be a bitch, Sarah Booth, just because you have improper distribution of fat deposits. That old ‘more to love’ crap is just that—crap.”
I laughed out loud. Cece was hard to best.
“What brings you to the newspaper on a beautiful Sunday?” she asked. “Something about Doreen Mallory?”
“Tinkie and I are helping her.”
Hallowed Bones Page 5