Detective Defender

by Marilyn Pappano

  “You want to go into the living room?”

  Martine paused, then shook her head. “In here.”

  * * *

  Jimmy was the last to walk through the doorway she’d indicated. She went first, turning on lights, opening curtains, and Murphy followed. Jimmy stood at the threshold, taking in everything before invading it.

  He would admit, he didn’t know Martine well. That time he’d tried to get her to go home from Murphy’s party with him had been only their second meeting, and since then she’d looked at him like he was some kind of bottom-feeder. He did know that he wished things had happened differently back then, that she and Evie Murphy were like sisters, that his ex-wife, Alia, had been welcomed into their group last year and that Martine ran the voodoo shop below: part good fun, part legitimate business. He knew she was serious and mysterious and superstitious and sometimes wild and worrisome.

  This room didn’t seem to go with any of that.

  It had once been a dining room, he suspected, from the general size and shape, the proximity to the kitchen and the arched doorway into the living room. Now it looked like it belonged in a suburban house, reigned over by a crafter who indulged creativity in the lulls between being World’s Best Soccer Mom and World’s Best Cheer Mom. The woman belonging to this room drove an SUV, had a closet filled with conservative trendy clothes, was organized enough to keep complex schedules for four kids in her head, never missed a PTA meeting and terrorized any mother who did.

  It looked nothing like the Martine he’d offended a few years ago.

  It held a large rectangular table, the top etched with a one-inch grid, and four perfectly matched chairs. Every available inch of wall space was covered with white bookcases, and the shelves were filled with books, craft supplies, an array of tools, fabric and a lot of things he didn’t recognize, all of it in color-coordinated hampers or boxes. The lamps in the room gave off bright white light; for the first time in a week or more, he could see clearly again. The fog had lifted, at least inside this small space.

  Martine settled on one side of the table. Jimmy sat on the opposite side next to Murphy. She opened a white bin, neatly labeled with the years, and pulled out a photograph, laying it on the table in front of him and Murphy.

  Jimmy leaned forward to study the shot of the smiling blonde in an off-the-shoulder gown. Gaudy decorations behind her suggested a high school prom, an innocent time. It was funny the things twenty-plus years could change and the things they couldn’t. This pretty, smiling, well-nourished, blue-eyed blonde shouldn’t have a thing in common with the underweight, hard-worn, weary woman they’d seen in the cemetery this morning, but he had no doubt they were one and the same.

  Murphy knew, too, but he still offered his cell phone to Martine. She glanced at the picture—quickly the first time, as if afraid there might be damage she didn’t want to have in her mind, then for a still quiet moment. Shivering, she held her hands to her coffee mug before lifting it for a drink.

  “Her name is Paulina Adams. We grew up together in Marquitta. She called yesterday afternoon and asked to meet me by the river.” Her voice sounded hollow and distant, making its way through a thick haze of shock and emotion and guilt and sorrow. Jimmy had heard that voice a hundred times from a hundred different people, when he broke the news that someone they loved had died. God, he hated that part of the job. Today, because it was Martine, he hated it even more.

  “Did you meet her?” Murphy asked. Of course she did. Jimmy wouldn’t even have asked.

  “She, um...she looked like she’d been having a tough time. She was frightened. She said...” Her breath sounded loud in the room. “She thought someone was trying to kill her. I thought she was being paranoid. But I guess it’s not paranoia if someone really is out to get you, right?” Her smile was faint and sickly and slid away faster than it had formed.

  With prompting from Murphy—a lot of it; the hesitations and pauses started long and got longer—she related the conversation with Paulina. Paulie, she’d called her, and in return Paulina had called her Tine. After a time, she fell silent, locking gazes with Murphy. “How did she die?”

  Death notifications were Jimmy’s least favorite part of the job, and definitely the least favorite part of that job was answering questions like that. No one wanted to hear that their sixteen-year-old daughter was raped before she was murdered, or that their elderly father had been beaten with a baseball bat by the thugs who broke into his house. Certainly Martine did not want to know that her friend’s heart had been cut from her chest.

  “We’re waiting for the autopsy report,” Murphy said gently. All cops, no matter how tough or gruff or abrupt, had a gentle side—even Jimmy himself. Granted, the only people who ever saw his were the victims and the officers he worked with. Martine couldn’t see anything when she pretty much pretended he didn’t exist.

  “Why would someone want to kill Paulina?” he asked, part curiosity, part to remind her that he did exist.

  Martine breathed deeply, her fingers running along the edge of the storage bin in a slow back and forth pattern. Her nails were painted dark red, and heavy silver rings gave an elegant look to her hand. Those hands could perform magic. He’d felt it for himself that last night, when everything had been full of promise. He didn't know even now what he had expected at the time—a few hours, a few dates, maybe even something serious—but what he'd gotten was rejection and her never-ending scorn. Most of the time, he was okay with that. Most of the time, he provoked her just because he could. But sometimes he caught himself wondering what if...

  Realizing he was watching her, she stopped the rubbing and clasped her hands. “I don’t know. Before yesterday, I hadn’t seen her in twenty-four years.”

  “But you were best friends.”

  “Were,” she repeated for emphasis. “In school.”

  “What happened?”

  Again she drew a deep breath. He wasn’t sure if it was meant to imply her annoyance at being questioned by him or if she was using the time to figure out the right answer. Right answers never needed figuring. The truth came easier to most people than evasions or lies.

  “We were kids. We went to the same school, the same church, had the same interests. Then we graduated and...things changed. We changed. The ones who went to college went elsewhere. The ones who didn’t moved elsewhere, too. We wanted to see what the world had to offer, and we lost touch after a while.” A narrow line creased her forehead. “Are you still in touch with your best bud from high school?”

  “I am. I introduced him to his wife. His kids call me Uncle Jimmy.”

  The crease deepened into a scowl. “Of course they do.” Snideness sharpened her tone. “Most of us move on after high school. We all found new lives and new friends.”

  “And yet when Paulina was having a tough time, when she thought someone was going to kill her, she came to you, someone she hadn’t seen in twenty-four years. Doesn’t that seem odd? That she wouldn’t go to one of those new friends you all replaced each other with?”

  Martine’s face flushed, giving her the first real color he’d seen since she’d found them at her door. Anger? Embarrassment that she didn’t have an answer for a perfectly reasonable question? Guilt that if she wasn’t outright lying, she was at least not being entirely truthful?

  He had to give her credit: she didn’t shove back from the table, pace around the room or throw him out of her house. He’d watched plenty of people do all three. He’d even been on the receiving end of a few punches in the process of being thrown out. No, Martine might have surpassed the limits of her tolerance for him, but she retained control.

  “I don’t know where Pauline’s new life and new friends are,” she said, a clenched sound to her words. “I don’t know where she went after school, what she did, how she lived, whether she married or had children, if she kept in touch with her family or
anyone else. No one could have been more surprised than I was when I heard her voice on the phone, or when I saw her, or when she ran off into the fog. We were friends a lifetime ago, but after twenty-four years, she’s as much a stranger to me as she is to you. I’d have better luck coming up with suspects who want you dead than Paulina.”

  If the conversation hadn’t been so serious, he might have laughed at that. He’d been a cop for eighteen years. Everyone could come up with a list of people who wanted him dead.

  She slid her chair back and stood, replaced the picture in the bin and closed the lid. “I have to get ready to open the shop, and I need time to...”

  Jimmy silently completed the sentence for her: grieve over a stranger who’d once meant the world to her. He needed time to figure out whether he believed everything—or even anything—she’d told them. His first two questions for himself after an interview were Did she lie? and Why? He wasn’t looking forward to telling Murphy he believed his wife’s best friend had lied.

  Murphy made the small talk to get them out the door—thanks, sorry, take care—then they took the stairs in silence. The street was just as empty of life as it had been when they came.

  Murphy started the engine and turned the heat to high before thoughtfully tapping his fingers on the steering wheel. “Notice how she just happened to have that box on the table? The yearbooks were inside there, too. A lot of pictures, souvenirs, old cards. Seeing Paulina yesterday upset her more than she wanted to show.”

  “Maybe she was wondering how Paulina went from that kid at the prom to that woman on your phone. Or maybe seeing her made her nostalgic for the good old days.”

  Murphy snorted. “I know you didn’t miss the fact that she wasn’t telling us everything, so don’t make excuses. I love Martine, but I’m not here because she’s my kids’ godmother. My job is to find who killed Paulina and why.”

  “But you can’t forget that she’s your kids’ godmother, can you, and that makes the job harder. Evie and the kids would never forgive you if you treated her like a suspect or an uncooperative witness.”

  “Hey, I can be tough,” Murphy said in self-defense. “I once handcuffed Evie and took her to jail.”

  “Yeah, and you’ll never do that again, will you?” That arrest had been the end of their relationship the first time around. Once Murphy realized he’d been duped, he’d had to solve a few murders, arrest a few corrupt feds and grovel like hell to get back into Evie’s life. In Jimmy’s opinion, that was a hell of a lot of work for one woman.

  Which probably explained why he hadn’t stuck with just one woman in a long, long time.

  Chapter 2

  Oh, God, she’d lied to the police—and not just to the police, but to Jack.

  Groaning, Martine dragged her hair into a ponytail. Instead of being bouncy and perky like it should be, it just dangled limp and heavy—the way she felt, coincidentally. She’d put on makeup as soon as the detectives had left, but she’d had a hard time finding the balance between enough and too much. Even now, she couldn’t tell whether she looked like someone who’d had a shock or someone trying to pass for a clown.

  She hadn’t actually lied to the police. She just hadn’t volunteered a few things, like the fact that Paulina believed their voodoo curse was the reason for the threat against her. Or that one of their other best friends had been killed just a few months ago, allegedly because of the curse. Or that Tallie, Robin and Martine herself were on the supposed hit list, too.

  Martine couldn’t get past the cold hard fact that the others ignored: their voodoo curse wasn’t real. It had been far more Dr. Seuss than Marie Laveau. They hadn’t raised any spirits; they hadn’t disturbed the peace between this world and the other; they hadn’t done anything a million stupid kids before and after them hadn’t done.

  What had happened to William Fletcher had been a coincidence—not even a surprising one, according to gossip. He’d been warped in his tastes and careless in his pursuit of them, and Callie and Tallie’s mom had often said that one day the consequences of his actions would catch up with him.

  That Saturday night they had.

  But it wasn’t her fault, or Paulina’s or the others’.

  Heaving a sigh that echoed with restlessness and sadness, she pulled on a bright yellow-and-pink madras plaid rain slicker and a pair of boots and headed out. Back in the day when the shop was new and finding its way, she’d made time to bake goodies for her employees’ breakfast and breaks, but business had luckily picked up about the time her baking interest waned. Now she visited Wild Berries, a small shop on Jackson Square, and bought treats far better than she could make.

  The strange dampness made her pull the slicker hood over her head as she walked. It wasn’t raining exactly. It was more as if the drops of water were suspended in air and broke only when a person bumped into them. The few that trickled down her face were ridiculously cold and sent shivers all the way to her feet.

  And all the weather people could say was Unusual weather patterns or Maybe a break this weekend. Anise, one of her employees, kept insisting the sun was never going to shine again, but then, Anise was a gloom-and-doom sort of person. With her distinctive Goth appearance, Martine hadn’t decided whether she added to the ambiance of the shop or scared the customers instead.

  When Martine stepped inside Wild Berries, a bell dinged overhead, and a small high voice sang out, “The sun will come out tomorrow...”

  She slid her hood back to revel in the brilliant smile the shop owner, Shelley, gave her. Even on her worst day she summoned more optimism than Martine could even imagine at the moment. Shelley was happy, she’d once told Martine—truly, seriously, contented all the way down to her soul. Martine knew days of deep satisfaction, but she envied Shelley her pure unwavering light.

  “How’s business?” Martine asked as she strolled the length of display cases, her mouth watering with each new discovery. Lemon and brown sugar and chocolate perfumed the air, along with buttery pastry and cinnamon and coffee. If it was possible to absorb calories by osmosis, Wild Berries was the place to do it.

  “My early birds are reliable. It’s slow right now, but it’ll pick up by lunch. How about your place?”

  “People come, buy and go. Let me have twelve of your most decadent creations, would you? Make one lemon with a sign that says ‘Hands off. For Martine’s pleasure only.’”

  With a laugh, Shelley folded a brightly decorated cardboard box and began filling it. “I thought I saw you pass by yesterday afternoon, but you were moving so fast, I wasn’t sure.”

  Martine kept her smile in place by sheer will. “Yeah, I—I had a—a meeting.” With a woman who’d been murdered twelve hours later. God, that sent a chill through her soul. She wondered about Paulina’s parents: Where did they live now? When would they be notified? How thoroughly would the loss of their only daughter devastate them?

  And more questions. Had she been married? Was there a husband out there worrying where the hell his wife had gone? God have mercy, what if there were kids feeling the same?

  And what about Tallie and Robin? They should know, too, because they’d been Paulina’s friends, too. The five of them had shared a lot of history.

  And they deserved a warning because, even if Martine didn't believe in the paying-for-their-curse business, it seemed someone else might.

  Paulina had believed it, and she was dead. Callie had believed it, and she was dead, too. Martine couldn’t have helped Callie, and she hadn’t helped Paulina, but if she at least contacted Tallie and Robin...at least gave them a heads-up...

  A flash of color wavered in front of her, and she blinked hard, bringing the plastic bag holding the pastry box into focus. Shelley wore her usual smile, but it was tinged with a bit of concern. “You okay, Martine?” she asked, and Martine was pretty sure it wasn’t the first time.

 
“Yeah, sure. Nothing a few days on a tropical beach wouldn’t cure.”

  “You and me both. Sun, sand, cabana boys...my dearest dream. Maybe the lemon tart will take you away for a few moments, at least.”

  Martine traded her debit card for the bag, then looked inside and located the tart underneath the box’s cellophane lid. In fine print across the pastry, Shelley had written with frosting, Reserved for Martine. With a laugh, she pocketed the debit card again. “My employees are most grateful, and so am I.”

  “Have a good day. And don’t let the weather get you down. No matter how dreary, it’s still New Orleans, and that beats a sunny LA or New York or Chicago any day.”

  Martine waved as the bell dinged above her again. Shelley was right. A bad day in New Orleans was better than a good day anywhere else. She’d had a lot of dreams growing up, but in terms of distance, they’d ended fifty miles from her hometown. She enjoyed traveling, but at the end of every trip, she was happy to be home where she belonged.

  Would always belong.

  And no one—no old friend, no murderer, not even Detective Jimmy DiBiase—could take that from her.

  She was halfway past Saint Louis Cathedral when the nerves between her shoulder blades prickled. The power of a look never failed to amaze her: this one was as physical as an actual touch, and it made shivers dash down her spine. She tried to casually glance over her shoulder to see who was watching her, but when she moved her head, the hood of the slicker stayed where it was, instead giving her a good look at the pink lining. Stopping and actually turning around was a bit obvious, but when she reached the intersection, that was exactly what she did.

  It was truly raining now, so much more normal than the earlier damp that some pressure deep inside her eased. The few people around were intent on getting to their destination, except for a crowd of tourists huddled beneath a lime-green golf umbrella and conferring over a map. No one showed any interest in her. No one seemed to notice she existed, despite her yellow-and-pink slicker.