“I don’t know, Ross. It’s pretty messy. Risky, too. Why not just arrange a quiet little accident?”
“How do we know they haven’t already tried that?” Something twitched at the edge of his mind, then faded.
Delaney nodded. “Makes a little bit of sense, Ross. Your noodle isn’t as hashed as you claim. So, if you’re right about them, they missed their mark last night and might try again?”
Mickey nodded. “I think it’s at least worth looking into. There weren’t that many people involved. Maybe five or six coming off the plane. Everyone else had cleared out. If one of them had a near accident lately—”
Again with the twitch. What was he forgetting? What was he too damn tired to call up from the slippery depths of his brain?
“Something wrong?”
Mickey rubbed his head where the remains of last night’s headache lingered. “I’m forgetting something. Hope it’ll come back. Feels important.”
“Don’t sweat it. Thoughts are like women. They only come when you don’t want them.” Delaney pushed his chair back. “I’ll see if I can scare up a list of those names. All it’d take is a phone call to each person. Though I think I should talk to your Luci in person—if only to see the legs.”
“You can waste your time if you want to. I asked her the standard questions last night.” And got some highly non-standard answers, he could have added but didn’t. It would only encourage Delaney. He liked to collect eccentrics. “If you insist on questioning her, count me out. I could die a happy man if I never have to talk to her again—”
The end of his sentence was drowned in the sudden honking of horns and squealing of tires. An old, rattletrap car pulled recklessly across traffic and stopped at the curb. Right next to a “NO PARKING ANYTIME” sign. It was a Volkswagen full of bodies, most of whom appeared to be the male-with-biceps variety. With one exception.
The door creaked open. Luci Seymour delicately began to extricate herself from the young man on whose lap she’d been perched. Her momentary suspension across a hefty knee left a lot of her infamous leg exposed for an enjoyable moment, effectively halting male traffic on the sidewalk for the duration of her suspension. Then there was a collective in-drawn breath of awe, changing quickly to one of regret when, with a wiggle and a twist, Luci freed herself and her skirt from car and man.
7
“Luci.” Mickey’s brain groaned. A much lower organ signaled delight. He felt Delaney grip his arm.
“You seriously mislead me, Ross.”
Mickey studied Delaney’s awestruck expression with resignation. Only time and exposure to Luci would wipe it off now. With deep suspicion, Mickey watched her approach. He didn’t know why she was wearing what looked like mourning clothes on a hot weekday morning, but the drifting lace and floppy-brimmed hat made her look deceptively harmless and far too charming. Let Delaney take the ride this time. He’d be the one to keep his wits about him in the bright hot light of day.
“Mickey.” Her voice was rich with a mournful Southern accent she hadn’t had last night as she held out her hand to him. “How fortunate. I was just on my way to see you. The boys...” She made a vague gesture with a black-gloved hand in the direction the Volkswagen had gone. “...were going to buy me breakfast before taking me to you.”
Fighting a rearguard action against another lust surge, Mickey took the hand and resisted a need to kiss it by shaking it. “Aren’t those the same guys who wanted you to strip on the hood of their car?”
“Well.” A fan appeared from somewhere and was used to good effect. “Sort of, though it wasn’t exactly a strip, just a more progressive version of the bunny hop.”
“Strip, bunny hop, uh...” Delaney’s confusion turned Mickey’s and Luci’s attention his direction.
Luci looked him up, then down, and extended her black gloved hand and sultry smile in his direction. “Hello?”
Delaney slanted a laughing glance at Mickey before pressing a gallant kiss on her wrist above the glove. “I’m Kevin Delaney, and you have to be Miss Luci. Mickey’s just been telling me about last night. I hope it hasn’t put you off New Orleans?”
“Well, I haven’t been asked to strip before—”
“He means at the airport,” Mickey said.
“Oh.” Luci blinked, trying to remember what about last night was supposed to have upset her. Mickey’s pained expression prompted her to say, “Men have tried to kiss me—”
“The shooting,” Mickey snapped, avoiding looking at Delaney.
The urge to grin had the edges of her mouth twitching. “Oh. That. Right. The shooting. Did you catch them?” The two men shuffled their feet, making it even harder to keep the grin at bay. A sweet smell crossed her nose’s path, pulling her attention abruptly from them. “Yum. Those beignets look lovely. It’s been years since I had one.”
She gave them a hopeful look and saw Mickey open his mouth to cut off this blatant solicitation, but Delaney forestalled him.
“Mick and I were just going to have some. Would you like to join us?”
“I would adore it.” She pretended not to see the obvious signs—streaks of powdered sugar on their suit pants—that they’d already had some, and slipped a hand through Delaney’s crooked elbow. “So kind.”
Mickey stood his ground, but neither of them appeared to notice, so he stomped after them, reaching the table too late to stop the order going in.
“We’ll have to make it quick, Delaney,” he said, going for firm and authoritative. “We have to get back—” The words died in his throat when she turned towards him, her eyes large and sad in her face. “Is something wrong?”
“Wrong?” She turned back to Delaney. “Do I look like something’s wrong?”
Delaney looked uncomfortable. “Well, yes.”
She leaned forward and patted his arm. “I am sorry. Sometimes I emanate.”
Mickey looked at Delaney and found the same bewilderment in his eyes, so he looked at Luci just in time to see her give a tiny shake, casting off sorrow like a cat shakes off water.
“It’s these clothes my aunts picked out. They were somebody’s funeral outfit. Death and mourning are very strong auras.” She leaned closer to Delaney, giving him a confidential smile. “Auras are very useful in my profession. Did Mickey tell you I’m an actress?”
Mickey choked.
“No, he didn’t.” Delaney leaned in to meet her halfway. “I’ll bet you’re a great leading lady.”
“That’s so sweet of you!” Mickey couldn’t believe it when she rapped him lightly with the fan. “But I’m not really the leading lady type. I do character parts.” She gave Mickey a quick look, her eyes wide and mischievous, before turning them back on Delaney. “I just finished a run in Arsenic and Old Lace.”
“One of my favorites.” Delaney covered her hand with his. “And you were—?”
“Abby, one of the crazy aunts who kill old and lonely men. It’s an amazing coincidence, when you think about it, because when they showed it to me, I had an overwhelming urge to say my lines, only there was no Mortimer to freak out.” She turned to Mickey. “Then I thought of you. Isn’t it interesting the way fiction and reality sometimes collide?”
Mickey’s eyes narrowed. Was that humor lurking in the depths of her eyes? He leaned towards her and asked with calm emphasis, “What are you talking about?”
She looked surprised, then demure. She looked away, then back. “How can I say this?”
“Try words,” Mickey suggested.
“It’s...a...stiff.”
“A...stiff?” Mickey had been expecting a curveball from her, but he still wasn’t ready for it. Perhaps it wasn’t possible to be ready for her curveballs.
She looked down, then back up at him, her eyes deep, green and utterly mysterious. “Stiff in...every...way.”
Luci didn’t get her beignets. She looked longingly over her shoulder as Mickey and Delaney hustled her to their car and inserted her in the back seat.
“Shouldn’t
we call in the Crime Lab and the Coroner’s office?” Delaney asked Mickey across the top of the car.
“You heard what she said about fiction and reality, Delaney. What if she’s mixed too much fiction with her reality?”
Delaney’s face was a study in the journey to enlightenment and then to horror as he processed this.
“Right. We wait.” He pulled open his door and squeezed in, no car being wholly capable of accommodating his bulk.
Mickey grinned and slid behind the wheel. The grin faded as he watched Luci. In the back seat, she straightened her body and dress, removed the floppy hat and fluffed her hair back up. She settled in, dead center, her hands folded in her lap like a Vanderbilt in a limousine. Her pose settled, she looked around her with something less than enthusiasm.
Mickey felt his hackles rise again, but couldn’t seem to help it. He didn’t want to ask, didn’t want to turn and look at her when he did, but couldn’t help that either.
“What?”
“Is this a real police car?”
He opened his mouth but closed it when he realized he didn’t have an answer. He turned around and started the car, leaving the field of battle to Delaney. He’d wanted to meet Luci. Here was his chance. Mickey put the official light on the dash and used it just long enough to force their way into traffic.
Delaney propped an elbow on the seat and said to Luci, “It’s unmarked for undercover work.”
“I see.” Luci nodded wisely. “No siren?”
“Sorry.” Delaney looked almost guilty. “Dead bodies aren’t exactly emergencies.”
Luci smiled, her face partially framed by the rear view mirror. “Certainly not a frozen one.”
“Frozen?” Mickey’s question was a quick echo of Delaney’s. Like Delaney, he looked at her, though his look was, of necessity, very brief, because of the swerve the front wheels made, followed quickly by the honk from the car behind him.
“I said he was a stiff,” Luci reminded them, as she quickly hunted up the seat belt and secured it. “What did you think I meant?”
“That he was—” Delaney stopped and gave Mickey a help me out here look.
In the rear view mirror, Luci saw Mickey’s bug-eyed “I wish I could help you” look and barely managed to hold back a grin. She cleared the chuckle from her throat and said, “He’s that, too.” They were both showing their whites when they looked at her this time. Thank goodness for red lights. Luci tread lightly, using her look of gentle inquiry in hopes of bringing the tension down a few notches.
Mickey choked. Delaney managed a strangled, “And you’d know this because he’s—”
“Naked,” Luci finished for him.
It was Delaney’s turn to choke. Mickey seemed to have recovered, though his voice sounded like it was being squeezed past a painful obstruction. “So your aunts have—”
“A naked dead man in their freezer.” She used the rear view mirror to make sure her expression was approving enough to reward them for their comprehension without further antagonizing them.
The skin above Mickey’s right eye developed a twitch. He realized the light had changed and put the car in gear—after earning another honk from the car behind them.
“It could be an accident,” Delaney said without conviction.
“Only if bullets are a natural cause of death in this city,” Luci said.
“Bullets?” Mickey sounded more despairing than questioning, but Luci decided to ignore that part.
“Well, bullet. Could be bullets, though there’s just the one hole. I’m not a trained professional, but Miss Weena said he’s been plugged right through the heart with something small caliber.”
Mickey swallowed, a dry raspy sound, before producing with extreme dread, “Miss Weena?”
“She’s had...limited experience with small caliber firearms.”
Mickey got the feeling she was avoiding eye contact with him, and he made a mental note to investigate Miss Weena’s firearms record before exchanging an uneasy look with Delaney. “It’s field-day time for the press, with our asses in the kick position here, Delaney.”
“They’ve been there since we signed on to be cops, Ross. Kind of getting used to it.” He turned back to Luci, his face showing strain. “You say you discovered the body this morning?”
“Oh, I didn’t discover it. My aunts found it, or it might have been Boudreaux. You’d have to ask them about that.” A slight frown appeared between her brows, as if this was a question she hadn’t expected or thought about. “He’s their man. Does the gardening and odd jobs around the place.”
“Uh huh.” The grunt could have meant anything as Delaney busied himself writing in his notebook, asking without looking up, “Anyone recognize the victim?”
“Oh, we all did, but we don’t know him, you understand.”
Mickey didn’t. “You all did what?”
“Recognized him.” Luci sounded like she was explaining, but she wasn’t. Mickey knew an explanation when he heard one, and this wasn’t one. Especially when she added, “But we don’t know him.”
“How the hell can you recognize someone but not know them?” He could hardly see for the twitch above his eye.
Luci shrugged. It was an elegant, vaguely European shrug and caused him to twitch again, but lower down this time. He tried to think that twitch away, but Luci’s mysterious heady scent was winding its way through the air currents and into his nostrils. Both twitches got worse instead of better.
“I didn’t think it was possible,” she said. “But it really is.”
A red mist formed around the edges of his vision, mixing with the lust. St. Charles narrowed to one lane. If he could just hang on a little longer...
He slowed down, trying to keep the car at the center of the red tunnel.
Luci looked at the heirloom timepiece Miss Hermi had pinned to the front of the dress, did a little math and said, “Could we pick up the pace a bit? They’ve been alone with him for quite awhile now.”
Mickey felt his eyes widen as the red tunnel narrowed even more. It took him a long beat to realize there was a red light at the center. He hit the brakes and turned to look at Luci. Delaney was already staring at her, showing whites all around the brown.
“They know about evidence, don’t they?” Delaney asked.
“I did explain to them about evidence and preserving the crime scene, but it’s hard to know what they understand because they’re aging Seymours, which makes it worse. Like wine, aging seems to bring out the bouquet more.” Then she added in a confidential aside to Delaney, “You notice I was careful not to say fine wine, out of deference to Mickey’s headache?”
“Mickey’s head appreciates it,” Mickey said, making no effort to sound appreciative. “Mind explaining why you didn’t just use the phone?”
“I told you, they don’t have one. The technology thing?” She looked at Mickey, then Delaney, but found only increasing confusion.
“How can they not have a telephone?” Delaney rubbed his face, but the confusion stayed where it was. He sounded dazed when he added, “It’s not safe!”
Luci sighed. “I know. Uncle Willy got them one of those ‘I’m falling and I can’t get up’ gizmos, but they buried it under the phlox.” She frowned. “I wouldn’t have chosen phlox. Hydrangea maybe but not phlox.”
They both looked at her, then each other, then her again.
“It’s genetic,” she said. They didn’t blink. “The light’s green.” Another long pause. “That means we can go now.”
Mickey faced forward and went. Delaney was either comatose...or praying.
Luci relaxed. That had gone better than she expected.
8
It wasn’t that he didn’t trust Fern and Donald, Artie told himself as he slid out of the cable TV truck he’d “borrowed.” The overalls he’d found inside were a nice bonus. He’d had enough time to get new shoes before heading over to the Seymour’s to wait for a chance to get inside. Too bad he’d forgotten about the old lad
ies’ thing for electronics. Miss Hermi took one look at him, shrieked and slammed the door. The first time on his foot. He limped back down the walk and almost limped out in front of Fern and Donald. A quick turn took him away from them just as an unmarked police car came around the corner with lights flashing.
He turned again but didn’t see the dog that had come out to sniff him. One minute he was upright. The next he was lying on his back in the grass behind a small white fence staring at a big scratch on his new shoes.
The dog, panting helpfully, jumped the fence and stuck his nose in Artie’s crotch.
When they’d stopped in front of the house, Delaney hopped out and opened the door for Luci. Mickey looked past him, then pointed towards the yard with a half-grin that still had dazed around the edges.
“Look. A gnome.”
Bent precariously over the porch railing was a short round man with a Humpty Dumpty body and stumpy legs. His inverted bald head was visible through the porch railing.
“Boudreaux,” Luci said.
Mickey watched him over-balance, then tumble into the azaleas. There was a shudder of leaves, then he emerged, leaves clinging to pate and clothes. He started to brush himself off, but stopped when he saw them.
“Would you tell the aunts we’re going to look at their stiff?” Luci said.
Mickey watched in horrid fascination as Boudreaux approached, his pants slipping further down his hips with each jogging step. His cracked lips opened and out came a Cajun-tinged garble of words, none of which Mickey could decipher. He looked at Delaney and found him suffering from the same lack of comprehension.
“Uh oh.” Luci shook her head. “How long have they been there?”
Boudreaux responded with another burst of gibberish.
“Oh, dear.” She looked at the two men. Boudreaux trotted back to his azaleas. “We’d better hurry.”
Mickey didn’t move. He couldn’t. Not yet. Not until he had one moment of understanding. It didn’t have to be a big moment, but he damn well wanted to understand something.
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