Do Wah Diddy Die

by Pauline Baird Jones

  “Yes.” A certain grimness to Mickey’s voice alerted her before he got his question out. “How did you know where the money was found?”

  Luci gave him her “oops” smile. “I may have run across it when I was in the . . . attic, but I just thought my aunts had developed an aversion to banks. It was a reasonable assumption.”

  “Uh huh.”

  She thought he would say more, but he didn’t. Instead he opened a file and pulled out a creased picture. “We found this tucked in his pocket. Recognize him?”

  Luci took the picture. It was a mug shot, though not a good one, complete with numbers across the bottom. Front and side view.

  Luci felt the first tremor of...something. “Who is he?”

  Mickey picked up the file. “His name is Arthur Maxwell and he was Reggie’s cellmate last time he was in prison.”

  “Really?” She frowned slightly. “He looks...kind of like my neighbor’s new husband. The one she hit with her Volkswagen.” The pieces of all her impressions, the faces of the players both dead and alive, spun in her head like snow in one of those globes, with the truth buried somewhere in the middle. If she could just get alone to think…

  Mickey ground his teeth and snatched the photo back. “This isn’t a joke—”

  Luci sighed. “I am trying.” She lifted the lid on one of the shoeboxes and fingered the bills. “Do you suppose he’s given up on trying to get this? He must know you’ve found it.”

  “We’re keeping it quiet. He might be hoping we wouldn’t search the attic.” He rubbed his head. “Under normal circumstances, we might not have.”

  Mickey had the photos of the victims in a stack on the table. She sat down and looked through them, arranging them in order of discovery as her thoughts spun slower and slower.

  “Not exactly a rogue’s gallery, is it?” Luci murmured. She tapped the photo of the guy found in the freezer. “I wonder how he fits in?”

  Mickey sat down next to her. “What do you mean?”

  “I’m not sure,” Luci admitted. “It’s just that, well, this one—”

  “Dante’s sidekick, Max,” Mickey supplied for her.

  “Just Max?” When Mickey nodded she continued. “Interesting. He must have been looking for the money, but this woman, Reggie, the hit couple, my aunts and their friends, the—they’re all, well, older.”

  Mickey noticed the stop, the hesitation and the slight emphasis and frowned. What had she meant to say? He stared at her, the innocent widening of her eyes only increasing his suspicion that there was something, possibly several things, she wasn’t telling him. He made a mental note to keep an eye on her.

  “You don’t really fit either,” he pointed out.

  “No,” she said. “I don’t seem to, do I?”

  She leaned back with an air of decision. “You should have the aunts look at your lady over there.”

  “Why?”

  Her eyes warned him to brace himself.

  “I have a feeling she was Reggie’s date today.”

  His whole body twitched. “Reggie is dead.”

  Luci arched her brows. “Not the faux Reggie.”

  Mickey sighed. “You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”

  Luci looked apologetic. “Yes, but I feel conflicted about it.”

  “Exactly what is it we’re doing out here?”

  Luci looked at Gracie in surprise. Surely it was obvious.

  “We’re looking for the missing body, the one Boudreaux saw in the freezer the first time.”

  She let the beam of the flashlight dance around the darkened garden, then directed it back on the sketch she held. “Boudreaux has marked every area he can remember replanting in the last few months.”

  “What if he forgot something?”

  “I have considered that possibility, but prefer to deal with it only if we strike out. The largest area is over there by the fence. Some kind of bush. Couldn’t understand what he called them, but I think that’s the best possibility. It’s more person- length than the others. Though Miss Hermi managed to stir things up quite a bit this spring. She was in a new broom sort of mood.”

  “Yes, I noticed that myself. Reggie got her all stirred up. If he hadn’t ended up under one of the plants himself, I’d think he had an ulterior motive. You’re quite sure there is another body? Couldn’t it have been Reggie that Boudreaux saw?”

  Luci noticed that Gracie moved, not above the ground, but not really on it either, while Luci had to be careful for the pitfalls of uneven terrain that the fitful glow of flashlight failed to fully illuminate. The moist night was marginally cooler than the day, and the rich smell of earth and flower heavily scented the motionless watchful air.

  It’s lucky I have no imagination and a working knowledge of the ghostly, Luci told herself wryly, or this feeling I’m being watched might make me uneasy.

  “Boudreaux saw this body before Reggie was supposed to have gone to Cleveland.” Luci stepped off the path and shone her light against a line of flowering bushes. “I think this is the spot. Apparently Miss Hermi wanted to break up the block of color or something.”

  She got on her knees and shone the light into the leafy interior of one of the bushes.

  “Does the ground look disturbed?” Gracie asked, kneeling beside Luci.

  “This is a reclaimed swamp. It probably didn’t look disturbed two days after these bushes were transplanted.” She leaned back with a sigh, giving Gracie a speculative look as she pondered the right approach for her proposition.

  “So? Do you dig now?” Gracie seemed to grow still. “You don’t have a shovel. Why don’t you have a shovel?” A pause. Then it came. “Why did you invite me along on this little excavation?”

  Carefully not looking at Gracie, Luci said, trying to sound casual, “I thought you might be more help than the aunts?”

  “Surely Boudreaux would have been a better choice to dig up the garden?”

  “I wasn’t...actually...planning on...digging up...anything. Disturbing the scene of a crime is a criminal offense, you know.”

  “How were you planning—” Gracie stopped abruptly. Then, “No. No way. I am not sticking my head into the middle of a corpse—no matter how phantasmal I may be. I already did that once today and it was not fun. Why don’t you just have Mickey and Delaney take care of it?”

  “There probably isn’t a corpse at all. Boudreaux was drunk when he saw this supposed body,” Luci coaxed. “I didn’t want to bother them until I was sure.”

  “Bother me, please,” Mickey’s voice said out of the darkness just before a bright light flashed in Luci’s eyes.

  Luci looked at Gracie.

  “We’re busted,” Gracie said.

  “You don’t have to sound so relieved,” Luci said. “No one’s gonna strip-search you.”

  Gracie’s smile was edged with wicked. “You wish.”

  20

  Artie, disguised as the blind man again, tapped his way down the street past the Seymour house. The dark glasses that covered his eyes allowed him to see one elegantly shod foot in front of the other as he walked. His new shoes, brown for once, needed to be monitored for shine and that something extra that he didn’t have a name for but involved how the shoes looked with the rest of him. He still wasn’t sure brown was his shoe color, but he’d been caught by the pair. Well and truly caught. It was more than the detailing, though it was very nice. A sweep of leather at the heel, the smooth expanse of brown across the toes. The place to tuck a dollar...

  He sighed. And the color had intrigued him, he had to admit. He wasn’t sure what Helen would think of them. She’d advised against brown the last time they’d shopped together, but that had been an inferior brown. This one had just a touch of red to it. Ripe and rich, it had been irresistible in artificial light. Now, he was pleased to note, the sun had found richer, deeper browns in the leather. Surely Helen would be as enchanted as he was by the pair.

  They also served another purpose. They took his mind off what wa
s happening on the other side of the Seymour’s fence where what looked like an army of cops was digging.

  What were they looking for? And even more important, had they found his money? There’d been no mention of it in the newspaper story, though the article hadn’t been without its worrisome side. Like the fact that the guy he’d shoved up the chimney was Dante’s man. Still got cold chills thinking about that close call.

  If they hadn’t found the money, how was he going to get it past the police and Dante, who had a couple of guys watching the house right across the street from the police? Just when he thought it couldn’t get messed up anymore than it already was—

  Damn Unabelle. Why did she have to pick right now to get married? Two weeks and he would have been free and clear with more than enough money to keep him and Helen in hog heaven for as long as he lived.

  And damn Cloris for being related to Dante. He’d never have gone near her if he’d known! Bad luck the bastard happened to live in New Orleans, too. And Harriet. How the hell had she found him? Too bad she’d been so unexpectedly competent.

  At least the old ladies were expectedly incompetent. They hadn’t blinked when they saw Harriet confront him at the party, even though they thought he was dead. Weird, but who was he to look a gift horse in the mouth when he needed one?

  Could that be turned to his favor? Because what he really needed was a plan that brought the money to him.

  He realized something was dulling the leather of one shoe. He picked up the pace, rounded the corner out of sight of the watchers, then bent down and rubbed a bit of dust from the toe of one shoe. Someone hit him from behind. He felt his face hit the pavement before his brain registered it coming.

  Busted, he thought. Then the something started licking his ear.

  Gracie put aside her book and stood up, drifting to the window, trailing chilled air in her wake. Luci looked up from the newspaper and her thoughts, relieved to have the thoughts interrupted and even more relieved to have Gracie blunt the muggy warmth of the room.

  “Something wrong?”

  “It’s awfully quiet. Where are the girls?”

  Luci smiled at hearing the aunts called “girls.”

  “They’re getting ready for their monthly visit to your grave. Didn’t you see the flowers in the entryway?”

  Gracie shook her head. “I’ve been avoiding the hallways since...” She sighed, sending a cold chill into the too warm room. “How’s Delaney?”

  Luci put the paper down and rose, stretching the kinks from her back, wishing she could so easily rid herself of the kinks in her thoughts. “He’s...pretty bummed.”

  “If only...” Her words sent another chill swirling around the room.

  “You weren’t dead?”

  Gracie nodded. “You’re lucky...”

  “That I’m not dead?” Luci shook her head. “You couldn’t be more wrong.” She had to move to stay ahead of thoughts. “I’m beginning to think we Seymours are all born dead.” She came up against a wall and had to turn toward Gracie. “Or maybe we’re just born afraid.” Luci headed toward Gracie until she felt the chill from her presence, then turned and stalked away.

  “Um, Luci,” Gracie said, amusement threading through the sad in her voice. “You’re pacing.”

  “We don’t pace,” Luci pointed out, doing her turn at the wall. She was halfway across the room when it hit her. “I am pacing. I’m freaking pacing! I can’t believe it! Do you know what this means?”

  “That you’re not as dead as you thought you were? That you can still change the course of your life? You can still live?”

  “Can I?” Luci felt the agitation in her. It was like being possessed by an alien being. “Can I change who knows how many centuries of family conditioning? My brain is hard-wired to do Seymour until I die! To never marry—”

  Luci spun around and faced Gracie. “Why is that? Why don’t we marry? Why did Lila—who was not designed by nature or nurture to be a mother—leave him, leave me to grow up without him? Why did she do that? Freaking inquiring minds would freaking like to know!”

  Luci felt her chest, which had only ever heaved from exercise, heaving with raging emotion. Heaving with...rage. Felt her eyes blur with unfamiliar tears. Felt like, what? She mentally poked the emotion ball and realized what she wanted more than anything was to go fetal and whine. And then find him, her father. She wanted him to hold her and tell her it was going to be all right. Even if it was a lie.

  Her mind shifted. So did her body as she stared at Gracie, who lost her cohesion in the storm of emotion coming at her. When she reformed, her eyes were deep and sad. “I’ve spent a lot of years trying to come up with a good answer to that question.”

  Luci drew in a trembling breath. “And...did you?”

  “Not a good one.” She turned and stared out the window.

  Luci joined her and saw Delaney talking to another cop in the garden.

  “I never meant to hurt him,” Gracie said. “I never thought...”

  “He’ll...probably...get over...you.” It seemed cold comfort.

  Gracie looked at Luci. “But will I get over him?”

  “I’m so sorry, Gracie. So very sorry.”

  Gracie’s gaze sharpened. “Then do something.”

  “What?”

  “Live. Love. Go find Mickey and—”

  “And what?” Luci could feel panic replacing agitation.

  “Everything you’re afraid of.” Gracie’s gaze bored into her, seeing everything. Luci felt wide open, exposed and raw. “He’s in the parlor pulling his hair out. Go to him.”

  “I can’t—”

  “Yes, you can. Begin. You don’t have to do it all right now, but begin. Before it’s too late for you!”

  Begin. She could do that. That was just...talking. As if Gracie sensed her capitulation, she smiled. It was like the sun coming out. No wonder Delaney had fallen hard. “I love you, Gracie.”

  “Get out of here,” Gracie said, but Luci could have sworn she blushed. If a ghost could blush.

  Mickey, concentrating on a new stack of papers, didn’t hear the door open, wasn’t aware of movement until he smelled Luci’s perfume tangling in the air around him. It was not unlike her: contrary, mysterious, with an underlying and almost irresistible charm. Mickey hunched his shoulders as she came around and leaned on the back of his chair, tossing a folded newspaper down in front of him.

  “If I didn’t know you to be the soul of upright, though excitable honesty, Detective Ross,” she said, her voice soft and sultry, her lips so close to his ear that he felt her warm breath puff against the side of his face, “I’d accuse you of dissembling with the press.”

  “Huh?” Concentration scattered, but the will to not react to her remained firm. Without looking at her, Mickey shoved the newspaper aside, tried to focus on the typed words of the report he’d been reading just fine until she came in.

  “Why would you deliberately try to live down to the public’s low opinion of the NOPD? Is it a plot-in-the-making?”

  His chair creaked again as she withdrew, padded around the table and sank with unsettling grace into the chair opposite. Mickey sighed, rubbing his tired eyes in an effort to postpone as long as possible the moment he’d have to face her green enigmatic gaze. It was getting harder and harder to remember all those good sensible reasons not to get involved with her when it felt so damn right just to be in the same room with her.

  He was a grown-up. Surely he could control himself and his heart around someone who was so bad for him? At this rate, he’d be doing the late afternoon talk circuit with a label under his name on the screen that read: Love left him for dead. Or something equally humiliating. He felt her gaze and her sympathy, as if she followed his thoughts and was sorry for disrupting his life. He gave in and looked at her, since not looking hadn’t helped any.

  She sat lightly in the old-fashioned chair, as if she might vanish at any moment. More ghostly than Gracie, like a sleepy cat, her thicket of lashes dro
oping over her eyes. The eyes, however, were anything but sleepy. Emotions appeared and disappeared like flashing lights on a dark highway, appearing and disappearing too quickly for him to read. But he thought he saw regret go by and it gave him hope.

  Maybe, just maybe, he could be the guy to—he realized where he was going and stopped. It was just the challenge, he told himself, wanting what you can’t have. It’s a guy thing. Everybody says so. He wasn’t...in love. Love was for fools, optimists and the pages of novels. Love didn’t last. Didn’t need a crystal ball to read the odds against anything lasting in this world, and something as breakable as love? Right.

  Did he know, Luci wondered, how very readable his thoughts were, how clearly they played out in his too-blue eyes? In the space of five heartbeats, he’d almost talked himself into, and had talked himself out of, doing something about what was simmering between them. Gracie was right. It wouldn’t take much to push him over the edge into acting. Her own blood stirred just thinking about what he might do. He was just so dang cute when he was all stirred up. And he was more likely to let down his guard and kiss her. Kissing seemed like a good place to begin. When he kissed her, she felt Seymour fade and brave creep in. In his arms, maybe she could be brave enough to live the way Gracie urged.

  He rubbed the back of his neck and asked on a sigh, “Why don’t you just ask me if you want to know something?”

  And if I asked you to do what I’m thinking, she wondered, would you do it? Gracie was both right and wrong. Luci did need to begin, but not with the complications from the murder still hanging fire. They both needed their wits about them to sort it all out. If the aunts got hauled off to jail, what would Gracie do?

  It was either good logic or a cowardly rationalization.