by BJ Bourg
As I watched Dawn console the victim’s wife, I couldn’t help but admire Dawn. She could be soft and caring in one instant, yet decisive and aggressive in the next. I’d met a lot of strong women in my life, but none quite like Dawn.
When Katina had regained her composure somewhat, Dawn continued questioning her. “What’s the first thing you noticed when you entered the cabana?”
“I actually noticed Wilton before I went inside.” Katina stared off into space and shook her head, as though seeing the image in her mind’s eye again. “I don’t understand why his privates were exposed. I’ve never seen him like that before. I mean, he’s stumbled into bed a few times with his zipper undone when he was drunk, but you couldn’t see any flesh. When I first saw him this morning, I thought he was sleeping. I stormed inside screaming at him and asking him what the hell he was doing in front of the window half naked.” She shook her head slowly. “When he didn’t stir, I knew something was wrong, but I didn’t think he was dead. I just thought he was really drunk or sick. I…I never imagined I’d lose him.”
Katina buried her face in her hands and wept again. Dawn was patient. She quietly comforted the woman until she was able to speak intelligibly again.
“You mentioned Wilton would go off and sleep in the cabana sometimes,” Dawn said. “Would he stay gone all night when you two were fighting?”
“Yes, he’s done that many times.”
Dawn looked at me and began chewing on her lower lip. I knew what was coming, and was happy she was leading the interview.
“Mrs. Michot, I hate to delve into your personal life, but I need to know if—”
“Yes,” Katina said, interrupting Dawn. “Wilton was having an affair. Hell, he’s had many affairs.”
Dawn clamped her mouth shut and listened as Katina spoke.
“The first time it happened, it was with my best friend, Lisa. Well, my former best friend. It was several years ago. We were hosting a party here at the house and a bunch of us were eating inside when I noticed Lisa and Wilton were the only ones not in the house. I went outside and caught them making out in the pool. They didn’t see me, so I ran inside and got Lisa’s husband. By the time we returned outside, her top was off and he was kissing on her breasts.” She shook her head. “It was the most sickening thing I’ve ever seen.”
“What happened next?” Dawn asked.
“When we confronted them, Lisa pushed away from Wilton and began saying he forced himself on her. I knew she was lying, because she’d always been a big flirt. Besides, I’d seen the way she was kissing Wilton in the pool. Her husband went after Wilton, but I threatened to call the cops. Lisa grabbed her husband and left. She didn’t even bother putting her top back on.”
“How’d you and Wilton get along after that?”
“Well, he apologized and swore it had only been a one-time thing.” She hung her head. “Like a fool, I believed him. It wasn’t six weeks later that he was caught screwing a high school teacher in a stall at the carwash. Can you believe that? They parked in the stall and just started having sex—right out there in public where anyone could’ve driven by and seen them.”
“How’d they get caught?” Dawn asked.
“A cop stopped to check them out and he caught them.” She shook her head. “When the cop drove up with Wilton in the back seat and told me what happened, it was all I could do to stay with him.”
“Why didn’t you divorce him?” I could tell Dawn was struggling to hide her contempt.
“He said he was drunk and she came on to him in a time of weakness. He promised it would never happen again.”
Dawn nodded slowly, and then asked how long it had taken for it to happen again.
“A month, maybe two. He promised to go to marriage counseling after that one. I was a bit encouraged, so I made several appointments, but he never showed up.”
“Let me guess—he did it again.”
“Yeah, he picked up a hitchhiker on his way home one night. They ended up behind a cemetery and the grounds keeper called the cops and reported a suspicious vehicle in the area.” Katina sighed. “He was drunk again, so they called me to pick him up from the station.”
Dawn’s arms were folded across her breasts now. “And you still didn’t leave him.”
“What was I supposed to do?” Katina threw her hands up in the air. “He wouldn’t let me work. He controlled every dime we had. The house was in his name. Our cars weren’t our cars—they belonged to the dealership. I had nowhere to go and no money to get there. What was I supposed to do?”
“I’m sorry, ma’am.” Dawn’s face softened. “I just don’t like it when someone lets another person walk all over them. It’s easy for me to sit here and ask why you put up with it when I don’t even have a man in my life.”
“The truth is…I liked our life and I didn’t want it to end.” She rubbed her eyes with her shirt sleeve. “It got to the point that he knew I wouldn’t leave and I knew he wouldn’t stop, so we both kind of went about our business and stayed out of each other’s way.” She grunted. “My business was taking care of the house and his was doing whatever the hell he wanted and whenever he wanted. I promised myself I would eventually get up the nerve to leave, but then…”
Katina grew silent. She just stopped talking and stared down at her hands. Dawn put a hand on her arm. “But then what?”
“He gave me an incurable STD.”
Dawn gasped. “Are you serious?”
“I actually believe he intentionally gave it to me to make sure I’d stay with him. While I wasn’t enough for him, he needed me and, in his own strange way, I do believe he loved me.”
“If he was always running around, then why’d he need you?”
“He needed someone to keep his house in order and to be there when he had to impress folks at a party or some other gathering. He used to say that married men garnered more respect, because if a man can hold down a marriage, he can accomplish anything.”
It was my turn to grunt. I wanted to tell her how stupid it was, but kept my mouth shut. Neither Dawn nor Katina seemed to notice my grunt, and Dawn asked if Wilton had any current girlfriends that she knew about.
“He murdered the last girl he slept with.”
Dawn’s head snapped around. “Excuse me?”
“He passed on his STD to Beth LeDoux and Beth passed it on to her husband. He told me Beth’s husband went on a two-day bender after leaving the doctor’s office and then stumbled into the dealership to find the man responsible.” Katina shook her head. “Like the true coward he is, Wilton locked himself in the bathroom while Beth and an innocent salesman died for his sins.”
CHAPTER 9
Magnolia Parish Coroner’s Office
“None of the hostages from the dealership knew anything about the STD,” Dawn said as we stared down at Wilton’s body. He was lying on his back on the stainless steel autopsy table. His boots and clothes had been removed, so he was completely naked now. “I can go back and interview them again if you think it’ll help, but I believe they would’ve said something about it.”
I nodded. That was a juicy piece of gossip, and I was certain someone would’ve mentioned it had they known.
Doctor Ally Fitch entered the room and her brown eyes lit up when she saw us. “Hey, how are you two?”
“Never better,” I said.
“That’s great.” As Doctor Fitch suited up for the autopsy, she told us how relieved she’d been to hear about us closing the sniper case last month. “I didn’t want to send my daughter to school until we knew for sure what was going on. Scary times, I tell you.”
Doctor Fitch pulled on her gloves and turned toward the table. She stopped and pointed when she saw Wilton Michot’s face. “Hey, isn’t he the guy from Olivier’s Dealership?”
Dawn nodded. “One and the same.”
“I saw him on the news.” After thanking her assistant for prepping the body, Fitch approached the table and visually examined Wilton, starting at his
head and moving toward his feet. “The notes say he was found lying on a sofa in a pool room with his fly open.”
“That’s right,” Dawn said, snapping a few pictures. “There was no forced entry, no sign of a struggle, no obvious injuries…nothing at all to suggest what might’ve happened.”
“So, we’re not thinking this had anything to do with the hostage thing?”
Dawn shook her head. “He was the one who was supposed to die, but, as far as we can tell, that case is closed. Besides, there was zero evidence at the scene to indicate foul play.”
“Unless,” I said slowly, “dying with your privates exposed is considered foul.”
Doctor Fitch smashed the recorder pedal and spoke briefly into the microphone that hung over the autopsy table, making oral notes about the condition of the body. After she was done, she asked, “Why was he supposed to die?”
Dawn explained about the STD and how Beth’s husband had killed the wrong salesman.
“So, the poor guy who was murdered didn’t sleep with Beth LeDoux at all?” Fitch asked.
“Nope.” Dawn stabbed a finger at Wilton’s forehead. “And this cowardly bastard hid in the bathroom while three innocent people paid for what he did.”
“Well, Beth LeDoux wasn’t exactly innocent,” Doctor Fitch said. “She did mess around on her husband with Wilton.”
“I don’t really give a shit what she did.” The aggression in Dawn’s tone seemed to surprise Doctor Fitch. “She didn’t deserve to be shot down like a rabid dog, and neither did those other two victims. If that bastard, LeDoux, didn’t like what his wife did to him, he should’ve divorced her.”
“I don’t disagree with you on that,” Doctor Fitch said slowly, looking across Wilton’s body at Dawn. I saw Dawn meet her gaze, squinting as though daring the coroner to open her mouth again. I quickly realized things could turn ugly in a hurry, so I gently touched Dawn’s arm. “Hey, can you step outside with me for a minute?”
Dawn didn’t acknowledge what I’d said until Doctor Fitch looked away and began gathering up her tools to perform the autopsy. Finally, she turned and stormed out the door. I followed her into the shade of the front carport, where my truck was parked next to the hearse. (After we’d concluded our interview with Katina Michot, Dawn and I had driven to the Seasville Substation and she’d jumped in with me.)
“What’s going on?” I asked, watching as Dawn began to pace back and forth on the concrete.
“So, when I was responding to the dealership last Monday, I heard a domestic call over the radio.” Dawn stopped pacing and turned to face me. “When I got to the scene, I found a man dragging his wife to the back of the house. She was all beat to shit. I thought she was dead at first, but then she started moaning. This prick decides he’s going to start fighting, but after a little scuffle I take him into custody.”
I nodded when she stopped to take a breath, not knowing where her story was heading.
She fished her phone from her back pocket and, after messing with it for a few seconds, shoved the screen in my direction. “Well, I get this text message on the way over here telling me the wife bonded the prick out of jail. She then marched her ass right down to the district attorney’s office and signed a drop-slip, requesting that all charges against her husband be dropped. She wrote that she fell and hurt herself and her husband was only trying to help her when I arrived. She claimed she was unable to speak and I interpreted the situation all wrong.”
I frowned. “I’ll never understand that, Dawn.”
“And you know what else?”
“What’s that?”
“They then went to IA and filed a formal complaint against me for excessive force.”
“The woman?”
Dawn nodded. “She and her husband went, but I know he’s making her do it. She’s deadly afraid of him.”
I was quiet for a few seconds, then asked, “What should we do?”
Dawn looked up and searched my eyes. “We?”
“Yeah, what should we do about it?”
“I’d like to pay her a visit and talk to her—see if he’s threatening her.”
“Okay, then,” I said. “When we’re done here, why don’t we go and do that?”
“You don’t mind?”
“Not at all.”
Dawn smiled. “Thanks, London. I need to know she’s okay.”
“Now, let’s go see if Doctor Fitch can tell us what happened to Wilton.”
When we returned to the autopsy room, Doctor Fitch was elbow deep in Wilton’s chest cavity. She had already made the Y-shaped incision to the front of his torso and then removed his breastplate, exposing his internal organs. She had also removed his heart and placed it on a tray near the autopsy table. She looked up when we drew near.
“This might take a while,” she said. “The external examination revealed a healthy, albeit slightly overweight, individual with no injuries of any kind. I’m thinking it could be natural causes. I haven’t seen any obvious signs of a heart attack thus far, so I’ll need to dissect the blood vessels and then open up the heart to examine the internal surfaces and structures.”
“How long do you think it’ll take?” Dawn asked.
“It just depends on what I find.” She straightened and rubbed at the mask on her face with the back of her forearm. “If the organs don’t reveal anything, I’ll remove the skull cap and inspect his brain, which could take all day. If I still can’t find a cause of death, I’ll have to wait for toxicology results before rendering any conclusions.”
Dawn nodded. “Can you call if you find something?”
“Sure. Leave your number with my assistant. We’ll call either way—whether I find something concrete or not.”
CHAPTER 10
Before trying to retrace Wilton Michot’s movements on the night before his death, I drove straight to Jaguar Lane. When we were a couple of houses away, Dawn pointed to the Alvey residence.
“Hank’s truck isn’t there,” she said. “So he must be at work.”
I stopped in front of the house and parked on the shoulder of the street. Keeping a wary eye on the windows and door of the home, I followed Dawn to the steps under the carport. She knocked once and I immediately heard noise from inside. Footsteps stomped against the raised floor and drew nearer. When it stopped, the door swung open and a woman stood there wearing a tank top and painted-on shorts. Part of her left breast was protruding from the side of her shirt and there was a cigarette hanging from the corner of her busted mouth. Her face and exposed arms were covered in bruises.
“You again?” Cynthia Alvey grunted. “What the hell are you doing here? Haven’t you done enough damage?”
Dawn forced a smile. “Hello, ma’am. I just wanted to drop by and check on you…see if you were okay.”
“I’m fine now that Hank’s back at work.” She sneered. “But thanks to you, I had to spend the little savings we had left to bail him out of jail. Who’s going to reimburse me for that? You?”
Ignoring her comment, Dawn shot a thumb over her shoulder. “When I was here last week I noticed that Hank’s truck had Kentucky plates on it. Is that where you’re from?”
“No, it’s just where I lived for most of my life.”
“What brings you here?” Dawn tried to sound pleasant.
“Hank lost his job in the mines and my mom told me that my brother’s company was hiring.” She seemed to relax a little, but it was short lived. “I thought it would be good for us—a new start, you know?—but then you showed up and ruined everything when you started throwing your badge around.”
“Look, I’m not going to apologize for arresting him. He deserved it for what he did to you. No one should put up with that kind of abuse.”
“What are you talking about? Hank doesn’t abuse me. I fell—and you know it. Hell, don’t you think I’d call the cops myself if he’d be beating me?” She grunted. “Damn nosey neighbors could’ve come over and helped Hank get me to the bathroom instead of causing troub
le.”
I could tell Dawn was trying her best to be patient. “Ma’am, you don’t have to live this life. You can get some help. I can place you in a battered woman’s shelter where you’ll be safe.”
“Why would I go to a shelter when I have a perfectly good house right here?” Cynthia shook her head. “No, thank you…Hank and I are just fine on our own.”
“But what if he kills you next time?” Dawn stepped closer. “Please…let me help you. You don’t deserve this.”
“What do you know about what I do or don’t deserve?” Cynthia scoffed. “And Hank didn’t touch me. I fell and hurt myself. He was only helping me to the bathroom when you arrived and screwed everything up. You took one look around and rushed to judgment. All you cops are the same. We’re just lucky you didn’t hurt my Hank worse than you did. He’s thinking about suing, you know? I’d watch myself if I were you.”
Dawn glanced around the carport area. “Do you have someplace you can go if things get too bad? Do you have your own vehicle?”
“Lady, I don’t drive and I don’t need a place to go. I have my Hank and that’s all I need.”
Realizing she wouldn’t get anywhere, Dawn pulled out her business card and handed it to Cynthia. “This is my personal number. Promise me you’ll call if you ever need anything…anything at all.”
Cynthia folded her arms across her breasts, refusing to take the card. “Keep it. I won’t ever need to call you, and I don’t want you back on my property.”
Dawn bent over and placed the card on the top step, inches from Cynthia’s painted toenails. “I’m serious—you can call anytime.”
As we turned and walked back to my truck, Dawn said, “I have a feeling we’ll be seeing her again, and I don’t think it’ll end as well as the last time.”
I couldn’t argue. I’d seen too many domestic violence cases that had progressed from an occasional slap in the face to a brutal homicide. If I had my way, I’d take care of Hank Alvey myself and ensure that he never ruffled a blonde hair on Cynthia’s head, but then I would be no better. There was a reason we had a legal system filled with checks and balances, and I firmly believed in that system.