Mick shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “We’re fine. I understand. More than you think. I know you’re upset. Things, happen.” He felt embarrassed, too. Never in his law enforcement career or his married life had he ever carried on in such an unseemly manner. Something about her got under his skin.
He sat on the couch. Listened to Alma moving around upstairs, opening and closing drawers and closet doors. He noticed he hadn’t finished his drink. When he raised the glass, he spotted something on the table at the other end of the couch.
A closer look showed the face of a murder victim... inside a red circle. Mick frowned. Why had Alma drawn a circle around the woman’s face? He wondered if she knew the woman whose body had been found in an alley. He was pleased not to see a big X over the face. That would’ve seriously concerned him.
He retuned to his seat. Lamplight shined on the glass in his hand. Twisting the glass left then right, he observed the color of the tequila.
Yellow. Caramel. Gold.
“Blonde.”
He finished the drink in one gulp. Carried the glass to the kitchen sink. His hand brushed against the cell phone attached to his belt. He noticed no one had tried to contact him. Perhaps another woman hadn’t been murdered, but if one had, he knew she’d be a petite blonde.
#
Alma slid open the bottom drawer of her dresser. Scooped out the clothing, and piled it all on the floor. In the far right corner on the bottom of the drawer was a tiny black satin tab. She got hold of it, lifted up the fake bottom, and set the board on the floor. Hidden below was a book of voodoo spells and a twelve by twelve by two gilded antique box.
She stopped. Leaned back on her heels and checked the hallway to make sure Boutin hadn’t come upstairs.
Moving fast, she flung the lid back on its hinges, and made a quick assessment of the contents. Confident she’d replaced the items she used the last time she took out the box she buried it beneath two pairs of blue jeans in her suitcase. The book! She tucked it in beside the box, and added two folded shirts.
About to head downstairs, she took a moment to lock the suitcase. Hid the key in her bra.
#
After escorting Alma to her room, Mick Boutin reluctantly drove out of the hotel parking lot. He lit a cigarette. His mind’s eye re-viewed the events of the evening through the lens of an odd sort of kaleidoscope. Every time he’d been with her he sensed an undercurrent of something strange and wonderful. He didn’t have a name for it.
Was something added to the tequila?
The urge to spend the rest of the night with her had been overwhelming. Without much effort, she made it clear she wanted him to leave. He did manage to give her his cell phone number. Told her it’s the fastest way to reach him. Intentional or not, she gave him the impression she didn’t care.
As he drove through the heart of the city, he noticed his eyelids had grown heavy and the foot pressing down on the gas pedal was going numb.
CHAPTER 31
By dawn’s early gray light, Detective Lucas Cantin stood at the mouth of the alley on Decatur, across the street from the wharf, and watched his partner limp toward him.
“Gary?”
“Don’t ask.”
Light rain grew heavier. Pea-size hail pinged off their umbrellas as they stared at the woman whose body, before the storm hit, had been covered in scraps of food, blood... and rats.
“I think its Sarri,” Gary said, softly.
Of the three prostitutes who worked Braud Way, Sarri was the most popular. There was something special about her. She possessed a natural sense of humor, and her outlook on life had been great, considering her lifestyle. Gary recalled how different she was the day she saw her enter a craft store. Creased blue jeans. Clean white T-shirt. Ponytail. No makeup. She was downright pretty. Sarri Luce was also a petite blonde.
Gary and Lucas exchanged a knowing glance. Sex workers had a way of turning up dead worldwide, but this death was clearly different. Or rather, the same, considering she’d been murdered in as bizarre a manner as Susan Nolin. They could only hope DNA testing would show whether or not it had been the same perpetrator.
Predator, thought Gary. “If this turns out to be the same person who killed Nolin that means we might have a serial killer on our hands. The press will have a field day with the information, if word gets out.”
“It is the same person, Gary, and we both know it. The person who did this is nothing more than a low-life coward.”
“I think it’s safe to say this goes beyond a dastardly attack on an unarmed citizen. Don’t think about the women being murdered, think about how they were murdered. Why wasn’t shooting or stabbing them good enough?”
Two uniformed officers, the first to arrive on the scene, stepped aside to let the detectives pass by. They glimpsed at one another, but remained silent until the men were out of range.
“Whoooa, dude,” said Samuel Martin. “Did you hear what the detectives said? If this does turn out to be the work of a serial killer, we’re going to have our hands full.”
“I’m pretty sure Homicide already thinks a psycho is on the loose,” said Ethan Hebert. “Damn, didja see the woman’s face?”
“Did you forget I was standing right beside you?”
“Yeah, well, okay. Rats. Freaking rats. You think this guy is as much of a badass as Ted Geon? Or is he worse?”
Sam smiled. “You’ve been reading up on famous serial killers again, haven’t you? So who’s this Geon?”
“I didn’t read about this guy, someone told me about him. Back in the fifties Ted Geon lived on the family farm in Wisconsin. When a local woman went missing, the sheriff had reason to think Geon was involved. The authorities went to his farm, and discovered some of the most grotesque crap ever committed. Seems the guy had murdered at least fifteen women. Dug up a bunch of others, including his mamma, in the cemetery. Ted Geon wasn’t just a serial killer he was a cannibal, and he made stuff out of leftover skin and bones. His place was called the house of skin, or something like that.”
“Jeez. If this killer’s of the same sort, just think of the promotions and pay raises we’ll get if we’re the ones lucky enough to catch him.” Sam caressed the imaginary detective shield clipped on his jacket lapel.
“We’re off duty in,” Ethan glimpsed at his watch, “right now.” A big grin. “Why don’t we find a couple of the other hookers to question? No reason not to carry out our own investigation. If nothing else, the experience alone will give us an edge over the other applicants for the detective division.”
“Hell yeah.” Fist-bump. Sam rubbed his stomach. “I don’t know about you, but I’m starving. I think we’ve got enough time to grab something to eat first, don’t you?”
Ethan frowned, swung his head side to side and scanned the area. “I’m thinking, if we’re gonna question those women we need to get going. The detectives are already looking for them.”
“And I’m thinking the women don’t want to be found any time soon. Aw, c’mon. I haven’t eaten since last night. It’s going to take us a while to find them, and then we’ll spend more time questioning them. Oh. Wait. We haven’t even figured out what to ask them. See, we need to go somewhere and write it all out. We can go to Marven’s Garden. It’s a little soup and salad joint, up the street and around the corner on Chartres. We’ll sit by the windows up front so we’ll be able to keep an eye out for the other prostitutes and the detectives.”
“Okay, I’m in. I’ve never had soup for breakfast before.”
When the police officers rounded the corner on Ursula Avenue, they saw Detectives Northcutt and Cantin farther up ahead, casually approaching two known prostitutes.
Sam Martin sensed he’d lost an awesome chance to move ahead in his career—by all of five minutes. He flattened a hand on his chest, no longer able to feel his detective badge.
“Cheer up, Sammy. There’ll be other opportunities. We just have to keep our eyes and ears open. C’mon, might as well head on o
ver to the restaurant and have breakfast. We’ll walk real slow past the detectives, that way we can eavesdrop on the conversation as much as possible.”
>+<|>+<
“Tell us everything you can remember about last night, Zoe,” said Gary Northcutt, retrieving a ballpoint pen and a notepad from his overcoat pocket.
“Daisy and I hung around right here on the corner of Chartres and Ursula. Sarri went that way.” Zoe nodded toward Decatur. “She does, uh, did that, sometimes when she wants, um wanted, to be alone to think about stuff.”
“Did you or Daisy hear anything, anything at all, during the time she was in the alley?”
“No, Gary. I already told you, dammit. We heard nothing. The storm was coming, and it was awful windy last night.”
“How about you, Daisy,” asked Lucas Cantin, drawing attention to the woman standing off to one side.
A flash of fear crossed her face.
“No. Nothing. I’d tell you if I had.”
“Okay. Thanks just the same.” Cantin handed her his business card.
Daisy Hernandez flattened an arm over her stomach and propped the other arm up with her fist. Cigarette smoke got in her eyes. She crumpled the cop’s card in her fist; let it fall to the sidewalk.
CHAPTER 32
Captain Oliver Foret called Northcutt and Cantin to his office.
Closed the door behind them.
“Put yourself in the shoes of the killer and the victims, men. Take a few minutes and give it some thought,” he said. He picked up the newspaper and tossed it forward so they could see the headline featuring another alley killing.
He wasn’t ready for the media to take off on the case and screw it up for them. “We can’t have this crap. A bokor? Voodoo? Really? That’s the best they could come up with? I’m assigning every available officer to work on this case. We have to stop this maniac before he kills anyone else,” Foret shouted, rapidly pounding a fist on his desk. At fifty-seven, he’d had all the death he could stand. He yearned to retire before he lost the few remaining strands of gray hair clinging to a shiny scalp.
“One thing we noticed,” offered Gary, “the scene didn’t look staged. He apparently hit them before they knew it was coming. Their bodies weren’t posed in a sexual manner, though. Which is kind of unusual. Makes me think he didn’t want to dehumanize them anymore than he had to, except for leaving them partially nude. Okay. That makes no sense. There are other things, though. Rats. Boils. I’d be in hog heaven if I could figure this one out.”
“I want to point out another obvious connection,” said Lucas. “Their eyes were missing. Nolin’s were cut out. Luce’s had been eaten. It’s as if the killer, or killers, didn’t want them to be able to identify him, or her, even from the grave. The killer may have been someone the women knew.”
Gary nodded in agreement. “Except, the two came from very different walks of life, so to speak. I doubt they knew the same people.” He snapped his fingers once. “No. The killer could’ve been a customer... to each of them.”
“Ah, I get what you mean,” said Foret.
“Isn’t there something in the Bible about plucking out offending eyes?” Lucas asked.
“I think so,” said Gary. “Damn, I sure hope we don’t have some religious fanatic on our hands.”
“You know, standing there looking down at both women,” Lucas said quietly, “you can recall feeling the fear and the pain of other women who’ve been attacked, and were lucky to live to tell the tale. In these two cases, though, I have a feeling it was a blitz attack. I don’t know. Their bodies were stiffer than a tailor’s dummy. Kind of paralyzed. I hope they weren’t conscious to experience the horror of it all.”
“Which only makes me wonder why the killer didn’t want them to experience the pain. Isn’t this the best part for a psycho, other than gaining attention? We didn’t know the Nolin woman, but we sure as hell knew Sarri,” said Gary. “The only piece of this puzzle that doesn’t fit is the writer, BJ Donovan. Last night she received a threatening email, possibly from the killer of those two women.”
Lucas glimpsed at Gary.
Foret continued to stare at the newspaper headline. “You need to evaluate the range of evidence and data collected so far, and you need to be able to re-create the crime scene in your minds. You also need to know as much about both victims as you can, in order to get a feel about the case. Gary, Lucas, go through the body-related findings, if any, and read the initial report. Go back and talk to the first officers who arrived on the scene. Maybe one or the other remembers something else. Ask them again, what did they see. Maybe the scene had been altered somehow or some way.”
“We’ve viewed the photographs already, and we’ve asked for a schematic drawing of the crime scene,” said Gary.
“Yeah,” said Lucas, “and we’ve already reread the medical examiner’s report, Captain.”
“Good, good. I’ve been thinking about this email crap. How do we trace it back to the sender?” Foret asked.
“Using his email address, we can contact his Internet service provider and get his identity.” Gary thought of BJ.
CHAPTER 33
Detectives Cantin and Northcutt learned the Internet service provider was local. They now had the name of their killer. Virgil Wentzel of 262 Caulfield Lane, New Orleans, Louisiana.
Four uniformed officers were immediately dispatched to Caulfield, a dead-end road.
Wentzel’s house stood dark and quiet at the end of the road, and was surrounded on three sides by trees and overgrown brush. It was the only house on the short street, and was separated from other houses by the heavily wooded part. They were told to remain out of sight until the detectives arrived with a search warrant.
Spanish moss draped the live oaks. From their hiding places behind the broad trunks, the officers observed shutters, soffits and guttering in a serious state of disrepair. The clapboard siding and stuccowork had long since lost their original color. Bermuda grass had been choked to death by weeds. The windows were covered on the inside with loosely hung black or dark blue bed sheets. Both of the dormer windows on top of the single-story house had either been used for target practice or had been hit by large hailstones.
Bursting through the door with a search warrant in hand, Northcutt and Cantin stopped dead in their tracks. They could easily see the place was empty except for a computer, telephone, and a desk lamp on a flimsy foldout card table in the farthest corner of the living room.
Wooden floors were stained and rotted from water damage and termite infestation. Sections of the wallpaper were curled under from the ceiling to the center of the wall, the colors and patterns no longer discernible. The popcorn ceiling was discolored and cracked, here and there, from a leaky roof. The linoleum on the kitchen floor had become peeled back in spots, and had turned a disgusting yellowish gray. Roaches ran undisturbed over the counters, stove and sink speckled with black droppings of feces. Nothing in the cabinets except more bugs milling about with nowhere to go. The refrigerator door hung off one hinge, the off-white interior dotted with mold and mildew.
Cantin pushed up the light switch on the kitchen wall. The low-watt bulb in the ceiling fixture barely shined through the dusty glass cover. “The electricity’s definitely on.”
Down the hall, the one and only bathroom was in sad shape. Once-white porcelain was now almost the blackish green color of mold. The tub, sink and toilet were stained a rusty color. Bugs crawled about freely.
Three bedrooms. Each as bare and filthy as the other. Dark green carpeting stretched from the hallway to the four corners of the bedrooms, and appeared covered with a thin fuzzy white layer of mold, possibly caused by high humidity and no air conditioning.
Cobwebbed ceiling fans.
Spider webbed closets.
The only thing out of the ordinary was the garbage. Rather, the lack thereof. No empty packages, bottles, jars, or cans. Not one single scrap of food. Perhaps even a serial killer couldn’t handle eating in such a nasty env
ironment?
Northcutt reread one of the sheets of paper clutched in his fist. The records from the deed office showed an attorney named Richard Gravois as the executor of the house at 262 Caulfield Lane. Northcutt made a note to contact the attorney. He stepped outside to draw in a breath of fresh air.
“Wentzel.” When and where have I heard that name?
CHAPTER 34
“Hello, BeeeJay.”
“Hello, Frank. How are you? Where are you,” she asked, quietly. His anger was palpable.
“I’m in Houston, Texas, and I didn’t call to talk about me. I want to know, right now, what the damn hell is going on there? Has been going on, rather. I just heard some shit about murder on the evening news. The goddamn reporter said they’d received an anonymous tip that novelist BJ Donovan of New Orleans, Louisiana was involved, then commented about email Missus Franklin Donovan had received directly from a serial killer. Damn you, BJ. I was sitting in the hotel bar with a potential client whose sizeable bank account I was trying to tap into when, without warning, your picture flashed onto the TV screen. It embarrassed me to no end. Now, ask me again how I am, you stupid bitch!”
“Calm down, Frank. If you stayed home a little more than what you do, I might not’ve gotten into this mess,” she feebly attempted to avert the blame.
“Don’t you dare put this off on me. How dare you. I’m working my ass off to give you a good life, and this is the thanks I get?”
Her own anger began to build momentum.
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