by BJ Bourg
I studied the man for a long moment. His eyes were blank as he stared at the floor. “Mr. Bertrand, can I ask you what time Kathleen left home Wednesday night?”
“Um, it was early evening, I guess. She gets out of church around eight, so it was right afterward. She didn’t have to be there until Thursday morning, but she usually leaves Wednesday night so she doesn’t have to be on the road so early in the morning.”
“Usually?” I asked. “Does she do this often?”
“She goes up once a month and has a conference with her firm’s partners in Mississippi. They meet for an extended weekend and she’s usually home by Sunday night.” Joey glanced at his watch. “She would’ve been home this evening sometime, anywhere between five and nine.”
“Why didn’t her law partners call when she never made it to Mississippi?” I wanted to know.
Joey shrugged. “I don’t get involved with her business. She’s an independent woman, you know? She doesn’t like me meddling in her affairs.”
I started to frame another question when Joey asked if he would get to see his wife’s body. “I need to see her—to be sure.”
“Absolutely,” I said. “We can take you there as soon as we’re done talking.”
He nodded and wiped his unkempt hair with the damp towel. “Is it true what everyone’s saying about how she died?”
I didn’t want to lie and I didn’t want to admit it was true, so I ignored the question. “I don’t like to ask this kind of thing, but I’m just following procedures. It’s routine that we find out if there have been any problems in the marriage.”
“I understand.” He shook his head. “We argue about things like every other couple”—he pointed to the missing crown molding overhead and the staircase that still needed spindles—“but nothing major.”
“I’ve always heard a carpenter doesn’t like to come home to more carpenter work,” I said. “I guess that’s true.”
“It is. And Kathleen didn’t like talking law when she was off. Every time we had family gatherings someone would invariably start asking her legal questions. How to draft a will, what to do if someone got hurt on their property, could they sue the neighbor for the dog always knocking over the garbage—it was endless.” He stopped talking and his eyes clouded over. “I can’t believe she’s gone. It doesn’t seem real. I keep thinking I’m going to hear the deadbolt turn and she’ll come walking through the door.”
I frowned. “We’re really sorry for your loss. We’re going to do everything we can to catch whoever’s responsible.”
“I appreciate you saying that.” He wiped his eyes and sat up. “What happened to her car?”
I didn’t want to give away too many of the finer details, so I just told him it had been located in Magnolia Parish.
“Do you have any leads?” he asked.
“Not at this time.” I hesitated, never liking this part. “Again, this is routine and I don’t want to offend you, but was there any infidelity in the relationship? If she was unfaithful, that would be an avenue we would definitely want to explore, because a boyfriend would be a most likely suspect in a case such as this.”
“No, she wasn’t unfaithful. She was a God-fearing woman who went to church every Sunday and Wednesday.”
“Which church?”
“The only one in town…the Second Temple Fellowship.”
I nodded, thinking back to an earlier statement he’d made. “She goes every Sunday?”
“Religiously.” He nodded for emphasis. “She never misses.”
“If she gets home between five and nine, how does she make the services every Sunday? You said earlier that the services end around eight.”
“The sermon starts at six-thirty. If she gets home at five, she’ll leave from here to go to church. If she’s late, she’ll go straight to church and I’ll see her afterward, which is usually between eight and nine, depending on how long she stays and visits.”
A thought seemed to suddenly occur to him and he fixed me with level eyes. “I watch all the crime shows, so I know where this is going. I’m automatically a suspect, ain’t that right?”
“Well, no one is actually a suspect at this point,” I explained. “When authorities use the phrase, ‘Everyone’s a suspect,’ it doesn’t mean they suspect everyone. It simply means they shouldn’t rule anyone out until all the evidence has been collected and the case has been thoroughly investigated.” I pointed to Joey. “I don’t have a shred of evidence suggesting you did this, so you’re not a suspect. However, you haven’t been cleared yet, either, because we haven’t finished processing all of the evidence and the investigation is just getting started.”
He nodded his understanding. “I just want you to catch the evil bastard who killed my wife. She didn’t deserve this.”
“Of course she didn’t.” I was thoughtful, and then asked if he knew if Kathleen had any enemies. “Anyone who might want her dead?”
“None at all. She was loved by everyone.”
“What about friends?”
Joey shrugged. “She hangs out with some of her coworkers and the ladies from church every now and then, but that’s about it. She’s too busy with work to socialize much.”
“Do you know who her friends are?”
“Her partner is Ashley LaCroix. They’re pretty close. And she has a friend from church named Shelby Rove. They’ve been friends since they were kids.”
“Speaking of kids—do you two have any?”
“We have two grown boys, Nathan and Sirus, but they both live away and we don’t see then much anymore except for holidays…” He got choked up and began bawling again. “How in the hell am I supposed to tell them what happened to their mom? How do you explain something like that?”
CHAPTER 15
I couldn’t imagine the pain Joey was enduring, so we waited patiently until he had calmed down enough to speak again. When he nodded his head that he was okay, we asked about his sons and whether or not they might have been in touch with Kathleen since Thursday.
“Nathan lives in Morgan City. He’s nineteen and still has a bit of a wild streak, so we don’t hear from him much. When he’s not working offshore, he’s usually partying with his friends or hanging with the girlfriend of the week. We hear from him once or twice a month, but we have to initiate the contact.” He paused to take a quivering breath. “Sirus is twenty-two. He just started med school in Houston and we don’t expect to see him until Thanksgiving. He doesn’t call much either, but it’s because he’s so busy studying. I think Kathleen spoke with him last weekend.”
“What about parents and siblings?”
“Her parents live in New Orleans. She talks to her mom pretty often.” He stopped and shook his head. “This is going to kill her dad. She’s got one brother and one sister, but they both moved out of state. Kathleen’s the only one who stayed close, so she sees their parents more often. If she leaves the conference early enough, she usually stops in for a quick visit on her way home.”
When he finished talking, I jotted down some notes and hesitated again, but then went for it. “In order to move the investigation forward, do you mind giving us permission to search your wife’s financial records, cell phone records, internet history…things like that?”
“I’d love to, but I don’t have access to any of it. We keep our finances separated.” He stood, but grabbed onto the sofa to steady himself.
Dawn quickly moved toward him. “Are you okay?”
He nodded, pausing for a second to get his legs under him. “I’d like to see my wife now—if that’s okay.”
I glanced toward a doorway that led to an office. There was a large mahogany desk at the center of the room and a desktop computer was centered above it. It must be Kathleen’s home office and I wanted to be in there turning over every sheet of paper, but I needed permission or a warrant.
“Do you mind if I go through her office before we leave?” I asked, taking one more shot at it. “Just to see if it’ll offer
any clues as to her disappearance.”
“I mean, I wouldn’t necessarily be opposed to it, but it would be a waste of time,” Joey said. “And right now I’d like to be with my wife.”
“Certainly.” I cursed under my breath and put on a fake smile. “We’ll take you there as soon as you’re ready.”
While we waited for Joey to change his clothes, Dawn leaned close and told me she’d accidentally wandered into a couple of bedrooms while searching for the bathroom to get Joey a towel. “They had to be guest rooms because they didn’t look lived in, but everything I saw was in pristine condition. If there was a struggle in this house, he sure cleaned up his mess, because nothing’s out of place.”
I mulled over her information and our conversation with Joey. I finally asked Dawn if she thought we had enough for a search warrant.
“It’s not a crime scene and he’s not a suspect,” she said. “I don’t think we’ve got a leg to stand on.”
I begrudgingly agreed about the house, but I knew we could get a warrant to search her cell phone records and bank accounts. I quickly shot a text message to Detective Melvin Ford and asked him to get Kathleen’s purse from evidence and obtain the account numbers on her credit cards and checking account and prepare a search warrant for each.
I also wanted a search warrant for her cell phone, but I didn’t know the subscriber information. Keeping my voice low, I asked, “How are we going to get the information on her cell phone service provider? If he’s involved, he won’t give it to us.”
She lifted a finger and winked, and then called out to Joey.
“I’ll be right there,” he hollered from the master bedroom, which was positioned deep in the house. “I’m almost done.”
Dawn pulled out her phone and pretended to be playing with it when Joey appeared in the hallway. He had changed into dress jeans and a button-down shirt. Although it was wrinkled, it was better than the torn shirt he wore earlier.
“My phone doesn’t seem to be connecting,” Dawn said, slapping it against her hand. “What service provider do y’all use out here? Maybe that’s the problem.”
“We never have problems,” Joey said. “We use Ring-Tele. I know my neighbors had to switch to Ring-Tele when they moved out here last summer.”
Ring-Tele was a local telephone company that provided services for land lines and cell phones, as well as internet and cable service. I was relieved, because I had dealt with the company before and their managers were always quick to honor our search warrants and court orders.
While Dawn made small talk with Joey on the way to my truck, I shot a follow-up message to Melvin and gave him the information. I also asked him to have Kathleen’s cell phone forensically examined. I wanted to know what she had been up to in the days leading up to her murder.
CHAPTER 16
3:00 p.m.
Magnolia Parish Coroner’s Office
“This officer will see to it that you get home safely,” I told Joey Bertrand after he had finished spending time with his wife and we had walked outside to meet Lieutenant Jim Marshall. I handed Joey my card. “If you need anything—anything at all—don’t hesitate to call.”
He nodded weakly and slipped into the front seat of Lieutenant Marshall’s cruiser. Dawn and I stood and watched them drive away.
Joey had said all the right things and he was as emotional as I expected I’d be if that was Dawn lying on the morgue slab, but I still wasn’t sure about him. Something he’d said earlier was bothering me and I couldn’t wait to mention it to Dawn.
“Earlier, at his house,” I began, “Joey said Kathleen didn’t deserve what happened to her.”
“I remember.”
“That strikes me as odd.”
“Why?” she asked. “Do you think Kathleen deserved it?”
“No, I don’t think anyone deserved it, and that’s what makes the comment odd to me.”
Dawn leaned back against my truck, her eyes tired and droopy. “Care to explain yourself? I’m too exhausted to play mental ninja at the moment.”
“If something terrible happened to you, I wouldn’t say you didn’t deserve it—”
“Gee, thanks a lot,” she interrupted.
“Well, because it’s completely unnecessary. Of course you don’t deserve to be crucified. When we heard the news of that boy getting his arm bit off by a shark, we didn’t say he didn’t deserve it—because it’s already understood. Now, if you did something wrong and I’ve been wishing mean things on you, but I thought this punishment was too severe, I might say you didn’t deserve it because of the guilt I felt for wishing mean things on you.”
I could almost see the wheels in her head turning. “So, you think she might’ve done something wrong and he wished some evil on her, but this was much worse than anything he would’ve hoped for her and now he feels guilty for wishing her ill?”
I pointed at her. “You nailed it.”
She shrugged. “It seems weak.”
“We need to get to her law firm first thing in the morning and find out everything her partner knows about her.”
Dawn glanced at her phone. “What are we going to do until then?”
“Head to New Orleans to visit with Kathleen’s parents and then go to church.”
Dawn shuddered and I nodded my understanding. “I can go alone if you like.”
She shook her head. “I’ll be fine.”
CHAPTER 17
6:00 p.m.
Second Temple Fellowship, Plymouth East, Louisiana
“This is different,” Dawn said when I parked at the far end of the asphalt parking lot to the Second Temple Fellowship Church. She was referring to the simple and modest construction of the building. There were no fancy picture windows or large mahogany doors or massive concrete steps leading to the place of worship—it was a plain rectangular building wrapped in wooden siding. The building was white with brown trim and there was an overhang that offered a little shade over the doorway. A squat steeple topped with a crucifix stood proudly above the roof of the church. It appeared dark and ominous against the waning daylight, as though serving as a reminder of the horror that had befallen Kathleen Bertrand.
“If he’s taking his parishioners’ money,” Dawn said, drawing my attention from the crucifix, “he sure isn’t putting it back into the building.”
I nodded but didn’t say anything, because I was fully aware how troubled Dawn had been when she and Brandon Berger had handled the case with the Magnolia Life Church.
I stepped out of my truck and we walked across the parking lot, where she and I waited in line to get inside. It was a small place, but there was a long line waiting to enter.
Upon leaving the coroner’s office, I had received a call from Joey Bertrand saying his in-laws had gotten word about Kathleen’s murder and they were en route from New Orleans. While waiting for them to arrive in town, Dawn and I had eaten lunch and checked on the status of the search warrants Melvin had prepared for us. Not thrilled about working on a Sunday, but happy to be helping on the case, Melvin had gotten all three warrants signed by a district judge and he had faxed them to the legal departments of the appropriate companies. He said he was waiting to hear back from the technicians, but they said it might be a few days.
Joey had called again when Kathleen’s parents arrived in town and we met them at the Bertrand residence. A family friend had driven them down because they were too distraught to drive, but they gutted through the interview and answered all of our questions. When we left, we were no closer to finding Kathleen’s killer and were leaning further away from Joey as a suspect. According to his in-laws, he was a good son-in-law and he and their daughter had enjoyed a healthy relationship.
“Kathleen adores that boy,” her dad had said, “and he adores her. They raised two fine young men and, now that they’re empty nesters, they finally have more time to themselves. Kathleen was saying just the other day how she feels closer to Joey now than ever.”
Dawn and I had wrapp
ed up the interview just in time to run home to change and then return to Plymouth East for the church sermon. Now, we stood there wondering if we’d ever make it inside.
“Does everyone in Plymouth East go to this church?” I asked Dawn out of the corner of my mouth, keeping my voice low.
She nodded, as though certain. “It’s a residential requirement. If you don’t attend at least one session per week, they show up at your house with a mob and drag you from the town.”
Several elderly women who were standing in front of us began whispering amongst each other. One of them pointed in our direction, but quickly turned her head when our eyes met.
The crowd shuffled forward a little at a time and we finally made our way through the entrance, where a man stood on each side of the door and they were greeting the crowd as they entered. When they reached Dawn and me, who were last in line, they welcomed us and pointed toward the last pew.
“Since when is there assigned seating in church?” Dawn grumbled.
Before I could answer, the doors slammed shut behind us and several musicians took to the stage.
I scanned my surroundings. Other than the double doors we’d entered, there was one more exterior door at the front of the building to the left, and a door that went deeper into the structure toward the right. There were four windows on the left wall, four on the right wall, and two on the rear wall.
I was impressed with the size of the crowd. If every person in each pew would’ve slid over a few inches, they might’ve been able to squeeze a dozen more people, but not much more than that. As it was, I felt like I was in the pocket of the lady to my right, and Dawn was nearly in my lap. When I stole a glance at the woman beside me, I noticed she had some sort of cloth on her head. I looked around and realized all of the women had one. I knew enough about religion to know that some Christian faiths used to require women to cover their heads during worship as a symbol of man’s authority over them, but I didn’t know it was still being practiced in modern day. If a man told Dawn to put a cloth over her head as a symbol of authority over her, she’d drop-kick him into the next parish.