by Jana DeLeon
“Nah, man,” the bartender said. “I just made a new pot. Let me get you a hot one.”
“Thanks,” the cop said as he leaned against the bar, surveying the patrons. Then his gaze locked on the three of us and didn’t shift. In all fairness, we probably looked like an odd trio. Three completely and normally dressed and sober women on Saint Charles Avenue was clearly not the norm. Not today.
“Excuse me, Officer?” I asked, making sure I checked his rank before I spoke.
“Yes. How can I help you ladies?” he asked.
“We’re looking for a Detective Bishop,” I said. “Dispatch told me he was working the parade but didn’t know what area he would be covering. I don’t suppose you can help us out with that?”
He spent an extra couple seconds studying us, probably trying to assess the threat level. I found it both amusing and disappointing that he must have decided the threat level was low to zero when he pulled out a sheet and scanned it. If he only knew.
“Looks like Bishop is supposed to be between Poydras and Canal,” he said. “Sorry I can’t narrow it down any more than that.”
“So you guys just walk the area you were assigned?” I asked.
He nodded. “And we keep walking until all these fools go home. Is there anything I can help you with? So you don’t have to go looking for Detective Bishop in this madhouse.”
“I don’t think so,” I said. “I might have some information about a homicide he worked about three years back. I’m not sure it will help, but I figure it doesn’t hurt to give him the information.”
“Yep, you’re going to have to talk to Bishop directly if it’s his case,” he said. “If you don’t run him down tonight, he’ll probably be reachable tomorrow afternoon. Those of us who work the parade get a later start tomorrow.”
“I imagine the whole city gets a later start,” I said.
“Not the people you wish would,” he said as the bartender handed him a huge cup of coffee. “You ladies enjoy the parade.”
He headed out and we trailed behind him.
“Okay, which way?” I asked.
Ida Belle pointed. “A couple blocks that way and we hit Poydras. The distance between there and Canal isn’t too bad. We lucked out on that part. If he’d been given streets closer to the start, we wouldn’t have even made it over there by the time this thing gets rolling.”
“It looks like it’s already rolling,” I said as a man bumped into me and dumped an entire cup of beer down my back.
“Sorry,” he said, then gave me the once-over followed by a creepy smile. “Can I buy us both a drink?”
“Keep moving, buster,” Gertie said. “Or I’ll pull the gun out of my bra and show you how I use it.”
I wasn’t sure if it was the threat of the gun or the potential of seeing her bra or anything in it, but either way, it had the drunk moving on to find his next conquest.
“At least I smell the part now,” I said.
“It’s not Mardi Gras until you’re wearing beer,” Gertie said cheerfully.
“I’ll be quite satisfied to return to the apartment dry,” Ida Belle said.
“What if he’s cute?” Gertie asked.
“I’m getting married,” Ida Belle reminded her.
“Oh yeah!” Gertie said. “Sorry. That was never something I thought I’d have to take into account. But hey, now I can go with ‘but you’re not dead.’”
“When it comes to drunks dumping beer on me, there’s the possibility that someone will be dead,” Ida Belle said.
“Well, your argument got us to Poydras,” I said. “You ready to start looking for Bishop?”
Gertie reached up with both hands and shook her chest.
“What in the name of all that is holy are you doing?” Ida Belle asked.
“My gun is digging into the right boob.”
“Please tell me you don’t have that Desert Eagle shoved in there,” Ida Belle said.
“If I had the Eagle shoved in here, it would be digging into my kidney,” Gertie said. “I went boring like the two of you. It’s a nine-millimeter. And maybe some Mace. And a pocketknife.”
“That’s asking a lot of your bra,” I said. “All I ask is that mine keep my boobs under my shirt when I’m in public.”
“Well, if the rated-R portion of the evening is over, can we get this show on the road?” Ida Belle asked.
We proceeded up the street, repeating the process we’d used earlier, with each of us checking out a different shop. We were almost to Canal when I spotted a cop going into a café.
“There!” I pointed and picked up speed.
We hurried across the street and into the café. The cop was at the counter and we headed straight for him. I was a bit disappointed when I got a glimpse of his name tag but figured maybe he could guide us in the right direction.
“Excuse me, Officer,” I said. “I’m looking for Detective Bishop. Dispatch told me I could find him around this area of Saint Charles. Do you have any idea where he might be?”
Okay, so Dispatch didn’t tell me, but it was easier than explaining our process.
The officer looked momentarily taken aback and glanced across the café, then looked back at me. “Is there something I can help you with?”
I smiled. “You already have. I assume the gentleman in street clothes sitting at the table in the corner is Detective Bishop. You need to work on your poker face. Thank you for your help.”
Detective Bishop had heard the entire exchange and watched the officer leave the shop. He was still shaking his head when we stepped up to the table.
Late thirties. Six foot two. A hundred eighty pounds. Excellent muscle tone. No weaknesses that I could see. Also extremely good-looking. Which didn’t present a physical danger to me, but I could see where he might to a lot of women.
“If you’re on break, we can wait until you finish,” I said.
He shook his head. “If you do that, you’ll be chasing me up and down the street in this crowd and hoping I can hear a word you’re saying. I have another twenty minutes. If you don’t mind my finishing my dinner while you tell me why you need to speak to me, I’m game.”
“Of course we don’t mind,” I said.
“Heck, I was going to order,” Gertie said. “That smells delicious.”
“Pot roast,” Bishop said. “This place has the best. And as it’s the special today, no waiting required as long as you get it before they run out.”
I waved at the server, and when she walked over, we ordered three pot roast dinners and three sweet teas.
“I take it you’re not here for the drinking,” Bishop said after we’d ordered. “Or are you pacing yourselves, unlike the thousands of fools outside the door?”
“I don’t get drunk in public,” I said. “It slows reaction time.”
He raised one eyebrow and I passed him a business card.
“These are my assistants, Ida Belle and Gertie,” I said.
He sighed. “You know I’m not going to talk to you.”
I knew there was no love lost between cops and PIs. Cops saw us as interfering buttheads who likely couldn’t get a job as a cop.
I held up a hand. “Look, I know the drill. But I’m not your usual PI. I’m a former CIA operative, for starters, and I’m doing this because retirement at my age is a huge stretch and I like puzzles. But after working for the government for a decade, I can’t take any more of their red tape. That’s why I went private.”
“CIA? Really?” he said, clearly surprised. “And an operative. That reaction time comment makes a lot more sense now. Have you killed anyone I’d know?”
“Probably, but I’m trying not to make a habit of it now that I’m a civilian.”
He smiled and I could tell I’d won him over with my stellar wit and the possibility that I’d killed people he didn’t like.
“So how can I help you, former CIA Operative Redding?” he asked. “Did I arrest a client of yours?”
“No,” I said. “In fa
ct, I don’t have a client at all. I just have an interest in keeping people safe and there’s a situation in my town that’s gotten my attention. Things don’t fit.”
He nodded. The great thing about detectives was they got that statement because one usually didn’t rise to the position of detective without having the ability to spot things that were out of balance.
“So where do I come in?” he asked.
I briefly explained the situation with Katia.
“You’re sure it’s homicide?” he asked. “Not a stray?”
I shook my head. “Trajectory was wrong.”
“You could tell that by a look through a woman’s clothes and a jacket, in dim light?” he asked.
“I’m sort of a specialist on trajectory,” I said.
His eyes widened as he caught the reference. “Okay, then. How can I help? I’ve never heard of Katia Grekov and Lord knows, the sheriff’s department wouldn’t like me butting into their investigation. Not that I have any jurisdiction or grounds.”
“Oh, trust me,” Gertie said. “We know all about the displeasure of the sheriff’s department when we ‘butt in.’ Doesn’t matter that we’ve caught some of the worst criminals the town has seen in a while.”
Bishop looked back and forth between Ida Belle and Gertie, and I knew he was trying to make sense of Gertie’s statement, especially as it looked as though it was coming from an extra on The Golden Girls.
“It also doesn’t help that Fortune is dating the lead deputy,” Gertie continued. “Not that I’m saying she shouldn’t date Carter. He’s a great guy and perfect for her. He’s just a bit too rigid about his job and following rules.”
“Carter LeBlanc?” Bishop asked.
I nodded.
Bishop smiled. “I’ve heard about you. Carter has a couple buddies with the force. According to them, you’ve got some serious skills.”
“Except for the ability to stay out of police business, that’s true enough,” I said. I didn’t see any reason to hide what we were doing. I’d figured from the beginning that my talk with Bishop might get back to Carter. Not that I didn’t plan on telling him. Just not right away. So hopefully, the usual law enforcement gossip train would be too busy with Mardi Gras to waste time carrying tales back to Sinful.
He laughed. “I’ll bet Carter has his hands full. But you’ve got me curious. Why the interest in this murder? This woman was a visitor, right?”
I explained the similarity in appearance and dress between Katia and the woman she was visiting and that Katia had been standing there with the woman’s daughter.
“So you think the wrong woman was killed?” he asked. “That seems a stretch. More likely, this Katia was into something she shouldn’t have been and trouble followed her. Unless you think the husband did it. But even I can’t see him pulling off that kind of stunt with his own kid standing right there. Even if he couldn’t stand her anymore, he would have made sure his kid was out of the way.”
“I think the wrong woman was killed because this is the second time Katia’s friend has escaped death while someone else died. Three years ago, you responded to a homicide—a woman and her sister were attacked in a parking lot and the sister died.”
He scrunched his brow for a couple seconds, then nodded. “Right. I remember. Russian girls. What’s the connection?”
“Natalia Guillory was the woman who survived that attack. She’s also the woman whom Katia was visiting.”
He put his fork down. I’d finally gotten his attention.
“That is interesting,” he said. “You got any theories?”
“Other than maybe Natalia is the real target and someone’s bungled it twice? No. All I know is Natalia’s husband is cheap and keeps to himself. It’s a family policy. He works for the government and the word is he’s intel. They moved to Sinful right after her attack into a house he inherited from his great-aunt. They attend church but no events at church. Their child is homeschooled. They are members of nothing and have no friends that they hang out with. It’s hard to form a theory about people when you can’t get any information on them.”
He leaned back in his chair. “The plot thickens. So you’re thinking that maybe this Natalia was into something before she met her husband that’s got her targeted? Or is the husband the target and they’re going for his wife to make an example?”
I shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine at this point. But I don’t like thinking that a killer could be lurking around Sinful, waiting for another opportunity. If Natalia was the intended target, then that makes two innocent people who’ve died because of whatever this is. I don’t want anyone else caught in the cross fire.”
He nodded. “Because the next time, it might be someone you know and care about. I get it. I’d be concerned as well. And I’ll admit, the situation has definitely piqued my interest. But I still don’t see how I can help. Even if I got you a copy of the police report, I don’t think it’s going to tell you anything.”
“I already have it, and it didn’t,” I said. “Except for your name.”
He narrowed his eyes at me. “You want to tell me how you got a copy of an open investigation report?”
I really didn’t want to get into an argument over police documents and what was legal and not legal and the like, so I threw out my ace in the hole just to speed things along. After all, lunch hour was almost up.
I smiled. “Did I mention that we’re staying right on Saint Charles Avenue? Big Hebert is lending us his place.”
He stared. “Big Hebert? That Big Hebert?”
“Are there others?” I asked.
“I suppose not,” he said. “So if you’ve read the report then you know as much as I do.”
“Not really,” I said. “We weren’t there, and I know you don’t put your hunches and basic observations into the official report. You can’t without taking some flak for it. That’s what I want. All the thoughts you had about the case that you would never have put into writing.”
He blew out a breath. “That’s going to be tough. It was years ago and with so little to go on, not much time was spent on it, either.”
“Let’s start with the obvious,” I said. “Did you believe they’d been mugged?”
“No doubt about that,” he said. “A camera about halfway down the street caught part of it before they fell outside of view. It was horribly grainy and black and white only, but you could see well enough how it started. Unfortunately, we were never able to track down another camera with a better view of the perps. Not that it would have mattered with those masks on, but we couldn’t even track movement for more than a half a block.”
“So both women were taken to the hospital,” I said. “Were either conscious when you arrived?”
“Not really,” he said. “I was only a block away when I got the call, but it was bad. One victim was barely breathing. The other was in and out of consciousness, mostly out. And when she was in, she wasn’t coherent at all. Both of them got bashed in the head something awful. I’ve never seen so much blood. When we got to the hospital, they hauled them off for tests and surgery immediately. I didn’t get to talk to Natalia again until the next morning. Her sister never regained consciousness.”
“Where were their car keys?” I asked.
“In the purse we found,” he said. “Natalia’s wallet and cell phone were still in place as well. The young men who witnessed the perps running away claimed one dropped something as he ran. Since he didn’t have time to strip the cash and credit cards out, I assume that wasn’t intentional.”
“Probably not,” I said, “or they would have taken the car. Tell me about Natalia. How was she when you talked to her?”
“Bad off,” he said. “I was there when she woke up screaming ‘my sister, my sister’ over and over. It was brutal.”
“I can imagine,” I said.
“Then she touches her head and the doctor tells her she was attacked, she’s in the hospital, and has a head injury,” he said. “I could t
ell she was terrified when she asked about her sister.”
“Did the doctor tell her that her sister didn’t make it or did you?”
“I told her,” he said. “But she didn’t believe us. She insisted on seeing her and she was so worked up that the doctor finally called for a wheelchair and we took her down to the morgue to show her the body.”
“That must have been awful,” Gertie said.
He nodded. “She fell apart, sobbing like I’ve never heard before. When she finally got a breath, I asked her what her name was. She was confused until I explained that we’d only found one purse belonging to Natalia Guillory but there was an old photo in her wallet of the two of them with ‘Natalia and Annika’ written on the back. We had assumed they were sisters since they looked so much alike.”
“Sure,” I said.
“She tells me she’s Natalia,” he said. “We’d already run her driver’s license the night before but she no longer lived at that address. I had the computer guys trying to track down info on her—marriage license, employment records, social media, something—but they’d come up empty.”
“What about her cell phone?” I asked. “I thought you said it was still in her purse.”
“It was and it was completely clean,” he said. “No address book. No call history. I was going to initiate a trace with the phone company that morning but then thought I didn’t have to since she was awake.”
He shook his head. “Thinking about that clean phone along with what you’ve told me has me wondering what really happened. Don’t get me wrong, it had every marker of a typical mugging. But…”
“But what?” I asked.
“Well, who doesn’t have contacts in their phone?” he asked. “And who deletes call history and texts right away? I mean, I guess it makes more sense now that I know her husband is intel, but it did seem odd at the time.”
“I can see that,” I said.
“Then things went really south,” he said. “I asked her to tell me what happened, and she stared at me with this completely blank look then started to cry again, saying she couldn’t remember. I figured she was just highly stressed and might feel better if she had a family member there, so I asked if she was married. She didn’t have a ring on but that doesn’t mean much these days. She starts to breathe really fast and then says she doesn’t know.”