“Not there, there,” Elijah was pointing to some steps to the left of the building. They led down to a door, outside of which a big, burly man stood, and from which bright lights, the sounds of people talking, or more accurately, shouting, and the lonely strains of a trumpet, could be heard. Elijah led them down the steps, spoke a few quiet words to the guy on the door, and then beckoned to his companions to follow him inside.
When they opened the door that led into the cavernous space of the underground club—it was literally underground—an explosion of noise burst forth as a huge swell of chatter. The club was packed and the crowd seemed to heave as one. All ages mingled together, drinks in hand, half of them leaning in close to their companions so that they could converse with one another. It was dark except for the lights around the bar, the odd wall light, and spotlights pointing out from a stage in the corner.
Elijah inched his way through the crowd to the bar, nodding occasionally, clasping the hand of one man in greeting, waving to several others. Behind him, trying to stay close, were Nat and Roxy. They clung onto each other as they used their combined body weight to force their way through the throng.
Elijah leaned in to speak to the barman as he placed two cocktails and a beer on the counter. The barman pointed and Elijah looked over, nodding his thanks before taking the drinks and turning around just as Roxy and Nat reached him.
“Here we go, ladies. Mojitos for you and me, Roxy, a beer for you, Nat.”
“You know, I’m a little more sophisticated than I look,” Nat said tartly, taking her beer and giving it a swig in a fashion that disputed her statement. “A cocktail would have been fine.”
“Where’s Royston Lamontagne? Does he have an office at the back?” Roxy shouted hopefully. The noise was deafening.
“Oh no, this isn’t Royston’s club. He’s visiting tonight. Looking for new talent, I expect. It’s Karaoke night. Music promoters and record industry execs travel from all over to come here on Monday nights. Anyone can pick up the mic but this place is known for trying out up-and-comers who are hoping to get noticed. There’ll be some really good voices singing on that stage later.” Elijah pointed at the raised platform that was empty except for a mic stand and some speakers. Next to the stage was a piano and a drum kit. A sweaty man was weaving his way, hunched over, around the equipment, cable in one hand, a transformer in the other.
“Elijah!”
“Alphonse!” A slight, dark-haired man with skin that shone like spotlights in the dim light of the club embraced Elijah, slapping him on the shoulders, before standing back as best he could given the crush of the crowd. “What are you doing here?”
“We’re here for the music, man, a good time. We’re also looking for Royston Lamontagne. We were told he’d be here tonight. My friend here has a meeting with him.”
“Really?” Alfonse swiveled to regard Roxy, looking her up and down. “Sing, do you?”
“Oh, no,” Roxy gushed breathlessly. “I’m here about…something else. He told me to meet him at midnight.”
Alfonse looked at his watch. “Yeah, he should be here soon. He comes most Mondays although he’s been telling me to get some better talent in or he might stop coming by. The ones we’ve had in lately haven’t interested him. I’ll keep my eye out and give you a wave when he arrives.”
“Thanks, man,” Elijah said. The two men clasped hands before Alfonse was swallowed up by the crowd around him.
Another voice cried out, “Elijah!” Elijah turned. There was a crash from the stage. Roxy and Nat looked over and when they looked back, Elijah had disappeared.
“Now what?” Nat said, taking another swig of her beer. “Our connector and protector has gone.”
“I guess we just wait for Lamontagne to appear. It’s just a few minutes to midnight. Not long now.”
“Look over there, a table. Let’s get it, quick!” Roxy and Nat once again joined forces to shove their way through the crowd and scrambled to reach the empty table like it was a deserted island in the middle of an ocean. They crashed down onto the banquette in relief.
“Oh, but now I can’t see a thing!” Roxy cried. “I’m never going to be able to see Lamontagne when he arrives.”
“Stand on the table!”
“What? I can’t do that.”
“Course you can. Come on, I’ll help you,” said Nat.
And so, in her tight bodycon dress and her high heels, Roxy, helped by Nat, clambered onto the table to get a full view of the crowd and the door to the club. As she stood up, pulling down the skirt of her dress so that it reached her knees once more, she immediately spied the tall figure of Royston Lamontagne. He was standing in a corner near the bar. He looked exactly as he had at the séance. His suit was impeccable, his tie was thin and straight, and he continued to wear sunglasses despite the fact he was indoors and it was night-time. Under his arm was his tiny dog, Fenton. Lamontagne was talking to another, much shorter man whose rumpled shirt and rolled-up sleeves denoted sartorial credentials that were far less distinguished than his companion’s.
“He’s here. I’m going in.” Roxy got down onto her knees and from there climbed from the table.
“Well, I’m staying put. You’ll find me here when you’re done,” Nat said. “I’ll take care of your cocktail while you’re away.” She winked at Roxy who took a deep breath, put her hands up in front of her and moved into the crowd.
Several minutes later Roxy emerged a few feet away from where Royston Lamontagne stood. And thank goodness she did. Jostled and inadvertently pushed along by the crowd, she had taken a long and circuitous route to reach him. Brushing herself down, and finger combing her short hair, once again grateful for the style’s practicality, she walked up to Lamontagne and stuck out her hand, panting gently, her nerves having evaporated during her journey across the floor of the club.
“Mr. Lamontagne? Roxy Reinhardt, from the Funky Cat Inn. And Meredith Romanoff’s séance. You asked me to meet you here. To talk.”
Lamontagne looked at her. Or at least she thought he did. It was hard to tell what he was doing behind those sunglasses. She heard a drumroll and the crash of a cymbal from the direction of the stage. A bass guitarist began to warm up.
Lamontagne lifted his head to the stage and beckoned to her. “Five minutes, I said.” He led her away from the club down a corridor. When they were far enough away that they could speak without shouting, he stopped and leaned against the wall.
“You’re looking into Meredith’s death?”
“Yes, um, as a sort of…adjunct to the police department.”
“What do you want to know? Be quick.”
“Well, how did you know Meredith?”
“I’ve been seeing Meredith for years. She gives me, well, let’s call it advice. I’ve had many private consultations with her. This was the first public one. She’s not been to New Orleans before. I usually see her when I’m traveling. This was the first time I agreed to meet her with other people being present. Big mistake. One I won’t be making again, obviously.”
“What sort of advice?”
“Adv…? Look, that’s private. It’s nothing. I’d ask her questions, and she’d give me answers. Sometimes I’d take her advice, sometimes I wouldn’t. It was just a bit of fun, you know.” Royston looked around. “Look, you’re not going to tell anyone, are you? That I was there?” Lamontagne’s little dog gave a yip and snapped at Roxy as if to warn her off.
“That depends, Mr. Lamontagne, on whether you’ve got anything to do with her death.” Roxy could hear the band clearly now. Their beat was untidy and they weren’t very tight, unlike the high, whiny voice that was currently singing along with them. Whoever it was, she didn’t think they’d be scouted for a record deal that night, or anytime soon.
“Me? Are you kidding? Of course I had nothing to do with Meredith’s death! We were associates, that’s all. She gave me advice that I used to help make my business decisions. I’ve made a lot of money over the years, in part thanks t
o Meredith. Why on earth would I want to kill her? It would make no sense.” Fenton yipped three times in a row in agreement. Lamontagne leaned down so that his lips were close to Roxy’s ears. He was so tall that it was quite an effort for him. “If you want to find out who killed Meredith, look into that husband of hers.”
“Why do you say that?”
“My assistant went to a retreat run by Meredith in Arizona. I wouldn’t go because it wasn’t private so I sent her instead. I was expecting great things, it being in Sedona and all. Those vortexes are supposed to be pretty powerful, but according to my assistant, it was a total bust. Charles ruined it. My assistant said that Meredith was harsh and rude during the retreat, but that it wasn’t her fault. She confided in my assistant that Charles—because he didn’t support her and her work—was causing ‘energetic disturbances’ that stopped her connecting with the spirits properly. She said that she had a vision that Charles was trying to kill her. Like he was trying to stop her from doing important work. I never saw him sabotage her but…Wait!
They both listened. From the club, the noise had died down. The crowd was silent, attentive. Roxy could hear the piano playing chords, just chords, allowing someone their moment to sing and, Roxy could tell, sing mightily. It was a woman, her voice low, deep, rich, awash with longing and mood. The voice swelled to a crescendo and then peaked as she belted out the chorus to a ballad full of sorrow and lost love. A few in the crowd whistled and cheered before being quickly shushed by others wanting to hear more.
“Oh my…Who is that? Who is that?” Lamontagne, Meredith Romanoff’s murder forgotten, pushed past Roxy. “I have to see her. I have to.” He disappeared through the open door into the club and the crowd that filled the room to bursting. Roxy stood where she was. She didn’t need to see who was singing. She already knew. It was Nat. She was singing in front of people. Unfamiliar people.
CHAPTER THIRTY
WHEN NAT CAME to the end of her song, the crowd who had remained silent to the end erupted in cheers and applause. They drummed their feet and their hands on whatever surface was available to them. Nat stood and looked out, apparently bemused, perhaps confused, certainly unmoving. She swayed a little. Roxy stood at the back of the hall and watched as the crowd began to chant, “Who are you? Who are you? Who are you?”
Louder and louder they chanted as they pressed forward toward the stage. Nat looked around, unsure of what to do, fear beginning to cross her face as she looked from side to side, her feet planted to the spot. Cocktail umbrellas, beads, even a scarf were tossed onto the stage making Nat blink and stare. Then to her right, there was movement. A group of men led by Elijah appeared and barreled Nat off the platform. They formed a circle around her as they propelled her through the noisy throng to the back door where Roxy was standing.
“Get her out of here!” Elijah cried. “Quickly!” The crowd had followed them and were now pressing in again, like a formless, mushrooming, many-headed monster that threatened to subsume them, gobbling them up. Roxy, startled, immediately grabbed Nat’s hand. “Come!” she commanded Nat. They ran.
Outside, the cold air stung their faces as they sprinted, but it only served to propel them faster up the steps and down Frenchmen Street, and into the neighborhood beyond. “Can you run all the way back to the Funky Cat, Nat?” Roxy asked breathlessly. She hopped as she pulled off her high-heeled shoes one after the other to run barefoot.
“Yes, I think so, let’s try it,” Nat said laughing, the cold air making her eyes bright. “Phew, that was something wasn’t it? I thought they were going to eat me alive. What a night!”
What a night indeed, Roxy thought wryly, feeling the wind blow her hair and her feet slap the pavement as they ran back to the safety of the Funky Cat Inn.
Roxy sighed and slumped back against her headboard. She’d packed Nat off to bed and was now sitting cross-legged on top of her own. It was 2 AM. Her laptop sat in front of her, the glow from the screen illuminating her face while Nefertiti squeezed into the space between the keyboard and Roxy’s belly button.
Roxy considered everything Lamontagne had told her earlier. Could Charles really be the kind of person he’d described? Was his feedback, second-hand as it was, meaningful? Was Meredith right? Was Charles trying to kill her?
“Okay, fine,” she said. She was going to do a little online sleuthing and see if the Internet could help her out. Her fingertips hovered over her keyboard. “Right. Charles Romanoff,” she said, typing his name into the search bar.
The first result was his business profile, stating that he was—as he had told her—a pediatric surgeon in North Carolina with over forty years’ experience. There were articles about his foundation and the life-changing work it did in developing countries. Roxy read that Charles had been recognized with several awards, as one would expect of a ground-breaking surgeon of his experience and stature. She quickly clicked over to view the image results. As she scrolled down the page, she saw pictures of Charles in his white coat, his green operating scrubs, with Meredith at events, with his colleagues, and out in the field among the people who lived in the impoverished villages where he did his work. She scrolled back up the page.
She stopped at a picture of Charles and Meredith. He had his arm around her shoulder. Meredith was dressed to the nines in an off-the-shoulder black dress and sparkling jewelry. Roxy peered in close. Behind them stood a woman. She was glaring, her red mouth twisted into a growl. Roxy scrolled back down the page again and suddenly caught her breath. Yes, there she was again.
This time, the woman was standing next to Charles, and they were surrounded by young children dressed in brightly-colored loose clothing, their hair cropped close or braided in cornrows. The caption underneath said they were in a village called Lietbhar in Sudan. This time, though, the woman wasn’t growling. She was looking up at Charles, smiling adoringly.
Roxy continued to scroll. Sure enough, she found another photograph taken at the same time. The same village, same children, Charles and the woman, but this photo was different again. Not only was the woman craning her head to look up at Charles as she smiled, but he was looking down into her eyes, reciprocating. Roxy shifted her position on the bed. The scene looked a little too cozy for Roxy’s liking. She thought that the look Charles was giving the woman wasn’t of a type that would leave Meredith calm and collected had she seen it. She leaned back against her pillows and thought for a moment.
How had Meredith and Charles really been with each other? He had appeared attentive enough, but he had also seemed ambivalent about her work, sometimes believing in it, at others not so much. Meredith was also tricky, and Charles had looked long-suffering the first time Roxy had met him. She wondered if Charles might have fallen out of love with his wife. Or perhaps he was jealous of the fame and recognition Meredith received? Or he felt overshadowed. Or that she was a liability. He might have faced ridicule and censure from his peers and found her an embarrassment. Spirits and healings and readings were hardly compatible with a worldview steeped in science.
Roxy sat up again and went back to her search results. She clicked over to the foundation’s website. On the About page, she learned that the woman in the photos was Stacey Wilson, a nursing administrator at Charles’ foundation. She had worked for it for 20 years. Roxy’s mind raced. Could Charles be having an affair? Was that where he had gone when he went missing? To meet with his mistress?
Roxy took a deep breath. “Calm down, Roxy girl. You have no basis for this thinking except for a couple of photos found on the Internet. Keep an open mind.” She let out a big yawn with a groan but forced herself to consider the motivations of all the suspects before she would allow herself to sleep.
She had to admit, the murderer could be Dr. Jack. Perhaps she had overestimated his kindly, calm nature. It was possible that he had become so incensed with Meredith over the argument they’d had, that he’d decided to shoot her.
The murderer could be Terah. She might have killed Meredith in revenge for t
he treatment Meredith had meted out to Terah during high school. It seemed unlikely 40 years later, but it was possible.
It could be Royston Lamontagne, though Roxy didn’t have a motive for him yet. Still, she could find one, she was sure of it. He didn’t seem a very agreeable sort of person, and his lifestyle was of the type that would contain plenty of potential for shady dealings. She just needed to dig further. She was sure she’d find something.
The murderer could be Charles, a man who may be having an affair with his co-worker or may have felt his wife’s livelihood an embarrassment, one that impacted him negatively or overshadowed him. Or he might have been so jealous of his wife’s success that he was driven into a murderous rage. Oh dear, Charles had a lot of motives.
It might even be George. Perhaps secretly he wanted to break free of Meredith’s vice-like grip over his life and gifts, or he had simply had enough of her humiliating him.
Roxy’s eyes scanned her room, searching for something, anything that might provide a flash of inspiration. Her eyes alighted on her purse. Meredith’s book—it was at the bottom of her bag. Of course! Why hadn’t she looked at it before? Maybe there were some clues in there. Roxy pulled the book from the bag, got herself comfortable, and immersed herself in the pages. There was no index, and while it was a thin book, it was no pamphlet. She’d have to skim it.
For half an hour, Roxy scanned the pages and found much that was interesting but not pertinent to her mission. The exercise was becoming tedious. She was losing hope that the book would prove to be of any use and was considering turning out her light when she came across some passages that mentioned George.
Nothing looked meaningful initially. Meredith described how the pair met—at a retreat she was running—and how he was “immature” in his psychic gifts, but very eager. Roxy got a bad feeling as she read the words. It did look like Meredith was determined to paint George in the role of a bumbling but well-meaning apprentice.
Roxy Reinhardt Mysteries Box Set Page 46
