Big Easy Evil

by Heather Graham

  “We do need to get married,” Quinn said lightly.

  He didn’t wait for her response. She was still grinning. He headed after Billie, knowing she would follow.

  As would Wolf. He was an amazing dog, completely loyal to Quinn, but well aware his true duty in life was to guard Danni now against all things, real and…shouldn’t be real, but were!

  In the kitchen, he found a young man. Blond, medium build, sitting at the table, nursing a cup of coffee. When the man saw Quinn and Danni enter, he leapt to his feet. His hair was long, falling over his forehead. His eyes were light and filled with anxiety.

  “Michael Quinn, Danni Cafferty, this is Mr. Sean DeMille. He’s in need of a private investigator. An open-minded private investigator.”

  Sean DeMille stepped forward to strenuously pump Quinn’s hand, and then take Danni’s and do the same.

  “Please, sit back down, Mr. DeMille,” Quinn said.

  “Please. More coffee?” Danni asked, giving him one of her warm smiles. The man instantly seemed to ease a little; Danni had that kind of an effect on people.

  He sat. “There was a murder,” he began.

  Quinn felt Danni’s eyes on his. They’d both heard about it; a man named James Hornby had been killed the night before; it was a major news story. He’d been found in a Garden District yard, slashed to shreds as if a grizzly with buzz-saw teeth had gotten a hold of him—quite impossible in the city of New Orleans. The news had been focused on little other than the story that had broken just that morning.

  If they hadn’t already seen the news, Sean DeMille was ready to explain.

  “He was ripped open—ripped. Or hacked! As if…as if some rabid creature with shark’s teeth, or a were-creature tore him up,” Sean DeMille said, shaking his head, still in disbelief. “An axe…my axe!…was sticking out of his head.” He shook his head. “I don’t know if…if the injuries killed him, or the axe. The axe would have killed him. I mean…it was in his head. And I knew him!” he added softly. “Well, not as a friend, but I’d see him on Magazine Street, sitting against a shop wall or something…begging? I don’t think he was a heroin addict or anything, just an old dude who had hit on hard times.” He was thoughtful. “Jimmy! Yeah, his name was Jimmy.” He looked at Michael Quinn with another sad shake of his head. “I didn’t think of that—I didn’t think of his name when the cops were there. But…Casey was just in such bad shape. She was convinced it was me. That I was the body. She was screaming and hysterical, and I was trying to calm her down, and it was so bad…and I don’t know. I just don’t know what the hell happened!”

  “This occurred in your back yard?” Quinn asked.

  Sean nodded. “I was working on it for Halloween…I love Halloween. I—I once loved Halloween. I do great decorations. Well, I create some of my own decorations, but mostly, I design sets or scenes or whatever…I design events for a living. Our front yard is fantastic. I love having the neighborhood kids in, or kids from anywhere. When I’m done, the day or so before Halloween, I have them bus in kids from other areas, kids who can’t…can’t pay to go to things. So, the house looks like a horror house, and the yard—front and back—looks like a theme park. But…I…we…don’t own any animals. And I usually see Jimmy on Magazine Street. Saw Jimmy on Magazine Street. Poor Jimmy, poor Jimmy. It was…horrible.”

  “Go back a bit,” Danni suggested softly. “Did you find the man? Or had Casey called the police?”

  “I had been working on the new horror park in that old empty warehouse property in the CBD, Central Business District, you know? It’s called Horrible Hauntings.”

  “I know the place,” Quinn said.

  “I’m an engineer and designer,” Sean said. “One of our coffins wasn’t popping open when it should have been. I’m hands on—a lucky guy, I love my work. When there was a problem, I went in. Casey was working at the house. I still don’t really understand what happened with her. She heard something. Someone pushed her. He called her name, and pushed her.”

  “Who called her name and pushed her?” Danni asked.

  Sean shook his head, looking helpless. “There was no one in the house. And she thought she was hearing two voices. The police looked; they looked everywhere. I thought at first they were going to arrest Casey—or me!—except…there was no way she could have done such a thing. I mean, physically. I don’t know how Jimmy came to be in the yard. I never had him to the house…I’d just give him money or buy him a meal sometimes. As far as I knew, he didn’t have any idea of where I lived, and he wouldn’t have considered me anyone special. I dialed 911 the second I arrived…there were a half dozen witnesses ready to swear to where I had been…and there was no blood on me or in the house, I mean. Or on Casey or me…and he’d been… ripped up, like I said. Ripped up by a…creature! The house belongs to Casey, really. She bought it from her parents. She grew up in that house! There’s never been anything like this before…never. I’ve never seen anything like this before and I was…lord, I was in the military!”

  “Where is Casey now?” Danni asked.

  “Home. Exhausted. The forensic people and the police with them really just wrapped up about an hour ago.”

  “And Jimmy was found last night at about nine?” Danni asked.

  “Yes, right about nine…and I think he hadn’t been dead very long. The house has been searched and searched, and the yard, and Casey is exhausted, but, can’t sleep.” He shrugged suddenly. “I grew up here. It’s not like I’m a good Catholic or a good anything, but when I go to church, it’s Father Ryan’s church, and I know he comes here a lot, and I always thought it was all hocus pocus, but…I know I need help! Casey’s not alone. Gill and Chrissy are there…and my boss…feeling guilty, I guess. He had called me in. And the night manager, too. They’re good people; they care, and they worry.”

  “But the police are all gone now, right?”

  “There’s just one cop, kind of watching over things in the back, I guess. He’ll be there a while; the detective is coming back with some other expert. I needed to be there…but…I just…I just don’t know where to go from here. We were up all night. We can’t be afraid of our home, Casey loves it…and I need…I need to know what happened, where to go from here!”

  Quinn looked at Danni. As he did so, his phone rang.

  He glanced at his caller I.D.

  It was Larue. Detective Jake Larue. Once upon a time—before Quinn had discovered his life was to be a bit different—he’d met Angus Cafferty and then Danni. And he’d learned just what the house on Royal Street housed, and every crime could come with a greater evil than even that which existed in the hearts of some men. That evil, though, often found men and women with whom it could easily attach.

  “Excuse me,” Quinn said. He stood up and walked back into the hall that connected the kitchen, Danni’s studio, the stairs to the second floor—and the shop, The Cheshire Cat.

  “I’ve got one for you,” Larue said. “Need your help.”

  Larue didn’t really understand quite what Quinn and Danni did. He just knew they could be really helpful in certain circumstances. He was a good cop; best detective Quinn had ever known.

  But, Larue didn’t really know exactly what they did. He didn’t want to know.

  “Dead man attacked in the Garden District?” Quinn asked. “Ripped up as if by a creature with razor-sharp teeth.”

  “You’ve heard.”

  “Couldn’t really miss it. But, no real details. I just heard about a man being found on the news, and now…there’s a man named Sean DeMille sitting in the kitchen right now.”

  “Yeah, well, I still have a cop in his back yard. Forensics spent the night going through the place. As far as we can tell, neither the killer nor the victim was ever in the house, but…we picked up some big patches of earth along with the body.” He was quiet for a minute. “There was an axe left in the victim’s head. The axe belonged to Sean DeMille; he used it in his work in the back yard.”

  “I heard.”<
br />
  “We don’t know if the killer would have found another method to kill…if the axe happened to be there, or what. So much blood…anyway. Want to meet me in the Garden District? Or should I swing by for you?”

  “Pick me up; I’ll leave Danni the car. She can talk to Sean while we’re still here and then…then do some research.”

  “Five minutes,” Larue said.

  “Should I bring Sean DeMille with me?”

  “Hell, yes. He’s the only one who is going to know what goes on and off in that yard of his!”

  Quinn returned to the kitchen. Sean’s hand was on the table; Danni’s was gently laid over it.

  Billie McDougall was leaning against the stove. He nodded to Quinn as he entered.

  He’d stay here with Danni; he knew exactly where Quinn was going.

  “Sean, I’m not sure how you knew to come to Danni and me,” Quinn said, “but I used to be partnered up with the lead detective on the case. Can you come with me? Did you drive here?”

  Sean shook his head. “I took the street car and then walked through the Quarter.”

  “All right, good.” He looked at Danni.

  Check the book, please?

  Danni, of course, lowered her head in agreement, and then rose and looked at her visitor. “Anything you need, Sean, you just come on back here, okay?”

  “Thank you!” the man said. “Thank you.”

  Wolf barked.

  Quinn showed Sean the way out through the kitchen door to the courtyard. At the door, he looked at Danni.

  See? He questioned silently. Halloween! Wrong holiday, but…

  Bah! Humbug!

  ***

  Stairs from the hallway led down to the basement and to what had been Angus Cafferty’s office—and private collection.

  Danni still didn’t fully understand—and probably never would—just what caused certain objects to bring out murder and mayhem and pure horror.

  She had adored her father. He’d been older when she’d been born, but the man had been a Highlander! Fierce, tall, broad-shouldered, and strong—and the kindest human being she had ever met, a gentle giant. A good human being. She had thought she’d have him forever.

  And, of course, he had surely not intended to die when he did, leaving her to learn everything she needed to know about their “curios” and “collection” from Michael Quinn and Billie. And, naturally, since Quinn had known things about her father she hadn’t, she had started off thinking of him as the biggest ass she’d ever met…

  Amazing how that had changed! She thought of the way he had been so intent on his reading, and then the way he had held her, hazel eyes deeply intent and almost gold, a lock of sandy hair falling over his forehead.

  She’d come to adore him; he was her lover, and her companion is so many ways. Quinn was a good six-foot four and every inch of that was solid, lean, muscle. She couldn’t imagine trusting anyone more, or becoming involved with anyone else so completely and passionately.

  She wondered if he’d known something had happened, someone would be coming to see them. Of course, they’d known about the murder, but…

  It might have been something easily explained, drug related, accidental…

  Larue didn’t call on them unless there was something unusual.

  And—before becoming amorous!—Quinn had seemed moody, as if he’d been waiting for something to happen. Maybe he did have a bit of a strange sixth sense. She had definitely learned all things were possible in the years since her father had died—and she’d met Quinn.

  She heard a soft whine. Wolf.

  The dog had followed her downstairs. Ever her guardian.

  “Wolf, you know, Quinn and I really do need to get married. We keep saying it…and we keep getting involved in other things, and, well, you know! We have friends who want a big thing, but, hey, maybe Vegas! An elopement!”

  Wolf let out an approving bark, wagging his tail.

  Danni sat down at what she still referred to as “her father’s desk,” and picked up his book. It wasn’t any book known in the world, like the “Book of the Dead,” or any such thing. It was her father’s book, but it had come down through their family, through a long line of…curio collectors. And within its pages were fonts of information, info on evil people through the ages, on the objects they had owned, on things that sometimes held onto the evil of those who had owned them—or even had them fashioned in order that their souls—if they could be called souls!—might live on. In the past, they had dealt with an evil bust, an evil painting, murders in the bayou…and more.

  She sat down and began to carefully search through the pages of the book—ancient, she thought, though she doubted even her father had known how old it was.

  Of course, she didn’t even know what she was looking for.

  “So, Wolf. Halloween came about because of the ancient Celtic holiday, Samhaim, Christianized into All Hallows Eve. And then, hm, there’s a great story about the jack-o-lantern. Do you know that one, Wolf? The tradition started in Ireland, too, so they say. There was this fellow—named Jack, of course, who was always tricking people and dealing with them in a very shady way. Anyway, he didn’t want to go to hell, so one day he trapped the devil in a tree—got him up that tree and pinned him there with crosses, because we all know, the devil can’t cross a cross—and then made the devil swear he would never take him into hell. The devil swore—and Jack let him go. Well, then, just go figure! Jack dies, as all men must die, and when he gets up to Heaven, Saint Peter says Jack was way too badly behaved in life to enter Heaven. So, Jack tries to get into hell—but the devil is good to his word and refuses to let Jack in! Jack is therefore forced to roam the netherworld, the darkness, for eternity, and to light his way, he finds a turnip—there were no pumpkins back then in Ireland—and he lit up his turnip to guide him through the darkness and ward off evil spirits! What do you think of that, Wolf?”

  Wolf dutifully barked, as if he’d been enthralled by her story.

  “Remind me, Wolf, with all this going on—we’re going to need a lot of lanterns.”

  She flipped more pages, wishing there was a computer search engine that could help her. She could just key in the words, “savage beasts that axe in heads and rip mortals to pieces.”

  But, she didn’t have a search engine.

  Billie stuck his head in the doorway.

  “How’s it going?” he asked her.

  “Slow!” she told him. She looked at him.

  “Keep at it,” he said quietly. “We’re fine; Bo Ray has the shop in good shape; it’s busy as usual, but he can move like a bat out of hell, so all is well. And while you keep at it, I’ll help him.”

  “Sure,” she said. “I just…I need to go there, too, you know. I need to see where this happened; I need to see some of the things in Sean’s display. I’m…”

  She stopped.

  She’d flipped a page.

  And the page’s headline read, “Savage beasts that axe in heads and rip mortals to pieces.”

  Chapter 2

  Sean DeMille was a little awkward when Jake Larue pulled off on the side of the road in front of the shop to collect the two of them. Quinn realized Sean and Larue had naturally met the night before, when Larue had first been called out to the scene of the crime.

  “Hello, sir,” Sean said. “I just…well, it’s so horrible I thought we could use any and all help and I know how busy the police are and—”

  “It’s okay, Mr. DeMille. As you can see, I called Quinn in on this, too,” Larue said. He glanced at Quinn. Quinn grimaced. “Our crime scene people have been through the house and the yard, and we’re good to go with all else.”

  “We should get going,” Quinn suggested quietly.

  “Hop in.” Larue said.

  Sean took the backseat; Quinn the front.

  Larue was a good cop, a year or two older than Quinn’s mid-thirties. He wasn’t quite as tall; he was a lean man with the perfect manner for his job. He could be tough a
s nails, and also easy enough to encourage those who could help to do so. He told Quinn sometimes, at first sight, Quinn was more intimidating, being well over six feet and with some of the city remembering he had once been a golden boy in the city, a football hero who had thrilled many an armchair quarterback. But, Quinn had been horrible at being revered; too much, too soon—and he had flat lined because of an overdose of drugs and alcohol. And in that time…

  Someone, something, had been there. A guardian angel? The force of his imagination? At any rate, he’d seen himself there, seen himself dying—and seen something or someone else. One way or another, he’d been given a second chance.

  And he’d changed his life, being a cop…and then finding there was more in the world than met the average eye and then, of course, Angus Cafferty.

  And Danni.

  “I don’t know what to do,” Sean said bleakly from the back. “I had arrangements with some of the schools. Halloween week. They’re supposed to be bringing the kids out…Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. Wednesday. That’s tomorrow. What will I do? I mean…even if the scene…even if you release the yard or whatever cops do, how can I bring kids to a yard where a man was mauled to death by…by something that doesn’t exist?” he asked desperately. “Oh, lord, I’m horrible. I’m worried about what to do and a man was killed. It’s just for some of the kids…it’s a big deal. Something they look forward to because…because it’s all they get.”

  “You’re not horrible,” Quinn said. “While we’re still living, we still worry about what we do.”

  Sean nodded. “Not the yard…not the yard. What if I’d had a kid in there?”

  “You didn’t,” Larue said.

  “Change of venue,” Quinn suggested. “Maybe you can still do something for the kids at another venue.”

  “We don’t know another venue,” Sean said bleakly. “Casey owns the house. We do okay, but, we’re not rich.”

  “We might be able to find someone to help,” Quinn said, glancing at Larue.

  “You know someone?” Larue asked, frowning.