Maid for Murder (Charlotte LaRue Mystery Series, Book 1)

by Barbara Colley

  “Empty?”

  “Yeah, as in no one at home. They found evidence that someone had been there, though—been there probably as recently as last night”

  “So close yet so far away,” she murmured.

  “Yeah, but close only counts in horseshoes.”

  “Hmm, maybe ... maybe not—not if Jeanne got worried enough about her mother to check on her in person.” As soon as the words came out of her mouth, she immediately realized her mistake.

  “Why would she do that?” Louis narrowed his gaze and stared hard at Charlotte. “We’ve kept the old lady’s condition out of the news. We’ve also got a tap on all the phones. So far, Jeanne hasn’t tried to contact anyone, so there’s no reason to think that she even knows about her mother’s collapse.”

  Charlotte’s stomach turned sour. She was trapped, trapped by her own duplicity. And now there was no way out, no way she could tell him that Jeanne did know about her mother, not without admitting she’d talked to her. And admitting she had talked to her would make it look as if she’d been helping Jeanne all along.

  “Charlotte? Is there something you’re not telling me? Something I should know?”

  She never had been good at lying, and she never had been good at poker. But for once she was going to have to lie through her teeth and bluff her butt off.

  “Uh-oh, you caught me.” Charlotte forced a laugh. “I hate to admit it, but lately I’ve been having a lot of what they call ‘senior moments.’ I’d forgotten that Jeanne escaped before Clarice was taken to the hospital.”

  From the expression on the detective’s face, there was no way to tell if he’d bought her excuse. Until he said otherwise, Charlotte decided to pretend he had. “Ready to look around next door?” She held out the key again.

  While Louis Thibodeaux inspected the other side of the double, Charlotte waited in agony on the porch swing. She figured that Jeanne was smart enough to realize that the phones would be tapped Considering the relationship between mother and daughter all these years, Charlotte also figured that Jeanne wouldn’t be able to stand not knowing her mother’s condition, even at the risk of being caught.

  The more Charlotte thought about it, the more it made perfect sense that Jeanne just might show up at the hospital, especially if she’d somehow found out that Clarice was probably dying.

  Somehow, someway, the police needed to know, needed to be watching for her to show up. Charlotte sighed. But how? How could she tip them off without admitting to the phone call, without incriminating herself?

  When the solution came to her, her stomach began churning with anxiety and indecision. She pushed out of the swing and began pacing. Knowing a way out was one thing. Actually doing something about it was an entirely different matter.

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Charlotte hated hospitals. It had been two years since she’d last been in one to have her gall bladder removed. Despite the newer laser technology that had been used on her, she could still remember how sore she’d been after the surgery.

  As she passed up the main information desk and headed straight for the elevators, she kept a sharp eye out for anyone who looked even vaguely familiar. She wasn’t that worried about being recognized. With the help of an old, loose-fitting dress that hid her shape, a black wig, and heavy makeup, a shade darker than she normally wore, she’d hardly recognized herself once she’d finished donning the disguise. But she was hoping to recognize Jeanne if, in fact, Jeanne did show.

  At the elevator, Charlotte punched the ARROW button that pointed up and waited. It had been a couple of hours since Louis Thibodeaux had left. Once he’d inspected the other side of the double, it hadn’t taken him long to decide that he wanted to rent from her. He’d hastily written out a deposit check, then hurried out the door with the excuse that he had some work to catch up on.

  The elevator bell dinged. When the door slid open, Charlotte stepped inside. Scanning the floor numbers on the panel, she selected the fourth floor, where the ICU was located. The elevator doors closed, but Charlotte couldn’t stop thinking about the way the detective had rushed off. Right up until he’d received the phone call from Judith, he’d acted as if he had all the time in the world.

  The elevator was slow. When it finally reached the fourth floor and stopped, it seemed to take forever for the doors to open. Charlotte reached up to adjust her purse strap. Like her dress, the purse was old. But it was the only one she owned that was big enough to tote around the hardcover book she was reading. She’d figured it was going to be a long night, so she might as well catch up on her reading while she waited.

  Once the doors opened, Charlotte took a deep breath and stepped out into a wide hallway.

  Her plan had been a simple one in theory. She would disguise herself and stake out the ICU area. When and if Jeanne did show up, Charlotte would make an anonymous call to the police, then leave before they got there.

  If anyone questioned her about her presence on the floor, she’d decided to pretend she was there sitting with a neighbor who had a relative in ICU.

  As Charlotte quickly glanced around to size up the place, a set of wide double doors across the hallway suddenly swung open. A nurse, accompanied by a doctor, walked through. Something about the way the doctor walked seemed vaguely familiar, but Charlotte couldn’t get a good look at him, because he still had on the mask and cap of surgery scrubs.

  But she did get a good look at the ICU area beyond the doors before they closed. Somewhere on the other side of the doors was poor Clarice.

  Would Jeanne show up? she wondered yet again. And if she did, would she get there in time, before her mother died?

  The doctor and nurse who had come out of the ICU were slowly walking away from her down the hallway. Behind Charlotte, the elevator doors slid open. Her back was to the elevator, but she automatically stepped to the side to make way for anyone getting off.

  “Orandmother’s internist said he thought she was a little better when he did his rounds at noon”

  Charlotte’s pulse jumped. Even without turning around, she immediately recognized Anna-Maria’s voice. Praying that her disguise would be enough, she stood frozen to the spot until Anna-Maria, accompanied by James, walked past her toward the double doors across the hallway. James reached out and tapped a square metal plate on the wall, and the doors immediately swung open.

  For long seconds after the doors closed behind the couple, Charlotte still couldn’t move.

  They always get better before they die.

  Charlotte shivered as the old saying came to mind. How many times had she heard of a terminally ill patient who would rally around and appear to be improving just before they died?

  She was still lost in her reverie when a sudden prickly uneasiness came over her. It was the same feeling she’d experienced the day she’d been walking and Louis Thibodeaux had followed her in his car.

  Someone was watching her.

  As casually as she could, she glanced to her right, then to her left. The doctor and nurse she’d seen earlier were still standing in the hallway. Both were staring at her.

  Charlotte stared back. When she nodded and smiled, the nurse broke away and walked toward her.

  “Can I help you?” she called out.

  “I certainly hope so,” Charlotte said, pitching her voice a bit lower than normal. “I’m looking for the ICU waiting room.”

  The nurse nodded. “Do you have a relative in ICU?”

  “No, but my neighbor does. I’m just here to keep her company.”

  The nurse pointed to Charlotte’s right. “Go down to the end of the hall. It’s on your left. You can’t miss it.”

  Charlotte nodded, and as she followed the nurse’s instructions, she could feel the woman’s eyes watching her as she walked away.

  The nurse had been right. The ICU waiting room was plainly labeled. The outside wall of the room was mostly glass. Except for a teenager sprawled out asleep on one of the small sofas, the room was empty. Charlotte chose t
o settle in a chair near the glass wall. Seated in the chair, she had an excellent view of the rest of the room as well as a view of the main elevators.

  Except for a quick trip to the hospital cafeteria for a bite of supper and the three times Charlotte had gone to the restroom, she’d kept her vigil of watching and waiting.

  Charlotte glanced up at the large round clock on the wall. Both hands were almost straight-up midnight. So far, none of the women or the men she’d seen going in and out had even come close to resembling Jeanne.

  Other than Anna-Maria and her fiancé, the only person she’d recognized so far was the nurse who had approached her earlier. A couple of times, Charlotte had seen her pass by in the hallway, but other than glancing inside the waiting room, to Charlotte’s relief, the woman had ignored her.

  Anna-Maria and her fiancé had only left the ICU once as far as Charlotte could tell. An hour after they’d left, they had returned, and she hadn’t seen them since. From one of the women in the waiting room, Charlotte learned that it wasn’t that uncommon for the nursing staff to allow close family members to stay in the room with a loved one who was dying.

  Charlotte’s heart ached for Anna-Maria, and she was at the point where she was beginning to question why she was even there in the first place. She was exhausted, so exhausted that she’d fallen asleep a couple of times despite the fact that she was sitting in a chair that only a sadist could have designed. The book she’d brought along had turned out to be boring, and not even the numerous cups of coffee she’d consumed had helped.

  “Enough’s enough,” she grumbled. Charlotte stuffed her book back into her purse and headed for the elevator. It was time to call it quits and go home.

  The elevator doors were already standing open, so Charlotte walked right in. She’d just stepped closer to the selection panel when she heard footsteps slapping against the tiled floor in the hallway ... someone running. When Charlotte turned her head to see what was going on, a tall, dark-haired woman charged into the elevator.

  “Move!” the woman yelled as she shoved Charlotte away from the floor-selection panel.

  “Hey!” Charlotte grabbed the wall rail to keep her balance.

  The woman ignored her as she frantically slapped at the button that closed the doors.

  Unease crawled through Charlotte as she stared at the woman, and she backed away from her. The doors began sliding closed. Charlotte eyed the opening, wondering if she should make a run for it.

  Suddenly, a doctor burst through the double doors of the ICU. “Stop her!” he shouted, bolting for the elevator.

  The elevator doors slammed closed. Only a second passed before it registered who the doctor really was, but by the time Charlotte realized he was Louis Thibodeaux, it was already too late.

  The woman whirled to face Charlotte and drew back her arm. In her hand was a scalpel.

  In spite of the thick-rimmed glasses and the dyed black hair that had been cut in a shorter style, Charlotte knew the woman was Jeanne. Somehow she’d missed her. Either Jeanne had already been there, she decided, or she’d come in when Charlotte had gone to the cafeteria or the restroom.

  “Don’t make any sudden moves and you won’t get hurt.” Jeanne reached back and punched the emergency STOP button. The elevator bumped to a stop, and an alarm went off.

  Charlotte’s hand tightened on the rail. According to the number showing, they were stopped somewhere between the third and second floor. She figured she only had two choices. It was obvious that Jeanne hadn’t recognized her, so she could keep her mouth shut and wait to see what she was going to do next. Or she could reveal who she was and try talking her into giving up.

  But Jeanne was a desperate woman with nothing to lose, Charlotte reminded herself. She’d already killed two men, and she’d told Charlotte that she’d rather die than go to jail. So what was one more murder, especially the murder of the woman who had gathered the evidence against her to begin with?

  Charlotte quickly decided on the first choice. She would wait Jeanne out, wait and pray that either Louis Thibodeaux or some other policeman would be there when the elevator doors opened again.

  As if she’d read her mind, Jeanne glared at her. “When this elevator stops the next time,” she said, “you’re going to be my ticket out I won’t kill you because I need you as a hostage” She waved the scalpel. “But this little knife can cause a lot of pain. Understand?”

  Charlotte nodded that she understood.

  “Now—” Jeanne motioned at Charlotte. “Very slowly, move over here in front of me.” Jeanne raised the scalpel threateningly.

  Charlotte’s thoughts were racing almost as fast as her pulse. Like a flash, in her mind’s eye she saw into the future of the next few minutes. It was a long walk to the entrance of the hospital and an even longer one to the parking facilities at the back of the hospital. The police would be waiting for them when the elevator doors opened.

  Once again in her life, Jeanne was desperate and cornered, and she wasn’t thinking things through. Despite her hastily conceived hostage plan, the NOPD had sharpshooters who wouldn’t hesitate to take a shot if one came open. One or both of them was going to end up dead ... unless ...

  Jeanne waved the scalpel again. “I said get over here!”

  Charlotte nodded even as she took a firmer grip on her purse. Only about three good steps separated them. Charlotte made the first step slowly. When she stepped out again, she brought up her purse and smacked it hard against the hand holding the scalpel.

  The purse hit its mark, and the scalpel flew out of Jeanne’s hand. Before Jeanne could recover, Charlotte lowered her shoulder. Using her elbow like a battering ram, she slammed it into Jeanne’s stomach.

  When Jeanne clutched her stomach and doubled over, Charlotte jumped back and searched frantically for the scalpel. She spotted it on the floor in the opposite corner and quickly scooped it up..

  With wary eyes on Charlotte, Jeanne struggled to get to her feet. “Please,” she gasped. “Don’t hurt me. I—I wasn’t going to hurt you.”

  Charlotte wasn’t exactly sure why, but something told her to keep quiet and not give herself away. Charlotte drew back her arm, and using the scalpel in the same threatening manner that Jeanne had used it, she motioned for her to move away from the elevator’s control panel.

  Jeanne backed away toward the opposite corner. “I have money,” she cried. “If you help me, I’ll pay you. Please!” she begged. “Please help me.”

  Charlotte only hesitated a moment. Then she firmly shook her head and reached for the emergency STOP button. Once she’d pulled it, she hit the first-floor button. When the elevator began moving again, Jeanne burst into sobs. Covering her face with her hands, she crumpled to the floor.

  Within seconds, the elevator stopped again, and the doors slid open. The first person Charlotte saw was Louis Thibodeaux. He was half-hidden, crouched behind the edge of the doorway leading into the hospital gift shop.

  “NOPD!” he yelled. “Drop the scalpel, lady. Drop it now!”

  Charlotte was so relieved to see him that if it hadn’t been for the gun he was pointing at her, she would have hugged him. Then, suddenly, it seemed as if there were police everywhere, all pointing their guns at her.

  Only then did Charlotte remember that she was in disguise, that neither Louis nor anyone else knew who she was. She dropped the scalpel, and it clattered to the floor.

  “Now kick it out here,” he demanded.

  Charlotte did as he asked As soon as the scalpel cleared the door of the elevator, an officer darted over and grabbed it.

  “Now come on out of there.” Louis motioned at her with his gun. “And you—on the noor—you get out here, too”

  The moment Charlotte stepped out of the elevator, she was seized by an officer who was waiting, out of sight, on the side of the elevator doors. He yanked her purse off her shoulder, then grabbed her by the arm and twisted it up behind her back. Charlotte winced with pain when she felt the handcuffs tig
hten around her wrist Then he yanked her other arm behind her back and cuffed that wrist, too.

  Still sobbing, Jeanne stumbled out and stopped just behind Charlotte. Another officer seized her and performed the same ritual.

  Once they were both handcuffed, Louis bolstered his gun and approached them. Pointing at Jeanne, he told the officer standing beside her, “Read her her rights, then take her to lockup. She’s the one wanted for murder.”

  The officer nodded, and as he pulled her toward the front hospital entrance, he began reading Jeanne her rights.

  “What about this one?” the officer beside Charlotte asked.

  Louis shook his head. “I’ll take care of her.” With a shrug, the officer handed over Charlotte’s purse and walked away.

  Louis tucked the purse beneath his arm, then turned and watched until Jeanne was well out of earshot. When he faced Charlotte again, the angry look on his face made her flinch. He narrowed his eyes. “I’m taking you in personally.”

  With his free hand, he reached out and grabbed hold of her arm. Left with little choice but to stumble along beside him, Charlotte panicked. “Louis—wait.” She tried to shrug loose, but with her hands handcuffed behind her back, there was no way to dislodge his grip. “Don’t you recognize me?” she cried. “Please!”

  Suddenly, he stopped. Yanking her to a standstill, he rounded on her. “You bet I recognize you, Ms. Charlotte LaRue. And I was right all along. You’ve been involved in this mess from the beginning, haven’t you? You’ve been helping her every step of the way.”

  Sudden bone-chilling fear seized Charlotte. “No!” she cried. “No—you’ve got it all wrong.”

  “Oh, have I, now?” he drawled nastily. “If I’ve got it all wrong, just how did you know Jeanne would show up at the hospital tonight? Just what in blue blazes did you think you were doing?” His dark eyes were full of contempt as they swept over her from head to toe. “Of all the harebrained, idiotic stunts you’ve pulled so far, this one takes the cake. Maybe this will teach you to stay out of police business from now on.”