Who Dat Whodunnit

by Greg Herren

  “Yes, I am!” she snapped. “I have always believed gun ownership is a responsibility.” She shook her head. “I’ve been meaning to replace the lock on the chest and just never got around to it. If I had, that horrible woman would still be alive.” She paused. “At least it was someone like her and not a kid or something.”

  I’d opened my mouth to tell her to stop beating herself up about it, but the words died in my throat. “Mom—until the killer’s behind bars, it’s probably not a good idea to act glad Tara’s dead.”

  “I’m not going to pretend I’m sorry, any more than I’ll pretend to be sorry that awful Marina Werner is dead.” She set her jaw. “That would be hypocritical.”

  “Marina Werner’s dead?” Dad asked.

  I nodded. “It was just on the news. Someone killed her yesterday morning.”

  “Not a good time to be a hypocritical Bible-thumping homophobic bigot,” Mom remarked. “I’d be worried if I were Peggy MacGillicudy.”

  “Maybe they’re connected,” Dad mused. “It makes sense, doesn’t it? Marina was one of the organizers of the rally, and Tara was the main speaker. And they’re both killed in a short period of time.”

  “So, who at the party on Sunday night would have wanted them both dead?” Mom scratched her head. “Besides you and I, John?”

  “Father Dan—but I just can’t see Dan killing anyone, can you?”

  “No, I can’t. I suppose any of the gays and lesbians would have a motive—”

  “Okay, enough—granted, it’s all interesting—we’re getting off track here. We don’t know for a fact the two murders are connected.” I steered the conversation back to the gun. “What we need to do is figure out who could have taken the gun between when you got back from the shooting range Sunday afternoon and eleven p.m. last night,” I said, shaking my head a little bit. “Obviously, everyone who was at the party Sunday night could have taken it.” I walked into the kitchen and got the small spiral notebook Mom used to make grocery lists.

  I flipped it open and wrote down our names and Frank’s. “We’re going to need to give the police a list anyway, so we might as well be ahead of the game,” I explained as I kept writing names: Father Dan, Dominique DuPre, Emily Hunter, Lurleen Rutledge, David Williams, Jesse Santana, and stopped. I closed my eyes, remembering.

  There had been other people here that night—people I hadn’t really known.

  I tossed the notebook and pen to my parents. “Those are the only people here I knew.”

  None of whom, I added to myself, had any connection whatsoever to Tara Bourgeois.

  At least none that I know of at the moment, I added.

  Mom scribbled down some names. “That’s everyone who was here Sunday night.”

  “Who was here in the apartment yesterday?”

  “Just us,” Dad replied. “Until after the dinner party.”

  “Where I punched Tara Bourgeois in the nose,” Mom went on. She moaned. “Thank the universe we invited everyone over last night! After that—and it was my gun—” She closed her eyes and shuddered.

  “It would look pretty bad, Mom—that’s what I’ve been saying.” I commiserated, glad the seriousness was finally sinking it. “If Jared hadn’t gone back over there this morning—”

  “My goose would have been cooked.” Mom shuddered again. “Time of death isn’t an exact science…there’s always a window.”

  “What?” I glanced at her. “How do you know that?”

  “Forensics for Dummies,” she replied with a shrug. “I ordered a copy from Garden District Books after”—she hesitated—“after the mess with Colin at Mardi Gras.”

  “Forensics for Dummies,” I repeated, trying not to smile.

  Dad tossed me the notebook back. I looked at the list of names Mom had written down. Mike Mueller. Gary Musson. Ken Taylor. Gia Romano. Jamie Oliver. Cara White. “I don’t know any of these people,” I said.

  “Mike, Gary, and Gia are in Emily’s band,” Mom said helpfully. “Mike’s lead guitar, Gia’s bass, and Gary is the drummer. Ken is Gary’s boyfriend. Jamie’s a student at UNO we were hoping would hit it off with Emily.”

  “So, Jamie’s a girl.” I made a mental note. “And who’s Cara White?”

  “Lurleen’s assistant.” Dad replied. “We didn’t know Lurleen was bringing her, but we didn’t mind. She’s a nice girl.”

  I closed my eyes and tried to put names with the faces. Ken and Gary were easy—they’d kissed every time the Saints scored. Cara was obviously the quiet young woman who’d stuck close to Lurleen all night.

  Unfortunately, I’d been tense all afternoon like everyone else in New Orleans, so Frank and I had started smoking pot around two. We’d been totally stoned out of our minds by the time we got to Mom and Dad’s.

  Note to self: stop smoking so much pot.

  I sighed and made a copy of the list, tearing it off and sticking it my pocket. “Who would have had the chance to take the gun?”

  Mom and Dad looked at each other. “Anyone could have, really,” Mom said with a helpless shrug. “Everyone’s eyes were glued to the television. I wasn’t really paying any attention to what anyone else was doing.”

  “And when Hartley made the field goal the whole place went crazy, remember?” Dad went on. “We were all screaming and yelling and hugging and jumping up and down. Some people ran out onto the balcony—”

  “Frank and I ran down the back stairs and danced in the street,” I said, an involuntary smile creeping across my face. “It was chaos—and we left the gate open.”

  “We were all out on the balcony,” Dad remembered. “For at least an hour after the game. We were all out screaming and yelling and cheering.”

  “And anyone could have gone back inside and taken the gun.” I closed my eyes, picturing the chaos in the Quarter that night, the joy and exhilaration.

  How could someone have thought to steal Mom’s gun in the midst of all that emotion? The whole city had been celebrating. The streets of the Quarter were more crowded that night than they had been on any Fat Tuesday I could remember.

  It didn’t make sense to me—but I’d been caught up in the emotion of the moment.

  Frank and I had even danced on the hood of a police car at some point during the celebration—a celebration that had lasted until the sun came up.

  It had been chaos—and not just in the Quarter. The whole city had partied all night long, every neighborhood. At some point, Frank and I had been in a second line weaving through the mobs of people on Bourbon Street. Horns had blared, bands had played, strangers hugged and kissed.

  I couldn’t even begin to remember all the people I’d kissed.

  The whole night still didn’t seem real.

  But someone hadn’t cared about the Saints going to the Super Bowl as much as they had about getting Mom’s gun.

  “Someone came here that night intending to take the gun and use it.” I opened my eyes, focusing on my parents. “It’s the only thing that makes sense.”

  “Someone at our party,” Mom said after a moment, her voice grim, “is a murderer.”

  Chapter Five

  The Hierophant

  The need for acceptance by one’s peer group

  I took the inside staircase from Mom and Dad’s down to their combination coffee / tobacco shop, the Devil’s Weed.

  When I was a little kid, I used to love the inside staircase. The door to it was in the hallway of the apartment leading back to the bedrooms, and looked like a closet door. At the foot of the staircase was a door leading into the storage room of the shop—but there wasn’t a knob or anything on the storage-room side. In fact, looking at the wall you wouldn’t know there was a door there at all. There was a wall sconce directly just to the left. If you turned the sconce to the right the door popped open. Mom and Dad loved it because if someone ever broke into the shop they wouldn’t know how to get upstairs—but they always locked the upstairs door anyway. I loved it because it was like a secret passageway
in a creepy old black-and-white movie from the 1930s. Nothing gave me greater delight than to climb up on a chair in the store room and turn the sconce.

  Now I hardly ever used it—I always took the back stairs.

  I turned the knob on the door and pushed it open. The storeroom’s lights weren’t on, but there was plenty of light coming in from the open door to the store. I could hear the espresso machine running—Emily must have a customer.

  My phone started ringing—my ringtone was Lady Gaga’s “Telephone”—and I looked at the screen. A thrill rushed through my body. I clicked the red answer button on the screen. “Colin!”

  “Hey, baby.” His deep voice purred through the phone. “You’ll never guess where I am.”

  “Beirut?”

  He laughed. “I don’t even want to know why you said that. No, I’m in a cab and we just passed the Metairie Road exit. I should be home in about ten or fifteen minutes.”

  My knees went weak, and I leaned against the wall. I couldn’t believe my ears. “You’re home?”

  “Why do you sound so surprised? Angela said she’d e-mailed you.”

  That bitch, I thought. “All her e-mail said was ‘contact made,’” I replied, trying not to let my anger at her creep into my voice. “She didn’t say anything about you coming home.”

  “Don’t get mad at her,” he replied with a laugh. “To her, that means I’m on my way home. She forgets you don’t know her code words.”

  I took a deep cleansing breath and let the irritation go. Once I was centered again, I couldn’t help but laugh myself. “Are you sure you’re not the psychic around here? It’s like you read my mind.”

  “I just know my Scotty.” His voice was low and seductive, sending a chill of desire through my body. He’d been gone for months. “I can’t wait to get home. Man, I need me some hot lovin’ from my boys.”

  “Frank’s on his way to Biloxi—he has practice.” I couldn’t keep the pride out of my voice. “I’m glad you’re back—he’s got a title shot this Saturday.”

  Colin whistled. “Cool! I knew he’d do well with that promotion! So, he’s a big star now?”

  “Denny”—Denny Whistler owned Gulf Coast Professional Wrestling, the promotion Frank wrestled for—“says Frank gets more fan mail than any two other guys in the show combined, which is amazing—especially for a bad guy.”

  “Bad guys are more fun—and I’m sure it doesn’t hurt that he has the best body in the show,” Colin observed. He let out a sigh. “But it’s a bummer he’s not home. I sure hope you’re up for some fun this afternoon.”

  I thought about it for a moment. Depending on traffic, he was anywhere from about ten to twenty minutes from home. I could interview Emily quickly, and possibly get back to the apartment around the same time he got there. “Well, I’m not home right now—I’m on a case, actually. I have to interview a potential witness, but I should be back to the apartment around the same time you do if I hurry.”

  “A case?” That got his attention, which was typical. Colin loved his work. “What’s the case?”

  “I don’t want to get into it right now,” I replied, glancing out the door into the store. Emily was ringing up the espresso drink I’d heard her making, talking to a guy in a full-length trench coat with a gold wool Saints cap on his head. I added in a whisper, “The longer I spend talking to you, the longer it is before I get back to the apartment.”

  “Okay, then, back to work,” Colin said cheerfully before whispering into my ear some of the things he was going to do to me when we were both home.

  “See you in a bit,” I breathed into the phone, clicking the call off. I leaned against the door frame and took a few deep breaths.

  Damn, he could really get me going.

  Emily Hunter was in her late twenties with dark hair shaved down to a military-length buzz cut. I’d never seen her hair any longer than that—she was meticulous about keeping it short. She had a round face and lovely oval green eyes. Emily always exuded positive energy—she was one of the most upbeat people I’d ever had the privilege to know. She’d come to New Orleans for Mardi Gras seven years earlier and stayed. She’d gotten a master’s degree by the time she was twenty-one, and had spent a year in Mexico City teaching English at an incredibly expensive private girls’ school. “I felt trapped, though,” she explained to me once, “and it just seemed so wrong—all those spoiled girls at the school and all the poverty just outside the front gates—it was so unfair, and wrong, so I decided to save as much money as I could and do all the things I’d always wanted to do.” Mom and Dad had practically adopted her, and she’d been working at the Devil’s Weed for years. She had an amazing singing voice, but I hadn’t had a chance to see her perform with her new band, Huck Finn. She loved to sing, and frankly had a better voice than most music industry superstars—but she had no ambitions to use her voice to attain fame and stardom. She sang because she enjoyed it. “And if I ever stop enjoying it, I’ll stop doing it,” she told me once.

  “Scotty? You okay?”

  I looked up and smiled at Emily, who was standing in the storeroom door. “Yeah, just give me a second. I was just talking to Colin—he’s on his way home.”

  She gave me a knowing smile. “I can imagine. You want some coffee?”

  I nodded, following her back into the store. “I also need to talk to you about something, if you’ve got a few minutes.”

  Emily filled a large cup from one of the large thermoses behind the counter, added some half-and-half and a package of Sweet’n Low before stirring it and handing the hot cup to me. I took a sip and let the heat radiate through my body. “You know exactly how I like it.” I beamed at her. “Perfect.”

  “I’ve been making you coffee for going on seven years now,” she replied with a wink. “I’d have to be an idiot to not know how you like it. And all appearances to the contrary, I am not an idiot.”

  She gave me her big grin. “What do you want to talk to me about?”

  “The party Sunday night.” I leaned against the counter.

  Her face got dreamy. “Wasn’t that awesome? I still can’t believe we’re in the Super Bowl.” She shook her head. “It’s so weird—I grew up in Chicago, but I never cared about football till I moved here. I still don’t care about football outside of the Saints, though.” She laughed. “I didn’t get home until eight o’clock Monday morning, I just didn’t want the night to ever end. Did you?”

  I smiled. “No. Sometimes I still can’t believe we’re in the Super Bowl.” I hesitated, trying to figure out the most diplomatic way of asking the next question. Fuck it, it’s Emily, just go ahead and ask, she’s practically family. “You didn’t happen to notice if anyone went into Mom’s junk drawer Sunday night, did you?”

  She frowned. “The one in the corner? Why?” Her eyes got wide. “Oh, no, is something missing?”

  I did a double take. “Mom’s gun is missing—and it’s not like it was a big secret she kept it there.”

  She scratched her head. “I don’t remember seeing anyone in that corner, but it’s possible, I suppose.” She frowned. “And after the kick, everyone went nuts and it was just crazy—everything’s really a blur after that. Someone could have taken it then, I guess. Why? Has something happened?”

  She’d find out soon enough, so I didn’t have a problem with telling her. “Someone killed Tara Bourgeois last night.”

  “Tara Bourgeois?” She made a face. “That homophobic bitch?” Her jaw tightened. “I’m not surprised—only that it took this long.” She narrowed her eyes. “But what does Mom’s gun have to do with—oh.” Realization dawned on her face.

  I sighed. “My cousin Jared was dating her, and he found her. Mom’s gun was there.”

  “But how is that even possible?” she whispered. She looked confused, and her face had gone pale.

  “Someone must have taken the gun during the party Sunday night, or sometime yesterday—but no one was in the apartment yesterday until late last night.”
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br />   She nodded. “So, it stands to reason someone took the gun during the game.”

  “Did your band mates know about the gun?”

  “You don’t think—”

  “Everyone at the party Sunday night has to be checked out, Em.”

  “I suppose you’re right, but I can’t imagine—” She gnawed on her lower lip. “I don’t even want to think someone in Huck Finn is a killer. I mean, they’re a great group, Scotty.”

  “How well do you really know them? You’ve only been in Huck Finn a few months, right?”

  She sighed. “Yeah. I met Ken first—Ken Taylor,” she added as I started scribbling notes. “Ken’s not in Huck Finn, he’s Gary’s—Gary Musson’s boyfriend, and he does a lot of our publicity for us. He works for a P.R. firm in the CBD. Destry asked me to sing with him one Saturday night and Ken was here.” Destry was a longtime friend of the family. He taught music at NOCCA, and every Saturday night he sat in the Devil’s Weed and played his guitar for tips. “After we were done, he told me he knew a band that needed a new lead singer, would I be interested? I thought why not? I’ve never been in a band—it’d be something new. And you know I’m all about new experiences, right? He set up an audition for me, and after I sang a few songs with them they hired me.” She grinned. “Ken and Gary live over on Dauphine Street, Mike and Gia share a place in the Marigny.” She grabbed her cell phone from her bag, stored under the counter, and read off their cell phone numbers, which I dutifully wrote down.

  “What else can you tell me about them?”

  “Gary’s the afternoon bartender at the Saint, over on Magazine Street. Mike’s a personal trainer at some gym on St. Charles Avenue, and Gia works at a tanning place.” Emily shrugged. “Mike’s originally from Alabama, I think, but Gia, Gary, and Ken are all from New Orleans, I think. Ken and Gary—they’ve been a couple for about five years, I think. Gia and Mike live together but they’re just friends. I think Gia’s bi but don’t know for sure. Mike—I don’t know about Mike. I think he’s gay, but I’ve never seen him with anyone, male or female. I probably am just stereotyping because he’s a trainer. He’s in a good shape, takes care of himself, always dresses well. He might just be a—what’s the word? Metrosexual?” She shuddered. “I hate that word.”