by BJ Bourg
He clicked on the record button and said, “Okay, now they’re recording. If you need any more footage, I’ll have it.”
I needed Thursday night’s footage! I wanted to scream, but didn’t. I thanked him and trudged out into the cool morning air. I walked to the edge of his driveway and looked up and down Dire Lane. Troy Gandy might’ve ridden his bicycle right in front of this house—but I’d never know it.
CHAPTER 26
After leaving Mr. Pellegrin’s house, I drove to Mechant Groceries. It was a newer building that had gone up at the corner of a large sugarcane field. The concrete parking area and the foundation upon which the store was built took up about 200,000 square feet of land. More and more, it seemed progress was pushing the cane farmers onto smaller and smaller tracts of land, and I wondered what would happen if they were someday pushed out of existence. I certainly wouldn’t be happy, because thick cane syrup was my favorite pancake topping.
I got a parking spot close to the store and walked inside, making a mental note of the location of the payphone and the surveillance camera as I walked by. It wasn’t very busy at that time of the morning. I hooked a left and stopped at the service desk.
“Can I help you?” asked a young girl who appeared to be a high school student.
I smiled. “Yes, ma’am. I need to speak with a manager.”
She lifted a handset from its cradle and dialed a four-digit number. “Miss Cassandra, there’s a detective asking for you.” She quickly shook her head. “No, not by name—he’s just asking to speak with a manager.”
When the girl returned the handset to the cradle, she smiled and said the manager would be right down. Before the words left her mouth, there was movement from an elevated office behind the counter. On my side of the wall to the office and just behind the young cashier, there were five shelves extending from one end to the other, left to right, and they were filled with every kind of liquor one could imagine. I saw a variety of vodka bottles and felt an urging in my gut to have a drink.
Blinking quickly, I turned away and focused my attention above the top of the wall, where a short stocky girl was lumbering down the stairs. She disappeared for a brief moment and then reappeared around the corner to the left. She stopped when she reached the young girl. Her shirt had the name Cassandra and the title Weekend Manager embroidered on it.
I introduced myself and asked if we could speak in her office. She hesitated, glancing down at the badge clipped to my belt and the gun on my hip.
“You’re not in any trouble,” I said. “I just have to ask some questions about a customer.”
That seemed to reassure her. She lifted a section of hinged countertop and let me through to her side. She then led the way up a flight of stairs and into a square office that overlooked the store aisles below. Cassandra sat at the desk and folded her hands in her lap. “What do you need from me?”
“I’d like to look at surveillance footage from August sixth, between nine and ten o’clock in the morning…the camera overlooking the payphones. I need to know the exact time a particular call was made from the payphone.”
Cassandra’s eyes narrowed. “You’re the second person in two weeks to ask to see that footage. There must be something very important on there.”
“Really?” I cocked my head sideways. “Who was the other person?”
“Some man with a badge who said he needed to see the tapes because of a case he was investigating.”
“What kind of case was it?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“You didn’t ask?”
“No…and I didn’t ask you either. I just assume it’s not my business.”
Good point. “Did he volunteer any information at all?”
“He said he got a call from the payphone and he wanted to see who made that call.”
My heart began to beat in my chest, as I figured I was finally on to something. Could this be the guy they called? Had he tracked them down? If so, was he our dead guy? Or did he have something to do with shooting the dead guy? “Did this man say what date and time it was when he received the call from the payphone?”
She was thoughtful. “He did give me an exact date and time, but I don’t remember. I wrote it down on a sticky note, but that’s long gone. I do think it was in the morning sometime, though.”
“Did he say what the call was about?”
She shook her head.
I drummed my fingers on the desk. “What did the man look like?”
“He was taller than me and a little stocky. He had an accent—that much I know.”
“What kind of accent?”
“Like he was from Alabama or something.”
I jotted that down in my notes and then pointed to the monitor hanging on the wall above the surveillance equipment console. “Can I see the footage from the payphone?”
She grimaced and sucked air in through her teeth. It made a whistling sound that was annoying. “Oh, did you say the sixth of August?”
I nodded.
She turned to a calendar on the wall and, flipping back to August, began counting from the sixth to today. “It’s over forty-five days, so we won’t have it. Our system will record over itself every forty-five days—sometimes sooner.”
I wanted to curse my luck out loud, but didn’t. I dropped my notepad on the desk and leaned back in my chair. What would it take to catch a break in this case? As I stared at the ceiling thinking, I suddenly had an idea. I leaned forward. “What day did this man come in the store?”
Cassandra stared at the calendar, as though she thought it would speak to her. Finally, she nodded. “It was the eighteenth—two Sundays ago. He came in about twelve-ten.”
It was only thirteen days ago, but I was impressed that she remembered the exact time he came in. I asked how she could remember that small detail.
“I only remember because the Saints were playing and I was up here in my office listening to the start of the game. They had just kicked off when I was called to go down and speak to the man. He stayed here for over an hour, so I missed a big part of the game.” She shook her head. “I was so mad! And then they lost and that just ruined my whole day.”
I smiled, and then asked to see the footage from when the man came to the store.
“Sure,” she said. “I’ll do it, but just as long as we’re done before tomorrow at three-twenty-five, because I ain’t missing another game for this payphone.”
I nodded and watched as she began working the surveillance system. I couldn’t help but wonder who would appear on the screen. Would I finally be able to identify our victim? Would his identity unlock the key to his murder? If so, hopefully it would help me solve the murder of Troy Gandy, because, as of right now, we didn’t have a single viable suspect in his strangulation.
Within minutes, Cassandra paused the video and stabbed the monitor’s screen with her index finger. “That’s him.”
I studied it and frowned, asked her to play it from when he first appeared in the camera. She rewound the tape and replayed it to show the man walking into the store. The camera at the entrance was the best angle to capture his face, but dark sunglasses and a red ball cap obscured most of his features.
“Do you have a better shot of his face?” I asked. “Maybe one without the sunglasses?”
Cassandra sped up the tape and we watched people come and go throughout the noon hour until our mystery man finally walked out, but it didn’t show his face. She switched angles and views and played the footage around the times he arrived and left, but none of the angles offered a clear view of his face.
“Can you capture all of this footage and burn it to a disc for me?” I asked. “Even though I can’t identify him, I’ll still need it for evidence.”
While she set out to download the footage, I leaned back in the chair and crossed my arms, thoughtful. “Did he tell you what he was looking for?” I finally asked.
“No, but he made me stop the tape when three boys walked up to th
e payphone and began playing with it.” She shoved a blank DVD into the CD bay on her computer and waited for it to load. “He asked me to print out pictures of the boys and then he asked me if I knew who they were.”
“Do you?”
She shook her head. “I think I’ve seen them in the store before, but I don’t know who they are.”
“Did you give him the pictures?”
“I did. They looked like high school kids, so I told him he might try going to Attakapas High School. Everyone in Mechant Loup goes to Attakapas High, so, unless they’re from somewhere else, someone at the school should know who they are.”
I watched idly as she pulled the video file up on the screen and began playing it to make sure it had copied correctly onto the DVD. She stopped it at the part where the man was approaching the front door and she was about to eject the DVD when I sprang to my feet.
“Wait!” I said. “Play it again.”
She jerked in her chair. “Jesus! You scared me.”
I mumbled an apology and leaned closer to the monitor as she clicked on the video file and hit the play button. The man was seen ambling toward the front entrance and he was shoving a set of keys into his pocket. As he did so, the front of his shirt hiked up and I could see his belt buckle.
“Can you zoom in on his buckle?” I asked, holding my breath.
“Sure.” Cassandra highlighted the section around his stomach and clicked the magnifying glass icon. Suddenly, his belt buckle popped up larger than life on the screen.
I shoved a finger toward the American flag belt buckle with the black shadow of a bear in the foreground. “That’s my guy!”
CHAPTER 27
Since it was Saturday and the schools were closed, I spent the rest of the morning speaking to friends—they were few—and relatives of Troy Gandy, but no one had a clue what could’ve happened to him. As expected, his mom was a total wreck. I’d made contact with his dad, but the man didn’t seem bothered much by his son’s murder. That infuriated me, but I managed to keep a lid on my anger and get the information I needed from him, which was next to nothing.
Before grabbing lunch from a drive-through, I drove out to Attakapas High just in case there was some kind of afterschool function taking place, but the place was locked up tight. After wolfing down my burger and fries, I headed to the office to make some calls. Someone in Gatlinburg had to be missing a private investigator.
After speaking with someone from the Gatlinburg Police Department, I then called Sevierville PD, Pigeon Forge PD, and the Sevier County Sheriff’s Department, but no one had filed any missing person reports for a private investigator.
When I hung up the phone after making the last call, it was nearing five o’clock and I was beginning to feel frustrated. That blue Nissan truck had to be somewhere close by. As far as I could tell from watching Mr. Pellegrin’s video footage, it had never left Dire Lane. What if it was stashed away in someone’s garage?
The thought brought me to my feet. I couldn’t get a warrant for every garage down that street, but there was no law that prevented me from knocking on every door and asking everyone for permission to search their garage, just as I’d done with Rick Vincent. If they didn’t have anything to hide, they shouldn’t have a problem with allowing me to search.
So, that’s exactly what I set out to do, and two hours later I was no closer to finding the truck than before my bright idea. Everyone who had been home had cooperated fully. Although I had already searched the Vincent’s garage, I stopped by and asked Judith how Cindy was doing.
She frowned. “I didn’t realize how much she liked that boy. I took her to a counselor yesterday and we have another session on Monday. She’s really having a hard time.”
I looked around, but didn’t see her son. “Where’s Burton?”
“He and his friends are in the canal.” She chuckled. “They think they’re junior detectives now, and that they’re going to solve the case for you.”
I didn’t laugh. “If they do, tell them I’ll buy them dinner every Friday night for a year.”
When I left Dire Lane, I drove to the shelter, where Susan was sweeping the hardwood floors in the great room. She looked up and wiped dust from her face when I walked inside.
“Any luck?”
I shook my head and grabbed a dustpan to help out. As I knelt before her and placed it on the ground to scoop up the mess, I told her everything I’d done.
She stopped what she was doing and stared down at me. “The guy in the video is the victim?”
“Yep.”
“He’s a P.I.?”
“Yep.”
“Huh.” She rested her arm on top of the broom handle. Her hair was pulled back into a bandana and her sleeves were rolled up over her toned shoulders. “I can’t believe no one’s reported him missing yet.”
“I’ll check with the school on Monday to see if he showed up there,” I said. “Maybe they’ll have a good face shot of him from their cameras.”
She shrugged and swept the trash into the dustpan and I walked it to the garbage can in the corner of the room.
“What about Jake Boudreaux?” I asked.
“He’s still on the run. Sheriff Turner’s got two deputies guarding Allie at the hospital and there’s a car watching the grandparents’ home where Sammy’s staying.”
After putting the dustpan on a nearby bookshelf, I walked over to Susan and wrapped my arms around her. We stared into each other’s eyes for a long moment. She kissed me before turning her head and scanning our surroundings.
“I think it’s ready.” Her voice was laced with pride. “I stocked the pantry and refrigerator with food, the bathrooms are loaded with anything a woman might need for herself and her kids, and all of the beds are made. We’re ready to roll.”
I smiled warmly. Susan’s vision—and tons of elbow grease—had turned this old dilapidated plantation home into a secure and charming refuge for battered women and their children. There were twelve bedrooms, seven bathrooms, two kitchens, a vast dining room, a great room, a sitting room, and a laundry room with three stacked washer and dryer sets.
“I’m sending out an email blast to the police social service divisions of all the neighboring parishes.” She leaned her head into my chest. “And you know what I hope their response is?”
“What’s that?” I asked.
“I hope they tell me I’ve done this for nothing, because there’s no more violence against women and children.”
CHAPTER 28
Sunday, October 2
Melvin was still at the police department when I walked in at seven o’clock Sunday morning. He greeted me with a smile and a slap on the back. “It’s good to see you walking around here again.”
I thanked him and asked why he hadn’t gone home yet. “Didn’t your shift end at six?”
“I’m waiting on a call from an informant who might know where Jake Boudreaux is hiding.”
My ears perked up. “If you’re going after him, I want in.”
“Absolutely! It’ll be like old times.”
I went into my office and began the most boring but important part of police work—report writing. It took me a little over an hour to get the first draft of my report up to date and I was about to start working on the crime scene sketch when Melvin burst into my office.
“It’s Jake—I know where he’s at!”
I dropped my triangular architect scale ruler and chased him out the door, down the steps, and into the parking lot. I jumped into the front passenger side of his F-250 and, after snapping my seatbelt in place, held on for dear life.
“Where are we heading?” I asked.
“East Coconut Lane, last trailer on the left. He was just seen going in the back door.”
I gritted my teeth as I stared out the window at the houses that blurred by. I remembered the joy in little Sammy’s face when he found out he was going to get to eat a hamburger—I’d seen the same expression on Abigail’s face many times during her sho
rt life. Children were a gift from above and I couldn’t understand how any parent could neglect their offspring or abuse them in any way. I secretly hoped Jake would resist arrest. If he did, I would—
I suddenly caught myself. What would I do if he resisted? Would I go too far…again? I shuddered and wondered if I was really prepared to do my job in a fair and just manner. The man in me wanted to beat the snot out of Jake Boudreaux, but the cop in me knew I’d have to exercise restraint and use only that force which is necessary to apprehend him. Who would win? Even as we were coasting down Coconut Lane on our approach to the trailer, I didn’t have an answer…and it scared me.
Like any tactically sound cop, Melvin stopped several doors down and out of sight of the target location. We each slipped out of the truck and met behind it.
“Want to come up through the woods?” Melvin asked. “It’s dense enough that he’ll never see us and it’ll be unexpected.”
“It’s your call,” I said. “I’m only along for the ride.” And the ass-whipping, I thought, again fantasizing about Jake resisting.
Melvin nodded and then led the way across a shallow ditch and into the greenery. He picked his way carefully through the woods, dodging trees, ducking under low-lying branches, and avoiding picker bushes. He finally angled back toward the street and then stopped when we reached the tree line. He pointed to a moldy white trailer with faded yellow trim that was perpendicular to the tree line. “That’s the one.”
The crank-up windows on our end of the trailer were partially open and appeared to be for the master bedroom. There was a window on the back side of the trailer that opened into the same room. The window frame and glass had been ripped out and there was only a rag covering the opening. Last I checked, rags couldn’t keep out mosquitoes, so whoever lived there had to be miserable. I glanced down the back side of the trailer and saw a door, but it was padlocked from the outside. Unless they could walk through walls, no one was exiting from there.
