by BJ Bourg
It was past three and I still hadn’t eaten. Brandy had followed Susan and me to town, where Susan retrieved her Tahoe and led Brandy to the shelter, and then I headed straight for Connie’s house. I had just turned down the street when my cell phone rang. I glanced at the screen. It was a number I didn’t recognize, so I ignored the call and parked my Tahoe on the shoulder of the road two houses away from Connie’s place.
After receiving radio confirmation that Takecia was in position behind the Taylor home, I slipped out of my SUV and walked along the town sidewalk until it ended at the edge of the Taylor property. While it was still cool out, the sun was shining bright and it had dried up the roads and made for a more pleasant day. I strode across the neatly cropped lawn while carefully eyeing the structures on the property, which took up the entire corner of the block.
A white pickup truck was parked under a detached carport that was pressed up against the western end of the property line. A workshop shared a roof with the carport and it appeared empty. I continued across the wide driveway that separated the carport from the house and passed two windows and a narrow door before making it to a winding sidewalk. The sidewalk curved around the yard and then ducked between two giant palm trees before reaching a bricked patio that served as the entrance to the house. Two white rocking chairs were positioned on opposite sides of the heavy brown door. I shoved one out of the way so I didn’t have to stand directly in front of the door as I knocked.
My fist echoed loudly under the patio and I waited. The house was built on a slab, so there was no chance of hearing footsteps approaching, but I listened for the slightest movements from inside. There were none.
I got on the radio and asked Takecia if there was movement out back.
“Negative,” she said. “It’s quiet as a church service back here.”
I wanted to ask her to clarify what type of church she meant, because my mom grew up in a church that believed in raising the roof when they worshipped. I frowned at the memories of being forced to attend church services. As a boy, I’d preferred spending my time tromping around the swamps hunting and fishing, but my mom didn’t appreciate my aspirations. When my dad was home from work, he would spend a lot of his time exploring the swamps with me and he even allowed me to skip church a few times, which drew a bit of ire from my mom. When I was about fifteen, I finally quit church altogether and that really caused some tension between my mom and me.
My relationship with Mom had improved when I’d moved out of the house at seventeen, but I joined the La Mort Police Department a few months north of my eighteenth birthday and suddenly found myself too busy to visit. After losing Michele and Abigail, I’d gone a long time without calling or visiting and it broke her heart. Dad was always working, so she had suffered through the empty-nest syndrome all alone. I had reconnected with my parents a little over two years ago and had intended to stay in touch, but life and my new job as police chief had ruined those plans—
“Anything?” Takecia asked after a few minutes.
“No.” I had noticed two garage doors on the western side of the house, so I walked over and banged on one of them. There were four windows high on each door, but they had been covered from the inside with aluminum foil and I couldn’t see inside. After five minutes of waiting, I called Takecia and asked her to meet me down the street near my Tahoe.
When she pulled up in her fully marked Dodge Charger, I leaned on the door frame. She reached up to push her dark sunglasses up to her forehead and the muscles in her slender arms rippled as she did so. I’d seen her spar with Susan and I knew she could take care of herself.
“It is the week before the Thanksgiving holiday,” Takecia said in her Jamaican accent, “so the lady might be out spending poor Mitch’s life insurance money.”
She was probably right. Although it would be a while before Connie could collect the money, it certainly wouldn’t be the first time someone had gone out and run up credit card debt in anticipation of a settlement or winning the lottery or some other kind of payout.
“Well, I guess I’ll head to the office and get Jack Billiot ready for transport,” I said. “He’s been holed up long enough.”
“I fed him lunch around noon,” Takecia said. “When I offered him a cola, he turned it down and requested a beer instead.”
“Did you give him one?” I asked jokingly.
“Of course.” She smiled, exposing a row of perfect teeth. “I wouldn’t want to violate his civil rights.”
After saying goodbye to Takecia, I drove to the police department and finished the paperwork on Jack’s arrest. I then called the sheriff’s office requesting a prison transport. While waiting for them to arrive, I set about packaging all of the evidence I’d recovered and then secured them in lockers. Once that was done and Jack had been picked up, I traveled to the coroner’s office—grabbing a burger from a drive-thru on the way—and attended the autopsy of my victim.
Doctor Louise Wong was in a hurry, so she didn’t waste any time cutting Mitch Taylor open. Her assistant had x-rayed the body earlier in the day and marked the general area where the projectile was supposed to be located, so it was easy for Doctor Wong to fish out the bullet that killed the bar owner.
Once she’d pulled it out of a narrow wound channel with a pair of thin forceps, she dropped it into a white envelope and handed it to me. “What size caliber do you think it is?” she asked.
“Nine millimeter,” I said without looking at it.
Doctor Wong raised an eyebrow. “You sound sure of yourself.”
“I found a nine shell casing at the scene,” I explained. “If it’s not a nine, then I’m in trouble.”
She sealed the envelope and handed it to me. “Well, I hope you’re right then.”
Once she had made her recorded notes, she pointed to a paper bag on the floor in the corner. “Those are his personal effects: clothes, wallet, belt, wristwatch, and some cash money—lots of it, so it couldn’t have been a robbery.”
I nodded my head. “You’re right about that.”
I drove to the police department and secured the bullet in an evidence locker. First thing Monday morning, I was heading to La Mort to turn in all of my evidence, but right now I had two more interviews to conduct.
CHAPTER 11
One hour later…
After going to her house and speaking with her husband, I found Joyce Reynolds standing outside of the Corner Pub reading the official notice that I’d posted declaring the place closed until further notice. I stood in the shadows of the building behind her and shoved my hands in my pockets. The sun was going down and, while the news called for fifty-three degrees, it felt much cooler where we were. People were walking up and down the sidewalk all around us and she didn’t seem to notice them—or me.
“Mrs. Reynolds, are you okay?” I asked softly.
She jerked, turned to face me, looking me up and down. Her gaze began at my black boots and moved upward until she was looking me in the eyes. “What…I don’t understand. What happened here?”
I shot a thumb down the street. “Why don’t you come to the station with me so we can talk?”
She tugged at the ends of her short jean skirt, trying to make it longer. Her shoulder-length blonde hair was flat-iron straight and I could smell her perfume from where I stood. She was too dressed up to know what had happened.
“Hadn’t you heard?” I asked.
Her mouth opened and then clamped shut. After two more attempts, she said she’d heard something on the news about a robbery in town. “But they didn’t mention a name or what business and I would’ve never thought it was Mitch or that it was here.”
When Joyce’s husband told me she was heading to work the nightshift, I figured she didn’t know. “Why don’t you follow me to the police station?” I said. “We can talk in private and I’ll be able to answer some of your questions.”
Joyce wrapped her arms in front of her chest and nodded, walking briskly to her car, which was parked on the shoulder of the s
treet a few spots behind mine. I watched in my side-view mirror until she started it and pulled on her seatbelt, and then started down the street. Within seconds, I turned into the parking lot in front of the police department and parked in the visitor lot so she could follow me. I then led her upstairs and into my office.
After getting the preliminaries out of the way, I asked if she knew of anyone who wanted Mitch dead.
“No, he was a good guy. Everyone loved him.” Her face was ashen. “If someone could murder Mitch, then not a one of us is safe.”
“What about customers? Did he have to kick anyone out, cut them off, or break up any fights?”
“Every now and then he has to cut someone off, but they never get mad.” She shook her head to emphasize her point. “They always show up the next night and thank him for looking out. All of our regulars are like family and the tourists who come by love the place. We’ve got a solid five-star rating online—seventy-eight perfect reviews. No one has ever said a bad thing about the place.”
I wondered how much she knew about his personal life, and knew there was only one way to find out. “What do you know about the situation with his wife?”
“Well, I know he keeps going back and forth between Connie and Brandy. If you ask me, the biggest mistake he ever made was leaving Connie. She was the best thing that ever happened to him. She was with him when he was nothing, you know? She helped make him who he is today.” She stopped and frowned. “But Brandy, she came into it thinking he had money. If you ask me, that’s the only reason she’s with him. He does okay, but he’s not rich, and she’s got him blowing through his money. She’s bad news. I don’t think she wanted to hurt him while they were together, but if he ever left her, I could see her as the vengeful type who might try to do something to him or Connie.”
Great, I thought, it’s possible both women wanted him dead.
“Please understand,” I began, “I have to ask these next questions as a matter of formality, but I don’t think you did anything wrong.” When she nodded her understanding, I continued. “So, where were you last night?”
She fidgeted in her chair. “Is…um, is this confidential?”
“Yes, ma’am.” I leaned in a little, wondering what had made her so nervous. Did she know something about the murder? I didn’t peg her as the killing type, but what if she knew who did it? It would take about a week for the evidence to be processed, so to get a break now would be golden. “Everything you say here will stay here unless it’s needed in court, and you’ll know about it long before we have to reveal it.”
She hesitated, then sighed. “I was with Foster last night.”
“Foster Blake?”
She nodded. “He works weekdays at the bar. He told me his wife’s family was in town and he didn’t want to be around them, so he had rented a room in Magnolia Parish, where no one knows him, and he asked me to meet him there. I did and we spent most of the night together.”
I wanted to ask if anyone who worked at the bar was faithful, but resisted the urge. “What time did you get home?”
“Around three.”
“What did you tell your husband?”
“I told him I had to work extra because of the upcoming holidays.”
“And he bought that nonsense?” I winced inwardly. It had come out harsher than I intended, but I didn’t apologize.
“He trusts me.”
Instead of commenting, I scrolled through my notes. “Do you know where Foster lives?”
Joyce nodded. “He lives somewhere on Lacy Court.”
“Do you know his wife?”
“I’ve never met her, but he said they’re separating soon. They got into some kind of argument and he said it’s over for them.”
I spent another thirty minutes going over her story and gathering more information about Mitch. When I was satisfied she’d told me everything she knew, I ended the interview and walked her outside into the cool evening air. I glanced at my phone. It was almost seven. I wanted to speak with Foster and was halfway to his house when I remembered the call I’d ignored earlier. I pulled to the shoulder and selected the number from my recent calls list. Although I hadn’t recognized the number, I immediately recognized the voice that answered.
“Hey, Clint, how are you?” asked Detective Mallory Tuttle, who worked for the Chateau Parish Sheriff’s office. “I was calling about your murder case. I might have a suspect for you.”
CHAPTER 12
Later that night…
Susan and I took a lazy walk to the shelter while my mom cooked dinner for us. Achilles zigzagged along the street ahead of us, taking in the countless scents along the route.
“I keep telling your mom she doesn’t have to cook for us,” Susan said, “but she insists. When I got home this afternoon she was frying a pot of meat and cooking some rice. I won’t lie—it smelled delicious.”
“I think it gives her a sense of purpose,” I mused. “Since I left home as a teenager, she’s only had my dad to care for, but when he’s offshore she feels lost and lonely. She doesn’t have anything to do, you know? I think helping us out is making her feel useful.”
Susan walked in silence for a few seconds, and the only sound I heard was Achilles’ heavy breathing and her crutches scraping against the shell street. I knew something was on her mind, because she was way too quiet. Before I could ask, she brought up work.
“You got home late. Any breaks in the case?”
I told her about the phone call I’d made to Mallory Tuttle thirty minutes ago. “It seems Mitch Taylor testified against a fellow named Chris Jenkins ten years ago. It was a carjacking that took place at a convenience store where Mitch was getting gas. He was the only one who got a good look at the suspect and he was able to provide a license plate number of the stolen vehicle and a good description of the suspect.” I paused and shook my head. “Mallory said there were seven other witnesses in the parking lot, but they were all playing on their cell phones and didn’t see a thing.”
“I believe it,” was all Susan said as she continued walking beside me. It appeared she was listening to me, but I didn’t know if she was hearing everything I said.
“Anyway, Chris was released two months ago after serving only nine years of a twenty-year sentence, but Mallory didn’t find out about it until last week when his parole officer called to say he’d missed his meeting and there was a warrant for his arrest for violating the conditions of his parole.”
“How in the hell did he get out of prison early?”
“Thanks to the changes in the sentencing laws last year, he got credit for good time and was eligible for parole a lot sooner than he would’ve been under the old rules.”
“Who on earth had the bright idea to start releasing violent offenders early?” Susan asked.
“Beats me, but we’re going after him first thing in the morning.”
“What about Connie Taylor? I thought you told me earlier you were going to interview her first thing in the morning? How many ‘first things’ can you do in one morning? And I thought you were going to interview Foster Blake this afternoon?”
“I did tell you that, but now Connie will have to be the second thing in the morning, and Foster Blake will have to get in line. This Jenkins fellow seems to be a good lead.”
I could see the glow of light from the shelter when we stepped past the tall cane. The farmer who worked the land had begun harvesting his crop and he was at it every day, working his way across the property as quickly as he could.
When we reached the porch of the shelter, Susan fished out her key and unlocked the front door. We entered and she called out to Brandy Lewis. She called out a second time and Brandy appeared from one of the rooms down the hall. She wore a long night shirt and was drying her hair with a large bath towel. Her eyes were hopeful when she asked if we’d arrested Connie Taylor.
“Is it safe for me to go back home?”
“No, we didn’t arrest Connie yet,” Susan said. “We were just coming
to see if you wanted something for dinner. My mother-in-law is cooking some pot fried pork and she’s making enough to feed a small army, so you’re more than welcome to join us.”
Brandy nodded, smiling warmly. “That sounds good. Can I come up to your house after I finish drying my hair?”
“Sure.” Susan and I went into the kitchen and checked the supplies to make sure Brandy would have everything she needed during her stay there, and we then began the long walk back to the front of Paradise Place, which was the street we lived on. The women’s shelter was something Susan had dreamed about doing all her adult life, and it was conveniently and securely located behind our house along the private lane.
Susan wasn’t saying much on the walk, and I knew something was still bugging her. “What is it?” I asked. “I can tell something’s eating at you. Is it your leg? You know it’ll be all healed up before long and you’ll be good as new.”
“It’s not that,” she said softly, her eyes following Achilles as he plunged in and out of the cane field rows, chasing ghosts.
“Then what is it?”
“I missed my period, so I took a pregnancy test today.”
My heart jumped in my chest. “Are we going to have a baby?”
She shook her head. “It was negative.”
My shoulders drooped. “Maybe you should’ve led with that last part, so I wouldn’t have gotten my hopes up.”
She didn’t laugh.
“There’s more,” I guessed. “What’s going on?”
“I didn’t think it before, but when there was a chance I was pregnant, I started to feel guilty.” She took a breath and exhaled. “I’d like for us to be married before we have a child.”
“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me!”
Susan jerked her head toward me, and in the dim glow from the street lamps I could see that her eyes were wide. “I’m not—why would I joke about something like this?”
“No, I mean my mom must’ve talked to you.”
