Peggy Holloway - Judith McCain 02 - Portrait on Wicker

by Peggy Holloway

  “Yeah, I remember her,” she said. “She was in here with a red haired guy and they were asking about Mr. Lessiter.”

  “You know Mr. Lessiter?” I asked.

  “Yeah, he used to come in here with a younger blond haired man, Mackey was his name, I believe. I’m attracted to older men and that Mr. Lessiter was one good looking older man. He wasn’t interested in me though. It was a blow to my ego. Look at me! Most men drool over me. Mackey tried to get me to go out with him, but he was too young.”

  She was pretty in a dumb blond sort of way. Probably someone Mackey would be interested in.

  When asked what she told Tracy and George she said, “Just what I told you. Actually, Mr. Lessiter and Mackey had just been in the night before. Mr. Lessiter had told me to call him if anyone came here asking for him…”

  She now looked worried. “Did I do something wrong?” She asked.

  Mark looked angry. “You called and ratted them out!” It wasn’t a question. He was blaming and judging.

  I put my hand on his arm. “Take it easy, Mark. Lucy, do you still have the number he gave you?”

  “I don’t, but do you want to know where he was staying? I followed them one night. I know I shouldn’t have. I feel kind of ashamed telling you this, but now I’m glad I did.”

  “Can you take a break and take us there?” Mark asked.

  She looked around the restaurant. We were the only ones there. She went into the back and was out in less than five minutes. We were soon crossing the Vilano Bridge, heading North on San Marco. She was driving her old beat up Toyota. We ended up in at older motel on US 1 North. It was pink like they were painted back in the 60s.

  “That’s his car over there,” She said.

  I noticed it had a rental tag. We looked at each other. We both knew that Mr. Lessiter and Mackey were already dead. We let her drive us back to the restaurant and took our own car back to the motel.

  The manager introduced himself as Rudy. “As far as I know, they’re still in there,” he said. “They left strict instructions for the maid not to clean their room. They usually come by here for clean towels…” His voice trailed off.

  “When was the last time they asked for clean towels?’’ I asked.

  “It’s been awhile, come to think of it.” He got a key off the pegboard in back of the counter and we followed him.

  As soon as he unlocked the door we smelled it. The same smell we had smelled in Julia’s studio. This was evidently where one or both of them had been killed. There was blood everywhere. One of double beds was soaked in it. It had soaked through into the carpet. I only got a glimpse, but that was enough. We followed Rudy to his office and he called the sheriff’s department. While we waited I took Mark outside.

  “Mark, what are we going to do? We can’t get involved in this.”

  “I don’t know any way around it, Judith. We’re caught in the middle here. We had better decide here and now what we’re going to tell them.”

  Before we could think up a story, the sheriff drove up. I almost laughed, he looked so stereotypical. His fat belly hung over his belt. I always thought it must be from all the donuts.

  He was chewing gum and looked at Rudy. “What we got Rudy?”

  Rudy began, “These two came in here asking about the occupants in room 7B…”

  As he explained I looked at Mark. We didn’t have time to discuss our story and we were in a bind. My mind was going off in all directions when I realized Sheriff Winslow was talking to us.

  “You two need to come we me,” he said as he ushered us into the backseat of his car.

  CHAPTER 35

  It had been over ten years since I had been in police car and I was nervous. Mark looked mad. Winslow didn’t say anything but headed north toward Jacksonville. He took the exit for the airport. Mark and I looked at each other.

  “No questions yet,” the sheriff said. He drove around the back of the airport where there was a private plane. The blades started turning when we drove up.

  He escorted us into the plane and left. The inside of the airplane looked like a living room. Mark sat on one of the love seats and I sat in a recliner. The stewardess brought us glasses of white wine.

  We didn’t say anything until we were airborne. Then Mark unfastened his seat belt. “I’m going to talk to the pilot and find out what’s going on. Are they going to get us over the Atlantic Ocean and push us out, or what?”

  Just then the door to the bathroom opened and out walked Tracy. “That won’t be necessary, darling. I’m sorry for the deceit.”

  No one said anything, and then we were all talking at once. Besides all the questions there were so many emotions you could have cut the atmosphere with a knife. I think both Mark and I were at first angry, then relieved, then so happy we were crying. We held onto each other and cried for some time. After we all wiped our eyes and blew our noses, we settled down with a glass of wine while Tracy filled us in.

  “You two jumped the gun on us,” Tracy said. “It’s a good thing Winslow caught the call. He moonlights for us from time to time. I hardly know where to begin.

  “First of all, I had to pretend I didn’t trust my boss, Alan Coleman. He had to stay out of it. This is so complicated I’m having a hard time staying on track. Okay, when Alan worked out of New Orleans, before he was promoted to my boss in Houston, he was part of a team investigating two judges. George, who is also alive by the way, was part of a team in St. Augustine investigating a judge there.

  “This investigation has been going on a long time. I was only given clearance for this right before I left Houston. I know I hurt both of you by having to pretend I was dead…”

  “Tracy, who did we bury?” Mark asked “Do you know how much pain you put your little boy through? There has got to be a limit to what you will do to catch the bad guys”

  “I know, Mark. Believe me, I know. I hurt all the people I love. But just think, darling, if we can save one teenage girl, won’t it be worth it? It’s not just about catching the bad guys. Please understand, Mark. What if it was Brad at risk?”

  They hugged and kissed while I looked on grinning. Suddenly Tracy pulled back, “I’ve got to go get ready.”

  When she came back out of the bathroom, Tracy looked like Mimi. She was wearing gray contact lenses, a blond/gray wig and she had aged her face. I thought at first it was Mimi.

  She laughed when she saw us staring, “I have to remain incognito while in public. Everyone has to believe I’m dead. George is in disguise also.”

  CHAPTER 36

  When we got back to New Orleans, we went straight to the Hyatt. Mark and I had a suite there and it was only a matter of moving Tracy in with Mark. The first thing Tracy did was to call her boss, Alan Coleman. She told him we knew she was alive.

  “They were doing their own investigating, trying to find out who killed me,” I heard Tracy say. “To tell the truth, I’m glad. I don’t like lying to my husband and kid, or anyone for that matter.”

  When she got off the phone she said, “Alan has given me permission to tell you the basics. The investigation started before Mackey said what he did on the witness stand. After he alluded to the pedophile ring, involving the judges, they had to make it appear that he had been killed.

  “He was recruited by the FBI and his death was faked. There was a prisoner who had been beaten to death, beyond recognition, in the shower. He was the same size as Mackey. Judge Truman did lie to us at the time. He’s one of the judges we can trust. The DA, defense attorney Crocker, and all of us were deceived.

  “Mackey thought he would profit from the FBI, by telling what he knew. He couldn’t help us that much. He didn’t really know much. It wasn’t enough that he escaped a jail sentence.

  “When he saw there was nothing else to gain, he went to Calvin Lessiter for employment. It was a pretty gutsy move considering Lessiter was one of the names he had given us.

  “We think he was able to get an in with Lessiter by being able to warn him
that we were onto him. After that, Lessiter used Mackey to help him discipline the girls.

  “Mackey found out he didn’t have the stomach for it and came back to us. He tried to convince us he had been getting information about Lassiter but hadn’t been part of the torture.

  “Things started falling apart when you rescued Julia,” she said and looked at me.

  “George and I were ordered to go to St. Augustine, move into Julia’s beach house and flush them out. We made sure to hit all the restaurants and ask about Lessiter and Mackey.

  “When we asked the waitress, Lucy, whom you met I believe, if she had seen them, we could tell right away she was attracted to Lessiter. We were counting on her to rat us out, and she did.

  “That very night they came to burn the house down. We were ready for them and got out. We had a Jane and John Doe, every morgue has them, and we substituted them.

  “We later put on disguises and followed them to the motel where they were staying…”

  “You killed them and then transported them to New Orleans?” I asked.

  “I didn’t say that,” she said.

  Mark and I looked at each other but didn’t pursue it. I personally didn’t care who killed them as long as they were dead.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” she said. “We believe Lessiter killed Mackey right after he helped him torch the beach house and took him to Julia’s condo in hopes of pinning it on Julia.”

  This made me so mad I almost lost it. “That son-of-a-bitch, he put her through hell and then tried to pin a murder charge on her. I’m glad you killed him. I wish I could have made him suffer before you killed him.”

  “I never said we killed him, Judith.”

  “Whatever. He’s dead and I’m glad. So where do we go from here?”

  “I plan to go to the meeting tonight at John and Rosa’s.”

  “How do you know about the meeting?” Mark asked.

  “John has kept me posted.”

  “Wait til I see him, I’m going to kick his ass,” Mark said.

  “He is a hell of an actor,” I said. “But I agree with Mark. He needs his ass kicked. But I’ll give him a break since he’s a new daddy.”

  “Good thinking, Judith. And by the way darling, you’re my big strong hero, but no match for John and I don’t want you hurt. I just got you back.”

  We were able to laugh a little over that but not for long.

  CHAPTER 37

  Since we still weren’t sure who we could trust, Tracy kept up her old lady act. On the way to John and Rosa’s house we told her what Delilah had heard, while living in the bayou.

  “The judge we suspect in St. Augustine is a woman,” Tracy said.

  “By the way,” she continued, “I called John while I was changing on the plane and he suggested you introduce me to everyone as Rosa’s mother, who has just flown in to see her first grandchild.”

  John was waiting on the front porch when we drove up and he was grinning from ear to ear. We hugged each other, but Tracy warned us not to be to overly enthusiastic.

  John looked at me and winked, “There’s someone who wants to see you in the kitchen, Judith.”

  When I got to the kitchen, Bill grabbed and kissed me. Someone cleared her throat. I pulled back and saw Delilah. Before I could rush over to her she gave a small shake of her head. She had several pots of food going and I greeted her like I would greet a servant. I saw by the twinkle in her eyes that I had done what she wanted.

  I looked in the pots and saw familiar Cajun dishes like she had cooked when I was living at Dave’s. I started talking to her about cooking and soon, just as I had hoped, Bill looked bored and excused himself. We kept up the pretense for a little while to make sure he wasn’t coming back before hugging.

  “It’s so good to see you, Delilah. But what are you doing here?”

  She laughed, “Dave thought it would be a good idea if I came over here to help out with the cooking. He say it would be a good idea too to check out this woman judge’s voice, to see if I recognized it.”

  “What a good idea, Delilah. Maybe you can pick up some vibes while you’re here too. Wow, just think, we’re all doing detective work.”

  I almost told her about Tracy being alive but decided against it. I knew I could trust her, but it wasn’t my secret to tell.

  I was sampling Delilah’s gumbo when Bill came in to tell me the judge and Sandy had arrived. Just then Tracy came into the kitchen carrying little Jennifer and I introduced her as Alice, Rosa’s mother. As we were leaving the kitchen, I noticed Delilah eyeing Tracy with suspicion.

  “I’ve managed to locate Tricia Hunter,” John announced when we were settled down with wine and the appetizers Delilah had brought in.

  “Patricia Hunter, the first victim of Calvin Lessiter?”

  “Yeah, she is now thirty two years old and lives in Virginia Beach. I talked to her briefly on the phone and she’s willing to talk to us.”

  “I’ll go,” I said, “it’s a nice safe assignment.”

  Bill spoke up, “I think I should go with her.”

  “What about your job here?” The judge asked.

  He looked at Sandy, “I think my partner can handle everything here. I have so much vacation time coming to me; I’ll never be able to take it all. I was planning to add it to my retirement anyway.”

  I felt excited. I was growing more and more attracted to Bill but, at the same time, I felt guilty about Ben. I knew if I spent more time alone with Bill I was going to end up very involved with him.

  “Well, I guess that’s settled then.” The judge gave a big sigh of relief. “That’s one thing out of the way. I just hope she can help us.”

  “I managed to get the autopsy report for Beth,” Sandy said. “It looks like she did die of exposure. She had a trace amount of benzodiazepine in her system, but nothing else. That could be from any over-the-counter headache medication.”

  “Does anyone else have anything?” asked the judge.

  When no one said anything she said, “Could we sit at the dining room table to finish this delicious meal?”

  We all laughed. The rest of the evening was lighthearted. Tracy helped Delilah serve and I was reminded of the first time I had met Tracy, when she was working undercover as a cook at the Reynolds’. No one seemed to notice the two servers studying them.

  After everyone left Delilah said, “That wasn’t the voice I heard. I got nothing but good vibes from this here judge.”

  She turned to Tracy. “You, on the other hand, are not who you pretend to be.”

  Tracy laughed, “You’re right,” and pulled off her wig and took out her contacts. “I’m Tracy Carr of the FBI. Everyone thinks I’m dead.”

  Delilah looked at Mark and smiled, “No wonder you seem so much lighter tonight. I thought it didn’t take you long to finish your grieving.”

  Tracy turned to me. “You sure you can trust Bill?”

  “Yes I am. Even when he arrested me, when I was sixteen, he was kind to me. He’s always been good to me. What about you, Delilah? You pick up anything on him?”

  “Besides the fact he wants to get in your pants? No I don’t. He has such a strong attraction to you it drowns everything else out.”

  I could feel myself blushing and that’s when Rosa came in. “She had a good man in Ben, but chose to throw it away,” she said.

  That made me kind of mad, but I didn’t say anything. I knew she was only concerned about me. I turned back to Delilah. “What about Sandy?”

  “She been in love with that white boy for years and she didn’t like him volunteering to go with you, no.”

  Mark, Tracy and I left to go back to the Hyatt at around 11:00 p.m. We stopped in at Georgie Porgies for a nightcap before going up to our room.

  CHAPTER 38

  Bill and I got to the airport at 7:00 a.m. The first thing I did when we were airborne was to order coffee. John had given us directions to Tricia’s house and told us she worked as a cocktail waitress at a
little bar on the beach.

  There is something I’ve never understood about morning people. We knew we couldn’t see Tricia until later in the day but Bill had insisted on getting an early morning flight. We couldn’t check into our rooms until later in the day either. I could have slept longer.

  We ended up walking along the river walk and stopping for breakfast. As soon as the Hyatt on the river let us, we checked into our rooms. Bill had made reservations and I noticed he had gotten a suite.

  We had time to kill and I turned on the TV. The news was on and they were showing footage of the police pulling up a body out of the river. It was a young woman. They were calling her Jane Doe. She had no ID on her.

  Tricia had told John that she usually slept until around 3:00 p.m. We got dressed and headed over to her apartment. We kept knocking but no one came to the door.

  Finally a girl came out of the apartment next door and said, “Quit knocking. She’s not there.”

  “Do you know when she will be back?” Bill asked.

  She had dirty blond hair and was wearing a dirty tee shirt and cut off jeans. “She didn’t come home all night,” she said.

  “Is that unusual?” I asked

  “Nah, she works at the same place as I do and sometimes we get lucky, if you know what I mean.”

  “I don’t feel good about this, Bill,” I said as we were walking away.

  I kept thinking about the body they had pulled out of the river, the same river where we had breakfast. We walked on the beach for awhile and Bill said he was going to drop me off at the Hyatt. He wanted to go to the local police station and see if they had an ID on the woman they had fished out of the river.

  While he was gone, I turned on the TV and surfed through the channels but could find nothing. I thought about ordering room service, but didn’t think I could eat anything. Instead, I paced.