We’d just driven past the tiger’s cage, LSU’s real live mascot pacing somewhere in its concrete cave, when she said, “How the hell do you remember their names?” and for a second I thought she meant the tiger.
I glanced over at her. “How the hell can’t you?”
“I remember the motherfuckers who do it. The rest is as much of a blur as I can make it. James Duncan.”
I nodded. “The stepdad.”
“That felt good, catching him.” She pitched her cigarette.
“Gwen!”
“What?” Her tone was just as testy as mine.
I pointed at the ashtray, and she scowled, gazed out the window. I wondered if she really didn’t remember Letticia Baldin’s name. We’d worked it together, brought the group out two nights later to the parking lot that faced her first-floor apartment.
Letticia Baldin had been a vivacious nine-year-old with poor vision, dyslexia, and an aptitude for art. She’d been the oldest of five children and frequently ran the household, or attempted to. Her mother was a drunk, her stepdad a crack addict. Her mother, in a moment of lucidity, had thrown James Duncan out several weeks before. He came back to the apartment one night, strung out and looking to steal something he could sell to support his habit. He thought everyone was gone, but Letticia was there, sleeping in the front bedroom. We knew from his statement that she stood up to him, told him to get out. We knew from the crime scene that she fought and fought hard. He beat her, stabbed her multiple times with a pocketknife, tried to strangle her with his hands. He hit her so hard on the chest with a hammer that her heart was bruised from its impact with her spine. Still she fought: she clawed him, broke two ribs, and left three bite marks in his arm and upper back. Finally he took an electrical cord, stood on her body, and pulled it tight around her neck until she stopped kicking and breathing.
“You know, I worry about you,” Gwen said as we turned onto River Road.
“You back on that again?”
“You work this shit over too much.”
“Nah.”
“Yeah you do.”
“No, I do not.”
“You’re doing it right now. I can see it in your face, girl.”
“Gwen.”
She gave a small strangled laugh. “You know what I do out there? I pray we catch whatever pissant fucker did it and hope we don’t get caught ourselves.”
“Then why do you do it?”
She looked at me like I was stupid. “Because you ask me. The more important question is why you do it.”
I shrugged.
“Like beating a dead corpse,” she muttered, then did her burro’s hiccup laugh. “Sick pun, huh?”
I bit back a reply as she pointed, said, “Look, they’re up there.”
We drove up the dirt road that led to the top of the levee. Four cars were pulled off in the grass. Tracy, Cathy, and Angie leaned up against one car. Marge and Beth, partners out of Plank Road Precinct, leaned against another, a study in contrasts: Marge was wide and solid with dark wavy hair and thick features; Beth was tiny, delicate almost—the gun on her hip was almost bigger than her forearm and gave her an unbalanced look—her blondish-white hair was cropped as short as a man’s. Like Gwen and me, everyone wore jeans, sneakers, and dark sleeveless tops or T-shirts. All of us had been on the job for seven years or more except Angie, whom I didn’t know well but thought had too quick a smile. The others I liked and trusted: Beth for her steadiness and practicality, Marge for her grittiness and humor, Cathy for her decency and integrity.
Tracy walked up looking tired. Somehow she always looked diminished in civilian clothes, more middle-aged too. “Marge and Beth will ride with you; the rest will come with me. No lights once we hit the road.”
“Anyone else coming?” Gwen asked.
“They’re working or couldn’t make it.”
“Smart move,” Gwen muttered as Beth and Marge climbed into the backseat. “What’s new, ladies?”
“Cathy thinks her husband’s drinking again,” Beth said.
“Yeah,” I said, “I heard.” Cathy’s husband, Ray, worked in Auto Theft and could be a morose jerk.
“Really?” Gwen leaned forward and studied Cathy through the windshield. “You never said anything.”
“Knowing Ray, it’s possible,” Marge said.
“You think?” Beth said.
Marge nodded. “Good detective, though.”
“They make a strange couple,” Beth said.
“He’s an arrogant fucker,” Gwen said.
Angie passed in front of our car, raised a hand in greeting. She looked as if she were promenading down sorority row: her steps bouncy, arms swinging, whistling an unrecognizable tune.
“She’s different, isn’t she,” Beth said, more comment than question.
I grunted.
“She’s young,” Marge said.
“I heard she fucks like a rabbit—” Gwen began.
“Gwen,” I warned.
“What? What’s with your Gwen thing tonight?” She snorted, her “dickhead” snort. In the rearview mirror, I saw Beth and Marge exchange quick glances.
“Nothing,” I said.
We rode with the windows down, the warm, humid air barely moving over our skin, the faint light from the moon guiding my way and throwing jagged patterns across the road as I drove slowly past Doris Whitehead’s dark house with the window units going full blast, past Jeannette’s quiet, empty house, and pulled off on the shoulder, then cut the engine.
Tracy motioned for me to the lead the way, and I checked quickly to make sure my gun was snug in its belt holster; the others were doing the same. We never went anywhere without our guns: the supermarket, bars, out for dinner, running errands. Sometimes it was in a purse, sometimes tucked under clothing. There was no down-time really, except in the sanctuary of your own home.
I cut on my five-cell flashlight to orient myself then shut it off and once again traversed the length of Jeannette’s empty driveway—her car gone, impounded for evidence—feeling a moment of déjà vu as I heard our footsteps crunching louder than I liked on the shell driveway. We moved as quietly as we could, stopping often to listen before moving on. I always loved this moment, it seemed magical to me, when your eyes slowly adjusted to the dark and you realized you could see more than you thought, when you became a part of the night instead of fighting against it.
“It is fucking spooky out here,” Gwen whispered. I stifled another “Gwen.” She always said this. It was her way of saying, “I’d rather be somewhere doing something else.”
Still, she had a point. It was always a little unsettling returning to the scene of a crime, middle of the night or not. Something lingered, took on subtle vibrations that thickened the air: this way violence was, here be the shadow of terror.
Don’t be silly, I chided, shaking myself back into the moment.
The moon flitted in and out behind the clouds. Other than the sounds of our breathing and our footsteps, the silence was unnatural and heavy, the humidity smothering, a thick blanket you couldn’t take off. Sweat trickled down my neck and back, gathered at the edges of my hair.
Technically we weren’t supposed to be here. No one was supposed to enter a crime scene until the Homicide detectives took the tape down. So we were always careful to stand only on the boundaries of the taped-off area, careful to leave no trace of our presence. And we never entered a structure. Then again, we were the law, and we could go pretty much where we damned well pleased. Still, how would we explain our presence here? We hardly talked about it among ourselves.
If we were ever caught, at the very least there’d be lots of questions. And the department was overly cautious these days, toeing the inside of the official line since Steve Darcy’s shooting. We could be transferred to desk jobs, deemed unstable. Or too emotional. Wacko women, Wiccans, spiritual mumbo-jumbo, supernatural raising of the dead: who knew what other cops would think. Especially the men. How do you explain the need to honor a woman who h
as been brutally murdered, to remember her for who she was, to give at least some weight to the life she lived and fought to keep, to say, “We remember you, we will always remember you and what you went through.”
Beth cut off a sneeze, whispered, “Allergies, sorry.”
I led them to the rear of Jeannette’s house, under the shadow of a large pecan tree and several hackberries, so we faced the window of her bedroom. We stood in a tight circle, our shoulders just touching. I tucked my flashlight in a back pocket and folded my arms, suddenly wishing I were here alone. It seemed terribly important, urgent even, that they feel the nuances of her life, not just see her as another murdered woman.
“Well?” Tracy pushed a hunk of hair off her brow, gestured at me to begin. I shut my eyes, trying to find the path that would bring her to life for them.
I traveled back to the moment I stood over Jeannette’s body, opened my eyes, and spoke in a low voice about what I knew of her life, the letter she’d written Vince, what he’d done to her. Marge and Beth swore several times under their breath; Tracy sighed repeatedly. Angie and Cathy kept their eyes closed, Cathy frowning slightly. Only Gwen looked at me as I spoke, her gaze steady, her earlier comment hovering at the edges of her blue eyes: You know, I worry about you. I’m okay, I wanted to tell her, really truly. It’s just a blip, a bump; I’ll get over it.
A slight rustle off to our right made us pause, listening. Angie put her hand on her gun.
“Critters,” I whispered.
“Five minutes,” Tracy said, her voice clipped but soft. “Then we’re out of here.”
I stared at Jeannette’s house, thought about her singing rock-and-roll songs when Vince wasn’t home. I remembered the Rolling Stones tape in her car, and a line floated up: you can’t always get what you wa-ant. I thought about Gwen’s bad pun—beating a dead corpse. Is that what we were doing? Was this all just some egoic salve, an exercise in futility? Fact: A dead body. Fact: There was nothing we could do to change that. Fact: We were alive, and she wasn’t.
The moon came out from behind a cloud and reflected off her bedroom window. She would have seen that moon at night, lying there in bed next to her silent husband—him done for the moment with her body—her yearning for more rising up in her throat, making her bones scream. Did she long to leave, I wondered, just to get the hell out of there, or did she really believe she could make it work, that Vince would see her, hear her?
I readjusted my gaze. Something wasn’t right.
I must have made a sound, because Gwen looked over at me, and her face changed expressions fast. The second she whispered my name, half question, half alarm to her voice, I thought I saw movement beyond the window, a darker blur in the shadows of the interior, and it dawned on me that the blinds were up, not down as Barker and Cowan would have left them, not down, my mind quickly registered, as they’d been on all the other windows we’d passed by on our way back here.
Now everyone else was looking at me too and following my gaze to the window.
“Blinds are up,” I whispered. “Should be down.” I bent my knees, my hand on my gun as I quickly looked to the right, just inside the edge of the window. Looking directly at objects in the dark doesn’t work; the mind plays tricks and vision blurs. As I shifted my eyes, trying to look without looking, Tracy was already on the move. “Something’s in there,” she hissed.
Icy-hot beetles scurried through my body.
“Motherfuck.” Gwen tugged at my arm. I shook her off, my throat and mouth dry and tight, ran quietly toward the window in a crouch, Marge and Beth flanking me on either side. Gwen swore again, but I knew from the sound of her footsteps she was right behind me.
We stood on either side of the window, our sides pressed up against the wood, guns out and pointed upward in both hands, speaking in urgent whispers, using hand signals. Tracy stood behind an oak tree, where she could see us and the south side of the house.
“Cover the front,” Marge said.
“Cathy and Angie have it,” Tracy said.
Beth and I did a quick glance in the window at the same time, pulled back and shook our heads.
“Sarah.” Gwen had her hand on my back, both pressing to let me know she was there and tugging to get me to move back.
If that was Vince in there, if our too-tense nerves hadn’t imagined movement, what would we do with him? Get to a phone. We needed to get to a phone and get units out here. I took a step back.
Beth had just ducked under the window toward us, and I’d taken several more steps backward, following Gwen’s hand now bunched around my T-shirt, pulling me, when several sounds came in quick succession: a soft thud inside the house, the squeak of a screen door, and just behind those noises, the distinct crisp sound of a shell being racked into a shotgun from the north side of the house.
There was a tangled rush of movement: Marge followed Tracy around the south side as I edged to the north corner, Gwen’s gun inches from my shoulder. Beth was just behind us, her funny allergy wheeze squeaking rapidly.
Gwen and I looked at each other, nodded, and we stepped out, Beth at Gwen’s shoulder, around the corner, saw the figures coming down the kitchen steps, moved quickly into a wide stance with knees slightly bent, arms outstretched, guns pointed at what I now saw were two men.
“GET ’EM UP, MOTHERFUCKERS,” Gwen yelled, me right on her heels with a thick, deep “FREEZE, POLICE,” trying to see their hands in the patchy moonlight. Empty, I thought, the hands look empty, but they were moving in and out of the shadows, those hands, they kept moving even as the men attached to the hands froze, heads turning slowly toward my voice, when a gun went off, twice, my ears slapped hard with the sound, and the first man, the one farthest from the house, pitched forward and collapsed onto the dirt.
The other man—thin, short, heavily bearded—threw his empty hands into the air. “What the fuck you doing?” he said, backing up several steps, even as I was running, all of us running, Gwen and Beth beside me, Marge and Tracy from the other side of the house, running toward the men.
Gwen reached down to the man on the ground. Two large gaping exit holes gushed blood from his back. “Gun, he had a gun.”
“I heard a shotgun being racked,” Beth said, and Tracy said, “Me too.”
“Don’t move, don’t think of moving,” I hissed at the living man, his eyes round and white, his breathing rapid, a half snarl quivering brave around his lips.
Marge and Tracy knelt beside Gwen. “Where is it?” Gwen kept saying. She felt under his body, patted the ground beside him.
Tracy touched a hand to his neck. “No pulse.” No movement either. This man had died quick and hard.
“SHIT, he had a gun; I saw a gun.” Gwen’s voice was soft but emphatic, anger and fear all mixed together in a way I’d never heard before. Panic, I realized. I was hearing panic in Gwen Stewart’s voice. My stomach twisted.
“It could’ve traveled some when he fell,” Marge said, and she and Tracy started making wider circles. Beth pulled the flashlight out of my back pocket and joined them. Cathy stood off to one side, her hands resting on her waist, watching Gwen.
I pulled out my badge and held it up in front of the man’s face. “Name?” He wore black jeans, a dark red T-shirt, and a baseball cap.
“You women all cops?” His voice was both incredulous and sarcastic.
“What is your name?”
“Vince.”
“Vince.” I felt a rush of elation and smiled, my not-at-all-sweet smile. “Pleased to meet you. And who’s this here?”
“Roger. What the hell you shoot him for?”
“He had a gun.”
“Ain’t neither one of us had a gun, you stupid bitch.” The look on his face was contemptuous. A pit opened wider in my stomach.
“Motherfucked,” Gwen muttered and heaved the dead man over, started patting him down, her movements jerky.
“Freeze!” Marge said suddenly, and I looked, saw her and Tracy and Beth with guns pointed toward the trees
. The flashlight illuminated Doris Whitehead, stepping out from behind an oak tree, shotgun pointed at the ground.
Oh, sweet Jesus. “Not the woman,” I yelled. “She’s okay.”
Vince shifted, whispered, “Goddamn nosy old cooze,” and I looked over at him. “Uh-uh,” I said. “Steady there.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Marge take the shotgun from Doris Whitehead’s hands. She gave a tight-lipped smile to Marge, who carefully opened the shotgun and ejected the round.
“That explains the shotgun,” Tracy said, and Gwen swore again. I found it hard to breathe. Vince cut off a chuckle when I looked at him.
“Officer Jeffries,” Doris Whitehead said. “This is that sumabitch I told you about.” The satisfaction in her voice was tight and grim.
“You know this woman?” Marge asked.
“Name’s Doris Whitehead. Lives next door,” I said.
“I get my hands on you—” Vince growled. His hands began to drop, and he shuffled forward.
That’s all it took. I never said a word. I just tackled him low at the knees, letting my shoulders carry us to the ground, my weight and fury hold his squirming body down, my hands moving quickly over his upper body, checking for weapons, him yelping and panting as he fought until Beth came around and pressed her knees against the flesh near his collarbone, digging in so hard he grimaced, swearing at him not to move, not even to think of moving, telling him to shut up. I straddled him, pulled out a wallet, a screwdriver, a wad of cash, two rings, pliers, a pack of cigarettes, and a hefty set of keys from his pockets. Beth kicked each object out of his reach as I tossed it. I checked his groin, squeezing his balls hard enough to get a squealed “oomph” out of him, ran my hands around his waistband, down his legs, the backs of his knees, inside his socks, three fingers inside his workman’s boots. I looked at Beth, said, “That’s it.” She nodded, her allergy wheeze rattling like a fan, but she didn’t ease up the pressure on his collarbone.
Anything You Say Can and Will Be Used Against You Page 19
