The Whispering Room Read online

  “So she’s working on a book about the Courtland case already?” Evangeline’s tone was skeptical.

  “I don’t know about that,” Lapierre said. “All I know is that she dropped some pretty big names during our phone conversation. By the sound of it, she’s cultivated an impressive roster of sources in local law enforcement, including an NOPD deputy chief.”

  “Which one?”

  “Doesn’t matter. What does matter is that the woman is well-connected.”

  “Okay. So she’s well-connected.” Evangeline was puzzled by the phone call. Why was Lapierre telling her all this? “Is she coming in to give a statement?”

  “She claims she suffers from a mild form of agoraphobia. According to her, she’s prone to panic attacks anytime she leaves her house. So I’m sending someone to her place in the morning to hear what she has to say.”

  “If you don’t mind my asking, why are you telling me about her?” Evangeline said. “I’m off the case, remember?”

  “Oh, I remember all right. But Lena Saunders is refusing to talk to anyone but you, Theroux.”

  “Me? Why? I don’t even know her.”

  “She says she knew Johnny.”

  Evangeline was stunned into momentary silence. Her heart started to pound as she clutched her cell phone. “How?”

  “Evidently, he was one of her NOPD contacts.”

  “On which case?”

  “She didn’t say.”

  Even though the name had sounded familiar to Evangeline earlier, she was almost certain she hadn’t heard about Lena Saunders from Johnny. She would have remembered. And yet if he really had been one of the woman’s contacts, why hadn’t he mentioned her? He surely would have brought it up if he had talked with a writer.

  “I still don’t understand why she wants to see me.”

  “You can ask her yourself tomorrow,” Lapierre said.

  “Does this mean I’m back on the case?”

  “Nice try, but this is a one-time-only situation. The woman claims to know something about the Courtland murder case and we need to know what that something is. And since she has some influential friends up the food chain, I’m inclined to accommodate her just this once. The last thing I want is a deputy chief breathing down my neck.”

  Lapierre’s voice lowered conspiratorially. “Look, Theroux. I can’t tell you what to expect when you go over there in the morning, but just watch yourself, okay? This woman may not be the kind of tinfoil-hat whacko we’re used to dealing with, but if you ask me, she sounds like a real kook. This could be nothing more than a figment of her imagination, but we’ve got to hear her out anyway. When you leave her place, you come straight back to the station and see me. Don’t talk to anyone else about this, not even Hebert. You got me?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Evangeline said, resisting the urge to gloat. The unintended consequence of Lena Saunders’s request was that now Evangeline had more leverage than she’d had ten minutes ago. Not much more maybe, but if she played her cards right, she might just persuade Lapierre to put her back on the case.

  “Where and when do I meet her?” she asked.

  “Nine o’clock tomorrow morning at her house.” She gave Evangeline the Garden District address, then hung up.

  A few minutes later, Mitchell called. “Thought you’d like to know, I just heard from Lorraine. She was over at Linda’s house when Nathan called. Sounds like he’s on his way to the cemetery. If you hurry, you can probably still catch him.”

  “Hey, thanks for the heads-up.”

  “No problem. You want me to meet you over there?”

  “I’m only ten minutes away. He’d probably be gone by the time you could get there.”

  “Yeah, you’re probably right about that. Traffic’s a bitch today. Anything else going on I should know about?”

  Evangeline hated keeping things from Mitchell, but she also knew better than to get on Lapierre’s bad side. “Same old, same old,” she muttered.

  They chatted for a few more minutes, and then she called her mother to warn her she’d be late picking up J.D.

  It wasn’t until she’d hung up that Evangeline remembered she’d yet to thank her mother for the mobile.

  The sun was just setting when Evangeline pulled her car to the curb near the cemetery gates. Killing the engine, she watched as a tour guide shepherded a group of tourists to a waiting bus.

  That’s good, she thought. Get them all out of there before dark.

  Although popular destinations for tourists, New Orleans cemeteries were extremely dangerous at night. Common sense dictated that the narrow paths between the rows of vaults and tombs could effectively conceal a mugger, and yet every year people fell prey to vicious assaults, especially in the old cemeteries near the Quarter.

  Before she climbed out of the car, Evangeline slid her gun into the back pouch of her bag. Then she slipped the strap over her shoulder and across her body for easy access. As she walked across the street, she stayed alert for any untoward movement.

  And for Nathan Mallet.

  She’d already spotted his red Mustang across the street. The 1967 classic stood out among the SUVs and minivans of the tourists, and Evangeline remembered how much Johnny had always coveted that car.

  But to her eyes, the Mustang looked worse for the wear since the last time she’d seen it, and she wondered again what Nathan had been up to since Johnny’s shooting. Why he had felt the need to leave town so quickly.

  Several people still milled about inside the brick walls even though the sun was already setting. By New Orleans standards, Mount Olive was relatively new, but it had many of the same characteristics as the older cemeteries. The rusty iron gates opened into an eerie necropolis of sun-bleached tombs and contrasting shadows cast by the crosses and statues.

  If she had come to visit Johnny’s vault, Evangeline would need to turn right inside the gates, but that wasn’t why she was here. Her plan was to ambush Nathan on his way out.

  But after a moment, she found herself threading through the ornate tombs and mausoleums to the row of vaults at the back of the cemetery.

  Someone had placed fresh flowers and a votive candle in front of Johnny’s marker, and Evangeline wondered uneasily who had been visiting here while she’d been estranged.

  She touched the bronze plaque, still warm from the day’s heat, but she felt no connection to her husband’s remains. It was strange, but here, where his body had been laid to rest, Evangeline couldn’t feel his presence at all.

  The sun dipped below the treetops and the promise of twilight settled over the vault. But she knew it wasn’t a sign or a message from Johnny. Not this time. It was just the end of another day without him.

  Turning to leave, Evangeline noticed a man coming toward her on the path. He was tall and thin with a pale, emaciated face that was badly scarred on one side. He was dressed all in black and his hair gleamed like India ink.

  As he came closer, Evangeline could see that his lips were moving, and she thought at first he was speaking to her. Then she realized that he must be talking to himself.

  An icy awareness slid down her neck. She wanted to look away, but there was something oddly compelling about the strange man. She was intrigued by the scar on his face, by the pallid gauntness of his features.

  But what held her enthralled were his eyes. They were as black as night, and yet they seemed to burn with an inner fire that chilled her to the bone.

  His disturbing gaze was still on her when he drew even with Johnny’s tomb. He said something aloud, which Evangeline didn’t understand.

  “Excuse me?”

  He kept on walking, cutting her a sideways glance as he went by.

  When he was all the way to the end of the row, he looked over his shoulder. He said something else, and this time Evangeline could have sworn he mouthed her name.

  She started toward him, but by the time she got to the end of the vaults, he’d disappeared behind a large mausoleum.

  Slipping her han
d into her bag, Evangeline closed her fingers around the handle of her weapon. Wary of a trap, she gave the mausoleum a wide birth as she circled around to the front.

  The man was nowhere to be seen.

  Light from the fading sun sparked off the crypt’s stained-glass windows and a cross on the top cast a long shadow across the eerie landscape.

  Something had fallen to the grass on the path in front of her, and as Evangeline drew closer, she saw that it was an origami crane.

  She thought instantly of the mobile on her son’s crib, and she had the strangest feeling that the dark-haired man had dropped it there for her to find. But why? She didn’t even know who he was.

  Searching the path ahead of her, she caught a glimpse of him again. He was looking over his shoulder, smiling at her in a way that made her heart pound in trepidation. Who the hell was this joker and what did he want with her?

  Evangeline started after him again, but he was adept at using the maze of crypts and vaults to conceal himself. She followed him for several minutes, catching enough quick glimpses to lead her back to the gates. But when she emerged onto the street, he was nowhere to be found.

  Completely unsettled by the odd chase, Evangeline crossed the street and waited beside the red Mustang for Nathan Mallet. She kept an eye out for the scarred stranger, but he didn’t show himself again.

  Nathan came through the gates a little while later, but he didn’t see Evangeline until he was almost in front of her. He looked up in astonishment, as if suddenly catching sight of a ghost.

  “Evangeline? What are you doing here?” He was a lot thinner than the last time she’d seen him, and like his car, he looked a lot worse for the wear. His clothes were ragged, his hair unkempt and he seemed to have a hard time looking her in the eyes.

  “I came to see you, Nathan.”

  He glanced around nervously. “How did you know I’d be here? Never mind.” He lifted a hand and rubbed the scruff on his chin. “My sister’s always had a big mouth.”

  “Why haven’t you returned any of my phone calls?” Evangeline asked.

  Even in the disintegrating light, his eyes looked glassy and unfocused. “You know how it is. You never know what to say in a situation like that. Plus, I’ve got a lot of personal problems I’ve been dealing with lately.”

  “We’ve all got personal problems.”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “Could we go somewhere and talk?”

  “About what?”

  His darting gaze made Evangeline uneasy. He was on something, which could also make him volatile.

  “I’ve still got a lot of questions about the night Johnny died,” she said.

  “What makes you think I know the answers?”

  “You were working cases with him at the time of his death.”

  “Yeah, but we didn’t work every case together.” He shoved his hands in his pockets and stood looking out over the street. “You really shouldn’t have come looking for me,” he said softly. “I’m not going to be able to help you.”

  “Because you can’t or you won’t?”

  “You need to just go on home to your baby.”

  His tone deepened Evangeline’s disquiet. “That almost sounds like a threat, Nathan.”

  He shrugged. “You don’t need to be afraid of me.”

  “Is there someone else I should be afraid of?”

  He paused. “Can’t you just leave it alone? Johnny’s gone. Nothing I can say will bring him back.”

  “I know that. But I still want to talk to you. Can we sit in your car for a few minutes? I don’t like standing out here in the open like this. I feel too exposed.”

  He gave her a strange look, but he unlocked his car and they both climbed in. The interior smelled of reefer.

  Nathan’s head dropped to the back of the seat as he ran a hand across his eyes. “I don’t know what you think I can tell you. I wasn’t with Johnny that night.”

  “But you must have some idea of what he was doing in that parking garage. Why did he go there?”

  He stared straight ahead. “I don’t know.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  It was getting dark fast, but there was still enough ambient light coming through the windshield that Evangeline could see the harsh angles of Nathan’s face when he turned toward her. She could even see the regret in his eyes as he stared at her for the longest moment.

  Then he shook his head. “You don’t want to ask me any more questions about that night, Evangeline.”

  Her heart skipped a beat at the look on his face. “I have to know,” she whispered. “What was Johnny doing in that parking garage?”

  He drew a long breath and released it. “He went there to see a woman.”

  Fourteen

  To humor Lynette, Don spent several minutes driving around the neighborhood, looking for the old Cadillac Eldorado she’d spotted earlier, but apparently the car was long gone and so were the two snakes that had been on the patio.

  Lynette had watched them slither away just before Don got home, but to his credit, he’d grabbed an old machete from the garage that he used for hacking down bamboo and went outside to tramp around in the yard and flower beds.

  While he was out there, he decided the grass needed cutting, so he hauled out the lawn mower and got to work.

  Lynette stood at the kitchen window and watched him make pass after pass through the grass. The light was almost gone, but he didn’t let up until the whole backyard was trimmed. Somewhere along the way, he’d discarded his shirt, and Lynette was surprised by the flutter of awareness in the pit of her stomach.

  How long had it been since she’d noticed how attractive her husband still was? How long since she’d paid him a real compliment?

  Despair settled around her heart. She was still so mad at him she could spit, but her anger did nothing to fill the hole left by his indifference.

  Lynette wanted to turn away from the window, pretend that nothing was wrong. Pretend their lives would go on just as they always had. But she had the strangest notion that if she looked away, or even blinked, she might never see him again.

  Mistakenly, she’d believed that the glue of a forty-year marriage was strong enough to bind them together forever. But while she’d remained rooted to the past, entrenched in their settled ways, Don had moved on. And she’d let it happen without lifting a finger to stop it.

  Lynette’s eyes burned dryly as she watched him wheel the lawn mower toward the back gate. She didn’t take her eyes off him until he’d disappeared on the other side of the fence, and then finally she turned back to the stove.

  He came inside a few minutes later and she heard him go into the bathroom to get cleaned up. She wondered if he would even notice the scrubbed tile in the shower, the stack of clean towels in the linen closet, the cake of fresh soap in the porcelain dish. Had he ever noticed any of those things, or did he just take her labors for granted?

  When he came back into the kitchen, he was dressed in pressed khakis and a pullover shirt in the color of blue that Lynette had always loved on him.

  His hair still damp from the shower, he stood in the doorway and propped one hand against the frame. “Something smells good.”

  She glanced over her shoulder as she continued to work. “It’s nothing special. Just gumbo and cornbread. Peach pie for dessert.”

  “Your gumbo’s always special,” he said.

  Lynette turned in surprise and she felt a catch in her chest as their gazes met briefly. But when he saw her hopeful smile, he glanced away.

  She tried not to let it bother her as she bustled around the kitchen, cleaning the counters and loading the dishwasher.

  “I should get back to the office,” he finally said. “I’ve still got work to do tonight.”

  Lynette tried to mask her disappointment as she shrugged. “That’s too bad. Evangeline will be here to pick up the baby soon. I was hoping we could all have dinner together tonight. It’s been a while since you’ve seen her,
hasn’t it?”

  Don glanced at his watch. “How much longer before she gets here?”

  “She had an errand to run first, but she should be here any time now.”

  “I guess I can stick around for a little while.” He folded his arms and leaned a shoulder against the door frame. “Listen, Lynette, when she gets here, I don’t think we should mention any of this to her. She’s got enough on her plate these days as it is.”

  “Mention what?” Evangeline asked. She’d let herself in the front door and had come up behind Don without either of them seeing her.

  It was likely no one else would have noticed her pinched mouth or the feverish gleam in her blue eyes, but Lynette knew her daughter too well.

  Something had happened to badly upset her, but Lynette had learned a long time ago that Evangeline didn’t like to talk about her work. Not the bad cases, anyway. Nor did she talk much about her personal problems, even when Johnny had died. She kept so much bottled up inside her.

  Maybe that’s my fault.

  Lynette had never been one to talk about her feelings, either. Maybe if she’d been a little more open with Don, their marriage wouldn’t be on the brink of disaster.

  Her first instinct still was to wrap her arms around her daughter, hold her close, protect her as best she could from the ugliness out there in the world. Shield her from any more pain that might be headed her way.

  God knows, she’s suffered enough.

  Lynette had always been protective of both her children, but especially Evangeline, in large part because of her gender and size. But she needn’t have played favorites because Evangeline was stronger than Vaughn, stronger than all of them. Her daughter had grown into a remarkable young woman.

  Maybe in trying to shelter Evangeline, she’d really been trying to protect herself, Lynette thought. Maybe it was high time she faced some hard truths about her own life.

  “What were you two talking about?” Evangeline asked as she came into the kitchen.

  Lynette took a deep breath and spoke before Don had a chance to. “Your dad is moving out.”