The Whispering Room Read online

  She couldn’t believe she’d actually said it, and now that she had, she couldn’t bear to witness the look on Evangeline’s face.

  So Lynette turned instead to her husband. She could tell he was shocked that she’d beat him to the punch, but the relief she’d expected to find in his eyes was slow to form.

  Instead, the emotion that flickered across his face looked a little like panic.

  Well, Lynette thought. Well.

  Evangeline sat at the kitchen table, bouncing J.D. on her knee. Her father had left before dinner, mumbling something about getting back to the office, and now she and her mother sat across from one another, avoiding each other’s eyes.

  J.D. crammed a blue plastic rattle in his mouth, then offered it to Evangeline. “Hmm, slobbers,” she said, and he gave her a toothless grin as she pretended to lick the toy.

  Her mother had given him a bath earlier, and now he smelled of baby powder and the apple sauce he’d had for dinner. The red-and-white-striped sleeper he wore looked so soft and adorable, Evangeline just wanted to cuddle him, but at the moment, J.D. had other ideas. He was wide-awake and raring to go. Flinging the rattle to the floor, he squealed in delight when it landed with a loud clack against the tile. Then he started to fuss until the toy was retrieved so that he could do it all over again.

  “Dinner was great, Mom,” Evangeline finally said. “Let me put J.D. in his high chair and I’ll do the dishes real quick.”

  Her mother gave an absent wave. “Don’t bother with the dishes. It’ll give me something to do after you and the baby leave.” She looked tearless and stoic, but Evangeline knew it was just a facade.

  “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  “I’m fine. This has been building for a while now. Your father…” She trailed off as her gaze darted away. “After all these years, you think you know someone,” she murmured.

  Evangeline thought about Nathan’s revelation earlier. Of all the things she’d imagined him telling her about the night Johnny died, another woman had never once crossed her mind.

  “It’s not how it sounds,” he’d rushed to assure her. “He was just visiting a friend.”

  “Is that what he told you?”

  Nathan glanced away without answering.

  “Who is she?”

  “I don’t know her name. I don’t think Johnny ever mentioned it.”

  “You’re lying.”

  He sighed and scrubbed a trembling hand down his face. “She was a material witness on one of his cases, okay? That’s how they met. She was having a hard time getting by, like a lot of people are these days. He felt sorry for her and tried to give her a hand now and then until she got back on her feet. They were just friends. Johnny swore that’s all it was.”

  “Then why did he never tell me about her?”

  “Maybe he was afraid you’d get the wrong idea.”

  No kidding, Evangeline thought now as she gazed down at her son.

  But she’d never given Johnny a reason for worrying she’d jump to the wrong conclusion. She wasn’t clingy and emotional, nor had she ever been the jealous type. She was not the kind of wife who harbored unwarranted distrust for any woman who came into contact with her husband. Evangeline had no problem with Johnny having female friends. After all, she had Mitchell.

  So there was no reason for him to keep things from her, even a friendship with a female witness. Evangeline had always believed their relationship was open and honest and mutually trusting. There was nothing they couldn’t tell one another.

  Apparently, she’d been wrong.

  Not only had Johnny kept that friendship from her, he’d never mentioned Lena Saunders, either.

  Now Evangeline couldn’t help wondering what else she might discover about her dead husband. Something Meredith Courtland said about her own marriage came back to her.

  I guess that’s why they say the wife is the last to know.

  Maybe the cracks had been there in their marriage all along, but also like Meredith Courtland, Evangeline had chosen not to see them.

  Impulsively, she reached across the table and took her mother’s hand. “I’m sorry you’re having to go through this. But all marriages have problems. Maybe Dad will come to his senses and it’ll all blow over.”

  “Maybe he will,” Lynette said with a wan smile.

  “Can I ask you something, Mom?”

  “What is it?”

  “What was Dad’s problem with Johnny?”

  Lynette looked up in surprise. “What do you mean?”

  “It was so obvious he didn’t like him, and I never understood why.”

  “Fathers are always protective of their daughters. It’s only natural.”

  “Are you sure that’s all it was. Dad didn’t…he didn’t suspect something about Johnny?”

  “Like what, honey?”

  At her mother’s tender tone, Evangeline felt an unexpected flood of tears. She lifted J.D. to her chest and rested her cheek against the top of his head. He tolerated the affection for a moment before he pulled away.

  What if Johnny really had been involved with another woman? What if everything she thought about him, about their life together, was nothing but a lie?

  What if he had never really loved her?

  “What’s wrong, Evangeline?”

  She squeezed her eyes closed. “I still miss him, Mama. Sometimes I don’t think I can bear it, I miss him so bad.”

  “I know, honey.”

  “At least with Dad, you’ve still got a chance to make things right. But with Johnny…I just keep thinking about all the things I wished I’d said to him before it was too late. I lie in bed at night and all the arguments we ever had go round and round in my head. I remember every petty little thing I ever said to him, the way I used to nag at him for leaving his clothes on the bathroom floor or dishes in the sink. And I wish I could take it all back. I wish…even now…I wish…” She wiped a hand across her wet cheek. “I just want him back. I don’t care what he did…I just want him back.”

  Later that night, Evangeline awakened to the strangest feeling. She’d been so certain when she opened her eyes that she’d find Johnny standing over her, she was actually startled when no one was there. Something lingered, though. She thought at first it was his cologne, but it was really just a memory.

  Even so, she got up out of bed and checked in the bathroom. Then she padded down the hallway to the baby’s room. She checked every inch of the house before crawling back into bed and huddling under the covers.

  Johnny was gone. He wasn’t coming back. Ever.

  She rolled to his side of the bed and buried her face in his pillow. But the linens had been laundered too many times and his scent had long ago faded.

  And Evangeline knew that no matter how hard she tried, eventually some of her memories would slip away, too.

  Fifteen

  Hours after Nathan Mallet left Mount Olive, he drove to a bar a few blocks from the cemetery and parked on the street so that anyone tailing him would be sure to spot his car.

  Taking his time, he locked the door, pocketed the key, then went inside and found a table at the back where he could watch the whole room, including the front door.

  When the bored waitress came over to take his order, he discreetly showed her his badge—after all, she wouldn’t know that he’d walked off the job months ago—and asked if there was a back way out of the place.

  She pointed to the restroom area. “Go through that door, past the men’s room and it’s at the end of the hall.” Nervously, she glanced around the empty bar. “Is there going to be trouble?”

  “Nothing for you to worry about,” he told her. “I just need to get someone off my tail.”

  She didn’t look at all reassured. Mallet saw her talking to the bartender a few minutes later, and they both kept glancing in his direction. He just hoped they didn’t decide to call the cops, at least not before he could get out of there.

  When the waitress returned with his drink, Ma
llet downed the whiskey, slid the empty glass to the edge of the table and motioned for another. He discreetly dropped some bills on the table, then got up and headed toward the restrooms, bypassing the men’s room for the rear exit at the end of the hall.

  He opened the door and slipped outside. Pressing himself into the shadows, he peered down the alley toward the street. When the coast seemed clear, he hurried to the back where he climbed a chain-link fence and jumped down on the other side.

  A few minutes later, he was back at the cemetery.

  The gates were closed and locked by this time, but he scaled the brick wall easy enough and soon he was making his way through the crypts and mausoleums to his first wife’s vault, where he’d been earlier.

  Dropping to the ground, he leaned back against the still-warm concrete as he removed his gun from his pocket and tucked it beneath his leg. Then he pulled a fifth of whiskey from his other pocket, uncapped the bottle and took a long swig before letting his head fall back against the vault.

  After a while, it started to mist and he turned his face skyward, letting the moisture cool his overheated skin. He was nervous and punchy, but being back here with Teri helped calm him. It always did.

  Man, he still missed that girl.

  She’d only been eighteen when they married, fresh from her high school graduation when they ran off to Biloxi. He’d just celebrated his twenty-first birthday. Young, stupid, crazy in love.

  Back then he’d wanted nothing more than to be with her day and night. Even now, he could remember feeling that he would never be able to get enough of her.

  A year later, she was dead. Killed by a drunk driver when his car hit hers head-on.

  Nathan had quit drinking after the accident. He felt he owed her that much. For years, he never so much as touched a drop, but then his life had taken one bad turn after another. His mistakes had started to catch up with him, and he’d sometimes have a drink or two just to get through the day. Before he knew it, he couldn’t crawl out of bed without the sauce. He went to sleep loaded and he woke up reaching for his next drink.

  His second wife, Kathy, was a good woman and God knows she deserved a lot better than what he’d put her through over the years. But after all this time—well over a decade—he’d never been able to forget about Teri. He’d never been able to stop thinking about what might have been. If only he’d been with her that day. If only she’d taken another route home.

  Nathan’s visits to the cemetery had become both easier and harder over the years. Easier because it was the only place where he ever felt any real peace. Harder because it always hit him anew how much he’d lost when Teri died.

  “Hello, Nathan.”

  With an effort, he opened his eyes. He hadn’t even realized he’d drifted off, but when he saw the man standing over him, he came fully awake and a warning shivered down his spine.

  He couldn’t see the man’s face, but he knew that voice.

  “Long time no see,” Nathan said as he dropped his hand to the ground beside his leg. “I was about to give up. Thought no one was coming. I’d have been mighty pissed, too, after driving all the way up here to see you.”

  “Have you ever known Sonny to go back on his word?”

  Nathan shrugged. “Like I said, it’s been a long time. People change.”

  “You sure have.” The man kicked Nathan’s foot with the toe of his boot. “You look like shit.”

  “Thanks a lot.” He lifted the bottle and took a long swig.

  “You need to take better care of yourself. Maybe try a steady diet of something besides Jim Beam.”

  “I’ll make you a deal. You live your life, I’ll live mine.”

  The man laughed softly and turned to glance around. “I didn’t see your car on the street. How’d you get over here?”

  “Walked.”

  “From where?”

  “From where I left my car,” Nathan said, evading the question.

  The man turned back to him. “The feds are bound to know you’re back in town by now. You sure you weren’t followed?”

  Nathan snorted. “None of those fuckers know New Orleans like I do.”

  “Don’t get too confident.”

  “I’m not,” he said. “Matter of fact, I ran into a little unexpected trouble when I was here earlier.”

  “Yeah, we know about that.”

  Nathan looked up in surprise. “You know? What, you guys spying on me?”

  “Just keeping an eye on things,” the man said. “Big difference.”

  Right.

  “What did Evangeline Theroux want?” he asked.

  Nathan scowled. “What do you think she wanted?”

  The man hesitated. “Let me rephrase that. What did you tell her?”

  “Nothing, man.”

  “She sure seemed upset when she left. So I repeat…what did you tell her?”

  Nathan wiped a shaky hand across his mouth. “She kept asking about that night. I had to tell her something to get her off my back.”

  “And?”

  “I told her about the woman.”

  Another long pause. “I see.”

  “At least now she’ll stop asking questions,” Nathan said hopefully.

  “You think?”

  “Yeah, man, we’re chill.” He handed up the bottle to his companion. “Have a drink and relax.”

  “No, thanks, but you go ahead and knock yourself out.”

  “Don’t mind if I do.” Nathan took another swallow and recapped the bottle.

  “What else are you on?” the man asked conversationally.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’m talking about drugs, Nathan. Narcotics. Chemicals. What gets you baked these days?”

  “Hey, I’m clean.”

  “Sure you are. That’s why you look like a walking corpse. Hooch didn’t do that kind of damage. If I was a betting man, I’d put my money on meth. The nirvana of the Southern redneck.”

  Nathan’s hand was still beside him on the ground. Just a fingertip away from his gun. “Something tells me you didn’t come here just to insult me. Why’d you want to see me anyway?”

  “We’ve got some loose ends that need tying up.”

  “Such as?”

  “You’ve got an addiction, Nathan. That makes you dangerous to Sonny. Especially with the feds breathing down his neck.”

  “Nah, man. What are you talking about?” Nathan’s fingers inched closer to his weapon. He didn’t like where this conversation was headed.

  “When you run out of money, you might be tempted to start selling secrets. We can’t have that, now can we?”

  Nathan reached for his gun, but he was too late. He barely caught a glimpse of the silenced weapon before a bullet caught him square between the eyes. His head flew back, spraying blood and membrane all over his dead wife’s tomb.

  He was dead instantly, but the killer pumped two more rounds into his chest for good measure. Then he squatted beside Nathan’s body and rummaged through his jacket until he found a wallet and car keys.

  Standing, he pocketed the booty, then turned and made his way to the back of the cemetery, where he slowly walked down the row of vaults, reading the plaques.

  Johnny Theroux. Rest in peace, asshole. Scaling the brick wall, he dropped like a cat to the other side.

  A moment later, he disappeared into the night.

  Sixteen

  The next morning, Evangeline pulled to the curb in front of the address Lapierre had given her the day before. It was a little before nine, and she was glad to have a few minutes to herself before interviewing the mysterious Lena Saunders.

  Evangeline hauled out the notes she’d scribbled earlier at the station, but she found it impossible to focus her thoughts. Her eyes burned from fatigue, and she squeezed them closed for a moment against the blinding sunlight that bounced off the windshield of a parked car.

  She hadn’t slept much the night before. Too much on her mind.

  On the heels of Nathan’
s disclosure had come the news of her parents’ impending separation. She supposed the trouble in that marriage had been brewing for a long time, too, but she’d managed to convince herself they’d work things out. If their relationship had survived the hell her brother, Vaughn, had put them through back in his youth, she would have thought they could weather any storm.

  Apparently, she’d been wrong about that, too.

  Was there such a thing as a healthy marriage these days? she wondered.

  Her parents. Mitchell and Lorraine. And now the memory of her and Johnny’s marriage was tarnished with doubt.

  Glancing at her watch, Evangeline saw that it was almost nine. She climbed out of the car and took a moment to gaze around the neighborhood. Lena Saunders lived only a few blocks over from Meredith Courtland in the Garden District. The houses along this street were slightly smaller, but the yards and gardens were just as well kept, the white facades of the homes just as sparkling in the summer heat.

  Out on the street, two boys rode by on bicycles, ball gloves swinging from their handlebars. They laughed and clowned as they sped through the lawn sprinklers, and Evangeline wondered for a moment what her life would be like when J.D. reached that age.

  She watched the boys until they were out of sight, and then she turned and started up the walkway. The bushes were still dripping from the sprinklers, and the air smelled of wet grass and honeysuckle.

  The door was opened by a young man in linen pants, leather sandals and a thin cotton shirt. His light brown hair was stylishly cut, and behind the thick black frames of his glasses, green eyes twinkled with good humor.

  “You must be Detective Theroux,” he said, stepping back from the door so that she could enter. “Come on in. Lena is expecting you.”

  He led her from the light-flooded foyer into a large room decorated in gray and black with punches of red. The layout of the house reminded Evangeline of the Courtland home, but the clean, minimalist furnishings were a far cry from Meredith Courtland’s lush, eclectic style.

  But the view from the French doors was exactly the same—a sun-drenched courtyard and sparkling pool.