She’d always liked David. He’d majored in theater, but she’d always thought he might have turned into a playwright. He loved to tell stories. Had a flair for the dramatic, which he’d used to make a good living with the tour company he’d started with Julian Henri. There, his love of local lore and dramatic talents had combined perfectly. She knew that he and Julian had accumulated raves from almost every online travel site.
“Rougarou. I think the thing is real,” he muttered. “I didn’t at first. I mean, it was all going so well. The rougarou was a legend told to scare kids, to make us be safe, to make us behave. All the stories about the Good Witch and Count D’Oro. They’re just that. Stories. Last night, the tour boat was full and we were going to make some serious money. We’re booked for weeks to come. But I don’t know now. I’ve put the tours on hold and returned the fees paid. We were telling the tales, talking about the area, working the group, and then we found a dead man.”
She’d not seen nor heard any of the local news for the day. Most of the time Billie or Bo Ray managed the shop. She was there often, but thanks to them she could focus more on her studio and be with Quinn. More time to deal with problems just like this one since, after all, she had inherited the Cheshire Cat and all that came with it. Now she realized that Jake Larue had probably called Quinn because of the murder—even if it had occurred way out in Honey Swamp.
“David, you do understand that whoever killed this man may have been aware of our local legends and just used one to their advantage.”
She could barely remember the details of when the last bayou murders had taken place. Understandable, given she was only six. But it was as if history was repeating itself. History from long ago.
And from not so long ago.
He looked at her, his thoughts apparently running parallel with hers. “You remember, don’t you? It was the same thing. Those young women out in the swamp. Three of them. And they never did catch the killer. They blamed it on the rougarou. The local people did, anyway. The press dubbed him the Wolfman Killer because of what happened to the throats. That was twenty years ago. Then the killing stopped. And now?” His voice carried anguish. “What else could it be?”
“There are still many logical reasons why this happened, David. Even in the way it did. There are still the normal motives for murder. Someone was furious. Someone wanted to get even. Jealousy, hatred, greed. And this someone knows the legend, as we do, and thought that killing like that would cause everyone to get scared and shake the police off the right track. Yes, this is truly horrible, but I’m still confused. You said that the rougarou sent you a note?” She tried to smile and ease his sense of fear. “This is the first time I’ve ever heard that the rougarou liked to write.”
David’s fear wasn’t eased, nor was he amused, and he glared at her. “In the mud, Danni. He wrote in the mud. Near the dock. Julian brought the people and our boat back in. I went with the police. But when they brought me back in I saw it by the floodlights we keep burning by the dock. There were letters, weird letters, like a kid had written them.”
“What did they say?”
“‘I’m coming for you.’”
David’s voice was just a sliver of sound on the air.
“The area had been pretty trampled by then. People were really freaked out. They couldn’t wait to get back on the bus. The police had to interview them all.” He tightened his hold and dropped his gaze to his mug. “The cops didn’t see what I saw, Danni. And before I could tell them to stop, they walked all over the letters, erasing every last one.”
“David, that message could have been for anyone. You said there were twenty or so people on the tour. And it might have been innocent, like someone’s friend trying to say that they’d be there to pick them up instead of them coming back into town.”
“You don’t get it, Danni.”
He thrust a finger into his chest.
“My name was there. In the mud. It said, ‘David, I’m coming for you.’”
Chapter 2
“I know it was a monster.”
Jane Eagle appeared to be the younger of the two women seated in Larue’s office—and the most hysterical.
“Okay,” Quinn said gravely, not disputing her. He turned to her friend and travel companion, Lana Adair, and asked, “Did you see the monster?”
Lana tossed Jane a guilty expression, as if she hated telling the truth. “I didn’t see him. Not in the swamp. But I did see the dead man. His head was…there was blood in the water and…white stuff. I mean the poor fellow’s brains. Oh, God.”
“Did you see the monster at your balcony window?” Quinn asked.
Lana shook her head, glancing sadly at Jane again. “I did see what looked like bloody prints of some kind. We didn’t even call the police. We left and got a cab because we didn’t know where we were going and asked for the closest police station. Detective Larue sent some men out right away, and he told us it was blood.”
“The guy on the boat wasn’t lying,” Jane said. “It was a monster. A rougarou. That’s what he was talking about. And he was so good, so knowledgeable. He was great. Until—”
“The body in the bayou. And for all that blood and stuff to be in the water, it had to just have happened,” Lana said.
“The guide didn’t freak out. I think his friend did a little. Or his partner. The captain. His name was Julian. After the lady saw the body and yelled, he turned white. Then the guide—”
“David,” Jane said. “Cute. Nice.”
“He was pretty competent,” Lana said. “He got on some kind of radio and called the police. They came in a boat. David, yeah. David, that’s his name. Anyway, he got on the cop boat and the captain brought us back to the dock to be questioned.”
“We were all freaked out on the bus back to the city,” Jane said. “We had drinks.”
“Lots of them,” Lana added.
“Oh, we don’t usually,” Jane said. “I mean, yeah, it’s New Orleans, but we’re not big drinkers. I just love the city in winter. Kinda cold, but not too cold. Nice to walk around.” She hesitated. “It was there. We’re at that cool place on Dauphine. It’s only two stories and every room has a balcony, either looking over the courtyard or the street, and every balcony has a window and a door. The rougarou was in the window. I saw him. And he saw me. He knows I saw him in the swamp and I think he’s after me because I did.”
She was close to hysterics and Quinn knew he needed to calm things down. “We can start by moving your room.”
“You really think there was a rougarou and that it followed these young ladies to their hotel?” Larue asked, obviously trying hard not to sound so incredulous that he offended the young women.
Quinn looked at Larue, who quickly read his expression. No, he didn’t think a monster had followed them. But changing rooms could appease the young women, or at the least make them feel better, as if the police were trying to do something.
His friend nodded in agreement.
“We’ll get a police escort and have you out of your hotel and into one that is right on Bourbon Street,” he said. “It’ll be a room over one of the hottest night spots where there are always cops and security guards. Detective Larue and I will go with you so that we can personally make an inspection. Now, bear in mind, we don’t doubt what you saw. We’re just not sure what you saw is really a rougarou.” He lifted a hand as Jane was about to protest. “People in this area all know the legends about the rougarou. Someone out there might be using the legend. In this day and age, it’s quite possible to fake a monster.”
They both looked at him with huge eyes, seemingly wanting to trust in him.
“Sound like a plan?” Quinn asked Larue.
The detective nodded. “Let’s move, though. We have to get out to Honey Swamp. We’re going to help the task force with the investigation.”
Ten minutes later they were at the hotel where the young women were staying. Quinn inspected the balcony while they gathered their belongings tog
ether. The room sat on the second floor, but the balcony might have been easily accessed from the street. There was a heavy pipe near enough for someone to crawl up and gain a grip on one of the wrought iron rails. “How did someone walk through the French Quarter all dressed up without being noticed?”
“This is New Orleans,” Larue said. “Not far from Bourbon Street. Think about it, Quinn. Does anyone really notice crazy around here? I mean, there’s a lot of crazy.”
“Something like the rougarou? A giant man with a wolf’s head?”
“Somebody walked stark naked down Bourbon Street about two days ago, and it took that long for anyone to report it to the police,” Larue told him.
“That’s not a rougarou.”
Larue shrugged. “Okay. I’ll give you that.”
“To put a spin of logic on this, I’d say that it was more than possible for a man to dress up, then crawl up here to scare Jane and Lana. It’s also possible that whoever was here had nothing to do with the murder in the swamp, or maybe someone got wind of the situation and knew that the two young women had been on the tour and decided to scare them. They’re visitors, yes, but they know the city and they might have met a young man anxious to scare them. Then he comes along and offers his presence as protection against whatever has them frightened.”
Larue did not argue.
“At any rate,” Quinn said. “Let’s go meet your friends from Pearl River.”
* * * *
“I remember the murders,” David said, looking into space as if he could see across the years. “My dad was so worried about my mom. He didn’t want her going out at all. They found the one young woman, Genevieve LaCoste, almost where we were last night. I don’t know why I remember her name so clearly. She was a mess. The medical examiner said that she’d been ripped up by animals after death. But Danni, her throat was ripped out, too. Just like the guy last night. The cops never found the killer. They insisted that there was a killer, but old Selena Duarte told them that it was the rougarou. She said that the young women had behaved badly. They ignored the rules of Lent and spent their nights drinking and meeting up with young men at bars.”
“They never caught the killer,” Danni said, “but that doesn’t mean that there was a rougarou. Have you offended anyone, David? You or Julian? Do you know if anyone is angry with you? Someone who would do something so horrible, just to ruin your tours?”
He laughed. “There’s old Selena Duarte. But she’s five-foot-two and pretty fragile.”
“Why is Selena upset with you?”
“She considers the swamp her personal property.”
“But other companies do swamp tours there.”
“Apparently, according to Selena, our night tours have awakened the spirit of the rougarou. We’re not being respectful.”
“Anyone else?” Danni asked.
She wished that Quinn was here. She wasn’t sure how to help David or where to go from there. She’d learned that objects could be evil. Either within themselves or by making others believe in evil.
The rougarou of legend was not a thing, not inanimate. It was a beast, a creature, a monster.
“Julian is one of the nicest guys in the world. He’s never offended anyone,” David said. “Except for that one guy. He wanted a job with us, but Julian didn’t like him. He said that he came in for the interview either stoned or drunk. And when Julian said something, the guy told him that he should be cool, ‘it was like, New Orleans, and you know, we’re all laid back here.’ In fact, he thought that we should serve absinthe on our swamp tours, and that the captain and the guide ought to drink with everyone. You know Julian. He’s a safety first kind of guy. Partying is fine on your off hours, but never when you have a responsibility. He told the guy to get out. The guy told Julian that he was going to rot in hell.”
“You still have his application?” Danni asked.
“Sure. But whether people tell the truth on an application or not is another matter,” David reminded her.
“Let’s head over to the office. Is Julian there?”
“He should be. It’s right on Chartres Street. Are we walking?”
“Yep. And we’ll take Wolf with us,” she told David.
Though he couldn’t protect them from everything, the dog’s presence might make David feel better. She hurried into the shop to tell Billie that she’d be with David and to give Quinn a heads-up if he called. Billie had Bo Ray down working with him. She left the shop with David.
As they walked down Royal Street to the corner, then to Chartres, they passed her shop window. Count D’Oro stood there, his mannequin eyes fantastically evil, his white shirt and gold vest impeccable despite the pool of fabric “blood” at his feet and the display of “Rougarou Repellent,” voodoo-doll-like charms on the small three-pronged stool by his side. The mannequin had an evil twist to its lips and he gripped his cane with its silver wolf’s head with casual ease, as if ready to move at any moment. David stopped walking and stared. It was clear that he hadn’t noticed the window when he’d visited the shop in the past.
“Count D’Oro, known to have awakened the demon of the rougarou before his murder spree,” he said.
“The man was a sick murderer long before he believed he had the power of the rougarou, and long before he claimed that it was the rougarou doing the killing,” she told him.
David continued to stare at the display, then he turned to Danni. “He claimed that the rougarou did the killing. Others claimed that he turned into the rougarou, that his head became the head of a vicious wolf-like monster with mammoth, ripping teeth. Supposedly, he used that cane to bash heads in.”
“That cane is plastic, David. It’s just a display.”
“Of course,” he murmured, laying his hand on Wolf’s head. “Let’s go talk to Julian about the weird guy who applied for a job. But from what he said, the guy wasn’t much of a rougarou. More like an idiot.”
He started walking.
She followed him, glancing back at her own display.
Strange.
It seemed like the smile on the mannequin of Count D’Oro had widened.
Ever so slightly.
* * * *
The two cops from Pearl River seemed like solid guys. Hayden Beauchamp was young, fairly new to the force, slim, fit, and a bit in awe of the older Dirk Deerfield.
Deerfield was a twenty-five-year vet with the force. Larue had told Quinn that he was planning his retirement in another five years. Before being with the Pearl River force, he’d spent five years with the LAPD. He was weathered, easy, and confident, and he’d heard about Quinn.
In fact, he’d seen him play football.
“There was a professional career out there for you,” he told Quinn after shaking his hand. “Can’t say as that I’d not have chosen football over police work or investigation.”
Quinn shook his head. “Football honestly wasn’t that kind to me. I think I’m where I’m supposed to be now.”
They’d met at the station and gone through the medical examiner’s initial notes. Then they looked at the crime scene photos.
“Thing is, the bayou isn’t kind,” Deerfield said. “We had police and forensic crews out to the site within the hour. But all the blood and other matter had dispersed. A few creatures were already nibbling on the corpse. We’re lucky a hungry gator didn’t just take it down.”
“Shall we see the site?” Larue asked.
Deerfield nodded. “You can, but there’s nothing to find. Crews went over the area. Not a single piece of evidence. Not even litter thrown out by a passersby. But, sure, we can head to the site. All this harkens back to some bad stuff about twenty years ago.”
“I remember,” Quinn said.
“I even remember,” Beauchamp added. “I was just a kid back then, but I remember. I can’t believe that I’m working with a cop who was on that case. Sad and amazing. All that, and the killer got away.”
“Still haunts me,” Deerfield said. “We never caught that guy.
From what I understand, though, it wouldn’t make much sense for this to be the same perpetrator. From the classes they send us to, I understand that such a killer either gets worse, gets caught, or gets dead. He just doesn’t stop for twenty years. And that rougarou bull that goes around? What? Some wolf-headed, old Cajun legend hides out for twenty years without anyone catching sight of it? I don’t think so.”
“You’re thinking some kind of a copycat killer?” Larue asked Deerfield.
“Could be. Regardless, he needs to be caught. Three young women. Lovely, sweet girls. And we had nothing. Boyfriend of one was seen by dozens of people working. We checked out the local tours, the neighbors, you name it. We had no forensic evidence. It was a nightmare.”
“Just like here,” Quinn asked. “The same. Down to the details?”
“Same method of murder,” Deerfield said wearily. “But this time the victim was a man. Someone has been studying the past.”
“Autopsy was first thing this morning,” Beauchamp said. “Rush on everything, and since so much of his skull was cracked in, throat all ripped up, and him in the water, the ID became a challenge. We can’t just put a picture of him out in the papers. No fingerprints matched anything we have, but we do have some dental charts in our missing persons report.”
“Bring up the autopsy report, will you, Hayden?” Deerfield asked Beauchamp.
Quinn lowered his head to hide a small smile. Deerfield was key in that partnership. Older, more experienced, aware of the pitfalls. Beauchamp pulled his weight in their partnership with tech expertise, his phone the size of a notepad, and he had the report up as Deerfield finished speaking.
“White male between the age of twenty-eight and thirty-four. Five-feet-ten-inches tall. One-hundred and seventy-five pounds. Last meal—crawfish etouffee, grits, and asparagus. He’d eaten somewhere in the hour and a half before his death, and Doc Melloni has been around a while. He knew right away, which is good. Thing is, most places out here do serve crawfish etouffee.”