“If they’re here, no one has broken into my house,” she said.
“Hey, I was taught to walk a lady to her door,” he said lightly.
“Ah, now we’re going to be...polite, nice, courteous?”
“I really am nice, polite and courteous. I was just hoping Ryder—that’s Detective Stapleton—would let me work this thing.”
“Because you should still be a cop?” she asked him.
He shrugged. “Yeah, I should still be a cop. Or something. Or...” He let his voice trail. He looked at her for a moment with real concern and confusion. “You... So you’ve seen the dead for a long time?”
She hesitated and then exhaled a long breath.
“A dead man saved my life,” she said softly. Then she grimaced. “When I surfaced and saw the boat, the blood, my parents... I went numb. I fell back in the water. I would have drowned. But there was a man in the water, a long-dead pirate—or privateer, as he later assured me.” She took another deep breath. “And then I came here, to New Orleans, and... Well, they like to say this is one of the most haunted cities in the country.” She shrugged. “It is. Helps a hell of a lot when you’re a tour guide.”
He smiled ruefully. “I guess it would.”
“You?”
“Today,” he said quietly. “Today. My first time. And I don’t...”
“Don’t...”
“I’ve seen a lot of death. FDLE, we got a lot of bad cases. Bodies in stages of decomposition, bodies chopped to throw in the ocean...a lot of bad. Lost both my parents, though they were older, and it was natural causes.” He shrugged. “As I said, my family is in Lafayette Cemetery in the Garden District.”
“I’m sorry,” she murmured.
He smiled. An honest smile. “The thing is... I’m wondering why I suddenly see a flapper who passed away in the 1920s.”
“Maybe because you needed to see her. I saw my pirate because I needed to survive. Maybe you need her to help with this case.”
He smiled and nodded again. “Well, then, let me get you to your door. I understand the NOPD and the FBI will have a task force with Adam as the titular lead, and Axel, Ryder and me—and every cop and agent in the city on it.”
“What do I do?”
“Be a tour guide. I’ll find you in the afternoon,” he said.
The dogs followed them to Katie’s door, tails wagging.
She unlocked her door, and Dan peeked in.
“Love this. Great little house,” he told her.
“Thanks.”
“You want to let these guys in for the night?” he asked her.
“Ah, well, they’re following us because they want treats. But the gates between the stables and my place are open. Their job is to guard the stables, and they have nice plush beds there.”
“Okay, then.” Still, he hesitated. “I listened to everything you said about Neil Browne and Jennie. And I think you’re really on to something with them.”
“You do?” she asked. “Even with George saying they existed, it seemed the cops back then thought he had made them up, and I was a kid and didn’t know better and agreed. While he was never arrested for my parents’ murders, he was under suspicion. The hospital stated his condition was critical when he was first found, and there was no hard evidence he committed the crime. His story of being hit and sent flying overboard chimed with the forensic evidence they did find.”
He shrugged, looking out at the night. “I’ve come across people like the man you described. They’re charming. Pleasant, polite, devious and cold-blooded. Psychopaths. Killing someone is no different than squashing a bug to such people. Sometimes, people they kill are just in the way, preventing what the person wants. And sometimes they become fixated on an idea, and to them people need to die because of that idea. People—and statistics—show most such killers are men, but I’ve seen the work of misfired minds come in male and female. I think...”
“Yes?” she asked.
He was looking toward the road in front of her house beyond the gate.
“I’ll tell you another time,” he said. “Axel and Adam are waiting. They’re not impatient types, but it is late, and tomorrow the autopsies are starting at 7:00 a.m.”
“Yes, of course, go ahead.”
“I will tell you,” he promised, “when I see you next.”
He waved, heading down the walk and out to the waiting car.
CHAPTER FIVE
Dan’s morning started at the morgue with Axel and Ryder.
Adam Harrison was working at the local offices, where he could remain in contact with their main offices and gather any intel from research he could find.
Dr. Vincent was going to handle all three bodies. While the New Orleans morgue had more medical examiners—good ones—on staff, it had been agreed he would oversee the autopsies on all three victims.
And if such attacks should arise again, he would oversee the autopsies done on those victims, too. Any little detail could become important, and the medical examiner on one case might see that same detail in another.
It would be a long morning.
Despite so much that was obvious, Dr. Vincent carefully went over each body. And Dan could only imagine the scene as it had unfolded.
Dan had read Ryder’s reports on the victims, and he couldn’t help but think about them as their wounds were described in detail and the customary autopsy procedures were performed.
Elle Détente had been in her midforties; she had been a beloved caretaker for the elderly couple for almost twenty years; Randolph Rodenberry had suffered from Parkinson’s disease, and when their son had left home to become career military, they had hired Elle. She had been a childless, young widow; she was one of the family. Dan could imagine she hadn’t suspected anything amiss, that she had been shocked to turn away from the sink where she had been rinsing a few dishes and see an axe-wielding killer before her.
Randolph might have opened his eyes to see his killer, but he hadn’t seen them long. The first blow had cleaved his skull down a line
