A Thin Dark Line

seen.

Gus had come to her bedside on Sunday to personally take her statement regarding Doll Renard. He listened without comment while Annie related the events of the last ten days, his face lined with a tense emotion she was afraid to name.

She thought about it now as she sat down on the edge of the bed to rest a moment from the effort of getting dressed. What had been gained and what had been lost in all of this? A murderer had been unmasked and stopped. Annie had gained insights into her own strengths and abilities. But the losses seemed disproportionately heavy. She'd seen an ugly side to men she had to work with and rely upon. Lives had been altered, some damaged beyond repair.

She limped out of the hospital into a day that was cool and gray with the promise of rain, and eased herself awkwardly into the shotgun seat of the cruiser Noblier had sent for her. The deputy was Phil Prejean. He squirmed in the driver's seat like a five-year-old with a full bladder.

'I-ah-I'm sorry for what all that happened, Annie,' he said. 'I hope you can accept my apology.'

'Yeah, sure,' she said without conviction, and fixed her gaze out the window.

They drove out of the lot with an itchy silence thick in the air between them.

News vans from television stations all over Louisiana crowded the curbs out in front of the courthouse, even though the arraignment was still more than an hour away. The parking lot was clogged with cars. Annie wondered what those same reporters who had called Hunter Davidson a folk hero ten days ago would call him now that he'd killed an innocent man.

The story of a crime went so much deeper than what people read in the papers or saw on the nightly news. No reporter could cram into a column inch or a sixty-second sound bite how the repercussions rolled outward from a single violent epicenter to shake the lives of so many people- the victim's family and the perpetrator's, the cops and the community.

Josie Bichon had been left without a mother. Her grandfather would go to trial for murder. Belle Davidson had lost a daughter and stood to lose a husband. Victor Renard had lost the only people who could understand any part of the workings of his damaged mind. The people of Bayou Breaux had suffered irreparable damage to their sense of trust and safety.

Prejean pulled into a visitor's slot near the back entrance to the law enforcement center. Annie hoped it wasn't prophetic. Hooker scowled at her with suspicion as she limped past his desk, as if she had been revealed as an undercover spy on his shift. She received a variation on that same look from Myron as she passed the records counter. Valerie Comb in Noblier's outer office still looked at her as if she were a bad piece of meat.

The sheriff had put on his funeral suit for the day's media attentions, a charcoal pinstripe that didn't hang quite right on his big-boned frame. He'd already jerked his tie loose at the throat. He looked older than Annie remembered him a week ago.

'How you doing, Annie? You okay for this?'

Alarm struck a low, vibrating note in her gut. 'That depends on what this is, sir.'

'Have a seat,' he offered, pointing to one of his visitor's chairs. 'The doctor released you?'

'Yes, sir.'

'He signed a release? You'll forgive my skepticism, but you've developed a bad habit of defying orders recently.'

'They didn't give me a copy of it,' Annie said, sucking a breath in through clenched teeth as she settled herself down on the edge of the chair. 'They gave me a bill.'

His point about her insubordination made, Noblier didn't press for the documentation. He settled into his own chair and looked at her hard for a moment. Annie returned his stare evenly.

'We executed a search warrant on the Renard home over the weekend,' he began at last, opening the pencil drawer of his desk. 'Among possessions found in Marcus Renard's workroom were items known to belong to Pam Bichon. We also found this.'

He tossed the plastic dancing alligator across the desk. Annie picked it up, feeling a vague embarrassment at the silliness of the thing with its leering grin and red beret. Then feeling a creepy sense of violation. Renard had taken this innocent trinket from her as a token. He'd fondled it, held it, and thinking of her, tainted it.

'Deputy Prejean recognized it. Thought you might want it back.'

'Thank you, sir.' She slipped it into her jacket pocket, knowing she would throw it away the minute she left the room.

'Found in Doll Renard's bedroom was a nine-inch boning knife. Found it between her mattress and box spring,' he went on. 'Never found it before because the warrants never extended to Mrs. Renard's bedroom. The knife's been sent to the lab.'

'Was it clean?'

Noblier weighed his answer for a moment, then decided she'd earned it. 'No. It wasn't.'

The idea turned Annie's stomach. Doll Renard had kept a bloody knife beneath her mattress so that she could take it out and remind herself of the atrocities she had committed in the name of motherhood. But she appreciated the evidence for what it would provide. Closure-for Pam, for her family, for the cops who had worked the case. 'They'll be able to match blood and tissue.'

'I expect so.'

'Good.'

The sheriff went silent again, watching her, frowning. A bad sign, she thought.

'I been giving a lot of thought to this over the last couple of days, Annie,' he began. 'I can't condone my deputies going off on their own, investigating cases they ain't assigned to.'

'No, sir,' Annie murmured.

'You always have been one to stick your nose in where it don't belong.'

'Yes, sir.'

'Nothing but trouble. Creates dissension. Undermines command.'

Annie said nothing. She had a perverse need to relish the feel of her career slipping away.

'On the other hand, it shows initiative, guts, ambition,' he said, taking the pendulum back to the high side. 'Tell me this, Annie: Why'd you go after Fourcade that night?'

'Because it was the right thing to do.'

'And why'd you go after Renard on your own?'

It was Annie's turn to weigh her answer. She could have said she hadn't trusted Stokes to do the job, but that wasn't it, not really. Not on a gut level. Not in her soul, where it counted most.

'Because I felt I owed it to Pam. I was the first person to see what her killer had done to her. There was something very… personal about that. I felt like I owed her. I found her body, I wanted to find her justice too.'

Gus nodded his head, pursing his lips. 'You haven't talked to the press.'

'No, sir.'

'At the press conference this afternoon I'll be telling them how you were working undercover to help crack this case. Your next paycheck will reflect your overtime.'

Annie's eyes widened at what sounded for all intents and purposes to be a bribe.

Noblier read her face like a clock and narrowed his small eyes. 'I won't have my authority undermined, Annie. My deputies work for me, not around me. The OT is a bonus- consider it hazard pay. Understood?'

'Yes, sir.'

'You got a hell of a lot to learn about how the world works, Broussard.' He had already begun his dismissal of her, his attention going to the notes he had scribbled for the press conference. 'Report back to me when you come in off sick leave. We'll do the paperwork on your reassignment… Detective.'

Detective Broussard. Annie tried the sound of it in her mind as she hobbled back down the hall. It sounded good. She pulled the plastic alligator from her pocket and tossed it in the trash as she passed the sergeant's desk.

Fourcade was waiting for her outside the door. He stood leaning against the building, his ankles crossed, his hands in the pockets of his jacket, concern in his eyes.

'Noblier made me a detective,' she announced, hearing the ring of disbelief in her own voice.