Submission Page 16

  She pushed the door farther inward, repeating his name.

  It took a moment for her eyes to adjust. When blackness turned into shades of gray and outlines of furniture, she reached back and closed the door after herself.

  And the minute she heard the lock click home, she felt a blow to the back of her head that plunged her into an unyielding darkness.

  22

  “WHAT DO YOU MEAN SHE’S checked out?”

  It was all I could do not to grab the tie the guy at the Ritz’s front desk wore and use it as a garrote.

  “I’m sorry, Detective, but that’s what it says here. She checked out yesterday at noon.”

  I looked down at the computer screen he was consulting as if I could make heads or tails out of what he was reading. “Does it give a forwarding address?”

  “Let me look….”

  I paced a short ways away, reaching for my hat, only to realize I must have left it at my sisters’ house. Damn. I ran my fingers through my hair instead.

  “No, I’m sorry, sir, there’s no forwarding address listed.”

  I stormed from the lobby, taking in everything and everyone around me. Why would Molly check out? Obviously she was still in town, because she’d succeeded in finding my youngest sister.

  Or maybe the gesture had been her last before she’d finally given up on finding her own sister’s killer and headed back home to Toledo.

  My heart thundered in my chest at not knowing where she was. Whether she was safe. What she was doing.

  The tires squealed as I pulled away from the curb, heading to…I didn’t know where.

  MOLLY WAS HAVING THE dream again. The one where she was Claire on the morning she’d been murdered. She felt the cold blade of a knife being pressed against her throat. The warmth of her own blood seeping out of her wound, dripping onto the sheets of the bed she lay on.

  Gasping for air, she snapped upright—only to find a weight on her hips preventing her from moving.

  “Stay still, you little whore.”

  A woman’s voice. And if her nose was correct, she was the source of the stifling perfume Molly had smelled at the entrance of Alan’s apartment.

  Alan.

  “I don’t understand,” the woman said, ripping the front of Molly’s shirt open. “I already killed you. I already killed you. How could you have survived? I already killed you.”

  Molly’s lungs refused air as she fought to hold her destroyed shirt together. The woman’s words left little doubt in her mind as to their meaning: she was her sister’s murderer.

  And she thought Molly was Claire.

  Her captor straddled her hips, effectively pinning her to the bed. Molly’s legs felt like deadweight and her head pounded where she’d taken the hit. How long had she been out of it? And what was the woman doing in Alan’s apartment?

  She frantically looked around the apartment from her vantage point but could make out little in the darkness.

  “Please,” she said. “I’m not Claire.”

  Her captor caught her around the throat. In the dimness Molly could see that she wore all black. And that she was a complete stranger to her.

  “Don’t you lie to me, slut! What do you take me for, an idiot? I’ll never forget your face. Not when you came to my house with your little story, ruining my life by telling me my husband loved you. You!” Her fingers tightened and Molly coughed in reflex. “I paid you to stay away from him. You took the goddamn money and kept seeing him anyway.” Her voice grew shriller. “Did you think I wouldn’t find out? Did you think I was stupid? Well, Astrid Devereaux Hodge might be a lot of things, but stupid is not one of them, do you hear me?”

  The name rang a bell somewhere in the cottony depths of Molly’s mind.

  Please, please let someone hear her. Let someone hear her screams and call the police.

  Then she remembered where she was. Recalled that down here in the Big Easy people were reluctant to call the police. If an incident didn’t have an immediate impact on them, the general populace looked the other way, ignored it, letting things happen that perhaps were meant to.

  Panic and dread saturated her muscles as Astrid released her grip on Molly’s neck. Molly coughed violently. She could smell leather and realized it was because the other woman was wearing gloves.

  “No, no…I must stick to my plan. Stick to my plan.”

  Molly recognized the way Astrid repeated everything twice, almost in a state of delirium. Dealing with a murderous woman was difficult enough. Facing a deranged murderous woman was even worse. There would be no reasoning. No laying out of the facts. No talking her out of what she was about to do.

  With a start she realized that her sister had known her killer. Only it hadn’t been the man she loved. It had been his wife.

  Hot tears welled up in her eyes. Had Claire tried to debate with the insane woman when she’d woken up to find her in the hotel room she’d shared for one night with Claude Lafitte? Claire had been no lightweight. Molly knew that fact from years of sibling rivalry that had sometimes involved physical tussles.

  She definitely would have fought.

  Astrid ripped off the rest of Molly’s shirt, then tugged at the waist of her slacks.

  “What…what are you doing?” Molly whispered, forcing herself to be calm, to get a grip on the situation, waiting for the best time to try to make her escape.

  “Revealing you for the whore that you are.”

  Molly’s belt pulled free, and Astrid tossed it over the side of the bed where she’d thrown her shirt.

  “That’s what they should do to women like you. Forget a scarlet letter. You should be made to walk around naked for the whole world to see what a whore you are.”

  Her voice broke as if she was close to tears.

  “Twenty years. Twenty goddamn years I put into that marriage. The perfect wife. I entertained for him. Helped him land his job as captain of the goddamn precinct. I took care of myself for him. Watched what I ate. Exercised. Bought the best makeup and the prettiest clothes. I even gave up my dream of having children because of him. He didn’t want them. Said it would ruin my figure.” She had her hands to her head, as if she was hearing voices she didn’t want to listen to. “Every day I serviced him. Sometimes twice. Do you know how many times that is in twenty years?”

  Molly was too occupied with the information Astrid had just given her.

  Hodge. That was the name of Alan’s immediate superior. The captain of the precinct where he worked.

  And Alan had had an affair with the captain’s wife….

  The woman who’d killed her sister.

  Instinct trumped her fear as she grabbed Astrid’s arms and tried to twist her from where she sat on top of her.

  The other woman shrieked, fighting her with a power that could be fuelled by nothing less than insanity.

  With the strength of her legs combined with her hold on Astrid’s hands, Molly managed to throw her off balance, then followed through by shoving her off the bed, to the left. As soon as she was free, she rolled to the right, so that they stood staring at each other across the mattress.

  “You’re helping him, aren’t you?” Astrid accused, waving a knife that looked as if it could have gutted an elephant. “Alan’s been hiding you from me so you could all get me out of the way.”

  Molly’s gaze was stuck on the knife, which glinted with light shining in from the window behind her.

  “You’re probably fucking him, too, aren’t you? Of course. Because that’s what whores like you do.”

  This whole “whore” bit was starting to wear on Molly’s nerves. Her sister may have been a lot of things, but a whore was not one of them. And neither was she.

  Even as she knew quick, clear thinking would be the only thing to see her out of the situation alive, she couldn’t help the anger that burgeoned inside her. She eyed where Astrid stood between her and the door, then looked around for something to use to protect herself. Surely there was a bottle of bourbon somewhere. To
her surprise, she didn’t see any.

  She stared at a lamp. But rather than pick it up to ward off attack, she switched it on.

  Astrid reacted as though the sudden burst of light had blinded her, moving her arm to shield her eyes and gasping.

  “I…am…not…Claire,” Molly said evenly. She snatched the top sheet from the bed and wrapped it around her right arm. If she held out any hope of disarming Astrid, she’d need the protection, something to ward off the sharp blade of the knife. “I’m her twin sister. But if you’re determined to pursue whatever you had in mind, I’ll gladly avenge her death.”

  Astrid seemed to regain her bearings. While she still held her arm up to shield her eyes, she waved the knife she held.

  “Liar. If that’s the truth, what are you doing here?”

  “She’s here because she belongs here,” a male voice said.

  Alan.

  Molly’s heart skipped a beat in her chest as she spotted him in the open doorway.

  “While you, Astrid, most certainly do not.”

  His presence seemed to catch Astrid off guard.

  Why wasn’t he drawing his gun? Molly thought in a panic.

  He held out his arms. “Christ, Astrid, what are you doing?”

  The older woman looked a word away from collapsing in grief. “Oh, Alan. I just couldn’t take your rejection anymore. I needed to see you. But you wouldn’t let me. I needed for you to tell me everything would be okay, just like you did before.”

  Molly relaxed, but only slightly, as she stood in her bra, with her pants undone, her top shredded on the floor at her feet. Her breathing had slowed, but she was still aware of its ragged sound. Perhaps because she had come too close to not breathing ever again.

  “I think she came here to kill you,” she told Alan.

  He squinted at her.

  “She was already in the apartment when I came by. The door was ajar. Then, when I came inside, she accosted me.”

  “She’s lying!” Astrid charged. “That whore is incapable of uttering one truthful word.”

  “Then what were you doing inside my apartment, Astrid?”

  Molly saw that he left off with a knife from his question.

  Astrid stared at the item in her hand as if seeing it for the first time.

  “The question is, I think, what is she doing here?” Astrid pointed the knife in Molly’s direction.

  Molly took a step back even though the bed still separated her from the woman.

  “Isn’t it bad enough my husband screwed her? Did you have to screw her, too?”

  “Astrid,” Alan said slowly, “that’s not Claire Laraway. That’s her sister, Molly.”

  She looked from him to Molly, then back again.

  Then she began shaking her head. “Oh, Alan. You were the only who never lied to me. Why did you have to start now?”

  Then with a shrill, guttural scream, she charged him, knife held above her head. Alan caught the arm holding the dangerous weapon, but Astrid kicked and hit at him in a way that made Molly wince. Then she grabbed the knife with her free hand and swiped at him, penetrating the arm of his coat. He stumbled backward, grasping the area.

  “Alan!” Molly rushed forward.

  Astrid switched the knife to her right hand and waved it wildly at Molly. “You’re next, whore.”

  She advanced on her. Molly lifted her linen-covered right arm, fending off a glance from the sharp blade.

  Then Alan caught Astrid from behind, and Molly reached up and twisted the knife from her hand. It landed with a dull clatter on the floor.

  Alan met Molly’s gaze. She couldn’t be sure what she saw there. Sadness, maybe. Relief.

  “Astrid Hodge, you’re under arrest for the murder of Claire Laraway and Valerie Chevalier. You have the right to remain silent….”

  23

  I STOOD ON THE OTHER side of the two-sided mirror, staring at the scene in the interrogation room. Prosecutor Bill Grissom stood next to me, jingling spare change with his hand in the pocket of his expensive slacks. Normally, as the detective in charge, I would have been the one questioning Captain Seymour Hodge. But if ever there was a conflict of interest, it definitely applied here. So instead I watched as John Roche interrogated him.

  Although it wasn’t so much an interrogation as a monologue. On Hodge’s part.

  “If you’re going to arrest anyone, let it be me,” he said, looking somehow smaller in the room, his presence diminished by his words, by his guilt. “It’s all my fault. I had that affair and Astrid just…snapped. Something happened and she changed.”

  Grissom leaned closer to me. “So what do you think she did? Is it possible she harvested his sperm and inserted it into his dead mistress’s and your ex-wife’s bodies in order to set him up for the crimes? You think the hairs we found in the wounds match his?”

  I rubbed my closed eyelids. I could have done without the imagery. “I don’t know. But I think after Claire Laraway showed up dead, he had to have suspected something.”

  “Aiding and abetting?”

  I looked at the prosecutor. He seemed out to get blood on this one. As far as I was concerned, too much blood had been spilled already.

  I thought of Molly and how close she had come to being number three on Astrid’s list.

  “I think the guy’s already paying enough, don’t you?”

  In fact, Hodge seemed riddled with guilt. And surely his career was over. Couldn’t have the wife of a captain going around killing people. Didn’t reflect well on the department.

  “I knew it was a woman.”

  I stared at Grissom.

  “The security video of the black-cloaked figure coming out of the Josephine. Helps that she was wearing the same clothes tonight. Should wrap up everything nice and neat.”

  “Yeah. Congratulations,” I said, heading for the door.

  “Where you going? You’re the one who cracked this case. Don’t you want to stick around and enjoy the spoils?”

  “I think I’ll pass.”

  Truth was, I wasn’t feeling very triumphant. Yes, while a killer was no longer roaming the streets, I had been indirectly responsible for Val’s death. For whatever godforsaken reason, Astrid had gotten it into her head that the reason I didn’t want to see her had to do with my ex. Maybe she’d been following me. Maybe she’d seen us having lunch together. Maybe she’d known someone had stayed the night at my apartment and had assumed it was Val.

  Whatever the reason, had I never slept with Astrid Hodge, my ex would still be alive.

  Unfortunately Claire Laraway wouldn’t have been so lucky.

  I shook my head, wondering at the way some women’s minds worked. So her husband had had an affair with a younger woman. It wasn’t like that had never been heard of before. And since Claire had spent the night with Claude Lafitte, it had been a pretty good indicator that her relationship with Hodge was over.

  Then again, you had to consider the woman. Astrid Hodge had been top-shelf at one time. Crème de la crème. The woman every man watched when she entered a room. But, of course, that was all temporary when you looked at the whole picture. Time saw to that. Once you got into your forties, there was always someone younger, someone prettier than you. I guess for a woman like Astrid, who had built her entire world and relationship around her looks, having that fact rubbed in her face had made her snap.

  And I hadn’t helped.

  I walked out of the precinct and stood in the bright midmorning sunlight. No, I didn’t feel like celebrating. I felt like having a good, strong drink.

  Even more, I felt like seeing Molly.

  “SO THAT’S IT, THEN,” Molly said as she sat across from me at Tujague’s.

  I found it interesting that I’d taken her to the place that had essentially started our affair.

  I’d gotten the name of the new hotel she was staying at and called her, asking her to meet me at the restaurant. I figured we could kill two birds with one stone. Over a great meal I could tell her everythi
ng that had happened, down to Hodge’s interrogation. And by then I’d hopefully have a handle on my unsettled feelings about the whole shebang.

  Damn, she looked good. She’d taken a shower and had changed into a pair of neat slacks that fit her just so and a blouse that was frilly and sexy, the white complementing her pale skin and hair, which she wore loose.

  I avoided looking at her neck and the few light bruises there, caused by Astrid’s choking her—which reminded me that it could have been much worse.

  I nodded. “Yes, that’s it.”

  I’d explained to her—hesitant beginning to bitter end—what had happened and how. She’d nodded here and there but had kept quiet, seeming to be far away from the table filled with food. Hell, my own mind wasn’t on the food, either. And my mind was always on food at Tujague’s.

  She reached out and touched my hand. Her skin was warm and soft against mine. “Thank you.”

  “For what?”

  She glanced down at the tablecloth. “For including me. For taking the time to tell me everything when it couldn’t have been easy for you.”

  I shifted, and the movement caused her to remove her hand. I missed it as soon as it was gone.

  She said, “None of this is your fault. You know that, don’t you?”

  I stared out the window at the people passing on the street, then at the customers inside the restaurant. “You can’t ignore the role I played, Molly. Had I not slept with Astrid…had I just talked to her when she wanted to talk…maybe…”

  “Maybe Valerie would still be alive?”

  I winced, realizing the futile nature of my thoughts.

  I’d never been one to play the game “what if.” Facts were facts. I looked at Molly’s beautiful face across from mine. And the fact here: Molly was ten times more woman than I deserved.

  “So…” she began slowly. “Where do we go from here?”

  I squinted at her. I hadn’t expected her to come out and ask me a question of that nature. Women tended to be savvier about stuff like that nowadays.

  And men didn’t come more commitment-phobic than me.