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Two units made the scene ahead of her. The cars sat at flamboyant angles in the front yard of the little brick house, beacons rolling. One officer sat on the concrete front steps, either watching out for the ambulance or being sick. The latter, A
He grabbed hold of the wrought iron railing to steady himself as he rose to his feet. The front-porch light gleamed off his red hair like the sun on a new copper pe
"Hey, A
"Hey, Tee-Rouge, where y'at?"
"Tossing my cookies. What you doing here, chère?"
"Caught it on the sca
Tee-Rouge gave a snort and waved a hand in dismissal. "That's some victim. Somebody oughta lift that li'l gal's nightie and see what kind of hairy balls she's hiding under there. She shot this son of a bitch point-blank in the face with a cut-down shotgun."
"Youch. Who is he?" A
Tee-Rouge shrugged. "Chère, his mama wouldn't know him if he sat up and called her name. He's got no ID, but he was wearing the mask. There's feathers all over the damn scene. This is our scumbag of the season right here."
"You call the detectives?"
"Yeah, but Stokes, he's who-knows-where. In bed with some chick, probably-no offense."
A
"Not so far. Quinlan's on his way, but he lives clear up in Devereaux. It'll take him some time to get down here."
"Who's inside?" she asked, starting for the door.
"Pitre."
Groaning to herself, A
The living room was empty. There was no immediate sign of the victim. The bedroom looked to be a straight shot down the hall to the left. Pitre stood just inside the doorway, at the feet of the fallen assailant. A
"I'm not go
A
The rapist lay on the floor, arms outflung. He was dressed in black, covering every inch of his body, including his hands. He could have been black, white, Indian-there was no telling. There was virtually nothing left of his face. The flesh-and-bone mask that set one human being apart from the next had been obliterated. The raw meat, shattered bone, and exposed brain matter could have belonged to anyone. The hair was saturated with blood, its color indistinguishable. A fragment of the black feather mask was stuck to a jagged piece of cranium. The stench of violent death was thick in the air.
"Oh my Lord," A
Scraps and chunks of the assailant's face had been sprayed up onto the ceiling and on the pale yellow wall. The sawed-off shotgun lay abandoned on the bed.
"If you can't take it, leave, Broussard. Nobody asked you here," Pitre said, moving around the bed to check out the shotgun. "Stokes won't be amused to see you."
"Yeah? Well, maybe the joke's on him," A
"Hey," Pitre said with the delighted surprise of a child finding the hidden prize in Cracker Jack. "We know the guy had one blue eye."
"How's that?"
A nasty grin lit his face as he leaned over the bed and stared at his find. " 'Cause here it is. Would you look at that! That sucker musta popped clean out of his head when she shot him! It's just sitting here like a little egg!"
Stokes's turquoise blue orbs came clearly into focus in A
"Man Without a Face. Anybody see that movie? This guy's uglier. If I'm lyin', I'm dyin'."
A
"Man, Broussard, you are like the goddamn clap-unwanted, unwelcome, and impossible to get rid of."
"I'm sure you're the voice of experience," A
"Who asked you to the dance, anyway?" Stokes asked. "We don't need any secretaries here, don't need any crime dogs."
"I thought the victim might appreciate having another woman here."
"Yeah, he probably would have if he wasn't dead."
"I meant the woman."
"Then go find her and get the hell outta my crime scene." He looked right at her and said straight-faced, "Can't have you messing up any evidence."
As A
Pitre laughed.
The victim, Kim Young, was in her neat little yellow kitchen, leaning back against the counter, trembling as if she had just walked out of a freezer. The pale blue baby-doll nightgown she wore barely cleared the tops of her thighs and was liberally flecked with blood and tissue. The mess had sprayed across her face and into her dishwater blond curls.
"I'm Deputy Broussard," A
She looked up, glassy-eyed. "I-I shot that man."
"Yes, you did."
From where she stood, A
"Did you get a look at him before you pulled the trigger?"
She shook her head, dislodging a bone fragment from her hair. It fell to the tile floor next to her bare foot. "It was too dark. Something woke me up and-and-I was so scared. And then he was right there by the bed and I-I-"
Tears choked her. Her face reddened. "What if it had been Mike? It could have been Mike! I just shot-"
Ignoring the blood and gore, A
The assailant's name was Willard Roache, known affectionately by his old pals in the penal system as "Cock" Roache. He had a long, ugly history of sexual assault charges and two convictions. He'd done his last jolt in Angola and had been released in June 1996. His last address listed with the state correctional system was in Shreveport, where he had dumped his parole officer and his identity.