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I showed them ID, then I was let inside. No problem, Detective Cross.
I really wasn't sure why, but I had a vague feeling that we had missed something in the house. Forensics had spent hours going over the place. So had I. We hadn't found anything concrete. Still, I didn't like being in the old house again. The domain. Maybe I needed a gris-gris for protection.
I walked through the overdone, very ornate foyer and living room. My footsteps made the big house sound empty. I kept wondering, what were we missing? What was I missing?
The master bedroom was situated off the hall at the top of the stairs. Nothing had changed since the first time I was in there. Why in hell had I bothered to come back? The large, open room was filled with dark modern art, some of it hung, but several paintings were propped up against the walls. The magicians slept in a bed, not in the coffins we'd found below in the tu
As I was searching through their closet again, I came across something I hadn't seen before. I was sure it hadn't been there when I'd examined the bedroom earlier. Lying among the shoes were effigies of Daniel and Charles — miniature dolls of the magicians.
There were slash marks across the throats, chests, and faces. Just like the way they had been murdered.
Where the hell had the gruesome effigies come from? What did they mean? What was going on down here in New Orleans? Who had gotten into this house after we sealed it? I was tempted to call Kyle, but I held off. I wasn't sure why.
I didn't want to go back down into the tu
What were we missing?
Unspeakably violent murders went back at least eleven years.
Our two best suspects had been murdered.
Someone had put effigies in their bedroom.
I went down to the cellar, then into the tu
I heard a scraping noise and stopped. Something was walking around. I reached into my shoulder holster, took out my Glock.
I listened closely. Nothing. Then more scraping.
Mice or rats, I thought. Probably all it is. Probably. Almost definitely.
I had to go and look further, though. That was my problem, wasn't it? I had to go look, had to investigate, couldn't just walk away. What was I trying to prove to myself? That I had no fears? That I wasn't like my father, who had quit on just about everything in life, including his kids and himself?
I inched forward slowly and quietly — and I listened to the house.
I could hear water dripping somewhere in the dank tu
I used my old Zippo to light a few torches hung on the tu
The anger, the rage co
What were the killers angry about?
Where were they right now? I never heard them coming, never saw a movement.
I was hit — twice. The attackers had come swiftly out of the darkness. One went for my head and neck. The other hit around my knees. They were a team. Efficient.
I went down hard, and it took the wind right out of me. But I fell on the attacker who was wrapped around my legs. I heard a loud crack, maybe a bone breaking. Then a scream. He let me go.
I got up, but the second assailant was attached to my back. He bit me! Oh Jesus, no!
I cursed and slammed him into the wall. I did it again. Who the hell were these fantastic madmen? Who was the leech riding my back?
He finally let go, the son of a bitch! I spun around at him. I clipped the side of his head with my gun. I hit him again with a solid left hook. He went down like a sack.
I was breathing hard, still full of fight, though. Neither of the assailants was moving much now. I kept the gun on them while I lit another candle on the wall. That was better; light always helps.
I saw a male and female, probably no more than sixteen or seventeen. Their eyes were like dark holes. The male must have been six foot six or more.
He had on a dingy white T-shirt with "Marlboro Racing First to Finish" printed on it and baggy, scungy black jeans.
The girl was around five two, with wide hips, wide everything. Her black hair was stringy and greasy, with reddish highlights.
I touched my neck and was surprised that the skin wasn't broken. There was no blood on my hand.
"You're under arrest," I yelled at the two of them. "You goddamn bloodsuckers."
Chapter 77
Vampires? If that's what these twisted creeps were?
Assassins? Murderers?
Their names were A
I spent three hours attempting to question the suspects that night, then another four hours the following morning. Elo and Masterson wouldn't talk to me or anyone else — not a word. They wouldn't say what they were doing inside the mansion in the Garden District. Why they had attacked me. Whether or not they had placed the sinister effigies in the closet of the dead men.
The teens simply glared across the plain wooden table in one or another of the interrogation rooms at police headquarters. The parents were notified and brought in, but Elo and Masterson wouldn't speak to them either. At one point, A
In the meantime, there were lots of others from the fetish ball to talk to. The commonality among most of them was that they held "straight jobs" in New Orleans. They were bartenders and waitresses, hotel desk clerks, computer analysts, actors, and even teachers. Most were afraid to have their alternative lifestyle come out at work, so they eventually talked to us. Unfortunately, no one told us anything revealing about Daniel and Charles, or their murderers.
It was an extraordinarily busy night at the precinct house. More than two dozen homicide detectives and FBI agents conducted reinterviews. We exchanged notes and bios with highlighted inconsistencies. We went hard at the most obvious liars in the group. We also kept a list of the witnesses who seemed most likely to break under pressure. We switched interviewers on them; sent them to their cells, then summoned them back before they could sleep; we doubled up on them.
"All we need is a few rubber hoses," one of the New Orleans detectives said while we were waiting for A
When A
Sams went at her. "Good morning, glory. It's nice to see your pasty-white face again. You look like total shit, babe. I'm being kind. Several of your friends, including your pathetic boyfriend, have broken down already tonight."