Alligator Moon. Joanna Wayne
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road onto a dirt one bordered on either side by swampland. There was no shack. In fact there was no sign of human life anywhere, and she had a sudden impulse to turn around and get the hell out before what was left of the road dissolved into the watery morass.
Yet Dennis Robicheaux had chosen to end his life standing in just such a soggy swamp. At least, that was the sheriff’s version. But even if you were set on ending it all, why spend the last few seconds of life sinking in the mud instead of sitting behind the wheel of a nice, dry car?
Had he been doing penance, too—for a mistake that had killed Ginny Lynn? Lots of questions. No answers.
The old dirt road grew more difficult to maneuver. Cassie dodged potholes and bounced across deep ruts and places where the road had all but washed out. It crossed her mind that the guy in the bait shop might have seen her as a nosy reporter and sent her on a journey to nowhere.
She shouldn’t have had that soda. They always went right through her, and her bladder was already protesting the rough road and screaming for relief.
She was about to turn around when she saw John’s black pickup truck stopped in the middle of the road. She threw on her brakes, thinking something was wrong, then realized that her earlier fears were actually true. The road narrowed to a path just beyond the truck and disappeared into the bog.
She spotted the house a few yards off the road. It was built of split cypress logs and stood on short piers that put it just above the swampland that surrounded it. A couple of weathered rockers, some metal pails, a foam cooler and a jug of Kentwood Springs water sat on a porch that swayed to the left like a woman who’d carried babies on her hip for too many years.
Cassie studied the shell walkway that led to the porch as she crawled from behind the wheel of her car. Reaching back into the car, she grabbed her black notebook and started down the path, swatting a vicious mosquito the size of a small helicopter as she did. Like the mosquito, she was unannounced and uninvited. But probably not unexpected.
An attorney, even a nonpracticing one like John, knew that the word murder and the mention of Dr. Norman Guilliot’s name would lure a reporter just as surely as his smelly bait lured fish onto his hook.
She rapped on the door of the cabin and it creaked open as if she were being welcomed by some invisible phantom. The eeriness settled in, creeping up her spine like a wet chill on a frosty January morning. She wasn’t on the edge of civilization. She’d passed that about five miles back. It didn’t get more isolated than this.
Cassie rapped again, then eased the door open a few more inches. “John Robicheaux?” She called his name tentatively. “Anyone home?”
No answer. But the door was open and she really needed to go to the bathroom. Not that there weren’t plenty of places to go outside if she dared venture off the shell path. She didn’t dare.
She stepped into a rectangular room that apparently served as dining room, den and study. Her gaze settled on a massive claw-footed pine table that stretched along a row of side windows. There was a floor-to-ceiling homemade bookcase on the opposite wall, filled to overflowing with both hardcover and paperback selections. Two worn recliners and a mock leather sofa with a split in the armrest were clustered on the side of the room with the bookcase. A large wooden desk sat against the back wall.
The desk was empty except for a stack of newspaper clippings and a computer. The computer stood out, as if it had been plucked from the modern world and placed in the time warp that had trapped the rest of the surroundings.
The floorboards groaned as Cassie crossed the room to a closed door she really hoped was a bathroom. Luckily, she was right, and indoor plumbing had never looked so good. She took care of business, then washed her hands and dried them on an earth-colored towel—a towel that smelled of soap and spices and musk.
She turned half-expecting to see John behind her, but it was only the smell of him and the fact that she was surrounded by his personal things that made the sense of his presence so strong. His razor, his toothbrush, an open bottle of over-the-counter painkillers.
She left the bathroom and walked to the bookshelf. She scanned the titles and found everything from the classics to Dennis Lehane’s newest thriller. Not one law book, though, or anything to suggest John had ever been a practicing defense attorney.
She picked up a homemade cypress frame from the top of the bookshelf and studied the photograph. Two boys, one a teenager, the other a preschooler, stood between an elderly man and woman. The man had on black wading boots, a shirt that was open at the neck and a pair of baggy jeans. Gray-haired, too thin, but smiling big enough to show a row of tobacco-stained teeth. The woman was plump, with salt-and-pepper hair pulled into a chignon on top of her head.
There was no doubt that the oldest boy was John. Hair as black as night, a cocky smile and the same eyes that had seemed to see right through her yesterday. And already sexy, though he couldn’t have been more than seventeen or so when the picture was taken. And the younger boy must be Dennis. Adorable, with the same thick dark hair and cocky smile. There were quite a few years between them, yet she got the impression from John that they’d been close.
The Robicheaux brothers. From the swamps to law school and anesthetist training and on their way to the good life. Now Dennis was dead. And John was…
Actually she wasn’t sure what John was except angry, grieved and incredibly virile. And in spite of the fact that the door had been unlocked and had opened at her knock, she still felt uneasy at being here when he wasn’t around.
Reporters who are scared to take chances end up with predictable, boring copy. That was pretty much the basic rule of journalism, the no guts, no glory edict of reporting. She’d always had more balls than most of the male reporters she’d worked with, but still the sheer isolation of this place was getting to her.
She’d about convinced herself to clear out when she heard footsteps on the porch. She turned as John pushed through the door, then propped a hand on the facing and glared at her. “Why don’t you come in, Cassie Pierson? Make yourself at home?”
His stance and voice were intimidating, but she kept her back straight and her own voice just as level. “The door was open.”
“Cajun hospitality.” Only he didn’t sound the least bit hospitable.
She smelled the whiskey on his breath from across the room and knew she didn’t want to get into an argument with him. “Your truck was here,” she said. “I assumed you were around somewhere.”
“I’m around. What do you want?”
“To talk.”
“I’m listening.”
He wasn’t going to make this easy. “Do you remember our conversation yesterday?”
“I’m half-drunk, not addled.”
“Do you still think Dennis was murdered?”
“I still know that he was. I also told you yesterday that Norman Guilliot would manipulate you and use you the same way he uses everyone else in town. That didn’t keep you from going back out there today.”
“What did you do? Pay someone to follow me around? Stalk me yourself?”
“Beau Pierre’s a small town. News gets around.”
“Then I guess there are no secrets in Beau Pierre?”
“Oh, there are plenty of secrets—just not for long. They’re like splinters buried under the skin. They fester awhile, but eventually work their way out. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to do some more drinking before this day gets any further along. If that offends you or bothers you in any way, feel free to find your way out of here the same way you found your way in.”
“You say Guilliot wants to manipulate me, and that could be true, but what about you, John? Why do you need me?”
“Me? Need you? You’ve got things way wrong, sweetheart.”
“Not the