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“Hey, you don’t have to explain to me. I’m not in your chain of command.” Murphy disappeared into the kitchen, then returned with a paper plate of cookies and a plastic glass of lemonade. “Sorry for the dishes. Our kids are hell on breakables.”
They settled at the dining table, Alia reaching for a cookie before her butt was fully in contact with the chair. They were home-baked—sniffing out home versus commercial, fresh versus day old, was one of her talents—and they were dotted with yellow specks of lemon zest. Incredible. She might marry for an unending supply of cookies this good.
“I called DiBiase to compare notes, but he was, uh, busy. He gave me your number.”
Alia snorted. She knew too well what Jimmy’s busy looked like on his days off. “That’s okay. I’ll make him squirm for the details tomorrow.” She took another cookie. “How did the killer get into the Wallace house?”
“There was a broken glass in the back door. The alarm wasn’t armed.”
“Same as Jackson’s. Weapon?”
“Knife from the kitchen.”
“Narrowed the time of death any?”
“Likely between 2:00 and 5:00 a.m. Same method of entry, same weapon, same approximate time.” Murphy scowled. “I’ll find out what I can about Jeffrey, but a doper going all psycho on his father is one thing. Going all psycho on one of his father’s friends...”
They shook their heads at the same time.
“You know, Jackson and Wallace were good friends all their lives. Maybe something they did years ago has come back to bite them in the ass.” Alia took a sip of lemonade sour enough to pucker her mouth, sweet enough to make her taste buds do a happy dance.
“Any idea what?”
She glanced out the French doors on the far side of the room. Landry and Evie were sitting on the broad veranda, paddle fans overhead stirring the air. Two kids played in the yard while a third bounced on Evie’s knee.
Something had happened to drive him not only out of the family home but out of the family, as well— something damaging enough that he didn’t want to talk about it all these years later. Could it be related to Jackson’s and Wallace’s murders?
She looked back at Murphy and forced a smile. “My head is entirely too full of ideas, Detective. It’s weeding them out that’s the problem.”
* * *
Landry had never been dissatisfied with the apartments where he’d lived since he was fifteen. They’d always been a bit on the shabby side, like much of the French Quarter. They were old, run-down and lacked amenities such as air-conditioning, heat, a bedroom—except for the current one—and furnished with third or fourth-hand stuff. Failings aside, they’d been his. Besides the landlord, he’d had the only key to the lock; no one could come in unless he invited them.
Privacy like that made up for a lot of shortcomings.
But there was something awfully pleasant about sitting on Evie Murphy’s veranda, smelling the flowers, hearing the fountain, listening to the kids’ giggles and shouts. What he’d seen of the inside was luxurious compared to his own place, and what he’d seen of the outside, well, he could spend a whole lot of time in that courtyard.
He and Evie had talked about the kids, about New Orleans, her psychic business, even a little about himself, while they shared cookies and lemonade. Now, with the youngest of her three dozing fitfully in her lap, she said, “I’d ask you how the son of a murder victim wound up with the NCIS agent investigating the case, but then I’d feel obligated to tell you how I wound up married to the detective who once arrested me.”
His brows rose even as he corrected her misimpression. “I’m not with Alia.”
Her snort was similar to Alia’s, though softer, more delicate. “She’s a beautiful woman, isn’t she? Obviously, I didn’t know her when she married Jimmy, or I would have told her not to because of that faithfulness problem.”
“Did the spirits tell you he couldn’t keep it zipped?”
She gave him a chastising look. “Womanly intuition did. Sometimes you can just tell. He’s a good detective, though.”
“Then between him, Alia and your husband, they should be able to figure out what’s going on.”
Her chair creaked a few times as she shifted the girl to rest against her other arm. “It would help if the people they question were forthright.”
She wasn’t looking at him when she said it, and there was nothing pointed or accusing about her tone—just a general statement offered in a careless voice. Landry was no fool, though. He sensed what she didn’t put into words or tone.
