The Evidence Room: A Mystery (16 page)

“You did?”

“I did. She was extraordinary.”

In the doorway, Josh broke the spell. “Doc, you mentioned that you might have some new information?”

“Right, right. Come through here to the autopsy suite for a second.” He hesitated in the doorway. “Aurora, I’m not sure how you feel about seeing these pictures of your mother this way.”

“It’s all right, Doc,” Aurora assured him. “I need to know.”

Something in her voice told him not to argue. “All right, then.”

He led them through and fitted the picture of Raylene up to the light board, then hit the switch so that darkness enveloped them. He pointed to the bruising on her chest, and Josh leaned in to get a closer look. “Can you see that?”

“Finger marks,” Josh said.

“Exactly. Marks from fingers Wade Atchison didn’t have. His hand was mangled in a shrimping injury.”

“So there’s no way he did this,” Josh said.

James snapped the light back on. “Absolutely not. He could have been involved, sure. But he’s not the one who killed Raylene Atchison. Those are someone else’s hands.”

“Maybe he had help,” Josh mused.

“Maybe. I brought my findings to the police department, but they’re calling it a closed case.”

“That’s what they told Papa,” Aurora said. “He had questions too. He asked them to retest some of the old samples, and they refused. So what do we do?”

“There is another option,” James said. “Sometimes, in the case of an unexplained death, families send evidence out to an independent lab. I have details on a few independent places we’ve used before. I’d just need your permission to release it to them for testing, Aurora.”

“Really? It’s that easy? Just tell me where to sign.”

“Ruby has those forms—you can get them from her. How is the rest of the investigation going?”

Josh was inspecting the toe tag on Jasmine Doe, the prostitute from the earlier intake.

“Doc—do you mind?”

“Sure,” James said, confused about who Josh could be looking for. Was he working another case? “She was brought in this morning. Blunt-force trauma. No ID on her yet.” He watched Josh slide the drawer out, curl back the sheet and stare into the remains of her face, then replace the sheet. “You want me to keep you posted?”

“No, that’s fine. What were you saying about forms?”

“Ruby has them up front.”

“Thanks, Doc. We’ll get out of your way. Really appreciate your help on this one.” He shook James’s hand, and Aurora followed him out the doorway, then turned to face James.

“Thank you,” she said.

“Don’t thank me yet.” He leaned against the stainless-steel table. “There’s an old saying about medical examiners—we have all the answers when it’s already too late. But I’ll do everything I can on this case.”

She grasped his hand, threading her fingers through his own, the flat of their palms pressed together. The tenderness of the gesture startled him. It was as though she saw something in him, the way Raylene had.

“I know,” she said. “And I have a feeling it’s not too late.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

From inside Praise The Lord Donuts, Jesus Christ was watching Josh.

Not just one of Him, but more than Josh could count. On statuettes and candles, and from a lofty perch atop a cake made entirely of chocolate glazed donuts, the bearded man with the crown of thorns regarded him with a sorrowful gaze. Josh hoped that if there really was someone on high running this shit-show, he would look more like Buddha, a laughing fat guy reminding you that life was great. That was a God Josh could get behind, not some emaciated guy reminding you that he was strapped to a cross and it was completely your fault.

Raylene Atchison had worked here, alongside Bobbie Sharpless, her best friend, who still owned the place. There was no statement from Bobbie in the police report, but Josh was willing to bet she had some good information, had shared some kind of silent camaraderie with Raylene the way women did with their friends. It wasn’t much of a lead, but he had to work every possible angle.

There was something familiar about the bluetick hound that blocked the doorway to the shop. He eyed Josh briefly and then resumed chewing a catfish head with slow, lazy bites. Josh gave him a scratch behind the ears before gently easing him aside to open the screen door.

“Miss Bobbie?”

She was behind the counter, her arms elbow-deep in a sink jammed full of soaking dirty baking trays, her apron shiny with streaks of grease. Her homecoming days were long past, but beauty still clung fiercely to Bobbie Sharpless. Her bottle-blond hair was swept into a cheerleader’s high ponytail, with a few strands pulled loose around her delicate face. Sweat from the heat of the ovens had rendered her pale pink sundress translucent, revealing the creamy skin of her chest. Bobbie smiled at Josh, the tired smile of a person who wishes she were somewhere else.

“Josh Hudson,” she said, her voice fluttery in a girlish way. “And why is the law coming to visit me today?” Under the bakery’s fluorescent lights, she looked otherworldly, incandescent. Bobbie shook her hands dry and pulled a cruller free of a congealing pyramid behind the counter using pink tongs. “How ’bout a Lamb of God Lemon Cr
è
me, Josh? Fresh today.”

“A policeman can’t say no to a donut. Thank you, ma’am,” he said, pulling it free of the tongs with a napkin and taking a bite before wrapping it up. “I just had a few questions for you about Raylene Atchison.”

“Raylene.” Bobbie crossed herself and sank into an orange plastic chair behind the counter. “Now, there’s a name I ain’t heard in years. I heard that her little girl is back in town. I’ve been meaning to come by, bring her some goodies. I guess she ain’t little no more.”

“No, ma’am,” Josh said. “I’m sure she’d love to meet you.”

“You think so?” Bobbie leaned back in the chair. “She was the most precious child. Raylene and Wade just could not get enough of her. I told them, that baby’s never gonna learn to walk if y’all don’t put her down. They carried her everywhere, just like a little queen.” She sat back up. “And why are you asking questions now?”

“We have reason to believe that Wade might not have been the one who took her life.”

She covered her mouth with a hand. “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,” she said. “I always thought the story didn’t make sense.”

“What do you mean?”

“I knew Wade,” she said. “We were sweethearts before he met Raylene. Nothing serious—we were just kids. But he was a good man.”

Josh thought about the police report. “I saw a lot of domestic violence reports in the file,” he said quietly.

“I ain’t saying he was perfect. They fought, for true. Raylene wasn’t no shrinking violet, either. But when they had Aurora—it changed him. Wade came in here, he stood right where you were standing, and he told me, ‘That little girl is the reason I was put on this earth. I’d die protecting her.’” She dabbed at her eyes with a corner of the dish towel. “A man doesn’t say those things lightly, Detective Hudson. Do you understand that?”

Josh thought about Jesse. “I understand,” he said.

“I wanted to take her,” Bobbie said, and the pain in her voice sliced through Josh. “I wanted to raise Aurora like my own child. That little girl, all by herself.”

Josh reached for her hand across the counter. Behind her, outside the window, rain began to shatter the bayou’s silken surface. “You can still help her, Miss Bobbie. Tell me something that might help us solve this case. Anything.”

“Raylene was afraid,” she said.

Above them, the lights in the store hissed and flickered, and outside a trembling finger of lightning split the bayou in half.

“Who was she afraid of?”

“She wouldn’t tell me. We used to talk about everything. My ex, Tim, he’d go out to his daddy’s fishing camp with Wade, and Raylene and I would stay on the boat. We talked about our husbands all the time. Wade wasn’t the problem.”

Josh thought about the file, the litany of domestic violence calls. “Bobbie, the police were out there at the house a lot. You have to understand why people think Wade’s the one who done this.”

“He wasn’t the problem,” she repeated. “I know what you’re saying about him, and you’re right. He was an asshole when he drank. But I’m telling you, Josh, that little girl changed him. Being around Hunter changed him. He was doing better.”

“So who do you think it was that Raylene was afraid of?”

“I don’t know. She didn’t like the people Wade was working for. You know the Crumplers. You can’t trust any of their kin. I know Raylene was mad about them cutting up those gators. She loved those damn animals.”

“How do you know she was afraid?”

Bobbie walked over to the screen door, and the hound wriggled in, shaking his mottled fur free of raindrops before settling at Josh’s feet. Bobbie smiled. “Looks like Cyrus remembers you,” she said. “We lost him last year. He got spooked and ran behind the boat rental place. And you’re the one who brought him back.”

So that was why the dog looked familiar. The memory clicked into focus: Josh crashing through the underbrush, the dog crouched in a tangle of dying flowers, terrified. It was Josh’s first year as a patrolman in Cooper’s Bayou.

“Yes, ma’am, I do remember.”

“You’re a good man.” Her words vibrated through him, as though someone had plucked a single string deep inside. It wasn’t true, but he saw in her face that she believed it.

“I’m just trying to help out a friend,” he said.

Bobbie fingered the tiny gold cross that rested in the hollow of her throat. “She knew something was coming, Josh. She saw it. And it wasn’t that bayou voodoo, neither. She told me someone was following her. Threatening her. God help me, I don’t know if I could have done something to help her.”

Josh’s mind lit up with the possibilities. Was someone angry with Raylene for protecting the alligators? It was big business on the bayou; people had been killed for less. He was going to have to go back to the Crumplers for answers.

“You are helping her now, Miss Bobbie.” Her face was shiny with grief, the weight of a long-carried burden etched in the skin underneath her eyes.

The bell above the door jangled, and Boone filled the doorway.

“Good afternoon, Miss Bobbie. Detective Hudson.” What was he doing here? Josh felt a sickening jolt to the gut. The game was up; Rush had found out about his little investigation, and now he was going to be fired.

“It’s sure been nice chatting with you, Miss Bobbie,” Josh said. “I do hope I’ll see you soon.”

“Y’all take care,” Bobbie said, collecting herself and hurrying back behind the counter.

Outside they stood under the awning, the silence heavy between them.

“So you following me around now, or what?” Josh attempted a joke, but Boone’s mouth remained set in a straight line.

“Josh, I have some news. Your dad is a free man. I wanted to be the one to tell you.”

“How long ago?” He hadn’t thought the parole board would be dumb enough to recommend release, but if anyone could sell bullshit, it was Doyle Hudson. This was going to make the search for Liana more complicated.

The storm was picking up steam now. The Jesus statues rattled like chattering teeth against the window behind them.

“This morning.” Boone laid a hand on Josh’s shoulder. “I tried to have the guys keep tabs on him, but he’s in the wind. I’m sorry, Josh.”

Josh looked out over the bayou, over the tops of the cypress trees to the towns beyond, where somewhere his sister waited, probably unaware that her father was out there, free. There wasn’t a damn thing Josh could do about it. He would try Pea, but what good would that do now?

“Thanks, man,” he mumbled to Boone, and pulled his collar up against the rain.

“I know what you’re up to,” Boone said. “This Atchison thing.”

Josh stared at him.

“Relax. I’m not going to turn you in, buddy.” They descended the stairs together.

“So what’s your take on it? The Atchison case?”

Boone frowned. “It’s a long time ago. These cold cases, I mean, I don’t know. Some stuff just never gets figured out, you know? Nobody’s got a one hundred percent solve rate.”

“Damn,” Josh swore. “Boone, your work ethic is just blowing me away right now.”

“Seriously, man.”

“Just because something happened a long time ago doesn’t mean it stops being important,” Josh told him. He thought about the boxes, stacked high in the evidence room. “You can’t just give up.”

“You’re right. Absolutely. Just be careful.”

“Yeah. See ya.” Josh pulled up his hood and faced the rain.

“Josh. Wait a second.” Boone reached into his waistband and handed Josh a gun. “It’s my personal one,” he said. “Until you get yours back,” he explained. “Keep it on you. I have a feeling you might need it.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Royce Beaumont, the attorney whom Luna Riley had recommended, worked out of an office above a kiddie playland called Baboon Jack’s.

Aurora stood in the blistering heat next to a man in a frog costume who was chain smoking on the front steps.

“Excuse me,” she said. “Do I go around back to get to Royce Beaumont’s office?”

The frog man shrugged off the felt green hood of his costume and glanced up at her with mild interest. “Only way out is through,” he said, pointing to the kiddie park. “They just got done with the glitter ponies carnival. Watch your step.”

“Thanks.” The guy wasn’t kidding. Inside, glitter and streamers surrounded one traumatized-looking pony standing in the middle of the room. Aurora made her way down the main hallway to the staircase at the back. On all sides, children shrieked and darted among arcade games and pits filled with brightly colored plastic balls. In the corner, a pink stereo blared a tune that sounded like it was being played at twice the normal speed. Everything shimmered with glitter. She wondered if she had ever come here as a kid.

Aurora wound her way up the back steps to an office door and pressed a buzzer. It was amazing that anyone could hear with the insistent thump of the music below, but miraculously someone pulled the door open.

A woman in her forties with feathered bangs and cat’s eye glasses smiled at Aurora and beckoned her inside. “Aurora Atchison. I can’t believe it’s you.” Aurora was getting used to the stares she got around town, but this was something more.