“Yes, I know I can’t have one cigarette.”
“It’s like that with other stuff… Every once in a while, you think, man, I’d love to have that high, just one more time. But you know you can’t do it.”
“You’re not afraid you’ll be tempted, are you?” Nikki asked her, worried.
Andy shook her head. “No. Because I know what could happen. And I’ve seen far too many lives destroyed. I’m straight as an arrow now.”
“Good for you,” Nikki said.
“And I love my job.”
“That’s great. Hey!” Nikki said suddenly. She lowered her voice. “Speaking of drugs and addictions…look.”
“What?”
“There’s that guy again.”
“What guy?”
“The one we saw today, at Madame D’Orso’s.”
Andy turned, looking across Conte. There was a crowd around the popular bar on the corner, which was supposedly haunted by a cool jazz guitarist. “Where?” she demanded.
“Right there. Great. I gave him a twenty, and he used it to go drinking,” Nikki said in disgust.
“I don’t see him,” Andy said, craning her neck and frowning.
“There…right there.” Nikki pointed. The man was there, staring straight at her. He still looked as if he longed to reach out, touch her…talk to her.
Then the crowd moved. People laughing, talking. A sad trumpet lament began to play. And he was gone.
“Well, go figure. No more twenties to junkies, huh?” Andy said. She walked on.
And Nikki followed, trying to shake off the sudden chill that seemed to wash over her like ice from a not-so-distant past.
Another day.
Another corpse.
A junkie, lying beneath one of the highway overpasses, nearly covered by newspapers and other debris, needle by his side.
Detective Owen Massey and his partner had been called in after the patrol cops had cordoned off the scene. The ME had arrived, too, and agreed that this was just another life wasted, tragic but simple.
Not dead too long. At least the poor sucker hadn’t rotted and decayed like a misbegotten rat. By the ME’s estimation, this particular John Doe had only been a goner for a matter of hours. Cause of death seemed obvious. Heroin overdose.
Nearly quitting time, and he was tired. He loved the French Quarter like he might his child, if he’d ever had one. But there were days…
A few more lines to fill in, and he could go home, he thought, sitting at his desk.
Massey had nearly finished with the paperwork—not a homicide, death by misadventure—when his partner came striding across the room.
“Hold the presses,” Marc Joulette said.
“You got an ID?” Massey asked. “A match on the prints?”
“Yeah. Tom Garfield. FBI. Under cover for the last three months.”
“What?”
“FBI,” Joulette repeated.
Massey groaned, nearly letting his head fall on the table.
It would be one hell of a long time before he’d be going home that night.
“The feds will be sending someone.”
“Oh, great.”
He let his head crash to the desk.
No one noticed. A bunch of uniforms were heading out, talking as they went.
Massey looked up, frowning. “Politics,” Joulette told him. “Going to provide security for some rally.”
Massey arched both brows. Joulette shrugged. “It’s a hot race for that senate seat,” he explained. “I haven’t seen this much activity in a coon’s age.”
“Politics. In Louisiana. There’s a cesspool for you.”
“Hey!” Joulette protested. “There are a lot of good guys out there, trying to make a difference. Not to mention right here in the department.”
Actually, Massey agreed. There were plenty of good men in the department. And he hated the fact that Louisiana politics had too often been on the shady side. It was a good state. He loved New Orleans with a passion. He shrugged. “Problem is, no two guys seem to have the same opinion when it comes to what constitutes the greater good.”
“Well, we’re not politicians. We’re cops. And we’ve got a dead fed on our hands.”
“Right,” Massey said.
“Hey, Massey, Joulette.” It was Robinson, a street cop who had spent some time in forensics.
“What’s up?” Joulette asked.
“Purse snatcher,” Robinson said. Young and wiry, he was a good cop, capable of running down perps who were convinced they could outrun any of the parish’s beignet-eaters.
Massey cleared his throat. “Um…wrong fellow to get after a purse snatcher,” he said.
Robinson grinned. “Hey, I know.”
“You mean you didn’t run the guy down?” Joulette asked him.
“Naw, I got the call too late.”
“So…?” Massey prompted.
“This is just curious. Maybe nothing. But I thought that I’d show you.”
Robinson produced the small sketchbook he’d been carrying. He was a good artist, and the sketch he’d produced appeared to be a likeness of Tom Garfield, their dead FBI agent.
Frowning, Massey stared hard at the picture. “What’s this?”
“The woman whose purse was snatched told me that she never saw the man who swiped her bag, but she said she’d seen a suspicious-looking down-and-outer right before it happened. On Bourbon Street. I asked her to describe the guy. And this is what I got. A picture of your corpse.”
“Robinson, you’ve seen the pictures of Garfield. You just drew him ’cause those images were in your mind,” Joulette said.
“No. The woman told me this was the guy she saw—to a T.”
“Couldn’t have been. If this purse snatching just happened, Garfield was already dead,” Massey said more gently. He liked Robinson.
“The woman swears up and down that this is who she saw.”
“So our fed is dead but snatching purses?” Joulette scoffed.
“Maybe he’s got a look-alike running around the city, that’s what I’m suggesting,” Robinson said. “Who knows how or why, but it could mean something. I just thought you two should know.”
“Did you show the boss?” Massey asked.
Robinson nodded. “Weird, huh?”
“Thanks,” Massey told him. “Hey, can I keep the sketch?”
“I’ll make you a copy,” Robinson assured him. “The boss already has one.” He gave Joulette an aggravated stare and moved on.
“Everybody’s