The Delilah Complex

Eighteen

Noah Jordain poured chicken broth into a saucepan, added two tablespoons of oil and a cup of uncooked rice. While he waited for the mixture to come to a boil, he poured himself an inch of Maker’s Mark and took a sip.

Carrying the glass, he walked out of the kitchen and into the living room, where he put a CD in the expensive Bose stereo system. Jordain lived in a much nicer place than most NYPD detectives could afford, but he had a sideline: he played and wrote jazz, and some of it was good enough that he’d been able to buy his Greenwich Village loft and some original arts and crafts furniture with his ASCAP royalties.

Back in the kitchen, he checked the stove and covered the boiling rice.

Cooking was therapeutic for Noah, as it had been for his father, who’d been one of the toughest cops in the New Orleans police department. Jambalaya had been his specialty, and whenever Noah made it he thought of his dad. André Jordain had been a well-respected policeman and a thirty-year vet when someone set him up.

He and his partner, Pat Nagley, had busted a cocaine ring. It looked like an easy collar until the defense presented evidence that André and Pat had been on the take, accepting payoffs from the dealer for five years and finally turning him in when he refused to increase the payoffs.

Noah and his family knew the accusation was bogus. Yes, his father had been a flirt; yes, he had too much to drink sometimes and had let his temper get the better of him. But a bad cop? No way. Someone had been on the dealer’s payroll, but it hadn’t been André Jordain. And Noah had vowed that one day he’d clear his father’s name. That’s what had brought him to New York four years earlier. He’d heard the dealer was tied to someone high up in the NYPD.

After another gulp of bourbon, Noah lifted the lid, smelled the fragrant stock and spices, and stirred the mixture. Then he went to work on the rest of the ingredients, putting andouille sausages in a frying pan and turning up the heat.

He sliced bright red and green peppers and a bunch of scallions, chopped some tomatoes, then removed the sausages. While they drained on paper towels, Noah threw cut-up chicken into the pan, stirred it and finally added the vegetables.

Jordain breathed in the smells and felt the first kick of homesickness when his phone rang, the sound clashing with the smooth Dizzy Gillespie jazz CD. No matter how much he wanted to, he couldn’t ignore the phone. That was the one thing Noah resented about being a cop.

It was Perez.

“Noah, I just got a call from Betsy Young at the Times-” He didn’t have to finish.

“Number 2?”

“Yes.”

“Do they know who it is?”

“They are saying no.”

“And we’ve had, what, a hundred, two hundred missing-persons reports in the past few days?”

“At least.”

“What was in the package?”

“Same as last time-three photos and another clump of hair.”

“We’re not going down there. Ask a uniformed cop to go get Young and the evidence and meet us at the station house.”

“No prob.”

“And call Butler. Have her waiting for Betsy and get the photos to the lab ASAP.”

“Want me to pick you up?” Perez asked.

Jordain looked at his watch. It was eight. “Did you eat yet?”

“No.”

“You hungry?”

“What are you cooking?”

“Jambalaya.”

“I’m hungry.”

“Good. Come on over. We can eat in ten minutes and then go meet the press. It’s always better sparring on a full stomach.”

“She is going to hate that we made her wait.”

“We are not making her wait. Have Butler talk to her.”

“It’s going to screw up her deadline-” Perez stopped midsentence. “Right, that’s what you want, to keep the story from running tomorrow.”

Jordain hung up and sighed. The first story, announcing the murder to New York and the rest of the world, had been an embarrassment to him and the rest of the department. For the paper to have gotten it first was unacceptable. And to make it worse, they still didn’t know a single damn thing about what had happened to Maur. But now for there to be a second man? And for the Times to know again before they did?

He eyed the Maker’s Mark lovingly but didn’t pick up the glass again. He was officially back on duty.

Usually the SVU is not the last to know. Whoever was behind these murders wanted a Times reporter to get the story before the police.

Why was that?

They finished up their second helpings of the food- without the beers they wanted because work was waiting-in fifteen minutes. Long enough to make the reporter cool her heels.

They’d wolfed down the spicy rice mixture as if it might be their last meal. At least, their last good meal. And well it might be. There was no telling how much information they were going to get tonight. They might not come up for air for a day or two.

“If there are two of these killings…” Jordain said as he and Perez walked out into the damp night air, climbed into Perez’s car and headed uptown to the station house.

“Don’t say it,” Perez begged.

But Jordain had to say it. He had to give weight to it and make the words real. “If there have been two of these killings, there might be three. The last thing we need is another multiple on our hands. We’re still reeling from the last one.”

“Maybe this is just a copycat of last week’s murder.”

“Maybe you are dreaming,” Jordain sighed.