The Dollmaker

Sixteen

After Dave left the Hotel Monteleone, he drove to a dive off Highway 90 and sat in the parking lot, watching the neon light flicker over the doorway as he tried to convince himself he could get through the night without a drink. Best thing he could do was go home and get a good night’s sleep.

But he knew it wasn’t going to be that easy, and when he finally pulled out of the parking lot and headed for home, he decided he’d better stop by and visit with Marsilius for a while. Dave had learned the hard way that it was never a good idea to be alone when the demons were riding him as hard as they were that night.

He drove with the window rolled down, and he could smell the sugarcane out in the fields. It was a calm, still night, with only a mild breeze to stir the willows that bowed low over the water.

Turning off the main highway, he took a back way home, past an old cemetery and a few houses perched on the edge of the bayou. Water oaks arched over the road, and the moonlight that shimmered through the heavy canopy turned the Spanish moss into silver lace.

The lights were off in his uncle’s house when Dave drove by, but he hadn’t heard Marsilius mention anything about taking the boat out. Like Dave, his uncle was a night owl, and even when he didn’t have a late charter out to the oil rigs, he was often up until dawn. But tonight it looked as if he’d turned in early.

Dave decided it was just as well. Marsilius was a good guy, but he could be like a dog with a bone when he sensed Dave was hiding something. And the last thing he wanted tonight was an inquisition. Seeing Claire had left him edgy and morose. For a long time now he’d tried to convince himself that his feelings for her were dead and buried, but he’d only been fooling himself. Claire was still a part of him. She always would be, no matter how many years went by or how much they hurt each other. Even if she was married to someone else, he would always think of her as his wife.

As he pulled into the drive, he thought about heading down to the dock to see if the boat was still there. It was going to be a long night, and he figured it might be a good idea to take the Sea Ray out a few miles from shore and drop anchor, sit in the dark until the craving eased enough for him to sleep.

But come morning, he’d be right back where he’d started. All he’d done by stumbling from one drunk to the next was postpone the inevitable. And now Titus was right. It was time to pay the piper. Dave couldn’t keep running away from his problems, because sooner or later he’d have no place left to go but the grave.

His truck tires crunched on the shale drive as he parked beneath an oak tree and got out. A mild breeze stirred the wind chimes on his screened-in porch, and Dave paused on the steps to stare out at the darkness.

Past the row of pecan trees in his yard, he could see the glint of the bayou. The water was dark and still, but the night was alive with the sounds of crickets and bullfrogs, and the bushes were aglow with lightning bugs.

He watched for a moment longer before letting the screen door close behind him. Unlocking the front door, he shoved it open, then leaned out slightly to toss the key back into the flowerpot. A floorboard creaked inside the house and Dave froze for a split second as a terrible premonition flashed through his head. But the warning came too late. By the time he’d turned back to the door, a shadow was rushing through the darkness toward him.

A baseball bat swung at his face, and Dave ducked as his arm flew up to deflect the blow. The wood caught him on the side of his skull and then bounced off his right shoulder. He heard a loud pop in his ears as he stumbled backward, reaching for his gun. The bat struck him again, across the stomach this time, and everything went black as he doubled over and fell to his knees.

Bracing himself on one hand, he gulped in air. He’d been caught completely by surprise and now was too dazed to fight back. He had the impression there were two of them, but he wasn’t sure why. He couldn’t see anything. His mouth hung open and his eyes refused to focus as blood ran freely down the side of his face.

Hands grabbed his arms and dragged him inside the house, where he was dropped facedown on the hardwood floor. A long string of spittle and blood hung from his mouth as he tried to lift his head.

“Lay still, asshole.”

A steel-toed boot connected with his rib cage, and Dave fell back to the floor. Someone straddled him and, with a fistful of hair, yanked his head back. A knife blade flashed in the moonlight a split second before he felt the edge against his throat. The man on top of him smelled of sweat and whiskey, and he was breathing heavily, not so much from the strain, Dave thought, but from excitement.

A pair of polished shoes came into Dave’s view, but when he tried to look up, the blade pressed into his throat.

The man in front of him paused, lifted one foot and struck a match against the sole of his shoe. A second later, Dave smelled the acrid scent of cigarette smoke as the man exhaled noisily. Walking over to the window, he sat down in a chair and continued to smoke. From the corner of Dave’s eye, he saw the glowing arc of the cigarette as the man lifted it to his mouth.

“You’ve got two options here, Dave. This can go fast and easy, or we can drag it out for hours. It’s your call, but I know which option my boy here would choose. Seems as if he’s got an ax to grind with you.”

“Enough talk,” a third man said from the doorway. “Just get on with it.”

The command was soft and steely, but this time Dave didn’t try to turn toward the voice. He kept his eyes forward and watched blood run off his cheek and drop on the hardwood floor.

“Tie him up,” the man with the cigarette ordered.

Dave gritted his teeth as his wrists were wrenched back and bound tightly with a thin cord that bit into his flesh.

“You’re in some serious shit here.” The smoking man spoke in a voice that was almost pleasant. “Obstruction of justice, tampering with evidence, interfering in an official investigation. Any one of those charges could get you put away for a very long time.”

Dave lifted his head. “Is that why you brought a bartender with a baseball bat to help arrest me?”

The man got up from the chair and walked across the room to stand over Dave. “You think you’re pretty smart, don’t you? Got it all figured out. In that case, I guess there’s not much point in keeping up the pretense.” He knelt and, for the first time, allowed Dave to get a look at his face. He was a big, muscular guy with hair clipped down to his scalp and a scar that ran the length of his jawline. He smiled in the moonlight. “Do you know who I am?”

“Only by reputation. But the description I was given didn’t do you justice, Nettle. No one mentioned how bad you stink. You smell just like a dead man walking.”

“You’re a funny guy, Dave. A regular comedian. But maybe what you smell is the stink of the gutter. I hear you’ve been spending a lot of time there.”

When Dave said nothing, Nettle stood. “Yeah, that’s right. I know you by reputation, too. I heard you were a real dumb-ass, and you just proved to me that you are.”

“I don’t like to disappoint,” Dave rasped.

“As I said, this can go easy or I can let your old buddy Robert have his way with you. It’s your call. But make no mistake. I’ll get what I came for. One way or another. And the way I see it, when you start interfering in police business, fucking with an ongoing investigation, you gotta expect some blowback. Even a dumb shit like you should know better.”

Dave wiped his mouth against his shoulder as he pushed himself up to lean against the wall. His head lolled back against the plaster. “If you’re still trying to pass this off as official police business, then I think we need to reevaluate which one of us is the dumb-ass.”

Nettle stared down at him. “Maybe I ought to let my boy here give you a little preview of coming attractions. Seems to me you could use an attitude adjustment.”

“That sounds about right. You’re used to having people clean up your messes, aren’t you, Nettle?”

“That’s pretty good coming from a guy like you.” The detective pulled out his gun. “If you’ve got two brain cells left, you’ll tell me what I want to know so we can end this bullshit right now. It’ll only get uglier once I lose my patience.”

“And here I thought we were getting along so well,” Dave said.

Taubin was standing beside Dave and kicked him in the ribs again. “Show some respect, dickhead.”

“Fuck you, Bobby Ray.”

He laughed out loud. “You just sealed your own fate, Creasy.”

“Shut up,” Nettle said. “Let me handle this. Go out to the porch and keep watch.”

“You’re the boss,” Taubin said. “But once you’re done with him, you give me a holler, hear? Me and Dave got some unfinished business to settle.”

Nettle squatted in front of him. “Let’s try this again. You’ve been a lush for years, everybody knows it. You didn’t just wake up from a stupor one morning and decide to start asking questions about a couple of homicides. Someone put you up to this.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

The butt of the gun slammed against the side of Dave’s skull. “Wrong answer, asshole. You didn’t print those police files I found in your desk off the Internet. Someone gave them to you. I want a name.”

Dave kept silent. He was a dead man, anyway. He’d seen Nettle’s face. No way he was getting out of this alive.

“Let’s up the ante, shall we? You got an uncle that lives just down the road. Maybe we ought to get him over here and see what he knows.”

Dave still said nothing.

“That the way you want to play it, fine.” Nettle stood and shoved the gun into the waistband of his trousers, then reached down and yanked Dave to his feet. His wrists were still tied behind him and his head throbbed sickeningly. He needed to vomit, but he wouldn’t give them the satisfaction.

Nettle shoved him toward the door and Dave stumbled out to the porch.

“Help me get him down to the water,” Nettle told Taubin. “He’ll talk then.”

The two men dragged him off the porch, across the yard and down the steep, muddy bank to the water’s edge. Dave had no idea where the third man was, but he had a feeling he was somewhere behind them. As they neared the water, the fecund scent of the swamp mingled with the smell of blood, and Dave started to wretch.

“Shit, man, are you sure about this?” Taubin asked anxiously as they waded into knee-deep water. “I ain’t too crazy about the swamp. These waters gotta be full of gators.”

“Don’t worry,” Nettle told him. “This won’t take long.”

As they waded out a little farther, the lily pads on the surface undulated with the movement. Dave could feel the sinewy maze of cypress roots beneath his feet and had to struggle to keep his balance.

When the water was nearly waist high, Nettle pushed Dave to his knees. He tried to get up, but slipped on the muddy bottom. Nettle clamped his hand around the back of Dave’s neck and pressed his face underwater.

Dave went completely still, trying to reserve the air in his lungs, but after a few seconds, his instincts took over and he began to thrash around, slinging his head from side to side, trying to free himself from the viselike grip that held him under.

The last of his air rushed out of his lungs and Dave’s mouth opened instinctively. As water streamed into his nose and throat, he couldn’t contain his panic.

Nettle jerked him to the surface, and Dave came up gasping and sputtering, his head still pulsing from the pressure. When his captors released him, his feet slid out from under him and he went down again. Quickly he surfaced, shaking his head from side to side, and Taubin laughed out loud. “Look at that dumb pecker-wood.”

Dave saw Nettle smile in the moonlight. “I bet he’s ready to talk now. Let’s get him to the bank.”

They pulled him out of the water and plopped him facedown in the mud.

“Who gave you those files?” Nettle asked calmly.

“I don’t remember,” Dave gasped. His heart was pounding hard and fast, and his mouth was filled with the taste of swamp water, blood and fear.

“Someone brought you into this,” Nettle said. “I want a name.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Like I said, we could get your uncle down here, see what he knows. Or maybe we could pay a visit to your old partner. He might know something. Titus has a kid still at home, right? A girl about fourteen or fifteen. You know better than anyone how far a guy would go to protect his daughter, don’t you, Dave?”

“You son of a bitch. You lay one finger on that girl, I’ll kill you. If there’s anything left once Titus gets through with you.”

Nettle just laughed.

“Next time, I say we leave him under longer,” Taubin said. “If he comes back up, we won’t be able to shut him up. If he don’t, we can just leave him for gator bait.”

They moved toward Dave again, but this time he was ready for them. He rolled to his back and slammed his foot into Taubin’s groin. The man’s knees buckled and he fell to the ground in a fetal curl. He lay groaning in pain and rage for the longest moment before slowly rising to his feet, one hand pressed between his spraddled legs while the other hand pulled out his knife.

“You’re a dead man,” he gasped as he started toward Dave. “I’ll gut you like a catfish—” A light caught him in the face and he blinked in shock. “What the hell…?”

A split second later, a bullet hit a cypress tree behind him and the bark exploded into the water. Taubin swore again as he dived for cover.

“This is private property!” Marsilius yelled from the darkness. “I already called the law so you’ve got about five seconds to get the hell out of here before I start blowing some head off!”

To punctuate his warning, he fired off several rounds, hitting targets so close to Taubin and Nettle that there was little doubt about his aim. If he’d wanted them dead, they already would be.

Taubin rose shakily to his feet, keeping his head low. “Let’s get the hell out of here. I don’t want no trouble with the local boys. You ain’t paying me enough to get my head busted open by some redneck deputy with a billy club.”

Nettle glanced down at Dave in the dark. “Do yourself a favor. Stay out of New Orleans and stay out of my business. Next time it won’t turn out so good for you.”

And then they were gone. Pain twisted inside Dave’s gut and he rolled over to vomit in the mud. When he was finished, he lay weak and trembling on his side. It was all he could do to keep from blacking out.

A moment later, Marsilius knelt beside him in the mud. “How bad you hurt, son?”

“I’ll live,” Dave muttered. “Thanks to you.”

“That head’s gonna need some stitches.”

“I don’t think it’s as bad as it looks.” Dave struggled to sit up. “I’ll clean it up when I get home, see how it looks.”

“Don’t talk crazy, son, they laid you open good. I’m taking you to the hospital. Can you walk or do I need to back the truck down here?”

“I can walk.”

His uncle helped him to his feet. “You sure? You’re staggering around like you been on a three-day drunk.”

“I’m fine,” Dave said, a split second before he passed out cold.

By the time they left the hospital, the sky had already started to lighten in the east. They’d waited hours to see a doctor. It was Saturday night and the end of a three-week rotation for some of the workers on the offshore oil rigs, so the emergency room had been packed with guys fresh in from the platforms and ready to party.

Dave had sat holding a towel to his head as he filled out the paperwork, and every time Marsilius went to ask how much longer it would be, the heavyset nurse behind the desk would glower and tell him they would just have to wait their turn like everybody else.

Finally, Dave had been taken to a cubicle and treated by a freckle-faced intern who looked barely old enough to vote. The gash on Dave’s head took several stitches, but he didn’t have any broken bones or ribs, and once the doctor had him patched up, he signed Dave’s release papers because they were short on beds. That suited Dave fine. He wouldn’t have stayed, anyway. He hated hospitals. Something about the smell, he decided as he walked outside.

He rolled down the window in Marsilius’s truck and tipped his head back so the air rushed over his face. Clouds scuttled across the eastern sky where the sun hovered just below the horizon.

As Marsilius turned down the dusty road to home, he cut Dave a glance. “You ready to tell me what happened earlier?”

“I thought it was pretty obvious that I got my ass kicked.” Dave watched out the window as distant heat lightning shimmered just above the treetops.

“You know what I mean. Who were those guys?”

“Just forget about it, okay? The less you know, the better off you’ll be.”

“Yeah, well, here’s the thing. After the potshots I took over their heads, I have a feeling those bastards may not be feeling too kindly toward me. I’d at least like to know who I need to be on the lookout for.”

“I guess you’ve got a point,” Dave said. “The big guy is NOPD. His name is Clive Nettle.”

Marsilius turned to look at him. “A cop? Shit fire, Dave, what are you mixed up in?”

Dave ignored the question. “The scrawny one is an ex-con named Bobby Ray Taubin. I think there was a third one, but I never got a look at him. Bobby Ray works for JoJo Barone. Evidently, he also does some side jobs for Nettle.”

“What do they want with you?”

“I guess they don’t like some of the questions I’ve been asking. Or more to the point, they don’t like the answers I got from JoJo Barone.”

“When did you go see JoJo?”

“Yesterday. He told me that Clive Nettle killed Renee Savaria at a private party he arranged, and the whole thing was covered up by some of the other cops who were there that night.”

“Do you believe him?”

“If I didn’t before, I do after tonight.”

His uncle let out a long breath. “What the hell are you going to do with that information?”

Dave frowned into the darkness. “I don’t know yet. Look for the other cops who were involved, for one thing.”

“You can’t go this alone, son, you’ll need somebody watching your back.”

“Don’t worry about it. I’ve got that part covered.”

“Sure as hell didn’t look that way to me. This is dangerous shit, Dave. You gotta bring somebody else in on this fast. Somebody you can trust.”

“Yeah, well, that’s the problem. JoJo said those parties were attended by some pretty heavy-duty brass. I don’t know how far up this thing goes.”

“What about the D.A.?”

Dave had thought of that, but going to Lee Elliot would be a tricky business, considering his involvement with Angelette. Dave still hadn’t figured out her angle yet, and until he did, he wasn’t about to put much faith in anyone she was that closely associated with.

“What makes you think I could even get in to see Lee Elliot?”

“Maybe you couldn’t, but Claire’s sister could.”

Dave’s laugh was bitter. “You’re joking, right? Charlotte LeBlanc despises the ground I walk on. No way she’d hear me out.”

“Then maybe you better get out of town and lie low for a while. I have a friend in Houston who owns a garage. He’d put you to work, no questions asked.”

“I’m not running away. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I did that. But I’d feel a whole lot better if you’d head on down to Houston. I don’t want to see anything happen to you, old man. You’re the only family I got left.”

Marsilius downshifted as he turned a curve. “I can take care of myself. You’re the one I’m worried about. This ain’t over, Dave. They’ll be back, and next time I might not be around to pull your ass out of the wringer.”

“They won’t come back right away. They know I’ll be ready for them now. They’ll wait until they think they can catch me by surprise again.”

“You seem pretty sure about that.”

Dave shrugged. “It’s what I’d do.”

“I hope you’re right, son. I truly do.”

They were both silent after that, and Marsilius didn’t speak again until he pulled into Dave’s drive and cut the engine. He offered to come in, but Dave wasn’t up for any more company, and he wanted to be alone so that he could try and figure out what his next move would be.

Inside the house, he went from room to room, securing doors and windows, but he knew the effort was futile. The glass in the back door had been broken so that someone could reach in and turn the lock. Dave wouldn’t be able to get the window fixed until the next day, and he was too tired to even board up the opening for now.

He hoped what he told Marsilius held true, that Nettle wouldn’t come for him again right away. But just in case, he placed his.38 on the sink while he showered, and slipped it underneath his pillow when he went to bed.

Then he lay on his back for a long time, staring at the ceiling as he thought about Claire. And Ruby.

He closed his eyes and tried to sleep. He was bone-deep weary, but he still couldn’t rest. After a while, he got up and walked over to the window. He heard one of the rocking chairs on his front porch creak, but he wasn’t alarmed. He knew who was down there.

He listened, heard the sound again as Marsilius shifted his weight to accommodate his bad knee. Dave stared out the window for a few minutes longer, then went downstairs to make coffee.