A brown Oldsmobile was parked in the 1300 block of Simon Bolivar Avenue, directly across from the Melpomene Housing Project high rise. LaStanza slowed the Ford as they passed.
“That’s it!” Jodie snapped excitedly as both recognized the license plate number.
LaStanza nodded and continued on before making a U-turn through the neutral ground to double back. Jodie called Mark on the radio right away with the news. As their sergeant acknowledged the transmission, his own voice rising with excitement, Paul Snowood and Felicity Jones came on the air to say they were in route.
LaStanza found a spot in the 1400 block and parked a block behind the Oldsmobile. He killed the engine, turned off the lights and rolled his window the rest of the way down and waited. Jodie sank as far down in the seat as she could and called in a Code Five with Headquarters, alerting them to the stakeout. When she finished, she put the radio on her lap and unsnapped the hammer snap on her shoulder holster, withdrawing her nickel plated Smith and Wesson .38.
Jodie squirmed in the seat, rubbing her back with her free hand.
“You OK?”, he asked.
“This goddamn shoulder rig kills my back.”
“Oh.” It took her long enough to find out.
LaStanza’s magnum was already in his hand, resting against the side of his right leg.
“You put those magnum loads back in?” she asked in a hoarse whisper.
“Abso-fuckin’-lutely.”
It was against departmental regulations to have magnum rounds in your gun. Only .38 ammo was authorized. With a hot load, you might miss and kill a pain-in-the-ass innocent bystander or two. LaStanza didn’t worry about regulations. He never missed. Anyway, if he shot one more person, he’d be a gelding.
“Well,” she said a minute later, “you were right about Simon Bolivar.”
He nodded slightly but kept his eyes trained on the Oldsmobile and the area surrounding the parked car. He felt no satisfaction in coming up with the latest lead, even if it was the one that finally worked. He was too focused on the job at hand to linger on the fact that he had found something in the police computer that pointed them in the right direction. He had found that Sandy Courane was arrested three times in the 1300 block of Simon Bolivar for turning tricks. Sometimes, a little luck went a long way.
Nine minutes later, Mark’s white Ford pulled up a cross Simon bolivar, stopping directly in front of the Melpomene high rise.
“I see it,” the sergeant grunted on the radio.
A minute later, Snowood and Fel drove slowly past LaStanza’s position before settling in a spot in the 1200 block, on the other side of the Oldsmobile.
Glancing at his watch, LaStanza noted it was exactly eleven p.m. Traffic was till heavy on Simon Bolivar. Pedestrian traffic wasn’t as heavy on their side of the street. Outside the high rise, where Mark was parked, there were enough people to call an election.
Eight long minutes later, Mark came back on the air.
“Looks like there’s an abandoned car two cars behind the Olds. See it?”
LaStanza leaned out his window to take a look. There was a black Pontiac Bonneville, about a ’68 or ’69 model, parked behind the Pinto parked behind the Olds. He could see its back window was gone as were both tires on the driver’s side, the street side of the car.
“Cover me,” he told his partner as he started to get out. Hesitating a moment, he looked back at her and added, “Don’t just keep an eye on me, Capish? Keep an eye around here. Don’t let anyone sneak up on you.”
Her cat eyes were glued to his as if she was about to say goodbye. She blinked and let a slight smile crawl across her nervous lips. He nodded, turned and climbed out. With his radio in his left hand and his magnum held against his right thigh, LaStanza moved steadily along the parked cars, crossing the narrow expanse of Thalia Street to the Bonneville. Shards of broken glass surrounded the car, along with shattered wine bottles, twisted beer cans and a blackened banana peel.
The windshield was the only glass left on the car and it had several long splits across it. Pausing momentarily to make certain nothing alive was inside the car, LaStanza noticed more refuse littering the seats.
He opened the rear door. It popped on rusty hinges. He quickly slipped into the back seat, closing the door behind him. He rested the back of his head against the door he’d just entered and sprawled out across the floorboard. His vision was limited to the sidewalk side of the car. He called Mark and told him.
“10-4,” his sergeant responded, “I’ll let you know if anyone approaches.”
“10-4.”
Damn, he had to readjust himself three times immediately to remove a coke can, an ashtray and the base of a desk lamp from under his back side. Damn again, he thought, settling back on the sticky floor. He’d just given Jodie a speech about partners not separating and look where he was.
“Never split up,” he told her earlier, as they cruised. “Whatever happens to your partner, better happen to you.”
She agreed. Except now she was half block away.
Sucking in a deep breath, he was nearly gaged by the stink inside the car. He didn’t even want o know what it was. It smelled too bad.
He cracked open the door on the street side to let in more air and to leave him a quick exit when the time came. Only it didn’t come. It just go hotter and stickier in the confines of the dead Pontiac. The wait was grueling. Beside the stench and the filth, the car was an oven, a sweltering steamer, a pit where no air entered. It plastered his tee shirt against this chest and sent rivulet of sweat down his back and wrinkled his hands into the hand of an old man. He thanked God he wore jeans. He thanked God even more that he had a rubber grips on his revolver.
With his radio turned down low and pressed against this left ear, he waited. Cars zoomed by outside, as if in another world. Occasionally a passerby would stroll by but no one even looked in at him and Mark never called so there was no danger and no Brooks.
The minutes stretched by like taffy dripping from a Salvador Dali clock. Blinking sweat from his overheated eyes, LaStanza concentrated with all his might on what he could see and hear on the radio cradled in his damp hand.
Then the word ‘gelding’ crept into his mind and he flushed it away quickly. Readjusting himself, he glanced at his watch. It was not five minutes until one in the morning. He sucked in another breath of superheated air and reminded himself of the old Sicilian saying his father had put on him when he was pursuing the Twenty-two Killer.
“Ice in the veins,” he told himself over and over again and tried his best to control his breathing. There was no way to control his racing heart. And the minutes dragged on.
When Mark’s voice came on the radio, he nearly hit the roof of the Bonneville.
“I think that’s him,” Mark whispered over the air.
LaStanza held his breath and waited for the longest seconds of his life to pass.
Come on.
“OK,” Mark said again, this time a little louder, “we got Brooks coming out of the house right next to his car. He’s in a white shirt and dark pants and he’s moving to his car now.”
LaStanza listened for footsteps. A car passed so close it rocked the Bonneville. His heart pounding hard, his face reddening in anticipation, he held back and waited for Mark. Come on, you son-of-a-bitch he was thinking, his teeth grinding so hard his jaw ached.
Then he heard it.
“Now!”
LaStanza moved quickly and silently. Rising and opening the door at the same time, he had one foot on the pavement as he caught sight of Brooks climbing into the driver’s seat of the Oldsmobile.
Before Brooks could close the door, LaStanza was on him, jamming the muzzle of his .357 magnum against the man’s jugular vein and growling, “Freeze!”
The man’s eyes bulged at him as he tried to pull away.
LaStanza cocked the magnum and snarled, “Police!”
Brooks froze.
“Hands against the windshield. Now!”
The man reached forward slowly and place his palms against the windshield. His eyes were riveted to LaStanza’s in a lingering, unblinking stare. There was fear in the eyes. LaStanza knew, for certain, that there was blood in his own eyes. He heard Jodie running up behind him. He also heard screeching tires and the sudden blare of a siren and whooper as the other two police cars tore around a mad dash.
“Open your mouth!” LaStanza told Brooks.
The man hesitated.
“Open your fuckin’ mouth!”
Brooks obliged and LaStanza shoved the magnum into the open mouth.
“Now close it!”
Brooks’ lips sealed around the muzzle of LaStanza’s gun.
“Now, follow me out the car!” LaStanza inched backward with the man following the magnum.
Jodie was in perfect position. She opened the door, reached in and slapped a cuff on Brooks’ left wrist. Then as the man slowly exited the car, she pulled the arms behind him and cuffed the right wrist.
Only then did LaStanza tell Brooks to open his mouth so the magnum could be withdrawn. Jodie shoved Brooks around the open door to the hood of the Olds and laid him face down on the hood. She began to search him as Mark’s car screeched to a halt behind them at the same time Snowood’s car slid u from the wrong way on Simon Bolivar.
Jodie found a .38 tucked in the waistband of Brooks’ pants. Jerking it out, she passed it to LaStanza who tucked it into his back pocket.
LaStanza wiped the muzzle of his own gun on the back of Brooks’ shirt before re-holstering it. Then he leaned forward and yanked at the hair on the back of the man’s head and began reciting the ritualistic dogma of police work – “All right, Fuck Head, you have the right to remain silent… ”
His heart was still pounding and he knew that the blood in his veins was anything but ice. A crowd quickly collected around them. He could hear Snowood calling for a marked unit. The street lights seemed to brighten in the excitement. LaStanza looked at his watch and saw it was two in the morning of a simmering summer morning in the big city, with kids edging forward to watch grown men with guns and radios and a blond woman with her own gun and radio holding a killer against the hood of a brown Oldsmobile.
Mark began barking orders. He told Snowood to jot down a description of Brooks’ house for a search warrant. He assigned Jodie to search the Oldsmobile.
“I’ll sit tight with Jodie,” he told LaStanza. “Soon as you get the search warrant, send Snowood back here and we’ll search the house.”
Two Sixth District units came flying up, blue lights splattering across the dark night, sirens wailing like banshees. LaStanza and Snowood each grabbed an arm and led Sam Brooks from the Oldsmobile to Snowood’s Ford. Brooks was so big, he even towered over Snowood.
Glancing back, LaStanza caught Jodie’s eye and winked at her. She smiled back and said, “Fuckin’ A!”
“What about me?” LaStanza heard Fel Jones ask Mark.
“Talk to these people,” Mark said, waving his hand at the gathering crowd.
•
Brooks wouldn’t talk to LaStanza. He wouldn’t talk to Snowood. Seated in the chair next to LaStanza ‘s desk, he set his square jaw and rolled his eyes away from their peering stares. He was light skinned alright, with a wide face, a flat nose and big lips. His face looked extra large, especially with the receding front hairline.
He surprised LaStanza a minute later when he said, “I’ll talk to Blondie.”
LaStanza’s eyebrows rose.
“Yeah, she’s got a nice ass.” Brooks lowered his voice in adding, “I seen her around. With you.”
LaStanza had never hit a man in handcuffs before. So he put Brooks in an interview room before he broke that tradition.
“Yeah, Blondie’s just my style,” Brooks said defiantly as they closed the door on him. His evil smile was dotted by a gold front tooth, just as Abby Marshall described. Snowood was already busy cutting the search warrant for Brooks’ house. LaStanza mixed up a fresh pot of coffee. Then he called Lizette.
It was a quarter until three in the morning and she was asleep.
“Hello?” Her voice was groggy, worried.
“It’s over. We got him.”
“Oh!” her voice rose, “Good. I’m glad you called.”
“Now go back to sleep.”
“Wait. What time is it?”
He told her as he kicked his feet up on his desk.
“Everybody OK?” she asked.
“Sure. Mark and Jodie’s searching his car. Paul’s typing a search warrant and I’ve got my feet up on the desk.”
“What about Fel?”
“He’s talking to his brothers.”
He could hear Lizette yawning. When she finished, she had another question, “Was Brooks a wimp?”
“Naw. He did French kissed my magnum.”
“Dino, you didn’t stick your gun in somebody’s mouth again.” She sounded like mother superior.
“Sure did.”
She yawned again.
“Guess what he wants?”
“Huh?”
“He wants to talk to Jodie.”
Lizette let out a hollow, “Woe!”
He called Bunny next. She was harder to wake up but became so excited he had a hard time getting her off the phone.
He wrote a note to himself to call the Camp family in the morning and the Dillards family too, even if they didn’t give a fuck about their daughter. Then he’d call Mrs. Roberts on Constance Street. Tomorrow, he’d put a call to Hot Coffee, Mississippi, and talk to Cherry. He’d also call Los Angeles for Abby. He’d leave Marid Ahbhu, the French-Algerian to Jodie.
When he pulled his feet off the desk, a piece of paper followed and fell to the floor. It was another phone message from Mr. Clark of the Lowe Coast. LaStanza picked up his receiver to call the old fool.
Jodie entered at that moment and he hung up before dialing. Covered in sweat, her hair partially matted against her head, she certainly did not look fresh and crisp anymore. She was smiling like a Cheshire Cat.
She dropped her briefcase on her desk and held up a plastic bag with something in it. He leaned over and looked. It was a button. His eyes lit up.
She was nodding. “It’s the one from Margaret Leake’s skirt.”
It looked like it to LaStanza.
“I already went by the lab. It’s identical,” Jodie said.
“Where’d you find it?” He sat back down.
“Sandwiched between the spare tire and wheel well in the truck. And that ain’t all. We found blood in the back seat and the truck.”
He jumped up and almost hugged her.
“That’s fuckin’ great.” God, he wanted to slap her on the back. He settled for slapping the top of his desk.
Jodie was rolling too. He knew he had to bring her down fast.
“Sit down,” he told her.
“Huh?”
“Brooks wants to talk to you.”
She sat down.
“I got some suggestions,” he told her. “But this one’s yours panda. He’s all yours.”
LaStanza let it sink in a couple seconds before continuing, “You can try the direct approach. ‘I know you did it. You know you did it. You wanna lie? Go ahead.’ Or you can try pride. ‘Hey, that was the hardest murder to solve. You’re smart.’ Or you can tell him he made a big mistake and then don’t tell him what it was. Let him sweat. Or you can tell him to be a man and face up to it. Or you might wanna walk in and sit down, cross your arms and just stare at him and then say, “Well?”
Jodie liked that one.
“OK,” LaStanza was far from finished, “if he stares you back in the eye, he’s not afraid but don’t let that put you off. If he crosses his arms, that’s a defensive move. If he lowers his head, he’s falling.
Jodie was taking notes now.
“Remember,” he said, trying to slow down, “take a separate confession for each murder.”
Then he reached into his briefcase and pulled out his new tape recorder and handed her three cassettes. “You need anything else,” he added, “call me on the intercom.”
“Anything else I need to know?” she asked, her face masked in nervous confusion.
“Yeah,” he said with a smile, “go get him partner.”
There was no need to tell her how important the confessions were. She had to know.
Rising, he told her, “Keep him cuffed. Behind his back. And keep your gun on your hip. If he starts anything, shoot him in the head. Twice. Fucker’s already killed three women. You hear me?
“Yeah.”
She paused just outside the door and closed her eyes. He let her collect her thoughts. Then she wet in, leaving the door cracked open. He leaned against the door and listened. He heard a chair moving and then silence for a long time until, finally, Jodie said, “Well?”
Brooks reply was too muffled to hear. But the voices continued, so LaStanza moved to the coffee pot and poured a cup into the FUCK THIS SHIT mug before returned to his desk.
•
He remembered his first whodunit, how the Slasher would only talk to him and not Mark. He remembered how he felt facing the monster one on one and taking the confessions of probably the most important murder case he would ever handle. He was a rookie dick, just like Jodie. She would be all right.
He kicked his feet up on his desk and tried to relax his mind. It was then he noticed Snowood was gone, probably in route to the judge’s to get the warrant signed. LaStanza was alone in the wide squad room. He took a sip of coffee, cradled the mug between his hands resting in his lap and closed his eyes.
He let his mind roam back to the batture, to the water and the levee, to a tranquil scene of Acadian girls who looked like Lizette. Then he envisioned the bodies. He wanted to think of the bodies, of the Pam know as Slow and her new black boots, of the Pam known as Fawn and the five point star on her gold tooth and of Margaret Leake and her torn mauve skit. He wanted to recall every detail, the mud, the heat, the strains of Reverend Stokes’ deep voice echoing Amazing Grace through the projects.
Opening his eyes, he put the mug on his desk and grabbed his pen and wrote himself a note. Usually a homicide man wasn’t as concerned with ‘why’ as much as ‘who’, ‘what’, ‘when’ ‘where’ and especially ‘how’. ‘Why’ is what sold mysteries to civilians who never saw a dead body that wasn’t in a casket. But now, now that it was nearly over, he wanted to know why, why that spot.
When the phone rang three quarters of an hour after Jodie went into the interview room, LaStanza answered quickly. It was Mark. He was calling from the killer’s house.
“Guess what I found?” the sergeant quipped.
“Surprise me.”
“A Beretta .22 caliber, Model 21, blue steel with black plastic grip.”
“That’s got to b e it,” LaStanza said.
“Let’s hope so.” Mark let out a sign before adding, “We also found a shit load of pictures of girls from magazines.”
“Porno?”
“Some. But most have undergarments on. Mostly red.”
“Red panties?” LaStanza sat up.
“Yep.”
“Take them.”
“I already have.”
Mark told him they’d be finished shortly and then hung up.
Red. Red panties. How had Bunny put it? ‘Sam’s fruit for red panties’. Same used to have her put on red panties and he’d get hot, tear them off and hurt her. Margaret Leake wore red panties on the night she died. Her killer ripped them. Jesus. It was all fitting together like a fuckin’ jigsaw puzzle.
LaStanza picked up the phone and called the Fourth District. When a patrolman named Curtis answered, he asked if Kelly was working that night.
“No, he’s off.”
“Look, I need his home number. This is LaStanza. Homicide.”
“Sure. Is it important?”
“Everything I do is important,” LaStanza said and stared laughing right away. “I’m just kiddin’ ya. It’s not important. I’d just like to talk to him. OK?”
“Sure.”
Kelly must have been in a dead sleep. His phone rang ten times before he answered.
“What ya’ doing?” LaStanza asked.
“Sleeping.”
“You wanna meet the Batture Murderer?”
“You kiddin’ me?”
LaStanza could see the man sit up in bed.
“Nope. He’s right up here in the office. Take your time and come on over and I’ll introduce you.”
“Yeah!”
Then LaStanza called Mr. Clark. The old man sounded as if he was already awake.
“Glad you called,” Clark said, clearing his throat. “I got an idea. This may sound screwy.”
Oh, no!
“Ever hear of Che Guevara?”
LaStanza put a hand over the receiver so the old man couldn’t hear him laughing.
“Are you laughing at me?” the man said.
A hand over the receiver didn’t work.
“Mr. Clark,” LaStanza explained, “we caught the killer. He’s sitting twenty feet from me right now. It’s all over.”
“Is he Cuban?” The old man was in a foul mood now.
“No, we think he’s Venusian.”
“What’s that?”
LaStanza bit his li so he wouldn’t laugh again. “It’s kinda complicated,” he told the old man. “Look it up. It’s in the dictionary.” He spelled the word for Clark.
“Venusian,” Clark repeated before hanging up.
LaStanza stared at the receiver as a dial tone replaced the angry voice. Then he shouted, “It means the mother-fucker is from Venus! That’s right. The fuckin’ planet!”
He fought the urge and hung up the receiver without slamming it. He looked at the clock on the wall. It was after four now.
Stretching and rolling his neck around in a slow circle, he caught sight of an envelope in his IN tray. He picked up the envelope and pulled out the sheet within. Leaning back in his chair he read he contents again, aloud, to the empty room It was a note sent to him by Stan Smith.
“This has been posted in the Sixth District Hall of Shame”
There once was a fancy-dressed wop
Who forgot that he was a cop
He parked his Italian sports car
Near a Jackson Avenue bar
And the street boys fuckin’ STOLE IT
Stan was such a fuckin’ Ass-hole, but LaStanza figured he deserved that note. Abso-fuckin’-lutely.
•
Kelly entered as he was going for a refill of coffee. Eager and excited, the tall patrolman looked even younger in a muscle shirt and blue jeans. Son-of-a-gun had a better build on him than most of the New Orleans Saints, then again, so did most people.
Wide eyed and eager, Kelly wanted to know the whole story. LaStanza raised a hand in protest and passed Kelly the dailies.
“Read these first.”
As Kelly was reading, Bob Kay waltzed into the squad room. Wearing a sweaty gray jogging suit with an NOPD gym logo on its front, Kay sported fresh crew cut. The man’s glasses were secured to his oval head by a wide red, elastic band that made him look more like a cosmonaut than a police lieutenant.
Nodding as he arrived at LaStanza’s desk, Kay caught his breath before stating, “Word’s out that you got a triple murderer up here.”
“Where’d you hear that?”
“Police garage,” Kay panted, winking at the same time. “It’s the talk of the town.”
“We got the Batture Killer.”
“Who?”
“The whores on the levee,” LaStanza gave him a hint.
“Oh, yeah.” Kay looked around the empty room.
“My partner’s interviewing him in there.” LaStanza pointed to the small interview room door.
“Kintyre?”
“Yep.”
“Outstanding!” When the big man smiled, his entire face broke open. He always liked Jodie. He was nodding again as he added, “She’ll break it off in his ass.”
With that last remark, Kay turned to leave, but only after patting Kelly on the shoulder and winking again at LaStanza and leaving them with a goodbye, “Brother.”
LaStanza wondered when the man ever slept.
Kelly was still reading a minute later when another lieutenant entered the squad room. This time it was William Fredericks, Commander of Burglary. Almost as tall as Kay, Fredericks was much older but just as friendly. He was a contemporary of LaStanza’s father, in fact, actually partnered with the old man back in the good-ole-bad-ole-days. Fredericks ware bifocals and a gray toupee atop his bald head. That morning, he had a Rip Van Winkle look on his face as if he’d just be yanked out of a hundred year sleep.
Acknowledging Kelly’s presence, Fredericks greeted LaStanza with an, “Hello son. I understand you have Sam Brooks up here.”
Jesus, the fuckin’ newspaper wouldn’t be out for hours but every cop in town already knew.
“Sure do.”
“I don’t’ know how much you know about Brooks, but he’s been my main snitch.” Frederick paused for emphasis before continuing, “for quiet a while.”
LaStanza felt his eyes kick into Sicilian. They narrowed and did not blink. In the back of his mind a flag was waving. No wonder Brooks never did any time.
Fredericks got straight to the point, “Can you cut him some slack?”
LaStanza almost laughed in the man’s face. Shaking his head slowly, he answered, “Not really Lou. We’re talking about murder.” He was trying to be nice but his heart wasn’t in it.
Fredericks tried a fatherly smile and said, “I know you can’t just let him go, but can you give him any kinda break?”
“Not a fuckin’ inch.”
LaStanza’s voice must have been a little too sharp. He saw the lieutenant recoil a bit before reaching for the nearest chair to pull up next to LaStanza’s desk.
Fredericks kept his voice low and soft as he said, “Aren’t we talking about two fuckin’ whores?”
“And a white woman, not that it makes a fuckin’ difference.”
“I didn’t know that.” It made a difference to Fredericks.
LaStanza felt his stomach twitching. The flag was waving madly now and he figured it out, suddenly.
“You knew about the two whores, didn’t you?” LaStanza asked his father’s old partner.
Fredericks didn’t answer. He didn’t’ have to. It was in his eyes. The bastard.
LaStanza leaned toward the lieutenant. He tried to keep his voice under control when he said, “Why didn’t you just come and tell me?”
Fredericks didn’t answer. He leaned back and looked at LaStanza as if someone had just spit in his face. The old man blinked twice and started to speak. He said, “Son... ”
LaStanza sawed him off with “Don’t call me ‘son’.”
Fredericks got hot. Huffing, he started up again with, “Your father and I… ”
“I’m gonna say this one time,” LaStanza snarled, his fingers digging into the arms of his beat-up chair, “Get the fuck away from me!”