Murder in the Irish Channel (Chanse MacLeod Mysteries) (6 page)

She was also one of the best cops on the force. In the weeks after the flood, Venus had thought about taking an early retirement and moving up to Memphis near her daughters. Her home in New Orleans East was completely destroyed, and the entire New Orleans Police Department had taken a beating in the national press. She’d eventually decided to stay and work, to help rebuild not only the city but the department as well—which was a good thing. New Orleans couldn’t afford to lose someone like Venus. She’d lived in the carriage house behind Blaine and his partner’s house for a couple of years before finally buying her own home in Uptown New Orleans, on General Pershing Street. She kept saying she was going to have everyone in our little group of friends over for dinner, but it hadn’t happened yet. She kept saying she was waiting until she had the house fixed up just the way she wanted it.

I knew better than to press the subject.

Blaine was my age, give or take a year or so, and the youngest son of a prominent old New Orleans society family. He was about five-nine, and obviously spent a lot of time in the gym. He liked to wear his shirts tight with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. When he was off duty, he favored tight sleeveless T-shirts (when he bothered to wear one) and loose-fitting pleated madras shorts. He had beautiful dark blue eyes, olive skin that tanned easily, and curly black hair with a bluish sheen to it. He shaved every morning, but by midafternoon he always had a blue-black shadow on his cheeks and chin and under his nose. He used to like to go out dancing in the Quarter gay bars every weekend, but over the last few years had tapered that off quite a bit. He had a wicked sense of humor, was a merciless tease, and never seemed to let anything bother him for long. He lived on the opposite side of Coliseum Square from me with his partner, Todd Laborde, in a gorgeous mansion they’d renovated. Todd was about fifteen years older than Blaine and owned a number of successful businesses around the city. They’d been together since Blaine was in his early twenties, and they had an open relationship. Blaine and I had been fuck buddies for a short period of time. That was ancient history, though—now we were just close friends.

“I don’t know why people can’t just drink regular coffee anymore.” Venus shook her head, apparently not finished with her tirade. Her big gold hoop earrings started swinging. “I mean, seriously. Why does everyone have to have some kind of goddamned thing no one ever heard of ten years ago? What the fuck is a goddamned triple mocha skinny latte with a shot of this or that or whatever? Who even thought about putting that shit in their coffee in the first place? When you’re done putting all that crap into it, it doesn’t even taste like coffee anymore.” She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “Coffee is fucking coffee, for God’s sake.”

I glanced down at my iced mocha and tried not to let her see me smile. “Next you’ll be yelling at kids to get off your lawn.”

“Yeah, well, if you had your own lawn you wouldn’t want kids running all over it and tearing it up, either.” Venus threw her head back and barked out a loud laugh. “And you’re not getting any younger yourself, there, buddy.” Venus trained her big round brown eyes on me, a smile playing at the corner of her lips. “And it’s generally not a good idea to be rude and insulting to someone you need help from.” She nudged Blaine with her elbow. “Right, partner?”

It wasn’t strictly kosher, but sometimes Venus and Blaine would slip me some information I shouldn’t have access to, or would do some checking for me—as long as it was never traced back to them. Cops have a
lot
more access to information than private eyes—and private eyes have access to a lot more information than your average Joe Citizen. In return, I’ve been known to help them out with some of their cases from time to time—whenever they needed something done that might not necessarily hold up in a court of law.

It’s a nice little arrangement that some of their higher-ups might not look kindly upon, but it worked for us.

“Yeah, well, be that as it may, you know as well as I do if Chanse doesn’t find this woman, she’ll never be found. You know who caught the case, Chanse?” Blaine took a sip from his coffee and wouldn’t look me in the eye. “Delvecchio.”

My heart sank. “Fuck.”

There really wasn’t much else to say. If Venus was one of the better cops on the NOPD, Albert Delvecchio was the epitome of why the department had such a bad reputation. Lazy, racist, homophobic,
and
sexist, he’d been assigned to Missing Persons primarily because it was a place where he could do the least amount of damage. The general consensus around the department was Delvecchio had something on someone—it was the only explanation anyone could come up with for why he hadn’t been fired with extreme prejudice years ago. His virulent homophobia meant Blaine would get nowhere with him—the racism and sexism ruled Venus out as a confidant. Delvecchio hadn’t seen the inside of a gym since high school—if he had then. He was balding but tried masking it by combing his graying hair over the baldness. He had an ever-expanding beer belly and the disposition of a warthog—an angry warthog, at that. He was a lousy cop—the kind who talked smack about the higher-ups when they weren’t around but would shove his head as far up their asses as possible when they were. He was insulting and crude to his fellow officers, and I’d come close to slugging him any number of times during my brief tenure in uniform. I still regretted not loosening a few of his teeth for him. He was also a lazy son of a bitch who always tried to pass his work off to anyone available, and wasn’t especially smart either.

If it were left solely up to him, Mona O’Neill would never be found.

“Well, in that case I’m not going to owe either one of you a favor,” I observed, taking a drink of my iced mocha. “Because if it’s Delvecchio’s case, he maybe did a half-assed interview with Jonny and didn’t bother with anyone else—so undoubtedly I know a hell of a lot more than he does.”

“Yeah, well, I can’t argue that point with you. But he did put out the APB, at least—I checked on that.” Venus blew on her coffee before taking a drink. “But you’re right, that’s about all he did. He’s probably forgotten all about her already.”

“Unless he’s changed, he forgot about her two minutes after he finished talking to Jonny,” I replied.

“If you got her credit cards, I can run them.” She rolled her eyes. “I don’t think he even did that.”

I slid the list I’d made before leaving Mona O’Neill’s house across the table. Venus didn’t look at it. She just folded it and slipped it into her purse. “Thanks.”

She shrugged. “She’s one of those church protesters, isn’t she?”

I stared at her. “How did you know that?”

“Are you confusing me with Delvecchio’s sorry ass?” She looked at Blaine. “He apparently thinks I’m too stupid to run her name.”

Blaine grinned back at her. “You’d think he’d be nicer to cops risking their jobs to do his work for him, wouldn’t you?”

“You’d think.” She turned her head back to me, her face without expression. “You heard about the archdiocese deciding to try to stop the vigils by having the protesters arrested for trespassing. The cops had to kick in the damned doors—can you believe that? Police officers kicking down the doors of a church. In New Orleans.” Her eyes glinted. “The bastards at the archdiocese dropped the charges, of course, once the message boards online lit up.” She shook her head. “Idiots. Even if public opinion wasn’t on the protesters’ side, it sure was after that. Nobody wants to see the cops kicking in the doors of a church on the news.” She sighed. “But that’s what happens when you have an archbishop who doesn’t have a fucking clue about the city he serves. I don’t know why they can’t give us an archbishop from New Orleans. Anyway, she was the one giving interviews to the press after the arrests. She was all over the news.” She shook her head. “You should watch the local news more often.”

“But do you really think having a local as archbishop would make a difference?” I asked. I’d heard this argument made, but it had always struck me as another example of New Orleans’ particular xenophobia against anyone and anything Not From Here. “I mean, an archbishop who was a local would be facing the same money problems Archbishop Pugh is facing. Wouldn’t he want to close churches, too?”

“I always forget you aren’t from here,” Blaine replied as Venus just glared at me. “The major reason everyone’s complaining about Archbishop Pugh is because he doesn’t understand the importance of the individual churches. For him it’s all about money—and neither one of those churches is really costing the archdiocese money to stay open. Both parishes are self-supporting. That’s why the parishioners are so pissed off. There are other parishes in the city that aren’t self-supporting. If it was really about losing money, why these particular churches instead of the ones that
are
losing money?”

I debated with myself for just a moment, but plunged ahead anyway. “Well, there’s something I don’t understand. I mean, who cares if your church closes? What difference does it make what church you attend services at? Catholic is Catholic, isn’t it? Isn’t it all about communing with God?”

“Chanse—” Venus reached across the table and grabbed my right hand with both of hers, squeezing. “Maybe it’s different in other places, I don’t know, I don’t live somewhere else. All I can tell you is what it’s like here. In New Orleans.” She let go of my hands and looked out the window as a Coca-Cola delivery truck went by. She took a deep breath. “St. Anselm has been serving its parish for over a hundred years, and so has Our Lady of Prompt Succor. People who were baptized there, confirmed, married, had their kids baptized and confirmed and married there—the place itself matters to people—it matters.” She shrugged. “And it’s hard to let go, Chanse—it’s like having your heart ripped out.” She swallowed. “I’ve been going to St. Anselm myself since the flood. My old parish in the East isn’t there anymore.” She closed her eyes. “I was baptized and confirmed at Mary Queen of the Universe. I was married there. My kids were baptized, confirmed, married there. It kills me that Mary Queen of the Universe isn’t there anymore, Chanse. And now I go to St. Anselm—and soon if the archbishop has his way, it’s not going to be there anymore, either. And that’s just wrong.” She finished her coffee and pushed her chair back. “Haven’t we lost enough here already? Do we have to lose our churches, too?” She took her cup back to the counter for a refill.

“Have you talked to Paige at all?” Blaine asked as she sat back down.

“Paige? Why?” I asked, startled.

Blaine laughed. “Some friend you are!”

Venus tried not to smile, but gave up and grinned broadly at me. “Seriously.” She got out of her chair and walked over to the counter, picked up a magazine, and walked back. She slapped it down on the table in front of me and started laughing.

It was the latest issue of
Crescent City
,
and the cover photograph showed a group of people standing in front of a church with their arms linked. The headline said simply, F
IGHTING FOR
R
ELIGIOUS
H
ERITAGE
. Beneath that, it said in a smaller font:
An in-depth look at the church closing controversy by Paige Tourneur.

Paige was my best friend, the editor of
Crescent City
, and had been dating Blaine’s older brother Ryan for about four years.

“Paige has been covering this story since the archdiocese announced they were closing the churches,” Blaine went on as I flipped to the article. “You mean she’s never mentioned it to you? And you don’t read her articles?” They exchanged glances.

“Can’t wait to rat your ass out to her,” Venus said with a grin. “You’re gonna have some serious ’splainin’ to do, Mr. Man.”

I looked at her. “Okay, I admit, I never read the newspaper and rarely watch the news. And she’s used to it. She used to get mad at me when she worked at the paper, but it doesn’t bother her anymore. But can you explain something to me? If it’s two churches, why does St. Anselm’s get all the coverage and no one ever talks about Our Lady of Prompt Succor—which is a ridiculous name for a church, I have to say.”

“Because it’s over on the West Bank,” Venus replied. “And that best-selling novelist is a parishioner at St. Anselm—so he gets them a lot more coverage, people listen to him when he talks. But the archbishop is trying to close
two
churches.” She pushed her chair back and stood up. “It’s a pity, too. St. Anselm is a beautiful old church, and the parishioners are really great people. They really made me feel at home there.” She picked up her purse and stalked out of the coffee shop.

Blaine leaned back in his chair. “Don’t mind her. This whole church thing has got her riled. I can’t say as I blame her—she already lost one church to Katrina, and now she’s about to lose another? And I think her younger daughter’s having marital trouble, but you know how she is. She won’t say a damned thing until she’s ready—and in the meantime I got to put up with her damned moods.” He winked at me. “Speaking of, how are things going with Rory?”

“Okay.” I shrugged. “Taking things as they go, really. I don’t want to rush anything, and neither does he.”

“I’m just glad to see you—”

My iPhone started ringing, and I gave Blaine an apologetic smile as I ran my finger over the screen to accept the call. “Hello, Abby,” I said into the phone, “can you wait a sec?”

Blaine pushed his chair back and stood up. “I got to go, anyway. I’ll call you later, man.”

I nodded, giving him a fist bump before he walked out of the coffee shop. “Sorry about that, Abby.”