LITMIR.BIZ

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read Maman Renée, Vodun, Potions, Fortunes in peeling paint. She’d want to steal that, too.

      Just as the black-haired woman pushed open the door, a little girl, maybe eight or nine years old, ran up to her.

      “Mignon!” the woman cried, leaning down to buss the girl’s cheeks. “Here you are, early as usual.” She gestured toward the canvas tote dangling from her wrist. “I have a new piece for you to learn today.”

      “Miss Rose,” the little girl said with a shake of her many neatly braided pigtails, “I want to play ‘Saints Go Marchin’ In.’”

      “In good time, ‘tite.” She pushed the door open and let the girl go inside ahead of her. Just as she entered, she turned back and glanced around. Dixon could have sworn her gaze lit on him for an instant before she pushed the door closed.

      For a couple of seconds, he stared at the weathered wooden door with its clear-and-red leaded glass insert, his chest contracting as if a giant fist squeezed it. The little girl had called her Rose.

      Rose. Thinking of the woman’s features, doubt nagged at him, but he’d come this far. He wasn’t about to give up without checking her out.

      He looked around. Maman Renée’s voodoo shop was one of a row of similar two-story houses.

      In a window of the house next door, he saw an elderly man’s gnarled, dusty-black fingers push the lace curtains aside, then quickly let them drop.

      The house on the other side and the duplex across the street were both boarded up and the duplex’s roof was caved in. They looked as though they hadn’t been touched since Katrina.

      Half a block up the street, he saw the tables and chairs of an outdoor café. The sign said Bing’s, since 1972. He walked over and sat. When a husky man with a towel slung over his shoulder and a marine tattoo came out to take his order, Dixon nodded toward the voodoo shop.

      “What happened to Maman Renée?” he asked casually, but the man wasn’t fooled. He eyed him suspiciously.

      “You a cop?”

      Dixon gave a short laugh and shook his head. “Café au lait,” he said. So Bing was protective of Rose Bohème. Dixon had seen it a lot in the old neighborhoods during his career as a homicide detective. He was glad she had neighbors who cared for her, but it was going to make his job a lot harder if none of them would give him any information.

      He’d asked his question about Maman Renée as an icebreaker. He knew that five months ago, Renée Pettitpas, seventy-eight years old, had suffered a stroke. Rose had called 911, but by the time the EMTs arrived, Renée had died.

      So what now, Lloyd? he asked himself as he waited for his coffee. The little girl was there for a piano lesson. It fit. Rosemary Delancey had majored in music at Loyola University’s College of Music and Fine Arts. Everything about Rose Bohème fit, except her face and her age.

      As he frowned, trying to figure out what was wrong with her features, the folded photo in his wallet that he’d taken from Rosemary Delancey’s apartment seared his buttock like a brand. He’d always hoped that one day, if she’d survived that bloodbath, someone would see her and recognize her, although truthfully, he’d never really believed the day would come. Yet here he was, about to confront the woman who everyone believed had been murdered twelve years before.

      He unwrapped the cloth napkin from around a fork and spoon. The flatware rattled. He held up his hand. He was actually shaking.

      Bing returned at that moment with his café au lait. He set it down, then folded his arms and watched him.

      Dixon sipped the hot milk-laced coffee.

      “Why’re you so interested in Maman Renée?” Bing finally asked gruffly.

      Dixon didn’t answer directly. “I see you’ve been here since 1972.”

      Bing looked down his crooked nose at him.

      He nodded at the tattoo on the man’s forearm. “Marines,” he said.

      “Yeah?”

      “I’ll bet you can take care of yourself.” Dixon watched Bing.

      A dark brow shot up. “Wanna try me?”

      Dixon shook his head with a short laugh. “No. I guess the folks around here take care of Rose, now that Maman Renée is gone.”

      “How’s any of that your business?” Bing said, unfolding his arms and clenching his fists. “‘Cause we don’t like questions and we sure as hell don’t like cops.”

      Dixon leaned forward and put his elbows on the table. “I’m worried that Rose could be in danger,” he murmured.

      Bing stiffened and his eyes narrowed. “How?” he asked.

      Dixon took a calculated risk. “You remember when she first showed up here twelve years ago?”

      The Marine didn’t respond.

      “Someone had tried to kill her. Maman Renée took care of her.” Dixon watched Bing’s expression.

      “So you say,” the man responded, shrugging.

      Dixon studied Bing as he finished his coffee. “You’re here every day?” he asked.

      “That’s right,” Bing said forcefully. “And I keep an eye on things, too.”

      “I could use your help, watching out for Rose,” Dixon said. “I can’t be here all the time.”

      Bing’s expression didn’t soften one bit. “You say a lot, mister, but you ain’t said who you are or why Rose is your business.”

      Dixon stood and slid a five-dollar bill under the empty mug. “I’m a cop, just like you figured. Detective Dixon Lloyd, Homicide.” He took out his wallet and showed Bing his badge. “But I’m working undercover. Nobody—nobody—can know I’m on the job. Rose’s safety is at stake.”

      “Then why’re you telling me?”

      “Because you protected her. As soon as I asked you about Maman Renée, you made me as a cop and you wouldn’t tell me anything. Can I count on you to keep an eye on her and let me know if you see anyone or anything suspicious?”

      Bing nodded. They exchanged phone numbers and Dixon held out his hand.

      Bing eyed it suspiciously. “I’m gonna watch out for Rose. I do anyway. And I’ll call you if I see anything. But I swear, Lloyd, if you put her in harm’s way, you’ll answer to me.”

      “Understood,” Dixon said.

      Bing eyed him for another couple of seconds, then he shook his hand.

      Dixon walked back down the street toward Maman Renée’s shop. Once her student was gone, he’d knock on the door and ask the questions that had burned inside him for twelve years.

      How had she escaped from her attacker? Where had she gone? And why had she never come forward to let her family and the police know she was alive?

      Her murder case—Dixon’s first homicide—was the only case he’d never managed to solve. In the past twelve years, he’d earned a reputation in NOPD. They called him The Closer, and now he finally had the chance to earn the title. Before this week was out, he planned to close the case the press had dubbed The Beauty Queen Murder.

      ROSE BOHÉME CLOSED the front door behind Mignon after warning her to go straight home. She smiled to herself. The eight-year-old had been taking piano lessons for only three weeks, and already she could sight-read five easy pieces. If she kept on like that, Rose wouldn’t be able to keep up with her for much longer.

      As she climbed the wooden staircase to the apartment above, a flash of light from the window blinded her.

      She froze in nameless terror as red amorphous afterimages of the flash seared into her brain.

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