CHAPTER TWO
Memorial Day, 7:50 a.m.
Memorial Day, 7:50 a.m.
Joshua walked through the front door of the police station with his helmet under one arm and his insulated lunch bag in the other. “Good mornin’, Chief Cardiff,” Emily Sonnier said, with almost-genuine cheerfulness. “Mornin’,” he answered back, trying to be as nonchalant as possible concerning his macabre cargo. He walked quickly to his tiny office, put the lunch bag and helmet on his desk, then stood in the doorway of his office, looking out at his overnight dispatcher. “How was your night, Emily?” he asked, smiling an easy smile.
“Real quiet,” the slightly plump redhead answered. “Not a single call. I listened to some radio chatter from the sheriff’s office early this morning, some trouble with poachers in the southern part of the parish. No calls from here in town, though.”
“No criminal activity in the bustling metropolis of Oakdale, huh?” he said, laughing slightly.
“No sir. Quiet as a tomb.” Her bright blue eyes searched his face. “What’s up, Chief?”
His smile faded a bit. “What you talkin’ about, Emily?”
“You know. You got that look.”
He swallowed, and needlessly adjusted his collar. “A look like something’s happened?”
Emily narrowed her gaze. “A look like you done somethin’.”
“I ain’t done nothin’.” He tried to restore his smile and said, “Besides, you ain’t known me long enough to learn my looks.”
She gave a slight snort. “I’ve known you for a year now. That’s long enough. Men ain’t so hard to read.”
Joshua looked back over his shoulder at the helmet and lunch bag on his desk. He asked as casually as he could, “How long you worked here, Emily?”
She answered, in a very clipped, sharp manner, “Twelve years. You know that.”
He nodded. “Eleven years longer than me. And you lived here all your life?”
Emily punched a few function keys on her computer keyboard. “Don’t remind me. My whole damn life in this shithole.”
He watched her face carefully. “It ain’t so bad,” he said quietly.
She barked out a scoffing laugh. “Don’t make me doubt your sanity, Chief. Ain’t nobody wants to live in Oakdale.”
Joshua sighed and said, “I moved here to take this job.”
Emily shook her head. “Yeah, I still can’t figure that one out.”
Leaning back awkwardly on the door frame, pretending nonchalance, the police chief said, “Say… all that time you lived here… has the city’s police department ever had any problems with, uh, with the prison? I mean, do our people cooperate with their people? You know, if there’s ever an issue…”
Emily lifted her eyebrows. “We about to have some trouble with the prison?”
“No, I didn’t say that,” he answered quickly. “I just wondered… have there ever been any problems with… y’know, like with… investigations?”
“What you mean, investigations?”
“Like, if there was a crime that affected the prison and the city. Ever have any jurisdictional problems?”
Worry washed over Emily’s face. “What is it, Chief? What kinda trouble we got?”
“It’s nothin’. Really.”
“Chief. C’mon. Tell me what’s up.”
Joshua exhaled slowly, then said, “Emily… you ever done something just ‘cause you felt it was the right thing to do?”
Emily shook her head slowly and said, “You feed that homeless guy that sleeps under the stairs at fish market again?”
Joshua chuckled. “No.”
“Did you give him money?”
Joshua waved his hand, as if to wipe the subject away. “No. Look, this isn’t about Gabby.”
Emily’s eyes widened. “You know his name?”
Joshua was growing more and more exasperated. “Forget about the homeless guy, Emily. I’m not talking about him, and I’m not talking about doing a good deed for someone. What I’m talking about is more like… like some private thing. Something you do in a moment, a moment when no one else sees what you’re doing. Just you and God know. And even though some folks might say it was the wrong thing to do if they knew what you did, you know it was the right thing. You know it was the right thing to do, you just don’t understand why. You ever done anything like that?”
Emily peeled off her telephone headset, dropped it on her desk, and stood up. “Oh my God, what have you done?”
Joshua closed his eyes and sighed. “Nothing. I just… I collected some evidence.”
“Evidence,” Emily repeated, making the word sound hollow.
“Evidence of a crime in our town. A crime that took place here in Oakdale.”
“What kind of crime?”
“Not sure yet. Murder, maybe.”
Emily held her breath for a moment, then exhaled heavily. “Murder? What did you find, a weapon?”
Joshua looked around nervously, then lowered his voice to a whisper. “I’ll show you what I got, Emily, but you can’t tell anybody. Not anybody. Fontenot and Broussard are due here any minute to start their shift.”
“Big Fontenot or Little Fontenot?” Emily asked.
“Little Fontenot,” Joshua said.
Emily made a thoughtful clucking sound for a moment. “Yeah, you can’t trust him. He talks too much.”
Joshua’s voice was urgent, filled with tension. “Em, I can’t trust anybody. Just you. We can’t tell the guys who come in this mornin’, or the guys who worked last night.”
“We prob’ly won’t see the guys from last night,” Emily explained. “You know that. They usually just go straight home, fill out their timesheets when they come in for their next shift.”
“But if they do come in, they can’t know anything about this. And you cannot tell Angie.”
Emily shot a glance at the clock on the wall. “She should be spellin’ me any minute.”
“I know,” said Joshua. “That’s why I’m sayin’ all this. You can’t tell anybody -- none of the officers, and definitely not Angie. Not anybody.”
“My lips are sealed. Swear to God. Now, what you got?”
Joshua looked down at the floor, avoiding Emily’s gaze. “And, uh… you can’t tell none of them boyfriends of yours.”
Emily managed a humorless chuckle. “You ain’t gotta worry about that. I ain’t had a date since Valentine’s Day.”
“That ain’t what Little Fontenot says,” Joshua teased.
“Screw what that piss ant says. I told you he talks too much. Now show me what you got, Chief.”
Joshua walked behind his desk. “Step in, and close the door behind you,” he said as he opened up his insulated lunch bag. He spun the helmet around so that the gory neck faced Emily. He then unsnapped the visor and pulled it off, revealing the corpse’s face.
Emily was shocked, but not by what she saw. She was shocked by the implications of what she saw. “My God, Chief, why didn’t you set up a crime scene wherever you found these?”
“I can’t say for sure,” he answered uneasily. “I just knew it would be… complicated. The case would’ve been taken away from me immediately.”
Emily thought for a moment, then asked, “Where did you find these?”
“Bonner Farm Road,” Joshua answered. “North of the prison. They were right out on the road.”
“Bonner Farm Road is in the city limits. Why you think somebody’s gonna take the case away from you?”
Joshua heaved a heavy sigh, and said, “‘Cause there was a body tangled up in the razor wire at the top of the prison fence.”
Emily stared wide-eyed at Joshua. “What the fuck you thinkin’, Chief? You gotta notify the prison.”
“No,” he said forcefully. “That’s exactly what we’re not gonna do. These body parts are in our jurisdiction, so this is our investigation.”
“Don’t you think that body hangin’ in the razor wire should be a part of the investigation?” Emily asked.
Joshua nodded thoughtfully. “Probably. Eventually. But not now.”
“Why the hell not?”
“Because…” Joshua’s words trailed off as he looked down at the sleepy-looking head.
“Because why?”
“Because there’s somethin’ wrong with this,” he said, indicating the body parts with his outstretched hands. “Somethin’ funny. It’s like it was… it was staged. Like somebody wanted these body parts found by somebody. Found by somebody outside the prison.”
Emily turned to the door. “Let me call the prison. I know the warden’s secretary.”
“No! Em, you promised!”
“I had no idea what I was promisin’,” she shot back angrily.
Joshua put his hand on her shoulder, then turned her around gently to face him. “Em, listen. How far back from the road is the prison fence?”
“How far… what are you askin’?” she asked, not looking at him.
“From Bonner Farm Road -- how far back is that prison fence?”
Emily shook her head, confused. “I don’t know. Twenty, twenty-five feet.”
“It’s thirty feet,” he explained. “You think this head and these hands would’ve somehow flown across that space of ground and hit the pavement when that razor wire sheared ‘em off?”
She looked again at the body parts on the desk. “No. Not unless there was some really high winds blowin’. Even then…”
“And were there any high winds last night?”
“No. No storms this far inland last night.”
Joshua slapped the corner of the desk. “Don’t you see? Somebody put these things on the road. Somebody wanted ‘em found.”
“Maybe some critters drug ‘em there.”
Joshua sat down in the chair behind his desk and stared down at the head and hands. “Nah. Animals would’ve taken ‘em on out into the woods. Besides, there’s no sign that anything got ahold of ‘em. Clean cuts, no indication of animals bitin’ or chewin’.”
Emily looked at him, finally meeting his gaze. “Chief, it’s like you’re so bored you’re makin’ a mystery for yourself.”
Joshua smiled at her. “Like that Sarah McLachlan song. Building a Mystery.”
“Hell, I don’t know about that,” she answered, smiling back at the chief. “If it ain’t Elvis, I don’t pay much attention.”
He motioned to the body parts again and said, “But I’m not just making it up, Emily. The mystery was already there. I came motoring up the road this morning like I do every morning, and there was a head and a pair of hands on the highway in front of me. Apparently whatever happened had just happened, because the body was still hanging up on the fence. The prison C.O.s should be finding the body before long. I’m sure they’re doin’ a fog count this mornin.’’
“What’ll happen then?” Emily asked.
“That’s the million dollar question.”
The sound of the outer door opening prompted Emily to return to the outer office. As she opened the chief’s office door, Joshua pleaded, “Not a word, Em. Please.”
She turned back to him for a moment and said in a fierce whisper, “It’s against my better judgement, but fine. Not a word. But you better find someplace to store that shit on your desk before somebody sees it. I don’t know what your plans are, forensics-wise, but I’d strongly suggest some kinda freezer.”
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