Indian Country Noir (Akashic Noir) (18 page)

I slip on my extra-dark Ray Ban Balorama sunglasses as I sit at
my desk in the bureau, the early-morning sun burning through
the withered tint on the wall of windows while Jodie explains
the case to the assembled cops. It's 10 a.m. now and I'm worn
out. That's what I get, being thirty.

Yes, there was blood inside the Wolf's SUV. No, no one
saw him jump. No one saw him walk away either. The everalert bridge operator didn't even notice the abandoned SUV until a passing Harbor Police car almost ran into it. Yes, we
checked cabs and buses, but no one picked up anyone close to
the Wolf's description.

The ever-efficient Harbor Police are dragging the Industrial Canal, only they're not optimistic. The canal's deep
enough for ocean-going ships and they can't keep the locks
closed for long. I feel myself dozing off.

No one in the room believes he jumped, so we set up a routine. Lt. Merten takes over, handing out assignments, sending
detectives to cover all the Wolf's known haunts, houses of his
relatives, places he's worked, whatever they've come up with
from the computer.

I'm slipping now, my regular breathing lulling me to
sleep.

I feel someone shaking me and raise my sunglasses to
Juanita Cruz's eager face. "I'm going with you tonight. You
want me to meet you here, or what?"

I pull my feet off my desk. "Come again? What did I
miss?"

"I'm assigned to work with you." She sounds apologetic.

"No problem there." I stand and stretch. "What are we
supposed to do?"

Juanita points to Jodie standing next to the coffee pot,
waving us over.

"You two go sit on his ex-girlfriend," says Jodie. "The one
he went out with just before Kim." She takes a sip of coffee.
"We've notified everyone from his journals to be careful."

On our way out, Juanita remarks, "Everyone wants you to
be the one to catch him."

I don't have to ask why.

Shortly after sunset, following some needed sleep and a thick burger and fries at my favorite haunt, Flamingos Cafe
in Bucktown, I sit parked in my unmarked car with Juanita.
We're outside the Wolf's old girlfriend's apartment house on
Constance Street just down from Howard Avenue, only three
blocks from Kim's apartment. The building is three stories tall
with a security front door and a gated garage out back.

Juanita and I both wear dark, short-sleeved dress shirts,
unbuttoned and open over black T-shirts, black running
shoes, and black jeans, with our 9mm's in nylon holsters on
our hips. She wears her hair down and looks different. Even
with only a hint of makeup, a brush of red on her lips, she's
very pretty, with those sultry Latina looks.

"So what's this girl's name again?" She has her note pad
open.

"Bessie Cleary, white female, twenty-three, five-five, thin,
light brown hair. Went out with the Wolf for over a year. Lived
with him. Jodie talked with her and Bessie doesn't think the
lovely Mr. Ahern Smith would ever hurt her."

Juanita looks up from her notes. "You sure he can't get in
the back way to this place?"

"I'm not sure. But the security guard's retired N.O.P.D.
and he's just chomping for a shot at the Wolf. Carries a Glock
35, .40 caliber, seventeen rounds. Itching to shoot."

I stretch out my legs as best I can. Even with the windows
down it's still steamy, not even a breath of wind. The only
smell is Juanita's light perfume, which is kind of nice actually.

"So, your girlfriend's mad at you?"

I'd mentioned it when I picked her up. "Yeah. Another
night alone. She said it's getting old all these hours I put in."

I don't tell her how many girlfriends have given up on me.
Don't want to sound pathetic. Heartache's part of the job, I
keep telling myself. Suddenly, the Wolf's words, heart's death, come to mind, and I brush them away. Fuckin' bastard.

"Kim thought the Wolf was the one." Juanita's voice is
husky with emotion. "Soul mate, you know." She takes in a
deep breath. "I remember the first time I saw Kim, all brighteyed and eager, right out of the academy. She smiled all
through that first shift." Her voice cracks.

"You were her training officer?"

She nods, catches her breath, and continues in a staccato
voice filled with emotion. "Her family's rich. She was an athlete. Played tennis in high school. Had two college degrees. Was
going to go to law school, but went to the academy instead."

I watch a man enter the building, but he's too short and
too old to be the Wolf.

"She became a cop because she was tired of being a victim."

I turn to Juanita, my eyebrows rising.

"Kim was mugged twice, once in an evening gown coming
from her debutante ball. It scared her and she didn't like the
feeling and wanted to do something about it herself."

A cab parks in front of the apartment house and an elderly lady gets out and enters the building.

"I've never known anyone with a clearer definition between right and wrong," Juanita goes on. "She was a problem
solver at scenes, running a guy in for hitting his wife, running
a woman in for neglecting her kids, making peace between
people more often than not."

I'm not much of a peacemaker.

Juanita readjusts herself, leaning against the door, facing
me more as she says, "Why is your middle name Raven?"

"I'm half Lakota."

She's confused, so I explain: "Sioux."

"Oh. Anyone ever call you the Raven?"

"No."

She comes right back with, "I looked up the word in the
dictionary this morning. Raven has other meanings, besides
the bird. It also means to be predatory, to seek or seize prey
and to plunder, and-"

I raise my hand. "I know. But what does that have to do
with anything?"

"How many men have you killed?" Her eyes are narrowed,
her pouty lips set seriously, and for some reason I can't tell her
it's none of her business.

"I quit counting at five."

I figured I'd get a raised eyebrow, but her face remains
set.

"The Grand Jury decided all were justifiable homicides.
They did cite me, however, for scalping two of them."

"Scalping?" Her eyes go owly.

She's so gullible, I have to play it out, so I reach my left
hand around and pull out my black hunting knife from its
sheath on my belt. It has a nine-inch blade, a Sioux instrument, sharpened on one side only, a proper knife for a plains
warrior.

She folds her arms. "You never scalped them."

Shrugging, I put my knife away. I don't bother telling her I
hadn't much choice in shooting the men. Truly. But most cops
never shoot anyone and Juanita doesn't have to explain her
curiosity. I'm an aberration, either the unluckiest Cajun or a
predatory Sioux taking revenge on the white eyes.

"The word wolf also means predatory, rapacious, and
fierce."

I chuckle finally to ease the pressure and counter, "So
what's your point?"

"I want to call you the Raven."

"You can call me Detective Beau, Officer Cruz."

She sits up as if I pinched her and looks out the windshield.

I have to laugh. "I'm just kiddin', Juanita. Beau's fine. I
just don't like nicknames."

A minute of silence is broken when she says, "I told you,
everyone wants you to be the one to find the Wolf. It's all
they're talking about at headquarters."

I don't like where this is going.

"Because you'll kill him."

"You shouldn't hang around headquarters so much." It's
my turn to stare out the windshield at the dark night. The
apartment building is now bathed in exterior lighting. The
night is extra dark because it's moonless and in the darkness I
feel a heartache, or rather the memory of heartache.

Her name was Lily and I thought she was the one. Soul
mate, you know. Only she walked out on me at the lowest
point in my life. Lying in that hospital bed after the operation to repair the knee I tore up in the spring game at L.S.U.,
sophomore season, with my bright future as a quarterback all
but gone, Lily told me she didn't love me anymore. I wanted
to run after her, convince her it couldn't be over because I still
loved her, but I couldn't even get out of bed.

It was for the better, I suppose. And the heartache only
returns if I think back. I fidget in my seat thinking how the
Wolf reacted to his heartache. Where did he find the fury?
I've never felt anger toward Lily and I guess that's the difference. The Wolf let his pain turn into rage. The Raven left
his pain where it belongs because life is a series of losses. The
Sioux know this and so do the Cajuns, refugees from Canada
driven to the swamps of south Louisiana.

"I wish something would happen," Juanita says.

Those chocolate-brown eyes stare into mine for a long minute and her face looks very relaxed, calm, and lovely in
the dim light. I feel my heartbeat now, but the moment is lost
as I catch a movement behind Juanita's head and tense a moment, then I see it's a homeless man.

Juanita turns as the man stops and asks if we can spare a
buck.

I climb out and he starts to back away until he sees me
dig into my pocket. He's middle-aged with a scraggly beard
and a well-worn knapsack on his back. I give him a five and
he thanks me. I pull out the Wolf's picture and ask him if he's
ever seen this man around. He shakes his head and thanks me
again and hurries away.

When I climb back in Juanita says, in a shaky voice, "I
didn't see him coming up behind me."

"That's what you got me for."

"Partner, right?"

"Almost." She nearly smiles and all the depressing thoughts
fade away from my brain. "Saw a bumper sticker yesterday
that said, There are three kinds of people-those who can count
and those who can't."

It takes her a second and then she laughs.

It hits me as soon as I wake up the following afternoon. The
Wolf broke into Kim's apartment and laid in wait for her. I get
dressed in a hurry. An ex-Green Beret is no one to mess with
but he's the one on the lam, not me. If he's dumb enough to
come at me, he'll join the list and I'll cruise through another
Grand Jury hearing. I'm thinking maybe I should call Juanita,
or at least Jodie, but all I have is this gut feeling and I hate to
roust the troops, especially if I'm wrong.

Stepping away from Sad Lisa, I see the brown-green water
of Lake Pontchartrain is as still as a pond. There's no wind whatsoever, the warm air steamy with humidity and the fishy
smell of iodine. The calm is unsettling. To a Lakota warrior, any
change in the environment, especially when normally rough
waters are suddenly calm, can be a warning from nature. The
warning is understood, if that's what it is. It reinforces my gut
feeling and I make sure to carry two extra clips of ammo, not
that I've ever needed that many bullets to kill someone.

Parking behind Bessie Cleary's apartment house, I walk
up to the garage gate and wave to the retired N.O.PD. man
who recognizes me and opens the gate.

"Something wrong?" he asks, pulling out his Glock.

I shake my head. "Just checking."

"She's at work," he calls out behind me, and I wave as I
tuck my portable radio into the back pocket of my faded blue
jeans. I wear a short-sleeved gray dress shirt over a navy-blue
T-shirt. Unbuttoned, the shirt covers my knife and holstered
Beretta. My gold star-and-crescent badge is clipped to the
front of my belt. I'm breaking in a new pair of black Reebok
running shoes.

I go up the back stairs. Bessie lives on the third floor, at
the front of the building. I turn into the hall from the backside and freeze. He's at the far end of the hall dressed in black
fatigues and black combat boots. Working on Bessie's door,
the Wolf doesn't see me creeping along the hall toward him. I
ease out my Beretta and flip off the safety. My heart's already
pounding but my hands are steady as I raise my weapon in the
standard two-handed police grip.

A door opens between us and a young woman steps into
the hall, drawing the Wolf's attention, and he spots me and
bolts.

"Police!" I raise the Beretta and the woman falls back
against her door. I race past. The Wolf leaps into the front stairwell. My Beretta cupped in both hands, I stop at the
opening of the stairwell and hear footsteps descending heavily, thudding on the carpet.

I follow the sound down the stairs, keeping on my toes,
pointing my weapon ahead as I take each turn. I can still hear
him descending as I reach the landing above the ground floor.
A metallic slam echoes up and I stop and ease my way forward
until I see the front door slowly closing. He's outside now and
I run for the door, catching it before it closes, hitting the metal
bar and swinging it outward. I hesitate a second, then scramble through the door.

The Wolf races around the corner, down Howard, not
even looking back, moving flat out. I pull my portable radio
from my back pocket and charge after him.

I key the mike. "3124-headquarters!"

"Go ahead, 3124," the dispatcher responds.

"I'm in foot pursuit of a signal thirty suspect. River bound
on Howard from Constance Street."

I describe what the Wolf's wearing and what I'm wearing,
trying my best to keep my voice low and calm. Last thing I
want is to sound like a lunatic on the air. Excited voices fill
the speaker but I can't hear as I pump my arms, running hard,
Beretta in my right hand, radio in my left.

People watch us from the sidewalks and the street, standing with wide eyes, like deer caught in headlights. The Wolf's
a half-block ahead of me, running head down, not looking
over his shoulder as he cuts between parked cars into the
street then back through them, up on the sidewalk in case
I'm crazy enough to let off a round or two. He bowls over
an elderly couple coming out of a furniture store as he turns
another corner.

"Police!" I yell as I jump over the couple, who don't seem seriously damaged. I try my best to tell headquarters we're on
Annunciation now, heading uptown. I'm gaining on him, I
think.