Diana Racine 02 - Goddess of the Moon

hunched motionless over the table, his head buried under a tangle of long, stringy hair and arms, one of which was decorated with a barbed-wire bracelet tattoo. Hall, a smorgasbord of Louisiana ethnicities, fidgeted in his chair, every part of his scrawny body in motion―tapping or rocking or jerking. Both men snapped to attention when Lucier and Beecher entered.
    Meade catapulted off his chair. “You’ve got to protect us,” he said. “The re ar e freaking monsters in that house. They came after us.”
    Hall jumped at Lucier at the same time, grabbing his shirt and pulling him close. “Yeah, brother, put us in protective custody, witness protection, or something. I ain’t going out there again.”
    Lucier wanted to assure them that breaking into Compton’s house guarantee d they wouldn’t be leaving anytime soon. “Okay, calm down. Tell me what happened.”
    Both started talking at once.
    “Hold on. Meade, you go first. ” He pointed Hall to his seat. “ You’ll have your chance after.” Hall opened his mouth, but one look at Lucier and he clamped it shut.
    “I met Compton’s daughter in a bar. She―”
    “Which daughter?” Lucier interrupted.
    “Maia. She came on to me like I was Brad Pitt or someone. The―”
    “What bar?” Beecher asked.
    “Juno’s in the Quarter. A lot of hot women go there after work.”
    Beecher snickered.
    Lucier took a seat on the other side of the table. “Was she alone or did she come in with someone.”
    “She always came in alone, ordered that pink drink. What’s the name of it?”
    “Cosmopolitan?”
    “Yeah, that’s it.”
    “Okay, go on.”
    “This woman is blonde, beautiful, and built. I didn’t know who she was, I swear. She never told me her last name until lat er. Shit, I didn’t care. When a broad like that hits on you, you don’t ask questions. You go with the flow, know what I mean?”
    “You mean like how come a gorgeous babe would hit on a skank like you?” Beecher said.
    Meade jerked his head back and stuck out his chin. “Hey, I don’t need the insults. A lot of women come on to me. I got sex appeal.”
    Beecher snorted, glanced sideways at Lucier.
    If this concerned anyone other than Compton, Lucier might have found the humor. But it did, and he didn’t. “She came on to you and then what happened ?”
    “We got to talking. I couldn’t get my eyes off her…you know. She kept pushing those babies in my face like I was supposed to do something with them. I wanted to, you know.” Meade looked at both cops as if he expect ed agreement. “Anyways, we met a few times at the same bar, and one day she brought up her father’s art collection. She said she hated her old man―something to do with her mother―and this was the best way to get at him because he loved his paintings more than his kids. It was worth a fortune and she knew someone who’d pay a lot of money for whatever she could get her hands on. Oh, Jesus.”
    Meade ran his fingers through his greasy hair while he kept his eyes steady on Lucier. Sweat trickled down his sideburns to his neck and onto his tee shirt, already ringed with dark underarm stains. “Look, before we say anything more, if we tell you what we saw, you ’ll give us a deal , right ? I mean, we didn’t do nothing . You can’t put people in jail for thinking about doing a crime, can you?”
    Hall bobbed his head in agreement, muttering something under his breath.
    The two didn’t have half a brain between them, Lucier thought. “Depends on what you tell us, and if Ms. Compton backs up your story.” But w hy would Maia Compton admit to robbing her father? Two facts bolstered their story. First, the two jerkoffs couldn’t have passed through the gate without help. And second, why would anyone admit to attempted robbery unless they were telling the truth? Logic told Lucier that Maia Compton did what they said , b ut why? The security tapes might shed light on the answer. If he could get his hands on them―which he seriously doubted.
    “Start from the beginning,” Lucier said.
    Hall pushed Meade aside. “The woman, Maia, said no one’d be home. We got inside, and while Johnny checked out the paintings, I thought I heard music coming from the basement. Not music, really, but like the music I heard in church when I used to go, but different.”
    “Different how?” Beecher asked.
    “Like, I don’t know, like chanting kinda , but not the same thing.”
    Lucier and Beecher exchanged glances.