Lover Beware

Donovan glared at his partner.
    “Let him talk.” Anna sat back in her chair. “What are your thoughts, Armstrong?”
    Full of self-importance, the young detective glanced away from Anna and toward Jerry. “I say J.D. killed ’em—his family, I mean.”
    Silence.
    Jerry’s face began to burn, as did Anna’s. Donovan slumped in his chair and Killroy reached for a piece of gum in his shirt pocket.
    Armstrong cleared his throat as he, more reluctantly, flipped open the notebook. “Hey, just because the guy is an A.D.A. doesn’t mean he’s incapable of losing it. He’s as human as the rest of us. Right?”
    Jerry turned his gaze on Donovan. “I’m not believing this.”
    “Sorry,” he said.
    “It’s a well-known fact that J.D.’s marriage was on the rocks. Big time. There were a few very public arguments between them.” Armstrong glanced from face to face. “Hey, if Damascus was any Joe Blow off the streets he’d be your number one suspect.”
    “But he’s not Joe Blow. Far from it.” Jerry reached for his coffee, the image of J.D.’s son smiling at him from the cup. “Granted, he and Laura had their problems. But no way in hell would he have harmed those kids. They were his world, Armstrong. The only thing that kept him going. Besides…sorry to further trash your case hypothesis, but J.D. was in Shreveport.”
    “Not at the time of the killing.” Armstrong swallowed and fingered the notebook. “He arrived back in New Orleans via Delta Airlines at two A.M . The M.E.’s report says Laura was killed sometime between midnight and four A.M .”
    “I’m not believing this,” Jerry repeated.
    Armstrong shrugged. “Fine. But he matches your profile. Right?” He glared at Anna. “Right? Besides, who better to copycat the French Quarter Killer than someone who is close enough to the investigation to know the precise particulars regarding the actual murders?”
    A knock at the door interrupted them. Molly peered in, holding a file in her hand. “Medical examiner’s report is here. The Bobbie Cox file.”
    Anna extended her hand. “I’ll take that.”
    Molly glanced at Jerry. He nodded, once again feeling the dart of annoyance from the detectives’ eyes.
    Anna flipped open the file; bypassing the autopsy photos, she read the report, then crushed out her cigarette. “Gentlemen, you may, or may not, have a break here.”
    Donovan reached for the folder. Killroy jumped from his chair, as did Armstrong. As they hovered over Donovan, he slammed his fist on the table. “Sonofabitch. Evidence of intercourse and a collection of seminal fluid.”
    Armstrong grinned. “This has gotta help us, right?”
    “Not necessarily.” Anna crossed her arms over her breasts as she rested back in her chair and waited for their full attention. Slowly, their gazes came back to hers. “She’s a hooker. It’s realistic to think that she was with another john before the killer got to her.”
    “And maybe not. Maybe he just liked this particular piece of ass,” Killroy said, causing Armstrong to chuckle. Donovan flashed the younger detective a look that shouted his annoyance.
    Jerry cleared his throat and checked his first instinct to punch out Killroy’s lights. Then he told himself that if Anna expected anything else from these men she was in the wrong business. Besides, Anna Travelli could give as good as she got, and then some.
    “There are obvious differences between the Bobbie Cox and Damascus cases,” she said. “Aside from the evidence of intercourse as reported in Bobbie’s M.E.’s exam, the signature of our killer is identical to the previous killings. He bound her wrists and ankles to the bed with thin wire, tortured and mutilated, decapitated, and left her body as is.”
    She turned to Jerry, one eyebrow raised and her lips curved in a smile that raised every cautionary instinct in him. “If we’re to discount the idea that the Damascus murders were perpetrated by a copycat, then I must assume you haven’t allowed the media in on all the particulars of these cases.”
    Jerry looked away, drummed one knuckle on the table as he glanced at the detectives.
    “Wonderful.” Anna shook her head. “So you’ve got a snitch leaking information to reporters. So we may very well be looking at a copycat.”
    He reached for his coffee, his gaze still locked with hers as he drank, inwardly cringing over the cold, bitter brew and the sharp assessment in her green eyes.
    Her smile flattened.