PI On A Hot Tin Roof

didn’t see
and:
there had to be an
and
in there somewhere. She replayed it again and found it:
“and I have to make sure.”
    There it was: Maybe not verbatim, but easily close. She had to hand it to Wesley.
    Next came Lucy’s impromptu interview, but she didn’t need it. The killer had taken almost everything from the previous section. She turned the tape off.
    “What was up with that?” Lucy asked.
    “Tell ya later, agitator.”
    “You are such a cornball.”
    “You hungry?”
    “I could use a burger.”
    “I know a place that makes burgers
and
milk shakes.”
    “Getouttahere.”
    “Would I kid about something about that? Real, old-fashioned milk shakes.” Talba had a slightly ulterior motive in spending a little more time with the kid—a vague idea that she ought to talk to Lucy about her fears. “Mind if I keep the tape for a while?” she asked.
    “Sure, why not?”
    “I’ll just be a sec.” And she went to copy it.
    She took the kid to Huey’s Diner, which occupied the site of the old Metro Bistro, once one of Talba’s favorite eateries, a good restaurant that had come and gone. When she’d been served a soggy salad and Lucy had her burger, she began her meddling. “Lucy,” she said, “would it help to talk about your nightmares?”
    “Uh-uh. Shrink’s got that covered. He says I’m just scared and it’s only natural.”
    “Is it always the same dream?”
    Lucy stopped eating. “How’d you know that?”
    “Because so often it is. What do you dream?”
    The girl put the burger down. “I dream there’s someone in my room—and I’m scared to death, because he’s about to get me.”
    Talba didn’t like that—and yet she was halfway expecting it. “He?” she asked.
    “I don’t know. I think so. It feels like a ‘he.’”
    “I wonder if it could be about something real.”
    “I don’t see how.”
    “Well, maybe someone
was
in your room sometime.”
    “Like maybe I got molested or something? You sound like Dr. Watson.”
    “That’s his name? Dr. Watson?”
    The girl giggled. “Don’t think I ever miss a chance to say ‘elementary’ to him.”
    “So,
were
you molested?”
    “Are you kidding? I’d remember, believe me. Besides…who’d want me?”
    “Oh, Luce, you idiot! Look, was someone in your room or not?”
    The girl’s face grew dark. Slowly, she nodded. Knowing she was busted. “I think so. But they didn’t hurt me. I’d know.”
    “When?”
    “Now why’d you ask that?”
    “‘Why this, why that’—what’s up with all the whys?”
    “Okay, okay, take it easy. I just asked because it was kind of strange timing—it was the night my father died.”
    “Was that your first nightmare or did it really happen?”
    “It’s just a coincidence,” she said crossly, draining her milk shake with a sucking sound.
    Right,
Talba thought.
And I know what they wanted.
    She steered the conversation on to other things, and when she dropped the kid off, reminded her not to tell anyone the real reason for the outing.

Chapter 23
    She called Langdon first thing in the morning, but got no answer, not even when she paged her. Next she tried Warren LaGarde, but his voicemail said he wasn’t in. There was only one person she hadn’t talked to in the whole dysfunctional greater family unit, and now seemed like the perfect time.
    She had LaGarde’s address from her files and the name of his current wife, Melissa, whom she spent half an hour backgrounding. Melissa had been a store clerk before Warren met her, in a shop that sold women’s underwear. He’d probably gone to buy a gift for another tootsie-pop and switched loyalties. But she wasn’t just a saleswoman. Oh, no. Every trophy wife must have a career of sorts and Melissa had one—she was a set designer, not something that was likely to keep her in designer clothing. So she did decorative painting as well—faux finishes and stencils, mostly for restaurants. Talba called the house with a pretext to find out where she was working, but, happily, the maid said she was home. Talba hung up while the woman went to find her, and drove to the LaGarde home.
    It was out in old Metairie, a suburb that was home to new money—and some old as well—but this house was new construction, evidently built on the site of a much smaller teardown, judging by the small size of the yard. Melissa flung open the door before she could ring, wearing jeans and a chambray shirt, “Oh! I thought you might be Warren.”
    Talba