Violets Are Blue

wheels in my head were turning slowly and methodically. Where did we go from here? I had no goddamn idea. Jesus, I was beat.
    The house was an outbuilding for one of the Garden District’s historic homes, a small carriage house with a second-story balcony. It looked like it could have been a cute, cozy B&B. Magnolia and banana trees surrounded it. So did an intricate wrought-iron fence, the kind I had seen everywhere in the French Quarter.
    About half of the New Orleans Police Department was already at the scene. So were a couple of EMS trucks, their roof lights spinning and blazing. The press was beginning to arrive as we did — the late shift.
    Detective Sams had gotten to the murder scene a couple of minutes before I did. He met me in the hallway outside the upstairs bedroom where the killing had taken place. The interior of the place had fine detailing on almost every surface — ceilings, banisters, moldings, doors. The owner had cared about the house, and also about Mardi Gras. Feathers and beads, colorful masks, and costumes were tacked up on most of the walls.
    “This is bad, even worse than we thought,” Sams said. “She’s a
detective
named Maureen Cooke. She’s in Vice, but she was helping out on Daniel and Charles. Most of the department is pitching in.”
    Sams led me into the detective’s bedroom. It was small but attractive, with a sky blue ceiling. Someone had once told me that color was supposed to keep winged insects from nesting there.
    Maureen Cooke was a redhead, tall and thin, probably in her early thirties. She had been hung by her bare feet from a chandelier. Her nails were painted red. The detective was naked except for a delicate silver bracelet on her wrist.
    Blood streaks were all over her body, but there was no sign of blood pooling on the floor or anywhere else.
    I walked up close to her. “Sad,” I whispered under my breath. A human life gone — just like that. Another detective dead.
    I looked at Mitchell Sams. He was waiting for me to talk first.
    “This might not have been done by the same killers,” I said, and shook my head. “The bite wounds look different to me. They’re superficial. Something’s changed.”
    I stepped back from the body of Maureen Cooke and took in her bedroom. There were photographs that I recognized as part of E. J. Bellocq’s study of Storyville prostitutes. Strange, but fitting for a vice detective. A couple of Asian fans had been framed over the bed — which looked as if it had been slept in. Or possibly the bed hadn’t been made the previous day.
    My cell phone rang. I hit a button with my thumb. I felt out of it. Numb. I needed sleep.
    “Did you find her yet, Dr. Cross? What do you think? Give me your best guess on how to stop these terrible murders. You must have it figured out by now.”
    The Mastermind was on the line. How did he know?
    Suddenly I was yelling into the phone. “I’m going to take you down. I’ve figured that much out, asshole!”
    I hung up on him, then I shut the phone off. I looked around the bedroom. Kyle Craig was watching me from the doorway.
    “Are you all right, Alex?” he whispered.

Chapter 79

    WHEN I got back to the Dauphine Hotel it was ten-thirty in the morning. I was too tired and too worked up to sleep. My heart was still racing. There was a message for me: Inspector Hughes had called from San Francisco.
    I stretched out on the bed and called Jamilla back. I shut my eyes. I wanted to hear a friendly voice, especially hers.
    “I might have something good for you,” she said when I reached her at home. “In my spare time, ha-ha, I’ve been taking a close look at Santa Cruz. Why Santa Cruz? you might ask. There have been several unsolved disappearances there. Too many. I plotted them out myself. Alex, something is happening down there. It fits in with the rest of this case.”
    “Santa Cruz was on our original list,” I said. I was trying to focus on what she had just told me. I couldn’t remember exactly where Santa Cruz was located.
    “You sound tired. Are you all right?” she asked.
    “I just got back to the hotel a few minutes ago. Long night.”
    “Alex,
go to sleep
! This can wait. Good night.”
    “No, I can’t sleep anyway. Tell me about Santa Cruz. I want to hear it.”
    “All right. I talked to Lieutenant Conover with the Santa Cruz PD. Interesting conversation. Annoying too. They’re aware of the disappearances, of course. They’ve also noted house pets and livestock