Tami Hoag - A Thin Dark Line

Lindsay Faulkner's enthusiasm faded fast. Irritation flickered in the big green eyes. She stopped just behind the receptionist's desk and crossed her arms over the front of her emerald silk blouse.

"You know, you people just make me see red. This has been hell on us-Pam's friends, her family-and what have you done? Nothing. You know who the killer is and he walks around scotfree. The incompetence astounds me. My God, if you'd done your jobs in the first place, Pam might still be alive today."

"I know it's been frustrating, Ms. Faulkner. It's been frustrating for us as well."

"You don't know what frustration is."

"With all due respect, yes, I do," Annie said plainly. "I was the one who found Pam. I would like nothing better than to have this case closed."

"Then go on upstairs and arrest him, and leave the rest of us alone."

She marched back down the hall. Annie followed.

"Renard is upstairs right now?"

"Your powers of deduction are amazing, Detective."

Annie didn't correct her presumption of rank. "It must be like salt in the wound-having to work in the same building with him."

"I hate it," she said flatly, going into her office. "Bayou Realty owns the building. If I could terminate their lease tomorrow, the whole lot of them would be out in the street, but once again the law is on his side.

"The gall of that man!" Her expression was a mix of horror and hatred. "To come here and work as if he's done nothing wrong at all, while every day I have to walk past that empty office, Pam's office-"

She sat for a moment with a hand to her mouth, staring out the window at the parking lot.

"I know you and Pam were very close," Annie said quietly, slipping into a chair in front of the desk. She extracted a small notebook and pen from her hip pocket and positioned the notebook on her thigh.

Lindsay Faulkner produced a small linen handkerchief seemingly from thin air and blotted delicately at the corners of her eyes. "We were best friends from the day we met at college. I was Pam's maid of honor. I'm Josie's godmother. Pam and I were like sisters. Do you have a sister?"

"No."

"Then you can't understand. When that animal murdered Pam, he murdered a part of me, a part that can't be buried in a tomb. I will carry that part inside me for the rest of my life. Deadweight, black with rot; something that used to be so bright, so full of joy. He has to be made to pay for that."

"If we can convict him, he'll get the death penalty."

A little smile twisted at Faulkner's lips. "We opposed capital punishment, Pam and I. Cruel and unusual, barbaric, we said. How naive we were. Renard doesn't deserve compassion. No punishment could be cruel enough. I've tortured that man to death in my imagination more times than I can count. I've lain awake nights wishing I had the courage…"

She stared at Annie, the light of challenge in her eyes. "Will you arrest me? The way they arrested Pam's father?"

"He did a sight more than imagine Renard dead."

"Pam was Hunter's only daughter. He loved her so, and now he carries that dead piece inside him too."

"Did you suspect Renard was the one harassing Pam?"

Guilt passed over the woman's face, and she looked down at her hands lying on the desktop. "Pam said it was him."

"And you thought…?"

"I've been over this with the others," she said. "Don't you people talk to one another?"

"I'm trying to get a fresh perspective. Male detectives have a male point of view. I may pick up on something they didn't." A good argument, Annie thought. She'd have to remember it when Noblier called her on the carpet for overstepping her bounds.

"He seemed so harmless," Lindsay Faulkner whispered. "You watch the movies, you think maniacs are supposed to look a certain way, act a certain way. You think a stalker is some lowlife with no job and a double-digit IQ. You never think, 'Oh, I bet that architect upstairs is a psychopath.' He's been here for years. I never- He hadn't…"

"We can't always see trouble coming," Annie offered gently. "If he'd given you no reason to suspect him-"

"Pam did, though. Not all along, but last summer, after she and Donnie split up. Renard started hanging around more, and it bothered her-the gifts he sent her, his manner around her. And when the harassment started, she didn't want to say anything at first, but she thought it was him."

"Who did you think-?"

"Donnie," she said without hesitation. "The harassment started not long after she told him she wanted the divorce. I thought he was trying to scare her. It seemed like the kind of thing he would think of. Donnie's emotional development arrested at about sixteen. I even called him on it, read him the riot act."

"How did he react?"

She rolled her eyes. "He accused me of poisoning Pam against him. I told him I'd tried that years ago, and she went and married him anyway. Pam always looked at Donnie and saw his potential. She couldn't believe he wouldn't live up to it."

"It must be very unpleasant for you now-trying to resolve the business issues."

"It's a mess. The divorce would have cut Donnie cleanly away from the realty company. Pam would have worded her new will so her half of the business went to Josie in a trust. I would have had the option of buying it out with the partner insurance we were planning to buy. We'd never gotten around to that before-the partner insurance. We just never thought about it. I mean, we were both young and healthy." She paused. "Anyway, none of those changes happened before…"

Annie decided she liked this woman, liked her strength and her anger on her friend's behalf. She hadn't expected this kind of caring and conviction from a former debutante. She had expected hanky-wringing passive grief. My prejudice, she thought.

"Now what happens?" she asked.

"Now I have to deal with Donnie, who has the business acumen of a tick. He's being extra obnoxious because months before the marriage split up, Donnie's company was in a financial bind and Pam agreed to hide some land for him in the realty so the bank wouldn't take it."

"Hide it?"

"Bichon Bayou Development 'sold' these properties to Bayou Realty on paper. In reality, we were just holding them out of harm's way."

"And you still have them?"

Her smile was slightly feral. "Yes. But now Donnie holds Pam's half of the business, so technically the properties are partly his. However, before he can do anything with them, he has to have my approval. We're currently at a standoff. He wants his property back and I want full ownership of the business. The latest wrinkle is that Donnie suddenly thinks Pam's half of this business is worth double what it is. He's trying to play hardball, threatening me with some nebulous other buyer from New Orleans."

Annie's pen went still on the paper. " New Orleans?"

New Orleans . Real estate. Duval Marcotte.

Lindsay shook her head at the ridiculousness of the idea. "What would anyone in New Orleans want with Bayou Breaux?"

"You think he's bluffing?"

"He thinks he's bluffing. I think he's an idiot."

"What would you do if he sold his half to this buyer?"

"I don't know. Pam and I started this business together. It's important to me for that reason, you know, as something we built and shared as friends. And it's a strong little business; we do well enough. I enjoy it. I will sell this building if I get the chance," she admitted, turning to look out at the parking lot. "There are too many bad memories now. And that bastard upstairs. I keep picturing Detective Fourcade beating him to death. I-"

She stopped. Annie sat very still. Out in the front room the door opened and the bell announcing potential clients tinkled pleasantly.

"Broussard," Faulkner murmured with accusation. "You're the one who stopped him. My God. I thought you said you wanted this resolved."