Greg Iles - Dead Sleep

“So much for the element of surprise,” Kaiser says as we cross through traffic to the van. “How about that picture of Oscar Wilde?”

“Beautifully done,” says Lenz, who appears preoccupied by something.

“Smith reminds me of Dorian Gray,” I think aloud. “A beautiful amoral man who will never age.”

“Why amoral?” asks Kaiser. “Not because he’s gay.”

“No. It’s something I sense about him. He’s like de Becque, yet different somehow. What do you think, Doctor?”

Lenz has a strange smile on his face. “You know what no one remembers about Dorian Gray?”

“What?”

“He murdered a man, then bribed a chemist to come to his house and destroy the body. The chemist used special compounds to burn the corpse until there was nothing left.”

“You’re kidding,” says Kaiser.

“No. Wilde was ahead of his time in many ways. Dorian Gray’s theory of murder was no corpse, no evidence, no crime.”

Thalia Laveau lives on the second floor of a three-story Victorian rooming house near Tulane University. Nine other women and two men live in the house, which is a nightmare for the NOPD surveillance team. Seven doors, twenty-one ground-level windows, and two fire escapes. Parked on the student-dominated block, we hunch inside the FBI surveillance van like J. Edgar Hoover-era G-men spying on “outside agitators.”

“The plan is for John to take the lead on Laveau,” Baxter says, looking at Dr. Lenz. “Does anybody want to change that before you go in?”

Kaiser and Lenz glance at each other, but neither speaks.

“I do,” I tell them.

All three men look at me in confusion.

“What do you mean?” asks Baxter.

“I want to go in alone.”

“What?” they cry in unison.

“This is a woman, guys. Maybe a gay woman. I’ll get twice as much out of her as you could.”

“The point isn’t to get something out of her,” Baxter reminds me. “It’s to find out whether she’s seen you before, and therefore your sister. And since no one else seemed to recognize you – except Smith, who didn’t try to hide it – this interview may be critical.”

I look him dead in the eye. “Do you really believe a woman is behind all these disappearances? Or even involved?”

“Let her do it,” says Dr. Lenz, surprising me. “The odds that Laveau is involved are low, and her nude paintings will probably tell us more than she will. But if Jordan can gain her trust, we might learn something valuable about one of the men.”

“You saw how Smith responded to me,” I press Baxter. “I think he would have opened up to me if I’d been alone. Wheaton, too.”

“Smith was responding to your fame,” says Kaiser, who looks uncomfortable with the idea. “Not your gender.”

“If you went in alone, what would you say?” asks Baxter.

“I won’t know that until I get there. That’s the way I work.”

The ISU chief looks tempted but worried. “Jesus, the liability-”

“What liability? I’m a private citizen walking up to someone’s door. If she invites me in, so what?”

“What if she sees you and freaks?” asks Kaiser. “Attacks you? If she’s involved, that’s a real possibility.”

“I wouldn’t turn down a gun if you offered me one.”

Baxter shakes his head. “We can’t give you a gun.”

“How about some Mace?”

“We don’t have any.”

“This is a bad idea,” says Kaiser.

“It’s better than sending you and Lenz in there,” I insist. “Look, I’ll know whether she’s seen me before as soon as she answers the door. Then I’ll tell her you guys are outside. I’ll tell the truth. I’m the sister of one of the victims, trying to find some answers, and the FBI is kindly providing some protection for me.”

“Let her go,” Lenz says. “We need to know what Laveau knows. This is the best way to find that out.” He looks at Kaiser. “You disagree?”

Kaiser looks like he’d like to argue, but he doesn’t. “Put the wire on her, and I’ll stand just outside the house with a receiver.” He watches me, his hazel eyes intense. “If you sense it going bad in any way, yell for help. And I mean yell. No codes that can be misunderstood.”

“That works for me,” Baxter says. “Let’s move, before Laveau decides to go out and get her hair done.”

“Get the T-4 off,” Kaiser tells Lenz., who removes his coat and starts unbuttoning his shirt, his elbows bumping us in the tight quarters. Baxter unstraps the tape from Lenz’s ribs, and Kaiser chuckles at the psychiatrist’s grimaces.

“She’ll see that transmitter under this blouse,” I point out, holding out the thin cotton.

“You’ll have to wear it under your skirt,” says Lenz, cradling the transmitter, dangling antenna, and microphone in his hands.

“Do you have more tape?”

Baxter digs into a metal drawer and comes up with a roll, which he hands awkwardly to me.

“This is no time to be shy,” I tell them, pulling my skirt up. “I am wearing underwear.”

“And very nice underwear it is,” says Dr. Lenz, looking at the cream silk bikinis.

“Come on, tape it on.”

“I don’t really know what I’m doing,” Lenz protests.

“Give me that,” snaps Baxter.

He takes the transmitter from Lenz, and under the close scrutiny of the other two leans over and tapes the transmitter and antenna securely to my inner thigh, high enough to give me goose bumps despite my bravado about modesty. When he’s done, he hands me the tiny microphone, which is connected to the transmitter by a thin wire.

“Run that under your waistband and up to your bra.”

“Why don’t you guys shut your eyes for this part?”

They do, and I secure the mike between the cups of my Maidenform with the tiny clip attached to it. “Ready or not,” I say softly. “Let’s do it.”

They open their eyes, and Kaiser opens the back door.

“Remember,” says Baxter. “You get a weird vibe, sing out, and the cavalry will bust in there.”

“Nothing’s going to happen.”

Laveau’s rooming house needs a new roof and a coat of paint, neither of which it’s likely to get in the next ten years. The door to her second-floor apartment stands at the head of some rickety wooden steps attached to the peeling clapboard exterior of the house. I cling to the handrail as I climb the steps, since I’m about as comfortable in heels as I would be in snowshoes. The door and facing are scarred from years of careless tenants. I knock loudly and wait. After a moment, I hear footsteps.

“Who is it?” calls a voice muffled by the wood.

“My name is Jordan Glass. I want to talk to you about your paintings.”

Silence. Then: “I don’t know you. How did you know where to find me?”

“Roger Wheaton sent me.”

There’s a sound of bolts sliding back; then the door opens to the length of a chain lock. One dark eye peeks out and examines me.

“Who did you say you are?”

So much for my face rattling her into a confession. “Ms. Laveau, do you know about the women who’ve been disappearing from New Orleans over the past eighteen months? Two were taken from Tulane.”

“Do I know about them? I’ve been carrying a gun for three months. What about them?”

“One of them was my sister.”

The dark eye blinks. “I’m sorry. But what does that have to do with me?”

“I found some paintings of the victims. The paintings were in Hong Kong, but the FBI found special sable paintbrush hairs stuck in the paint, and they traced them to Roger Wheaton’s program at Tulane.”

The eye widens, then blinks twice. “That’s crazy. Paintings of the kidnapped women?”