Cooper Vengeance

“Suppose it would depend on the man.”

“What did they think of Carrie’s husband?”

“That she was lucky to catch him. Hamilton Gray’s slipped the noose more than once since he was a boy, though God knows every girl in town’s been after him at some point.”

“Even Natalie?”

“No, not Natalie. She never has liked him much.” Margo lowered her voice. “I hear she thinks he had something to do with her sister’s murder.”

“What do you think?” J.D. asked.

“I can’t see the motive. He wouldn’t get her money—old Darden Becker made sure there was an airtight prenup. And I don’t reckon he’d have tired of a pretty little thing like Carrie so soon after the wedding. Besides, I heard he had an alibi.”

Alibis could be deceiving. “Say, do you know anyone around town named Alex?”

Margo’s forehead bunched with thought. “I think Ruby Stiller over on Beacon Road has a grandson named Alex. Why?”

He couldn’t tell her the truth, so he improvised. “I ran into a guy at the gas station yesterday. Said his name was Alex. We got to talking about fishing and he said he could show me some good spots, but I forgot to get his phone number.”

“That’s definitely not Ruby’s grandson—that kid’s in kindergarten.”

“Maybe I’m remembering the name wrong.”

“Well, if it’s fishing you’re after, you should hunt down Rudy Lawler. He lives up the road a ways—just out past Annabelle’s, in fact, maybe a mile or so.”

“Annabelle’s—that’s the place where Carrie Gray was murdered?” he asked, even though he knew very well it was.

“That’s right. Carrie bought the restaurant a few months ago and was trying to get it ready to reopen.” Margo pointed right, toward the west. “It’s about a half mile up the road.”

J.D. gently pushed his plate away. “It’s been a real pleasure meeting you, Margo. I’ll be back, I’m sure.”

Margo smiled brightly at him. “You just tell your friends about Margo’s, okay?”

She walked him out, waiting in the door while he slid behind the steering wheel. J.D. waved goodbye, then pulled out on the highway. But he didn’t head back to the motel.

He headed up the road to Annabelle’s.

AT 6:00 P.M., THE SUN was only just reaching the horizon, still hot enough to make Natalie wish she’d left her jacket in the Lexus. But she’d stopped off at her house to get her spare weapon, and she didn’t like walking around with her holster showing, not even at a place as secluded as Annabelle’s.

The restaurant had once been a favorite among Terrebonne locals, one of the few nice restaurants in the sleepy little bayside town. Then Annabelle Saveau and her husband, Marcel, had moved back to New Orleans to take care of Marcel’s aging parents after Hurricane Katrina, selling the property to a real estate speculator who’d thought the restaurant and surrounding acres of scenic woods would be an easy sell.

Years later, it was still for sale when Carrie decided she was tired of running the Human Resources Department at Bayside Oil and wanted a different career. Natalie’s sister had bought the place a couple of months ago.

It had become the place of her death.

“Oh, Carrie, why were you so fearless?” she murmured, walking around the low-slung building until she could see the back door. Carrie’s body had been found in the kitchen, laid out supine, as if she were merely asleep. Of course, the slashing stab wounds in her abdomen, and the blood pooling around her body gave the real story away.

The sound of tires crunching on the asphalt parking lot in front of the restaurant set Natalie’s nerves humming. Unsheathing her Glock 19, she eased her way back to the front and flattened her body against the side of the building to avoid being seen as long as possible.

The engine cut off and she heard a car door open. She darted a quick look around the corner of the building.

There was no mistaking the tall, broad-shouldered, dark-haired man walking to the front of the building. J. D. Cooper stopped in front of the door and tested the lock. The handle rattled in his hand but didn’t open.

Trespassing son of a—

Natalie eased away from the building, edging into the darkening woods behind her. She’d left her car down the road, not wanting to be seen snooping around what was, technically, still a crime scene, since she was on administrative leave.

But if she didn’t get to look around, she’d be damned if J. D. Cooper got to, either.

When she reached her car, she pulled out her cell phone and dialed 911. “I’m calling from Sedge Road, near Annabelle’s. I just saw a man trying to break into the restaurant.”

Chapter Three

“Look, if you’ll just call the Chickasaw County Sheriff’s Department and ask for Aaron Cooper, he’ll vouch for me.” J.D. winced as the handcuffs around his wrists bit into his flesh, glad Gabe couldn’t see him now. Although he might have need of the bail Gabe had mentioned any minute now.

“We tried. He wasn’t in the office.” Deputy Doyle Massey, one of the department’s investigators, had taken custody of him once he reached the station. Massey was a broad-shouldered man in his mid-thirties, with sandy brown hair and eyes the color of tree moss. He looked impatient, making J.D. wonder just how much work an investigator got in a department this size.

“Then ask for Riley Patterson. Or call the Gossamer Ridge Police Department and ask for Kristen Cooper.”

Massey glanced at J.D. “How many cops are you related to?”

“Do auxiliary deputies count, too?”

Massey grinned. “You must be the black sheep of the family.”

“Funny.”

“What were you doing snooping around there, anyway?” Massey unlocked the cuffs behind his back.

J.D. rubbed his sore wrists. “Am I under arrest?” Nobody had read him his rights, but clearly he wasn’t free to go.

Massey led him to a small interview room. “Take a seat.”

J.D. sat across from the deputy, wondering how much he should say about his real reason for being at Annabelle’s. His own family was sympathetic to his quest for justice, but he’d found over the years that the local cops would prefer he just butt out.

“At the scene, you said you were just curious about the place because it had been a murder scene. How did you know that, you being a newcomer to town and all?”

Oh, what the hell. If he lied, he’d just look as though he was hiding things. “Twelve years ago, my wife was murdered in Gossamer Ridge, in a secluded area, late at night. She was raped and stabbed to death. The killer left no evidence behind.”

The deputy’s eyes gave a small flicker. “Go on.”

“There’ve been similar murders. In Mississippi five or six years ago. Up in Millbridge, Alabama, in the last six months—”

“Are you talking about the murders that college kid committed? He was already in jail when Carrie Gray was killed.”

This must be how Alicia felt, J.D. thought, trying to explain her theory about the serial killer pair to Gabe the first time. “There are two people involved. Marlon Dyson—the college student—was only one of the two killers. The other one is the guy who actually does the stabbings.”

Massey frowned. “So the kid was just along for the ride?”