Read Online Mostly Murder by Linda Ladd - Free Book Online

kiss the nostalgia good-bye and just get down to the business at hand. “Looks to me like everything’s pretty normal. No newspapers piled up. Except for the broken flower pot out in the alley, Madonna Christien kept a tidy place.”
    â€œTrue, but never can tell what goes on behind closed doors.” Bourdain knocked again, harder this time. He called out, “NOPD. Open up.”
    No answer. When Bourdain inserted the key, it turned easily, and the door swung open. He called out again and was met with dead silence. He looked back at them and said, “You want me to wait outside while you clear the place?”
    â€œWhatever you wanna do, Rene. We just appreciate you comin’.” That was Zee, the grateful, polite detective, eager to please.
    They stepped inside the foyer and glanced around. Directly in front of them, white-draped French doors were closed. Zee and Claire both pulled their weapons, just to be on the safe side. Perhaps still a bit unsettled by all those big black stitches on the victim’s face. Rene Bourdain didn’t bother. Let them shoot it out all they wanted; he’d just wait outside where it was safe. The front hall led off to their left, and Claire could see the room at the far end. The open door revealed a white iron bed with white bedding. It was barely visible in the interior gloom.
    Rene said, “This’s your case, detectives. I’m not gonna interfere. Have at it. I’ll wait right here.”
    What is he, anyway, a U.N. Observer? Claire thought, but she pulled out some latex gloves and handed a pair to Zee. They snapped them on, stepped once more into matching paper crime scene booties. “Zee, you take the bedrooms down this hallway. I’ll check out the back of the house.”
    Zee moved off down the hallway, and Claire opened the French doors and stepped inside what appeared to be Madonna Christien’s living room. On the far wall, an undraped expanse of plate-glass windows slanted late-afternoon sunlight across the interior. The floorboards were painted white, as were the walls. Except that now there was blood spattered all over everything. Somehow Claire had expected to find neatness and order inside the apartment, just like there was outside, but was she ever wrong. There had been one hell of a struggle inside that room, violent and lengthy and bloody, one that had left pretty much anything not nailed down overturned, broken, or shattered all over the floor.
    Sidestepping the mess, Claire edged around the perimeter of the room, weapon out in front, finger alongside the trigger, avoiding pools of dried blood. She was very wary now, although her gut told her that whoever had been there was long gone with the victim in tow and a healthy supply of black and white paint and sewing thread and religious candles. Quickly, she cleared the kitchen and other rooms for more victims or a psychopath holding a voodoo doll with her face on it. After she was satisfied that they were alone in the apartment, she sidestepped her way back through the living room, thinking it looked as if Edward Cullen, that teenage vampire, had stopped lusting after Bella Swan long enough to have himself a hell of a blood feast. She hadn’t read those books, of course, but Zee and Nancy had filled her in on every single detail on every single page.
    Zee met her outside the French doors. “Neat as a pin in the bedrooms.”
    â€œLook in here, Zee. Madonna Christien was murdered right in there, I’d bet my badge on it.”
    Bourdain took a careful step inside the living room. “Christ almighty,” he breathed out. “Maybe I should bring in my forensics team to sweep this scene? Nancy’s probably gonna have her hands full down there at Thibodaux by the sound of it, both with your victim and the old LeFevres place. It’d be quicker, too, if we take over at this end.”
    Claire considered his offer and looked at Zee for his take. He