Chapter 24

24

Danny Perry sat in his radio car eating hot and spicy pork cracklings out of the bag on his passenger seat. He was parked strategically on the cross street to Quail Trace, far enough down the block to not be easily spotted, thanks in part to the sparse streetlights in the development.

He had a good view of the Mercier house, which was closer to a corner light. It was a nicer house than any house Danny had ever lived in. That was Marc Mercier, though, wasn’t it? Lucky son of a bitch. He always managed to come out on top, smelling like a rose. Everybody loved Marc, the golden boy of Bayou Breaux.

Danny had gone up to the door to let the wife know he was on duty, making a point of saying he had volunteered for the shift to keep an eye out for her safety. She was hot, of course, even if she hadn’t gone to the trouble of putting on makeup or doing her hair. The girls had always fallen all over themselves to get to Marc.

Not that Danny had any interest in having a wife, himself. Why limit yourself to one pussy? he asked. Especially considering how many girls out there were hot to fuck cops. But having a classy babe like Melissa Mercier in the lineup would have been sweet, for sure. People said she was a bitch, but sometimes those girls were the wildest in bed.

The reporters who had clogged up the street earlier in the day had given up and gone. The rumor among them had been that Marc Mercier’s wife was sleeping with her boss, but that didn’t make a news story. Now, if the two of them had killed Marc to be together, or killed him for the insurance, that was a story.

Of course, they might have, he conceded. Though if they had, they weren’t being very clever about trying to look innocent. Or maybe that was actually genius—to look so guilty, they couldn’t possibly actually be guilty. He couldn’t decide.

Anyway, he wasn’t convinced Marc was dead. He could just as well have gone to Mexico to live like a king, looking out on the Gulf of Mexico while being serviced by black-haired beauties. What red-blooded guy wouldn’t do that if he had the cash?

A white pickup truck came down the street from the entrance to Quail Run. Danny sat up straighter in his seat, hoping to see the tag number as it passed. It was after two in the morning on a weeknight. A town of mostly middle-class working people, the sidewalks of Bayou Breaux were generally rolled up by 10:30. People saved their late nights for the weekend. He held his breath as the truck turned down Quail Trace, but it rolled past the Mercier house and kept going.

None of the reporters that afternoon had admitted it, but Danny suspected one of them had been the prowler in the Merciers’ backyard the night before. Trying to catch the wife in the act with her boss. They weren’t going to be dumb enough to try it two nights in a row.

The alternate theory was Marc’s crazy mother, who had been the one to suggest Melissa Mercier’s affair with Will Faulkner, was trying to catch them at it. She seemed kind of old to be creeping through yards in the dead of night, but Danny had once seen her run across a football field and jump an opposing team player who had leveled Marc with a dirty hit, so she was probably capable of anything, even ten years later.

He ate the last of his cracklings and drank some Red Bull, then got out of his vehicle to take a piss in the bushes and do some jumping jacks. He needed to stay awake. These late nights were killing him.

He was still shaking the snake behind some azalea bushes when a car came from the opposite direction and turned onto Quail Trace. A blue Toyota Corolla, plainly visible under the corner streetlight.

“Shit,” Danny muttered, tucking his Johnson away and zipping his fly.

He watched the car go down to the end of the block and take a left.

“What the fuck?” he muttered, getting back in his vehicle. He started the engine and rolled down the street, making the same left just in time to see the Toyota turn left again, circling the block.

Danny could feel his heart beating in his chest as his mind raced. His hands were sweating on the steering wheel.

He knew that car.

That was Robbie Fontenot’s car.

What the fuck was Robbie Fontenot doing prowling Marc Mercier’s neighborhood?

Danny had begun to think Robbie wasn’t going to be a problem anymore. He had let himself start to believe Robbie Fontenot was dead, even though no one had come across his body yet. The pills should have done their job. Danny had put them in Robbie’s hand himself. He’d done the same with Rayanne. A bonus for keeping their mouths shut. If they took the pills and died, that was on them, not him.

But there he was, watching Robbie Fontenot’s car prowl this neighborhood.

What the fuck was he supposed to do now?

He killed his headlights and made the left, hoping he was far enough back to not be noticed. He could still see the Toyota’s taillights as it made yet another left.

What happened if he let Robbie get out of the car and go into the Merciers’ yard? If Danny got out and followed him, he might catch the guy, but then what? Arrest him? Take him in and run the risk that Fontenot might use what he knew as leverage?

What if he just shot him? he wondered. He could claim he thought Robbie had a gun and he shot him in self-defense. Really, he should be hailed as a hero for defending Marc’s wife and kid. Who knew what a druggie like Fontenot was up to or after?

But police shooting people attracted a lot of media attention these days, and there would be a lot of questions and an investigation. And they were in the middle of a neighborhood where people had security cameras all over the place. He couldn’t take the chance. He would be stupid to do anything there. He had to move this opportunity away from civilization if he could.

He stepped on the gas and flipped on his lights.

Ahead of him, the Toyota took off.

There was no way that thing was going to outrun a cop car, but Danny needed him out of the city limits, out of the way of witnesses. He eased off the gas, letting the Toyota get a good lead on him as they headed out of the development. He turned his light bar on but not his sirens, not yet. He didn’t want to attract more attention than he had to.

Quail Run was on the western edge of town. Beyond the development was a state wildlife management area, the road winding through woods and swamp. Wilderness. No houses. No witnesses. All he needed was for the car to turn right at the end of the road instead of left.

“Go right, go right, go right!”

The Toyota turned right and took off.

Danny hit the gas. Now he turned on the siren, out there where there was no one to hear it except the driver he was chasing and the dispatcher as he keyed his radio and reported the pursuit. He accurately gave the make, model, and tag number of the Toyota but purposely misnamed the road they were on as his patrol car ate up the distance between the two vehicles. Any officer looking to join the chase would be heading to Cypress Canal Road instead of Cypress Island Road.

The night was dark as clouds slipped in front of the moon, and trees and black water swallowed up the land on both sides of the narrow, winding road. Danny ran his car right up behind the Toyota. There was nowhere for him to go, no shoulder, no side roads to turn onto for another mile or more. The Toyota started to skid into a hard left curve.

“Roll, you fucker, roll!” Danny muttered under his breath.

The patrol car swayed coming out of the turn but stayed right on the Toyota. He pressed the gas and pulled to the left, coming up alongside the car’s rear quarter panel. If he timed this right, it would be perfect. He could turn into the Toyota to initiate a pit maneuver just as they hit the next curve. He had learned how to do it at the police academy, longer ago than he cared to think. There had never been any opportunity to put it to practical use inside the city limits of Bayou Breaux, but it wasn’t hard to do. Just find the right point to move his car into the Toyota, just a tap, just enough to throw it into a tailspin.

The Toyota would flip, roll off the road and into the trees. An unfortunate accident. No one would be the wiser. At the speed they were going, there was no way Robbie Fontenot survived.

Danny took a deep breath. His heart was pounding like a drum. The adrenaline felt like rocket fuel coursing through him.

The next curve was coming up fast.

He needed to time this just right.

He started to turn his wheel.

A split second too late.

A foot too far back on the Toyota.

He pulled the wheel just a little too hard.

And it all went wrong.

The Bayou Breaux PD cruiser went off the road doing seventy, sailing into a swamp full of cypress trees.

The Toyota skidded sideways. The left rear wheel came off the pavement for a breath-catching instant, then came back down. The car straightened and ran clear, its taillights glowing red, until the night and the wilderness swallowed it whole.