Chaos in Mudbug (Ghost-in-Law Mystery/Romance Series) (6 page)

“Here’s the list of villages,” he said and pointed to the piece of paper. “That isn’t all of them, of course. There’s probably more out there that I haven’t heard of than I have, but those are the ones big enough to support a shrimp house.”

Jadyn nodded. “So we check with the shrimp houses first and see if anyone recognizes the boat as one of the fishermen they buy from.”

“Exactly. Pricing varies a bit among the buyers, but not so much to make it worth a trip too far away from where he lives. Otherwise, he’d eat up the profit gain in gas.” He pointed to the map. “Given the path of the storm as it moved inland, I only covered villages to the east of Mudbug. So that leaves us ten shrimp houses to cover.”

Jadyn studied the map for several seconds, gauging the distance between the villages. “Great,” she said finally. “If we split up, we should able to cover them all today.”

“I think so. If either of us gets a lead beyond the shrimp house, then we check in and decide whether or not to double-team the lead.”

“Perfect.”

“I’ll make a copy of these and we can get going.”

Jadyn rose from her chair as Colt gathered the map and list. She followed him to the door, where he stopped and turned to look at her. “If you run into problems, even something small, or something doesn’t feel right, I want you to call me. You’ve got good instincts. If you are uncomfortable with someone or something, then there’s probably a reason for it.”

Jadyn felt a blush creep up her face at his compliment. He stared so intently at her that she completely lost her voice, managing only to nod.
 

“When we’re done,” he said, “maybe we can grab a bite to eat and exchange notes.”

He said it casually, like one law enforcement officer inviting another to beers after work, but Jadyn could hear an edge in his voice that told her the invitation wasn’t nearly as casual as Colt was trying to make it sound. And even if she’d been obtuse and completely missed that sign, the constriction of her chest would have been a dead giveaway.
 

“Sure,” she said, hoping she sounded remotely normal. “After a day of talking to fishermen, I’ll probably be dying for food and a beer.”

He smiled. “Give me a call when you’re on your way back to town. Unless something comes up first, of course.”

He exited the office, made copies, and filled Shirley in on their plans for the rest of the day.

“I’ll call if I get a line on a missing persons report,” she said. “You two be careful.”

“It’s just a wrecked boat,” Colt said.

The dispatcher raised one eyebrow. “That’s exactly how trouble starts around here.”

Jadyn followed Colt out of the sheriff’s department, glancing back at Shirley as she closed the door behind her. The dispatcher was staring out the window toward the bayou and frowning. It was an unsettling sort of frown.

Jadyn didn’t blame her. Nothing about this situation felt right.

Chapter Four

Taylor Beaumont looked across her desk at the distraught woman sitting in front of her. One hand held the tissue Taylor had just passed her. The other clutched a Fendi handbag that Taylor knew was part of a recent collection and cost more than she’d made last year with her detective agency. The diamonds on her fingers and around her neck were probably worth more than she’d ever see her entire career.

“I’m sorry to be such a mess.” The woman, who’d identified herself as Sophia Lambert, patted the corner of her eyes with the tissue, careful not to smear her mascara.

“Don’t worry about it,” Taylor said. “If people’s lives were perfect, they wouldn’t need me.”

Sophia sniffed again and nodded. “I suppose that’s true. You’ve probably seen more than your share of weeping women.”

“I’ve seen a few. Please tell me how I can help you?”

Taylor had been intrigued by Sophia as soon as she’d walked into the agency. Everything about her screamed old money, and Taylor was rarely wrong when it came to old money. What intrigued Taylor most was why Sophia was here, when she could have easily afforded the poshest private investigators in New Orleans.

“I want you to find my husband.”

Taylor’s interest flew a million times higher. A wealthy disappearing husband was the sort of thing movies of the week were made of. Which brought her right back around to why Sophia had chosen Taylor’s single-person, fairly green operation over the big agencies with tons of experience and lots of resources.

“How long has he been missing?” Taylor asked, figuring she’d get the business out of the way first, then get to the bottom of why Sophia had picked her.

“Well, technically twenty-nine years, but it’s a bit complex.”

Taylor froze, her pen poised on the tablet. “You might need to start at the beginning.”

“Of course. I know it sounds strange, and well, it is strange.” She blew out a breath. “I guess I should start with the explosion.”

“Whatever you think,” Taylor said.
 

“Okay. My great-grandfather started the first rubber refinery in the state, and every generation increased business and branched out further with the scope of what we do. One of our manufacturing plants uses highly flammable liquids for production. My husband, Sammy—Samuel Perkins—worked at one of the chemical plants as an operations director.”

“So you met Samuel through your family’s business?”

“Actually, we met at a bar in New Orleans, but my family still doesn’t know that. They all think we met at college. The funny thing is Samuel never even went to college. His family was quite poor and he’d been working construction when I met him.” She gave me a mischievous grin. “I might have lied to my family about his credentials to get him a job at the plant, but he was so smart and good at the work that no one ever checked.”
 

“No harm, no foul,” Taylor said.

“That’s exactly what I thought! Anyway, my father was an engineer and far more interested in the inner workings of the machines than running the business, so he was quite happy to leave a lot of those decisions to my Sammy, who single-handedly brought us into the twentieth century by installing computers and automating systems. He was what they call an early adopter.” She frowned.

“Tell me about the explosion.”

“No one’s quite sure what happened. Sammy said he needed to talk to my father, and the secretary told him that my father had left for one of the power buildings near the bayou twenty minutes before. Sammy left the office, presumably to talk to my dad. Twenty minutes later, the power building exploded.”

“Your father and Sammy were inside?”

She nodded. “The security cameras didn’t capture the area in front of the building, but they showed both of them entering the security gate that led to the dock and the power area. The explosion was so strong they never found any…they couldn’t…”

“They didn’t find the remains,” Taylor finished.
 

Sophia sniffed again and shook her head. “Before the firemen could even get the fire out, it started raining—one of those downpours that southern Louisiana is famous for—and a lot of the debris washed into the bayou. They searched the wreckage and the bayou for days, but never came up with anything concrete.”

“Except that neither man returned home.”

“No.”

“So what do you think I can find, all these years later, that the firemen didn’t discover during their investigation? My chance of locating something containing DNA almost thirty years later is practically nil.”

Sophia’s eyes widened and she sat forward in her chair. “But that’s just it—I’m not sure he’s dead.”

Taylor stared at her for a couple of seconds, trying to make the same leap, but couldn’t quite get there. “Let’s just assume he could have lived through the explosion. Why didn’t he come home? And where has he been the last thirty years?”

Sophia nodded, beginning to look a bit excited. “I saw this special on television, about people who’d been in horrible accidents and wandered away. Everyone thought they were dead, so no missing persons reports were filed. They were all rescued by Good Samaritans and nursed back to health, but not a single one of them knew who they were.”

“Amnesia?”

She nodded. “A couple of them started to remember as time passed, but several never remembered a single thing about their previous life. In every case, it was a chance meeting with someone who knew them before that exposed the truth.”

Taylor leaned forward, trying to keep up with Sophia’s leaps. “And someone who knew Sammy before saw him recently?”

Sophia beamed. “I think so. My friend Norma was doing some work with one of the local literacy organizations, delivering donated books to children in the villages southwest of here. She said she saw a man on a shrimp boat that was the spitting image of my Sammy. Only older, of course.”

Taylor sat back in her chair and tapped her pen on the desk, not sure how to proceed without completely dashing the woman’s hopes and not sure she had the tissues to handle it if she did.
 

“I can understand why you’d want to believe that Sammy somehow managed to live through the explosion,” Taylor said, “but none of us have any way of knowing what Sammy would look like today. It’s far more likely the man your friend saw reminded her of Sammy but he was someone completely different.”

“I’m well aware of how crazy this sounds. It’s exactly why I didn’t go straight to one of the big detective agencies. People talk, and the last thing I need is rumors circulating that I’ve lost the plot. I’m the CEO of Lambert Enterprises now. I can’t afford loose talk. The board of directors is just looking for a chance to get me out and anyone with a penis in. Sorry for the crassness of the statement.”

Aha,
Taylor thought. Sophia’s seemingly odd choice now made perfect sense. “No, that’s all right. I’ve been left behind in the penis wars a couple of times myself. I know what you’re up against.”

She stared out the window, considering Sophia’s story. She didn’t think for a moment that Sammy was still alive, but if Sophia wanted her to make sure, what did it hurt? She could definitely use the business and if she did a good job, and Sophia wasn’t too disappointed, she might get some clients out of the deal.

Suddenly, a thought occurred to her and she looked back at Sophia. “Did you remarry?” If the one in a million chance happened to pan out and Sammy was still alive, Taylor couldn’t help but wonder if there was a Mr. Sophia in the picture who wouldn’t be nearly as happy with the news.

Sophia looked down at her hands and twisted a large diamond around her ring finger. “I came close a couple of times, but it wasn’t right. No one’s ever been right since my Sammy.”

The forlorn look on Sophia’s face tugged a bit on Taylor’s heart. She always tried to keep her personal feelings out of her work, but the thought of Sophia pining for Sammy for almost three decades was the sort of thing made-for-TV movies were written about.
 

“I can pay extra,” Sophia said. “Double whatever you normally charge.”

“That won’t be necessary. I’ll take your case, Ms. Lambert, but only if you understand a couple of things—one, shrimpers usually cover a wide area depending on where the product is, so despite the fact that your friend saw this man on a specific dock, he could live miles away. It could take a lot of hours to locate him,
if
I can locate him at all.”

“The money isn’t the issue, and I understand the vastness of the task.”

Taylor wondered if someone like Sophia Lambert ever really accepted failure in others to provide them with what they wanted, but as long as she paid her bill, Taylor was willing to deal with some dramatics when things didn’t turn out the way Sophia wanted.

“Two,” Taylor continued, “if I find this man, and by some miracle he turns out to be Sammy, I can’t force him to meet with you. I will provide you with a means to locate him, but I can’t make him engage.”

“Of course you can’t.”

Taylor pulled out a contract and jotted down her hourly rate and a deposit. “Then I think you’ve found your detective,” she said and pushed the paper across the desk. “I’ll need the deposit to get started. I’ll provide you a report every three days along with an itemized list of hours and expenses, unless I find something sooner.”

Sophia didn’t even glance at the contract before signing and pulling out her wallet. “I hope cash is okay. I don’t want anyone to know…”

“Cash is fine. Do you want a receipt?”

“No. I trust you.”

“Great. Then the only other thing I need from you is a picture of Sammy. I can have someone age it. It’s not an exact science, but it gives me a little something to go on.”

Sophia perked up. “Oh, I forgot to tell you.” She reached down and picked up a manila envelope that she’d brought in with her. Carefully, she pulled a sheet of paper out of the envelope and handed it to Taylor. “My friend is a somewhat famous artist. She’s even been commissioned to paint royalty. She drew the man she saw.”

Taylor only had to glance at the drawing to know just how good the artist was. Every line, every tiny detail was so perfectly depicted that it looked almost like a black-and-white photograph. If Sophia’s friend was as accurate with the details as she was talented with her drawing, then this picture should be easily recognized by anyone who knew the man from the dock.