Officer Elvis (8 page)

“Kentucky trailer trash,” said Kendall, “with an emphasis on trash. Bless her pretty little heart.”

Let's see what else I can learn,
thought Darla. “Do either of you know anything about a J. B. Caulder?” she asked.

“Jerry Bob?” asked Kendall, eyebrows raised.

“Maybe,” said Darla. “But why would someone named Jerry use his initials instead of his name?”

“Don't tell me he's part of your investigation,” said Lulu.

“What do you know about him?” asked Darla.

“There's a blast from the Reylander past,” said Kendall, exchanging looks with Lulu.

“Jerry Bob and Tommy were bosom buddies,” said Lulu.

“Meaning they both had a thing for bosoms,” said Kendall.

“Well, it was bosoms that broke up their friendship, I can tell you that much,” said Lulu. “You want to tell it, Kendall?”

Kendall looked at Lulu. “You do it, girl,” she said. “You tell the story better.”

“It happened in high school,” said Lulu.

“Everything of real consequence in Mississippi has its origins in high school,” said Kendall. “Usually junior year. Sorry, Lulu, I had to get that in.”

Lulu continued. “Well now, Jerry Bob was gaga over this girl named Tammy.”

“There were three Tammys in that class,” said Kendall.

“This was the middle Tammy,” said Lulu.

The one everybody calls Tammy,
thought Darla.

“A little majorette slut. Bless her sweet heart,” said Kendall, who couldn't stop herself even if she tried, and she didn't.

“Actually the first Tammy was a majorette, too.” said Lulu. “Anyway, the short of it is that middle Tammy was Jerry Bob's girlfriend.”

“They went together for about two weeks, which was average for the time and place,” said Kendall.

Lulu took the story back. “Then Jerry Bob caught Tommy and Tammy, middle Tammy that is, in flagrante delicto in the backseat of…wait for it…Tommy's Caddy.”

“Tommy had that shitmobile back in high school, the same damn one,” said Kendall.

“No blessing the heart?” asked Darla.

“Not for an inanimate object,” said Kendall.

“So as you might imagine,” said Lulu, “fisticuffs ensued and, well, I wasn't present but, as Jerry Bob was a major badass, my understanding was that Tommy got himself—how should I put it?”

“Tommy got himself an old-fashioned Mississippi ass whipping,” said Kendall.

“Tommy never told you about stealing Jerry Bob's girl?” asked Lulu. “I thought he bragged about that to everybody. It may have been the only time in his life he succeeded in stealing somebody's girlfriend.”

“Of course, whenever Tommy told the story he always failed to mention the ass-whipping part,” said Kendall.

“Tommy and I weren't exactly confidants,” said Darla. “Do you know any more about Jerry Bob?”

“After high school, the story was he moved to Alabama and took up with a bad crowd,” said Lulu.

“How bad?” asked Darla.

“Dixie Mafia bad,” said Kendall. “Word is, he was supposed to have become some low-level operator for them. Of course, it could be just a rumor Jerry Bob put out there to build himself up. He was always trying to pump up his ego, the dumb goober. Bless his heart.”

Darla thought about a Dixie Mafia connection to ETA International. It wasn't that far-fetched. Over the decades, various crime organizations had involved themselves in the entertainment industry.

“I heard Jerry Bob is back in town,” said Lulu.

“What's he doing with himself these days, the little toad?” asked Kendall.

“He's a mover and shaker in the world of ETAs,” said Darla.

“You got me there, little sister,” said Lulu.

“He's in the bobblehead business,” said Darla.

Meanwhile, the Elvis impersonators had formed a semicircle around Cill. Between shedding tears, she smiled and joked, first with one, then with the other, but especially the tall, good-looking one.

The three women observed the scene with a mixture of wonder and disgust.

“Reminds me of something out of
Gone with the Wind
,” said Darla.

“That's the thing about the South,” said Kendall. “Every woman, no matter how low she is, thinks of herself as Scarlett O'Hara.”

“Yeah, well, bless her heart,” said Darla.

The following morning Darla placed a call to FBI Research Specialist Uther Pendragon Johnson. She'd known Uther from her days with the Hinds County Sheriff's Department, where Uther had been an intern from Jackson State, doing IT work. Even then, if an investigator needed a database developed, or analyzed, or needed information about anyone or anything, Uther was the person they turned to. Darla and Tommy had each worked a couple of cases with Uther before the FBI recruited him. Now he was a major player at the FBI's combined services information operation, but he might be willing to do a little pick-and-shovel work for an old colleague.

“Good morning, Detective, this is Uther Pendragon Johnson,” he said in a clipped Bahamian accent, sounding exactly like Sidney Poitier.

“I'm working the Reylander homicide, Uther,” Darla said, getting right to it.

“Yes. I understand Major Mitchell took the case in a moment of uncharacteristic sentimentality,” said Uther. Law enforcement people, like everybody else in Mississippi, were notorious gossips.

“I'm on a short leash on this one,” said Darla. “I need an information profile on a company called Trace Enterprises. What do they do? Who owns them? Who do they own? Where do they get their money? Any connections to organized crime? The whole nine yards, if you can spare the time.”

“How short a leash are you on?” asked Uther.

“Basically, I've got a day left before Shelby sends the case back to the county.”

“And you believe this firm, Trace Enterprises, to be of malicious intention?” asked Uther.

“My guess going in,” said Darla.

“Then I shan't tarry,” said Uther. “Developing a comprehensive information profile on a firm that wishes to remain in the shadows can be a time-consuming process.”

“You're the best, Uther,” said Darla.

“A subjective view, but one for which I am most appreciative,” said Uther.

They disconnected.

With not much more to go on in terms of leads, Darla spent the balance of the morning cranking out three overdue reports on cases she'd recently concluded.

Somewhere around eleven thirty, she had an idea and called her husband, Stephen, at the Jackson Women's Health Clinic.

They'd crossed paths and hadn't really seen each other the night before. Stephen had been called to the clinic for an emergency C-section before Darla got home from Tommy's viewing. He didn't return home until 3 a.m. and was asleep when Darla left for the office. This sort of thing happened all too often lately and neither of them liked it.

“Got time for a nooner?” Darla joked, when Stephen answered the phone. Only she wasn't joking.

“A nooner?” her Italian husband asked.

Darla was constantly surprised at how few American slang expressions Stephen understood.

“You know,” said Darla, “hide the sausage, or whatever they called it in Italy.”

“Ah, an assignation,” he said.

“Right. A siesta with sex. How about it, Doc?”

“I'd be crazy to refuse,” he laughed. “But I'm afraid you must feed me first. It sounds like I will need all my strength.”

“I guess we could eat first,” said Darla, feigning disappointment. “That could make it more of a date kind of thing, but really I'm only interested in your body.”

“And I selected you for your mind,” Stephen said.

“Let's go to someplace with fast service. I don't want to waste a lot of time on the preliminaries,” said Darla, half seriously.

They chose Nitty Gritty, a northeast Jackson eatery famous for its gumbo, as well as its speedy service. Darla arrived first and sat in the rear of the restaurant so she could watch the other diners stare at her husband as he made his way back to her. Dr. Stephen Nicoletti attracted attention nearly everywhere he went. He was a tall man, nearly six feet four, with an olive complexion and Italian features, offset by steel-blue eyes and blond hair. He had a slender but well-muscled frame, and a way of walking that put Darla in mind of a predatory cat. After three years of marriage she remained smitten.

He slid into the booth across from her, reached over, and kissed her half on the cheek and half on the mouth. “A nooner,” he said with that certain look in his eye. “We should do this more often.”

“Especially if you plan on getting me pregnant,” said Darla. “It's a matter of shots on goal.”

He looked puzzled for a second and then smiled like he'd got it. “Yes, like in football, or soccer, as you say. Yes, we need more shots on goal,” he said with a glint in his eyes.

They could joke about the lack of opportunity for intimacy, but she and Stephen were both concerned. Darla had lost a pregnancy once and they'd been trying to get pregnant again for the last six months. Their demanding careers and unpredictable schedules weren't making things easy. Another reason why they were looking forward to their upcoming vacation to Italy. A month, just the two of them, with no outside emergencies.

The waitress arrived and they each ordered the blackened gumbo, with chicken and Andouille sausage. Jackson, only three hours from New Orleans, had adopted some of the Big Easy's cuisine.

“How is your day going?” she asked after the waitress left.

“There were only four protesters outside the clinic this morning and only one of them called me a baby killer. That's better than most days. At any rate, we are open still.”

Stephen Nicoletti had lived in the United States for nearly a decade, but still, at times, had an odd way for constructing sentences. Darla found it endearing and never corrected him.

“And what of the search for Officer Elvis's killer?” he asked, tearing off a piece of the soft, crusty New Orleans–style French bread. “Have you—how did they say it in the movie—rounded up the usual suspects?”

Darla sighed. “No, but I've rounded up some
unusual
suspects.”

“Why does this not surprise me?” said Stephen.

“There's Tommy's girlfriend, who pretends she's Priscilla Presley. She calls herself Cill, wore a black cocktail dress to the funeral home, and posed for pictures in front of a cardboard cutout of Tommy dressed as Elvis.”

“This woman, she is not a candidate for the Junior League,” said Stephen, whose patients included a number of the more socially prominent young women in metro Jackson.

“I should mention Cill has Elvis's face tattooed on her butt,” said Darla.

“Left or right?” asked Stephen, smiling.

“I didn't actually see it. I heard about it from Conway Boudreaux, another unusual suspect.”

“This would be Continental Conway?” said Stephen. Two of Conway's strippers were patients at the clinic.

The gumbo arrived and Darla continued with the story between mouthfuls.

“Tommy and a couple of his religious zealot pals did a citizens' raid on Conway's gay strip joint, the Adonis Club. They closed the joint, but Conway got a small hunk of hush money for protecting the confidentiality of a few closeted senators who were getting lap dances.”

“This does not strike me as that unusual by Jackson standards,” said Stephen.

“Only it's not enough money to pay for the oceanfront property Conway is buying in Hawaii,” said Darla.

“I am guessing you heard some of this from Lulu Brister?”

“Of course, and it starts with a man everybody calls Brother,” said Darla.

“Someone from a monastic order?” asked Stephen.

“I wish it were that easy. He's Conway's half brother. There are two other brothers. But everybody calls the half brother, Brother. I never did find out why.”

“I can see how police work can be challenging,” said Stephen, “just keeping track of all the brothers.”

“Then there's Hardy Lang, the vegan meth dealer. Tommy helped put him out of business too, and now Hardy is blissfully running a wildlife sanctuary for catfish, out of a pond in his front yard on Highway 25.”

“All of this in one day,” said Stephen. “No wonder you were late getting home.”

“There's more,” said Darla. “A mobbed-up talent agent named J. B. Caulder, who claims he represents only the finest Elvis impersonators in the county, was chasing after Tommy.”

“Who may be the worst Elvis impersonator in Mississippi,” said Stephen.

At Shelby's request, Darla and Stephen had attended a concert Tommy did for the Policemen's Benevolent League.

They'd both finished their gumbo. “What should we have for dessert?” asked Darla.

“Each other,” Stephen whispered in her ear. He signaled the waitress for the check and turned to Darla. “If there is more to your Elvis investigation, you must tell me now. I don't think we'll have time for it later.”

“Well, did you know there's something called the Elvis Community?” she asked.

“You are talking about a commune, perhaps,” said Stephen, playing like he was baffled. “Where they all live together. Like the hippies?”

“Very funny,” said Darla. “I mean there are all these people in Mississippi who imitate Elvis. Hundreds, thousands maybe.”

“You did not know this? Two of my patients are married to men who impersonate Elvis as a hobby. One of the men drowned in a boating accident last week, poor fellow.”

The waitress arrived with the check and Stephen paid her in cash, signaling that she needn't bother with the change. “This nooner you speak of, it doesn't have to end at one o'clock, does it?” he asked, checking his watch.

“Let's take my Prius,” Darla said. “Maybe I'll turn the flasher on.”

Halfway to the car, Darla's cell chimed. The call was from Shelby and she knew she had to take it. Shelby never made calls during lunch hour. He was always too busy eating.

“I hope I haven't caught you at a bad time,” asked Shelby. “Have you had lunch yet?”

“Everything but dessert,” said Darla, looking at her husband.

“I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you to put the Officer Elvis murder on the back burner,” said Shelby. “I just got a call from Henry Jendlin at the FBI. I need for you to pedal your little Prius on over to the Jackson Convention Center. Looks like we got us an actual hate crime. I'd tell you the details, but I don't want to ruin the surprise.”

“Can you give me a hint?” asked Darla.

“It's along the lines of somebody stuck their finger in a light socket,” said Shelby.

“You sure you don't need an electrician?”

“Sorry about asking you to skip dessert,” said Shelby.

“I'll have it when I get home tonight,” said Darla, meeting her husband's eyes.