Shirley was dead, and he was starting to stink. He must have been there several hours when she found him. Shirlow Ty Baker was a six foot five, two hundred and sixty pound linebacker, or at least he had been. He had also been wanted in no less than four states for murder, armed robbery, drug charges and various petty offenses just to fill out the long resume of a criminal's career. Today, a sweltering hot Louisiana Sunday when most people were in church, 'Shirley' was face down on a patch of azaleas that had been neatly cultivated in Mrs. Francine Hupper's Shreveport lawn. Across the street, at the oakx shaded park on Loony Street (fitting name, she decided) white canvas tents were being set up for a wedding, or maybe a funeral, since the cemetery was right next to it. Once guests began arriving over there, someone would likely find ole Shirley, or worse yet, notice her poking around in the area. She was after all, hard not to notice.
Bijou St. Claire called herself Bee because in her circles the name Bijou St. Claire would have gotten the crap beat out of you on a playground, and as a 27 year old adult, the result was not much more friendly. She was Creole, quadroon if you fancied the 19th century vernacular, with skin pale enough to "pass" and hair curly enough to never. Her eyes were the piercing green of her father, and her lips the full, sensual cupid's bow of her mother. She was short. All the women in her family were what her mother called runts, but no one had ever complained. She was five foot and a squeaking one inch tall, and though her frame matched her name, she was no waif. Creole cooking and a spice for life had made it's way deliciously to her breasts and hips, and it was only by the grace of sit ups and lucky genetics that her waist remained small and trim, giving her the classic hourglass figure. She might have looked more in place wearing a cocktail dress at some debs ball with white gloves, but instead she was here, in the leafy lawns of Shreveport, in jeans, boots and a leather lace up top that made her feel like a werewolf hunter from a trashy novel. She did not own a cocktail dress.
Bee had been tracking Shirley for two months, which was twice as long as it usually took to track someone down. The trick to this one was that the client did not really want Shirley found. Shirley had run off with some boss's daughter and taken with him a load of cash from daddy's safe. A typical enough story. It only got complicated because Daddy had employed Shirley as a do-bad man long before the daughter was involved. Shirley had done hits for Daddy at $20,000 a pop, which was twice what Bee made on the rare occasions when she took on a job like that. She did not fancy herself any kind of hit-man... woman, but she had played the role of assassin exactly twice before, both sticky situations where there was not much choice involved. But that was another story. The fact was, Bossman had hired Bee to track down Shirley and 'keep an eye on him.' The daughter had split two weeks ago, gone back to her cushy life as Bossman's Daughter with all thoughts of a Bonnie & Clyde lifestyle abandoned. With Daughter out of harm's way, the private eye job had been upgraded to a hit. Bee took no pleasure in such tasks, but she was in more than a little bit of a bind. Her father, to put it mildly, had a gambling problem. He had run up a $60,000 IOU on the steamboat gambling halls which were owned by Gino Fatelli, or "Fats" as many called him, never to his face. Fats may have had a name that sounded like an Italian mobster, but in fact, he was a 300 pound blues man that played at the Pink Oyster Bar on Bourbon Street in New Orleans. He owned that joint too. Bee had always wanted to ask him why the hell he named his blues joint a name that sounded like a lesbian bar, but she had enough problems without letting loose her big mouth.
Fats wanted payment. He wanted payment fast. He had made it clear that if the cash did not arrive soon, her father would pay the bill with blood. Fats was no fool. He knew Reggie St. Claire was not good for it. He also knew Bee's skills. He knew her skills were worth more than a gambling debt. He had come to her and made a deal; if she did a few jobs for him, he would scratch Reggie's debt off his little black book. Meanwhile, Reggie better not even consider leaving New Orleans. Fats had eyes everywhere. So, Bee had taken jobs she would never consider otherwise. Gambling habit aside, her father was a good man, a simple man, and he had strived to be a good father to her, even in the worst of times. When her mother had split when Bee was ten, Reggie had raised her and her little brother Lucas all on his own. No easy task for a man who only made it through the fourth grade. Now, creeping around this shotgun cottage at sunrise, she had been too late. Someone had beat her to Shirley. She didn't know who, and really, didn't care. She could make a guess that one of the many people Shirley had screwed over had found him and shot him in the head, but she wasn't sticking around to make a case for it. Shirley was dead. She would go back to New Orleans and tell Fats she had done the job. This would be the last one. Her father would be off the hook, at least for now. She sighed a breath of relief, switching the safety back on her .38 special and checking her steps in the flower bed. Down the street, she had parked her motorcycle inconspicuously near the cemetery's back gate. Pulling her black helmet down over her mass of dark curls, she revved the engine and made her way toward New Orleans.
It was raining hell-bent when she rode into the city. The designated meeting place was a top floor room of the Pontchartrain Hotel. Fats may have been a greedy assed gangster, but the man had style. He had been wanting to get up Bee's proverbial skirt since day one, and had flattered her with champagne, expensive gifts and what he called his "priority personal attention" though none of these things would ever work on Bee. The man was holding her father hostage. She parked her bike and checked into the hotel under the alias "Dorothy Nine." Fats had told her she reminded him of the starlet Dorothy Dandridge, and had said that Bee was a 'nine' because if she were a ten she would be out of his league. Fats had reserved the room himself. She dropped her backpack on the four poster bed and checked her face in the antique mirror. The rain had washed what little make up she wore and now her trace of black eyeliner was smeared down her freckle speckled cheek like one of those goth kids she had seen in the downtown clubs. Her hair was damp. She fluffed it up with her fingertips and slicked on some lipstick. She would have cleaned off the smeared eyeliner, but she heard the lock open on the door. That would be Fats. She was surprised when it wasn't.
With one long legged stride, Alex Deveroux was standing entirely too close for comfort in the room... her room. Deveroux was a right hand man of Gino's, a rather unlikely one. For one, he was white. And white collar to boot. Even more unlikely, he was English. Tall, ashen hair, with startling blue eyes and a sexy crooked grin, Alex had picked up a charmer accent from a childhood and college years in Britain. The fact that he was pure bred Cajun had been long buried, but Bee knew it because Fats liked to brag to her about the unusual henchman he had acquired. Fats had tried his best to 'acquire' Bee as well, wanting her on the regular payroll, particularly to partner with Deveroux, who Fats called "Dee" as a joke. Dee and Bee. They would be the dream team, Fats had said. Deveroux and Bee went way back. She had met him when she was nineteen, and he had seduced her with his charm, a kind of wickedly sexy sleaze that should not have been sexy, but made her panties wet every time she thought about him. He was older than her, by fourteen years, and he called her 'SugarBee' in that odd British-New Orleans accent he had. No one else on Earth had that same accent. Later, when he had gone to work as Gino's right hand, she had stayed away, but he had left his mark on her.
"What are you doing here?" She asked, startled instantly by almost supernaturally blue eyes.
"You know why I'm here, Bee." He grinned, slouching against the door frame with his hands in his pockets.
"Oh, I see. You my babysitter now?"
"You look a mess, SugarBee. Rough night out?"
"Try not to be a dick hole, if ya please."
"Fine then. Down to business. Yes, I am your babysitter, if that's what you want to call it. Did you finish the job?"
"Shirley's dead. It's all done." She was not exactly lying, she told herself.
"Fats will be pleased. So will the client."
The Client was the rich man who had gone to Fats to employ the hit. He was probably sipping brandy in some gentleman's cigar room. His daughter was probably telling her friends how she lived a few weeks of the wild life with a wanted man. It would make her popular. Shirley was probably still rotting in the azaleas, and by now the wedding party had probably discovered him there and called the police. She told Deveroux as much.
"Good. The deal is done then, but of course, you'll need to stick with me until there's proof."
"With you? I was expecting Fats."
"Fats is a busy man. He sent me instead. But you don't mind, do you? I mean, you and me, this beautiful room... I'll order in some wine."
"Shut it down, Alex. I'm not that easy. I know the game, fine. The hit will be on the news soon enough."
"Switch on the telly then." He said.
She liked the way he said television. 'Telly.' It would be cute if he didn't look like he might actually devour her in the next couple of minutes. He had that way of looking at her, like he was mentally pouring barbecue sauce on her and licking his lips. She wanted to be able to honestly say she found this repulsive, but the truth was, it was making her nipples hard and she was pleased that she had worn the leather top which concealed this fact. She tried to stop staring at his long, elegant body standing there, locking the door behind him. She switched on the television and found the local news station. There was a chance the news would mention the murder today on the eleven o'clock, but there was also a chance they would pick it up tomorrow, which meant that she would have to spend the night, in this room, with Deveroux. The thought unnerved her, and much to her shame, sent a flush of heat between her thighs.
She flopped down in one of the oversize reproduction wingback chairs, and crossed her legs, trying to look cool and at ease. He smiled at this, as if he knew she was full of shit, and he probably did. She pulled the little table closer to her chair and fumbled through her backpack to find the deck of cards she always carried with her. Laying the cards out on the table she started up a quiet game of solitaire, pretending (or trying to) that he was not in the room. This seemed to amuse the cocky bastard greatly, and he chuckled, pulling up a chair himself.
"C'mon, luv, don't be that way. How 'bout we play a hand of gin. It'll keep you amused."
