Polished Off by Barbara Colley Page A

believe,” she told him, her voice whispery soft and just a bit hesitant. “I believe it was back in September when I bought it.”
    “Where did it come from before you got it?”
    “I-I really don’t know. I bought it at a clearance sale down in the warehouse district. It came out of a warehouse on Tchoupitoulas. The new owner was getting rid of the contents so he could renovate the old building and turn it into condos instead.”
    A warehouse on Tchoupitoulas? Charlotte frowned as something niggled in the back of her mind.
    “Did you arrange for the delivery, or did the owner have it delivered?”
    “The owner had it delivered,” Patsy whispered. “I paid him extra—a delivery charge.”
    But Charlotte was only half-listening, her mind still on the warehouse. Why did anything to do with a warehouse on Tchoupitoulas sound familiar? It wasn’t as if she ever went down to that part of the city ... except years ago when the World’s Fair was held in New Orleans. No, not that, she decided. It had to be something more recent. Maybe some kind of controversy about something. But what?
    After a moment she gave a mental shrug when she couldn’t recall any details and dismissed the familarity of the phrase “warehouse on Tchoupitoulas” as nothing important. It was probably just something she’d read in the newspaper or heard about on the news.
    “Ma’am, the crime lab unit and the detectives should be here soon. Until then, if you remember anything significant, you might want to write it down so you can tell them.”
    “Like what?” Patsy asked.
    “Well, for one, do you have any idea as to who those bones might belong to?”
    Patsy’s mouth worked like a fish, but when no sound came out, she covered her face with her hands and shook her head. “No,” she finally moaned. “Why on earth would I know who they belonged to?”
    “Now, now, ma’am,” the officer soothed. “Don’t get upset. I’m not accusing you of anything or saying that you do know. But the urn does belong to you, and if you’ve had it for six months, there’s a possibility that without your knowledge, a body could have been placed inside while it was on your property. And, another thing: I’m sure the detectives will want to know the name of the person who sold it to you.”
    Patsy looked as if she was going to protest again when the sound of a loud rap on the back door interrupted.
    “That’s probably the detectives now,” the officer told them.
    He left the room, and a few minutes later another man appeared in the doorway.
    Charlotte immediately recognized the man who entered the room. Out of all the detectives in the Sixth District, it was just her luck that the one who got this particular case would be Will Richeaux.
    Louis had once called the detective a “snotty hotshot.” At the time, Charlotte hadn’t understood Louis’s animosity toward the man. On the outside, Detective Will Richeaux was clean-cut and well-groomed, even handsome with his dark hair and piercing blue eyes. But how true the old saying, “Never judge a book by its cover,” was. In Charlotte’s opinion, he was a sleazy snake of a man who was both a liar and a cheat.
    Will Richeaux had been Judith’s partner for a while just before Louis retired. But the partnership had quickly escalated into more. Never mind that he was a married man with a child. Claiming that he was in the process of getting a divorce, he’d gone after Judith anyway. It was the oldest line in the world, and when Charlotte had found out about the affair, she’d told Judith so. Ultimately, thank goodness, Judith had come to her senses and finally realized that he’d just been stringing her along.
    The detective stared hard at Charlotte for several seconds. His eyes were cold, but there was nothing about his expression that revealed what he was thinking.
    He finally inclined his head at Charlotte. “Ms. LaRue.”
    Then his glance slid to Patsy. His eyes narrowed, and his lips thinned.