BAGHDAD ON THE BAYOU
A Jacob Stern Novel
By Aaron
ALSO BY AARON:
Revived in Rio
An Indian and Three White Man
(Confessions From Prison)
Broken Justice
DEDICATION
To Jane, my Lucia.
Published by:
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
COPYRIGHT © 2008 by AARON
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED,
INCLUDING THE RIGHT OF REPRODUCTION
IN WHOLE OR IN PART IN ANY FORM.
PROLOGUE
My name is Jacob Stern. Jake is what most people call me now-a-day. The private investigation office that I set up after my disbarment from practicing law after twenty years is in the heart of downtown New Orleans. About two blocks from the Dome. I like that. I have season tickets to the Saints, with a built in parking space at the building where my office is located. The office is on the second floor. It’s modest. Nondescript actually. There is an outer room. Nicki occupies that now. An inner room with an old oak desk, standard size, four-drawer metal file cabinet, an Office Depot computer desk on rollers sitting to the right side, computer, printer and internet with my own TI.
We have one window that looks out to the wall of the fifteen-story building next to us. Both buildings were built in the ‘50’s. On the shaded half glass front door, there is no name. Only “Licensed Investigator” in one inch, blocked black letters. Under that is my Louisiana private investigator registration number.
Nicki has been with me almost a year now. I’ve been training her in the investigation business. She is a good student on internet background checks and correspondence on Freedom of Information Act data from government agencies. She also handles the telephone well, which I hate. The fact that she is bilingual doesn’t hurt, when we are doing
work in Central America.
I am not sure how it all started with Nicki. I think that I’m still in a bit of shock as to how we got together. Most of my clients are law firms or shipping companies. A lawyer will have a case that needs investigation and assigns the fact-finding, both technical and non-technical, to me. If the technical is in my area of expertise I handle the fact analysis. Often, however, I retain a specialist in a given area to look at limited assignments or to double check in critical manner my opinions or fact analysis.
None of that has anything to do with how Nicki and I got together. I was working on a case for one of the local trust and estate boutique law firms and had just arrived in Rio de Janeiro in search of a witness. The witness was going to be Hispanic, gay, and I didn’t have much to go on. I’m not the sort of guy that guys would be attracted to. Hell, I’ve been around gays most of my life, and I’ve never been hit on once. I kind of feel rejected. Not really.
Anyway, I’m sitting in this hotel bar, in Rio, having just arrived. Along comes this interesting person who at first fools me. I really thought it was a woman, and so it was. That was Nicki, or sometimes “Nick” under disguise. We get to talking, and she agrees to help me find this witness in gay Ipanema. Now, I’ve done a fair amount of investigation work in Central American countries. “Help” whether it is a local investigation firm or a government agency is usually just a word to describe working the Americano over for a fee. That’s pretty much what I expected with Nicki, “Nick”. Didn’t turn out that way though. The shem was true blue and she did find the witness. Not only that, she introduced me to her little sister, Lucia. After a while, I fell in love with her. Yeah, even a guy my age can fall in love. I didn’t think it was possible either. When I lost my law license and my
BMW, my wife took off. She said I was a failure and had misplaced our trust. I figured that was the end of love, if that was what it was.
To make a long story short, Lucia and I brought Nicki up to the States to UCLA, Dr. Gary J. Alter, for a sex change operation. She was always a lady, but her genitals, both male and female, were under-developed. She was only twenty-three, frustrated and going through hell. Dr. Alter successfully operated on Nicki, and after months of post-operative psychological treatment, I brought her back to New Orleans and began teaching her my trade – private eye work.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not a “do-gooder”. In fact, after twenty years of law practice, several as an investigator, I’m pretty damn cynical – that includes government (all of them), religion (all of them) and people, except that once in a while people will surprise me, and I begin to think that there is a glimmer of hope for the human race.
CHAPTER 1
BAGHDAD ON THE BAYOU
The Bar 711 located on the corner of St. Peter and Bourbon in the Quarters is the site of rivalry, debauchery, drinking and dancing of the younger crowd. And more. Yes, they even dance on the extended bar ugly Coyote style in the late night wee hours.
The scene is quite different from the immediate aftermath of Katrina. Then, Blackwater mercenaries congregated on the corner in front of the bar, having arrived in unmarked, shaded suburbans with no license plates. These men were well armed, bulging steroidal muscles – some with M-4 automatic weapons, capable of firing nine hundred rounds per minute, or sawed off shotguns.
They shuffled in and out of adjacent Quarter buildings and apartments. They threw mattresses, clothes, shoes, and other household items from the French wrought iron balconies to the street below. The troops – Blackwater – draped an American flag from the balcony of Bar 711.
They were sent there unofficially or was it underhandedly by the most powerful man in the United States government – the Vice-President. Ostensibly, they were sent to “secure neighborhoods” and “confront criminals.” Never mind that the Quarter peoples and the 9th Ward were starving, had no clean water, could not escape the devastation from Katrina and were falling like flies from microbic infested flood waters, snakes and gators.
That was August 2005.
Dormand sat in his loft office with the one-way glass looking down at the midnight Bar 711 crowd of partiers. It was high school graduation time, and the young babes were feeling their freedom! Inhibitions were releasing. Ecstasy was passing around like hors d’oeuvres from a snack table. Tequila shots chasing beer and Red Bull following that. Music reverberating, pounding. Torso snaking back and forth; hips round in sensual sway. Dormand loved it. He loved it when it got like this.
It was Lt. Dormand back in Iraq. The squad drove into a Falujah ambush. Wiped out. Not Dormand. He got away. It was either general discharge or a court martial. Dormand reflected “Best damn thing ever happened to me.”
Yes, it was an easy move from army discharge to Blackwater mercenary in Iraq. The American government’s way of “outsourcing war”. Dormand had found his nitch! High pay for raw brutality. Kickbacks for Iraqi sex slavery or human trafficking. Those little girls could sure be a good piece of ass. “Once you got ‘em broken in,” he thought.
Then, all hell broke loose! Some “do-gooder” in Washington got wind of Blackwater miscues. About the same time Katrina hit New Orleans, Blackwater got a Katrina contract. Who knows what for? Or, why? – Anyway, it damn sure ruptured Dormand’s playground. Management shipped him right from Baghdad to the French Quarters.
“Pissed.” That’s the only way to explain it. “I was pissed! Brought my men into this backwater Baghdad on the Bayou and began kicking ass. The old guy that owned the Bar 711 was on his knees crying for his life in this very office when he signed the Deed over to me. I shot him right between the eyes. Neat, clean. No mess. The boys dumped him in the Mississippi. There was so much mud and water in that damn river you could dump a Mack truck. It would never be found.”
“Yep. Best damn thing that ever happened to me. Look at me now. I left that Blackwater business and built my own. Right here. Right in the famous French Quarter. Even the Cajun mafia don’t mess with me and my boys. This is mine. My place. Bar 711.”
Richard Dormand, of Blackwater infamy, was a muscular six foot, blue-eyed blonde Arian, late twenties. His eye caught the swirling hips and rhythm of a young black girl dancing close to the bar below. She twirled with arms raised dancing by herself, alone in her own musical fantasy.
“Nice, firm, round tits, short-cropped hair, tiny waist, round firm butt and look at those long legs” thought Dormand. “I’d like to stick it right up in there from the back.” He almost shook as he sensed the urge. “Ram it one more time. Teach it you own it. It’s yours.” He drifted as he noticed her smooth, glistening cocoa color. Color without a blemish.
“She’s getting loose,” he thought. “I’m going down.”
Dormand reached in his desk and slipped a small square packet of dust, highly soluble, into his jacket pocket. Some mushroom mix a voodoo witch gave him. “Works every time. So I’m told.”
“Hi there! My name’s Ritchie. This is my place. I brought you our house specialty – on the house! I think you’ll like it. It’s like a Piña Colada but even better.”
The young girl, who could have easily been a model, looked at Dormand with a bit of a blur. “No, no. I don’t think so. I’m just having fun.”
“I know. I know. It’s no problem. See, I brought one of our house specialties for myself. Sit down here at my table. Tell me what you’re celebrating. Tell me what you’re so happy about?”
Her eyes lit up. Twinkled. She gracefully eased into a chair at the table. Her black tights accentuated her long legs. Her empire waist top heightened her firm, smooth bosoms.
Dormand could feel electrical impulse.
“I’m here with my graduation class. We came to the Quarter for our celebration trip.”
She took a sip of the Piña Colada.
“Oh”? “Where are you from?”
“Houston. Do you own this place?” She took another sip. “This drink is good. I was thirsty.”
“Yep, this is my place. And like I told you, this little pepper-upper is our house specialty. Where is the rest of your class?”
“They went down the street to the next bar. Some of them wanted to go to the voo-doo store. I was just having fun dancing so I stayed. What did you say your name was?”
“My friends call me ‘Richie’. You seem like a friend. You can call me that.”
“O.K. Richie.” She giggled and looked away. Began to sway to the music again.
“You love to dance, don’t you.”
“Oh, I do. I always have. My mother had me in dance as a little girl, but that’s not what I’m going to be.”
“Really. What are you going to be?”
“I’ll be a Freshman at Yale. I’ll be leaving in three weeks.” She began to sway with soft erotic movements. Her eyes looked up but were becoming glassy. She took another sip of the Piña Colada.
“You seem a little woozy. Let me move over here by you. I’ll help you.”
Dormand moved his chair next to the girl’s. He reached in his pocket and fingered a small vibrator. He placed it between her legs.
“Don’t do that . . . .”
“I’m not doing it. It’s blackwater voodoo.”
She giggled. Then almost fell over.
“That drink must have been too strong for you. I’m sorry. Here. Let me help you up these stairs to my office. I’ll fix you some coffee. You’ll be all right in a few minutes.”
Dormand reached down with bulging biceps, picked up the girl and helped her up the short flight of stairs to his office. He laid her down on the large leather couch. He looked down at her. Young, innocent, a peaceful stupor. Her breasts filled with slow inhalation. Then relaxed.
Dormand smiled.
CHAPTER 2
ALLEN’S BAR
Jacob Stern sat at the bar while Allen dried glasses; or should we say, polished them.
“What is it about Allen always rubbing a glass with a cotton towel?” Jake mused to himself. “Is it therapeutic? Obsessiveness? What?”
Jake knew it would do no good to inquire. Allen probably didn’t know the answer. IF he did, he wouldn’t give it, anyway.
“Jake, you know your drinking habits have changed over the last year.” Allen noted out of the clear blue.
“Yeah.”
“Yeah. Getting married again has been good for you. That Lucia is a hell of a gal.”
“You got that right. I’m damn fortunate. After losing my law license, first wife leaving me or the money, whichever, and going into private dick stuff, it was like a downward vortex.”
“Yep. You going down to Rio on that insurance fraud case and meeting Lucia worked out
pretty well, after all. And her sister, Nicki, makes you a hell of an assistant. I’m not sure but she’s better than you.” Allen hee-hawed.
“Yeah. You’re probably right. But remember, great teachers are evidenced by good students.” Jake responded.
“Anyway. You’ve become a one-drink guy after work. You and your Chivas, water-back. Then home to the lovely Lucia.”
“You got it right Allen. Life is mighty good right now. But you know, most of what I’m doing is industrial espionage for big corporations. Sure! It’s a spy job. It pays good. But there’s not much satisfaction in it at the end of the day.”
“May be, Jake, but you’re not in the criminal element anymore. At least you’re not getting shot at” responded Allen.
“Yep, the peaceful life is not all bad. The day’s ended. The work’s done. Guess I’ll be getting’ out of here” Jake said as he lifted himself off the bar stool and turned to go.
Indeed, life had been good to Jake. Out of the depths of hell when he was once sued by his own client and disbarred through the manipulative politics of the legal profession, he had become the premier private investigator for the delta. Every law firm wanted his services. A year earlier he handled the Bancroft case in Rio. The family of one of the heirs to the Dow Jones Publishing Co. had become concerned that a gay interior decorator was getting to their elderly mother and that she may be in danger.
That was where Jake met Lucia, his beautiful, diminutive but wise and knowledgeable wife. And that was where he met Nicki, her sister, who was now a well-trained, licensed private eye in his office in downtown New Orleans. She had become his right hand.
Yes. It had become quite a turn around. The money in industrial investigation was good. The work wasn’t dangerous, as his criminal practice had been. Jake mused to himself. “Things can’t get much better!”
CHAPTER 3
WEIRD MARIE
Dormand wasn’t the type for gratitude, but in his own way he was thankful that Katrina had penetrated the walls of the city.
“I should send those idiots at the Corps of Engineers a box of chocolates” he thought. He was well aware that New Orleans would not have been devastated but for the ill-repair, the forgotten repair, of its levees and the ill-conceived construction of navigation canals around the city, especially the notorious Mississippi River Gulf Outlet, a shipping shortcut to the Port of New Orleans that had been a larger dirt-moving project than the Panama Canal. “You damn right that place got flooded.” He thought. “What stupidity!”
When gratitude did surface in Dormand, which was seldom, it had a socio-pathic bent – win vs. lose, death before life. He grew up under a Marine drill sergeant father, a mean drunk. Dormand hated Iraq. The sand flea bites, the stinking water, when you could get it, the rag-heads who were not loyal and none of whom could be trusted. Word was sent out of North Carolina by defense contractor Blackwater to Baghdad green zone Blackwater H.Q. on September 5, 2005. Less than a week after Katrina hit. Blackwater had received an emergency contract from Washington to send a team into Baghdad on the Bayou “to establish order.”
Dormand jumped all over it. He immediately picked four of his closest men who had been skimming the Iraqi human trafficking operation with him and notified H.Q. that “his team was ready and could be in place within 48 hours.”
The per diem was less. Dormand didn’t like that, but for the mercenary trade there was always a side business of some sort that could pick up the slack.
He and his men landed at New Orleans, beat the Federal government and FEMA by weeks. Immediately requisitioned a black SUV with tinted windows, unmarked with no license plates. Each man took a M-4 automatic, a riot shot gun, strapped on a holster with a .45 caliber in it, ample ammunition and headed to the French Quarters.
They were supposed to rendezvous at a hotel with other Blackwater forces but didn’t know exactly where it was. The team stopped short by two blocks at the corner of Bourbon and St. Peter. Two N.O.P.D. police officers were standing on the corner in front of the Bar 711. The SUV came to a screeching halt in front of them, Dormand’s team jumped out. Their flak jackets were covered with pouches for extra ammunition, their weapons ready.
The two policemen looked startled and backed up. “Where is Blackwater mustering?” demanded Dormand. “I don’t know.” Stammered one of the officers. “What are you doing here?” he asked.
Dormand and his team roared with laughter “securing neighborhoods”, “confronting criminals” he responded. “We’ll muster here. This looks like a good place” Dormand instructed his team.
“You guys go on down the street. Keep the peace” he shouted to the NOPD officers as he stormed through the front door of Bar 711.
Six months after the move in, Dormand and his men left the employ of Blackwater. The camaraderie and interchange with Blackwater troops never changed. Dormand made sure of that and made sure that the right people got their perks. One such person was the Baton Rouge evangelist who was an original supporter in the Blackwater formation and tightly connected with the White House and Rumsfield’s Department of Defense. His weekly Friday night tastes for the girls was a little difficult to keep up with. One time he would want a blue-eyed blonde. Next thing you know, it was an oriental. Finicky. Always changing. But for Dormand, as long as the right girls kept going up to Baton Rouge to “church”, the right things kept happening.
It might not have been so easy if Marie hadn’t shown up. “Boy! That was a weird day” mused Dormand. The rain had been coming down. The Quarter had gotten back on its feet after Katrina’s attack. Dormand now owned the Bar 711, and he and his men ran it, as well as “their territory” for protection and newly created “ventures.” They didn’t mess with crowding in on the drug runners. Didn’t need a war with them and didn’t want any heat from the Feds. Didn’t need to. That’s where Marie came in.
It happened this way. One of the men came up to the stair loft that rainy day. “Captain, there’s a weirdo down stairs. Says she won’t leave. Must talk to Blackwater. What do ya want me to do with her?”
Dormand looked out his shaded window at a moderately plump woman with long, unkempt gray hair in a dark shawl sitting at one of the tables.
“What does she want?” asked Dormand.
“Hell, who knows? She’s crazy.”
“This place is full of crazies. Guess that’s what people like about the Quarters. I don’t know.”
Dormand went down the stairs, pulled up a chair and sat directly across from the woman. He stared her straight in the eye. He didn’t say anything. She didn’t say anything but stared straight back. Penetration.
In high school Dormand was given the nickname “hardeye” because of the penetrating way he stared with his blue eyes. He liked the intimidation. This lady had him beat. He felt a bit uneasy. He had never seen eyes like that. It dawned on Dormand that he didn’t want to get into a stare down with this “bitch”. He might lose.
“What do you want?” he asked.
“You need help. There is danger.” She said in a mysterious tone.
He wasn’t sure whether her odd voice was concocted or chemically induced.
“I don’t need any help. I can handle anything that comes down the pike. You need to get outta here.” He answered.
“I will be here when I leave.” She responded. Her words were measured. She never blinked. Her face was emotionless.
“This can get nasty lady. You need to leave here”. Dormand repeated.
“When the moon fills full, I will make you much money. Take this. Put it in the girls’ drink.” she said and with slow methodical, deliberate but confident movements she rose from the table and left through the front door of Bar 711.
It was odd. Very odd. Dormand wasn’t the type to creep-out. He looked down at the small square folded packet she had left. It looked like what you would get in a packet of cocaine. In fact, that’s what Dormand figured it was.
He went back up the stair loft to his desk. Flipped the packet into the top right door. “Crazies” he thought “this place has got its share of ‘em.”
The next day was Friday. Dormand hates Fridays. He always had to find a girl – just the right girl – to send up to the preacher in Baton Rouge. She had to be sneaked in by 11:00 p.m. and back out by three or four in the morning. She had to be young. She had to be shaved, clean and smell a certain way. “It’s a real pain in my ass” thought Dormand. “I can’t just go pick some hyde up off the street. Oh no! He’s too picky for that. Hell, next thing I know, he’ll want a virgin. I don’t think there are any around here.”
That was last year and Fridays just kept coming around. Other than supplying the preacher, everything was great. The businesses were good. The money kept just coming in.
Weird Marie had helped. Turned out that the little packet she had given Dormand that day was a real winner, particularly when it came to Friday nights and supplying the preacher.
Marie was some sort of an expert on mushrooms. She lived in a bayou swamp out south of Gretna. You could only get to it by pirot. She had transplanted mushrooms from various parts of the world, as well as some spores she had brought from Mexico when she lived with the Nazatecs. She could conduct molecular studies to a level of combining distinct cladas to create new mutations that produced different, distinctive effects on a person who consumed them. She then ground spores into fibrous powder for easy consumption in any liquid.
Some had hallucinogenic effects. Others, actually did stimulate the libido. The most serious combination could produce death between six and twenty-four hours from the time of ingestion to the onset of symptoms. During this time, the cells of the kidneys and liver are attacked.
The levels of moisture, temperature, swamp tanic acid with the amount of oxygen in the bayou atmosphere in and around Marie’s swamp shack made for prolific production. She color coded each powdered species packet according to its psycho activity chart or physical effect.
None of this was lost on Dormand’s active mind or his international connections. He couldn’t stand the stinking Marie, but she had become extremely valuable. He had begun selling her products all over the world. The Arabs were going wild over it. Next! Maybe ship to the Orient?
CHAPTER 4
PROFESSOR JEFFERSON
Jake hadn’t quite made it to the front door of Allen’s bar when a well-dressed black gentleman came rushing in.
His eyes were wide. Slight perspiration glint from his dark skin. Grey slacks, navy blue blazer, open collared button down pinpoint shirt, oxford shoes.
“You must be Mr. Stern” he immediately assessed.
“How would you know that?” asked Jake.
“My name is Thomas Jefferson” he reached out his right hand in greeting. “One of your law firms and a colleague of mine recommended you. I desperately need your help.”
One of Jake’s downfalls in private law practice had always been the empathy he felt for his clients. Most lawyers have little personality tricks where they just feign understanding and empathy. Jake actually felt their fear. Even the ones he didn’t like, he felt that he was on their side. That there was a greater cause.
This man was under stress. He was afraid, bordering on hysterical and yet under a disciplined control.
“Come over here. Let’s sit at this table. What on earth is the matter?” Jake asked.
“My daughter, Tasha, has been missing for two days. She didn’t come back with her graduating class from their Senior trip last night. Her mother and I are beside ourselves Mr. Stern. We don’t know what to do.”
“Mr. Jefferson, I work in the industrial shipping and manufacturing investigation field. Missing persons is outside of our practice. Have you contacted the New Orleans police?”
“Yes. I spent two hours with the detective division this morning. Supplied them with a picture of Tasha and a bio. They weren’t encouraging, and I’m not sure how quickly they will move. Speed is paramount, Mr. Stern.”
“What do you do, Mr. Jefferson?”
“I am a law professor in international and marine law at the University of Houston.”
“That explains how well spoken you are and your intuitiveness.” Jake responded.
“I don’t feel well spoken at the moment. I’m at my wits-end.”
“Let me call Lucia, my wife, to let her know that I’ll be a bit late. Then, tell me about Tasha. Allen will bring you the drink of your choice.”
Allen brought Professor Jefferson a Southern Comfort, neat. He slowly took a small sip, sighed and looked at Jake with tired, stressed, watery eyes.
“Tasha is the light of our life. We are so proud of her. She graduated valedictorian of her high school in Houston. She has been accepted as a Freshman at Yale and intends to pursue her interests in international studies. She turns eighteen today. The day we were to celebrate at home in Houston. Here is a picture of her on my sailboat docked in Galveston Bay.”
Jake took the picture with a gesture of respect. He saw a tall black teen-age girl with a beautiful white-toothed smile, barefoot, in shorts and tee-shirt, standing on the deck of a small to mid-sized catamaran.
“I know you are very proud of her” responded Jake in a soft, low tone.
“Mr. Stern, I have been told on good authority, a colleague of mine at Tulane Law School, that you are good at what you do, reliable and have been known to push the envelope in tough situations.”
“Are you familiar with my professional past?” Jake asked.
“Yes. I am familiar with your disagreements with the ethics Bar. I have read about the Bancroft case you handled for the local estate lawyer, Micky Jones.
Jake did not respond.
“When did you first know Tasha was missing?”
“The kids arrived from New Orleans on Southwest at Houston Hobby, yesterday. 11:00 a.m. She wasn’t with them. They were all worried. They didn’t know what to do.”
“You said you met with N.O.P.D.?”
“Yes. I’ve filled out a missing person report. Apparently, this isn’t the first time this sort of thing has happened.”
“What did the police tell you?”
“They were courteous but aloof. They didn’t tell me anything. They wanted to know if Tasha has a boyfriend.”
“Does she?”
“No. She has been somewhat sheltered growing up in an academic household. Oh, she has dated on occasion. Nothing serious.”
“Where are you staying, Mr. Jefferson?”
“At the Hyatt. What can we do, Mr. Stern? What can you do? I’m asking as a colleague. Help me.”
“Do you know where Tasha was last seen?”
“The girls told me that they left her at a bar somewhere around Bourbon and St. Peter. They wanted to go check out Marie Labeau’s voodoo shop. That’s the last they can recall seeing her.”
“Mr. Jefferson, I know of you from my own practice in international work. A couple of your law review articles were a help to me in international banking processes. That was another lifetime ago.”
“Thank you. But tell me, is Tasha in danger? I don’t think her mother will stand up under the strain. The not knowing.”
“New Orleans and the Quarter is different since Katrina. What 911 was to New York City, Katrina was to New Orleans. The Crescent City strives to regain her balance, her history, her motif and ambiance. But there are new faces. New groups. It is a period of adjustment.”
“What you’re telling me is that you don’t have a guess as to where my child is.” Professor Jefferson retorted and finished his Southern Comfort.