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Tommy was so lonely and didn’t have two arms to hold him tight. But he hadn’t done any of that since we took up. Guess all he needed was a real woman.”
    “That must be it.”
    “Is there anything else? Tommy would have wanted me to do my part to help take a bite out of crime. Especially with him being the victim.”
    “That’s it,” said Darla, turning off the recorder.
    “Could you just wait here a minute?” asked Cill. “I want your woman-to-woman opinion on something.” She jumped to her feet and skipped off down the hall and into the bedroom before Darla could answer.
    Cill returned in less than a minute wearing a frilly black chiffon party dress. It reminded Darla of something out of the fifties she’d seen on an early episode of
Mad Men
that she and Stephen had watched on Netflix.
    “Give me your honest opinion,” said Cill, “as a fashionista.”
    Darla was at a loss for words.
    “For the funeral,” said Cill. “I’ll need to get the hat and the veil.”
    Darla thought for a minute. “I think Tommy would have been pleased.”
    “Me, too,” said Cill, her lower lip quivering. She sighed and seemed to regain her composure. “The trouble is those ole vintage clothing stores, they keep some funny hours.”
    Darla got up to leave. She handed Cill her card. “If you can think of anything else that might be important, this is my cell number.”
    Cill took Darla’s card and led her to the front door, taking Darla by the hand like they were BFFs.
    “There’s just one more thing,” Darla said. “I’m wondering why Tommy would put you in charge of the land, being as how you just recently met and you say you have no mind of practical matters?”
    Cill looked back at Darla, blank-faced.
    “He could have selected his attorney, Mr. McClure,” said Darla. “Mr. McClure has all sorts of experience in this area.”
    “I guess it was just something Tommy wanted to do for me,” Cill said, making a show of shrugging her shoulders.
    “But the land could never be sold, and the guardianship doesn’t come with any income,” said Darla. “A guardianship can involve a fair amount of work, the kind of work you say that you’re not interested in doing.”
    “A woman can never know what’s in a man’s mind, can she?” said Cill.
    “But you are going to remain the guardian?”
    “You coming to the viewing?” Cill changed the subject. “I know Tommy will be looking down, serenading us from on high.”
    “I wouldn’t want to miss that,” said Darla, as she went out through the door.

Chapter 5
The Devil’s Disciple
    Darla stopped for a late lunch at Gilly’s, off County Line Road. She wolfed down a plate of shrimp and grits while reviewing Tommy’s case files on her laptop. She found no mention of Conway Boudreaux or his enterprises.
    When she finished lunch, she hopped on Interstate 55 going south, and drove four miles to the Burline Avenue exit, in South Jackson. In Burline she drove past a row of boarded-up buildings and an abandoned railroad station. The street dead-ended at a gravel parking lot the size of a Little League field. At three in the afternoon, the lot was half full of vehicles. There was a flamingo pink cinder-block building at the end of the parking lot with a flashing neon sign, big enough to be read from two blocks away: CONTINENTAL CONWAY’S CENTLEMAN’S CLUB it said. THE SOUTH’S MOST BEAUTIFUL WOMEN. SHIRTS AND SHOES REQUIRED.
    Darla had been here before. A few years back, Conway Boudreaux had been a suspect in a homicide case. He’d had an alibi that stuck, and had ended up providing Darla with a contact that helped her solve the case. It was a one-time thing. He wasn’t one of Darla’s snitches. They knew each other, that was all.
    Conway Boudreaux was standing outside, at the corner of his building. Conway, who thought of himself as something out of
GQ,
was decked out in his signature look: a white cotton suit, and underneath the jacket, an electric blue silk