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A hint of panic crossed B’Lynn’s face. “Oh, here we go again! There’s no crime!”
“I can’t process the house as a crime scene when it doesn’t appear a crime has been committed here,” Annie explained calmly. “My time will be better spent pursuing other leads. Does your son have a bank card or credit cards? Where would those statements be kept?”
“As far as I know, he only has a debit card. He does his banking online,” she said.
“What about his cell phone? Is it part of your family plan?”
“Yes.”
“Good,” Annie said, knowing it was only good if Robbie Fontenot was using the phone his mother provided for him and didn’t have another she knew nothing about, or wasn’t using a burner phone for drug business. There were a lot of very unhelpful possibilities, and the possibility that a twenty-seven-year-old man with a history of drug abuse was walking the straight and narrow was the least likely of them all.
They locked up the house, and as they started across the weed-patch lawn for Annie’s vehicle, an unmarked city police sedan pulled up on the street.
“Did Detective Rivette ask you for any of this information?” Annie asked. “About Robbie’s phone, his credit cards, any of that?”
“No,” B’Lynn said, staring at the car as Dewey Rivette got out on the driver’s side. “He didn’t ask me a damn thing.”
“Let me talk to him,” Annie said.
“I don’t have anything more to say to that man.”
That was certainly a lie, but Annie could only hope B’Lynn would contain herself for the time being. She pulled in a deep breath and started toward the detective.
Dewey Rivette was in his mid-thirties, an unremarkable sort of guy—medium height, medium build, medium-brown $20 haircut. In his khakis and a button-down shirt, he had the slightly rumpled look of a single man who had never mastered the steam iron. Spoiledby his mama, no doubt. He had a round face and the petulant expression of a cranky toddler.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing here, Broussard?” he demanded as he walked up to stand toe to toe with her.
“Good morning to you, too, Detective Rivette,” Annie said calmly. “I’m here doing my job. How about you? Did you just drop by to say hello?”
“Am I supposed to be amused?” he snapped. “You come waltzing in here to take my case, and I’m supposed to be amused by you?”
“Well, I’ve never known you to have a sense of humor,” Annie remarked. “So, no, I shouldn’t think you’d be growing one now. And just what case are you referring to? Because when I looked, Robbie Fontenot had not been reported missing, his car had not been reported stolen, and according to his mother, you have done jack shit to find him, which is why Mrs. Fontenot came to the sheriff’s office first thing this morning, begging for someone to help her.”
“We took her complaint.”
“And did what with it? Line a birdcage?”
“We put a BOLO out on his car.”
“Oh, goodness!” Annie feigned amazement. “I hope you didn’t strain yourself getting that done!”
Rivette scowled. “I can do without your sarcasm.”
“Well, then you should probably leave, because I’ve got a bucket of that stuff for you, Dewey Done-Nothing.”
His face had begun to redden in blotches. “I took her complaint. I did a welfare check.” He ticked these points off on his short, stubby fingers. “If you’ve been inside the house, you saw for yourself there’s no reason to think anything other than that he just left.”
“So, case closed!” Annie said, dusting off her palms. “Pat yourself on the back, Dewey! What do you care what I’m doing, then?”
“You can’t just come into town and do whatever the hell you want!”
“Actually, yes, I can. Last I checked, Bayou Breaux is in Partout Parish, which is my jurisdiction, not just yours, town boy.”
“My investigation is ongoing,” he insisted. “Mrs. Fontenot can’t just go shopping for another law enforcement agency because I didn’t return her every fucking phone call.”
“Seriously? Are you new to the real world?” Annie asked. “Because you didn’t return her every fucking phone call, Mrs. Fontenot came to the SO this morning to speak directly to Sheriff Noblier, as is her right.”
Rivette suddenly looked sick. “She spoke with Sheriff Noblier?”
