Copyright 2019 Jacqueline D’Acré
We're hooked at the first sentence as Hurricane Katrina barrels down to slam the city of New Orleans and destroy it. Thunder Bay's Jacqueline D'Acre has allowed this blog to give you, Dear Readers, the first chapter of her upcoming mystery novel Killer Katrina, featuring the lovely Bryn Wiley. Enjoy!
Killer Katrina
A Bryn Wiley Mystery By Jacqueline D'Acre
Chapter One
Monday, August 29, 2005, 10:06 A.M.
Playing a lethal game of hopscotch, Hurricane Katrina touched down three times in Louisiana. The last landfall was in St. Tremaine parish, due north of New Orleans, on the far shore of Lake Pontchartrain. It was a Category Three hurricane when it arrived, so no one was expecting out of the ordinary devastation.
I’m Bryn Wiley and I was en route from Thunder Bay, Canada, home to St. Tremaine parish, to my tiny hamlet of Absinthe Wells. I was just outside Slidell when Katrina hit. Just before the arrival of the first wave of the hurricane I looked for somewhere to stop to ride out the storm. My arms and shoulders ached with tension as I had been fighting high winds and heavy rain for over an hour at the steering wheel. My canoe, lashed on top of my car, added to the pressure since it acted like a small sail in the storm, blowing me backwards.
From an eagle’s eye view a hurricane looks like a giant, round, saw blade composed of snowy-white clouds with a hole set slightly off-center. The “hole” is the eye of the storm and it’s calm inside the eye. Because the eye is off-center, one side of the hurricane is larger than the other, so it hits with more force, heavier rainfall, higher velocity winds and more thunder and lightning. More devastation.
I pulled into a coffee shop that was blessedly actually open. The car door almost unhinged itself when I stepped outside into sluicing rain with Lulu, my black Standard poodle, leashed close beside me. I struggled to close the door and after I slammed it shut I bent double and fought the wind and rain across the parking lot to the building. Inside, I was hit by a wave of coffee smell. I ordered my coffee—an extra-large—and I added milk and three Sweet’n’Lows at a small counter. I took a seat where I could simultaneously watch a blonde, Channel Four weather woman, struggle with high winds to make a report, and to monitor the storm out of a window cross-hatched with masking tape. The man at the counter said not a word about my bringing my dog into the place—everyone recognized that everyday rules didn’t hold right now. The other only occupant of the restaurant, a man in overalls in a seat not far from me, got up and turned up the sound on the TV.
“…Katrina began as a Category Five hurricane and fell to a Category Three with winds at one hundred twenty-five miles per hour. Parish officials confirm that in New Orleans, water was seen rising on both sides of the Industrial Canal…” shouted the girl as her umbrella blew inside-out. Rain lashed her and she struggled to stay on her feet. I sipped my coffee. It was delicious and hot, helping calm my shivering from the cold air conditioning and the wet. The ache in my arms was subsiding. Lulu lay down at my feet and with a sigh rested her head on her front paws.
I was worried about my horse, Count Amethyst, stabled at Theodore Goodall’s Morgan horse farm in St. Tremaine parish. “Am” had been there for the past three weeks while I vacationed on Lake Agimak at my uncle’s cabin, near my Canadian hometown of Thunder Bay in Ontario. But previously, I’d been living in St. Tremaine parish for many years and Orleans parish as well and now I considered New Orleans my hometown. I’m a writer who specializes in equine articles for horse magazines and I frequently found myself solving murders alongside the writing. The writing paid—well, somewhat—the murder-solving didn’t. But I couldn’t resist getting involved.
My last case concerned the murder of Theodore Goodall’s wife, Marcie. Now I sipped my coffee and fretted about getting home in the storm. The windows rattled and the small brick building shook as Katrina roared around it. Fear shot through me and I shuddered. Lulu whimpered and huddled closer.
I watched the hurricane through the masking-taped window and I caught my reflection. I saw a redhead with a short, asymmetrical haircut—one side cut to her ear tip, the other to her jaw. I was dressed in black jeans and a white sleeveless top. My green eyes didn’t show up against the raging storm outside.
Maybe when Katrina’s eye came through I could risk the drive along Highway 90 to Absinthe Wells. I called out to the man behind the counter who was drying a coffee mug with a small towel,
“Any flooding on Highway 90 you know of?”
“Just what you see on TV.”
The sixtyish, overalled man piped up. “I just came up Highway 90 from Mandeville. There’s water in the streets of Slidell. Right now you can get through, but with these winds I wouldn’t risk it. Could blow your car right over.”
“Thanks. I need to get to Absinthe Wells, check on my house, see if it’s still intact.”
The man spoke again. “Why don’t you wait here until the eye arrives, then make a run for it?”
“I was wondering if I could pull that off. How long will it take the eye to pass through?” The building trembled, the storm screamed; we had to raise our voices to be heard.
“I was wondering if I could pull that off. How long will it take the eye to pass through?” The building trembled, the storm screamed; we had to raise our voices to be heard.
“Probably about half an hour—if you don’t run into any flooding you’ll make it.”
I chewed my lip. “How long can I stay here?” I directed my question to the man behind the counter. He set the coffee mug down with a thunk and regarded me.
“As long as you like,” he shouted. “I’d never turn anyone out in a storm like this.”
“Thanks, you’re very kind,” I yelled back. I drank more coffee. The winds seemed to be diminishing. Maybe the eye was near.
Theo’s farm was farther inland from Lake Pontchartrain so maybe it was escaping flooding—but not high winds. I reminded myself that Theo’s stable was sturdy, well-built. Am was quite safe tucked away there. I turned my attention back to the TV.
The weather woman had long since given up on her umbrella. She stood in the wind and the rain in her red trench coat and red plastic hat, bent over to resist the winds.
“. . .At 8:14 this morning, the New Orleans office of the National Weather Service issued a Flash Flood warning for Orleans Parish and St Bernard Parish, citing a levee breach at the Industrial Canal. The National Weather Service predicts three to eight feet of water and advises people in the warning area to move to higher ground immediately. At 10 a.m. the hurricane touched down in St. Tremaine Parish…” the girl yelled.
So that’s what we’re experiencing right now, I thought, smoothing my wet hair. I must look a wreck. At least my shivering had stopped. I had many good friends in New Orleans: the Berkshires, Sue Thompson, Jan Bruckhouser, Malcolm White, and Harry Hood, who lived near the 17thStreet Canal—thank God nowhere near the Industrial Canal. Of all my friends, I worried the most about Harry. He’s in his fifties, obese, and a chain smoker. No telling what the stress of a hurricane might do to him. All my other friends were much younger, fairly fit, and healthy. I wasn’t too worried about them. Harry lives in New Orleans but keeps his horses, showy American Saddlebreds, in St. Tremaine parish. I got up, ordered another coffee, and after adding milk and Sweet’n’Lows sat back down. Lulu hadn’t moved. She smelled of wet dog.
The roaring stopped. The building ceased shaking. Just like that.
“The eye!” I cried. I spoke from twenty years-experience living through hurricanes. I gathered my purse, the coffee, Lulu’s leash, and hurried to the counter. I set my coffee cup down. “Can I get a go-cup?” I asked.
“Sure,” said the proprietor. He reached behind him for a paper cup. He poured my coffee into it and handed it over. “Gonna make a run for it?”
“Yep,” I said sweeping up the coffee cup and thanking him. I started for the door and waved goodbye to Overalls Man.
“Good luck,” he called.
“Thanks,” I yelled back, and I was out the door.
Outside, it was eerily calm. Water dripped from trees and the gutter was awash. Debris littered the sidewalk and the road: twigs, branches, someone’s plastic patio chair, a hunk of corrugated roofing tin, boards. Pine resin scented the air, no doubt from toppled trees. It was all rather refreshing. I opened my car door and let Lulu jump into the back seat. I got in the front, stuck the key in the ignition, then gunned it toward Highway 90. Amongst all my New Orleans’ friends, I worried most about Harry Hood, PhD, in
cvulnerable Lakeview. He lived very near the 17thStreet canal.c
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