Edith Boudreaux was nodding, but I'm not sure the nods meant anything. She said, "You think your client is that baby?"

"We believe she is, yes."

"That's who sent you here? The baby?" She was so nervous she was rocking, swaying back and forth as if in time with a heartbeat.

"My client is thirty-six years old. She's a woman now.

"That was all so long ago."

"She doesn't want anything from you, Mrs. Boudreaux. She simply wants to know the particulars of her medical heritage. Does breast or uterine cancer run in the family? Is the family long-lived? That kind of thing."

"My mother's dead."

"We know. And we know that your father is ill. That's why we came to you. Won't you help us?"

She was still making the little rocking moves, and then she said, "I have to call my husband. I need to speak with him."

She went out through the curtain without looking at us. Lucy blew out a loud sigh and took a cup of water from the cooler. "What's wrong with this picture?"

"Somebody scared her. Probably Jimmie Ray."

Lucy crumpled the cup, didn't see any place to toss it, put it in her pocket. "With what? All we're talking about here is an adoption."

It didn't take long for Edith Boudreaux to talk to her husband, and it didn't take long for him to arrive on the scene. We waited maybe eight or nine minutes, and then the outer bell tinkled and a tall, florid man about Edith's age came through the curtain ahead of her. He was thick across the shoulders and butt, with small eyes and a sun-reddened face and large hands that looked callused and rough. He was wearing a crisp khaki Evangeline Parish sheriff's uniform open at the collar, and he was the same cop I'd seen with Jimmie Ray Rebenack at the crawfish farm.

He said, "My name's Jo-el Boudreaux. I'm the sheriff here in Evangeline Parish. Could I see some identification, please?" As he said it he looked over Lucy and then he looked over me. His eyes stayed with you without blinking. Cop eyes.

Lucy showed her driver's license and gave him a business card. When he looked at my investigator's license he said, "California."

I nodded.

"You carrying?"

I shook my head. "Nope. Not licensed in Louisiana."

"Why don't we see?"

He pointed at the wall and I assumed the position and he patted me down. Lucy Chenier looked surprised and then angry. She said, "There's no need for that. I'm an attorney, this man is a licensed investigator. This is a legitimate inquiry." She was breathing quickly, confused by his manner. Everything had suddenly risen to a level she wasn't used to.

I said, "It's okay."

The sheriff copied some information off the license into a little notepad. After that he flipped back the license, and he didn't much care if I caught it or not. He said, "Yeah, well, we'll check on that. We'll see. Now that we know where we stand, why don't you tell me what you're after." He squared himself off at us, the way he'd front a kid he'd stopped for driving too fast on a back road.

Lucy didn't like it, but she went through it again for Jo-el Boudreaux, telling him about the sealed state documents, about the possibility that our client was the child given away by Pamela Johnson, about our client's desire not to contact her long lost family but simply to establish her medical history.

Jo-el Boudreaux was shaking his head before she finished. "You got any proof that this baby and your client are the same person?"

Lucy said, "No, sir. But they were born on the same day, and they're both female, and they were both given up to the state. That's why we need the records opened."

He was shaking his head again. "Not interested. I want you people to leave my wife alone. Whatever you're selling, we don't want any."

Edith Boudreaux looked like she wasn't as sure. She said, "Jo-el, maybe we should -"

He cut her off. "Edith, what's there to say? The past is the past, isn't it?"

Lucy said, "Our client doesn't want anything from you, Mr. Boudreaux. She simply wants to know her medical history. You can understand that, can't you?"

He said, "I understand that a lot of my wife's family's dirty laundry is going to be stirred up again. You people go around town spreading crap about my wife's family, it'll go hard on you."

Lucy stiffened and the court face appeared. "Is that a threat, Sheriff?"

"Yes, ma'am. I've just threatened legal action. As an attorney, I'm sure you understand that." He handed back her card. "We've got nothing to say to you."

Lucy looked at Edith Boudreaux. She was small behind her husband. Her eyes looked hurt. "Is this what you want?"

Edith repeated it. "What's past is past. Let's not stir things up." Nervous.

Lucy stared at the other woman for a time, then carefully put her business card on a stack of Anne Klein boxes. "I can appreciate your confusion. If you change your mind, please call me at this number."

Sheriff Joel Boudreaux said, "There's no confusion, counselor. If you leave the card, I can cite you for littering."

Lucy picked up the card, thanked Edith for her time, and walked out.

I said, "A litter bust. That'd probably make your month."

The cop eyes clicked my way. "You wanna push for the prize, podnuh?"

I said, "How'd a guy like Jimmie Ray Rebenack get you so scared?"

The big sheriff looked at me, and a single tic started beneath his left eye. The blocky hands flexed, and Edith Boudreaux touched her husband's arm, and it was suddenly still in the little room. Outside, the doorbell tinkled, and I wondered if it was Lucy leaving. Edith said, "Joel?"

Boudreaux went to the curtained door and pulled the curtain aside and held it for me. "You'd better leave now, podnuh. That'd be best for you. That'd be best for everyone."

I wished Edith a good day and then I walked out past the blond clerk. She smiled brightly and told me to have a good day. I told her I'd try. When I got to the door I looked back, but the curtain was drawn again and Joel Boudreaux and his wife were still in the stockroom. I thought I heard a woman crying, but I could have imagined it.

It was supposed to be a simple case, but cases, like life, are rarely what they seem. I walked out of Edie's Fashion Boutique wondering at the pain I'd seen in their eyes.

CHAPTER 10

L ucy was waiting on the sidewalk, her arms crossed and her face set. A couple of teenagers were behind her, looking at the sheriff's shotgun through the driver's side window of his highway car, the older of the two sneaking glances at Lucy's rear end. He cut it out when he saw me approach. Lucy said, "I've been doing this for almost eight years and I've never had a reaction even close to that. Something's wrong." "They're scared. Him, maybe more than her." As we walked back to our cars, I told her about Jim-mie Ray Rebenack and the two goons who'd come to his office. "I followed them to a place called Rossier's Crawfish Farm. Boudreaux was there, and some older guy with a Panama hat who was probably Milt Rossier. Boudreaux didn't look thrilled to be there, but he and Rebenack are connected."

"Do you think that Rebenack has seen these people about Jodi Taylor?"

"Looks that way."

"Maybe he's working for them, just like we're working for Jodi."

"Maybe."

When we reached the cars, Lucy leaned against her Lexus and shook her head. "I don't believe it, but even if he were, so what? All we're talking about is a child who was given away for adoption. It's a simple matter to unseal the files and confirm the biological link. It's done all the time."

I looked at her. "Maybe the problem is coming from an altogether different place."

She squinted at Edith Boudreaux's dress shop, thinking about it. Frustrated. "Well, it can't just end here. They say no, thanks, so that's the end of it. Jodi still has a right to find out about herself, and I'm still going to help her do that."