The Love Killings

by Robert Ellis

  Matt nodded. “He was fast. He had to be young.”

  Rogers tossed his pen on the desk and gave Matt a long look. “That doesn’t sound like Dr. Baylor to me. How ’bout you?”

  Matt would have liked to have said that the man he chased might have been the same man who murdered the Strattons and the Holloways. The real killer. He would have liked to have told Rogers how much sense it made that the real killer would come back for a second look once the cops were gone and he felt safe. He could have been looking for trophies. He would have had time to think things over. He could have made a return trip for a long list of reasons.

  But Matt kept his mouth shut. He watched the special agent wave his hand toward the door, pick up his pen, and get back to signing papers. In the grand scheme of things, Matt imagined that Rogers was pretty good at signing papers.

  You’re working with people who have their heads in the sand, Matthew. It’s the corporate way, you know.

  Matt turned around and walked out. The finish line seemed so far away.

  CHAPTER 38

  Andrew looked at Jones seated on the park bench, checked on that cop by the steps, then tried to steady his hands in the cold air and roll a joint without shivering.

  He had followed Jones from his office to Love Park on the JKF Plaza in Center City. It looked like Jones had picked a bench that gave him a view of the Love sculpture, the huge Christmas tree standing atop the shutdown fountain, and the art museum at the other end of the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. He wasn’t doing anything, really. Just sitting there sipping coffee and smoking cigarettes. Every once in a while, he’d pull out his cell phone, make a call, and hang up without saying anything.

  Andrew guessed that Jones was trying to reach someone who wasn’t home.

  He licked the paper and rolled the flap to finish off the joint, then checked on that loser cop again. Unfortunately, this was one of the worst places to smoke weed in the entire city. A great place to score, but not to light up. Andrew knew everything about Love Park because at the age of twelve, he used to come here two or three times a week. He used to come here to get away from his mother and think pure thoughts. He’d take the bus into the city, buy a hotdog, a Coke, and a pack of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, then find an empty bench and watch the show.

  Andrew pulled his wool cap over his cornrows but still couldn’t handle the frigid air. After tightening his scarf, he looked around to see who was close by. The woman on the next bench was staring at him until their eyes met, then she got up and hurried off. Andrew was used to getting that look, especially from women, and let the moment pass with just a bit of indignation. When he turned back to the cop and saw him step behind the trees, he lit up and took a deep hit.

  While the official name for the square used to be JFK Plaza, everyone called it Love Park now because of the Love sculpture by Robert Indiana. And while even Andrew had to admit that he liked the artwork, it was the architect who designed the plaza itself that made the place famous.

  Love Park was a skateboarder’s paradise, and that was the show he liked to watch so much as a boy. The steps, the smooth surfaces, the dips and rises—all of it made this plaza the most important single block to skateboarding culture in the world. The list of professionals who made their names here, an international list, was too long to count.

  The show lasted for ten years or so, and Andrew had only caught the last two summers. He could remember when he heard the news that skateboarding was now illegal on this sacred ground. He could remember sitting on the very bench that Jones was using. He could remember watching the construction workers giving Love Park its facelift. Although the park had been deemed “unskateable,” people still showed up with their boards. When city officials realized that their facelift had been a failure, cops were posted on the plaza twenty-four hours a day.

  And that was the problem. The shithead cop on the other side of the fountain.

  Andrew turned and snuck a quick second hit, then palmed the joint and glanced back at Jones.

  He was standing up and beginning to walk away. He could see Jones moving down the steps onto the sidewalk and heading up the block toward Market Street.

  Andrew pressed the head of the joint between his fingers and doused it with his tongue. After jogging down to street level, he fell into line behind Jones and slipped the joint into his pocket. The detective didn’t seem like he was in a hurry anymore. He was taking his time, looking at the people he passed on the extra-wide sidewalks here. Andrew could feel those same people looking at his face, but tried to ignore it the way he always did. He could feel them judging him, he could see them shunning him, he could tell that they knew something was wrong with him and were afraid. He turned and gazed at city hall on his left. When he checked on Jones, he realized that the detective had beaten the red light on Market Street.

  Andrew stood back and waited for the light to change. He could see Jones racing across Fifteenth Street and finally entering a building at the other end of the block on the Avenue of the Arts. Once the light changed, Andrew legged it down the sidewalk and gazed through the glass doors.

  It was a bar. An elegant bar that Andrew could tell was more than pricey. And it looked like it was attached to the lobby of the Ritz-Carlton hotel. He moved closer to the doors, watching Jones order something then pull out his cell phone and make another call. After a short moment, the detective lowered his phone to the bar without saying anything.

  Whomever he was trying to reach still wasn’t picking up.

  Andrew stepped away from the entrance and leaned against the building. He wished that he could just approach Jones and ask him why he wanted to kill his father. He wished that they could share their notes. He wanted to know what the mad scientist meant when he called Jones’s father the King of Wall Street. What did those words mean? King of Wall Street.

  All these questions with no answers. He needed someone he could talk with. He was tired of living his life in secret. Tired of always being alone.

  Andrew felt his cell phone begin pulsating in his pocket. He pulled it out and turned away from the people on the sidewalk. He was stoned, and entertaining the idea that the caller might be Jones seemed funny in a depressing sort of way.

  He unlocked the screen. It turned out that the call wasn’t coming from Jones, but Avery Cooper instead, and she was requesting a video call. Andrew accepted the offer and watched Avery’s image render on his phone. He could see her on her bed again, only this time she was removing her bra. He looked at her tits standing straight out from her chest like a pair of rockets. The weed was really good.

  “Hi, you,” she said in a cheery voice.

  Andrew giggled. “Yes, I am,” he said. “Hi, you, too.”

  CHAPTER 39

  Matt took a first sip from his glass, savoring the bourbon as it warmed his throat and stomach. After setting the glass down, he watched the bartender mix three vodka martinis for two young women seated at the other end of the bar with an older man.

  On most nights, Matt would have looked at the three of them and tried to guess what their story might be. Was the man their father? Their boss? Or just a sugar daddy?

  On most nights he would have enjoyed sipping bourbon, collecting visual evidence, and trying to put a story together. But not tonight.

  He let his eyes wander through the large room, taking in the three-story-high columns carved out of marble, the rich woods framing the windows, the sitting areas with tables surrounded by chairs and couches, and the vibrant color from the three massive water frames hanging on the wall behind the bar. It was the kind of lounge that only a five-star hotel could provide. And in spite of the size of the room and the ultra-high ceiling, the place was quiet and easy and just right.

  The bartender walked over. “You okay?” he said.

  “I’m good, thanks.”

  The man nodded and Matt watched him walk off. He had a certain confidence in the way he handled himself. Matt guessed that he was in his midfifties and had been ser
ving drinks for a long time.

  He took another sip of bourbon.

  This was the right place to be tonight, and the bourbon seemed like the perfect drink, but he still couldn’t let himself relax. He’d gone to the park to think things over, and he’d come to a few conclusions.

  Rogers and Doyle would never be convinced. Matt could make his case with words or even hard evidence, and neither one of them would see what now appeared to be plain as day. In their way, Rogers and Doyle were every bit as bad as the three detectives Matt had outed in LA. Three LAPD homicide detectives who got caught up in a rush to judgment until their worlds came crashing down. Six weeks ago all three of them had been alive. But not now. Not ever again.

  Matt let the memory pass, then got back on point as he thought about the Holloways’ bodies. Even though their autopsies had been completed, he didn’t think the medical examiner would release them until more results came back from the lab. The tox screens could be weeks off, but enough samples would have been harvested by the ME to deal with any result. Matt’s best guess was that he wouldn’t have more than a day or two to figure out which undertaker would be handling the bodies and managing the funeral service, and get someone to agree to put eyes in the room.

  What he didn’t understand about Rogers was that even if what Lester Snow had said this afternoon seemed hollow, any decent investigator had to assume that the undertaker’s initial response was the truth. To be safe, Rogers should have erred on the side of too much knowledge.

  Someone was messing with the corpses. It should have been considered true until proven false.

  Instead, Rogers was concerned about the way things looked.

  Matt took another sip of bourbon, picked up his cell phone, and tried Brown’s number again. When his call bounced over to voice mail, he switched off the phone and looked up. The bartender was staring at the entrance with concern, his brow narrowing.

  Matt turned and saw a young man breezing into the lounge and heading toward the bar. He noted the wool cap pulled over his head, the worn-out jeans, the unusually light-brown eyes that were glazed over and fixed on his cell phone. The man was bobbing his head and giggling at whatever he was watching on his phone.

  Matt glanced at the bartender, then lowered his glass and turned back.

  The man was headed in his direction. And the closer he got, the more his fixation on the phone came off like an act.

  Matt watched him grab a stool two seats away and sit down, then knock on the bar as if it were someone’s front door.

  “Barkeep,” he said in a loud, blusterous voice. “Barkeep.”

  The strong smell of reefer emanated from the man’s body and clothing. It seemed obvious that he was wasted. That there was something false about his presence. That his act was some sort of play.

  The bartender walked over and, from the way his face changed, smelled the weed, too. Matt watched his eyes get hard, like he was used to dealing with situations like this and had lost his patience.

  “You need to get out of here, pal. You’re in the wrong place.”

  The man with the wool cap glanced at Matt without meeting his eyes, then made an exaggerated face like he was hurt. “Oh, Barkeep. We were so close to having a good time.”

  He held out his cell phone and turned it so that Matt could see the display. It was a young blonde on a bed with her top off. She was getting out of her jeans and seemed horrified because Matt’s face was now on her monitor.

  The man giggled again, like he couldn’t control himself. “My new bitch,” he said. “You believe this shit?”

  Matt could hear the girl squealing over the phone. Apparently, the bartender could as well.

  In a flash, he jumped over the bar, grabbed the man with the wool cap by his coat, and ran him out of the lounge. When they spilled onto the sidewalk, and the bartender started back and entered the lounge, everyone clapped and cheered.

  He shot Matt a look as he slipped behind the bar. “You get a whiff of that guy?”

  Matt nodded. “Have you ever seen him before?”

  “No,” the bartender said. “But you never know these days. He could be staying in the penthouse, and I could be out of a job.”

  CHAPTER 40

  Andrew Penchant looked at all the faces passing his way, then grabbed his cell phone and picked himself up off the sidewalk. The screen hadn’t been damaged, the phone appeared to be working, but Avery Cooper had ended their video call.

  Just the thought of her big bare tits got his dick hard.

  He looked at the people moving by him on the sidewalk and felt the wrath surging through his chest. If he’d been a dog, he would’ve barked at them. Maybe sunk his teeth into them. How about a thigh, or some arrogant bitch’s tight little ass? He was about to open the door and re-enter the bar, maybe give that shitty bartender a good long look at what act two would play like, but he saw something remarkable through the glass and stopped.

  It was Ryan Day, the gossip reporter from Get Buzzed, hiding behind a plant in the lobby, trying to act casual while spying on Jones. He had his cell phone out and, from what Andrew could tell, was shooting “hidden camera” video for his show.

  Goddamn it, this weed was good.

  Andrew gave the reporter another look. Within a few seconds he was certain that he hadn’t been hallucinating. Ryan Day was pretending to use his cell phone while shooting video of Matt Jones.

  The idea of it, the audacity and overt rudeness, the in-your-face bullshit, took some of the sting off his anger. But as he thought about it, there was plenty of steam left. Ryan Day was a Hollywood sleazebag.

  Andrew felt someone touch his shoulder and turned. A man was trying to come between him and the glass doors in order to enter the hotel. Andrew grabbed him by the shoulders and reeled him in nice and close so he could see who he was pushing around.

  He gritted his teeth, his fangs, imagining that he was a dog again. “The main entrance is around the corner, asshole.”

  He could see fear welling up in the man’s eyes. A wild overdose of terror. The man was trying to pull himself away, but Andrew’s claws were digging into his coat. After several moments, he shoved the man away and let out another bark.

  “Get the fuck out of here.”

  He watched the man run down the block and vanish around the corner. People on the sidewalk were staring at him and going out of their way to avoid him. As he pulled himself together, he thought about what had just happened and decided that this was probably a good time to leave.

  He turned back to the glass doors for one last look. Someone was walking over to Day, a teenage girl and no doubt a fan of his TV show. The reporter seemed startled by the intrusion, his cover blown, but somehow managed to find a gracious smile for her. He let a bellhop snap a picture with the girl’s cell phone—the two of them together—then shook her hand. After a wave and another smile, Ryan Day hurried out of the lobby.

  Andrew stepped away from the doors and watched him exit the building. He had never been this close to anyone so famous, and he could feel his heart fluttering in his chest. As Day ignored him and started down the sidewalk, Andrew waited a few moments, then began following the celebrity reporter. Day had already returned his cell phone to his pocket, but Andrew gazed at the briefcase thrown over his shoulder and thought it looked a lot like candy.

  The reporter was heading east, breezing down the sidewalk across the street from city hall. He seemed to be admiring the way the building was lighted for the holiday season. Macy’s was on the corner, and Day started down Market Street, gazing at the window displays. For one brief moment, Andrew could hear a Christmas carol in his head. Some song that his boss had started playing over the PA system at the Walmart Supercenter two weeks before Halloween this year. Some old jazz singer who had probably been dead for half a century.

  He could hear it—the music and the lyrics—and it felt like torture.

  Andrew’s mind surfaced. Day hadn’t waited to cross Market Street at the corner. Instea
d, he’d scurried through heavy traffic in the middle of the block and was heading toward the Marriott Downtown hotel. Andrew knew that he’d have to risk being noticed. There was no way around it, and he stepped into the street. Ignoring the people blasting their horns, he rushed between the cars and caught up to Day before the reporter reached the hotel’s rear entrance.

  Day must have been in the zone because he never looked back and didn’t seem to notice. Andrew entered the hotel and glanced around the lobby. It seemed obvious that there were too many people here to grab Day’s briefcase and make a run for it. Instead, he followed the reporter across the room and into an elevator. He watched Day press the button to the nineteenth floor, then turn to him and ask what floor he’d like. But when the doors closed and Andrew said something like nineteen sounds pretty good, the expression on the reporter’s face changed.

  Their eyes had met, and for one brief moment, Day had been able to look inside.

  Andrew smiled and turned away as if he’d lost interest in the man. He guessed that there would be a camera in the ceiling and another somewhere on the rear wall. He found Day’s image in the mirror and saw the panic showing on the man’s face. Andrew couldn’t tell for sure, but it looked like the reporter might be trembling.

  They reached the nineteenth floor. Andrew held the doors open with a pleasant smile and followed Day down the hall. They were passing suites, one after another until they reached the second door from the end.

  And that’s when Ryan Day suddenly turned around with a small canister in his hand. Andrew didn’t get it at first, but then realized that Day was too nervous to work the sprayer. His hands were shaking and his fingers appeared soft and rubbery.

  Andrew flashed another pleasant smile, then smashed Day in the face with his right fist. It was a hard, crushing blow, and the gossip reporter collapsed onto the floor like a tree hit by lightning. Andrew glared at Day’s body, incensed by what the man had tried to do to him. And then he felt something deep inside him snap.