City of Echoes (Detective Matt Jones Book 1)

by Robert Ellis

  Worse still, wouldn’t that be his father’s goal? A goal worth fighting for. A goal worth paying for.

  Matt let the bottom line settle in for a while. He needed to pull himself together and stay focused. He needed to keep his mind free of distractions. He needed to keep an eye out for Billy Casper, and if they ever met again, put him in the ground.

  A moment passed.

  He couldn’t believe what he was thinking and tried to shake it off. What he’d done to Plank might have been overkill, but it was righteous. What he’d just been thinking of doing to Casper was something else.

  What was happening to him? What was he becoming? Was it really true that we become what we hate most?

  He gave Laura another look, then took a sip of coffee and returned to the worktable, where he had set up his laptop beside Kevin’s. The preliminary reports the FBI had put together on Dr. Baylor’s background were further along than he expected. To his delight, the link he had been given opened a file that was essentially live and had the same feel as the chronological record in a murder book. When any member of the team learned something new or had a thought or question that seemed relevant, it was added to the file, then stamped with the agent’s electronic signature, along with the time and date. For all intents and purposes, the file worked like every other blog on the Internet. Everything about it was fluid, everything current, except in this case everything was validated and a matter of record.

  Matt skimmed through the entries and counted more than twenty agents working the case along with Kaplin and Vega. While Los Angeles and New Orleans remained hot spots, the investigation had expanded into the Midwest and East Coast. Just after midnight, evidence had been uncovered that seemed to suggest that the doctor had stolen his name and identity from a man who had been killed in a hit-and-run accident while jogging some fifteen years ago. The man lived in Chicago and had graduated from medical school. Six months before his death, he’d completed his internship and residency at the University of Chicago Medical Center.

  Two photographs of the original Dr. George Baylor had been posted on the blog, along with a physical description provided by his last driver’s license. Even though fifteen years had passed, Matt could see it clearly enough. And when he continued reading, he realized that the FBI did, too. Nothing about the original Dr. Baylor’s death could have been accidental. Unless he believed in coincidence, the man had been singled out and hunted down for his name and background. By all accounts he was the perfect host for a man trying to hide his true identity and showing early signs of his predatory nature. The original Dr. Baylor had no siblings or wife, his parents were dead, and no one was left to look after his name. The two men were about the same age, their eyes and hair about the same color. Matt paged down to a photograph of the new and especially lethal Dr. Baylor. If he squinted, the two men looked like brothers.

  The match was so close that the feds believed the two men might have known each other or crossed paths in some legitimate way. Because of their age, they might have even attended the same medical school, sat in the same classroom, or worked in the same lab.

  Matt took another sip of coffee and looked at the rays of sunlight spilling through the window onto the carpet. Something about the idea that the doctor had stolen his name and identity fascinated him. According to the blog, three years passed before the new Dr. Baylor finally surfaced. Chicago was long gone by then, the doctor having moved to Los Angeles to begin his medical practice.

  So what was the new Dr. Baylor hiding? What was he running from?

  It had to be something horrific. Something he needed to get rid of; something that occurred in the first thirty years of his life that needed to be erased; something so devastating that he saw killing his own identity, and another person, as his only way out.

  Matt pulled the computer closer and continued reading. An agent working out of Washington was trying to piece together a profile of the new Dr. Baylor by examining his bills and credit card receipts. The process would take time to complete but had already shown promise and seemed to indicate that once a year the new Dr. Baylor spent two weeks on the East Coast. Using the Ritz-Carlton in New York City as his base, he spent three days in Princeton, New Jersey, and another three days in Greenwich, Connecticut. Because the trips were identical and occurred annually over fifteen years, the agent believed that the locations might point to the doctor’s original identity.

  Matt wondered if their paths had ever crossed. Princeton was only fifteen minutes north of Pennington, the town where he had lived with his aunt. They did their grocery shopping in Princeton. His doctor and dentist were located in Princeton. Matt used the library at the university on a regular basis for years. He sifted through his memory and began to feel uneasy. When he read the following post, his concern only intensified.

  The doctor had managed to escape from a burning house and vanish before their eyes but hadn’t made a single attempt to withdraw money from his bank or even borrow against a credit card. An examination of his accounts, a lack of assets or any investments at all, only seemed to raise more questions. His home on Toluca Lake Avenue had been worth millions of dollars. Baylor had paid for the property in cash, then applied for a loan equal to the value of the house. It seemed clear that he preferred living off the bank’s money rather than his own. But even more, no one could tell where the money from the loan went after the first year. No one could even say what happened to the funds he earned from his practice each month. Once the money was deposited into his checking account and his bills were paid, anything over twenty-five-thousand dollars was withdrawn in a wire transfer. Every single dollar over a balance of twenty-five grand disappeared.

  Matt didn’t understand why the agent who posted the information was confused. It seemed so obvious. It was an insurance policy, his life as Dr. George Baylor a shell. Either the doctor had a second false identity, or his real identity remained active and was clean enough that he could still bank his money there and feel safe about it.

  His real identity.

  Why had the doctor taken the time to save his life? What was he doing so close to home in New Jersey? And what about Greenwich, Connecticut?

  Matt closed his eyes. He could feel the bullet wound in his shoulder beginning to burn again. He could feel the churning in his stomach.

  Why had the doctor risked his own life to save him?

  Kevin’s computer beeped as an e-mail was delivered to the in-box. Matt knew that Laura had been using the laptop ever since it was returned by the crime lab. But when he glanced over at the screen, he noticed that the message had been sent to Kevin and that it didn’t look like spam. Even more, Matt thought that he recognized the sender’s address. Seeing his lost friend’s name printed on the header felt so eerie and unsettling. He stared at the screen for a moment. The e-mail address was Laura’s. The words on the subject line were more than vague.

  It’s me, were all they said. It’s me.

  Matt wheeled the chair over for a closer look. He could remember reading an e-mail thread between her and Kevin just after his murder. They were love letters that dated back to when he and Kevin were overseas. Matt hesitated for a moment, absorbing any pangs of guilt as best he could, then pushed through it and opened the new e-mail. It was another love letter from Laura. As he read the words, feelings of confusion were overtaken by waves of sadness and a profound loss. He thought about the things Laura had said last night after they made love. The idea that they had the opportunity to forget what had happened to them, but it would take time. As he continued reading her heartfelt words, he wondered if this was part of the grieving process. He could see her writing an e-mail on her tablet, then sending it to Kevin’s laptop as a way of keeping the connection open and his memory alive. He knew that many people who lose a family member keep their cell phone accounts open so that they can listen to their loved one’s voice in the outgoing message and leave a new message of their own.

  Matt finished reading the e-mail and settled back in
the chair. He could remember the pregnancy test kit he’d seen on the windowsill in the kitchen the night he’d told Laura that Hughes was dead. He could still see her sitting at the table in her pajamas. The anguish in her eyes. The tears streaming down her cheeks. All the heartache that had risen in an instant and, in the end, would never really go away.

  He looked back at the e-mail and reread the last sentence, then noticed that Laura had included an attachment. He clicked it open and realized that it was a partial view of a nude photograph. After maximizing the window, he sat back and stared at the image. He sat back and took the hit head on.

  It wasn’t Laura.

  It was another woman.

  Matt opened the thread and began skimming through the e-mails. The messages went back and forth, the last twenty-five dated after Kevin’s death. He had been having an affair, a long-term affair, and Laura had found out about it and—

  His heart skipped a beat.

  The e-mails that he’d read a few weeks ago had been written to and from this woman, and she had no idea that Kevin was dead. Laura had been posing as Hughes ever since he was murdered. Laura had been pretending to be—

  His cell phone started vibrating. He dug it out of his pocket and glanced at the caller’s name on the screen. It was Henry Rollins, the forensic analyst from the Photographic Unit at the crime lab. Matt had sent him video images recorded by a security camera that picked up Hughes’s murder from half a block away. Things had been moving so quickly, he never had the chance to follow up on it. Besides, Grace, Orlando, and Plank were all dead.

  Matt switched on the phone, still skimming through the e-mails. There were hundreds of them. He’d just assumed that they’d come from Laura. If he hadn’t seen the nude snapshot, he never would have guessed.

  “What’s up, Henry?” he said in a low voice.

  “Did you think I forgot about you, Jones?”

  “Are you talking about the video?”

  “Yeah, I’m talking about the video.”

  “What’s the point?” he said. “Everybody’s dead.”

  “We’ve got a problem, Jones. Actually, it’s more than a problem.”

  Matt already knew what the problem was. Hughes was having an affair, and Laura had found out about it. Fate made its move and caught up with them, and everything about what happened next cut to the bone.

  “Tell me what you’ve got, Henry.”

  “I just sent you a link. Are you anywhere near your computer?”

  Matt rolled the chair over to his laptop, saw the e-mail from the analyst, and clicked the link. A few seconds later the video of Hughes being robbed and shot in the parking lot behind the restaurant started playing on his screen. The images seemed clearer than he remembered. Everything appeared brighter.

  “I’m on it,” he said. “And you’ve made progress.”

  “I still can’t identify the shooter, Jones. But I can tell you who we’re ruling out.”

  Matt couldn’t move. It felt like he was sinking into a void, a black hole, his entire world crashing into the ground and skidding into a deep ocean. He glanced at the love letters on Hughes’s laptop. He didn’t need Rollins. He didn’t need anyone. He already knew.

  “Well, it’s not the three-piece bandit,” he said quietly.

  Rollins cleared his throat. “It never was the bandit. We found that out a long time ago.”

  Matt shook his head, his eyes glued to the screen. “And it doesn’t look like it’s Grace, Orlando, or even Eddie Plank.”

  “It can’t be. That’s why I called.”

  Matt shut his eyes and opened them again. He could see the shooter aiming the Glock 20 at the black SUV and firing round after round into Hughes’s body. When the muzzle flash finally ended, the shooter began running across the parking lot toward the camera. Rollins had slowed the speed down to a crawl here. Matt wondered why they had never even considered that Hughes’s murder could have been a crime of passion. That the number of holes the coroner counted in Hughes’s body added up to a lover wronged.

  “So let me have it,” Matt said in a quiet voice.

  “It’s all about body type,” Rollins said. “The picture’s bright enough that we can see it now.”

  “Tell me what I’m seeing.”

  Rollins cleared his throat again. A long moment passed.

  “The shooter’s a female, Jones. Look at her hips, her arms. Look at the way she’s running. The shooter’s definitely a woman.”

  It didn’t really need to settle in, but it did. Hideous and devoid of any light or any hope. Matt switched off his phone and looked away from the screen, still drowning in that ocean at the end of the way. Still unable to tell the difference between up and down or where the surface might be. He could hear words playing in his head. A single string.

  How much time would it take to forget?

  As much as he had. As much as he would ever get. As much as there was or ever would be.

  A picture came to mind. Driving through the heat of the desert on a road that had no end. And then another. Kevin Hughes’s unrecognizable body lying on the front seat of that black SUV, his entire corpse covered in blood and slivers of shattered glass. He could still smell the blood, the meat.

  He looked out the window. Laura wasn’t in the backyard anymore. He moved closer and didn’t see her by the pool. When he turned, he found her standing in the doorway. Her eyes were locked on the video playing on the laptop, then all over his face.

  CHAPTER 58

  “You did it,” he said in a quiet voice. “You shot Kevin. You murdered him.”

  Laura couldn’t look him in the eye any longer. She lowered her head and started weeping, pleading.

  “I didn’t, Matt. You have to believe me. I didn’t.”

  Matt shrugged it off and kept going. “You found out that he was doing this woman, and you killed him for it. Now tell me the truth, Laura. Tell me that you shot Kevin.”

  “But I didn’t shoot him. I wouldn’t. I couldn’t.”

  She fell onto the couch, still weeping and trembling and struggling to catch her breath. Matt fished through his briefcase, dug out the pack of cigarettes he’d bought after his confrontation with Casper, and lit up.

  “You have to believe me,” she whispered. “I didn’t kill anyone. I couldn’t kill anyone. I’m not that kind of person.”

  Matt gave her a hard look. “Yes, you are,” he said. “You could, and you did. You shot Kevin. It doesn’t matter what he did. You murdered him. That’s all that counts right now.”

  “No,” she said, burying her face into the pillow. “Please, Matt, stop it. I loved him. He’s all I ever wanted.”

  Matt took a pull on the cigarette and moved closer. “What’s her name?”

  Laura shook her head into the pillow but didn’t say anything.

  “Come on, Laura. You’ve been writing to her and pretending to be Kevin. What’s her name?”

  She lifted her head up and looked at him, her eyes wet and glassy. “Nicole,” she said finally.

  “What’s her last name?”

  “Jennings. She never uses her name in her e-mails.”

  “So who is she?”

  “An old girlfriend from high school. She’s in his yearbook.”

  “And you got her to send you a nude picture. Why?”

  “I wanted to see what she looked like now.”

  Matt nodded. “You mean, Kevin’s lover.”

  Laura straightened her back, her eyes turning inward, as if in a trance. “His lover,” she managed. “Oh, God, Matt. I loved him so much.”

  “You did it, Laura. Tell me that you did it.”

  “Oh, God.”

  He shook his head at her in complete dismay. “You don’t get it yet, but you will,” he said. “The clock’s already ticking, and we don’t have time for all this back and forth. They know that Kevin was killed by a woman. They have proof that it was a woman. That means you’re at the top of the list. That means you’re the only one on the list. And
don’t think that you’ve got what it takes to bluff your way out of it. The case will go to a couple of bulls in Robbery-Homicide. Bulls that have seen everything from every angle ten times over. They’ll see through your little act the minute you walk into the room. Even if they play by the rules, you won’t stand a chance. You’re still too close to it. You still can’t admit to yourself what you did. And that’s why it’s gonna be so easy to break you, Laura. They’re gonna break you down, and they’re gonna hurt you. You’ll be lucky if you get life without parole. Kevin was LAPD blue. He was one of their own. The way you shot him, the way you left him, I’ll bet the district attorney asks for the death penalty. And I’ll bet he gets it.”

  She closed her eyes for a moment—fear and agony showing on her face, as if she were visualizing her own execution. Then she looked up at Matt standing over her. When she finally spoke, her voice was barely audible and she seemed panic-stricken.

  “Oh, God, Matt. I did it. I shot him. I killed Kevin.”

  He grimaced. Hearing her say it felt like she had just taken a sharp knife and ripped open his soul. Matt took another pull on his smoke, then flicked the ash into the wastepaper basket and sat down beside her to think. He was lost in a world of bitter disappointments. Lost in a world of fear and anguish. He wasn’t looking at her, just listening to her shaky voice, her hoarse whisper.

  “I loved him, Matt. You’ve got to believe me. I loved him more than I ever loved anything or anyone. I wanted to have a child with him. A family. I wanted us to grow old together. I can’t tell you what it was like when you guys were overseas. How many nights I lost sleep because I was worried that Kevin wouldn’t come home. The dreams I had, the nightmares. The house felt so empty, so quiet and still. I couldn’t imagine living without him. If he died over there, if he did—well, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to go on. When he finally did come home, it was like a gift, a sign that everything would be the way I wanted it to be. The way I dreamed it to be. And then one afternoon I found those letters on his computer. I found out that he was cheating on me. That he was writing to this woman. That she lived in Austin, and that they were seeing each other and meeting on weekends every once in a while. That they were loving each other. That all of my worries, all of my hopes and dreams, all of my prayers had been a complete waste of time. He was doing this other woman and making a fool out of me. He was humiliating me.”