by Jill Jones
And she began to better understand where the monsters came from.
To Victoria’s relief, there had been no more Ripper-style murders since Billy Ray’s death, and everyone in the unit began to breathe easier. Once again, they were left without definite closure on the case, for Billy Ray had never confessed to being the Ripper copycat, but everyone, including Victoria, believed that the beefy young man was the killer.
He fit the profile well enough—right gender, right age, even the right sign on the Zodiac—a Virgo, highly organized and fastidious. Although he hadn’t technically lived in the level of society she would have expected, his mother’s delusions that she was from high society and her domineering ways would explain his hatred for women of that type. He was also surprisingly well-educated. His mother told them that he’d put himself through night school and had achieved an A.A. degree from the local junior college. They also learned how he financed his education, and his computer, and his killing spree. Sally Coleman admitted that her son was an accomplished thief.
Billy Ray had been at the Sherlockian symposium, he’d had motive, or at least believed he did, he’d tried to kill Victoria, and the murders had stopped after his death. Considering all that, the team felt that Billy Ray was their man.
Only occasionally did she get the feeling they were wrong. She told herself it was nothing more than residual paranoia.
With the case concluded, there was no more reason for Jonathan to remain in the States, and his boss had recalled him to duty. She’d pleaded with him not to go, but his reply reminded her why she loved him so.
“Sandringham is a fine and fair man, Victoria. He insists he needs me to wrap up the hit and run. He has been good to me, and I can’t let him down. But I promise, as soon as that affair is resolved, I’ll tell him about us. About our plans.”
Which were still uncertain. They had spent the past week trying to resolve the issues of real life that faced them, but they’d arrived at no definitive plan.
“I don’t care where we live,” he’d said, relieving her somewhat, because she really did not want to live in England. “But what would I do? I can’t be a kept man, Victoria.”
“You could join the agency.”
He’d shaken his head. “I’m too old. I probably wouldn’t survive the Academy.”
Victoria hadn’t told him, but she was experiencing an agonizing ambivalence about staying with the agency herself. It was not that she’d lost her commitment, but the day she’d thought she might die at the hands of Billy Ray, she’d had sort of an epiphany moment when she’d suddenly understood that it wasn’t just about her. It was about family. Her family. Jonathan. The family they would have together. She was torn, because she believed her work as a profiler made a difference. But she was needed on other fronts as well now.
She parked the car in the short term lot and turned off the ignition. Then she looked across at Jonathan, and the tears threatened all over again.
“How long do you think it will take?” she asked bleakly, trying to turn her thoughts in a more professional direction.
Jonathan reached for her hand and entwined her fingers in his. “Too long,” he said, kissing her fingertips. “But maybe it will go faster than I think. Sandringham told me an informant tipped us off that Lord Chastain’s car was being repaired in an obscure body shop in Banbury. He claimed he hit a deer when he was driving in the countryside, but forensic is checking the blood they found on the front fender to see if it matches Burt Brown’s. If that happens, we’ll have a nasty little case on our hands, and I’ll likely have to stay through the prosecution.”
Victoria closed her eyes and swallowed hard. It might be months before she saw him again. Without a thought of the public eye peering at them in the busy parking lot, she scooted across the seat and into his lap.
“Jonathan,” she whispered, kissing him hungrily. ”I love you so much. No matter…what happens, I will always love you.”
His kiss in return was fierce with passion and grief. “I’ll come back to you, Victoria. Soon. I promise. Wait for me.”
Victoria managed to restrain the tears until Jonathan had boarded his plane to London. Only when she watched the big jet take to the sky did she allow herself at last to cry. It was a quiet storm, witnessed only by the clouds she stared at through the plate glass window.
What lay ahead for them?
This was the tearful farewell at the airport she had anticipated. Would it be followed by the gradual letting go she feared?
Deplaning at Heathrow the following morning, Jonathan was like the walking dead. He tried to work up some enthusiasm for the task that lay ahead, but without Victoria, the hit and run and Lord Chastain and Burt Brown just didn’t matter. Nothing seemed to matter.
He was on autopilot as he claimed his bag and went through customs, going through the motions, acting normal. But nothing was normal. His life could never be normal without Victoria.
He shuddered when he thought of how close he’d come to losing her. And although Billy Ray’s death had brought an end to the copycat murders, he was still afraid for her safety. Something about it just didn’t feel right. He wasn’t used to listening to his intuition. Before he’d met Victoria, he hadn’t really believed in it. But something in his gut told him that the danger had not passed.
He connected with the underground and rode into the city feeling desolate and cursing himself for the fool he was for leaving her. Yes, he owed Sandringham a great deal. The man had made Jonathan’s career. But he owed Victoria more. His love, his life, his protection. He would never forgive himself if they’d let down their guard too soon.
But he’d returned to London, his loyalty to Richard compelling him to finish working his cases. After that…? He didn’t know exactly. He wanted a life with Victoria so much it hurt. But he had to make his own way in that life. Call him old-fashioned, but he could not, would not, live beneath the shadow of her family’s wealth and her own brilliant career. Maybe this sojourn back to England would give him time to come up with a plan.
In his office, a mountain of messages awaited him. He did not bother to look through them on his way into Richard Sandringham’s office. Although his emotions were in a muddle, he had a job to do. The sooner he got it behind him, the sooner the rest of it could be resolved.
“Welcome back, Blake,” the older inspector said, rising and extending his hand.
Jonathan shook his hand. “Thank you, sir.”
He must have looked dreadful, for his supervisor frowned and peered at him intently. “Are you sick?”
“Just tired from the trip, that’s all.”
Sandringham looked skeptical. “Well, have a seat and I’ll bring you up on things. It was Burt Brown’s blood on Lord Chastain’s vehicle, but we’ve had a bit of a complication. Lord Chastain has disappeared.”
Jonathan wasn’t surprised. “He’s a coward, sir, if I may be blunt. He ran down an innocent pedestrian, then fled the scene. Now that he was to be made accountable for his actions, he’s fled once again.”
“Are you sure Burt Brown’s death was accidental?” Sandringham asked, surprising him. “Or is there reason to believe that Alistair Huntley-Ames might have struck him down intentionally?”
Jonathan rubbed his forehead. That had been Victoria’s initial suspicion, when she’d thought that perhaps Brown had witnessed the murder and was blackmailing Huntley-Ames. But they now knew that Lord Chastain was not the Whitechapel murderer. There was no reason to believe the incident had been other than accidental. “I can’t imagine it. Burt Brown was a nobody.”
“Yet the two were seen arguing violently at the Sherlock Holmes Pub just before the accident.”
“True. We got in on the tail end of it. Seems Brown believed he had something of value that he was trying to peddle to Huntley-Ames, who thought Brown was just trying to rip him off.”
“Any idea what he wanted to sell?”
Jonathan shook his head. “There was nothing in Brown’s flat wort
h much of anything.” Suddenly, he thought of the key Victoria had found in the bird cage and wondered if his men had located the locker it opened. “Is the flat still secured?”
“Yes, but the property manager is screaming for us to release it. The company that owns the complex is missing the income. I don’t think there’s much there that we need, but I didn’t want to turn it over until you were back on the case.”
“I’ll get to it today. What about his belongings?”
“We’ve attempted to find the next of kin to claim his things, and his body for that matter, but so far, no one has come forward.”
Jonathan felt a twinge of pity for the old man who’d lived a life of charades and died in anonymity. “I heard he used to work for the royal family.”
“He did. He was a caretaker at Windsor for years. Much loved, although he was considered an eccentric. They had no record of his next-of-kin, though. In fact, the personnel office knew little about his personal life. Pretty frightening to think about, actually. He could have been a spy or in some other way a threat to the Queen. But the personnel man believed he was harmless enough. Apparently he’d been hired as a boy because his father worked there.”
A thought niggled at the back of Jonathan’s mind. Forensics had proven that the warning note that Victoria had received had been written on the tablet they’d found in Burt Brown’s flat. Accompanying the note was another, much older letter, and Erik Hensen had thought it was an authentic piece of correspondence from Queen Victoria to an unknown person.
Burt Brown had worked at Windsor. Could he have stumbled across some old letters of the Queen’s and stolen them? Was that what he’d been trying to pawn off on Huntley-Ames? Jonathan recalled Lord Chastain’s pride in being related, even if remotely, to the royals. It was a long shot, but perhaps there was a connection that would lead to an answer to Sandringham’s question—was the hit and run accidental or intended?
“I’ll get right on this,” Jonathan said when they were finished. “I’ve got a few ideas.”
“I thought you might,” Sandringham said with a smile. “You’re one of our best. We’d hate to lose you.”
Now why did he say that? Jonathan was troubled as he returned to his office, not about what Sandringham had said, but that soon, he would have to tell his supervisor and friend that he was, indeed, leaving.
He called a brief meeting of his team, who had located the locker to which the key from the bird cage belonged. “What was in it?” he asked.
His deputy shrugged. “We didn’t open it. We thought you’d…”
“Does the world come to a stop just because I’m out of town?” he said irritably. “What if there’s something in there relevant to this case?”
“Inspector Sandringham sort of tied our hands on this one, sir. He kept thinking you’d be back soon.”
Jonathan shook his head. He hadn’t realized that Sandringham relied on him so heavily. He hadn’t considered himself all that important to this case. Hadn’t, in fact, really thought it was much of a case. “Sorry.”
One of his investigators held up the key. “CC 36,” he said, tossing it to Jonathan. “The lock box is at Charing Cross Station.”
Jonathan pocketed the key and briefed his men on the outcome of the Whitechapel murder. “The FBI believes it was a young man who attended the Sherlockian symposium. He’d registered as Billy Ray, but his real name was William Raymond Coleman. Can one of you dig out the rosters of airline passengers you checked out?”
One man went for his files, and in a few minutes, they confirmed that a William R. Coleman had been on an early afternoon flight out of Gatwick the Sunday after the murder. “Although we were unable to get a confession because the suspect was killed in the act of trying to commit another murder, there is enough evidence to convince most of the investigating team that he was the copycat killer. The FBI has not closed the case, but is considering it cold.”
Even as he said it, he was struck by uneasiness. The outcome of the case still didn’t satisfy him. Inconclusive, as it had been when they thought FitzSimmons was the Whitechapel murderer. They had been wrong then. They could be wrong now. But Victoria and the FBI knew their business. He had to go with their call on the matter. He pushed aside his apprehension. “Now, about Lord Chastain…”
Sandringham had put out a country-wide police alert for the missing MP, but stopped short of using the media. Alistair Huntley-Ames was, after all, a Member of Parliament. There were certain things even Scotland Yard did not pursue publicly when it came to England’s better families. That was probably why Sandringham had wanted him back on the case. Jonathan understood the politics involved.
Later, Jonathan glanced at the pile of messages on his desk and decided they could wait one more day. “See you in the morning,” he told the clerk as he left. “I’m mobile if you need me,” he said, indicating his cell phone.
He headed toward the underground, on his way to Burt Brown’s depressing little flat, wishing Victoria was with him.
Victoria arrived home from work early the following day, for Jonathan had said he would try to call around six o’clock, DC. time. It had been more than twenty-four hours since she’d said goodbye to him, and she longed to hear his voice again. The telephone was ringing when she unlocked the back door, and she dashed for it.
“Hello, Jonathan?”
“Jonathan?” She heard a familiar male voice give a short laugh, but it wasn’t Jonathan. “No, Tori. It’s me, Trey. Remember me? Or has the intrepid inspector stolen you away from me?”
Disappointed, Victoria sagged into a chair, breathing deeply to calm her heartbeat. “Hi, Trey. When did you get back in town?” She was glad to hear from him, but she didn’t want to linger on the phone, because she didn’t have call waiting.
“Last night, but too late to call you. What’s the latest on your case?”
“We caught our man a few days ago. Just after you last called me.”
There was a long silence, and Victoria thought maybe they’d been disconnected. “Who was it?” he asked at last.
“The man whose sketch you must have seen on television. He went by Billy Ray, although that was not his full name. Didn’t you recognize him? He’s the creep who sat at lunch with us the first day of the Sherlockian symposium.”
“I thought he looked familiar. Is he in jail?”
“He’s dead.” Victoria told him what had happened.
“God, Tori, you could have been killed. When are you going to give this up?” he demanded.
“Trey, don’t…”
“Okay, okay. Let’s change the subject. How’s your love life?”
Victoria would rather have continued talking about her recent triumph. “My love life is none of your business.”
“Ah, then the inspector must still be in the picture.”
“Jonathan Blake is in London, Trey.”
“Your mother told my mother you were shacked up with him down at the cottage.”
Victoria’s chin dropped. Then her cheeks blazed in indignation. “What? When did you hear that? I thought you weren’t speaking to your mother.”
“We’re getting along a little better these days. I called her to let her know I was back in town, and as usual she was full of juicy gossip.”
“Crap.”
“Tch, tch. Such language,” he said, and she was irritated at the amusement in his voice.
“We weren’t…shacked up.” It was a lie, but she wasn’t about to admit the truth to her little brother.
“This is Trey, remember? You can tell me anything.”
“Why should I? You’re as bad a gossip as your mother. For your information, Jonathan…uh…Inspector Blake was here on business. He was working on the Ripper case.”
“Whatever you say. Your mother seemed to think it was funny business, not crime detection, that was going on down there in the cottage.”
“Like I said, Trey, it’s none of your business.”
“Okay, I’ll lay off.�
�� There was another long silence, then he said, “Mother also told me that they finally found out who killed Meg.”
“Yes,” she replied, her voice suddenly thick. “Can you believe it?”
“I didn’t at first,” he said in a low tone, then his voice rose. “But now I see what Meghan really was. She wasn’t the bad girl wannabe that you always claimed. She was bad. And she had it in for all of us.” Bitterness edged his words. “She did it to hurt you, Victoria, and your parents, and even me. Maybe she got what she deserved.”
Victoria was shocked. She’d never heard Trey speak of Meghan in anger. She knew that Trey had been in love with Meghan, but Meghan had not felt the same toward him. She’d once confided in Victoria her dilemma, that she wanted to keep Trey as a friend, but wasn’t romantically interested in him, and Victoria had advised her not to do anything that would lead him on or give him the wrong signals. “Tell him straight out what you want,” she’d said, “and what you don’t want.” And Meghan had, and it had broken Trey’s heart, but only for a short while. Trey never took anything too seriously. But maybe he had been angrier that she’d thought, and only now was allowing his true feelings to surface.
“Meghan was young and stupid, Trey. She didn’t do it to hurt us. And she wasn’t bad. She did it because it was…naughty. She was tired of being forced to be the good girl all the time.”
Trey snorted. “You were the good girl, Victoria. Not Meghan. Meghan knew plenty about being naughty.”
“I don’t want to hear it, Trey. Meghan is dead, her killer is dead, and it’s time to put it behind us.”
“Yeah, right.”
Something in his tone chilled her to the bone. “Leave it alone, Trey. It’s behind us.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
It was nearly midnight before Jonathan reached his flat. He was exhausted, hungry, and missing Victoria. He was also wired with excitement. Although he had not accomplished much toward his aim of solving the hit and run, he had hit pay dirt as a Ripperologist, if everything that had come his way proved authentic.
