“The response will needle him, for sure.” She placed her bowl on top of her bread plate. “Thank Rose for me. I’ll clean up, and then if you don’t mind, I’ll keep you company for a while. I’m in no hurry to get home.”
He cocked an eyebrow at her. “Will I be seeing more of you with Jake’s daughter in town?”
“Can’t I just like your company?”
“I know you do, Mimi.” He pushed back from the table with some difficulty, but she refrained from helping him. There was only so much assistance a man like Quinn would take. “I’ll rinse and you can put the dishes in the dishwasher.”
“That’s a deal.”
When she finished washing up the cookware, she joined Quinn in the living room where an old Hitchcock film played on the TV. She curled up in the corner of the sofa and dragged out her laptop.
Jake had texted her a couple of times during the evening and assured her he’d made some progress with his ex-wife. She just hoped he wasn’t pushing things with Fiona.
She accessed LA Confidential and read more comments on Sean’s blog about her history. He was already teasing the story for tomorrow, and despite her excitement about it a little knot had formed in her gut.
It was one thing to hunt a nameless, faceless, anonymous killer and quite another to have contact with that killer. It made the search for him that much more...personal.
She blew out a breath and took a sip of hot tea. Jake could take care of himself a lot better than she could take care of herself. If she thought Quinn’s worries about her were absurd, Jake would laugh off her concerns about him.
She glanced at Quinn over the top of her laptop, and then brought up Websleuths. “Quinn, have you ever heard of these true crime message boards where people discuss missing persons and murders?”
“I’ve heard about them.” He paused the movie. “One of them played a role in the investigation of the Golden State Killer, although more in the way of speculation than hard evidence. I suppose they’re all chattering about these copycat killings.”
“I suppose so. I’ve glanced through a few of them, and people really do want to help. It’s not just ghoulish rubbernecking.”
Jake had shared a lot about the case with Quinn, but he hadn’t told him about the link between copycats one and two and the Websleuths site. She’d honor that—especially because she had her own interest in the site now.
Holding her breath, she clicked on her personal messages on the website. Toby Dog had responded to her, and she read his message with a hand clenched against her belly. Weird, but not serial killer recruitment level weird.
He and his special friends liked to take the action from the message boards to real life, as he called it. They traveled to the crime sites, they did investigative work like measuring distances and time, visited the locations where the victims were last seen.
The administrators of the website prohibited that kind of activity, and if they found out a member was conducting his or her own investigation, they’d ban that member from the website.
She had no desire to play supersleuth, but Toby Dog, which she’d figured out was the name of Sherlock Holmes’s dog, piqued her curiosity about whether or not members were engaged in this activity on the copycat killer message board. What could they find out that the police couldn’t?
As she clicked in the field to respond, her phone rang. She caught her breath as she saw Sean’s name pop up on the display. She hoped he wasn’t having a change of heart.
As she answered, she pushed the laptop from her legs and stood up. “Hope you haven’t changed your mind.”
Quinn looked up from his movie, and she waved him off as she sauntered out to his front porch.
Sean’s heavy breathing made him sound like a creeper or as if he’d just finished running a 5k. “I haven’t changed my mind, but I need to talk to you about something—in person.”
“Are you all right? You sound...out of breath.”
“I am a little, but I’m okay. Can you meet me?”
“Now?” With her belly full of stew and sourdough bread, she didn’t feel like hopping on the freeway to meet with a blogger about last-minute changes.
He answered in clipped tones. “Yes, now.”
“Do you want me to bring Jake?”
“Just you. It’s important, Kyra.”
Her hands suddenly turned clammy. “Is—is this about the blog tomorrow or the blog today?”
“Both. It has to be just you. I need to meet you now, or I’m not going to be able to post the blog tomorrow.”
She glanced through the window at Quinn enthralled by Grace Kelly. He’d always told her that her mother had gotten it all wrong. Instead of naming her Marilyn after Marilyn Monroe, she should’ve named her Grace. Marilyn or Grace, he wouldn’t want her running off to meet Sean Hughes in the middle of the night.
“Kyra?”
“I—I’m still here. Where are you? At your home?” She had no idea where Sean lived, but anyone calling LA home could live a good forty-five minutes away from every other place in LA.
“I’m not at my house, but I live in Echo Park and I can meet you at the park by the lake there.”
“Why there? Can’t we meet at a bar or coffeehouse?”
“No!” Sean took a few steadying breaths. “We can’t be seen together. This is important, Kyra. Do you want that blog to run tomorrow?”
“It has to.”
“Then I’ll see you when you get here. There are still people walking on the path around the lake. I’ll be waiting in my black BMW in the parking lot near the little boat dock for those swan pedal boats. You know the area?”
“I know it.” She checked the time on her phone. “I’m in Venice. If there’s no traffic, I’ll be there in about thirty minutes. This better be good.”
Sean hung up without responding, and Kyra slipped inside Quinn’s house.
He looked up. “Everything okay?”
“Everything’s fine, but I have a work thing and I need to get going.”
Quinn studied her for a few seconds, and she marched past him to grab her hoodie. She brushed a kiss against his cheek. “I’ll see you next time.”
Grabbing her hand, he said, “Be careful.”
“I always am.” She moved her hand over the gun pouch on the side of her purse.
As she drove north to Echo Park, she periodically glanced at her phone to make sure Sean hadn’t texted her to call off the meeting or decide he could tell her everything over the phone. A few times, she’d reached for her cell to call Jake, but she didn’t want to intrude on his father-daughter time or worry him about his response getting posted tomorrow.
Had Sean discovered something about his anonymous source that he wanted to reveal to her? That would be the best scenario. She’d convinced herself that Sean’s source was her nemesis, Laprey, the person who’d been toying with her ever since the copycat killings began with Jordy Lee Cannon.
Laprey was more than a prankster, if he were responsible for the homeless woman’s death. He could’ve even been culpable in her foster brother’s overdose. That would leave two bodies at his door.
The drive took her closer to forty minutes than thirty, and by the time she swung into the parking lot near the boat dock only two cars remained—Sean’s and a white truck—both looked empty.
She parked next to Sean’s car and strapped her purse across her chest as she exited her vehicle. Lights along the edge of the lot saved it from complete darkness, and the moon lit up the swan boats bumping and swaying on the water.
“Sean?” She circled his car and stopped next to the driver’s side. The dome light glowed inside, and she noticed that Sean had left the door ajar. A file folder had spilled its contents onto the floor of the car.
Kyra licked her dry lips and called Sean on her cell phone. As his phone rang, a buzzing noise em
anated from his car. She peeked into the window and saw a light from beneath the driver’s seat. Sean had left his phone in the car.
Swallowing, Kyra stepped back from the car and called out. “Sean?”
Had he decided to take a stroll while waiting for her? Why leave his phone behind and his car door open?
Kyra eyed the truck on the other side of the small parking lot, and unzipped her gun pouch as she crept toward it. Unlike Sean, the truck’s owner had locked things up. Instinct or curiosity made her snap a picture of the truck’s license plate with her phone.
Claiming a spot in the middle of the parking lot, she turned in a circle. The road wound away from the parking lot on one side, and the lake beckoned on the other. Maybe he had gone to check out the boats.
She glanced over her shoulder and made her way to the boat dock where the pedal boats floated in a corral. As they bumped together, the soft clicking noise sounded like chatter.
Her sneakers whispered against the dirt and gravel that bordered the man-made lake. She tripped to a stop as she noticed a huddled form at the edge of the water.
“Sean? Is that you?” She flicked on her phone’s flashlight and rested her hand against her weapon, still zipped in her purse.
She drew closer to the man and a strangled scream clawed its way up her throat.
Sean Hughes lay curled on his side with a bullet hole in his head.
Chapter Eight
Jake’s unmarked sedan squealed to a stop in the parking lot of Echo Park Lake. She’s okay. She’s okay. He repeated the mantra in his head as he threw his vehicle into Park and scrambled from the car.
His gaze darted around the scene, flooded with lights from the emergency vehicles, and landed on Kyra sitting in the back of an ambulance, her legs hanging over the end. The blood pounded against his temples as he strode toward her.
“Are you all right? Why are you in the ambulance?” He rushed to her side and put his hand against her cheek, as if that could verify her condition.
Her wide eyes sought his face. “He’s dead. Sean Hughes is dead.”
Jake dropped to his knees in front of her and clasped both of her hands in his. “I know that, but what are you doing here?”
“I warned him.” Kyra’s head twisted to the side where Sean’s body lay crumpled beside the edge of the lake. “I warned him about his anonymous source.”
The EMT standing next to them cleared his throat. “You’re okay, Kyra, but you might want to keep warm. You’re still shivering from the shock.”
“Do you want to sit in my car?” Jake squeezed her hands as another tremble rolled through her body.
“Do you have to look at the body?”
“Another detective is checking it out now. I’ll have a look before the coroner gets here.” He leaned forward and whispered, “First, I want to know what you were doing here.”
She blinked. “Do you...do you think I had something to do with Sean’s death? Is that what they think? Revenge for the blog?”
“That’s just dumb. Do you really believe I’d think that?” He cinched her wrists and tugged her from the back of the ambulance. “I want to hear from you what happened.”
Under his guidance, she hopped to the ground. “I already told the patrol officer. I haven’t spoken to Detective Villareal, yet.”
“You can give a statement to me, and I’ll give it to Manny Villareal.” Still holding her hand, he led her to his car. When he got into the driver’s seat, he buzzed down the window in case someone wanted him...or Kyra. He turned to her. “Why the hell were you with Sean Hughes in a deserted park in the middle of the night?”
“He called me.” She dug into her purse and withdrew her cell phone. She tapped her display and held it out to him to prove her statement. “There’s the call at 8:52.”
“I believe you, Kyra.” He pushed the phone back in her direction. “What did he want?”
“This.” She flung her arm out to the side and hit the window with the ring she wore on her right hand. “He asked me to meet him here to discuss the blog. He basically told me if I didn’t come, he couldn’t guarantee your response to Copycat Three would be posted tomorrow.”
“He wouldn’t tell you anything else?”
“No, and I asked. He insisted that we talk in person. I even asked why we couldn’t meet in a coffeehouse or bar, but he didn’t want to be seen in public with me.” She lifted her shoulders to her ears and held them there stiffly. “I don’t know why, but I wasn’t going to take a chance that he wouldn’t post your response.”
Jake reached over and massaged the back of her neck until she dropped her shoulders. “Did he sound...different?”
“I don’t know him that well. I’ve spoken to him only a few times on the phone before this, but yeah, he sounded a little different.”
Jake tensed. “How?”
“You heard him on speakerphone the other day. He’s...he was a confident, smooth guy.” She twisted her fingers in her lap. “This time...not so much. He sounded worried. His voice had an urgency. It lit a fire under me, anyway.”
“Why?” Jake smacked the heel of his hand against his forehead. “Why would you agree to meet him here, of all places, in the dead of night?”
“You keep saying that—dead of night, middle of the night. It was nine o’clock. Even he told me there were people still walking around the lake.” She grabbed his arm. “Did the police check out that white truck? That was the only other car in the lot besides Sean’s car. I even took a picture of it, just in case.”
“I’m sure they ran the plate. If it’s anything or anyone connected, we’ll hear about it, but I doubt a killer’s going to leave his vehicle at the scene of the crime.”
“Cameras?”
“They’re here, and we’ll find out soon enough.”
“Even if the cameras don’t catch the killer, the footage should at least rule me out.”
He tucked an errant strand of hair behind her ear. “Nobody’s ruling you in, but why did you take a picture of the truck’s license plate? Did you suspect something was off? Take it from the top. You got the call. I’ll bet you didn’t tell Quinn where you were going and what you were doing.”
“Of course not.” She took a deep, steadying breath. “After Sean’s call, I told Quinn I had something to do for work—which is true. It took me about forty minutes to get here—traffic on the 110 as I went through downtown. By the time I arrived, there were no more walkers or joggers in the park. I saw Sean’s car and the truck. What gave me pause was that Sean’s car door was ajar and his phone was on the floor under the driver’s seat. That’s why I approached the truck with caution. Then I walked toward the swan boats, and I saw Sean’s body. That’s it. I called 911.”
“Why didn’t you call me?”
“You heard the EMT. I was in shock. After I found Sean, I ran back to my car and sat there with the doors locked and my gun in my hand, in case the killer came back for me.”
“I didn’t mean after you found the body. I meant after you got the call from Sean.”
“I didn’t want to interrupt you, especially after what your ex said about me today.”
Jake massaged his temples. “Did you tell the police about your gun?”
“No.”
“You need to do that. They’re going to want to know you had a weapon.” Kyra’s knees started bouncing, and he put a hand on one and squeezed. “They can rule out your gun as the murder weapon. Did they check your hands for gunshot residue, yet?”
“No.”
“I’m going to suggest they do that, too.”
“So, you do think they suspect me.”
“They would be bad detectives if they didn’t. You found the body, you had a motive, and they’re going to discover that you had the means.”
“And I called 911.”
“You should kno
w by now it’s not unusual for the perpetrator to call in the crime.” He stroked her hair. “I’m not trying to scare you. All of those things will rule you out.”
“He killed him, Jake.”
He chose his words carefully. “You think Laprey is his source, and Laprey killed him?”
“Yes.” She pursed her lips and her jaw formed a firm line.
“Why would he do that? Why give Sean the story, and then get rid of him?”
“Maybe he thought Sean was going to reveal his source to me and I’d finally learn Laprey’s identity.”
“If Sean were going to do that, why not just tell you over the phone? How would Laprey know Sean hadn’t already told you?”
“I’m not sure about all that, but who else would want to kill Sean? Kill him right before he talked to me?”
“Kill him when he knew you’d find the body.”
Kyra had been a bundle of action ever since dropping into the passenger seat. Now all motion ceased. Her next words came out through gritted teeth. “What do you mean?”
“Maybe this was some kind of setup for you. Lure you out here to find Sean’s dead body, maybe even an attempt to implicate you in Sean’s death.”
“But Sean called me out here.”
“Did he?”
“Of course, he did. I haven’t spoken to Sean much, but I did recognize his voice, and he called me from the number I have identified as his.” She dragged a hand through her hair. “What are you suggesting, Detective?”
Jake drummed his fingers against the dashboard. “You said Sean sounded nervous on the phone, agitated. Maybe someone was forcing him to call you.”
Kyra sucked in a quick breath. “You mean Sean’s life was already in danger when he called me? Someone was holding a gun to his head—literally or figuratively—to get him to call me and get me out here?”
“Then he killed Sean, and left the body here for you to find.”
“Why wouldn’t he stick around to kill me, too? He had the perfect opportunity.”
“Think about it, Kyra.” He waved a hand out the open window at Manny. “When has Laprey ever wanted to harm you? Tease you? Taunt you? Terrify you? Oh, yeah. All that. But he’s never once threatened you with physical danger.”
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