The Fourth Monkey

by J. D. Barker

  Mathers’s face went pale and he shuffled in his chair. “Jake? He couldn’t be.”

  Nash nodded. “He kidnapped Emory, and she’s still out there somewhere. Without food or water or someone to take care of her—she doesn’t have much time. Your son may be the only person left alive who knows where to find her.”

  Mathers appeared worse than his son now, his face pale, breath shallow. “Tyler, is this true?”

  Tyler drew in a breath. “He’s not the Four Monkey Killer. It’s not what you think.”

  Clair crossed the room and knelt at his chair. “I understand you cared for him, but he did some terrible things. Right now, though, we need to focus on Emory, and if you know where he took her, you need to tell us.”

  “He’s not the Four Monkey Killer,” Tyler repeated.

  Mathers rose and went to his son. “What are you trying to say?”

  “Uncle Jake was just trying to help us.”

  “Help you how?” Clair asked.

  Tyler looked up to his father, then returned his gaze to the floor. “My father has been having money trouble. He got downsized at work last year, and since then he’s had a tough time covering expenses, and he dipped into my college fund.”

  “How do you know about—”

  Clair raised her hand. Tyler continued.

  “Based on my grades, I’ve got a good shot of getting into an Ivy League school, but I’m not doing well enough for a scholarship. Dad still makes too much to qualify for grants, so we’ll need to pay out of pocket. The student loans won’t cover everything. Uncle Jake said the only way to make that happen is if I let him help me. When he found out he had cancer, he tried to get a life insurance policy, but they denied him as soon as they learned about his diagnosis. Then he told me he had another way.

  “About a month ago, a man approached him and told him he could make a lot of money if he helped him out with something. He told Uncle Jake it wasn’t illegal—well, not very illegal. He said he knew Uncle Jake was sick and he didn’t have much time left. This was a way for him to help not only me but a whole bunch of people. He said Uncle Jake couldn’t do it alone, though, that I would need to help.”

  Mathers was turning red again. “What did that bastard make you do?”

  “Mr. Mathers, please,” Clair said.

  Tyler sighed. “He didn’t make me do anything, Dad. Nothing I didn’t want to do, anyway. He said I had to get close to Emory Connors, maybe even take her out a few times. She’s hot, so I figured, why not? We went on a couple of dates, then I took her to homecoming . . .” His eyes drifted back to Clair’s. “At first I only wanted to see if I could get her to go out with me, but once I got to know her, I really liked her. We had a lot of fun. I could talk to her, you know? And she’s so smart. She even helped me with some of my classes. Things were going good. That’s when Uncle Jake told me to get the shoes.”

  “Mr. Talbot’s shoes?” Clair asked.

  “Yeah. Last Thursday we were hanging out watching a movie, and Mr. Talbot came by for about twenty minutes. His clothes were covered in dirt. He didn’t say why. He said he needed to take a quick shower and change, then he was off. He left his dirty clothes in the guest room for the maid. About twenty minutes after he left, I got a call from Uncle Jake. He told me I needed to bring him Mr. Talbot’s shoes. Didn’t say why, only that the man had told him to get them. I have no idea how he even knew Mr. Talbot had come by, let alone left some clothes behind. Kinda weirded me out. I thought he had cameras in the place. When Em got up to use the bathroom, I slipped the shoes into my backpack. I brought them over to Uncle Jake’s the next day. He didn’t say what the man wanted with them, only that he’d transferred enough money to cover my tuition and then some. For a pair of shoes! I couldn’t believe it. We expected the money to get pulled back out, but it wasn’t. The next day, Uncle Jake received a calculus book from the man. He told me I had to leave it at Em’s apartment. That seemed weird, but I figured, why not? If some strange guy wants to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for a pair of shoes and for me to—”

  “How much?” Mathers blurted out.

  Tyler turned to his father. “Uncle Jake said he initially gave him fifty thousand when he agreed to help, then another two hundred and fifty when we got the shoes with more—”

  Mathers turned to the detectives. “I don’t think we should say anything else until my lawyer gets here.”

  Clair rolled her eyes. “Tyler, where is Emory?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Detective, didn’t you hear me?” Mathers said.

  “What did this man look like?”

  Tyler shrugged. “I never saw him. I don’t think Uncle Jake ever did, either. He only talked to him over the phone.”

  “We have rights, Detective!”

  “Give us a minute.” Grabbing Nash by the shoulder, Clair pulled him out of the cramped office into the hallway. “Are you buying this?”

  “I don’t know what to believe anymore. Nothing about this case makes sense.”

  Clair’s phone vibrated. She glanced down at the screen and read the text message:

  CALL ME!—KLOZ

  62

  Diary

  We left Mrs. Carter in the basement.

  She had said they would come back, and they did. Less than an hour later, we heard the rumble of the Duster coming down the road. Mr. Stranger pumped the gas three or four times before letting the engine fall idle; he wanted us to know they were out there.

  The three of us gathered at the window and watched the green car for nearly five minutes before Father let out a gruff breath and pushed out the kitchen door, heading for the road.

  I stood in the open doorway with Mother behind me as Father plodded across our grass, heading straight for the Plymouth parked in the street between our driveway and the Carters’. He was about ten feet from the car when Mr. Stranger dropped into gear and sped away, kicking up dirt and gravel in his wake.

  Father stood and stared at the space where the car had been for a long while before returning to the house. He closed the door at his back and twisted the deadbolt. We rarely closed the wood door during the summer months. Without air conditioning, our little house grew stifling hot, and the circulation of open doors and windows was one of the few ways we battled the heat.

  He saw Mother and me watching him. “This is going to end badly.”

  “They don’t know she’s here,” Mother replied.

  “They know,” he said. “I don’t know how they know, but they know.”

  “Then why don’t we just give her to them? Let them do what they want?”

  Father thought about this for a moment, then shook his head. “I think she knows exactly where her husband’s work papers are hidden.”

  Mother crossed the room to the coffeepot and clicked the power switch. From inside the cupboard she retrieved a brown bag from PT’s Roasting Company, added two scoops to the filter, and pressed the Brew button. A minute later the scent of finely roasted happiness filled the room, and although Father said I was far too young to drink coffee (Father said caffeine would stunt my growth and increase my chances of insomnia as an adult), I appreciated the smell. I found it to be soothing, creating a calm that settled over the room. Mother retrieved two mugs, filled them, and carried them to the kitchen table, where she and Father took a seat.

  “Perhaps we should march her out to the lake and drown her, make it look like an accident,” Mother suggested.

  “That might open a larger can of worms. Mr. Carter is feeding the fish at the bottom of that lake. I don’t think we should risk drawing anyone’s attention to that particular body of water,” Father replied.

  “Her own bathtub, then?”

  Father took a drink of his coffee and set the mug back down, twisting it in his hands. “Those men already searched their house and know she’s not home. Since it appears the Carters left in a hurry, I doubt the missus would come back to take a bath.”

  An idea popped into
my head. From where, I am not sure, but it was a worthwhile idea, so I presented it. “You could strangle her and put her body in the trunk of their car. If you stage things right, it will seem like Mr. Carter killed her and ran off somewhere.”

  Both Mother and Father turned to me with blank stares. I was in trouble. I shouldn’t have said anything. Maybe I should go to my room and—

  “An excellent idea, champ!” Father said. “We left the car at the train station; that may be the perfect setup for a husband on the run.”

  Mother was nodding in agreement. “We should find out where they hid the work papers first, though.”

  Father’s eyes were fixed on his coffee. “Insurance?”

  Mother nodded. “Insurance. If these men don’t believe this little ruse, it wouldn’t hurt to have a little something of value for bargaining purposes. What if he stole the money too? The funds could come in handy.”

  “We’re not thieves,” Father said.

  “If we have to relocate, we’re going to need that money. Who knows how the rest of this debacle will play out. It’s their fault we’re involved. They owe us.”

  Considering Mother had killed Mr. Carter and we now had Mrs. Carter chained up in our basement, I failed to see how this was “their fault,” but Father must have agreed to some extent, because he offered no further objections.

  Mother finished her coffee, stood, and set her empty mug in the sink. “Should we do it tonight or tomorrow?”

  “Better to go during the daytime. The train station gets a little too quiet at night, and I think we’re more likely to be seen,” Father said.

  Mother asked, “How do you plan to get her to tell us where to find the work papers?”

  Father finished his own coffee and placed his mug next to Mother’s. “There’s the rub. She’s a tough cookie. Perhaps you’d like to give it a go?”

  The broadest of smiles crossed Mother’s face. “Oh, I would indeed!”

  63

  Clair

  Day 2 • 3:56 p.m.

  Clair crushed an empty Pepsi can and tossed it into the wastebasket next to Nash. “How long has it been?”

  “Since he went in, or since the last time you asked me?” Kloz replied.

  She shook her head. “Either . . . both . . . I don’t know. Why is this taking so long?”

  “Twelve minutes since you last asked me. Three and a half hours since he got to the hospital. Three hours and twelve minutes since they brought him in to surgery.”

  “This is my fault,” Nash said to nobody in particular. “I assumed the kid was CSI. He was photographing the scene; he had all the right credentials. There were a dozen other CSIs floating around, and nobody singled him out as some kind of imposter.”

  “He wasn’t an imposter,” Kloz said. “On paper anyway, he was legit. I checked with his supervisor. HR records had him transferring in from Tucson two months ago. Nobody verified the transfer by phone. They relied on the electronic records.”

  “Which were faked?”

  Kloz nodded. “Some of the best hacking I’ve ever seen. According to his lieutenant, Watson—I mean Bishop—worked a dozen or more cases since he got here. Half his unit swore he was some kind of super-CSI. He solved two murders with only a cursory review of the blood splatter. Hell, if he had stuck around, he’d probably be running the department in a couple years.”

  Clair looked confused. “But you said his fingerprints came back under a different name. How did you catch that and the crime lab or HR didn’t?”

  “His fingerprints came back as two different people. One set backed up the Paul Watson persona, but a juvie record came back as Anson Bishop. I think he hacked ViCAP and created the adult match in order to fool the background checks. They wouldn’t have had access to the juvenile record.”

  “But you did.”

  Kloz rolled his eyes. “Well, not officially. The juvenile record was sealed. You just need to know where to look. Forget how I got it. The point is, you can’t see the name on a juvie record until you access the file, so they probably assumed it belonged to Paul Watson. It was coded as a shoplifting, not a serious enough offense to block entrance to the crime lab, so whoever reviewed his file when he first started probably wrote off the charge and moved on. That’s if they were able to see the record at all. That’s a big if. I honestly doubt anyone dug that deep, especially since he came in on transfer papers.”

  “What do we know about Anson Bishop?” Clair asked.

  Kloz snorted. “We don’t know shit. As soon as I figured this out, I called Porter.” He drew in a deep breath. “Crap, do you think this is my fault? I mean, if I hadn’t called Porter, they’d still be out running around chasing leads. Bishop wouldn’t have had a reason to hurt him. Fuck, I did this.”

  The room went quiet.

  Kloz looked around at their faces. “Come on, guys, you’re supposed to say this wasn’t my fault. That something like this would have happened anyway.”

  Nash punched him in the shoulder.

  Kloz jumped up, his hand rubbing the spot. “What the fuck?”

  “If Porter dies, I’ll kick your fucking teeth in,” Nash growled.

  “Quit being a Neanderthal,” Clair said. Turning to Kloz, she added, “Of course it’s not your fault. You tried to warn him. Any one of us would have done the same.”

  A doctor with wiry glasses and dark hair entered the room from the hallway behind them, gave the two men a peculiar glance, and turned to Clair. “Detective Norton?”

  Clair stood. “Yes?”

  “Your friend came out of surgery without any issues. He’s a very lucky man. That knife was within an eighth of an inch of a major artery. The slightest deviation in the knife’s trajectory, and he would have bled out within a minute. As it stands, though, the wound is fairly superficial—nothing more than tissue damage. We’ll probably keep him overnight, but I see no reason for him to stay longer.”

  Clair wrapped her arms around the man, nearly knocking the clipboard from his hand.

  “Can we see him?” Nash asked.

  The doctor pulled awkwardly away from Clair and nodded. “He just woke up, and he’s been asking for you. Normally I would never allow visitors this soon after surgery, but he made it clear you’re involved in an open investigation and he’d come to you if I didn’t bring all of you in there. I can’t have him wandering the hospital, so I’m making an exception. Please try to keep it brief. He needs his rest.” He gestured toward the hallway. “Come with me.”

  Room 307 was semiprivate, and the bed nearest the door was empty. Clair felt her heart skip a beat as she rounded the corner and spotted Porter in the second bed, wired to a heart monitor with an IV line in his wrist. He turned toward them as they entered the room, his eyes glassy and distant.

  “Ten minutes,” the doctor said before turning and heading back toward the nurses’ station.

  Clair walked up to the bed and took Porter’s hand. “How are you feeling, Sam?”

  “Like someone stabbed me in the leg with my own kitchen knife,” he replied. His voice sounded rough, congested.

  “We’re going to get him,” Nash said.

  Kloz approached hesitantly, his head held low. “I’m sorry, Sam.”

  “Not your fault,” Porter said. “I should have seen the signs. There was something off about him.”

  “There wasn’t anything off about him,” Nash said. “He fooled all of us.”

  “What do we know about him?”

  Kloz explained about the fingerprints and the juvenile record. “Aside from that, we’ve got nothing. We pulled his photo from his ID and put the image out to the press. They’re airing his mug every chance they get. The captain has done three press conferences, and he’s got another scheduled for the six o’clock news.”

  Clair’s cell phone buzzed and she looked down at the screen. “Tyler Mathers is down at Central Booking. They’re holding him as long as they can, but he’ll probably be out in a few hours. He insists he doesn’t know an
y more than he told us. They showed him the picture of Bishop, but he didn’t recognize him.”

  “Tyler Mathers?” Porter frowned. “How does he fit into this?”

  Clair told him what they had learned—how Kittner was paid off to take his own life, how Tyler stole Talbot’s shoes and planted evidence.

  “Watson is 4MK,” Nash said quietly. “Or Bishop, or whoever. The little fucker has been orchestrating this entire thing from right under our noses.”

  Porter tried to take it all in, his mind fighting against the drip of painkillers. “I know you want to be here, but I really need you back at the station researching this guy.” He shifted his weight to the right. “He still has Emory, and now that his cover is blown I imagine he’s going to speed up his plans. She’s running out of time. We’re running out of time. Did he put an address on his paperwork with HR?”

  Kloz nodded. “Yeah, but it came back as Kittner’s place.”

  Porter twisted in his bed and immediately grimaced.

  “Careful, Sam. You don’t want to aggravate the wound,” Nash said, concerned.

  “That bastard knew exactly how to stick me. It only took seven stitches to close back up. Hurts like a son of a bitch, though.”

  “If he wanted to kill you, he would have. He just wanted to slow you down,” Kloz said.

  Porter shifted his weight again. “I should have taken one of you with me. I’ve had a tough time with this, and I don’t know what I’m comfortable talking about yet. I guess taking the kid with me to the Fifty-First was an easy way out.”

  Clair took his hand. “We’re all family, Sam. You can talk to any one of us or none of us. Just know that we’re all there for you when you’re ready.”

  Porter said, “They caught him, the guy who shot her. They busted him on another burglary, and the cashier from the market ID’ed him. It’s over.”