Alter Ego

by Brian Freeman

  “That’s right. Trust me, it was the only way I could think of to take him down. I know the surveillance was technically against the law, but if you’ve got her in one of your cells, I’d really like to get her out.”

  She realized that he didn’t know. He had no idea.

  “Cab,” she murmured unhappily.

  He watched her closely, reading the story in her face. The terrible truth dawned on him like the breaking of a wave. His blue eyes narrowed in disbelief. His clenched fist pushed against his chin. He swung his head to stare out at the Gulf water. She didn’t know which emotion held the upper hand in his heart. Grief or rage.

  “Who was she?” Maggie asked softly.

  Cab took a long time to reply. “Her name was Peach Piper. She worked for me.”

  “I’m really sorry.”

  “What happened?” he asked.

  “She was shot. We only found her body yesterday.”

  “Was it this John Doe of yours? The same man who killed the real Haley?”

  Maggie nodded. “Yes.”

  Cab shook his head. “It was Peach’s idea to use Haley’s name. To see if Casperson reacted. To see if he even remembered. I guess he got the message.”

  “Are you sure about him?” Maggie asked.

  Cab didn’t answer. For the moment he was far away. “Peach. I can’t believe it. She was this odd, quirky, lovely girl. A total loner. No family left. Lala and I were about the only friends she had in the world. And I sent her to her death.”

  “That’s not fair,” Maggie told him. “No, you didn’t.”

  The anger swallowed up his sadness. “We have to stop this son of a bitch,” Cab insisted, his voice choked with determination. “This has been going on for too long. We have to expose this psychopath for who he is. Casperson is the one who had Haley killed. He’s the one who had Peach killed.”

  Maggie tried to wrap her mind around the idea. “Cab, are you sure? Is that really possible? You said yourself all you have is smoke and no fire. You don’t have any evidence.”

  Cab stood up, which was like watching a flamingo perched atop long, gangly legs. He was at least six foot six.

  “I told you I also have an anonymous source. And I want you to meet her.”

  “Who is it?”

  “Someone who has known Dean Casperson for a long time,” Cab said. “Someone who knows the truth about him. My mother.”

  16

  When Stride saw the blue Hyundai Elantra for the third time that day, he knew he was being followed.

  It had shown up the first time as he drove down the Point from his cottage at seven in the morning. He’d noticed it three blocks behind him, but he hadn’t paid much attention. Then it had appeared again as he was leaving police headquarters to revisit the apartment used by Haley Adams—who was actually, according to Maggie, a Florida private investigator named Peach Piper. The Elantra had stayed behind him all the way to the Central Hillside neighborhood, where it disappeared when Stride pulled over to the curb. He wasn’t close enough to note the license plate or see who was driving the car.

  Now the Elantra was back again.

  Stride was driving north on I-35 on his way back from the Duluth Grill. He was almost at the Superior Street exit when he spotted the car in his rearview mirror. A blue Elantra wasn’t an uncommon vehicle in Duluth, but three times in one day was more than a coincidence. The car hung back, a quarter mile behind him in the left lane. Its headlights were on, and its windshield wipers brushed aside the light snow. He slowed to let the driver get closer, but the Elantra slowed, too, keeping a steady gap between them. He still couldn’t see inside the car.

  At Superior Street, he left the freeway. The Elantra changed lanes and prepared to exit, too. He stayed on the right-hand fork toward Michigan Street and headed into the downtown streets past the depot and the library. The blue car followed. He eased back on his speed, waiting for the stoplight at Fifth Avenue to change. As the light turned yellow, he accelerated and cruised through the intersection, leaving the Elantra stranded at the red light behind him.

  He drove two more long blocks before the light changed and then made a quick turn into the parking lot inside Harbor Center. The covered lot was dark, and he spun the Expedition around so that it was facing the street. Then he switched off his lights, and he waited.

  Thirty seconds later, the Elantra slowly passed the driveway. He got a brief glimpse of the driver, long enough to see that it was a woman with short auburn hair. She wasn’t familiar to him. He waited until two more cars passed, and then he pulled out of the parking lot and focused on the blue Elantra ahead of him. She drove as if she were trying to figure out where he’d gone, but she wasn’t savvy enough to look behind her. She went slowly, and the cars between them got impatient and blared their horns. Eventually, it was obvious that she’d given up on finding him. She sped up and turned off Michigan onto the cobblestoned pavers at First Avenue. Then she turned right onto Superior Street and made another right at Lake Avenue on her way down to the harbor area at Canal Park.

  Stride followed.

  In Canal Park, the Elantra turned into the parking lot at the Hampton Inn. He parked in one of the diagonal spots across the street in front of Caribou Coffee and watched through his driver’s window as the woman got out of the car. She wore a navy-colored bubble coat that looked new and gray dress slacks. She was young, probably no more than thirty years old. She walked swiftly toward the hotel entrance and shook snow from her bobbed red hair, which was highlighted with streaks of royal blue. As he watched, she disappeared inside.

  Stride got out of the Expedition and crossed the street into the hotel parking lot. He found the Elantra and made a quick call to Guppo to check the license plate. It was a Thrifty rental car from Minneapolis. He brushed snow from the side windows and peered inside. A paper map of Duluth was on the passenger seat and, as in John Doe’s car, a copy of the National Gazette. She’d also printed out a stack of archived articles from the Duluth News Tribune. The topmost story was a blurb from the previous winter about Stride’s marriage to Serena.

  Whoever this woman was, she was definitely watching him.

  He headed for the lobby of the hotel. Inside, he showed his badge to the desk clerk and asked about the woman who’d entered the hotel five minutes earlier. Her name, according to the registration, was JoLynn Fields. The address she’d given was in Sarasota, Florida.

  Florida again.

  Stride got her room number and headed for the elevator. She was on the third floor in a lake-facing room at the far end of the hallway. He walked down the corridor and rapped his knuckles sharply on the door. Someone called cheerfully, “Just a second!”

  The hotel door opened. JoLynn Fields saw him, and the smile on her face vanished.

  “Oh!” she exclaimed in surprise.

  “Hello, Ms. Fields. My name is Jonathan Stride, but I bet you know that.”

  He could almost see the calculations in her head as she thought about what to say. “Yes, I do, Lieutenant Stride.”

  “Well, maybe you’d like to tell me why you’ve been following me. And why you’re digging into my personal life.”

  Her smiled returned. “Okay. Sure. You know, I should have figured you’d spot me. Following someone isn’t what they make it look like on TV. And let me guess. When I lost you downtown, you started following me, right?”

  “You still haven’t answered my question,” Stride said.

  JoLynn opened the door wider. “Do you want to come inside? I don’t bite, Lieutenant, I promise.”

  He squeezed past her into the hotel room, where the heat was cranked high enough to make it uncomfortably warm. There were two queen beds, a desk, and an overstuffed chair near the window. She had a laptop open on the desk, but as she retreated to the far side of the room, she slapped it shut. She gestured for Stride to take the overstuffed chair, and she sat in the desk chair and propped her stocking feet on the bed. From where he was, he could see the lake through the wind
ow. Waves beat against the rocks, and snow streaked across the glass. The clouds were like steel. The boardwalk by the lake was empty.

  JoLynn looked outside, too. Her eyes were pale and gray. She shivered and tugged on the sleeves of her pink turtleneck, as if she could feel the winter chill simply by looking outside. The blue tints in her red hair looked like twisting snakes. “It’s pretty here, but I’m not built for the cold.”

  “It’s a lot warmer in Florida,” Stride said.

  “You checked me out at the desk, huh? Of course you did. Yes, I’m from Sarasota. Born and raised.”

  “What brings you to Minnesota, Ms. Fields?” he asked.

  “The movie is what brings me here, but I’m sure you already guessed that. I’m a reporter. Entertainment beat.”

  “Who do you work for?”

  “The National Gazette. And yes, I know, people roll their eyes when they hear that. Don’t worry, I don’t cover UFOs or Bigfoot. Although if Bigfoot is hiding anywhere, it would be somewhere like this.”

  “Why are you investigating me?” Stride asked again.

  “I’m doing a story on you.”

  “What kind of story?”

  “Human interest,” JoLynn told him. “That’s what our readers like. They want to know: Who is Jonathan Stride? Why is Hollywood making a movie about him? What is he like in real life? What kind of a hero is he?”

  Stride shook his head. He thought about Jungle Jack’s warning the previous day, and he didn’t think the timing was a coincidence. Dean Casperson had made a call and put the tabloid on his trail.

  “First of all, nobody’s making a movie about me. It’s an adaptation based on a case I worked on, but Evan Grave is not Jonathan Stride. And second of all, I’m nobody’s hero, believe me.”

  “Even better,” JoLynn replied. “People love strong men with flaws.”

  “The point is, I have no interest in anybody doing a story about me.”

  She shrugged. “No offense, Lieutenant, but that’s not how it works. I’m not asking for permission. I’m doing the story. If you won’t let me interview you, that’s unfortunate, but I’ll find other sources. However, I’d prefer to have your voice as part of it. I want to know what you have to say. Readers will want to know, too.”

  Stride leaned forward in the chair and put his hands on his knees. “Whose idea was this? Yours?”

  “Of course. You’re the man behind the mask. Dean Casperson is playing you. That’s news.”

  “Following me secretly feels like stalking, not reporting,” Stride said.

  “I was going to approach you about an interview, but once you know I’m there, you behave differently. Everybody does; it’s human nature. I wanted a chance to observe you before you realized you were going to be the subject of a profile. I wanted to see the real you.”

  “What you see is what you get with me,” Stride said.

  “Okay. So can I ask you some questions?”

  “You can ask. I won’t guarantee that I’ll answer.”

  “Do you mind if I tape this?”

  “Yes, I do mind,” he replied.

  “It’s only to make sure I get the quotes right.”

  “I’ll speak slowly,” Stride said.

  JoLynn smiled and leaned way back in the chair. She grabbed a hotel pen and chewed on it thoughtfully. She wiggled her toes on the bed. “You really are interesting. Dean is a good choice to play you.”

  “How well do you know him?”

  “Dean? Pretty well. I’ve been to their place in Captiva a few times. He and Mo are about as open as celebrities get. They make my job easy.”

  “He doesn’t have any secrets?” Stride asked. “I thought people want strong men with flaws.”

  JoLynn’s pale eyes saw right through him. “Just who’s interviewing whom, Lieutenant?”

  He shrugged. “What do you want to know?”

  “Let’s start with your work as a cop. I heard you went off a bridge a few years ago during a fight with a killer. You almost died.”

  “True.”

  “That’s pretty amazing. Did you think about quitting?”

  “I thought about it on the way down,” Stride said.

  “Funny. Is that how you deflect serious things? With jokes?”

  “Going off that bridge nearly destroyed my life in a lot of ways. So no, there’s nothing funny about it.”

  “You’ve had failures in your career, right? Criminals you haven’t caught? Mistakes you’ve made?”

  “Plenty.”

  “How do you deal with regrets? How do you let your failures go?”

  “I never let them go,” Stride said. “As soon as you do that, you run the risk of making the same mistake again. The trick is learning to live with them. I’m still working on that.”

  “Was the Art Leipold case a success or a failure? I mean, you caught him, but three women died before you did.”

  “Obviously, it was both.”

  “You’d known Art ever since you were a young detective, right? He reported on some of your earliest cases. And you never once suspected he was the killer?”

  “No, I never did.”

  “How did that change you?” she asked.

  “Well, for one thing, I learned not to trust reporters.”

  “There you go again,” JoLynn said. “Making jokes. It’s like a defense mechanism, huh? What about your personal life? Your job must take a toll. You’ve been married three times.”

  “I don’t think I like where this is going,” Stride told her.

  “Your first wife, Cindy, died. Then you married a Duluth teacher, but that only lasted three years. The people I’ve interviewed say you don’t talk about that marriage much. Is it because it ended when you cheated on her with the detective you’re married to now? Serena?”

  Stride stood up. “Okay. We’re done.”

  “But then you cheated on Serena, too, right? Before the two of you got married? I heard you slept with your Chinese partner.”

  He headed for the hotel room door, but JoLynn’s legs blocked him where they were propped on the bed. “Let me through,” he told her.

  “I’m not trying to roast you, Lieutenant. I just want the whole story.”

  “I told you, the interview’s over. Move your legs.”

  “What’s with the girl? Cat? That must have raised some eyebrows, huh? A teenage prostitute moving in with one of the city’s top cops.”

  He knew she was baiting him. And she was good at it. She wanted him to fly off the handle, to say something he’d regret. Or worse, he would do what he really wanted and physically throw her out of his way. He pushed down the anger he felt and kept his voice calm and cold.

  “Move. Your. Legs.”

  JoLynn shrugged in resignation. She turned sidewise, and he headed for the door. He threw it open and marched into the hallway. As the door slammed shut, he heard the reporter calling after him in a sunny voice.

  “See you in the papers, Lieutenant!”

  17

  In the parking lot outside the Ritz, Maggie found that she and Cab had twin Corvettes. She’d rented a yellow one. His was candy-red with an odd personalized license plate: catcha.

  “CATCHA?” she asked. “Is that the guy who gets balls from the pitcha?”

  Cab smiled as he held the passenger door open so that she could climb inside. He was elegantly polite. “Actually, my colleagues on the police gave me a nickname that followed me for a while. Catch-a-Cab. I moved around a lot. Never stayed in one place for more than a year or two.”

  “You’ve been in Florida for a while, haven’t you?”

  “Yes, I guess I’ve settled down. Hence the license plate. I try to embrace the worst things people say about me. And it’s not like I can complain about nicknames, because I’m notorious for coming up with them myself.”

  “You give people nicknames?” Maggie asked.

  “I know; it’s not my most appealing trait. I get it from my mother. She referred to Lala Mosqueda as Waw
a from the moment we started dating. She knew that it drove Lala crazy.”

  “I’m known for handing out nicknames, too,” Maggie admitted, thinking of the Gherkin.

  “Well, I guess you’re like my twin, Sergeant.”

  “Call me Maggie,” she said.

  They drove north. Cab took the I-75 on his way to Clearwater, where his mother lived. It was almost a three-hour drive, but at the speed Cab drove, she figured they would be there in barely over two. She’d always considered herself a fast driver, but Cab left her in the dust.

  “So you and Detective Mosquito are an item?” she asked on the highway.

  “Off and on. At the moment, off.”

  “I just got out of a relationship, too.”

  “Well, I’ve never been known for my stable romantic attachments,” Cab said. “That’s another thing I have in common with my mother.”

  “I was accused of murdering my husband,” Maggie said. “Can you top that?”

  “Did you actually kill him?” he asked.

  “I thought about it, but no.”

  “Then I can top that,” Cab told her. “I shot and killed my girlfriend in Spain. Turns out she was a terrorist.”

  Maggie’s head swiveled to see if he was joking. He wasn’t. “Wow.”

  “I spent a lot of years running away from that, but I’m done running.”

  Maggie was quiet for the next few miles. She found it disorienting to be speeding along the Florida freeway with this charming and handsome man while the rest of her life was buried in snow 2,000 miles away. It felt like a vacation from reality. She also felt a glimmer, just a glimmer, of what it might be like to be part of a world away from Duluth. That was something she had never considered before.

  She and Cab talked easily along the way. She liked him the way someone from the desert finds the mountains foreign and irresistible. He told her stories, and she did the same. She even went so far as to explain her star-crossed crush on Stride and how that particular fever had broken after their short-lived affair. He told her about the case on which he’d met Peach Piper, and it was obvious that he’d thought about the girl as a younger sister.