by Laurel Dewey
“How did you find Bailey since he changed his last name?”
Sam grinned. His body relaxed slightly. Finally, there was someone in front of him who was willing to listen to him. “I figured the little cocksucker would change his name. Don’t we all do that, thinking it’s going to give us a fresh start? I changed my name from Kolenkoff to Cole so I could fit in. I got to thinking of all the possibilities. He could have shortened it to Webb but that was too close to the real name. And then I remembered his mother’s name because the Van Gordens were a fixture in Short Hills. I put the two together and did some searching on the Internet and even added Webber just for kicks and then… Wow! Bingo! Jackpot! There he was in all his glory on that damn video!”
Jane realized at that moment that Bailey unconsciously created the perfect storm of words within the text of his video by using the tags, “Bailey Van Gorden” and “Webber”—albeit mistakenly for “Weber”—making it easy for someone savvy like Sam to locate him.
“I searched the video link to see if it appeared anywhere else. That took some creative thinking but I eventually found several other websites where it was linked and I quickly figured out what Bailey was really after.”
“Gay websites?”
“Yeah.” His eyes shone with mischief. “So, I knew how to play him. I contacted him via email using a fake name. He liked what he heard, I guess, because he asked to meet me at this strip club. I was in Chicago so I told him I needed a few days to get time off work. That seemed to excite him to think I would travel a distance just to meet him. It stroked his ego.”
“I bet it did.”
“I had a lot of vacation time built up from the funeral home I work at and so I decided to take it. And we met. I decided I would play a role so I wouldn’t let my anger take over until the right time. It was easier than I thought. He took my nervousness as excitement. But I told him I liked to get to know my customers before I agree to the final deal. And since he likes to hear himself talk and he talks even more when he’s drinking, I got to hear a whole lot of important information.” Sam’s eyes narrowed. “When he said he had a son, his only child, I couldn’t believe it! My plan for revenge started at that moment! It was perfect! I followed him back to his home one night and he didn’t even notice. For one week, I sat in the shadows and I watched who came and went from that house. It didn’t take more than a day for me to see his kid sneaking out and walking into town or heading over to the bridge. The more I watched his son, the more he reminded me of Bailey. And I hated him even more for that! But I couldn’t let him know that yet. I knew I had to act like a friendly face to draw him into my web. So one day, when Jake was on the bridge, I just happened by and we struck up a conversation. Nothing important. Just chatter. But it worked. It was obvious that the kid was hungry for someone to talk to. And I was more than happy to give him exactly what he wanted.” Sam patted his bloody leg, pressing the open wound back and forth with his fingers. “I was gonna take him that day, but I knew I needed at least one more visit with him to make him feel safe. I didn’t want him to fight me until I could control him. And then, fate intervened. I was waiting on the bridge for him one night, and there he shows up with a goddamned rope. I couldn’t believe it. My whole plan was imploding in front of me. He swung that rope over the bridge beam and stood up on that rail. I bolted from my car and grabbed him. I told him we’d go somewhere and talk. I could see he was desperate, and I knew that he’d do whatever I told him. Desperation is a manipulator’s best friend, don’t you know?” Sam sat back on his hands. “And the rest…well, you know the rest.”
“The clues.”
“It was my time! Like Thomas Wolfe, I published my revelations about the Webber family for all to see in hopes that they would finally acknowledge what happened to me!” He forced his hand through his thick, tangled red locks. “But nothing happened! There was one news conference. One! And nothing in the papers! Not even two sentences! You think that if you take a man’s son and you let him know that you mean business, that he’s gonna say or do something! But he does nothing!” Sam screamed. “Nothing!!” He buried his head in his hands. “All I wanted was for him to feel a little bit of what I felt over forty years ago! And he won’t even give me that!!” Sam looked at Jane, weariness painted on his face. “So, I do what I have to do. I tell his son everything. For several days, I tell him every dirty little secret about his family. But it gave me no pleasure. It just made the pain come back and hit me harder. And so, this morning, I gave up. I took that photo into town and left it where I knew it would be found.” He turned away. “And then I came here.”
Jane leaned forward. “Where’s Jake?”
Sam eyed her with suspicion. “What do you mean? You saw the photo.”
“Yeah. And I know it’s not Jake.”
“Of course, it is.”
“No, Sam. Jake has a tattoo of a dragonfly over his heart. That body has no tattoo.”
“It’s black and bloated. The tattoo must be obscured…”
“If you look very carefully through a loupe, you can see the outer edge of the stainless steel table underneath the sheet. You took that photo of a dead body in the morgue where you work.” Sam looked like a deer in the headlights. “That was all part of your advance plan, wasn’t it? Your clues were so well thought out. Every second was planned, including the climactic photo, should the need arise. You might have fantasized about torturing Jake and making him suffer, but I don’t think you did.” Sam hung his head. “I think you realized he was already tortured, especially when you saw him trying to hang himself.” Jane stood up. “I’ve never met Jake, but I know that kid pretty well now. And I imagine you and he hit it off pretty damn well.” Sam’s face gave him away. “So, I just need to know where he is.”
“He told me he doesn’t want to be found anymore.”
“I understand that. But do you want him to get hurt?”
Tears flowed down Sam’s face. “No.”
“Then tell me where he is.” Sam hung his head. “Look, I know what it feels like to be fifteen years old and all alone and abandoned. I know what it did to me, Sam. I know what it did to you. And I don’t want that to happen to Jake.”
Jane drove back toward Midas with Sam seated in the passenger seat. She dialed Weyler’s cell number and told him in the vaguest of terms to get into a patrol car alone and meet her in front of the Sunshine Mountain Lodge cabins just off the highway, which was located twelve miles from town. He arrived just minutes after Jane pulled up to the high mountain hideaway. She got out of the Mustang and walked around to the passenger side, opening the door. Sam’s injured leg was wrapped in the poplin shirt Jane had tossed into her car several nights before. Weyler took in the scene, not sure what was going on.
“Sam,” Jane said, “this is Sergeant Morgan Weyler.” She turned to Weyler. “Boss, this is Sam Cole.” Weyler’s eyes widened. “Before you bust a gasket, you gotta trust me on this one.” Jane started up the steep hill that led to the cabins.
“Jane!” Weyler called out. “What in the hell…”
“Please! You gotta trust me!” she yelled back as she ran up the hill and turned right. She jogged to the last cabin on the dirt lane. Sam said the door would be unlocked and he was telling the truth. Jane walked inside the low-ceiled, sparse bungalow. Just as Sam described, there was a bathroom to the left, next to a small kitchen. To the right was the living room and then a yellow door which led to an attached bedroom and bathroom. “Jake?” Jane called out. She tried the door and found it locked. “Jake?” She put her ear to the thin door and thought she heard movement. “I’m coming in,” she yelled as she stood back and gave the door a hard kick, busting the lock and swinging the door wide open.
She held back, taking a quick glance of the tiny room and seeing no one. “Jake?” she said with urgency. She noted a trashcan near the single bed. Inside was one of the vintage shirts, shredded to pieces. A plaid fedora lay on top of the shirt, also destroyed. Jane was almost positive she
could hear the breath of another person close by. She hunkered down and tried to see if there was movement under the bed. “Jake? My name’s Jane. I’m a cop and I want to help you.” She stepped into the room, but when she cleared the small bathroom on the right, she was tackled from behind. She fell forward, stunned, as she felt her Glock being stripped from her rear waistband. Jane flipped over on her back and looked up into the eyes of Jake Webber.
CHAPTER 37
Jake’s hands shook as he grasped the Glock and aimed it at Jane’s chest.
“You shouldn’t have come here!” he screamed.
“Jake, put down the gun!”
“Fifteen more minutes and I would have been gone!”
“Where are you going?”
“Away!” he yelled, still training the Glock on Jane with an unsteady hand.
“How are you going to do that?”
“I’ll hitchhike.”
“How far?”
“Far enough!”
“What are you gonna use for money, Jake?”
“Sam gave me five hundred bucks.”
“That was decent of him.” She sat up and Jake jerked the Glock forward. “Hey, hey, hey…take it easy! That gun’s got a hair trigger. Can I please just get up and sit on the bed?”
Jake nervously watched her. “Okay. But don’t you try anything with me.”
“Don’t worry,” she said, methodically standing up and sitting down on the single bed. “Five hundred bucks won’t last you long, Jake.”
Jake moved across from Jane, holding the Glock on her the whole time. “I’ll get a job. I’ll wash dishes, do odd jobs, whatever it takes.”
Jane noticed the jagged line in the back of his hair where Sam cut off the kid’s ponytail. “Sounds good, but you look real young for your age. How are you going to explain why you’re alone and need work?”
He clearly hadn’t thought of that. “I’ll figure that out when it happens. I’m changing my name, too, just in case anyone heard about me from the TV.”
Jane turned away. “Oh, shit…”
“What?”
“Change your name? And the beat goes on, Jake. Hey, I got an idea. Use your mother’s maiden name. That worked real well for your dad!”
He took a shaky seat in a chair, still keeping the gun on Jane. “I can’t go back there and live with those people.”
“I agree. But running is not going to fix your problem either. You read those books, Jake…the ones that Jordan gave you? If you run away, you’ll just play right into the family pattern. And everything you despise today, you will repeat in the months and years to come. Guaranteed.”
The kid started to cry, still holding the Glock, but his intention dimming as his emotions took over. “Do you have any idea what it’s like to find out the darkest secrets about your family history?” He glanced to the trashcan and the tattered shirt and fedora.
“Yeah. Actually, I do. It sucks. And it sucks worse when they’re dead. But you’re the one who bought the Truth poster. You’re the one who wanted to know it all.” Jake dissolved into a flood of tears. Jane reached forward and gingerly removed the Glock from his trembling hand and stuffed it in the rear waistband of her jeans. “You know, somebody recently told me that awareness is a demanding mistress. Once she wakes you up, she won’t let you go back to sleep.”
“Sounds like something Jordan would say.”
“That’s because he’s the one who said it. And it’s true, Jake. Once you discover the truth, you can never go back to the way it was before. Life…” She considered her own personal predicament. “God, life is forever changed. And it’s gonna take a while to see that life through new eyes. But give yourself some time and you can do it.”
Jake buried his head in his hands. “My bloodline has cursed me!” he cried. Suddenly, in a wave of rage, he stood up and kicked the trashcan hard against the wall.
Jane reached over and grabbed his hands. “No, Jake. The curse ceases to operate once you bring it into the light and expose it.”
He looked at her with beseeching eyes. “For real?”
She nodded. “For real, Jake.”
He thought about it. “How do you know for sure?”
“Because I feel it in my heart. You should understand that more than anyone. You chose to have the dragonfly tattooed over your heart so you’d always remember to be the light in the darkness. But before you can do that, you said you’d have to bust through the illusions. That’s what Liora told me, at least.”
“God, I miss her,” he said, choking on tears.
“I can fix that.” Jane said, standing up. “You coming?”
“I’m not pressing charges against Sam. I’ll stand up in court for him and I’ll be a hostile witness if I have to.”
“I’d expect nothing less from you, Jake.”
He stood up and walked toward the front door, glancing back at Jane’s Groovy T-Shirt. “Liora’s got a shirt just like that.”
“Is that right?”
Weyler’s eyes widened as Jane walked Jake down the dirt path and toward the two cars.
“Holy mother of God,” Weyler said. “You think you might have shared this with me, Jane?”
Jake reunited with Sam, touching him softly on his shoulder.
“It all happened pretty fast,” Jane admitted, standing back and staring at Sam and Jake. “Well, boys, this is what we call a predicament.” She turned away, considering the possibilities. “But I’m in the mood today to give everyone what they want and maybe a little bit of what they need as well.” She turned to Weyler. “And I mean everyone.” Jane thought her plan through. “Maybe if I can get you guys to cooperate and maybe another guy… maybe we can close out this day on a better note than it started.” Sam and Jake nodded. Jane sidled up to Weyler. “First thing I have to do is send a text to Bo’s cell phone. You have his number?”
“Sure.” Weyler brought out his phone. “What are you going to say?”
“This has got to be his catch.”
“Agreed.”
“So I’m going to tell him to meet us at the jail in thirty minutes.”
Bo looked taken aback when he got out of his patrol car and met Jane and Weyler. He hadn’t even seen Jake and Sam yet.
“Which one of you texted me?” he carefully asked.
“I did, Bo,” Jane said.
He looked at her with fearful eyes.
“We need your help, Bo,” Weyler broke in. “Jane’s got a plan but we need you to help make it happen.”
Bo still looked shell-shocked.
“Bo?” Jane said quietly.
“What?” Bo asked, his mind elsewhere.
“Can you help us?”
He nodded. “Whatever you need.”
“Well, first, old friend,” Weyler said, putting his arm around Bo’s shoulder and walking him around the back of the jail complex, “we need to introduce you to two important people.”
Bo looked up. “Holy shit.”
It took Weyler and Jane half an hour to work out an agreement between Bo and Sam. After that, they parted and Bo called Bailey to come down to the jail immediately. “Come alone,” Bo insisted to Bailey.
Bailey arrived ten minutes later, freshly coiffed, flush-faced and obviously congested. He was agitated with Bo, telling him that he had an important client he had to meet. But Bo explained to Bailey that Jordan Copeland asked to see him and make an on-camera confession regarding the kidnapping and murder of his son. When Bo insisted that this could wrap it all up, Bailey acquiesced. He led Bailey down the short hallway that led to the interrogation room and assured him that he and others would be on the other side of the mirrored wall watching and capturing the statement on video. Bo opened the door and Bailey walked in. As the door closed, Bailey heard the lock click loudly.
He turned and saw Jordan standing with his back to him, his trademark oilcloth duster covering his body and a hood covering the back of his head. Bailey brusquely pulled out a chair and plopped down, checking the cam
era with the red light on in the corner of the room so he could feature his best side. He folded his arms across his crisp white shirt and leaned back in the chair so that it balanced precariously on the back two legs. “Okay, old man. You said you wanted to see me. Tell me your confession.”
The man turned and removed the hood, revealing his face.
“You’re not Jordan Copeland,” Bailey said, dropping the chair back on four legs.
“Remember me?” Sam asked, his tenor confident.