“Me.”
For the first time that night, Tracey Henley gave way to tears.
CHAPTER EIGHT
DANNY MCGUIRE LOOKED UP FROM THE file in front of him as if he’d just seen a ghost. He’d been reading, in total silence, for the last twenty minutes.
“How did you hear about this case?”
Matt Daley shrugged. “I read about it online. I got interested in the Jakes case and I…well, I came across it. The Henley killing was a big deal in England. There was a lot of press at the time.”
“What exactly is your interest in the Jakes case, Mr. Daley?” Danny asked. “You never said in your e-mails.”
“I’m a writer. I’m fascinated by unanswered questions.”
Danny’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. “You’re a journalist?”
“No, no, no, a screenwriter. TV. Comedy, mostly.”
Danny looked suitably surprised. He nodded toward the file. “Not much to laugh about in here.”
“No,” Matt agreed. “But I also have a personal connection. Andrew Jakes was my father.”
Danny did a double take. Had Andrew Jakes had children? It took him a few moments to dredge up the memory. That’s right. There’d been a first wife, decades before he met Angela. One of the junior members of his team had gone to check out the lead but obviously thought it was nothing significant. Was there a kid? I guess there must have been.
“I never knew him,” Matt explained. “Jakes and my mother divorced when I was two. My stepfather adopted and raised me and my sister, Claire. But biologically, I’m a Jakes. Do you see any family resemblance?”
An image of Andrew Jakes’s almost severed, graying head lolling from his torso flashed across Danny’s mind. He shivered.
“Not really, no.”
“When I learned my father had been murdered, I got curious. And once I started reading up on the case, I was hooked.” He grinned. “You know how addictive it can be, an unsolved mystery.”
“I do,” Danny admitted. And how painful. This guy seems nice, but he’s so eager, like a Labrador with a stick. He wouldn’t look so happy if he’d seen the bloody carnage in that bedroom. The bodies trussed together. Jakes’s head hanging from his neck like a yo-yo on a string.
“When I read about the Henley case, I tried to get in touch with you, but that’s when I learned you’d left L.A. I tried Scotland Yard directly, but they weren’t too helpful. Didn’t want to talk to some crackpot American writer any more than the LAPD did.” Matt Daley smiled again, and Danny thought what a warm, open face he had. “You cops sure know how to close ranks when the shit hits the fan.”
That’s true, thought Danny, remembering his own years in the wilderness, begging for help finding Angela Jakes, before he joined Interpol. It felt like a lifetime ago now.
“Anyway, it took me awhile after that to track you down. I couldn’t believe it when I discovered you were at Interpol. That you were actually in a position to help me.”
Danny McGuire frowned. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. I agree that the two cases have similarities. But for my division to get involved, for Interpol to authorize an IRT, we have to be approached by a member country’s police force directly.
Matt leaned forward excitedly. “We’re not talking about ‘similarities.’ These crimes are carbon copies. Both the murder victims were elderly, wealthy men, married to much younger wives. Both wives were raped and beaten. Both wives conveniently disappeared shortly after the attacks. Both estates wound up going to charity. No convictions. No leads.”
Danny McGuire felt his heart rate began to quicken.
“Even so,” he said lamely, clutching at straws. “It could be a coincidence.”
“Like hell it could. The guy even used the same knot on the rope he used to tie the victims together.”
A double half hitch. Danny McGuire put his head in his hands. This couldn’t be happening. Not after ten years.
“Look, I know you have procedures you have to follow,” said Matt Daley. “Protocol and all that. But he’s still out there, this maniac. Matter of fact,” he announced, playing his trump card, “he’s in France.”
“What do you mean?” Danny asked sharply. “How could you possibly know something like that?”
Matt Daley leaned back in his chair. “Two words for you,” he said confidently. “Didier Anjou.”