Killer Ambition

32

Bailey pulled the still photo of Stuart Connor out of her jacket and put it on the table. I studied it again. It was lousy quality, a grainy black and white, typical of the cheaper variety of surveillance cameras. The guy seemed to be slender, medium tall like Brian, and had a similarly shaped head. But his hair was covered with a baseball cap that also obscured his features, so I couldn’t really see much. We’d tried to match the photo to the DMV and criminal databases, but it just didn’t have enough detail. I didn’t expect to find a great match in these records either, but I hoped we might spot someone who was worth at least a second look.

“I’ll start on the bottom shelf,” I said. “You can take the next one up.”

We worked methodically, looking at the photos in each file for someone who might match the guy in the video. Three hours later we had a stack of twelve “possibles.” Bailey asked Pete to come in. This time he was freshly showered and dressed in the beige studio uniform.

“Can you tell us whether any of these guys called in sick or took days off in the past week?” Bailey asked.

“Let’s take those to my office and I’ll check. I keep the daily logs on my computer.”

Pete was able to eliminate nine of them right off the bat. “Those guys have all checked in every day for the past five days. The other three…not sure. If they have off-site work to do, they might not come in, but that doesn’t mean they left town or anything.”

“No, but you’ve narrowed it down pretty well. Thanks, Pete. I’ll run the other three,” Bailey said.

Pete said he had rounds to make and left us, saying we could stay in his office as long as we liked. Bailey called in the information on the three remaining “persons of interest” and I thought about what we had so far.

When she got done, I shared my thoughts. “We’ve been thinking this was too much for one person to manage, right?”

“Right.”

“But we don’t know how someone got wind of the kidnapping. And we don’t know why the kids wound up on Boney Mountain.”

“Still with ya.”

“How’d the killer get them up there?”

Bailey shook her head. “Unless that’s where they’d planned to do the money drop all along.”

“In which case, the ransom drop in Fryman Canyon was what, a decoy?”

“Well…at least a way to separate the kids from the money,” I said.

“But how would the bad guy keep Russell from getting the real ransom note? The one that theoretically said, ‘Drop the money at God’s Seat’?”

The ring of Bailey’s cell phone saved me from having to answer. She made notes on the little pad she keeps in her jacket pocket as she listened.

“We’ve got two hits,” she said when she hung up. “One is for Nima Faluja.” She tapped his file. “He’s got a prior for shoplifting. Record was expunged a few years ago. The other is for Jack Averly. He’s a dope dealer. Got two convictions. Completed probation on his second case last year.”

I looked at both files again. “Really, it could be either of them.”

“I might’ve agreed, except Nima has a pretty good alibi.”

I looked at Bailey. “In jail?”

Bailey smiled.

I picked up Jack’s file. He was a production assistant. Those are usually aspiring writers, directors, actors, you name it, who get their asses thrashed for more hours and less money than they could make as waiters or waitresses. But I supposed it could also be someone who just wanted to work around the “industry”-or who wanted to deal to the “industry.” That’d be a fairly lucrative gig with all the highly paid, neurotic types floating around. And being a PA would be great cover for a dope dealer. “We’ve got an address for him, but-”

“If he’s our guy, I can’t see him coming back here. At least not yet.”

“But he doesn’t know we’ve got his real name, and unless he’s got a passel of fake IDs, he might have to use it now-”

“I’m calling NYPD,” Bailey said.

She gave all the information to Abe Furtoni and then called LAPD and did the same. “On the off chance he comes back here.”

Bailey made a copy of everything in his file, and just as she was finishing up, Pete came back. His formerly crisp uniform had wilted from the strain of Pete’s once again overheated body. He wiped his forehead when he came in. “Whew. Still hot as blazes out there. So what do you think? Anyone look good to you?” he asked.

“Can’t tell yet,” Bailey said. “But would you mind keeping this on the down low for now?”

“Not a bit.”

We thanked Pete for his help and he wished us luck. “And try to stay cool out there.”

There was no chance of that.

Bailey started the engine so we could get the air-conditioner running, and as I adjusted all the vents to face me, she pulled out her cell. “I’m going to see what we can find in this guy’s name. Car, cell phone, residence. See if it matches what we found in his file.”

“Great, but first…” I pulled out my personal cell phone and entered a number.

I waited while the phone rang. On the third ring, a voice answered. I put the phone on speaker.

“Yeah?”

“Hey, Jack,” I said, doing my best “bimbo babe” impression. “I been missing ya.”

I could hear a loudspeaker announcement in the background but couldn’t make out what it was saying.

“Who is this?” he asked, irritated and wary.

“Don’t you remember? We hooked up at the bar, in the hotel?”

“I don’t remember hooking up with anyone at any hotel, lady. You got the wrong number.”

The loudspeaker announcement sounded in the background again. Then he hung up. But that was okay, because this time I was able to make out the words. “Welcome to LaGuardia Airport…”