Cold-Blooded Liar, page 33
“Driscoll’s killer?” Navarro whispered.
“Same body type as the guy in Maureen’s video,” Kit whispered back. A sharp pain in her hand made her realize that she was gripping the cat-bird again. She withdrew her hand from her pocket, crossing her arms over her chest.
They’d see the man’s face any minute. Any second now.
The man walked toward the sofa, a glass tumbler in one hand. He sat next to Jaelyn, then turned his face toward the camera.
Kit leaned forward, shocked. “What the fuck?”
Because the face was Colton Driscoll’s.
“That’s . . .” Navarro sputtered. “What is this? His body type is all wrong.”
But the face was Driscoll’s, and the voice was Driscoll’s, too. He was smiling as he gave Jaelyn a glass of something dark and carbonated.
Kit had to remember to breathe. “What do you wanna bet he’s just roofied her?”
“Sucker bet,” Navarro said grimly.
The video rolled on and Jaelyn’s eyes drooped, then closed, her head lolling on the sofa’s back cushion.
Then the man with Driscoll’s face pulled a set of sparkly pink handcuffs from his back pocket. He snapped them on Jaelyn’s wrists and lowered her to the sofa.
Kit didn’t want to watch what happened next, but she kept her gaze on the screen as she bore witness to Jaelyn’s assault. So she won’t be alone, she thought, even though she knew that was foolish.
Tears burned Kit’s eyes and she blinked them away. Most of what was happening was being blocked by the back of the sofa, which was a small mercy. But they could see the man moving.
“Sonofabitch,” Navarro whispered, his voice breaking.
Kit nodded wordlessly, squeezing Ryland’s shoulder when the CSU leader shuddered out a ragged breath of his own.
The man arched his back as he finished, then shifted his body, sitting on the sofa at Jaelyn’s feet. Kit guessed he was zipping his pants back up from the way he moved. Leaving Jaelyn where she lay, he rose and approached the camera again, his body blocking the shot. Then he moved to the window, a martini glass in his hand.
The shot ended, abruptly shifting to the next clip. It was the same living room, but the shadows had changed. It was later in the day.
On the sofa, Jaelyn was stirring but appeared groggy and disoriented.
The man with Driscoll’s face reappeared, sitting on the sofa where he lifted Jaelyn so that she sat upright. He pulled the tie from his shirt collar and wrapped it around her throat while she struggled sluggishly.
Jaelyn was awake enough for him to see her fear, but not enough for her to have the strength to put up any kind of a fight. Not that she’d have been able to overpower the man. She was too small.
“Coward,” Kit whispered.
The man pulled the tie tight, holding until she finally stopped struggling.
He’d killed her.
Releasing the tie, he removed it from her neck and neatly retied it around his own, snugging up the knot. Driscoll’s face broke into a pleased grin that made Kit want to throw up.
She sat, breathing through the nausea. “Goddammit.”
He’d waited until Jaelyn had woken up to kill her. He could have done it while she was unconscious, but he hadn’t. He’d wanted to see her fear.
Ryland grabbed some tissues from the box on his desk and blew his nose before passing the box back to Kit. She wiped her own eyes and passed the box to Navarro, who did the same.
“What did we just watch?” she asked hoarsely. “It’s Driscoll’s face and voice, but that man is at least three inches shorter than Driscoll. Maybe four. Is the video faked?”
“I don’t know about all of it,” Ryland said, “but at least part of it—the man’s face—is definitely a deepfake.”
Shit. They were seeing “deepfakes” more and more frequently—videos in which one person’s face was superimposed on another person’s body. The technology was increasingly accurate, some of the fake videos nearly impossible to distinguish from the originals. The software was free and many deepfake producers needed only a fast computer and editing time to get the look they wanted.
The dangers presented by a well-done deepfake video could be disastrous. A husband seeing his wife having sex with another man? A politician saying something career-ending? A police official making a catastrophic announcement that was untrue? They could induce mass panic and violence.
It appeared that this deepfake was the commission of a real murder as well as an element of Driscoll’s fabricated life.
“How can you tell?” Navarro asked.
Ryland paused the video, the frame showing the fake Driscoll face. “Aside from the fact that this man is four inches shorter than Driscoll, the shadows on his face are all wrong. They don’t match the shadows in the room.”
Kit hadn’t even noticed. “But the rest?”
“I’d have to analyze it,” Ryland said. “The voice is dubbed, but the mouth movements match the words. I think the rest is real.”
“So Driscoll somehow obtained this video,” Kit said, “then superimposed his face on the killer’s and dubbed the audio?”
Ryland nodded. “That’d be my guess.”
“Can you see what’s underneath his face?” Navarro asked. “The real face?”
Ryland’s expression was both grim and full of regret. “No. We’d have to have the original, and this clearly isn’t it.”
Onscreen, the man with Driscoll’s face had hefted Jaelyn over his shoulder, her blond hair trailing down his back.
There were a few seconds of empty living room, then the video ended.
Kit pinched the bridge of her nose. “Driscoll used to be an IT person for a big firm in town before his temper got him fired. Could he have had the kind of expertise to do this?”
“Sure.” Ryland grabbed a bottle of ibuprofen from his desk drawer. “It’s easy for anyone familiar with photo editing to do. Time consuming, but not difficult. This is an excellent execution, though. Excepting the shadows, the head looks right on the body.”
“How did Driscoll get this video?” Kit asked. “Did he plant the cameras? Did he steal them from the killer? Did the killer record his kills for kicks? Did Driscoll do any of the murders or did he just claim this guy’s kills?”
“Good questions,” Navarro said wearily. “Let’s find out. Unfortunately, we’re going to have to watch the rest of the videos. Maybe some of them are originals.”
Ryland squared his shoulders. “Okay.”
Kit exhaled. It was going to be a very long night.
SDPD, San Diego, California
Wednesday, April 20, 8:45 a.m.
Kit looked up from her computer screen blearily as Connor Robinson sank into the chair beside her. He looked like shit. Just like everyone else looked after watching Colton Driscoll’s videos for nearly five hours.
“You okay?” she asked. She’d called Connor and Howard in to help sort through the video evidence and they’d divided the task with the CSU techs.
“Not really. This is some seriously sick shit.”
So far, they’d witnessed the rape and murder of seven teenage girls, all appearing to have been killed within the last five years. Cecilia Sheppard was the most recent, having gone missing eight months before. They’d identified Jaelyn Watts, of course, and Naomi Beckham as well. There were three victims between Jaelyn and Naomi, all tentatively identified using their photos in the missing-person reports.
The oldest video—so far—showed the assault and murder of Rochelle Hamilton, who’d gone missing five years ago. Miranda Crisp and Ricki Emerson, who’d disappeared seven and ten years before respectively, were not in any of the videos, nor were the two Jane Does discovered thirteen and fifteen years before. This led them to believe that Driscoll had begun recording the murders five years ago. Or, if the killer had made the recordings, Driscoll hadn’t gained access until five years ago.
Of the new victims they’d discovered this night, none had drama club included in their missing-person reports, but they’d follow up with the families to find out. There were no bodies for these victims, though, and that meant that the families still wouldn’t have complete closure.
“I know,” Kit said, trying to shove the images she’d viewed into a box in her mind, but it was hard. They’d all been so young. So hopeful. Until they’d accepted a drink from their killer.
It broke her heart.
“I had to stop,” Connor said raggedly. “I’ll watch more later. Driscoll was one sick SOB.”
“Yeah.” Kit rubbed her sore eyes. She’d cried a lot, and she hadn’t been the only one. Connor had cried, too, which had softened the edges of his frat boy persona. “Where’s Howard?”
“He went home for a little while. Said he needed to recharge, but he’d be back soon to finish watching.”
Because although they’d reviewed seven of the hard drives, they still had the contents of eight hard drives to view. Half of the thirty they’d found were duplicates, and that had been a relief. Having to watch the suffering of seven victims had been devastating. Watching thirty . . . Kit didn’t want to think about it.
Colton hadn’t only spliced his own face onto the killer’s body. In the other videos on the hard drives they’d searched so far, he’d replaced the victims’ faces with those of his favorite celebrities.
He’d been able to watch himself doing unspeakable things to the famous people he’d bragged about knowing during his sessions with Sam Reeves.
Sam. He’d be wondering about what they’d found. Kit owed him an update. She’d find time today to tell him.
“Do you want to head home for some sleep?” Kit asked Connor.
“No. I’m too wired to sleep. What’re you looking at?”
Kit returned her attention to her screen. “The Orion School’s website. I need to have my ducks in a row in case your friend isn’t able to tell us anything.”
“She texted me back,” Connor said. “Said she’d call me this morning. She wanted to check with the scholarship recipient to make sure it was okay to give me her number. Do you want to listen in on the call?”
“If I can, yes. If I’m not around, don’t wait for me.”
He nodded, rolling his chair sideways to see her screen. “What did you find so far about Orion?”
“Nothing yet. I’d just clicked on it when you sat down.” She explored the menu, checking the admissions tab. “Auditions happen in front of a committee.” She noted the committee members’ names. “We’ll need to run background checks on them before we head to the school.” She glanced at him. “You up for a trip to high school?”
He grinned. “Hell yeah. This time the principal will have to listen to me and not the other way around.”
She chuckled. “I stayed far away from the principal’s office. Kept my head down. Just wanted to pass my classes and get out.” She moved from the admissions tab to the one labeled About Us. “These private schools have their own boards. This one has a board of trustees.” She clicked on it and gasped as one name stood out. “What the hell?”
“Oh,” Connor murmured. “That could be very good or very bad.”
Dr. Alvin Levinson. Their criminal profiler was on the board of the Orion School. “He never mentioned it when I talked to him Monday.”
“You didn’t know about Orion School on Monday.”
“True,” she said. “But if he knew about the drama world, he should have said something, shouldn’t he?”
Connor frowned. “You don’t seriously think he’s involved, do you?”
No. But the response was knee-jerk. Levinson’s one of us. He wouldn’t hurt anyone.
But was she sure about that? The man in the horrific videos with Driscoll’s face had the same build as Levinson. And he had gray hair and glasses. She swallowed hard, bile rising in her throat at the thought that he could be involved in any way. “No, I don’t think so,” she said uncertainly, “but I have to ask him what he knows about Orion scholarships.”
“Ask who about Orion scholarships?” Navarro asked, leaning on one corner of Kit’s desk. He’d been in the commander’s office for the past hour, updating the brass. They were going to have to do another press conference soon, admit that Colton Driscoll had been murdered and that he hadn’t acted alone. That a murderer was still out there, targeting young women. And that they had leads, but no suspects.
What they did have, though, was a mental health professional who had the same body type as their killer with a solid connection to the school at least one of their victims was so determined to attend.
Kit met her boss’s sharp gaze. “Dr. Levinson.”
Navarro’s brows nearly shot up off his forehead. “Al Levinson? What are you talking about?”
She pointed to her screen and Navarro came around to look, flinching in shock. “Why didn’t he mention he had a tie to a drama school on Monday?” he demanded.
“I don’t know,” Kit murmured. “But we’re going to ask.”
“You bet your ass we will. I’ve known Al for twenty years. There is no way he is involved in anything like this.”
“Same body type,” Kit said quietly.
Navarro shook his head. “He’s pushing seventy, Kit. There’s no way he’d have been able to get Colton Driscoll into that noose.”
“Driscoll’s killer created a pulley system with one of those ropes,” she pointed out reluctantly. “He didn’t need to bear Driscoll’s entire weight.”
“That’s ridiculous. There’s got to be a good reason he didn’t mention Orion,” Navarro said while dialing on his cell phone. “Hey, Al. Can you come into the office again this morning? It’s important.” He was quiet for a moment, then said, “See you then. We can meet in my office.” After saying goodbye, he slid his phone back into his pocket. “He’ll be here in half an hour. Run background checks on the rest of Orion’s board and the staff in the meantime.”
Kit hoped he was right. She liked Dr. Levinson. “Yes, sir.”
Navarro had started to walk away when Connor said, “Hey, boss. Wait.”
Navarro looked back at them, visibly bracing himself, because Connor’s tone was ominous. “Yes?”
Connor grimaced. “Another article by Tamsin Kavanaugh. She says that we’ve got a second killer and that Orion School is suspected of involvement in victim recruitment.”
“Motherfucker,” Navarro snarled. “Who’s her source?”
“Unnamed,” Connor said.
Kit took Connor’s phone and skimmed the article. “Her source could be Madison, the girl at Naomi Beckham’s school. She’s the one who wanted the audition for herself. She’s the only one who knows about the link between Naomi and the Orion School, other than the school principal and us.”
Navarro’s expression was one of tightly controlled fury. “Did Dr. Reeves know about Madison? Did he talk to her, too?”
Kit shook her head. “I’m sure I didn’t mention it. We only talked about Veronica Gadd, Driscoll’s fourth ex-wife.” And she’d asked him about Rita, but that wasn’t important to this conversation.
“Shit,” Connor hissed. “This is a disaster, boss. Orion’s never going to talk to us now. We’ll have to break through a wall of lawyers. We have to get in front of this.”
Navarro raked his hands through his hair. “You tried to call yesterday, right, Kit?”
“I did. Left a message with the front desk for the principal.”
“Then we’ve attempted to get their statement. Let’s get Levinson’s take on the school before you head over there.”
“And talk to Connor’s old friend,” Kit added. “She’s supposed to call him soon.”
Navarro nodded. “Good. Let’s gather what information we can before we go in.” He pointed to the two of them. “You two go together.” Then he went into his office to deal with what was sure to be angry brass.
“Could Kavanaugh have followed you again?” Connor asked quietly. “Or put a tracking device on you?”
Kit shook her head. “I mean, it’s possible. But I checked a car out of the garage. It wasn’t my car. She’d have had to know which one I was taking, and I didn’t even know.” She rubbed her temples. “We don’t have time for her shit.”
“We have to make time,” Connor said grimly. “Because she keeps getting the jump on places you’ve been and people you’ve talked to.”
He was right. Dammit. “She had to have followed me to Naomi’s school, just like she followed me to Driscoll’s house. Tamsin would have put two and two together, knowing I was working on the serial killer case.”
“Your psychologist also knew about Driscoll.”
She blinked. “Dr. Scott?”
Connor shook his head impatiently. “Reeves,” he snapped. “He’s known about Driscoll from the beginning. He went to Naomi Beckham’s house after you left there. What if he’s following you? What if he followed you to Naomi Beckham’s school and asked questions there, then told the press?”
She started to say that Sam would have no reason to reveal the information as it spotlighted him as the confidential informant, but stopped herself. Sam had told people that he was a suspect. She didn’t think he cared if anyone knew at this point. “Yes, he knew about Driscoll and Naomi Beckham. I don’t believe he’d go to the press, though.”
“I’m not so sure. I don’t know him like you do.”
There was something accusatory in his tone, and Kit frowned. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Just that you’ve trusted him with a lot of information, Kit.” He shook his head before she could comment. “Who else knew about Orion?”
“Principal Larkin was there when Madison was talking about the school, but I doubt she’d talk to a reporter, either. The more I think about it, the more I think that Madison called Tamsin Kavanaugh to get her fifteen minutes of fame.”
