The Love Killings by Robert Ellis Page B

truth was that Matt thought the doctor had been trying to play him the same way he played the detectives investigating the murder cases in LA. Baylor had done everything he could to make everyone involved think that another man, Jamie Taladyne, was responsible for the three women he murdered in Hollywood and the Valley. Taladyne died at the hands of the police before Matt was able to see through the doctor and single him out.
    Matt had reached this conclusion six hours ago after watching the doctor’s car vanish down Sugartown Road. He’d made two calls, first to 911, and then to Kate Brown. It had taken less than ten minutes for the township’s first response units to arrive. But it had taken almost an hour before anyone from the city made it to the Holloways’ mansion in the suburbs. An hour Matt had used to reexamine the crime scene on his own and process what he thought had happened here tonight.
    He looked up and caught Dr. Westbrook staring at him through those thick glasses of his. He could see suspicion showing on the man’s face, and wasn’t sure if he liked him any more than Rogers. The two men seemed to have a great deal in common.
    Matt turned back to Doyle, still pacing, still tossing something over in his mind.
    “After Baylor tried to persuade you that his connection to both murders was a coincidence, what happened next?”
    “I tried to convince the doctor to turn himself in.”
    “How?” Doyle asked. “What did you say?”
    “He wanted to see my gunshot wounds. He wanted to see how they were healing.”
    Westbrook broke in. “Any show of concern or kindness is an act,” he said. “Dr. Baylor is a psychopath. Showing concern is just another tool in the madman’s bag of tricks.”
    Matt didn’t think so, but kept his mouth shut.
    Doyle stopped and turned and shot the psychiatrist an odd look. “It seems to me that this is more than a trick, Westbrook. How do you explain the fact that Dr. Baylor saved Jones’s life in LA?”
    Dr. Westbrook shook his head. “I can’t,” he said. “But I’ve never met a psychopath who wasn’t a manipulator. I’ve never met one who wasn’t a great role player. They know how to push buttons to get what they want, and they’re good at it.”
    Doyle nodded. “Point taken,” he said as he turned back to Matt and started pacing again. “Okay, Jones. Baylor examined your gunshot wounds. What did you say that you hoped might convince him to turn himself in?”
    “I told him that there had to be something left inside him because he did save me. He saved me twice.”
    “Anything else?”
    Matt stood up and leaned against the windowsill. “I told him that his story defied the imagination. No one would ever believe that he just happened to show up at the Strattons’ on the night they were murdered, and then again tonight at the Holloways’ with the bodies still warm. I told him that time was running out. That ever since his escape, the FBI has known that he’s not who he says he is. That everyone believes he murdered the real Dr. George Baylor fifteen years ago in Chicago. That the two of them may have met while attending medical school. That he was from somewhere on the East Coast and obviously running from something in his past that required a new identity.”
    “Where did you learn all that?” Doyle asked.
    “I was given access to the website before I was shot.”
    “How did Baylor react?”
    Matt paused a moment. He could still see the expression on the doctor’s face. He could still hear his voice.
    “He said that I needed him.”
    Doyle turned and gasped incredulously. “He what?”
    Matt reached into his pocket and opened a fresh pack of nicotine gum. Everyone in the room was staring at him.
    “He said that I still needed him. I just didn’t know it yet.”

CHAPTER 18
    Matt wasn’t exactly sure, but he thought that he’d lost his footing. He thought that he’d missed something while talking to Dr. Baylor and that it was