CHAPTER 4

"Have you ever noticed that when someone gets murdered you always hear "everybody loved them"?" Matt wiped the corner of his mouth then took another bite of hamburger.

"Uh huh." Hoyt was declaring war on his fries. "But nine times out of ten they were killed by someone who held a grudge against them."

"But there's always that tenth time." Matt looked at his phone again. He hadn't heard anything from CJ and he was wondering how Catey was doing. Shoving a fry into his mouth, he punched CJ's number on speed dial. He could hear his daughter crying in the background when his wife answered. "Hey, how did it go?"

"The actual shots went fine, but she's running a little bit of fever right now." The concern in his wife's voice alarmed him a little.

"Did you give her the drops?"

"Yeah, but it was thirty minutes ago. I was hoping that it would help by now."

Matt put down his burger. "Are you home yet?"

"Yeah, we made it here about five minutes ago."

"Hoyt, we've reached the end of our visiting folks today haven't we?" Matt couldn't help but be concerned about his daughter.

"Yeah, I think we've covered that pretty well. Go on and take care of Catey."

"Hey Babe, I'm on the way. Yeah I know, but…but…" He was listening to CJ. "Well it might not make her feel better but it would make me feel better. I'll be there ASAP. Love you. 'Bye." The private investigator got up from the table and threw the contents of his tray into the trash.

"Houston, all she needs is a little acetaminophen and some sleep. She'll be okay." Hoyt had been through the same thing with his daughter, but this was Matt's first time having to deal with it.

"I know, but…she's crying, Hoyt. She hardly ever cries." He took a sip of his Fizzy Pop. "I know, I'm silly. It's just…" He shrugged his shoulders.

"Go make things right for your baby girl, Daddy." Hoyt grinned at him. "If it makes you feel any better, I did the same thing."

"Thanks. I'll work on reading the blog while I'm at home." He took off toward his house. After making the trip home in near record time, Matt walked in the kitchen door and could hear his daughter crying still. He walked into the den where CJ was holding her and doing her best to calm her but she wasn't having any part of it.

"Want to give it a try?" She handed Catey off to Matt and after a couple of minutes of talking to her she started to calm down, but only slightly.

"I've got an idea." He walked out through the kitchen and down toward the barn. CJ followed along, and it didn't take her long to figure out what Matt had in mind. By the time he reached the pasture fence, Cricket was already standing there whinnying. Catey absolutely adored Cricket and the horse seemed to feel the same way. As soon as the baby saw the horse she started to calm down. Cricket was craning her head over the top of the fence to be able to nuzzle the baby. After a few minutes of her dad rubbing her hand on the jaw of the horse, Catey yawned and snuggled into his chest, drifting off to sleep. Matt patted the horse. "Good job, Cricket." He turned and headed back up to the house with his daughter and carefully put her in the crib.

Going into the kitchen, Matt pulled CJ into his arms. "Phew. Thank goodness she loves Cricket so much." He grinned at his wife.

"Wish I had thought of that." She smiled up at her husband.

"Well it always makes me feel better to be around the horses when something is bothering me, so I thought it was worth a try." He leaned down, taking CJ's face into his hands and kissed her. "Hmmm, it's been a while since I was home in the middle of a workday." Matt wiggled his eyebrows at CJ.

"Yes, it has." She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him, then let out a slight squeal as he picked her up and carried her back to the bedroom.

Later on that afternoon, Matt grabbed a cup of coffee and walked into the den, picking up the laptop on the way to his recliner. He pulled up Sherri Betts' blog and went back three months and began reading. Most of what the girl had posted related to her boyfriend and her job. But along the way, Matt discovered that Sherri had been a pretty good poet. He wasn't a big fan of poetry, but he liked what the young woman had written. It made sense, unlike some of the drivel that he had been forced to read in high school and college. By the time he got to the next month he found what Connie Fitzgerald had been talking about – the guy that was stalking Sherri. At first she would see him while she was in the checkout line at the grocery but didn't think anything of it: if he lived in the neighborhood, he would probably shop at the market. Next she started seeing him when she left in her car or when she went to the movies or even out on a date with Logan. After she told her boyfriend about the man, he had approached him and asked in a nice way for him to stop following her. It had worked – for about a week. Then she started seeing him everywhere, he repeatedly asked her out, and that's when she threatened him with a restraining order. That had been about a month ago, and after that there were no more entries about the man. She had found out that his name was Darrel Vincent. Other than a vague description of him that could have matched literally thousands of men in the Los Angeles area, there was nothing else about him in the blog.

CJ came and sat down next to Matt after starting a load of laundry. "Something to do with the case?"

Matt nodded and explained what little he and Hoyt had learned so far, then looked up Darrel Vincent. "Um. Not exactly an unpopular name." Matt had found four Darrel Vincents in the phone listings in LA. He started checking on each one, and decided that the fourth one was the guy.

"This is interesting. He's been served with four restraining orders in the last four years. It seems like he picks a woman and starts following her. I wonder…" Matt punched a few more keys and was looking for obituaries for the women that had filed restraining orders against the man. "Oh boy, this is looking likely. CJ, three of the four women who filed restraining orders against him are dead." He pulled out his phone and called Hoyt.

"Hey bud, I think I might be on to something." He explained what he had found and Hoyt agreed with him.

"I think we need to bring this guy in for questioning." He took down the address that Matt gave him. "How's Catey doing?"

"She's asleep. Finally." Matt looked over at CJ and grinned. "Cricket took care of the problem for us."

"Cricket? How did a horse… why am I even bothering to ask?" Hoyt laughed. "I'm going to see about picking this guy up, want to come along?"

Matt looked over at CJ. "Do you think you girls will be okay?"

"Sure, now that I know the secret." She grinned. "You boys be careful."

"Alright, CJ says I can come out and play." He ducked as she swatted at him. "Be there in a little bit." He hung up and gave his wife a kiss. "Love you, Babe."

"Love you. Be careful."

"Yes ma'am, I always am." He kissed her and headed out the door. When he got to the police station, Hoyt had already gathered a couple of patrolmen to help them with Darrel Vincent. Matt had put on his bulletproof vest when he got out of the truck and had his pistol in his holster by the time Hoyt met him in the garage.

"Are we expecting trouble?" Hoyt was a little surprised.

"No, but I've been instructed to be careful by the boss." He grinned as he got into the car with Hoyt and they pulled out of the garage. It was a ten minute drive to the apartment of Darrel Vincent. He lived on the second floor of an older apartment building on Jefferson Boulevard. As they started into the building, Hoyt told one of the officers to guard the door. Just inside the building they noticed an out of order sign on the elevator and headed up the stairs. Approaching apartment 316, Matt unlashed his pistol as did the patrolman. Hoyt knocked on the door.

"Who is it?" The voice from inside was that of a younger male.

"LAPD." Hoyt held his badge up in front of the peephole.

"Whadaya want?"

"I need to speak with Darrel Vincent."

"He ain't here."

"Open the door, sir." Hoyt unfastened his pistol and removed it from the holster after noticing Matt removing his. They could hear movement on the other side of the door, then the sound of a shotgun being pumped.

"Look out!" Matt yelled at the other two men just before the apartment door exploded outward from the force of the round. He ducked down and took a quick glance through what was left of the door and pulled his head back just in time as another shot was fired. The next sound that they heard was glass shattering and then they heard the patrolman outside yelling and another shotgun blast. Hoyt ran into the apartment and looked out the window while Matt and the other patrolman ran downstairs and out into the parking lot, just in time to see an old Camaro squealing out of the parking lot at a high rate of speed. "Damn it!" Matt headed for Hoyt's car just as the detective got there and they took off after the Camaro. They lost it after a bus pulled in front of the police car, even though the lights were flashing and the siren was sounding.

Hoyt turned the car around and headed back to the apartment. "Guess this would give us plenty of probable cause, huh?" Matt pointed at the apartment door which looked like a picture frame holding a bunch of splinters. They went inside and started looking around. Matt headed for the bedroom and began looking around. He couldn't put his finger on it, but something about the room just seemed off, and after a minute or so of looking around, he figured out what it was: the man had turned the closet into a room by knocking out one of the support posts and extending in the direction of the bathroom. "How in the hell could the apartment manager not notice this?" He looked at Hoyt who shrugged.

"From the looks of this place I doubt the manager is a real stickler for inspecting the property." The cop followed Matt into the makeshift room and both men caught their breath as he turned on the light. There along the walls was what amounted to a timeline in the life of Sherri Betts. There were literally hundreds of photographs of the young woman – including one of her lying dead on the floor of Taylor Holcomb's apartment. The two detectives exchanged a look and Hoyt pulled out his phone to call in the CSI techs.

Matt moved down the timeline and looked at the pictures more closely. Some had been taken outside the dead girl's apartment, some when she was in her car and others while she was shopping. He turned and looked at the opposite wall, where there were the beginnings of a timeline for another beautiful young woman. "Hoyt." Matt waved the detective over.

"Oh my God, he's already stalking another one."