Page 316 of A Matter of Time

I racked my brain. It had been ages. “I dunno, right after you left, at least three years ago. It was my blue one that I loved, the one Dane gave me.”

“I figured. It still had your old address on it, from that apartment Dane put you in, not where you live now.”

“Sam, what’s going on?”

“We’re not sure.” He huffed, walking to my bed and sitting down on it. “All we do know is that this one, along with other murders, has nothing to do with the Brian Minor case at all. They never did.”

I thought about Brian, about my friend Anna, his then wife, and her beagle, George. Funny that even though that night had been a horror, everything else paled because that was the night I’d met Sam Kage. Meeting him had been the most important moment of my life, when everything changed.

“Jory?”

“Sorry,” I said, looking at him. “Are you gonna get in trouble for being with me, since it sounds like I might be in the middle of another case?”

“No. Like I said, these murders have nothing to do with the Minor case.”

“That part’s good. That means we’re not doing anything that could jeopardize your job or⁠—”

“Jesus Christ, J, who gives a shit about me?” he yelled, raking his fingers through his hair. “You’re the one I’m worried about! You’re the one everybody… Shit! Did you fuckin’ hear what I said? We found your license on a dead guy just this morning. Your goddamn license!”

“I heard you,” I said softly, walking around in front of him and stepping between his legs so he had to lean his head back to look at me. “Now tell me about the others.”

He took a deep breath. “Well, counting Trey Hart⁠—”

“Is he the one that was killed in my old apartment?”

“Yes.”

“He was the first man killed?”

“That’s right.”

“Sorry, go on.”

“All in all, as I said, there have been four murders stretching over a three-year period.”

I held his gaze. “And?”

“And nothing. Four men are dead, but because the first one seemed connected to the case with Dom at the time, no one looked any further. The second might have been a case of mistaken identity as well, but the third and fourth ones seemed random.”

“But no one thinks they’re random anymore.”

“No.”

“How did you all come to that conclusion?”

“Because the third victim was killed this year, well after the Minor case was closed.”

I nodded. “How come no one made sense of this before?”

“The crimes were attributed to other things, and the gap between the killings was so long. Hard to make connections when the men were killed in different parts of the city and at first glance there didn’t seem to be any connection.”

“Until now.”

“That’s right.”

“Why now?”

“The FBI got involved when you were kidnapped by Dom because you were a witness in not just a murder case, but a case to put away Roman’s father.”