Page 59 of Healing the Heart

“Have you ever thought of becoming a profiler?” the computer man asked Val.

“She’s got plenty enough on her plate,” Eric grumbled. “Don’t give her ideas.”

“Can we continue, please?” Noah said from beside her, brimming with impatience.

Griff pressed his clicker and advanced the slides on the screen. Another image of Jordan appeared, this time on an employee ID badge. The writing was blurred, though, and she couldn’t make it out.

“It’s been bugging me how I could have fucked up so badly. I’ve gone over and over Robert Jordan’s club application.”

“Wait, his last name was Jordan? I always thought it was his first,” Val mused, her fingers tapping lightly on the table.

“That’s what he asked to be called when he joined,” Eric explained. “It happens. No one thought anything of it.”

“I didn’t,” Griff admitted. “When privacy is important to a client, they often use a different name.”

“I’ve noticed,” Fiona uttered under her breath.

“Nothing else was a red flag,” he went on. “He had a benign credit report, excellent grades on his college transcripts, and no rap sheet.” As he listed them off, Griff scrolled through examples. “He was a systems analyst and worked as an independent contractor for several companies here and abroad over a ten-year period. There was nothing to keep me from recommending him for membership. Not even a DMV hit. When I found this.”

His remote clicked once more, and an official-looking certificate appeared on the screen.

“Is that Arabic?” someone asked.

It could have been Sanskrit for all Fiona knew, leaving 90 percent of the document indecipherable to her. Then she noticed a subtitle written in English near the top—United Arab Emirates, Ministry of Health, Department of Preventative Medicine.

“Was he sick?” Val asked, sounding confused, which Fiona was glad to know because she was lost too.

“No. He’s dead,” Trey replied, sending a ripple of surprised murmurs through the room.

“I don’t understand,” Fiona inquired in rising agitation. “How can Jordan have died in the UAE but be here in LA?”

Noah’s hand slipped beneath her hair and settled on the back of her neck. With a gentle squeeze, he offered reassurance as he explained, “What I think Griff is telling us is that the Jordan we all know assumed the late Robert Jordan’s identity.”

“Exactly,” Griff concurred. “I got no hits on vital records for the deceased when the imposter joined three years ago. But there likely wouldn’t be a death record unless the UAE government reported it to our embassy. Which is strongly encouraged but out of US control.”

Advancing the slides again brought up an image of a man in his thirties with a receding hairline and glasses. Fiona had a sinking feeling that the stereotypical computer nerd, minus the pocket protector, on the screen was the deceased.

“This is the late Robert Jordan,” Griff confirmed an instant later. “Unmarried, an only child, and both parents are deceased. No next of kin listed anywhere I could find. He was an easy identity for the Jordan here to take over.”

“But how would he know about him?” Fiona asked, amazed that such a thing was possible.

“That, I don’t know yet. LA Jordan would have had to know UAE Jordan was dead for this to work. I’ll keep searching.”

“That leaves us where? Still in the dark about the Robert Jordan we thought we knew?” This came from the dark-haired stranger who, until now, had sat quietly taking it all in.

“Yes,” Griff reluctantly replied, his frustration that he didn’t have all the answers yet unmistakable. “But I’m working round the clock to find out.”

The stranger rose, a towering figure bigger than all the doms in the room.

“Get Jonas working on this, too. Not that I don’t trust your skills, Griff,” the big man said. “But we need to find this guy yesterday. I don’t like knowing we had an identity thief running loose in one of our clubs.” His dark-brown eyes shifted to Fiona. “I especially don’t like that he injured and has been terrorizing one of our own.”

Silence filled the room as the men, with grim expressions, again turned their eyes on her.

“As for how we can prevent this in the future,” the man went on, his voice dripping with authority, “you and Jonas put your heads together. It seems like it was out of our control, but I’d prefer it not to be repeated.”

“Yes, sir,” Griffin replied respectfully, which told her this man was someone important.

“Keiran, I’ll be in touch about what we discussed.”

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