Page 87 of Fatal Fame
"All you would need is a clean audio sample of the person you want to impersonate. About thirty to sixty seconds. Sometimes less."
"So like a podcaster's voice?"
"That would be clean, yeah. Once you have the sample, you upload it to one of the AI audio services, and it could have you say anything you typed in. Now placing a live phone call would be a little trickier. Like I said, it would be easier to have short, pre-recorded sentences and then leave them on an answering service, but they could be played back during a call. That's what I did with Mia." He looked guilty as he admitted this.
"So if you knew what to say beforehand?"
"Yeah. However, nowadays there's a way to do it live where it changes your voice in real-time."
Noah brought a hand up to his head as the full implications hit him. "Son, you are a friggin' genius!"
Ethan frowned as Noah moved away and brought the phone back to his ear.
"McKenzie, has the team left yet?"
"Not as far as I know."
"Meet me at the hotel in ten minutes."
Noah ended the call and looked back at his son, seeing him with new eyes. Ethan's technical knowledge had just provided the missing piece of the puzzle—the explanation for how Camila could have used Pierce's own voice to lure him to his death while setting up Marcus to take the fall.
31
Noah's hands gripped the steering wheel of his State Police cruiser as he navigated the darkening streets of High Peaks, his mind racing through the evidence they'd need to make the arrest stick. The breakthrough about voice cloning technology had provided the missing piece of the puzzle, but building a case that would hold up in court required more than theoretical possibilities, it required concrete proof.
His first call was to the Adirondack County Sheriff’s Office. "Rishi? It's Noah. I need you to pull the audio files from Landry's podcast episodes and isolate clean samples of Marcus Greer's voice. We're looking at potential voice synthesis technology being used to impersonate him."
The second call went to Judge Patricia Hoffman, requesting an emergency search warrant for Camila's hotel room and personal effects. The judge's questions were sharp and pointed, she'd learned to be skeptical of late-night warrant requests—but Noah's explanation of the voice cloning technology and its implications for the murder case provided sufficient probable cause.
His third stop was the convenience store closest to the hotel, a fluorescent-lit establishment that served the dual purpose of late-night snack provider and inadvertent surveillance hub for anyone foolish enough to pay cash for burner phones under multiple security cameras.
The night manager, a college-aged kid named Trevor who looked like he'd rather be anywhere else, reviewed the digital footage with the weary competence of someone who'd dealt with police requests before.
"Yeah, we had someone buy a prepaid phone three nights ago," Trevor said, fast-forwarding through grainy black-and-white footage until he found the relevant timestamp. "Paid cash, which always makes me remember because most people use cards now."
On the screen, Noah watched a figure in a dark hoodie approach the counter, purchase a burner phone and prepaid minutes, then leave without saying more than necessary. The person kept their head down, but there was something familiar about the build, the way they moved, the deliberate effort to avoid the cameras.
"Can you print me a copy of the receipt?" Noah asked. "And I'll need a copy of this footage sent to the State Police digital crimes unit."
Trevor nodded, pulling up the transaction records on his point-of-sale system. The receipt showed a cash purchase of $47.99 for a basic smartphone and thirty dollars in prepaid minutes, timestamped at 3:03 PM—approximately six hours before Pierce Landry was murdered.
By the time Noah arrived at the hotel, McKenzie was already waiting in the parking lot, his unmarked vehicle positioned to block the main exit. A High Peaks Police Department cruiser sat near the front entrance, its occupant maintaining a discreet watch on the building's lobby.
"It appears our little crew were just in the process of leaving town," McKenzie said as Noah approached. "They'd booked an Uber to the airport. I have an officer with them inside."
Noah nodded, feeling the familiar pre-arrest tension that came with confronting a suspect who didn't yet know their world was about to collapse.
They entered the hotel lobby, where Officer Janet Rodriguez from the High Peaks PD was maintaining a casual but watchful presence near the elevator. The Cold Trail team sat clustered around a seating area, their luggage stacked nearby, the atmosphere tense with the kind of forced normalcy that came from people trying to act like nothing was wrong.
Theo looked up first, his field equipment bag slung over his shoulder and his expression carrying the exhaustion of someone who'd been through too much in too short a time. "Is there news about the investigation?"
"As a matter of fact, there is," Noah said. "We have news about Pierce's murderer. We caught the person responsible."
The reactions were immediate and varied. Theo's eyes widened with surprise. Marcus leaned forward with intense interest. Sienna gasped and brought her hand to her mouth.
Camila remained perfectly still, her face maintaining the composed expression of someone listening to information that didn't personally concern her.
"What?" Marcus asked eagerly as someone who'd been falsely accused and wanted vindication. "Who did it? Was it related to the incident at the hospital we heard about?"
