Page 59 of You'll Never Know
“Where?” he asked, fighting for something else to say that would keep her there.
“To end it.” And then she pulled her hand from his and rushed back into the house.
Chapter 31
BAILEY
“This is unbelievable,” Ben says, gawking at the contents of the accordion file spread over the kitchen table in front of us. “He had all of this?”
“Yes,” I say, still struggling to believe it myself. My entire life, along with everything I thought I knew about the death of my family, had been flipped upside down in a matter of days.
“Unbelievable,” Ben says again. He’s repeated the word at least a half-dozen times since getting home from work. When he asked what I was doing, I passed him Reed’s file. It was the first one I read after returning from lunch with Zane. He’d organized everything into five smaller sub-folders full of detailed reports, photographs, and background information, one for each of Reed’s victims and a folder for Reed himself. I’d already studied that one for hours.
Reed’s upbringing was admittedly a tragic one. As a child, he was abandoned by his mother and left to his convict father to raise. Jack Aldridge dragged Reed all over the country searching for work: Pennsylvania, Nebraska, Arizona, Texas. They never stayed anywhere for long. Jack’s employment records were littered with terminations. There were run-ins with the law. Mostly petty stuff—bar fights and DUIs—until Jack killed a man on his front porch in Midland whenReed was twelve years old.
Reed spent a year in the foster system after that, racking up behavior complaints until his aunt, Beth Aldridge, adopted him and brought him to Durango, Colorado. Reed seemed to level out from there. He got decent grades and managed to land a spot on the high school football team. His yearbook photos look like those of all the other boys his age—Reed staring empty-eyed at the camera, attempting to look cool. Reed perched on a bench with some friends, managing to appear both bored and agitated at the same time. Reed on the football field caught in mid-flight, leaping for a pass. In those pictures, he never smiled. His smiles were reserved for Taylor White.
It’s why I’d keyed on her to begin with. There they were, sitting side by side on the gym bleachers, Taylor giving Reed anoh you!flap of her hand. There they were huddled over a classroom table, Taylor focused on a project, Reed focused on her. Just look at the two of them caught in conversation at a cafeteria table, so cute together, so in love. Zane hadn’t provided many photos of her and Reed on the flash drive he dropped into the file, but there were enough to let me know Taylor mattered. In those pictures, Reed’s smile was real.
“These are the women? The ones he conned?” Ben says, pulling a photo closer. I’ve arranged Reed’s victims in a single row at the top of the table by name: Rachel Dawson, an Etsy queen who designed cheap handbags and cutesy home decor. Lacey Grayson, a fitness buff whom Reed conned using a fake fitness franchise. Jennifer Stewart, a Montana realtor with a killer smile who made the mistake of adding Reed to her business bank account. And finally, Evelyn Nash—the payoff Reed had been chasing for years.
“Yep,” I say. “The ones we know about, anyway.”
“Fucking hell,” Ben says, returning the photo to the lineup. He takes one of Reed and whistles low through his teeth. “He dresses so differently in all of these. I’d never guess he was the same person.”
“I know,” I say. “It’s unreal.”
Beneath the women, I’ve positioned pictures of Reed as he appeared in each relationship. He was good.Really good.His wardrobes. His hairstyles. Even his posture. Every look expertly curated for his targets.
I study the different versions of Reed again, one by one.
There’s Lucas Pierce for Lacey Grayson, a tattooed gym bro fond of tank tops and full-body tans. Lucas is well built with muscular arms and wears his hair short in a buzz cut. He has a strong jawline and a V-shaped torso and looks like he belongs on the cover ofMen’s Health.
Next comes Miles Baxter for Jennifer Stewart the realtor. In these photos, Reed is freshly slacked and polo’d. He has a head full of investment-banker hair—perfectly parted to the side. His eyes are slightly magnified by a set of thick-framed glasses and he’s wearing a fake-as-shit smile I want to punch.
I shift my gaze to Logan Thompson. This version of Reed tends toward baggy clothing. Logan is a hoodie enthusiast who wears his ball caps backward and buries his hands deep in the pockets of his jeans. He looks like the kind of guy you’d find hitting vape pens behind a gas station. He’s not exactly my type, but he’s definitely Rachel Dawson’s.
The picture Ben holds is of Evelyn Nash’s Romeo, Adrian Wallace, a long-haired hipster in a denim jacket and slim-cut jeans. This iteration of Reed looks far less assured than the others—but purposefully so. I have no doubt he presented this way in order to not overwhelm Evelyn.
“It’s not just how he’s dressed, either,” I say, taking the photos of Reed and re-arranging them in a line, based on the dates of his cons, from the earliest to the most recent. I point at the first one, Logan Thompson—Rachel Dawson’s version of Reed. “Look at his face. See the fullness of his cheeks?” I move my finger to the right and set it on Lucas Pierce. “They’re slimmer here.”
Ben’s eyes narrow. “He lost a lot of weight, didn’t he?”
“Yes. And he went even further with the next girl.” I pull thepicture of Miles Baxter closer. “Look at his nose. See how it’s been contoured?”
Ben picks it up and squints. “Surgery?”
“I think so. But nothing that looks unnatural. Just enough of an alteration to change his appearance when combined with the new haircut and wardrobe.”
Ben sets the picture back on the table. “So, what name is he going by now?”
“Grant Wilson.” I dig into Reed’s file and pull out another picture and hand it to Ben. It’s a faraway shot of Reed sitting on a wraparound porch with a beer in his hand, gazing out at a spectacular view.
“Nice place,” Ben says.
“Yeah. The guy’s been enjoying his retirement.”
Ben studies me, then pops his elbow onto the table and leans forward. “You’re taking this to the cops, right?”
