Baltimore 03 - Did You Miss Me?

for what happened, but just having her name in the headlines could hamper her effectiveness in the courtroom. Instead of being the voice of the victims she represents, she’ll become the story. It’ll die down after a while, but it won’t be easy while she’s going through it.’
    ‘It gets worse,’ Joseph said, looking at his computer screen. ‘I can’t find any death certificate on file for Wilson Beckett in West Virginia, yet Daphne says she’s got a copy in her safety deposit box.’
    ‘That’s not good.’
    ‘I know. That’s why I called you. I need help in thinking this through before I tell Daphne. She’s been through enough. I’m certain she didn’t lie about having the copy of the death cert. We have two options.’
    ‘Clerical error or somebody’s fucking with her,’ Grayson said harshly.
    ‘That sums it up pretty well. If it’s a clerical error, it could just not be entered into the online system. Still, there would have had to have been a body or a complicit coroner to provide the certificate. I talked with the woman who works in the police archives tonight and she seems to know her stuff. I’m hoping she’ll know if one might have existed twenty years ago when Daphne requested it.’
    ‘Do you think it’s a clerical error?’
    ‘No. I think somebody wanted her to believe Beckett was dead.’
    ‘Who would want that? Beckett himself?’
    ‘Maybe. She was getting older. By then she was living with the Elkharts. He didn’t have proximity to “pop up” and scare her. He might have thought she’d get brave and report him. But if he falsified the death certificate, it means he knew she’d requested it.’
    ‘That holds true for whoever did it. Who else?’
    ‘He’s the only one whose motive makes any sense. And there’s the question of how she got the document to begin with. She’d contacted the FBI to report Beckett and they told her he was dead. She wanted to be sure, so she mailed in a request to the state records department and ended up with two copies. One the FBI agent got for her and one that she received from the state through the mail about a month later. Now all this assumes that Agent Baker exists.’
    ‘You should request her personnel record.’
    ‘I did. After I heard Daphne’s story, I requested her report on the investigation and for Baker to call me. Just now I sent a note to Bo, asking for her personnel record. Hopefully we’ll know something by morning.’
    ‘How did she contact the FBI? Did she go to the office or call them on the phone?’
    ‘Neither. She wrote them a letter.’
    ‘Why didn’t she call?’
    ‘I don’t know. I’ll ask her when she wakes up. I get the impression that she was watched pretty closely by her mother-in-law, Nadine. Maybe she was worried her calls would be screened. If so, maybe her outgoing mail was, too. Anyone who knew she’d contacted the FBI is suspect. The only people she had contact with in those days were the Elkharts – Travis and his mother. The staff. Her own mother to a smaller extent. And Maggie, also to a smaller extent. I don’t think Daphne got to see them often.’
    ‘I can’t imagine the Elkharts would have appreciated Daphne’s coming forward at that point. Huge scandal. I’m actually surprised the Elkharts allowed the marriage to happen at all. They had to have known what happened to her as a child. They would have done an extensive background check. I would have thought Travis would want a wife with no skeletons in her closet.’
    ‘The skeletons wouldn’t have been easy to find. Daphne was only eight at the time and they’d moved to a different town. Her mother changed her name, too. She’d been Sinclair, but she went back to her maiden name when her husband left.’
    ‘Elkhart had the money to buy a damn good PI, Joseph. They would have left no stone unturned.’
    ‘The only people who knew the whole story before tonight were Maggie and the FBI agent, Claudia Baker. Even Maggie didn’t know Beckett’s name.’ He blew out a breath. ‘But Daphne did call the state death records office to ask about Beckett’s death. If someone was monitoring her calls . . . Shit.’
    ‘They didn’t even have to be monitoring her calls. They could have been inspecting her mail and seen the request for the death certificate. All they’d have to do is whip up a fake, make it look official. Daphne was only— How old was she?’
    ‘Fifteen.’
    ‘Oh, Joseph, she was just a child herself. She