There was a long list of people who'd want Noah Walker dead. Most of them began and ended with his little extracurricular activities, so I'd decided to take another look at his Facebook page. Unfortunately, his account had since been locked. Thanks, Burenville Sherriff's Office! Fortunately, I'd had the idea to take about a dozen screencaps of his page and the comment section during my initial investigation. Thanks, my penchant for thinking ahead!

       Most comments, I remembered, were too old to really matter. Apparently, he'd taken a two-ish year hiatus. Probably because he'd gotten a nice job with an IT firm and didn't need the money.

       The comments that were most interesting had only started last April. That meant Noah had gotten himself fired and instead of filing for unemployment, he chose to pay his bills through extortion. Nice.

       That meant the list was short. Only three possible suspects:

       Kelli Olson. Former Miss Florida winner whose hard-won crown was revoked when Noah sold her obscure erotic photos to the press for cash. Killed her Miss America dreams and almost wrecked her career. But she'd pulled it back and became a successful businesswoman/councilwoman. Would she really risk everything she's worked for over some old photos that were already public? I'd already talked to her on the phone, so she was probably my most compliant suspect right now.

      Next was Felix Rosario. An amateur boxer trying to make it big in the local circuit. I'd messaged him last Thursday, but he'd ignored me. Boxing is a violent sport and Noah had shown up Friday night with a shiner on his right eye. Maybe they'd had a run-in hours before and he came back to kill him. Don't know what Noah had on him so the motive is still out.

      Lastly, there was David Howell III. An heir and businessman with a million-dollar fortune. Definitely an ideal target for blackmail. His background is clean, though. All accounts say he's an upstanding citizen and family man. No idea what he could be getting blackmailed for, but he seems to be a gun enthusiast with quite the collection. Could be promising...

       "What you working on?"

       I looked up from my laptop and turned my neck to look at Manny. "This woman came in 'cause she was being blackmailed for her nudes."

       He was sitting on his side of my bed with his own laptop propped open on his lap. "I remember. It was her boyfriend, right?"

       "Yep. A real shit-show."

       The light from my tv sent a soft glow across the room. We'd put on some movie and then separately started working because being a workaholic in a relationship with a workaholic knows no indignities. "Did she press charges?"

       "Nope. He's dead."

       "Huh. Well, if you can't press charges, I guess that's the next best thing."

       I threw him a look of concern. "That's a crazy thing for a homicide detective to say."

       He shrugged. "It's really just job security."

       I howled with laughter. "You know what I told her? I said, 'he's dead, you killed him, right?'. She was not happy."

       He gave me a little conspiratorial nod. "I'd want to kill someone who threatened to leak my nudes."

       My eyebrows raised into my hairline. "Oh? Has the gentleman been flashing that thang around the internet?"

       His mouth dripped sarcasm. "Yeah. There's nothing I love more than snapping picks of my dick and sending them to internet strangers. It's a public service really—don't laugh!"

       "I'm sorry, but the image of you taking delicate glamour shots of your dick and sending them out like e-flyers is too much to handle on a Monday night!"

       His eyes grew salacious for a moment before they crinkled with laughter. "What I mean is, I feel for her." He got serious; his eyes darkened. "It's different for a woman anyway. And to find out it was your own boyfriend is the ultimate betrayal. So yeah, if I were a woman, I might have to kill him."

       "That's what I thought too."

       "That she killed him?"

       "Yes."

       "Did she?"

       "No."

       "You sure?"

       I thought about that. "Uhhhhh...She can be very meek. Like, get the wrong meal at a restaurant and just eat it because it's easier than bothering the waitress meek."

       "Hmm." He closed his laptop and adjusted his back so he wasn't slouching against my headboard. "Suspects?"

       "A couple of other people he was blackmailing."

       "Hmm." I could practically see the gears start turning in his brain.

       "I already met one of them. A former beauty queen turned businesswoman turned politician." The laptop was starting to burn the tops of my thighs so I sat it on the bed just beyond my crossed legs. "She's the one who told me it was Noah."

       He pointed his finger. "So, she'll be the one who talks easiest?"

       "Yes!" It's spooky when he reads my mind. "The other two are a businessman named David Howell and a boxer named Felix Rosario."

       He furrowed his brow. "That last one sounds familiar."

       "Friend of yours?"

       "No. It's just familiar." He grabbed his phone from the end table and started typing.

       "My guts telling me it's one of the three." "There were more victims but most of the interactions were too old. These three were the last ones he extorted."

       "Your instincts are good so you're probably right. I'd still keep an open mind though." His expression grew enlightened. "Ah, Felix Rosario."

       "What about him?"

       He turned the phone, showing me a picture of Felix in the ring. "He's going to be in the fight Friday night."

       Fight? Oh! The fight I promised I'd accompany him to in place of Henry. "How serendipitous."

       "I'll say."

       "You think they'll be any way I could talk to him on Friday?"

       "It might be a little chaotic."

       Maybe I could track him down before then... "So, what are you working on?" I stared pointedly at his laptop.

       His face got tight. He cleared his throat. "Well, it's a murder..."

       "I could have guessed that."

       "I mean it's...it's..."

       It was so unlike him to stutter. "Are you okay?" I turned my body so I could fully gauge his reaction. "What's wrong?"

       "It's...a dead child." His heavy sigh shook him, the bed, and me.

       "Oh." I could feel every drop of humor draining from my face.

       "I want to share with you Evie, but some of these cases are...disturbing." He placed a consoling hand on my knee. "I don't want my job to upset you."

       "I get that." I rubbed at a sore spot at the base of my neck. "But if it's too much for you, you can talk to me." He didn't need to blurt out the foulest details just to lay down his burdens. There was a middle ground where he could share that part of his life without worrying that I couldn't handle it.

       But I could tell from the way he looked off in the distance that he wasn't comfortable sharing yet. For now, I'd let him safeguard me against whatever evils he encountered, and I could accept that. It wasn't an easy thing to share. "I know, I just...sometimes I need a break from it." He closed the laptop and sat it on top of the end table. "Let's stop working for the night."

        I moved my laptop off the bed and stretched out my legs. "Okay." No reason to push him on it. "What's happening in this movie we weren't watching?"

       He pulled me into his embrace, and we snuggled up together. "Hell if I know."

       "Should we start over?"

       "No. We'll probably figure it out between the two of us."

       "We are two very smart people." I nodded into his chest. "I'm pretty sure that dudes a mermaid."

       "Nah. Alien. For sure."

       We got comfortable just cuddling on my bed and roasting the hell out of this bad sci-fi production. It was nice to turn my brain off for a while and just...be. Sometimes I forgot that.

       "This actor's doing an amazing job at being a creep," I said when we were somewhere in the middle.

       "This is one of those movies where everyone is stupid. I can tell."

       "Of yeah. If that was me, I would've been left my momma and walked to the nearest town. Fuck a alien mermaid tryin' to impregnate me."

       He laughed and I felt it vibrate through his core. "My mom loved you by the way."

       I looked up at him in the dark. "Really?"

      "If she didn't, you'd know." His arm got tired, so he readjusted it then relaxed back into my comforter. "She thought you were nice, funny, pretty, and polite. She was impressed."

       The little boost to my ego made me smile. "Did you ever doubt me?"

       "No. But I think you doubted yourself for a second there."

       Maybe I did. I've always been cute and mostly well liked but that didn't mean everyone liked me. "Can't wait for the payback in three weeks!"

       "I know you can't!" He said with a little chuckle. "Can't wait to sic your mama on me!"

       "She promised to be nice." And she would be because she loved me. Besides, I had no siblings to ambush our get together and my parents had been divorced for damn near twenty years so meeting dad was a mountain for another day. On top of that mom hated cooking so we were meeting on neutral ground at a restaurant of her choice.

       So yeah, I think he'll have an easier time of it.

       We finished off the movie on a high note then crawled under my covers since we'd already prepped for bed. After we turned off the tv and the end table lamps, he kissed me quick, and we went to bed.

       I pretty much never fell asleep instantly so for fifteen minutes or so I was up listening to Manny fidget around until he found a comfortable position and thinking of tomorrows work.

       Most prominent in my thoughts was the Noah Walker case. I might be able to track down whatever gym Felix uses and confront him there, but I was drawing a blank on what my first move with David should be. It would probably come to me later, but I preferred to have a solid plan before I acted. That meant Manny was right, Kelli was currently the most likely suspect to talk to me since we'd already talked. But that also meant I couldn't lie my way through any sort of con with her because she already knew about my connection to Noah.

       Or rather, she thought I was one of his victims...

       That was my next step, then. Tomorrow I'd find out just how angry Mrs. Olson really was about Noah Walker and his career ending hacking.