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“Wow. You’re right,” Ruby agreed, standing beside me and looking down at the body. “It does look like her. Do you think some crazed fan? She wasn’t celebrity status, but she was still a public figure.”

“That gives us a large suspect pool.” I stood back up. “In a lot of cases, it’s best to look at people closest to the victim. Boyfriend, ex-boyfriend, family, coworkers.”

“We’ll need to notify the family as soon as possible,” Ruby said with a sad shake of her head. “Once the media gets a hold of this, it’ll get crazy. And there’s not a worse way to find out your loved one died than by seeing it blasted all over the news or fucking Facebook.”

Other than seeing the body, notifying the family was the hardest part about it all. I hated being the bearer of bad news. Hated being the one to tell a mother that her daughter was lying under a white sheet. Fortunately, I’d only had to do it a handful of times in my career. Never for a cold-hearted murder, though.

“Who found the body?” I asked Officer Bell.

“A fisherman,” he answered, pointing to a man near the group of other officers. “Name’s Jeremy Brown. He’s shaken up over it. As expected, I reckon.”

Ruby and I walked over to the man. He was as white as a ghost and shaking like a leaf.

“Good morning, Mr. Brown,” I said, showing my badge. “I’m Detective Riley, and this is Detective Shaw. Can you tell us what you witnessed earlier?”

He started describing his morning. He went to the lake every Saturday to fish when the weather was nice and had been in the process of loading his boat in the water when he saw the body a few yards away.

“Did you see anyone else in the area?” Ruby asked.

“No, ma’am. Just me.” His eyes widened, and his chin trembled. “Me and her, anyways.”

Addersfield was a quaint little town where sadistic murders didn’t occur.

Until now.

***

Talking with the Monroe family had been just as difficult as I imagined it would be. The mom had sobbed uncontrollably, and the dad had sat there in shock.

“She’s such a sweet girl,” Mrs. Monroe had cried. “I don’t know how this could’ve happened.”

“Do you know of anyone who might’ve wanted to hurt your daughter?” I asked.

Beth had recently broken up with a boyfriend, according to her parents, so we jotted down his name to talk to him later. They didn’t know of anyone else, so we said our farewell and left them to grieve in private.

“That was rough,” Ruby said, opening the passenger’s side door and sliding into the car. “Where do you think we should head first?”

“Probably the ex. They said it was a messy breakup.”

“As good a lead as any.”

The lead turned out to be shit.

The ex-boyfriend had a rock solid alibi for the night before. He worked the night shift in a factory, and his manager backed-up his story, plus there was video proof from the security cameras throughout the building.

“Whoever killed her must’ve had their reasons,” Jason, the ex-boyfriend, said. “People think Beth is this fucking angel, but she’s a damn whore. There could be any number of guys who’d want to do her in. If she could fuck it, she did. That’s just how she was.”

“You don’t sound too shaken up over her death.” Ruby arched a suspicious brow.

“I’d never wish death on anybody, but I’d be lying if I said I was upset.” Jason shrugged. “Bitch probably deserved it.”

Cocky little sonofabitch.

“No one deserves that,” I said, disgusted with him. The details of Beth Monroe’s death hadn’t been revealed yet, but I wondered how smug this little bastard would’ve been had he known exactly what happened to her. No one could bethatcruel. I moved toward the door and then stopped to look back at him. “We’ll probably see each other again. Enjoy the rest of your day.”

Jason had an alibi, but that didn’t rule out the possibility that he’d paid someone to do it for him.

“I wish he was the killer, just so I could see that smirk wiped from his face,” Ruby said as we got in the car.