Page 126 of The Body in the Backyard

“How about her? Do you recognize her?” He pointed to a woman in a sharp-looking purple suit planted between the two cameras with a direct line of sight to Griffin. She had dark skin and expert eye makeup and had her thick black hair pinned at the nape of her neck in a bun. She was frowning down at the stack of note cards in her hand.

“Live in one minute, people!” Food Stain Guy bellowed.

“I don’t recognize her,” Riley said. “She could be with the network.”

“Only one way to find out,” Nick said and headed for the woman in question. “Who are you?” Nick asked her without preamble.

She looked up coolly from her note cards, which looked as though they had a series of emojis on them.

“I’m Rebecca Maylen. Mr. Gentry’s attorney. And you are?”

“The guy who’s reluctantly trying to keep your client alive. You must sue a lot of people.”

She gave him a sharp smile. “My beach house in the Outer Banks is named Gentry Windfall.”

Nick rubbed a hand over his stubbly jaw. “Question from one professional to another. How do you get him to pay up?”

“I’m apparently smarter than you, because I followed the money. Griffin’s father pays me an embarrassingly large annual retainer to keep his son out of legal trouble. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to make sure my client doesn’t make himself look like more of an idiot than usual.”

“Good luck with that,” Nick said.

Food Stain Guy called for quiet and counted down for the live broadcast, and Nick sidled back over to Riley. He gave her a nudge and mouthed“lawyer.”

Riley glanced over and frowned, her nose giving a little twitch. “She hates him but loves the money. She’d be annoyed if her meal ticket dropped dead.”

“Hello, central Pennsylvania. I’m Tyrell Tutley coming to you live from the home of Channel 50’s own darlings, morning news anchor Griffin Gentry and sunshiny weather girl Bella Goodshine, who recently had to go on defense on their home field.”

“You know what?” Nick whispered in Riley’s ear.

“What?”

“Let’s just quit. We’ll let Griffin get murdered, sell the house, and move to a beach somewhere. You can wear bikinis all day, and I’ll fish for our supper.”

Riley snorted, earning a dirty look and ashushfrom a production assistant.

“You’ve had to step up your defense due to recent happenings off the field,” Tyrell continued on set. “Care to break down the play-by-play for our viewers and tell everyone what’s been happening?”

“Well, Tyrell,” Bella began in her breathy for-the-cameras voice. “It all started on a dreary fall day. It was a high of forty-eight degrees with precipitation.”

“We were watchingThe Price Is Rightand agreeing that I would be a much better host,” Griffin said, glancing toward his lawyer.

Off camera, Rebecca waved her arms and held up a note card with a heart on it. Griffin frowned and cocked his head like a golden retriever with a fur coat full of hair product. The lawyer pointed frantically at Bella. Griffin brightened and reached for Bella’s hand. The lawyer held up a smiley face sign.

Nick shot Riley a look. She rolled her eyes ceilingward.

He rolled onto the balls of his feet and took another gander around the room as Griffin and Bella took turns babbling at each other about the body in the backyard. Most of the crew was clumped together at their stations, looking both bored and pissed off.

“I was very brave,” Griffin said directly to the camera.

Nick gritted his teeth.What a fucking asshole.

Riley elbowed Nick in the gut.

“Ow. What was that for?” he whispered.

“For what you were about to say audibly on live TV. Oh shit?—”

“Oh shit what?” he demanded.