The worst part is that she knows exactly who I am. She’ll have heard that Drake and I are dating. Why else would she have walked up to him so strutty and been all “hello, darling” with a damn peck on the cheek?

I’m a woman. I’m ninety-percent of the sass in Holly Woods. She’s playing a game… With me.

I take a deep breath. That’s okay, really. She can play the game. She can hold all the cards, because I’ll be the fucking dice.

I am Noelle Bond, dammit. I am not a weeping, crying mess kind of girl because something shocks her. I’m a grab-it-by-the-balls, squeeze-out-the-explanation, and get-the-hell-on-with-it kind of girl.

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

The guy from last time is at the reception counter again, and he smiles when he sees me. “Hey! You’re the chick from the other day.”

“That’s me,” I smile sheepishly. “Is Nick here? I need to talk with him.”

“He’ll be here in five minutes. You want a coffee or something?”

“Oh, no, thank you. Do you mind if I wait?” I motion to the chairs.

“Make yourself at home.”

“Thank you.” I give him another smile and take a seat on the leather couch. Then I set my purse by my feet, and my mind, instead of returning to Jessica and Drake, focuses on Vince Fulton and what connection he could possibly have to Natalie Owens aside from being her dominant once in a while. If he was killed by asphyxiation, is it easy to assume he was the one who practiced on her? Maybe he was practicing autoerotic asphyxiation on himself.

But that doesn’t explain how the pillow got under the bed… And wouldn’t you use a pillow for a murder and a tie for yourself?

Unless he was interrupted before he could remove the pillow from his mouth, and someone else finished him off. He did look like he was holding his penis… Or maybe that was simply a ruse from the murderer in the hope that we’d assume it was an accidental death. They’re ridiculously common in users of it, after all.

All you need to do, in theory, is knock yourself unconscious, and unless you’re found, you’re a goner.

“Well, I didn’t think you’d be the next Bond I saw,” Nick drawls, the door swinging shut behind him. “They haven’t given you cuffs, have they?”

I stand, smirking. “Not today, doll. I was hoping to talk to you.”

He jerks his head toward the room we spoke in the other day and passes Dreads a coffee cup on the way past the desk. I click the door shut behind me and wait as Nick takes a seat on his stool and sips his coffee.

“Vince Fulton.”

“Is a bastard,” he replies. “What about him?”

“He’s dead.”

The shock in his eyes can’t be faked. “Fuck off.”

“He was found last night,” I say quietly.

“The murder at that shithole?”

I nod sharply. “He was Natalie’s most regular Dom, wasn’t he?”

Nick’s lips curve down. “Twice a week she was with him in the end. That’s all I know.”

“You knew a lot about the mayor. You told me that the truth will out. What does that mean?”

“It means the truth will be found out. You don’t strike me as a dim woman, Noelle. Information is there for everyone to find.”

“Where were you last night?”

“Excuse me?”

My lips tug to one side. “Seems to me you have the perfect motive to kill both Natalie and Vince. She broke your heart. He was instrumental to her deceit. A still-unidentified male was found going into her room not long before her time of death. We haven’t examined the tapes from D.O.M. yet, but I’d say you probably had an opportunity then, too.”

“Are you calling me a murderer?”

“No. I’m asking you if you are. After all, your track record is questionable, isn’t it? I mean, you were young, but…”

His face hardens, and his eyes narrow into angry slits. “That was a long time ago. What kind of killer would tell you if they are?”

“Someone who answers instantly with a no instead of questioning my reason for asking.” I smile as the realization washes over his face. “In all seriousness, where were you last night?”

“Here. I was working on a big back piece for some gym buff from Austin. Ask Niall out there.”

Niall? Oh, Dreads. “A copy of your schedule will be fine and a phone number to verify with the gym buff.”

“Niall will get you it.”

“Great. What else do you know about Vince?”

“He knew about her affair with the mayor. Helped her cover it up.”

“How?”

He shrugs. “When I called her out on the baby, Nat lost it, darlin’. She started beggin’ me and promised me she had evidence that could destroy the mayor’s life and his image. She said she’d threaten him with it, make him pay big, have an abortion, then we could move away.”

Hmm. “What kind of evidence? Did she hire someone?”

“She didn’t have the money for that. All of her spare cash went to the club.” He stands. “Look, that’s all I know. If I had the evidence, don’t you think I’d give it to you?”

“Do you think the mayor knows about it?”

“The evidence? Probably. Would he kill for it? Couldn’t tell ya.”

Get that evidence and we’ve probably found ourselves the killer.

I’m going to use that as my hope right now—that it’s that simple. I’m going to ignore that I have no idea what I’m supposed to be looking for when it comes to the evidence or who has it. Or if let’s be honest, it really exists.

God. It’s Harry and the fucking Horcruxes all over again.

Since my mission today is to find out as much about Vince Fulton as I can, I stop by Melanie’s coffee and bookstore. She always has something informative, and I’ve been here way too many times, promising a date with Brody for information.

I think I might actually have to hold up my end of the deal soon.

“I promise,” I say instantly, walking in. “As soon as this case is over.”

“Hmm.” Melanie smiles anyway. “Vince Fulton, right?”

“You know everything.” I smile and sit down.

She holds a strawberry cupcake up, and I sigh with happiness, nodding. A cupcake is exactly what I need. All right, so two cupcakes would be more accurate, but I am trying to curb my intake of them, after all. I’ll buy the second and eat it back at the office.

“He was odd, I think.” Melanie sets the cupcake in front of me on a small plate with a paper napkin and a fork and leans forward. Thankfully, her high-necked shirt is containing the goods, or I’d have a boob cupcake. She has, after all, won every wet T-shirt competition in Holly Woods since she was fourteen, and she doesn’t even enter half the time. “No, not odd. Quiet. He mostly kept to himself, but he came either here or Rosie’s once a week for coffee for his whole team on a Friday. It depended which of us were closer—and one week, when he was building on the other side of Austin, he sent us both gift cards to apologize.”

“Wow. Did you know he used D.O.M.?”

“Oh, yeah. Everyone knew that. He wasn’t shy. I think he tried to work as an escort, but no one really tickled his whip, if you know what I mean.”

Am I the only person who didn’t know that D.O.M. is a sex club?

“And Natalie Owens?” I ask.

“By all accounts,” Melanie says slowly, a coy smile creeping onto her lips, “Natalie Owens was his favorite little play thing. Rumor has it her hard limit was a hard limit.”

“What’s a hard limit?”

“The things you won’t do. Like your hard limit would be giving up cupcakes.”

I grin.

“Vince was apparently a total sadist, but so was Natalie. Even at the expense of their relationships. A few of the guys who use the club are perfectly respectable businessmen, but there were more than a few whispers in here about them plotting something. Something to do with money then running away and leaving Holly Woods.”

“They’re a fucking romance novel, those two, huh?”

“Only if Shakespeare is the author, given the ending.” Melanie chortles. “I don’t know what was going on. Natalie was an amateur photographer when she wasn’t messing around doing design work for the mayor. That’s about all I can give you.”