Third Degree (A Murder 101 Mystery)

resting on top of the waistband of his belted jeans. A few extra pounds actually looked pretty good on him; his face was far too pale and droopy in later photos.
    I wondered which version of Carter Ginny Miller had gotten: slightly chubby but kind of cute Carter or thin and bedraggled Carter? Because even as he dropped the weight and seemingly would have more options in the clothing department, he continued to wear his old clothes, cinching his pants at the waist until the last posted photo—dated two weeks earlier—had them buckling in the back (there was one side shot where this was noticeable) and bunched up in the front. Not a great look on anyone, particularly a middle-aged man.
    I read through a couple of the reviews and decided that Carter Wilmott would have been well advised to invest in a thesaurus. Because there were just so many ways to say “disgusting,” “awful,” and “dirty” without running out of words. Which he had.
    I revisited the few slings and arrows he had aimed at Greg and Beans, Beans, a place he confessed he frequented daily. He implored Greg to get better coffee beans and to not burn his brew. Carter struck me as a guy who loved to pick a fight, even if it wasn’t a fight worth picking. I scrolled down and read the comments that accompanied the post. Coffee Lover, in particular, was quite visceral in his or her reaction to Carter’s ramblings. I settled on the most interesting and threatening of the commenter’s responses to the post:
     
Coffee Lover: You’re a moron, Wilmott. If it wasn’t for Greg and his willingness to try a new business in this one-horse town, Main Street would be desolate.
    Not true. Main Street was a thriving strip of commerce with boutiques and cafés dotting both sides of the street.
     
Coffee Lover: You’d better shut up. If you know what’s good for you. And you don’t.
    Okay, not the best grammar, but the intent was clear: Coffee Lover wanted Carter to shut up and shut up quick. This guy had more enemies than I could count, but from the number of listings on the blog, he kept right on posting and right on pissing everyone off. What kind of personality disorder did Carter Wilmott actually have?
    I read through some of Lydia’s posts, as well, and while none overtly pointed to anonymous posters’ problems with violent partners, Lydia did seem to go there more often than not. I wondered how the poor woman who had written asking how to get her husband to stop leaving his dirty underwear on the floor had reacted to Lydia’s suggestion to “stop taking his abuse and leave immediately.” That was a little over the top, if you ask me. My initial reaction would have been to torch all of his underwear in full view of the neighbors, but that’s just me.
    I puzzled over the little details that I had gleaned from the blog as I shut my computer and put it on my nightstand. I looked down at Trixie, whose eyes were peering out from under golden eyebrows. “Cocktails?” I asked, and she jumped off the bed and raced downstairs. I heard her hit the hardwood floor of the hallway and skid all the way into the kitchen. She knows that when I say “cocktails,” what I really mean is a walk followed by a martini. Everybody wins.
    We set out for our journey, a gorgeous end of day in which much had transpired. I didn’t know how I was going to navigate the new liturgical rule that was being instituted at St. Thomas; I was a heathen at best, a heretic at worst. That was going to make things difficult, particularly if Father Dwyer and his flying monkeys made all of the faculty attend every holy day of obligation mass or become daily communicants or—gasp—become Eucharistic ministers. If that was the case, Etheridge better get some more insurance, because me in charge of the Holy Eucharist? That for sure meant that the building would cleave in two from the force of the bolt of lightning that would surely strike.
    Trixie and I wandered up and down my street until a black cloud that had been hanging low overhead decided to burst open and drench us with big, fat raindrops that soaked us within seconds. Trixie didn’t need any encouragement; she dragged me down the street, my arm straight out in front of me, the leash between us. We were home in less than a minute, but drenched nonetheless. I went in through the back door, which I hadn’t bothered locking, flustered and anxious to get inside. Trixie and I did a simultaneous shake-off not noticing that we had