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“He gave you a thumb drive?” Lucy said. “Does he say what’s on it? Whatever it is, he was in danger because of it.”
“He didn’t.” Zack handed her the note. “Just that I’d do the right thing.”
Cooper picked it up, turning it over to look at it from all angles. From what Zack could see, it looked like an everyday, garden-variety thumb drive. Nothing special.
It’d what it contained that was important.
“There’s only one way to find out what’s on it,” Cooper said. “Tate, where’s your laptop?”
“In the office. I’ll get it and we’ll take a look.”
Tate was only gone for a moment, bringing back his laptop. Leaving one of his employees to tend the bar, he had them gather in one of the booths in the corner where no one would be able to listen in or see what was on the screen.
“Let’s see what Ethan was shot for,” Tate said, pulling up the contents of the drive. “It looks like there are several videos on this. I’ll open one.”
Zack wasn’t sure what he was watching for a moment. By the time he realized, everyone else had as well.
“Holy hell, Ethan was shot for porn,” Frankie whispered. “That’s porn.”
It was worse than that. This was porn starring Ethan, and what appeared to be a drunk or drugged Sarah. They were in some bedroom that Zack didn’t recognize but he could clearly see who it was. Ethan and Sarah were having sex on the bed. Sort of. Sarah was clearly incoherent, lying there passed out.
“Who gets shot for porn?” Cooper asked. “It’s given away freely on the internet.”
“It’s Ethan and Sarah,” Lucy said, her voice low. “He videotaped her and him together. What a scumbag.”
“Maybe he didn’t know he was being filmed,” Jane said. “He might be a victim, too.”
“He knew,” Zack said, taking no joy in saying it out loud. “He keeps looking at the camera. And he’s talking to someone out of frame. Wait…did you see that? There was an arm in the screen. There’s a third person there.”
“That third person might be the one that shot Ethan,” Tate said. “Or not. I’m just thinking out loud here.”
“That’s a good theory,” Cooper said. “If the other person didn’t want the video seen, they might be willing to kill for it.”
“Can we turn that off?” Frankie said. “I don’t really want to watch your friends go at it, especially when one of them is too impaired to consent. This is rape, and I’m not feeling all that sorry for Ethan right this minute.”
Tate closed out the video, and double clicked on another file.
“Let’s see what else is on the drive. Maybe the third person will show themselves.”
It was another sex video, although this time not of Ethan and Sarah. It was his friend Jay and then-girlfriend Melanie. This time, Melanie was giggly but not falling down drunk. Jay kept glancing in the direction of the camera, but Melanie didn’t seem to know it was there. From what Zack could see, there wasn’t a third party in the room.
The other files were much the same. About half a dozen guys from Zack’s high school and their girlfriends in various stages of inebriation.
“The boys know that the camera is there, but those poor girls don’t. I’m sick to my stomach watching this,” Lucy said, turning her head away. “I think you can tell Jay that these girls did not, in fact, know what they were getting into and consenting to it. What an asshole.”
“What a criminal,” Jane sneered. “This is highly against the law. They’re not just creepy teenage boys, they’re criminals and rapists. And yes, I feel nauseous, too. This is vile stuff. No wonder they kept it under wraps and didn’t want anyone to know. Ethan felt guilty? He couldn’t look at himself in the mirror? He damn well ought to feel guilty. Christ, he didn’t care about this until Sarah was found.”
Zack didn’t want to see anymore. It made him sick to see people that he had been friends with – trusted, even - do something so horrific to another human being. Those girls had trusted their boyfriends, and they’d been taken advantage of. For what? Drugs? Booze? Feeling like they were adults when they were anything but?
“From what we know, these videos are worth killing for,” Tate said. “It got Ethan shot, and it could get you dead, too.”
“No one knows he has it,” Cooper pointed out.
“Unless Ethan told someone,” Lucy replied. “Or someone has a lucky guess as to who he gave it to.”
“That’s probably why your condo was broken into and tossed,” Jane said. “They were looking for the drive, thinking that Zack may have hidden it there. You said that you ran into Ethan, and he seemed paranoid, looking over his shoulder. Maybe they thought he gave it to you.”
“They should have gone into Cooper’s as well,” Tate said. “But they didn’t.”
