A Dirty Shame by Liliana Hart

basis, would have tongues wagging. But he was right. They could talk if they wanted. Nothing I could do would stop them.
    “Geez, Jack. I guess you feel pretty strongly about the whole thing. I guess I should just say thanks and be grateful.”
    “You’re a perverse creature, Doctor Graves. I don’t know why I like you.”
    “I can think of a million reasons. One is because I never told your mother when you got that tattoo. And another is because I never told Mandy Howe that you broke your date with her to watch game seven of the World Series with me.”
    “It was a good game,” he said soberly. “And if you think you’re going to blackmail me by telling my mom about that tattoo then you can think again. I’m not scared of her.”
    “Sure you’re not. And the tattoo is in such an interesting place,” I said, fluttering my lashes.
    His hands tightened on the wheel as we wound our way through the mostly empty streets into King George Proper. “If you get me in trouble, just know I’m bringing you down with me. You’ll have to admit to my mom that you’ve seen me naked if you squeal about the tattoo. She’s probably going to have a lot of questions about that if I know her.”
    Oh, boy , had I seen Jack naked. It wasn’t something I was likely to forget. I’d officially lost this round since anything else I said would only get me deeper into trouble. The sexual tension in the car notched up to where I had to reach over and shut off the heater for the first time in as long as I could remember. I ignored Jack’s chuckle of triumph and tried to think about anything besides tattoos and nakedness.
    Reverend Oglesby had lived in one of the older areas of King George Proper. It was a mish-mashed area where quarter-million dollar homes were interspersed with doublewides or run down frame houses. There was a good bit of privacy to be had, as the lots were large and there was good tree coverage. The roads were difficult to maneuver, especially now that it was dark, and we almost missed the turn into Oglesby’s place.
    Jack’s headlights flashed on a small neat square of a house with white siding and blue shutters. The porch was miniscule, and the only thing that made it at all interesting was the yellow crime scene tape across the door. The driveway was loose gravel and there wasn’t a garage or portico to park a car under.
    “It’s quiet out here,” I said as we got out of the car. “No neighbors peeping over fences.”
    “Yeah. The killers would have come in broad daylight, since they had to catch him before he left for his trip. We knocked on doors all along this road, but no one remembers seeing an unusual car at that time of day. Most people weren’t at home for various reasons, but everyone had nice things to say about Reverend Oglesby. They talked about how he’d help out neighbors by doing yard work or running errands if someone was struggling. He’d run this road and loop around the three miles every morning at six o’clock, seven days a week. One of the ladies down the street said you could set your clock by him.”
    We walked up to the porch and Jack opened the deadbolt that had been placed on the door to keep the curious out. The house smelled musty from emptiness as we stepped inside, and Jack flipped on the lights. A fine sheen of black powder from the fingerprint dust coated everything, but underneath was the smell of lemons and clean. It was a small space—a postage stamp sized living room and a kitchen with worn laminate floors and yellow-flecked Formica countertops. A short hallway led to two tiny bedrooms and a bathroom. The furnishings were spare, and a few bills sat on the little table in the entryway, addressed, stamped and ready to be mailed.
    “No signs of a struggle,” I said. “Not even a little one.”
    “Yeah, which leads me to believe that only one person was here to administer the drug. There just aren’t enough fingerprints belonging to other people. We got a hit off of