Page 116 of The System

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The next morning, when Carina woke up, without sex and Kieran to distract her, her thoughts had returned to her job, which she hoped to not only keep but move up from as she stared at her laptop. Carina had to be the earlier riser of the two, so she’d woken up first and had made coffee. Deciding to work from the kitchen, she’d pulled out her stuff and started typing. Working from Kieran’s place had proven to be interesting, though. When Kieran woke up, she had walked in, kissed Carina good morning, and made her own cup of coffee. They hadn’t really talked then because Kieran had still been half-asleep, which Carina had found cute, and soon after that, Kieran had gone to take a shower before she’d walked out of the bedroom with wet hair.

“You don’t need to dry that?”

“I don’t have a meeting until one. It’ll be dry before then,” Kieran had replied and disappeared into her office.

Carina had walked by once on the way to the bathroom and had seen her with massive headphones covering nearly half her head, glued to her screens. Things that Carina couldn’t possibly understand had been moving across the monitor, and she’d fallen a little more in love with this woman just watching her work.

Having used the bathroom, she left Kieran to her own devices and returned to the kitchen to find that she had a new email from Frank Richard, which was strange because he knew she’d been removed from his case and hadn’t contacted her since. She’d clicked on it, curious, and read it to herself. It was only then that she noticed it had been sent to Kevin, too, saying that he’d be interested in pursuing a new deal. Kevin had already replied, saying that Carina was no longer on the case and shouldn’t have received this information. Frank had replied back, saying that he thought she’d only been moved to second chair, which he’d known wasn’t the case.

“Um, Carina?”

She looked up to see Kieran standing there, holding her phone.

“Yeah?”

“Why did I just get a text message from Frank saying, ‘You’re welcome?’”

Carina smiled, nodded, and said, “Frank found a little loophole.”

“What loophole?”

“He sent me the bus footage.”

“He did?” Kieran moved to Carina’s side, sitting down next to her immediately. “Wait. He can’t do that, right?”

“Like I said, loophole. Want to watch it?”

“I already watched the part she’s in.”

“Maybe you’ll see something new this time.”

“Are you sure you’re not in trouble?”

“Frank did it, not me.”

“But Kevin is on this email,” Kieran noted.

“Yes. He explained that I shouldn’t have received it, and Frank told him that he was confused and thought I was only second chair.”

“Fucking Frank,” Kieran said with a laugh.

“So, the murder window is when?” Carina asked, already knowing the answer.

“Eight to eleven. And she’s there around nine, a little before it,” Kieran replied.

“So, that’s about one hour before the murder that we need to account for.”

“Well, she didn’t drive to the bus stop. She didn’t have a car. And his was found at the house, right?” Kieran asked.

“Kevin will suggest that she got a ride.”

“Okay. That’s still at least ten minutes, and he’d have to find the person who would’ve given her the ride to prove that, anyway. Nick took a phone call right at eight.”

“Yes, at two after eight, and it lasted eleven minutes,” Carina added, remembering the phone records she’d reviewed. “And that person said there was nothing off or weird about Nick during the call. His statement said that they hypothetically talked about a drug deal.”

“Hypothetically?” Kieran shook her head.

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