LITMIR.BIZ

       Chapter 5

      With his curtains drawn and office door locked, he dropped into the leather executive chair behind his mahogany desk. Usually that gleaming piece of furniture and the built-in shelves with all his favorite books would have soothed his frustrations, even after a long week at his day job. He might even have smiled at the degrees on the wall and the framed photos on his desk—one a family portrait and the other of him in uniform.

      But not today. No, nothing could tamp down his irritation as he attached the cable for his external hard drive to his second laptop, kept just for business purposes. It was all he could do not to slam his hands on the keyboard while using the keys and touchpad to reach the even more secretive back door of his already well-hidden website.

      He couldn’t alert his dear wife to his problems, either. She’d done a fine job of avoiding asking questions for years and had graciously accepted the baubles he’d showered her with as rewards. No sense in crippling a smoothly working system.

      With a few more expert keystrokes, he landed on a page showing recent transactions from his Soleil Enterprises customers, all paid for using the cryptocurrency Bitcoin for anonymity. He loosened his tie, smiling at the second-quarter sales figures. Those had already tripled since the same time period a year before.

      It was a beautiful business model, providing a wide variety of goods and services for his clients’ proclivities and peccadilloes, all at prices they were willing to stretch to afford. He didn’t even know why it was called the “Dark Web,” when it spelled a brighter future for the secret bank accounts of people like him.

      Except that his sunny days might have been clouded recently with a bucket of blood.

      He fisted one hand and squeezed it so hard with the other that all his fingers ached. If only it could have been the guy’s neck. Of course, he wasn’t certain that it was one of his customers who had crossed the line and murdered those girls. It could have been anyone. But the crushed tiara, part of the secret crime scene information that a loose-lipped peace officer had shared with him, had made him wonder.

      Tiaras. Princesses. The sinking feeling in his gut told him it was a possibility. He shouldn’t have taken a chance on that guy. But greed could trap anyone in its grasp, just as an online supermarket for dark desires kept his clients coming back. Maybe he’d been caught this time.

      “If it’s you, you’re done,” he whispered to the monitor.

      Leaving his own site, he navigated to a few others that the local FBI task force regularly monitored. Again, it was information he shouldn’t have had but did.

      He couldn’t casually observe the task force’s activities any longer. Everyone was searching for answers. He had to find them first.

      He closed the Dark Web browser, launched another on the Surface Web and selected a chat room website that was among his customers’ favorites.

      Though he rarely joined in on the conversations, he started a dialogue box for his screen name.

      MR. SUNSHINE: Today’s been hell. Who agrees with me?

      A knock at his office door interrupted him just as responses poured in.

      “I’m headed up to bed,” his wife said from outside. “Will you be working long?”

      “You go ahead. I have a little more to do.” Then, as an afterthought, he added, “Sweet dreams.”

      He wouldn’t be able to sleep now if he tried, so he continued to lurk, waiting to see who was playing that night.

      He’d worked too hard to build his empire, too hard to protect it. No one would be allowed to expose it or him. Not a customer who’d taken his fun too far. Not a task force that could uncover a connection during its investigation.

      Would he kill to preserve this good thing he had? In a minute.