“What in the heck is this?” Amanda asked.
“Looks like Hamill kept a secret library of sex videos,” Jacob said. “No wonder he had such beefed-up security on his computer.”
“He didn’t want Layla to see just how many different women he’d been cheating on her with,” Amanda added.
Spenser scanned the thumbnails of the video files Jacob had finally cracked. There were dozens of them. It looked like the same women appeared in a few of his videos, but by and large, the majority of them were with different women. As she studied the thumbnails, something about them made her look closer. She didn’t want to see them—the mere thought of watching one of those videos made her skin crawl—but there were alarm bells ringing in her mind, and she couldn’t figure out why unless she saw one.
“Play the first one, please,” Spenser said.
“What? You can’t be serious,” Amanda gasped.
“Something’s not right—”
“Yeah, a private sex tape collection is very much not right.”
“That’s not what I mean,” Spenser said. “Jacob, play the first one. Just… make sure you mute the sound, please.”
He frowned but did as he was told, and Amanda let out a disgusted groan as the clip began to play on the monitor. Spenser studied the silent clip. Throughout the clip, she noticed that Hamill kept looking back at the camera. The woman never did. The sly grin on his face made him look like he was part of some inside joke the woman he was with wasn’t in on.
“Jacob, stop this one,” Spenser said. “Play another one. Pick one at random.”
“And make sure it’s muted,” Amanda said.
“Got it.”
The second clip started to play and once again, Spenser noticed the same thing. Hamill kept cutting subtle glances at the camera with that same mischievous look on his face.
“Another one,” Spenser said.
Jacob played a third clip, and it was the same as the first two. It confirmed the thoughts that had been forming in Spenser’s mind since the first one had played.
“Okay, cut it,” Spenser said. “We’ve got what we need.”
“Thank God,” Jacob said. “Watching porn with my sister in the room was totally weird, awkward, and an absolute buzzkill, boss. Just thought I’d put that out there.”
“It was no picnic for me either,” Amanda added. “So, was that exercise for anything other than grossing me and my brother out?”
“What did you notice about those clips?” Spenser asked.
“I noticed that Seth Hamill is a filthy, disgusting pig,” she snapped.
“Those movies were shot from a hidden camera. The women he was with had no idea they were being filmed,” Jacob said.
“Bingo. Gold star for you,” Spenser replied.
“How could you possibly know that?” Amanda asked.
“Oh, I’ve developed that three-dimensional thinking you haven’t quite mastered yet,” Jacob quipped.
Amanda’s face reddened, and she seemed upset that she’d missed something that her brother, of all people, had picked up on. She glared at him.
“Seriously, how could you know that?” she pressed.
“The angle of the camera… it’s high up, almost like it’s on a bookshelf,” he said. “And if you look at the right edge of the frame, you can see there’s something there, blocking the view. It’s almost like it’s hidden behind something like, say, a book or something.”
Jacob blew up the frame of the video and Amanda leaned close as she looked at it, then turned back to them, a look of irritation on her face. She looked like she was beating herself up for not seeing it. It probably didn’t help that Jacob had. Spenser could absolutely relate to that sense of embarrassment about not seeing something that, in hindsight, seemed so obvious.
“Also, Hamill kept looking back at the camera with this stupid little smirk on his face,” Jacob said. “None of the women in the videos ever looked at the camera. It tells me they might have been completely oblivious to the camera being there.”
“Two gold stars,” Spenser said.
“Hooray for you,” Amanda said dryly.
“Somebody’s salty they didn’t get gold stars for a change,” Jacob teased.
“Stick it, geek,” she snapped.
“Children, play nice.”
Jacob chuckled quietly. Amanda pulled her hair back into a tight ponytail, her jaw clenched, and a look of determined focus on her face. She was too hard on herself. But Spenser liked that she was. Not that Amanda needed to, but the fact that she took things so personally showed Spenser that she was never satisfied and was always looking to sharpen her skills. She appreciated that.
“Okay, so Hamill was making dirty videos in secret. And… what? We’re thinking one of these women found out and offed him?” Amanda asked.
“That’s as solid a theory as anything right now,” Spenser said.
