But Not For Lust by BJ Bourg (comprehension books .txt) 📕

I’d found her contacts list and text messages. “Well, well, while she had been cheating on her husband, she sure was faithful to Nikia. His is the only number she communicated with.”

Susan had moved closer and was looking over my shoulder as I scrolled through the text messages.

I stopped dead in my tracks when I saw an exchange of messages from the Friday night that Betty had returned home to unexpectedly find Dillon hiding in their home. Betty’s messages were clear to understand, but Nikia wrote like a four-year-old and I had to strain to figure out the words.

Betty: OMG! Dillon is home!!!

Nikia: Wut the hell I tought he was workin wut did u tell him

Betty: I told him I was raped. He wants to know who did it!?! What do I say???

Nikia: Wear u at

Betty: Hiding in the bathroom. I told him I needed to use it and that it burned. He’s demanding to know who did it and threatening to kill them. I’m so scared! He’s going to find out about us!!!!!

Nikia: No he wont tell him Ty Richards did it

Betty: The crazy guy?

Nikia: ya Dillin gunna go after him and well be in the clear

Betty: Are you sure it’ll work?

Nikia: ya

“That little bastard lied!” I looked up at Susan. “Nikia set this whole thing in motion. He’s going down hard for this!”

She nodded and glanced back at the tiny screen. There were only a few more messages after that night. On Sunday night, Nikia had texted Betty and told her that Dillon murdered Ty and the two of them were in the clear. He later told her that he would contact the police department and report seeing Ty walking east of town. He said that once the heat was away from Jezebel Lane, he would move Ty’s body deep into the swamps where no one would ever find him.

“And if they do find the body and it leads them to Dillon,” he had written in his horrible English, “we’ll still be in the clear. You just need to stick to the story about Ty raping you and we’ll be fine. Don’t ever tell anyone we were having an affair and they won’t be able to link us to the crime. Deny, deny, deny!”

Betty had asked what would happen if Dillon told the police that Nikia helped kill Ty, and Nikia replied, “I never touched him, so they won’t find any evidence against me. And if he does involve me, I’ll offer to testify against Dillon. The cops will jump at the chance to have an eye witness on their side. After the trial, we can be together forever.”

Betty had asked Nikia what would happen if Dillon wasn’t arrested, and he responded by saying Dillon would have an accident one day and they could be together then.

After every message Nikia sent, he reminded Betty to delete their texts messages and the call history. She said she had, but in actuality, she hadn’t deleted a single one of them.

In his last few messages to Betty, Nikia asked what was wrong and why she wasn’t responding to him, but he received no response to any of those messages. In his final text message, he told Betty to destroy the phone or she would risk ending up in prison with Dillon.

“This will bury Nikia forever.” I stood and held up the phone. “Thanks to this, the district attorney’s office will definitely seek the death penalty against him. He basically put out a hit on Ty. Had it not been for him mentioning Ty’s name, Ty would still be alive today—and so would his mom.”

“You’re right,” Susan said with a nod. “He’s spent his entire life using and abusing women, and now he goes and does this?” She gritted her teeth. “It’s past time that someone gave him a lot of what he’s been giving. Death would be too easy for that little prick.”

I couldn’t argue, so I didn’t. I returned to the kitchen and indicated the crime scene. “Ready to get this thing processed?”

  CHAPTER 59

Three weeks later…

The week after Susan shot and killed Betty Watts, the Mechant Loup parade had gone off without a hitch. Amy, who was recovering nicely from both her physical and emotional wounds, had led the procession through town. Baylor rode shotgun in case she had an episode, but she made it through the entire parade without experiencing the least bit of anxiety.

Also on the day of the parade, but much earlier, Susan had received word that the district attorney’s office had cleared her of any wrongdoing. Thanks to the surveillance footage the sheriff’s office detectives had retrieved from Betty’s phone, the shooting was as open-and-shut a case as any they had ever been. While I hadn’t been worried about the results of the investigation, it was nice to receive the official word that she was cleared.

I had paid Nikia and Dillon each a visit in the parish jail. When I showed Nikia the text messages from the hide-away phone, he had begun cursing Betty for not deleting them and then he’d refused to talk to me. He demanded to see his lawyer, but I told him there was nothing to discuss. As for Dillon, he had been overcome with rage when I told him how Nikia had planted the seed in Betty’s mind about accusing Ty of rape. He promised to find some way to get to Nikia and kill him while he was in jail. This prompted me to notify the warden that Nikia was in danger, and he instituted measures to keep the two men separated while they were being held there. While I figured Nikia deserved whatever he got, it was my duty to do my part to protect those who were in the state’s custody.

As I had predicted, Prosecutor Britt Lucas from the district