She hung up and turned to him. “Hey, Myron.”
“Hey.”
Esperanza came toward him. She wore pearls and bold colors. Her blouse and skirt were both super-tight. All the senior partners at FFD were dressed likewise. It had been Sadie Fisher’s idea. When Sadie first started representing women who had been sexually harassed or assaulted, she had been told to “tone down” the outfits, to wear clothing that was both drab and shapeless. Sadie hated that. It was more victim blaming and she wouldn’t stand for that.
Now the lawyers on this floor did the opposite.
“Working a case?” Myron asked.
“Our client is a second-year law student at Stanford.”
“Good school.”
“Right. Her stalker, a horrendous guy who threatened to kill her on more than one occasion, was accepted to the same law school and insists on going. I’m getting the judge to issue an order of protection.”
“Think you’ll get it?”
She shrugged. “Just normal news at FFD. In not-so-normal news, is Greg Downing really alive?”
“Maybe, yeah.”
“I never liked him,” Esperanza said.
“I know.”
“You forgave him. I never did.”
“Look, I hurt him—”
“And he hurt you. I know. I’ve heard you say that before. It’s bullshit. You took him on as a client because you wanted to show everyone how magnanimous you could be.”
“Don’t sugarcoat it, Esperanza. Tell me how you feel.”
“Greg destroyed your dream—”
“He didn’t know how bad the injury was going to be.”
“—and now he’s faked his own death and murdered someone.”
“Uh, you may be jumping the gun.”
“Whatever. I don’t want to be part of this.”
“Oh,” Myron said. “Okay.”
“Don’t make that face. I hate when you make that face.”
“What face?”
“The Helpless Bambi one.”
Myron blinked and pouted, playing it up.
“Ugh,” she said. “Look, I got your message, and I did a deep dive on this Bo Storm for you.” Esperanza sat behind her desk and started typing on her laptop. “By the way, how was seeing Emily?”
“How do you think?”
“Not as bad as usual, I imagine. You’re happily married now. It’s all in the rearview mirror now.”
“True. Except.”
“Yeah. Jeremy. I get it.” Esperanza kept typing. “First off, Bo Storm isn’t his real name.”
Myron put his hand to his heart. “Gasp. Oh. Gasp. I’m. So. Surprised.”
“Yeah, I’m starting with the obvious because after that, it all gets pretty strange.”
“In what way?”
“Bo Storm has been off the radar for five years. I mean totally.”
“Since Greg supposedly ran overseas.”
“Right. He closed it all down. Not just his Instagram account. Bo had a pretty decent OnlyFans following. Good subscriber base, maybe because his rates were cheap.”
“When you say OnlyFans and subscriber base—”
She looked up at him. “You don’t know what I mean?”
“I don’t.”
“You pay for access to see him naked.”
“Oh.”
“And in sex scenes with other men.”
“Oh.”
“Do you really not know this?”
Myron shook his head. “And when you say ‘his rates were cheap...’”
“His monthly subscription fee was only $1.99 — but really I think he just used the OnlyFans to advertise his wares.”
“Wares?”
“Prostitution. It’s not just for us ladies. From what I’ve been able to find out, Bo worked at a gay sports bar called” — she raised her gaze and met Myron’s eye — “Man United.”
Myron looked at her. She continued to look at him.
“That’s actually a pretty funny name,” Myron said.
“Agreed,” Esperanza said.
“Do you have a real name for Bo?”
“Not yet but get this: I’m using this advanced facial recognition image search. You know what that is?”
“Pretend I don’t.”
“I put in a photo of someone’s face. It scours the entire internet and finds other photos that person is in.”
“Yikes. Talk about Big Brother.”
“It’s not new technology, Myron. It’s been around for years.”
“Okay, so what did you find?”
“Bo is in a bunch of posted photos from the clubs. Parties, tourists, that kind of thing. So far, I’ve found two things that are relevant for you. One, there are no recent photographs of him. Nothing at all in the last five years.”
“So,” Myron said, “since he stopped posting—”
“No one has posted a photo of him anywhere. That’s right. And that’s rare. You really have to try to stay that off the radar.”
Myron took that in. “What’s the other thing?”
“There is one crowd shot of Bo that you’ll find very intriguing.”
“Crowd shot?”
“As in, he’s in a crowd. As in, a sporting event. As in, your friend Bo attended an NBA basketball game.”
Myron froze. “As in, a game coached by Greg Downing?”
Esperanza nodded. “Greg’s Milwaukee Bucks in Phoenix playing the Suns. Six years ago. I zoomed it in for you and printed it out.”
She handed him a photograph. Yep, crowd shot. Bo sat behind the Bucks’ bench next to an uber-tan, uber-blonde woman packed into a tight tank top.
“Can’t be a coincidence,” Myron said.
“Man, you’re good.”
He smiled. He was happy that Esperanza had found such satisfaction in this new job, but he missed working with her on a day-to-day basis. MB Reps wasn’t MB Reps without Esperanza.
“So how do we find Bo Storm after all this time?” Myron asked. “Maybe Man United had his real name for payroll?”
“Already tried that. They’re under new ownership and got rid of all the old records.”
An idea came to Myron. “Explain that facial recognition search thing you did.”
“It’s fairly self-explanatory.”
“So if you had a photo of me—”
“I could put it through the search engine and theoretically it would find every photograph with you in it on the web.”
“Open up Bo’s dormant Instagram page for a second.”
Esperanza did. Myron started scrolling through it. He stopped and pointed. “This guy,” Myron said. “He’s in at least a dozen of Bo’s photos.”
She read the captions out loud: “‘Me and Jord doing our thang.’ ‘Jord and me at the club.’ Hmm, both of these guys are hot. Gay guys keep in such great shape. A lot of shots of them at the club shirtless.”
“Yeah, but not that.” Myron scrolled some more. “Here’s one of Bo and Jord at a barbecue in a yard.”
“Still shirtless.”
“And look — ‘Having the boys over for the Super Bowl.’”
“Still shirtless,” Esperanza repeated, making a face. “Who watches the Super Bowl shirtless?”
“Can we put this Jord guy through your search engine?”
Esperanza nodded. “That’s not a bad idea.”
“Every once in a while.”
“Give me an hour, okay?”
“Okay.”
Myron just sat there and stared at her.
Esperanza said, “I got something stuck in my teeth?”
“No.”
“What then?”
“I miss this. Don’t you miss this?”
She said nothing.