Mac pushed a hand through his hair. “I was blindsided when I walked in on my wife in bed with another man. I know how much damage cheating causes. How it destroys trust between two people who love each other. I couldn’t believe I’d done the same thing to Keely. I wanted to warn her because I knew how much seeing those pictures made public would hurt her.”
“Mac actually showed them to me. He broke our engagement. I was shocked. Enraged. Especially when I asked who the woman was and he told me he didn’t know her name. I thought he’d had sex with a nameless, one-night stand and ordered him out without hearing everything he had to say.”
Keely paused, her heart pounding against her ribs. Dash nodded at her, urging her to go on. “Today, Mac warned me that the pictures would go viral. That’s when the pieces began to fall into place.”
“You were set up,” Knox said, his voice steady, but she saw his barely contained anger simmering under the surface.
“He remembers nothing about Monday night. Or even us returning from Vancouver.”
“That’s common in victims who’ve been given date rape drugs,” Scarlett said, removing an iPad from her tote. “They have no memory of the incident and oftentimes can’t remember the days leading up to it.” She turned to Mac. “I doubt you had sex with this con artist. Under the influence of these kind of drugs, you would have been awake but unable to speak or move. She could have staged each pose and you would have been powerless to protest. Let me see your phone.”
Mac unlocked it and brought up the text before handing it to her. Keely watched Scarlett’s face. She had one of the best poker faces around, which served her well in court and during negotiations, but even Keely saw her friend struggling to mask her reaction.
“We’ll need to hire a digital expert but the pictures look real to me, not superimposed or spliced together. Still, you can see from Mac’s face that he’s pretty out of it.” She set the cell on the coffee table.
“I have Carson Porter nosing around now, trying to find out if anyone’s bought the pictures or who might be trying to market them to the media,” Keely added.
“It must seem obvious to everyone here what happened to me. I didn’t get it, though,” Mac said quietly. “I realize now that my brain was muddled by whatever I was given. I saw the pictures and believed I had fully participated. I thought I’d screwed around on Keely and because of that, she deserved a life away from a louse like me. I wasn’t able to connect the dots and put together that someone had drugged me and arranged the scenes. Even today, with my head clearer, it’s still a little beyond my comprehension.”
“Clearly, someone slipped Mac something in a drink and then took these photos,” Cassie said. “So, we’re talking two people involved in a conspiracy to commit a crime. Fraud?” She looked to Scarlett. “Is that what the woman in the pictures and whoever took them could be charged with?”
“It was a male voice on the phone that issued the blackmail demand,” Mac said. “He’s likely the guy who took the photos.”
Scarlett set aside her iPad. “This isn’t classified as fraud—Promissory, Concealment, or Constructive are the three types of fraud recognized in this state. We’ll need to go a different route. California enacted the first of its kind state law when they outlawed revenge porn—distributing private, explicit photos of people on the Internet to humiliate them. Think breakup revenge. A part of that, Senate Bill 255, deals with digital images of a harassing nature. It’s a misdemeanor to post identifiable nude photos of someone else online without their permission and with the intent to cause emotional distress or humiliation. If you take photos or videos of someone without permission and distribute them, it violates their reasonable expectation of privacy. If they sell Mac’s images without his permission, he can sue for damages because they’re profiting off his name and image.”
“Wait a minute, Scarlett,” Sydney said. “You said it infringes on a person’s right to privacy. But this is after the fact. The images have been sold and distributed. They’re already out there. What good will that do Mac? He’s publicly humiliated and this couple only gets slapped with a misdemeanor?”
“I hope we can stop whoever these people are before it comes to that. Under California Penal Code 518 PC, they’ve committed extortion, commonly referred to as blackmail. The guy used force or in this case, a threat, to compel Mac to give him money. An element of the law says this blackmailer is threatening to expose a secret or trying to connect Mac with something that will disgrace him and create a scandal. The law says this secret would harm Mac’s reputation so greatly that he would be likely to give up money or property to prevent the fact from being revealed.”
Scarlett shook her head. “Again, the problem is Mac didn’t pay up. These people basically have committed attempted extortion since Mac never consented to their request. He never handed over money or property.”
“By doing the right thing and standing up to these weasels, it’s only attempted extortion?” Keely asked, outraged.
“Yes,” Scarlett confirmed. “If we can find them, charge them, and they’re brought to trial and found guilty, they’ll serve anywhere from two to four years in county jail and pay a ten thousand dollar fine.”
Disgust filled Keely. She saw it reflected in the faces of those gathered.
Scarlett retrieved her iPad and continued. “The important thing is to go on the record now. File a police report about the extortion attempt. Figure out who did this and obtain a restraining order. We need to get down a timeline and list all the facts we know to present to the cops.”
“I can help with that,” a voice said from the doorway.
Keely turned and saw a tall, lean man in his late twenties standing there. “You must be Rocco. Come in.”
He joined them, his eyes sweeping the room as he took a seat. “Forgive me if I’m a little starstruck,” he apologized. “This is a powerhouse room.”
Keely quickly introduced everyone and thanked him for coming and then Scarlett took charge.
“Rocco, we’re going to establish what we know about this incident involving Mac and then investigate from there. You say you’re Mac’s neighbor.”
“Yeah, we live next door to each other in an apartment complex in Venice Beach.” His eyes flicked to Keely. “Or we did until recently. Mac’s not home much.”
“Did you see him Monday night?” Scarlett pressed.
Rocco nodded. “I had a friend over all afternoon. We’re working on a new gaming system for an Asian startup firm. He left just before six that night because he needed to take his girlfriend to the airport. When I let him out, I noticed Mac at the mailboxes, shuffling through his mail.”
“Okay, so Mac arrived inside his apartment by six,” Scarlett confirmed. “Did you see him again that night?”
“No, not until the next morning. He banged on the wall and I went over. Mac was in pretty bad shape.” Rocco paused. “I heard you say someone doctored his drink. I have a good idea who.”
Mac leaped to his feet. “What?”
“You didn’t tell me anything when I came over. I thought you had the world’s worst hangover. I gave you Red Bull and helped get you into the shower. Just now, I overheard about your drink and some pictures.”