Lorne started reading through the email exchanges between Robotham and Connolly, gaining an understanding of their professional and personal relationships. He read a few of them to Catherine and after an hour and three-quarters, he drafted a reply to the PM and read it aloud.

Hi, Bill... Thought that was you. Very nice site, better than the other. A few weeks now, still trying to settle-in. Tough. God bless, Francis.

"What do you think? Does that carry the tone?" He watched her nodding.

"Yeah, that sounds like him. I'd say send it."

He read it again silently, then pressed Send. "Gone." He glanced at the time on his computer screen. "Sixteen forty, how long do you think?" He leaned to kiss her.

"I would guess within the hour. What about Doctor Sick? Have you read any of those emails?"

"A lot of the later ones were among the three of them as they scrambled. I'll continue back to see how far it goes. See if I can find where their relationship started."

"Did you find the beginning of Robotham's with Connolly?"

"Yeah." He put his arm around her shoulder again and gave a little squeeze. "I don't think you'd enjoy it."

"My guess is they were talking about relieving Connolly of an unwanted part."

"Yeah. Robotham was going to do him when the Mounties brought charges."

"So Robotham switched from cutting to defending. Where does Frick come in?"

"I'm going to find out." He pointed to his screen. "I'm sure it's all here." He stood, moved behind her and reached his hands around to cup her breasts. "I need a break."

She turned her face to meet his lips as he bent. "A naked cuddle would be nice. I'm frazzed."

It was nineteen ten when she woke, still entangled and connected. "Amazing how tiring that stuff is. Emotionally and physically draining. You been awake long?"

"Not long. A few minutes. I was lying here thinking how much you mean to me. How much I love you."

"How much?" She giggled and squeezed a Kegel.

"They haven't invented the word for it yet, but a lot more than that." He chuckled. "Squeeze me up, Katy."

"Oh God, what was that? Space Wars or Sky Trek or something? Beam me up, Scotty." She did a slow series and felt him expand.

He began a gentle in and out to speed the process. Forty minutes later, they were back at the island counter reading the new message from rubme.

Hi, Francis... You back in Vancouver? Where? I can give you a room for a while. Do you still need my help with the excess bit? Bill.

"So it seems Robotham's in Vancouver."

"Appears to be, unless he simply has a connection here who has a room he can offer."

"Yeah, but the help thing. Sounds as if he's offering his cutting services to... Fuck! I'm getting numbed to this. Seems almost like discussing a carpentry project." She did a mock finger gag.

"I guess to them it is nothing but a project."

She stroked his forearm and nodded to the computer. "So what are you going to answer?"

"I'm going to read through the email exchange with Frick first to get a larger picture."

"Good thought. They must go back to before the trial for their manipulative conspiracy. I'll start dinner." She stood, kissed him, and walked to the fridge to explore. "There are still two pieces of snapper. How's that?"

"Huh! You say something?" He looked up from the screen.

"I said we're having snapper for dinner."

"Great." He refocused on the computer, then abruptly turned his head toward her. "I love you. You know that, don't you?"

"Silly question. How could I ever not know that?"

Twenty-odd minutes later, he looked up from his screen. "Mine wasn't the first case they've played their scam with, just the first one they were caught with."

"What have you found?"

"So far, I've found that he and Frick played this defence and expert witness game twice before, both of them priests. Got them both off. They must have been working for the Church, but I haven't found anything connecting them. Yet."

"How far back into it are you?"

"Three years, back to 2000. That's as far as I've gone. So sickening going through their conniving and scheming, twisting innocent boys into being the guilty ones." He put the Toshiba to sleep. "What can I do to help?"

"Wash your hands and sit. It's ready in two minutes."

After dinner, they leaned back on the couch, relaxing as the dishwasher hummed in the background. She watched her hand as she stroked his chest. "You know enough about Frick now to mention him in your reply?"

"Yeah, there were long, three-way email conversations leading to and through the trial. I've a good sense now of the relationships among them. Clearly more than only the trial."

"How so?"

"There were small things through the text, but the major thing was their exchange of bmexx user names. BotMan, PussMakr and BorNullo."

"Bornullo? That sounds like a Tuscan wine?" She laughed. "You needn't give up wine with meals just because I have, Lorne."

"I want to keep you company. Besides, I don't miss it as much as I thought I would. A dozen years as part of my diet, but it seems unimportant now. How about you?"

"Same, I rarely missed having it, but now..." She looked down as their hands arrived on her belly at the same time. "Snap!" She grinned. "We're being silly. What's the Brunello thing?"

"BorNullo. I made a note to search, but got bogged down in the emails."

"Curious?"

"Cuddle?"

"Yeah."

A dozen silent minutes later, he reached down and squeezed her butt cheek. "Gotta write a reply to rubme and see what the frick Frick's about."

"What are you going to say?"

"I don't know. I didn't want to spoil our cuddle by thinking of anything but you."

"Oh, my God! You are so... So... God, I love you." She squeezed him tighter.

A few minutes later they were back at the computers. "You go search for BorNullo in imBMEX.ru, I'll comb through bmexx.com." He spelled it for her. "Upper case B and N, no spaces."

Half a minute later she said, "Nothing there."

He glanced over at her screen and laughed. "Yeah, same thing I found. He has an innie. Good name for himself; born nullo."

"What's nullo mean? I've seen that before in your headings. In the headings on Robotham's drive."

"From nullified. Eunuchs. Most often it refers to everything being removed, but sometimes only castrated or just the penis lopped off. His, though, is simply incuse. Born that way. Here, he's pierced the head and added a ring. Likely so he can pull it out a bit to pee without dribbling all over himself. God that would be messy." 

"Yeah, look at this one, he's pulling it out with the ring, and this one, a big weight attached. I didn't realise penises came that short."

"Scarce, bordering on rare. Statistically quite similar to my end of the range." He nodded toward his crotch. "There are many of them posted across the net. A lot of sites, Shufflr pages and so on are dedicated to micros and minis. They also hide a lot of little boy images there. Child porn. But among the adults, there's a significant number whose penises don't quite reach the surface or barely peek out. I prefer my end of the range."

"Oh, God! So do I." She shivered lightly and smiled, then pointed to her screen. "It appears he wants his to be bigger, the other two don't seem to even want theirs. Three unhappy men."

Lorne sat and composed a reply in his notepad app and read it through a few times. Then he read it aloud to Catherine.

Hi, Bill... I'm with an old friend now in Kits, but feel I'm imposing. Where are you? You in touch with Gustav? God bless, Francis.

"I like that, but you've not mentioned the trimming."

"I thought I'd leave Robotham wondering. Keep his interest."

"Yeah, I can see that. Clever. I'd say send it."

He pasted the text into the IM reply box, read it through again, then clicked Send.