Graphic by Samantha Rose

Devon sipped his soda, his brow furrowed. Their day at the office had ended without incident and the two stopped at a small Italian restaurant a few blocks away from the hotel that their internship paid for. Their conversation had consisted of the clacking of Guadalupe’s keyboard and Devon’s questions. As their entrees arrived, Guadalupe finally spoke, shutting her laptop.

“This was a good first day,” she mused.

Devon raised his hand like a student with a question. “I’m enjoying your quiet detective thing, Batman, but why don’t you let Robin in on the details?” he asked. “Like, what were you just typing for the past half hour?”

Guadalupe dismissed him with a wave of her hand. “I was taking notes on the suspects.”

“Well, let’s go over them together then,” her partner replied.

Their table was beside a window. It was still light out, the sidewalks marked by couples on their way to dinner and men in suits fresh out of work. The tables near them were empty. Devon could not shake off his goosebumps after the message at work, nor could he stop peeking over his shoulder. He kept expecting to see a shadowy figure in a trench coat trailing them, shoulders hunched, hands in their pockets. Whenever he looked he saw nothing and there, in the quiet restaurant, he decided it was safe to finally discuss what they had learned.

“Let’s first consider the crime,” Guadalupe said. “Someone has hidden several stories throughout the Devil’s website with a timeline spanning months. The stories are all false and full of fake, extraordinary facts.”

“Why would someone do that?” Devon asked around a mouthful of spaghetti.

“If discovered, those stories would ruin the credibility of the publication,” Guadalupe replied. “As new as The Devil is, it would never recover and likely go out of business.”

“What employee wants their company to collapse?” Devon shook his head. “It just doesn’t make sense.”

Guadalupe took a bite of her panini. She adjusted her glasses before answering. “It would depend on the person,” she said. “For example, Dakota.”

“What?” Despite himself, Devon felt his voice raising. “Dakota doesn’t seem like she’d do something like that. She’s too nice.”

Guadalupe smiled. “Your urge to defend her is amusing, but consider what Mrs. Wilson said. Dakota wanted to be a writer and was instead demoted to receptionist,” she said. “She has access to the company files and likely knows who is using what alias at any given time. And, were the publication to fail, it’s not like she couldn’t find work as a receptionist elsewhere.”

Devon took what may have been the angriest bite of spaghetti he had ever taken. He would be lying if he had said he didn’t have a little crush on Dakota, but he swore it didn’t affect his judgement. It enhanced it, in fact. Evil geniuses were not the least bit attractive, and yet Dakota was. By his impeccable logic she was innocent. He snorted. “There’s no way Dakota is the criminal mastermind.”

Guadalupe nodded. “Dakota’s saving grace is her failure as a writer,” she said. “The false stories were written to the same quality as the other stories on The Devil. If she could write like that, she would not be the receptionist to start with.”

“Then she’s out of the list of suspects,” Devon said, slurping another glob of pasta. He felt sauce splash onto his cheeks and wiped it off with his fingers.

“Unless she has improved as a writer and she is simply holding a grudge,” Guadalupe pointed out.

Devon shook his head. “I don’t think it’s her. What about Mrs. Wilson? What if she brought up Dakota to throw suspicion off herself?”

“Also possible,” Guadalupe admitted. “Mrs. Wilson knew what computer I was working on, which the culprit would have needed to access my computer specifically.”

“Mrs. Wilson has the writing ability, too,” Devon added. “And if she works fact checking for the publication, she would probably use that to let other fake facts slide into published stories.”

“But, as far as we know, there’s no motivation for her to do this,” Guadalupe responded. “She’s a working mom and would likely seek stability for her family, not lose her job.”

“Felix?” Devon offered. Their laidback mentor didn’t seem to have a mean bone in his body, but they may as well check.

“He has the ability, but, again, no motivation as far as we know. Unless he plans to lose his job to spend more time surfing,” Guadalupe said. “As far as I can deduce, it seems Dakota is the most likely suspect of the people we have encountered.”

“I’ll investigate her more myself, then,” Devon said. He straightened himself and said it with as much conviction as he could muster. To his surprise, his companion laughed a short, sharp chuckle.

“Is that what you call your bad attempts at flirting?” she said. “You can barely speak to the girl.”

“When did you become so sarcastic?” he shot back. “I thought you were all serious business.”

The smile on her face didn’t falter. “When it comes to the mystery and work, yes, of course. But when it comes to you?” She shook her head. “It’s hard to stay serious with you, ‘Robin’.”

He brightened. “Did you just use a pop culture reference back at me?”

Guadalupe grinned.

Devon laughed and raised his hand for a high five. “There’s hope for you yet, Guadalupe.”

She high fived him. “Please,” she said. “Call me Lupe.” It was Devon’s turn to smile and nod.

The two discussed the other ridiculous trials of their first day and agreed to begin investigating Dakota the next day, as well as searching out new suspects. Their highest priority was contacting Chester, the man in charge of the technical side of the publication.

“We’ll split up and look for clues,” Devon said. “I take Dakota, you take everyone else.”

Lupe scoffed.