Kill Process (32 page)

It takes nearly twenty minutes because the API wasn’t built for this type of bulk query, and logging directly into the database isn’t a risk I want to take. When the query is done, one person rises to the top, nearly forty percent ahead of the second closest match. His name, his phone, his high school, all the data is mine. A few searches later, and I flesh out the rest of the picture.

Theo. Seventeen years old. Not a nice person, if he’s the one doing this. Before I burn him, I must make sure. I don’t want to wreck the wrong kid’s life.

I’m not familiar with Brazilian ISPs or Internet records, but what I want to know is easy for someone who is. I connect to a darknet board running on a pirate server on a Scandinavian ISP. There’s a chat room there, busy all hours of the day or night, where people trade favors. Like any modern social media system, of course, reputation is codified, the favor economy measured and meted according to contribution. In short, I’ve got credits to spare, and it takes only a quarter of an hour from the time I post my request with a bounty until I’ve got Theo’s home IP address.

I could trade in another favor to reset the router, but a quick test shows I don’t need it because the router is still configured with the default admin password. In a few minutes I’m on Theo’s machine, a Windows computer. He might have known enough to use a VPN, but he wasn’t smart enough to store all his compromising pictures and videos on a separately encrypted volume. There are thirty-odd folders, each labeled with a girl’s name. I spot check a few files. A video starts with a girl, eyes red and puffy, and Theo’s voice, speaking in accented English, telling her to take off her shirt. The bastard.

I stop and rest my head on the table, feeling sick. Afraid and angry at the same time, I’m divided between wanting to crawl into a corner or punching something. I don’t dare open Igloo’s sister’s folder, although I see her name there in the list of folders: Claire-14.

I sit up, and breathe in and out through pursed lips. I need to take care of him. But how? He’s seventeen. Can I kill a child, even a monstrous one like Theo? Maybe I don’t need to. Unlike in-person abuse, there’s a solid trail of evidence of Theo’s crimes. Here in the US, what he’s done is a significant crime, and with the right tips, the government would investigate and deal with him accordingly.

Will the Brazilian government treat online blackmail with the same seriousness? I don’t know what current Brazilian policies are. However, every government can be counted on to give the utmost consideration to the safety of their leaders. I spend a few minutes searching the Internet, and soon I find my answer. The Vice President of Brazil has a daughter.

I make a new folder on his computer: Juliana-14. I populate it with a few public photos of Juliana, then grab one clear shot, and feed it into Tomo’s image recognition algorithm. A few minutes later, it spits out a matching Picaloo user: xJulie02x. As I figured. The government probably won’t let Juliana create social media accounts as a semi-public figure. But then she’s a clever girl, under peer pressure like everyone else, and she found a way to make an account on Tomo’s companion photo sharing network.

The key thing is she’s in Tomo’s database, and she’s running the Picaloo app, which means I can grab her phone’s photos. I start the process.

It takes a while, so I use the bucket and clean my hands with a wet wipe. I eat half a scone I bought earlier. A few crumbs drop to the floor, reminding me of the accumulating DNA evidence in this room. I used the van for a long time, and before that, I had other blind offices. The problem, of course, is if someone finds this place and my DNA in it. My connection into Sprint’s backbone might be off the radar at present, but an NSA-level investigation would turn it up. If I’m caught now, it’s not only my fate I’m affecting. It’s the future of Tapestry and Thomas.

Is there any reason to believe anyone would be suspicious? How many times can I get away with this?

The upload is done. This part I feel a little queasy about, yet if I want to protect Claire, I can’t take the chance Theo will suffer anything less than prison. I pick a few of Juliana’s photos taken in her bedroom. They’re completely innocent: in one she’s making a funny face while she works on her homework, and in the other she’s holding up her dog and taking a picture in the mirror. But both are undeniably private, and that’s what will guarantee Theo goes to prison.

I add these photos to Theo’s hard drive. Then, working from Theo’s computer, I publicly post the photos on Tomo as Theo, and brag about breaking into Juliana’s home computer. I make sure his social media profile is up to date with his home address. No point in making the police work harder than necessary. To add as much pressure as possible, I submit a tip to Folha de São Paulo, the largest national newspaper, with a link to Theo’s profile.

One last task: I examine his browser history, find the sites where he’s been uploading photos of these girls hidden behind password-protected pages, and destroy all the sites. I’d like to remove the photos of his victims from his computer, but then I’d be destroying the evidence the police will need to put him away.

I disconnect and clean up after myself. It’s afternoon and I’ve been up since yesterday morning. There’s a nugget of satisfaction that I’ve taken care of Claire’s problems, wrapped in a thick layer of exhaustion, surrounded by a crunchy shell of worry. I have more than myself to consider now: my employees, payroll, our board meeting, Thomas.

I have work to do, both Tapestry work, and cleanup work here. I imagine the DNA, fingerprints, crumbs, footprints, and other records of my existence that place me here in this room. I’m too tired for any of it. I’ll come back and do it later. I need sleep.

S
OMEONE YELLS
and I struggle up, fighting bedcovers, until I’m sitting, my heart pounding and throat sore. It was me, screaming for help. The room is silent.

I rub my face and stare at the clock before I piece together the time and realize it’s the middle of the night. I have barely enough time to think I haven’t had one of those nightmares in months before I fall back to sleep.

When I wake in the morning, I find I’ve slept for almost fourteen hours, not counting my nighttime waking. I vaguely recall the nightmare, a nameless, faceless terror touching me as I lay paralyzed, unable to move or do anything. I feel dirty, like it wasn’t merely a dream, but someone actually violating me. I can’t wait to shower.

I glance at the urgently blinking light on my phone, which turns out to be a mistake. Too many guilt-inducing missed calls, screenfuls of text messages, and triple-digit new emails. I swipe the notifications off the screen. I can’t deal with all that. I take a long shower, forcing myself to stay in and ignore the psychological pressure of the demands on me. I’m toweling off when my phone rings with a call from Thomas. I place him on speaker as I finish getting ready in the bathroom.

“Hi, I’m getting dressed.”

“I like the sound of that,” he says, “but what the heck happened last night?”

“What do you mean?”

“We planned dinner and I was supposed to stay over. You never showed at the restaurant, and I called and texted a bunch, and never heard back.”

Oh, shit. “I’m so sorry. Work was crazy. When I got home, I took what I thought would be a short nap, and only woke up a little while ago.” My heart twinges at this lie. Crap, I hate being forced into this position. For a moment I’m furious at him for even calling, even asking me about yesterday. I don’t want to be accountable to anyone for how I spend my time. This is why I kept him distant, back when my social work was an everyday occurrence.

“Work, huh?” Thomas says.

“Yeah. There’s a lot going on.”

“That’s funny, I talked to Amber, wondering if maybe your phone had died or something, and she said she hadn’t seen you and you’d missed the board meeting.”

Oh, crap. The board meeting. The funding paperwork. Shit.

Whoa. Thomas was calling my coworkers?

“Why are you checking up on me?” The words come out of my mouth reflexively. It’s not until they’re out in the air that I realize what I’ve said. Those are the same words I said once before, before the whole world went to hell. Thinking of it, my skin crawls and my bowels weaken. The room spins and the left side of my face burns for no reason other than my memories.

Thomas talks, although I can’t make out his words over the pounding in my ears.

I gradually sink to the floor, my legs giving way as my mind fills with heinous thoughts. The walls close in on me, and part of my mind screams. Everything is numb and distant.

I look up to the counter, a million miles above me, where a corner of my phone extends out over the counter, a lifeline thin as a strand of spider silk, the other end of which is tied to an abstract concept called help. I fumble for the phone, hang up on Thomas, and hit the button for Emily. She answers, and I try to speak, but my voice has vanished, and nothing comes out. I want to ask for help, ask to be taken away from it all, but she is too far away.

*     *     *

I’m on a cold floor when there’s a distant pounding on the door. I hear it, but I can’t stand. Emily lets herself in, finds me in the bathroom.

She gets my bathrobe, wraps me in it, and urges me up. I follow her directions without conscious thought. She brings me to bed, gets me in a sitting position, tucks me in. I’m not crying, not thinking. I’m just nothing.

Some time later she comes back with a cup of hot tea, brings it to my lips, and holds it there. “Sip,” she says.

It takes a few moments for me to process the instructions, remember what that means, command my body to obey the order.

The sickeningly sweet tea brings back memories. This is not the first time Emily has taken care of me.

She sits next to me, makes me take more sips.

Her phone buzzes inside her purse. It stops, then buzzes again.

In my head, I form a thought with some difficulty, find the words to match the thought, send the words to my lips. “Get it,” I say, though by the time the words come out the phone has stopped ringing.

“It’s not important,” Emily says.

“You are,” I say, meaning she’s important, and the people who are trying to call need her, because there are things only she can do, but I can’t possibly say all those words.

“Nothing they need is as important as being here with you.”

Tears run down my cheeks as I silently sob.

Emily strokes my hair.

When I can finally speak, I give voice to my darkest fear. “What would I do if you weren’t here?”

“You are strong. If I wasn’t here, you’d call Thomas . . .”

I urgently shake my head.

“Or your therapist. Even if no one was there, you know what would happen?”

I shake my head no.

“You might have sat there on the floor for a while. Eventually, you would have gotten up. Even without me, or anyone else, you would have done it. You’re strong, Angie. The strongest person I know.”

“I feel like a china cup that broke and was put back together wrong.”

Emily takes my hand. “The Japanese have a name for that, when they repair pottery with gold. They say it makes the pottery even better.”

“Kintsugi.”

“There you go. But I’m not talking about your cracks. I’m talking about you, Angie. Remember in the fourth grade, when James was picking on me, and you stabbed him in the hand with your pencil to protect me? That Angie is still there, inside you, and she will always be there.”

I wipe my face with the back of my hand. “I twisted the pencil so the lead broke off in his hand. It’s still in there.”

“Believe me, I know. Every couple of years he posts a picture and tags me.” Emily sighs. “What brought this on today? You haven’t had an attack in . . . well, a long time.”

“I missed a date with Thomas last night. He called this morning to ask me where I was.” I stop, take a sip of tea. “He talked to Amber, found out I wasn’t at work yesterday. I asked him why he was ch . . . checking up on me.”

“Ah,” Emily says. She knows the story well enough, how the abuse started. “Thomas is a fine person. Besides, if he ever hurt you, I’d kill him. Maybe he was worried about you.”

“Maybe this is how it begins. Maybe today he’s asking where I was, and tomorrow he’s telling me I can’t go out.”

Emily takes a deep breath. “It’s hard to trust people.”

I nod.

“He asked you to marry him. Is that what’s bringing this on?”

Somehow I’d forgotten about his proposal. That wasn’t it. “It was him asking me where I’d been.”

“Try to see it from his perspective.” Emily’s phone buzzes. She ignores it. “You had plans for dinner. You forgot?”

I nod.

“He doesn’t hear from you, so he calls you. Did you answer?”

“No, my phone was off.”

“Did he email you?”

“Yes, although I didn’t see the messages at the time. I wasn’t checking email.”

“Jesus,” she says, laughing. “That is reason for concern. Since when are you not reading email?”

“I was busy.”

“Well, if you had plans, and you don’t show up, and don’t answer your phone or email, then isn’t it logical he might be a little worried?”

“Does that mean he should contact my coworkers, asking them where I am?”

Emily shrugs. “Maybe, maybe not. It depends on where you set your boundaries.”

“I’ve been pretty damn clear about where I set my boundaries.”

“Agreed, but he can still be worried and forget about those boundaries.”

“He’s not allowed.”

“He’s a human being,” Emily says. “He loves you. Hell, he may be worried you’ll change your mind about getting married. Who knows what’s going through his head? He’s a man, after all. They’re all sports and cars and sex up there. Can you imagine being in a man’s head?” She makes the universal sign for crazy, and I laugh. “Look, if I was suddenly missing, you would stop at nothing to find me.”

She’s right. When Igloo was missing, I called in a favor from Nathan9, and didn’t leave until I knew she was okay. Thomas is entitled to the same. I don’t know what I’m going to say if he presses me on where I was.