No Escape (8 page)

And now, the one time he was desperate for them to answer, they weren’t picking up.

He redialed. Again, it went straight to voice mail. “Yeah, Dad? Peter again. Listen, something kind of … bad happened, and I really need to talk to you. It’s important. Call me back.”

He hung up, frustrated. Peter was tempted to call Amanda and see what she thought he should do. But he could predict how that conversation would go. She’d immediately start criticizing him for not calling the cops, and would probably insist that he hang up and dial 911.

Which he’d been tempted to do, but something stopped him. He got the feeling that calling this in would make things even worse. And would they even believe him? It sounded crazy—that a bunch of armed guys had broken into his house but only took his computer, leaving behind the more expensive one sitting beside it. The only sign that the guys had been there at all was the damaged front door—and Mason had said someone would come by to fix it. That was what was stopping him, he realized; what kind of thief offered that? What was really going on here?

Peter went behind the desk and collapsed back in his dad’s chair. He opened the drawer again and took a big pull off the whiskey bottle, not caring anymore whether or not Bob noticed.

His cell phone rang.

Peter sprang to answer it, nearly sending it flying in his eagerness. “Hello?”

“Peter? What’s going on?” his dad demanded.

Peter fell back into the chair, overcome by a profound wave of relief. “Dad, I’m so—”

“What’s he saying?” Priscilla’s voice in the background.

“He’s not saying anything yet; give me a chance to talk to him.” As always, Bob sounded annoyed. He was one of those people who firmly believed that the world was engaged in an overarching and continuous plot to get under his skin and make life difficult. Peter could never figure out why. As far as he could tell, Bob’s life couldn’t be going much more smoothly. “Peter, you’re only supposed to call in an emergency. I thought we made that clear. We’re celebrating here, and don’t want to be disturbed.”

“This is an emergency,” Peter said defensively. “A bunch of guys broke into the house.”

“What? When?”

“Tonight. They just left.”

“Did you call the police?”

“Not yet,” Peter said, thinking,
Nice of you to be concerned
. Not
Are you okay, Peter?
or
Did they hurt you?
But then, nothing unusual about that.

“Well, why the hell not? What did they take?”

“Just my computer.” Peter paused. “Dad, he said his name was Mason. He seemed to know you and Mom.”

Silence on the line.

“Dad?” Peter finally said.

“We’re on our way home now. Just sit tight until we get there,” Bob said. There was an undercurrent of concern in his voice, and maybe even a little fear as he forcefully added, “Do not call the cops. I mean it, Peter—don’t tell anyone about this.”

“But Dad—”

“We’ll see you in a few hours. Remember, Peter—not a word.”

Peter heard his mother protesting in the background, then silence. Bob had hung up.

He started to lift the whiskey bottle back to his mouth, then changed his mind—he needed to be able to think. Peter put the bottle back in the drawer. As he was closing it, his eyes fell on the AMRF folder again. Twenty minutes after he started snooping around that firewall, a bunch of private security lackeys busted into his house. The chances of that being pure coincidence was slim.

What was AMRF, really? And what were they trying to hide?

The only way to find out was to make an active assault on their firewall—this time, covering his tracks. There was only one problem: They’d taken his laptop. And clearly, he couldn’t use Bob’s computer to hack in. Mason’s threat had been clear enough, and Peter didn’t want to think about what would happen if they caught him sniffing around again.

Peter tapped a finger against the desktop, his mind whirring. He wasn’t about to leave this alone, though. He needed help with this, from someone who couldn’t be directly linked to him. Someone that even those guys would have a tough time finding.

And he knew the perfect person.

He signed in to /ALLIANCE/ again—it was his website; even if they were somehow monitoring Bob’s computer, they couldn’t expect him not to manage it. Someone had posted a new video since his last log-in, but he didn’t have time to look at it. Peter tapped a series of keys to gain access to past posts.

He’d deliberately built anonymity into the framework of /ALLIANCE/. Similar groups had faced lawsuits in recent years, with governments from the United States to Sweden trying to track down hackers and penalize them. Plus there was always the danger that some of the more anarchically minded members might do something that wasn’t in line with his mission statement. So Peter made a point of loosely tracking regular posters, making sure they weren’t either government flunkies trying to co-opt the site, or people just trying to enact retribution on someone for personal reasons.

So while there were no real names used, Peter could get in touch with anyone who posted if he needed to.

He composed the email to [email protected]. Subject heading:
Research for paper
—keeping it innocuous in case the computer was being monitored. In the body of the email, he wrote,
Wanted to talk more about our term paper. Meet @ the quad later to discuss
.

Before hitting send, Peter hesitated. Getting someone else involved might put them in danger. Based on past postings, Rain sounded pretty tough, but still—it was a risk.

Then he remembered the feel of the knee in his back, and the arrogant expression on Mason’s face as he walked out the door with Peter’s computer. He clicked the mouse, sending the email out into the ether. Then he sat back to wait.

N
oa rushed up the stairs. She’d gotten off the T at Copley Station, the closest stop to the Apple Store on Boylston Street. But the store would be closing in fifteen minutes.

She’d kept her head down on the train, but no one seemed to notice her. It was always almost too easy to sneak a ride on the T. Noa made a point of paying when she could, honoring their honor system. Still, it was times like this that the lax security came in handy. The train had brought her past the stop nearest her apartment. When the doors slid open, she’d been tempted to jump out and head to her place. Maybe it was just a fluke that she’d been grabbed while walking away from it; maybe whoever took her didn’t know where she lived. She could take a shower, put on her own clothes. Crawl into bed, even though she didn’t feel tired despite everything that had happened.

Too risky, she decided. Not until she found out more about what was going on.

When she stepped through the doors into the cool white interior of the store, she was enveloped by a wave of calm. Funny how just seeing the giant logo of an apple with a bite out of it did that to her. For most people, home was represented by four walls and a roof. Not for Noa. She preferred a motherboard to a mother, a keyboard to house keys. Nothing was more comforting than the hum of a spinning hard drive.

At this hour, the store was nearly empty. The greeter was a geeky-looking guy in his midtwenties with a pocked face and spiky hair stiff with gel. His smile was strained as he said in a single breath, “Welcome to the Apple store can I help you with something we’re closing in five minutes.”

“Fifteen,” Noa corrected him.

“What?”

“Fifteen. You close at nine.”

He opened his mouth as if to argue, but she’d already moved past him, headed to the laptops bolted to a table at the far end of the room. There were a few other people checking out iPads nearby. No one paid any attention as she started tapping a rapid sequence into the keyboard of a floor model.

A minute later, she logged off and went to the register. A bored-looking clerk handed a bag to the customer ahead of her, then waved her up to the counter.

“My dad ordered me a computer. I’m here to pick it up,” Noa said.

“Name?”

“Latham. Nora Latham.” The Lathams were the fictional foster family she’d invented to fool social services. After a series of less-than-stellar experiences with the foster-care system, Noa had come to the conclusion that she was better off on her own. So she’d established a bank account in their name and filled it with cash earned by her fictional foster father. As far as her clients knew, she was Ted Latham, a brilliant yet reclusive IT consultant. He worked freelance, primarily for a West-Coast-based company named Rocket Science. They were perfect in that they held Ted’s skill set in such high regard that they threw a lot of business his way and didn’t question eccentricities like his refusal to make on-site visits. Ted had a social security number, a PO Box, and a stellar credit rating. And he was extremely generous with his foster daughter, transferring nearly his entire income into her personal account every month. Plus he and his wife, Nell, were big believers in homeschooling: so good-bye, high school. They were easily the best parents she’d ever had.

The clerk tapped some keys, then said, “Yup, here it is. I’ll have them bring it out for you. Step to the side to wait.”

Noa obliged. As she waited for the new MacBook Pro, she felt a pang. Her old computer had been in her messenger bag when she was taken. Losing it hurt almost as much as the loss of the jade bracelet. It was the nicest thing she’d ever owned. She’d just bought a similar model, slightly smaller and more portable, the 13-inch rather than the 15-inch. Chances were, she’d be carrying it everywhere for the indefinite future, so better to travel light.

A guy came out of the stockroom holding the new computer in a box. He was a slight variation on the door greeter, just as pimply but with darker hair. He grinned at her. “Nora?”

“Yup.” She held out her hands for the box.

He held on to it. “This is a great computer; I’ve got the same one at home.”

“Yeah, I know,” Noa said impatiently.

“We’re about to close, but if you want help setting it up, there’s a Starbucks right down the—”

“No thanks.” Noa reached for it again.

He looked wounded, but handed it over. “All right, then. Enjoy.”

Noa didn’t bother answering. She grabbed the box, tucked it under her arm, and headed out the door.

Even though her fingers were itching to tear open the box, she forced herself to wait until she was five blocks away. This time of night, downtown was quiet and desolate. She found the open Starbucks near Back Bay Station and made her way to a corner table, ignoring the pointed look of the girl behind the register who was waiting to take orders. Noa was oddly still not hungry, but the smell of brewing coffee was making her long for a mocha.

She remained freezing, though, like her insides were a solid block of ice. Noa rubbed her hands together, attempting to warm up.

She opened the box, got out the laptop, and powered it up. First thing she had to do was access some cash. These days, you needed at least a debit card to get through the day.

Noa logged on to her bank account, then checked the credit card companies. None of them could get her cash or a card replacement outside of a twenty-four-hour window, which meant she’d be stuck on the street until then. Not the worst thing in the world, but more than anything right now she wanted to be alone. The girl behind the register was still eyeing her, and Noa met her gaze, glaring her down. When the girl looked away, suddenly extremely interested in the muffin selection, Noa allowed herself a small smile and turned back to the screen.

Her eyes fell on the clock at the upper right-hand corner, and she frowned. That couldn’t be right.

A well-thumbed copy of the
Boston Globe
was splayed across the next table. Noa reached over and grabbed it to double-check the date.

“Oh my God,” she mumbled aloud. October twenty-fifth. The last day she remembered was October third. She’d lost three weeks.

Noa leaned back against the wall, stunned. Her hand reflexively went to her chest again, where the incision throbbed dully. She really needed a quiet place to try to figure out what had happened. Which meant that she might have to suck it up and do her least favorite thing in the whole world: Ask someone for help.

She logged into her email account and scanned through. A few messages from Rocket Science about potential jobs, the tone becoming increasingly annoyed as “Ted” didn’t respond. Some spam, and a couple of online billers.