Predator

  David stopped, his breath coming in gasps.

  “I don’t want to hurt you.”

  David looked at the gun. He had failed again. “Just go ahead and shoot,” he said. “Just kill me too.”

  Krebbs got to his feet, holding the gun aimed at David’s chest. Sweat covered his face, and his breath was heavy. “David, I understand why you’d want me dead if I killed Ella. But I didn’t. I didn’t.”

  “I saw you at the service tonight.”

  “Yes, I was there. I just wanted to show my support for the family. And some of her friends came from our youth group. I wanted to be there for them. I could never hurt Ella, David. Never. The week she disappeared I was out of town, in Washington, DC, getting the Teacher of the Year award.” He reached for a framed newspaper article on the wall, thrust it at David. “That’s me in the third row with all those other teachers.”

  David took the picture, looked at the date.

  “And a few nights ago, when those two girls were attacked, I had two basketball games that night. At least a hundred people saw me there. You can check. Yes, I have Ella’s picture. She was a great kid. I want to remember her. And everybody in Houston has gone to Karen’s GrapeVyne page today.”

  David felt the life draining out of him. He sat back on the floor, set his hands on his knees, and lowered his head. Could it be that he was wrong? The alibi looked convincing…

  Krebbs sat down on the floor facing David, still holding the gun. His face twisted, and he began to cry. “David, I’m so sorry she’s dead. Please believe me.”

  David covered his face. What had he done? He’d come in here ready to commit murder. He’d been so sure.

  He was losing it. And now he was in real trouble. “Go ahead and call the police,” David said.

  Krebbs shook his head. “I don’t want to do that.”

  “Why? I would have killed you if I could. I tried.”

  He lowered the gun. “Nobody has to know, David.”

  David wiped his face and looked at Krebbs. He knew him to be a good man. He worked hard for the church, for the school, for the kids. He’d been a good influence, a help in raising Ella and Krista.

  How could he ever think he was capable of murder?

  Krebbs put the gun down and got up, held out his hand. David took it, and Krebbs pulled him to his feet.

  “I’m sorry,” David managed to say.

  “It’s okay, man. I would have done the same thing.”

  “I thought…”

  “I know.”

  David pulled in a long, ragged breath. Wiping his face again on his sleeve, he went to the door, opened it.

  “David, next time you suspect someone, call the police. Don’t just go in swinging. Somebody might kill you.”

  David closed the door and stepped back into the night. He hated who he had become.

  And more than he ever had before, he just wanted to die.

  Twenty-five

  The friends and trusted employees in Ryan’s inner circle hated a conference room setting, so he’d designed a special room that inspired their creativity. It looked more like a playroom than a conference room.

  The place had a bank of computers around the walls for war-room type work, when they all needed to be online together. But instead of a table in the center of the room, there were couches and chaise lounge chairs. A cappuccino maker and theatre-style popcorn popper sat on the counter, and in most of their meetings, someone brought in a pizza or donuts to snack on while they worked.

  To offset all the calories consumed in this building, Ryan had installed a gym on the first floor, where they could burn them off.

  He’d brought no food today, but he hoped they’d still give him their best.

  Bridgit, a chubby thirty-year-old computer analyst, was wearing sweatpants and a wrinkled T-shirt that looked like it had been slept in. He pictured her getting up this morning and forgetting to shower or brush her teeth. She was focused, and her single-mindedness always benefitted GrapeVyne.

  Deuce, Shaffer, and Eli were all programmers who hated to be pulled away from their cluttered desks. Ryan hoped he could engage them in this new project so they wouldn’t sulk.

  Ian came in with Andrea and Alexis, twins with off-the-chart IQs. He’d met them in college, and they were among his first hires. He could always depend on them.

  Ian had finally showered, and his hair actually looked clean, though Ryan doubted he’d run a brush through it in days. He had that glazed look that told Ryan he’d been deep in the middle of something on his computer, and probably hadn’t even looked away in hours.

  They came in and took their various seats around the room, some lying down with their feet on the arm of a sofa, others plopping in front of the computers.

  “Everybody’s here,” Ryan said. “I appreciate you all coming.”

  “Nothing to eat?” Deuce asked.

  “No, not right now. This is serious, guys. I need to have a brainstorming session.”

  That made some of them perk up. They loved brainstorming.

  Ryan sat on the pool table, and with his legs swinging, said, “Guys, I’m sure you’ve all heard about the murders.”

  “What murders?” Andrea asked.

  “Ella Carmichael and Karen Anders.”

  “Who are they?” Alexis asked.

  Ryan sighed.

  “They’re the girls who were killed by an online predator who found them through their Thought Bubbles,” Eli said, scratching his shaved head. “What planet have you been on?”

  “I’ve been busy,” Alexis said. “Besides, I don’t watch the news. It’s too depressing.”

  “Obviously.”

  Ryan went back over what had happened to both of the dead girls, as well as Megan’s attack. “I was thinking that maybe we could get a little more proactive in figuring out who the killer is. Maybe we could use the Data-Gather program to isolate who the killer could be.”

  “That program’s only for advertising,” Ian said. “Besides, none of us works with it. All that data is gathered on the Willow side.”

  “I don’t even know what it is,” Shaffer said. “What are we talking about?”

  Ryan slid off the table and went to the computer he had hooked up to the projector. The computer desktop came up on the big screen.

  “Data-Gather is a program someone at Willow designed so that the advertising department could gather information about our clients and target them in their ads.”

  “Target them how?” Andrea asked.

  Ian was getting irritated. “Andrea, stop proving that geniuses have no common sense.”

  Eli threw a paper wad at Ian. “They don’t pay her for common sense. See Andrea, advertisers don’t want to waste their money advertising maternity clothes to men. They don’t want to advertise wrinkle cream to teens. So we use the program to spy on our subscribers.”

  “Okay, I got it,” Andrea said.

  “No, not spy,” Ryan said. “We just gather a few basic facts they post in their profiles, like their age, their gender, their region of the country, the kind of music they like…stuff like that.”

  “And that’s legal?” Andrea asked.

  “Perfectly. It’s being done all across the Internet. Advertisers love it, because they get a lot more bang for their buck.”

  “So you called us here to explain the Data-Gather program?” Bridgit asked, looking at her watch.

  “No. I wanted to brainstorm about how we could use that software to help identify who the predators are on GrapeVyne.”

  “You mean, like, have it flag all those who look at porn?” Deuce asked.

  “That would be one way. Maybe it could flag them if they look at porn and have underage girls as their GrapeVyne Friends, or if they go to the pages of people outside their age group. We could also tweak it to monitor whose pages they’re viewing.”

  “Sounds a little like Big Brother,” Alexis said. “Creeps me out.”

  “Maybe we should be Big Brother, no
t in the Orwellian sense, but in the sense that we’re protecting our younger siblings.”

  “So you want us to brainstorm search criteria for the Data-Gather program, to make it find predators?” Ian asked.

  “Yes. We get the computer to do the work for us.”

  “But who’s going to follow up with the people who are flagged? What if we find potential predators? What do we do with them?” Bridgit asked. “Do we turn them over to the police? Doesn’t that kind of cross the line of privacy laws? Doesn’t it equate to illegal searches?”

  “We’ll get the attorneys in on this eventually, to make sure we don’t violate any laws. But meanwhile, I just want you guys working on the new search strings. I know you’re all really busy, but this needs to be done ASAP. I don’t want any more girls to die.”

  In seconds they were all at the computers, pulling up ideas and hammering out solutions.

  He knew they’d conquer this before the day was out.

  Twenty-six

  The “Welcome Home, Megan” sign on the door of the Weiss College dorm lifted Megan’s spirits somewhat. She’d been assigned to that dorm when she’d come to Rice University as a freshman, and though she’d moved off-campus, she would be considered part of the Weiss College family until she graduated. Since she dared not go back to the apartment where Karen was murdered, Brennie had invited her to room with her. Brennie’s former roommate had flunked out the semester before, and they hadn’t assigned her a new one yet.

  Megan felt she would be safer in the dorm than she was in an apartment. It had more security, and people couldn’t come and go unless they had a key or checked in at the front desk.

  The girls who’d turned out to welcome her hugged her with teary eyes and condolences. Megan would rather have come in unnoticed. She didn’t want to talk, didn’t want to answer questions, didn’t want to have to comfort those who were torn up over her plight…and Karen’s death.

  Her apartment was still a crime scene, so her father was only allowed to go in for a moment, while the detective was there, to get some of her clothes and personal items. It didn’t take long to move those few items into the dorm.

  The girls helped her, then left her alone to say good-bye to her parents.

  As soon as they were alone, her mother burst into tears. “You don’t belong here, honey. You need to come home. I can’t stand the thought of leaving you here.”

  “I’ll be okay, Mom.” But the way she spoke with her wired jaw belied her words.

  “You need to heal. Getting around campus with that knee is going to be a major ordeal. And you’re the only witness. He might come after you—”

  Megan knew that was true. She expected him every moment of the day and dreamed about him at night. “I won’t go out alone, ever,” she said. “I promise, Mom. I’m not going to take chances. I’m scared too.”

  Her father’s face seemed etched with sorrow. “I checked,” he said, “and you can withdraw with a partial refund up until February 19. If you decide you can’t handle it, honey, you call us, and you can fly right home.”

  “I know.”

  “Even if you decide after that date. We’ll forfeit the money.”

  She pulled them both into a hug, and they all wept. Then finally, they let her go.

  She said good-bye to them, then lay on her new, unfamiliar bed, staring at the ceiling. Classes started the day after tomorrow. She needed to run some errands, needed to buy a new phone. But she felt so weak, so tired, and pain still racked through her. How would she manage?

  After a while, Brennie came back in and sat on the edge of Megan’s bed. “Okay, so what do you need to get done before classes start?”

  “I need to get a new cell phone.”

  “Okay, let’s go.”

  Megan sat up. “You don’t have to—”

  “Megan, I love you, and I’m all yours today.”

  “But you’ve done enough, letting me move in when you finally had the chance to have your own room.”

  “I hate living alone. And I hate not being able to check on you when I’m not here. So let’s go get that phone.”

  Since Megan hadn’t posted her phone number on her GrapeVyne site, she thought it would be safe for her to activate her new phone with the same number she’d had before. Since she didn’t have her SIM card, she’d have to enter her phone numbers again.

  But as soon as the clerk turned it on, she heard a chime. The clerk handed it to her. “You must have gotten these texts after you lost your phone.”

  Megan took the phone and saw a series of texts from her friends. Karen’s was prominent.

  Megan, where are u? I thought you’d b here by now.

  Then:

  I’m going out. Call me when you’re home.

  Brennie snatched the phone. “Don’t read these. It’s not healthy.”

  Megan grabbed it back. “Don’t erase them!” She scanned through them, reading each one, chronicling her friend’s attempts to reach her while Megan had been fighting for her life. Finally, she came to the last text, dated yesterday.

  U can’t hide from me. I’ll kill you next time.

  Megan dropped the phone as though it had burned her.

  “What is it?” Brennie asked, stooping to pick it up.

  “The text. It’s from him.”

  “Him?” Brennie picked up the phone, read the text. Breath whooshed out of her, as if she’d been kicked in the gut. “Megan, we have to call the police.”

  As soon as Krista got the call from Megan, she met her at the police station and sat with her at the police detective’s desk. They’d brought Megan several more books of mug shots to review, and still she hadn’t been able to find the man who’d attacked her. Krista wished she could help her, but only Megan knew what he looked like. She wondered if Megan was in any shape to remember details about the killer. Maybe she just hadn’t seen him clearly. Maybe she couldn’t remember.

  “I see him so vividly in my dreams,” Megan said. “I’ll never forget that face. He didn’t look like someone who could do something like that. He looked normal. Nice. I wouldn’t have gone with him if he’d looked evil.” She closed the book of mug shots. “Why isn’t he here?”

  “Maybe he’s never been charged with a crime before.”

  “That’s the only people in these pictures?” she asked. “People who’ve been arrested before?”

  “I think so.”

  The detective who’d been out of the room for some time came back in. “I have good news,” he said. “The text came from a pay-as-you-go phone registered under a bogus name. We pinged it, and we have it located. If this dude has it with him, we just might be close to catching him.”

  Krista squeezed Megan’s hand. “Are you going to pick him up?”

  “I just dispatched some men to go there. If you don’t mind hanging around for a minute, Megan, we might need you to identify him.”

  He went out of the room, and Megan began to sweat.

  Krista touched her shoulder. “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah. I just…I’m afraid to see him.”

  “I don’t think they’ll make you stand face-to-face with him. They’ll probably have you look at a line-up. That’s what they do on TV. You can see them, but they can’t see you.”

  Megan was trembling, her thin emotional cord frayed. Krista’s own heart raced with anticipation and dread. “Let’s pray, Megan. They have to catch him.”

  They were still praying when the detective came back in. They both looked up. “Did they catch him?” Megan asked.

  He sighed. “We got the phone, but not him. We found it in a Dumpster.”

  Krista closed her eyes, and Megan dropped her head down on the table. “Oh, no.”

  “Where was the Dumpster?” Krista asked.

  “It was on Willow Court, near the GrapeVyne Corporation building.”

  Megan brought her head up. “GrapeVyne?”

  Krista frowned. “Wait a minute. Are you saying that the killer, knowing Meg
an would reactivate her phone, bought a go-phone and texted her this message, then tossed it in the GrapeVyne Dumpster?”

  “That seems to be the case.”

  “Well, do you think it’s someone who works there?”

  “He’d have to be stupid to dispose of it near where he works. He’d know we could locate it.”

  “But maybe he doesn’t know. Maybe he thought a go-phone was so anonymous that it couldn’t be traced to him.”

  “We’re considering every possibility. But it’s more likely that he’s playing with us, reminding us that GrapeVyne was his tool for finding you. There aren’t any residential homes on that street. It’s only businesses, and GrapeVyne and Willow Entertainment take up two city blocks. The Dumpster was between the two buildings.”

  Krista and Megan looked at each other, unsatisfied. Krista didn’t know which scenario to believe. But it couldn’t be a coincidence.

  Twenty-seven

  It was found at GrapeVyne? When?”

  “Saturday.”

  Ryan held the phone to his ear and stepped to the glass wall that separated his office from his employees. “No way,” he told the FBI agent. “Nobody here would have done anything like that.”

  “It may not be one of your employees. But just in case, we need to know who in that company viewed Ella’s or Megan’s pages prior to their attacks.”

  Ryan frowned. “I don’t have any way to find that out. Not without going to each person’s individual computer and looking at their browsing history.”

  “Then maybe that’s necessary. We can send some people from our cyber crimes task force to help us figure this out. We can do it after hours.”

  “But even if you find someone, that doesn’t mean that person is guilty. My employees are all over our members’ pages. Someone might have gone to their pages for some other reason.”

  “It’s a starting place. We’d like to do it tonight.”

  He sighed. “Well, I have no objections, but I do have employees here at night. Some of my workers don’t ever go home.”