Killing Katie Read online

  “Love you, babe.”

  Snacks was on me as soon as I pressed my feet into the plush carpet of our children’s playroom. I called it a playroom, preferring the warmer, cozier, more joyful name over the usual, stationary names—basement or cellar. With a heated floor and all the finishes of the rest of the house, playroom seemed more fitting. Snacks folded her arms and legs around my calf, clutching the back of my jeans while squatting on my foot and preparing for a ride. It was a good thing I’d changed into something that was more mommy than business. Heels just wouldn’t have worked in this situation.

  “Ride ride ride,” she yelled, wanting me to walk. A smile peered at me from her upturned face. I shook my head when seeing her dark blonde hair laying tangled and out of control, strands of it pasted to her cheek with dried spaghetti sauce.

  “Didn’t you let Daddy clean you up?”

  “Come on, Momma!”

  “Hold on now,” I told her as I took long sweeps of my feet across the room. I grunted as I walked and tried to sound like a monstrous machine moving an impossibly heavy load. “Time to exit.”

  “Aww, Momma,” she complained and tugged on my pants leg until I felt the jeans slip from my backside. “Just a little more?”

  “Sorry, girl, but that’s all that I have for you,” I said. She let go of my leg and sought out something else to play with. “Hey, Snacks?”

  She darted a hopeful look and raced back over. I grabbed her little body and squeezed until she began to squirm. Michael glanced over the couch, but then turned back to the television.

  “Another ride?” she asked.

  “No more rides,” I answered, shaking my head. “But I think Daddy has something for you upstairs.” And without another word, Snacks was off in a run. I heard the thumps of little feet clopping up the stairs and followed them with my eyes as they moved across the ceiling.

  Michael kept his stare fixed on the video game, ignoring me when I sat down next to him. Now would be a good time to tell him about my work. Not the real work, of course, but that his father wouldn’t be the only one working . . . so to speak.

  “Got a second?” I asked, having no expectations.

  “Can it wait until I’m done?”

  “What are you playing?” I asked, glancing at the screen. I recognized the game, remembering lengthy discussions about whether or not a first-person shooter was appropriate. Steve objected, wanting to wait another year. I would have given him the same game three years earlier, when Michael discovered there was more to gaming than Mario and Luigi and a funny-looking princess that never needed saving.

  “C.O.D.,” he answered without breaking stride in a run toward his next ambush. I shivered against the chill in the playroom and snuggled up next to him. When he didn’t budge, I snuggled even closer, trying to warm myself and to thaw the barrier he’d put up between us.

  “I’m sorry that I was late,” I began, gauging him, waiting. His fingers stopped moving, his character on the screen stood still as if surveying a war-torn landscape filled with the dead and dying. “Listen, I’m going to start working part time soon and will probably be late again. Is that okay?”

  “Do you want me to take care of Snacks?” he asked, setting his game controller down to look at me. He had more questions on his face than hurt, and was completely adorable asking about his sister. I melted and forgot what I was going to say next.

  “I love you,” I told him, hugging him whether he wanted me to or not. “I’m sorry that you were worried about me.”

  “Just call next time,” he said, his voice sounding muffled against my shirt. “I can take care of Snacks if you want me to.”

  “That’s very sweet. We’re going to ask your grandma to help out.”

  “So you’re gonna get a job too?” he asked, breaking away from my hug to move his character again. The sound of the game’s gunfire continued, and his attention was nearly lost to it already. I picked up the other controller and motioned to him to add me. Michael hit the center buttons in a blur of fingers, and the screen split into two, with my player on the left and Michael’s on the right.

  “I am,” I answered. We quickly moved up to face a collection of other players. We stood back-to-back, circling and spraying bullets in a coordinated and rehearsed display, killing all that came upon us. He smiled and laughed as the other players disappeared from the screen.

  “You’re so much better at this than Dad.”

  “I know,” I added with a laugh. I said little else for the next hour as we defeated team after team.

  ELEVEN

  WITH THE SUN rising over the library’s steepled building, the light shone through the high eastern-facing windows, setting afire what had been lost in deep shadows during my previous afternoon visit. If not for the thickly paneled counter and the familiar rows of bookshelves, I would have believed that I’d entered the wrong place.

  As if to agree with this sentiment, a librarian working the counter caught sight of me and looked at me inquiringly. I didn’t recognize her; I searched for the older woman. I stepped fully inside, shaking off the morning chill as the heavy door eased closed; a poof of air washed up behind me. The librarian offered a greeting. Tossing her head to one side, she sent folds of butter-blonde hair over her shoulder. She wore a white knitted blouse with a low neckline, revealing a bounty of cleavage that screamed “sex” to anyone interested. Sexy she was indeed, and I gave her a second look, wondering if she’d let me pass without showing any identification. The nameplate on the counter had also changed from the night before, telling me that her name was Becky. She looked more suited to one of the city’s trendy stores—anything in the city other than a librarian.

  “Hi,” she said, fixing a broad smile while finishing with a book. “Be right there.”

  “Take your time,” I answered as I began fishing through my purse, hoping I could get away with playing the same “forgotten library card” story.

  Lean with perky boobs that pointed in the right direction—they jiggled as she made her way to greet me—I began to wonder if this young beauty might be the reason Nerd worked out of the library.

  “Welcome to Mainsford Library,” she said. “Can I help you find something?” Perky—that is what I decided to call her—couldn’t have been more than a year or two out of college. Her skin was smooth and deliciously young, and a pang of jealousy leaped up from the pit of my gut.

  “Thank you,” I answered. “I’m here to use one of the computers.”

  “Sure thing,” she snapped and motioned to the other side of the library.

  “Over there, yes,” I said. Then I added, “I was here the other night. I’m using the computer to look for a job.” Perky turned her head. She had already begun to dig out another book from beneath the counter. I waited for a response, biting my tongue, realizing that I’d offered up more than I should have.

  Don’t forfeit information.

  Perky barely acknowledged me. She’d heard what I’d said, but chose to check her phone after she’d finished with the book. She glanced up and quickly motioned to the computers. I took the opportunity to rush past the counter. I found Nerd’s eyes peering over one of the computers. I glared back with a surprised expression. Nerd shook his head in a way that quickly made me feel like an amateur again, or as he liked to call me, a “newb.”

  “When Becky is on, you don’t have to do, or say, anything,” he said as I settled at the computer next to him. “She’s barely a librarian. I mean, she has her degree and all, but she’s only coasting here.”

  Nerd watched Perky as he spoke about her. “So you know her?”

  “You might say that,” he answered, breaking his stare and turning back to the computer. “Ready to get started?”

  “I’m ready to learn some more,” I answered as I fished out another fifty from my purse. When I handed it to him, he pinched the bill in his fingers and lifted his other hand, revealing a small flash drive. The feeling I had at that moment was like Christmas morning and
opening the biggest gift under the tree. “For me?”

  “Let’s just say that with you, I’m feeling inspired,” he answered. I ditched my smile and firmed my lips, pressing until Nerd’s smile vanished. “Is something wrong?”

  “So how do I know this isn’t some kind of spyware?” I asked, thinking that it was the right question for a situation like this. I really had no idea how spyware worked, but the name implied caution and that was good enough for me.

  “The cop question again?” he asked, stuffing the money into his pocket. “Well, what might help is if I tell you to never ever, ever, plug that flash drive into any computer except the library computer. Make sense?”

  I thought about what he said and searched his face for the right response, but I was already out of my element. I didn’t understand why his response was right or wrong. “Okay, tell me why.”

  “Aren’t you more interested in what I made for you?” he asked, motioning to the flash drive. “We could talk spyware, or you could just trust that I’m in this as much as you are—actually, more than you at this point.”

  “Good enough,” I said as I plugged the flash drive into the side of the Mac. I had no reason not to trust Nerd. If there was a point he was dead-on about, it was that if any laws had been broken by now, he was the one who had broken them.

  A folder appeared on the desktop, cornflower blue and veiled with a picture of a skull and crossbones—only the skull had been replaced with a fat spider.

  “Nice touch,” I said, glancing over at Nerd after recognizing the folder was not like the others.

  “Strategy,” he said quietly. “A reminder to pull the flash drive out whenever you leave the computer.”

  “So what’s on here?” I asked, clicking the folder, opening it to reveal a set of files with obscure names.

  “The top applications are the proxy browsers we downloaded last time, only I’ve doctored them up to set up random hops so that you won’t have to.”

  “Different every search?” I guessed, remembering how important it was to cover our Web tracks.

  “Exactly,” he answered, lifting his brow. “You were listening.”

  “So why the flash drive?” I asked, appreciating the effort, but wanting to know if there was a significance that helped protect what I wanted to do. “Why wouldn’t we just download them again whenever we need to?”

  His eyes grew round and huge. He raised a hand and then clicked on an icon that looked like a dead rat. “This is a program I wrote, kind of a room’s view into the Deep Web. With it, you can index sites that are specific to what you are looking for.” The application launched to show a list of addresses and a corresponding color bar. The colors ran from shades of green through yellow and red. A thin line hovered over the wash of colors, indicating a level that seemed vaguely familiar to me.

  “So how does it work?” I asked, intrigued by the list of sites he’d already indexed.

  “Well,” he said. “I’ve started with a list of websites that can help you find just about anything illegal you can imagine.”

  “And the colors?” I asked. Most of the sites hovered yellow to green, but a handful were deep into the red. And with only numbers for the site names, the color was going to be my only guide.

  “Those give an indication of just how illegal the site is,” he answered. I felt my eyes narrow, trying to understand. “The yellow to green are mostly harmless: porn, drugs, services offered. You get my meaning.”

  “And the yellow to the red and the dark red?” I asked. Nerd pulled his hand from the computer and, for the first time, I saw a hint of reluctance in place of his ego and enthusiasm. “Come on, now. You know that I’m not here for porn or to pick up a date.”

  “How serious were you?” he asked. I saw the reluctance in his eyes deepen as he moved his chair away from the computer.

  Had I found Nerd’s line in the sand?

  He’d given me the keys, but he wasn’t going to go through the door with me.

  “You were serious, and not just browsing for a fling or something?”

  I paused and fixed my eyes on him, saying nothing until he began to look uncomfortable. He began to squirm, and I thought about how he’d never be able to hold up under the kind of interrogation Steve delivered.

  Let’s just hope it never comes to that.

  But in all fairness, I was an attractive woman staring at a nerd; I was flattered by the results.

  “Do I look like the type who would be interested in a fling?” I finally answered, but that wasn’t what he wanted to hear. “As for the other day? No. That wasn’t a joke. I am researching, but it might not be what you think.”

  “You want someone dead,” he quickly answered. “That’s what I’m thinking.”

  “How much do you know?” I asked, feeling equally nervous that I could be a click away from my goal. How close? “Is this something you’ve dealt with? Indexed?”

  Nerd shook his head and answered, “Not directly. Like I said yesterday, I squeak by with small hacks and some corporate spying, that sort of thing.”

  “The yellow ones?” I asked.

  He nodded, and then added. “The ones in red, those are the ones you’re looking for.”

  My heart began to race. I wanted to go to them immediately. I placed my hand on the mouse. Nerd followed the cursor as I moved it over one of the red links. He raised his hand, telling me to wait. “What?”

  “They’re not safe,” he said. “I haven’t perfected the filter. Some of those are traps. FBI, CIA, a bunch of other federal hoo-has. They set up mock sites for sting operations.”

  “I just want to see what is out there,” I said. Silence fell between us and I could have sworn he heard the thundering in my chest.

  “Let’s talk for a minute,” he pleaded. “Don’t click on anything yet.”

  My time was short and my patience was growing even shorter. I could feel it. And it wasn’t just the anxiety of wanting to act on my obsession—I wanted to establish something, needed to establish something soon. Otherwise, what was I doing? Nerd continued to stare with pleading eyes, his hand raised. I decided there was no more time for being vague. If Nerd was going to help, then he needed to know what he was going to help me with.

  “Listen to me. I’m going to be direct about why I’m here. It’s murder,” I told him. He leaned forward, lowering his hand. “I don’t have anyone particular in mind. Just advertising my services. Is that something you can help me set up?”

  Nerd stared, slack-jawed, and said nothing. He raised himself out of his chair a little and glanced around the library.

  “So you have nobody in mind?” he asked, sitting back down. I shook my head. “So you’re what? Offering the service?”

  “Yes,” I answered flatly, to which he wrinkled his brow. Nerd sized me up, same as he had when we first met. Only this time, it wasn’t with the intent of carnal fun. His expression turned to one of amused disbelief. I sat back in my chair, feeling defensive about what I’d shared. Crossing my arms, I asked, “What’s that look? I’m not threatening enough?” I glanced over to the counter, spying a glimpse of the hot librarian. I’d judged her too.

  “I’m sorry,” he began, shaking his head. “I’m just not seeing it. That is about the last thing I would have expected you to say.”

  “Obviously,” I countered. His gaze turned to confusion.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Think about it,” I added and motioned an aha expression, hoping he’d see the obvious insight into my strategy. “Do you think anybody would see me coming?” Slowly, his mouth gaped open as the realization took hold.

  “No, you certainly don’t have to worry about looking the part,” he said, moving back to the screen to circle the mouse’s cursor over the yellow and red links. “So you thought that you could just hang your shingle on the door and say that you’re open for business?”

  “Something like that,” I answered, scrambling for something better to say. But that was the idea, a
nd to hear it said aloud brought the earlier sentiment back. I crossed my arms again, plodding in thought and finding nothing. “That is what brought me here . . . to the library. No traces.”

  It was Nerd’s turn to remain quiet and for me to squirm in my seat. I glanced at the flash drive, thinking that maybe I could use it on my own to start a small online presence and go into business without his help.

  Did I really need him? How hard could it be?

  I moved the mouse’s cursor over the first yellow/red link. My finger twitched, anticipating a shopping mall of customers looking for a killer.

  “Stop!” Nerd burst out in a library whisper. “You’ll get yourself caught in a sting. Not sure why yet, but I like you and want to explore this with you. I’m interested in helping you. I need the money, so it will cost a cut of the profit. I have terms too.”

  “Terms?” I asked, not quite understanding what he meant.

  “Who.”

  His point was fair, and I’d already given a lot of thought to the question, “Only those the world would never miss.”

  Nerd pondered my answer, tapping his chin. “And it’s a team decision?”

  I nodded. A wave of enthusiasm warmed me when I heard him say “team.”

  “I can live with that.”

  “And the money?” I asked. His eyes regained their earlier focus as he opened a folder on the screen. A spreadsheet appeared, showing different currencies, a list of addresses, amounts. “What is that?”

  “With my line of work, I don’t exactly get a paycheck. Some companies pay me direct, expensing my work as a security service. That way I look legal. Even better, it’s taxable. But for my other work—where there are more zeroes—I have a different kind of bank and currency. And that is also where I can help you.”