Darknet (16 page)

Suddenly the video feed stopped and the chat room window opened up. There was a note there for her.

“Now you see what your delay has done. You need to get the money, Cin. $500,000. Don’t delay because that will only make the price go up. And don’t you even think about the police. I can see every move you make. I have cameras hidden through your house. I know you’re wearing an orange T-shirt and jeans right now. I have other people watching you, too. You can’t do anything without me knowing it.”

Cindy couldn’t help looking around the house, up at the ceilings, wondering if there really were any hidden cameras there. This time, though, she believed him.

She turned back and typed, “I need time.”

After a few minutes, he answered, “She won’t be getting any food. Take too long and she’ll be dead. Is that what you want?”

She stared at the reply, not knowing what to say back. Then the window closed and her Internet Explorer shut down.

It was 11:13 p.m.

* * *

Two hours later, Cindy was curled into a little ball on her couch. She had cried more in those two hours than she had cried in the past decade.

She felt a hole in her heart where Avril should have been.

The front door swung open and Tony walked in. He slammed it shut and even though Cindy could tell immediately that he wasn’t happy about something, she ran to him anyway and grabbed onto him like he was a life jacket.

“Tony, they took Avril!”

For a second he didn’t reply and she wondered if he’d heard her. Then he pushed her away.

“What? Who took her? What are you talking about?”

“She’s been kidnapped. They took her to blackmail me. I—”

She stopped and wiped her eyes with her hands, then took a deep breath.

“I’ve done something terrible. And there’s a guy that took her. He picked her up from—”

“Slow down! You’re not making any sense, for shit’s sake.” He grabbed her hand and pulled her over to the couch. “Sit and just tell me what the fuck is going on.”

She could smell beer on his breath and his eyes were glassy. That was never good.

Cindy tried to calm herself, wishing she could avoid telling Tony everything . . . but she knew there was no choice.

“I tried to hire somebody to kill you,” she said. She tried to keep her tone neutral, as if she was saying she was just cooking him an omelette. “It was a horrible thing, and I’m so sorry. But, then he started blackmailing me. He wants so much money, but then when I didn’t pay him, he kidnapped Avril. He has her locked up and it’s all my fault. I caused her this . . .”

She couldn’t help herself as the tears started to roll down her face. She couldn’t talk anymore, just shaking her head in shame.

He’d probably hit her any second, and for once she knew she deserved it. She slumped over and lay down on the couch, sobbing, just wanting this nightmare to be over.

Tony didn’t say anything until she rubbed her face on the couch and turned back to face him.

“You fucking hired somebody to kill me?”

Cindy couldn’t believe that he was more worried about that than Avril’s kidnapping, but she nodded and whispered again, “I’m so sorry. Please, help me find our little girl.”

“You think you’ve had a hard life with me, is that it?”

“Tony, forget that for now! We can deal with that later. We need to rescue Avril!”

“Easy for you to say, you ungrateful little bitch.”

Then he hit her.

He didn’t bother getting the sack of oranges this time. He used his fists and he beat the living shit right out of her. By the time he was done, she was a bloody mess lying on the floor, unconscious.

* * *

When she woke, she could barely move. Her knees both screamed with pain, as did her ribs. She felt that at least one of her ribs must be broken because it hurt so much to breathe.

She swallowed the blood that swam in her mouth and felt two loose teeth. One other one was missing altogether. Her eyes were swollen and there were so many other pains that she didn’t even want to begin to count them.

“Go clean yourself up.”

It hurt to lift her head to look at Tony. He was sitting in the nearby armchair holding a beer. There were two empty bottles on the table beside him.

It seemed impossible to think, so she had no idea how long she’d been unconscious. She glanced over at the clock: 3:15 a.m.

“NOW! We have to talk, but you’re a mess. Go clean yourself up and get back here.”

Cindy clenched her mouth and somehow managed to get her body working enough to let her stand. He’d never hurt her this badly before, and she was almost afraid to go look in the mirror.

When she did, she barely recognized herself. She looked like a Halloween monster, covered with purple and green welts, with dried blood sticking to her face.

The image staring back at her was even worse than the mess that had been made of Avril’s face. Thinking of Avril forced her to think clearly. She needed to help her.

She wet a face cloth and carefully blotted the blood on her face. It didn’t look like she was still bleeding, and she didn’t want to open any of the wounds. The cloth started white but quickly was changed to a dark pink. She ignored it and ignored the pain running through her body and ignored the monster sitting in the living room. Her only thoughts were to help Avril. For that, she needed Tony, although she wasn’t completely sure how he could help. There just was nobody else who could.

The blood washed away down the drain. She took off all her clothes and stood naked in front of the mirror. She wasn’t ever a vain person but she knew she had a pretty enough body. Until now.

Her entire mid-section was full of dark bruises. The only blood was whatever had fallen from her face along with one cut that seemed to go diagonally from below her left breast to her right hip. It wasn’t deep and it cleaned up easily, but everything hurt.

She had to stop a couple of times and sit on the toilet. Otherwise she would have fainted.

Her head hurt but she didn’t try to do anything with that. She could feel bruises, and when she pressed the back of her head, her hand came away with more blood.

I deserve all this
, she thought.
This is all because of me.

The other thought that she held onto was that maybe now he’d gotten the violence out of his system, he’d actually try to help.

Maybe.

She had to believe that. If he was still going to hit her more to get back at her, well, Avril would be lost.

The medicine cabinet had several different kinds of pain killers. She grabbed both Advil and Tylenol, swallowing two of each.

She sat one last time on the toilet to gain her bearings and then walked to their bedroom to get her housecoat. She wanted to close the door and lock it, to hide from the monster, but she knew she couldn’t.

Cindy went back and sat on the couch, at the farthest end from the chair he sat on. She didn’t say anything, just tried to stare at him.

He stared right back, anger in his eyes. She refused to budge, continuing to look right back at him.

“Who has her?”

Her mouth ached when she spoke, and her voice sounded like she was munching on wool. “He calls himself the Manipulator. Says if we give him $500,000, he’ll let her go.”

“Five hundred thousand? Are you fucking nuts?”

“It wasn’t my idea.”

He glared at her. “We don’t have that kind of money.”

“I
know
that. Don’t you think I see our money disappearing? Where’s it all go, Tony?”

He just shook his head. “We can’t count on winning the lottery, you know.”

Cindy knew what was coming and all she wanted was for him to keep his mouth shut.

“You need to ask them.”

“No. I can’t.”

“You’re gonna let your daughter die over some stupid problem with your parents?”

“You don’t know them.”

“I know they have lots of money. Right now that’s all I need to know. They have the money to save their grand-daughter and you fucking need to get it from them.”

Cindy shook her head, knowing he’d never understand.

“There has to be another way.”

“Like what?”

She didn’t have an answer. That’s what she needed him to help figure out, but that didn’t seem to be happening. She closed her eyes and tilted her head to the ceiling. Everything hurt.

Tony McKay was sitting on a log in a park near Puget Sound. It was deserted this time of day.

He was smoking a cigarette, something he rarely did, but today he felt he needed it. He’d left the stupid bitch alone in the house to stew about Avril, because he needed time to get away and think about what he should do next. He didn’t much care about Cindy’s thoughts on the matter.

His eyes were bloodshot. He hadn’t slept much the past few nights. Cindy had told him about Avril being kidnapped, and then the fight started, and even after it was all over, he argued with her about what to do next, and then it was four in the morning. How that happened he still didn’t know.

She had tried to convince him to call the police, at which point he had just about lost it.

“Why are you so fucking stupid?” he shouted. “You think that guy out there isn’t watching everything you say and do? Do you
want
him to kill our daughter?”

“Don’t say that. You know I want her back.”

“Then for God’s sake, stop with the stupid ideas. If he knows you’re getting the cops involved, why would he keep her alive?”

Of course she had no answer for that.

Tony held his lottery ticket in his hand, rubbing it for good luck. He wanted the cash. More than a million bucks was between his fingers. The money wouldn’t be used to save Avril, but he wanted to be sure he didn’t lose the ticket or something like that. Even smart people have been known to make mistakes.

He picked up his phone and typed an e-mail.

* * *

So far today, in three hours, Deb had had four customers enter the store, four nightmares waiting to happen. The chime that shouted when the door was opened was like the call of an executioner.

Today, all four men who entered were regulars, though, and they knew she wouldn’t be able to talk to them. They wandered through the store, one looking for guitar strings, one looking for music, the other two just browsing at anything new. Deb handled the cash perfectly and forced herself to smile.

Even though she knew they were safe, the customers scared her. After reading books and studying on the Internet for years, Deb still couldn’t overcome the invisible force that encompassed her, instilling fear into her whenever somebody spoke to her. Sometimes she hated herself for never breaking down the barriers. Everybody else managed to talk to people . . . why couldn’t she?

Ding.

The sound of an e-mail arriving stirred Deb from her reverie and she sat at her desk and clicked on the Gmail icon.

She actually had three new pieces of e-mail. Two were from online stores, but the last was from Tony.

She smiled and clicked it open.

“Need to see you. Your place at six o’clock. Big news.”

The message was signed with a happy face.

She hit reply.

“I can’t wait to see you. It’s been too long.” She smiled as she thought of them making love two days earlier. “I miss being with you and can’t wait to hear the big news!”

She sent the e-mail and went to pour herself a cup of coffee from the rear of the store. It was only a little after noon, but now she really wanted it to be quitting time.

* * *

Tony McKay arrived only five minutes late. That was actually good for him, because he often made her wait half an hour or more. Once he’d made a date to meet Deb and hadn’t shown up at all. She never asked why. She’d learned not to do things like that.

When she swung her door open to him, he was grinning from ear to ear. He carried a six-pack of beer even though he knew she always kept a good supply for him.

“Party time!” he shouted.

“Yay!”

She almost jumped up as she grabbed his head and pulled it close so she could kiss him.

Maybe today he’ll tell me we’re going out on the town. Maybe it’s the day he’ll tell me he loves me. Maybe it’s the day he wants to talk about a future together.

Deb wasn’t completely sure what big news constituted to Tony, but those would be wonderful choices.

Tony broke the kiss and closed the door. He took her hand and walked over to the couch.

“You doing good, babe?” he asked. “You miss me and everything?”

She nodded, her lips curling up. She loved how happy he looked. Sometimes it seemed like his smiles weren’t as genuine as they should be, like the corners of his mouth were being pulled up by invisible wires, but today she saw none of that.

“What’s going on?”

He nodded but didn’t answer right away. Instead he popped the cap on two beers and handed her one.

“To the future.”

For a second, she mis-heard and thought he’d said, “To
our
future,” and she just about peed her pants, but then her mind corrected what she’d heard. Still good.

“To the future,” she repeated.

He drank half the beer before telling her what he wanted.

* * *