He didn’t think it was possible for her face to go any redder, but her flush deepened from dark pink to full-out magenta. “Tips on how to keep their boyfriends happy while staying technically intact.”
“Really, like what?” He felt a grin tugging at his cheeks even as heat gathered in his groin. Damn, he loved watching her squirm in her seat.
Her withering glare lost its impact under all that pink. “I’m sure you would know better than I,” she said, presenting him with her profile as she turned back to her screen.
Damn straight. “I’d be happy to demonstrate any and all of them.”
Her mouth gaped as she gave him a disbelieving look. “Are you seriously hitting on me while we’re talking about the sexual habits of teenage girls? Could you be any more inappropriate?”
He held up his hands. “The offer was made purely out of professional courtesy.”
She shot him a glare. Licked her lips. Shifted in her seat. Yeah, for all her offense, she was thinking about it.
“All right, so Kstar90 got kicked out of the virgin club for being too skanky,” he said, letting Toni off the hook for the moment. “Besides the V-Club, what do you think her tie is to Kara?”
Toni clicked on a link to additional photos. Ethan sucked air through his teeth. He thought the picture of Kstar90 on her home page was bad, but these had crossed the line from racy to lewd. There were half a dozen, showcasing Kstar90 in various states of undress, every body part displayed for anyone with a Web browser to see.
All except her face, which had been painstakingly blurred out.
Toni’s mouth got tighter and her jaw took on a hard set as she clicked on one of the photos and called up another program. A separate window popped up with a grid full of data and a smaller version of the picture. But this time the subject’s face was clear.
Kstar90 wasn’t
connected
to Kara. Kstar90
was
Kara.
“Fuck,” Toni swore, echoing his own curse.
She quickly clicked through the remaining photos and ran them through the same program.
“That’s an EXIF viewer?” Ethan asked.
Toni looked shocked that he had any clue what she was doing but nodded.
“My brother Derek is more up on digital forensics than I am, but I try to stay current. What program are you using?”
“It’s my own program,” she said, clicking back over to Kara’s main page.
Ethan was grateful. He liked a naked woman as much as the next guy—hell, probably more. But looking at nude pictures of his client’s teenage daughter with Toni less than six inches away made him feel all kinds of dirty.
Toni sat back in her chair, worrying her bottom lip with her teeth. “These files have been altered and compressed, so I can’t get all of the information about the original pictures.”
Ethan didn’t have in-depth knowledge of digital photo forensics but he knew that depending on the file size and type, you could find out everything about a picture, including whose camera shot it when, and, if you had a camera that recorded GPS information, where on the globe it was taken. You could also, without much effort, extract unretouched thumbnails of pictures that had been altered.
Toni propped her elbows on the desk and put her head in her hands. “I told her to be careful about what she puts out there. And she goes and posts naked pictures of herself.”
Ethan didn’t say anything as Toni scrolled down the page through Kara’s most recent messages.
“She hasn’t posted to this page,” she said, voice vibrating with concern.
“Why would she? Her parents wouldn’t know to look here. She’s probably fine. I know this looks bad, but it doesn’t change the likelihood that she’s just holing up with a friend.”
“I want to believe that. But I never thought she’d do anything this stupid,” she said, gesturing at the screen.
“Teens aren’t famous for thinking things through. Even smart kids like Kara. Doesn’t mean she’s in trouble.” Ethan knew all about kids making dumb moves, especially kids whose home life was falling apart. When he was sixteen, he’d disappeared for a week to see if his dad would emerge from his black hole of obsession to come looking for him. In the end, his older brother Danny had found him, crashing in a rundown youth hostel in San Francisco.
He focused his attention back on the screen, where he saw the last message from Kara, dated Friday evening.
Can’t wait to see my honey tonite. He’s still pissed, but I’m hoping he’ll give me another chance.
He felt the hackles rise on the back of his neck.
“Who’s pissed?” Toni muttered, echoing his thoughts.
Ethan frowned as he read a message a the bottom of the page, dated last Wednesday.
I’ll give you one last chance to make it up to me. Meet me this weekend and show me how sorry you are.
This from someone with the charming moniker “T-Bone.”
His cell phone buzzed, interrupting whatever Toni was about to say. He swore when he saw his brother Derek’s number on the caller ID. “What’s up?”
“Just wanted to let you know we’re heading over to Dad’s in the next twenty minutes. He said he had something important to talk to us about, so don’t be late.” Tension dug into Ethan’s neck like bony fingers. He’d forgotten all about their weekly dinner with his dad. He’d managed to avoid the last two weeks, as he’d been working. But this week he had no excuse to blow it off.
“I wonder what new theory he’s come up with this time.” He sighed. And how much money he’s going to waste chasing after it, he thought. “I’ll see you there.”
Toni spared him a glance over her shoulder as she clicked through to T-Bone’s FacePlace page.
“That was my brother calling to remind me of another standing obligation.” He was reluctant to leave, and not only because he wanted to follow the trail to T-Bone and what he might know about Kara Kramer’s disappearance. He liked it here in Toni’s dark, sweltering apartment, working beside her.
“It’s cool,” she said without looking up. “I’ll let you know whatever I find out.” Her fingertip stroked idly over her mouse, as if she were fondling a patch of skin.
Okay, clearly he needed to get laid if watching Toni navigate cyberspace was enough to get him excited. He stood quickly. “I’ll be back in a few hours.”
Toni watched the retreat of his wide, muscled back with a combination of regret and relief. As much as she didn’t want to admit it, she was starting to crush on him. Not only was he hot, he was smarter than she’d first given him credit for. Not many people knew what EXIF data was, much less how it could be used for an investigation, but Ethan must do his homework.
And he had an odd knack for sensing when she was about to head down the dark road of fear and let anxiety override all logic. Using humor or short, pointed questions and remarks, he gently guided her back on track, keeping her from fixating on the worst-case scenario.
But she was grateful to see him go. The lustful undercurrents pulsing between them were far too distracting. Someone she cared about was missing, and she could barely concentrate because she couldn’t stop thinking about stripping Ethan Taggart naked. Better he was gone so she could really focus.
From T-Bone’s profile page she clicked on a link to T-Bone’s Treasure Chest.
Speaking of naked.
“Kara, what the hell have you gotten yourself into?”
Kara huddled on the thin pad and tried to figure out how long she’d been sitting here in the dark. A day? Two?
She had no idea. Her body shook with a combination of cold and fear. She sat with her knees curled up to her chin, her bound wrists looped over her legs in an attempt to hold in whatever body heat she had left.
Her eyes were wide open in spite of the dark, her ears tuned to every slight sound as she waited for the man to come back. Despite her grogginess from whatever drug was working through her, she hadn’t slept since the man left hours ago. After his brief greeting, all the more terrifying for how casual he’d sounded, he’d left and hadn’t come back.
Hazy details were starting to surface. She’d never made it to the party. She had a vague memory of a dark SUV, a rough hand on her arm.
And then the dark.
And then the man.
Who still hadn’t come back. Neither had anyone else.
Not to give her water, or food, or to take her to the bathroom or even give her a bucket to pee in. She’d been forced to scoot to the end of her rope and awkwardly push her pants down, trying not to lose her balance as she squatted in the dark with tears running down her face. She winced as she inhaled, the smell of her urine sharp in the damp, cold air.
Adding to her humiliation, she hadn’t been able to pull her pants back up with her hands tied, and they were stuck halfway down her butt.
She had a horrible, awful feeling she would be naked in front of the man soon enough.
He said he wanted cooperation. And though her brain tried to reject the idea, she knew with bone-tingling dread what his idea of cooperation would entail.
As she waited in darkness, panicky thoughts ricocheted through her brain. Why? Why her?
But she was afraid she knew damn well why.
This was all her fault, posing for the pictures. Talking herself into it, getting off on the idea of doing it behind her parents’ backs, her own secret life, proving—to herself anyway—that she wasn’t the perfect little girl everyone thought she was.
No one else was ever supposed to find out. Toby had promised.
But now someone—some scary-ass creep who kept girls in his basement—knew.
Her stomach cramped as a dozen scenarios, each one more horrifying than the last, raced through her mind.
The panic that had subsided as hours passed with no further contact exploded once again to the surface. “Please, help me, somebody help me,” she whispered, starting to cry. She closed her eyes, as though that could shut out the stifling dark, the stomach-churning fear. “Please, please, help me.” The whisper grew louder, turning into a high-pitched wail.
“Help me!” The wail became a scream, absorbed by the darkness. Some part of her knew no one would hear, but she couldn’t stop, the scream roaring from the deep pit of fear lodged in her gut.
Suddenly a door banged open and the room flooded with light. The brightness blinded her, piercing through her brain like a knife through her eyes. She huddled against the wall, desperately trying to blink the room into focus.
Her mouth opened, but this time her scream lodged in her throat as the large, blurred outline of a man came toward her.
The blade of a knife glittered in his hand; terror clawed at her chest as it came closer. But all he did was cut the rope securing her to the wall.
He jerked at the rope. Fresh pain erupted in the wounds of her wrists. Her elbow and shoulder joints protested as he yanked her to her feet.
What was going to happen to her? Where was he taking her? That and a thousand other questions skittered across her brain. But when she opened her mouth to ask, the fear switch flipped in her brain and another scream barreled its way up her throat, past her lips, as she staggered up a short flight of stairs.
The man was impervious to her fear, not sparing her so much as a look as he dragged her screaming, struggling form down a short hallway. Her scream gave way to harsh, panting breaths, coming so fast she was afraid she was going to pass out. In her hyperfearful state, odd details penetrated her consciousness. The wood paneling on the walls, the heavy furniture in the rooms she passed.
Through the windows she glimpsed the trunks of huge redwood trees, the kind that grew in the coastal mountains close to where she lived. They hadn’t taken her far.
Small comfort that was as the man jerked hard on the rope again and sent her stumbling to her knees. She fumbled to catch herself with her hands, missed, and smacked her chin on the hardwood floor. Blood flooded her mouth as her teeth pierced the tender flesh of her inner lip.
She started crying then, tears and snot pouring down her face as she was jerked once again to her feet and dragged the last few feet down the hall. She stumbled into a room, and the man who had come for her dropped the rope and left, slamming the door behind him.
A man sat at a huge mahogany desk, observing her. His hair was dark blond mixed with gray, slicked back from his forehead. He didn’t look like a psycho kidnapper. With his carefully combed hair and green polo shirt he looked like one of her dad’s golf buddies. Or someone who would show up at one of the dinner parties her mother was always hosting before her parents split, someone who would ask her lame questions like where she was applying to college and what subject she liked best.
He looked…normal.
The observation wasn’t at all comforting.
Deep-set, muddy green eyes raked her from head to toe, and his mouth stretched in a smile that made her legs shake and her blood chill.
“You’re even prettier than your pictures.”
He was the one who had first come to her in the dark. The one who wanted her cooperation. Sick dread knotted and pinched at her intestines, and she was afraid she was going to throw up, or worse. “My father,” she managed to grunt out. “My father has lots of money.” Her lips were numb, her tongue as thick as if she’d done five quick shots of Absolut. She licked her lips and tried again. “He’ll pay you. If you don’t hurt me he’ll pay you—”
He held up a hand, silencing her. “I know all about your father.” His voice was deep with a faint accent that sounded almost British but not quite. “And it is my hope, as it should be yours, that he will cooperate.”
He rose from the desk and approached her, and Kara backpedaled until her knees hit something, a table. He caught her before she could fall, pulling her up, pulling her close until her nose was flooded with the cloying smell of aftershave and hair gel, until she could feel his faintly sour breath on her cheek.
His hand was soft and manicured against the skin of her forearm, but his grip was bruising as he easily subdued her exhausted struggles. He extracted a handkerchief from a pocket with his other hand and wiped her face in rough swipes.
“Yes, much prettier than the pictures you post for the world to see.”