“But I don’t really know anything. I need to figure out who has been looking at my network space and printing out my tests. I should also check out what other teachers have been targeted. It’s probably a school-wide thing. It’s going to take me hours to get through all the data.”
“I have a date with Marcus tonight,” she said before flinging her head back and pouring milk straight in from the carton.
“Oh.” Delia felt a tinge of guilt for asking her sister to break her date. “I really wish you wouldn’t do that.” She said in reference to the milk fountain her sister had created.
“And I wish you wouldn’t force me to go out with this loser that literally, and I do mean literally, stinks.”
“I’m sorry, Donna Lee, but what do you expect me to do? I can’t sleep at night thinking about this. I have to find out the truth. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself knowing I had the ability to find out the people behind Lena’s death and did nothing about it.”
Donna Lee sighed. “I know your heart is in the right place, Dee. And I’m actually pretty proud of you for throwing yourself into this mystery and not dwelling on your creep of a soon-to-be ex-husband. But think about this, Dee: someone killed Lena. Someone has tried to kill you twice. How is this going to end?”
Locke was known to spend hours after school in his office working on one computer program or another. That was why it was necessary to get him out of the building. If Delia had two or three hours when she didn’t have to worry about interruptions, she felt she could make a lot of headway.
She sat down at his computer and tried his password.
Spliff
.
It didn’t work. He was probably one of those security fanatics that changed all his passwords every few days.
Her phone buzzed. It was a text from Donna Lee:
He hugged me hello.
Almost choked on the stench.
Delia knew she was in for a long night, especially if Donna Lee kept sending her updates like that.
She turned her attention back to the computer and began typing in every other nickname for marijuana she could think of. Nothing worked.
Twenty minutes later she got another text:
I think I saw a bug crawl out of his head
Delia closed her phone and went back to trying to figure out this weird guy’s password. She decided to try Asian related words.
Still nothing.
After 45 minutes she had an epiphany and typed:
Donna Lee
It worked. Wow, the guy had it bad. Delia cursed herself for not thinking of that earlier. She tried not to look at the clock for fear of seeing how behind on time she was.
Delia found her personal network space and noted how easy it was to circumvent the system and get in. Locke and anyone with the right administrative access code had the ability to tap into her personal space and view whatever she added to her files as she added them. They could also read her email and see what websites she visited. Delia suddenly felt very vulnerable, like she had no privacy. She hoped she hadn’t revealed any sensitive information through this account.
Another text:
Ugly, smelly
,…
let’s add boring as hell
Donna Lee was just trying to make Delia feel guilty with all these texts. She was going to owe her big time for this favor.
The network was pretty genius. Locke had set it up to where someone could view anyone’s activity on a split screen with their own. He could even watch the movements of more than one person at once. Delia wondered how many other teachers were being spied on.
A few clicks later, she determined that all the academic teachers at Saxon Arms had been victims. Delia figured that the mastermind watched as each teacher created a new test or quiz, then just copied it and sent it to a particular student or students. In her case, the student was C.J.
Now to figure out the mastermind.
Delia felt she had a pretty good handle on how the cheating was
accomplished,
now she needed to find out more about Promise Stone.
Her cell phone buzzed again, but she chose not to open it. Donna Lee’s complaining could wait till later.
She didn’t even know if she could find anything on Promise Stone on the network. Saxon Arms apparently wasn’t the only private school involved in this crime ring. Maybe another school was the center.
An hour later, she had found nothing in the system files about Promise Stone. She was just about to give up when something caught her attention on Locke’s personal file. There was an icon of a garnet ring. She enlarged the icon and stared at it closely. The color, the detail, the shape of the ring all looked very familiar. Then she remembered. Jason had a ring exactly like that. She clicked on the icon and, of course, the files were hidden and access was denied. She would have to go through a whole bunch of passwords once again to figure it out.
But this wasn’t any simple text password that she might be able to guess by delving into Locke’s disturbing psyche. She typed in
Donna Lee
and noticed the encryption code running as it tried to verify the password. She was in trouble. This application was networked to another server where unique passwords were continually generated and displayed digitally upon a token. A token she didn’t have. Not only that, but this new server would lock her out after three attempts. She had already failed once. She only had two more chances.
She sighed and rubbed her temples. After three hours of staring at a computer screen she needed a break.
She took out her phone and saw she had missed five text messages from Donna Lee:
Okay this is getting weird. He keeps talking about sex
Why is he talking about Japanese prostitutes?
Dee,
can’t take anymore.
Feel
dizy
2 much drink
Fgra
h
rhs
The last text was completely incomprehensible. That wasn’t like Donna Lee. She was an expert
texter
. Delia bolted out of the seat and dialed Donna Lee’s phone as she ran out of the school. No answer. What had she done? She made her sister go out with a guy she knew absolutely nothing about and who was possibly involved in Promise Stone. In fact, with all of his computer knowledge, he could very well be the mastermind behind it.
Or worse, the creep who killed Lena.
As Delia ran at full speed toward her car, the thought of being attacked again briefly crossed her mind, but knowing her sister was in danger trumped any fear for her own safety. She made it to her car without incident and was already out of the school parking garage when she realized she wasn’t sure where she was going. She decided to start with the restaurant.
When she arrived at P.F. Chang’s, she ran through the restaurant like a madwoman, poking her head into every booth in search of Donna Lee.
“Can I help you?” A waiter asked, pulling her away from obviously annoyed customers.
“Yes, I’m looking for my sister. She’s about 5’2”, Korean, with waist-length black hair,” Delia said, looking past the waiter into the restaurant. She craned her neck to strange angles searching each table. “She was with a creepy looking white guy with dreadlocks,” she added.
“Yeah, I remember them,” the waiter said. “The Asian chick seemed completely disinterested and kept typing into her phone under the table.”
“Do you remember anything else?” Delia’s attention quickly focused on the waiter.
“Yeah, the girl seemed a bit unsteady, like she had too much to drink. The guy practically had to carry her out.” It wasn’t like her sister to have too much to drink especially if she was with a guy she didn’t know, like or trust. Donna Lee knew she had a low tolerance for alcohol and always limited herself to two drinks at most when in mixed company. “They left about 15 minutes ago,” the waiter added.
“Do you know where they went?” Delia asked frantically.
“Um, he kept saying something about Willard. I think they went to Willard’s house.”
“Willard? Do you mean the Willard Hotel?”
He shrugged.
“Could be.”
Delia darted out of the restaurant. Not again, she thought. Not again.
She broke several traffic laws as she made a frantic trek to Pennsylvania Ave. She didn’t even bother to find a legal parking space or turn off her car once she got to the hotel. She ran inside as quickly as she could, but before she reached the front desk someone grabbed her arm and pulled her into a stairwell.
Delia kicked, flailed her arms and tried to scream, but he had her in a death grip and had muffled her mouth with his hand.
“Delia, calm down. It’s me.” She recognized the voice. It was Chase, but it didn’t make her any less anxious. She pretended to acquiesce so he would release his hold. As soon as he let go, she elbowed him in the stomach. She turned and kneed his doubled over body in the groin. Then she dashed up the stairs.
She didn’t get too far, however, as Sam Howard was at the top of the next flight. He grabbed her forearms and said, “If you want to see your sister again, you will calm down and cooperate.”
Her blood froze. Tears welled in her eyes. What had they done to Donna Lee?
“Please don’t hurt my sister, please. I’ll do anything.”
“We didn’t … hurt her … we saved her,” Chase groaned as he practically crawled up the stairs clutching his stomach with one hand and his nether regions with the other.
“Saved her? Saved her from Locke?” Delia’s distress waned a little, but her confusion rose.
“We’ve got her. We’re coming up,” Sam said into his wrist before grabbing Delia’s arm and leading her up the stairs.
She reluctantly let him lead her to a room on the third floor. When he opened the door, she saw Donna Lee passed out on the bed with a uniformed officer and an EMT standing over her.
“Donna Lee!” She exclaimed running over to the bed to hug her sister’s lifeless body. “What’s wrong with her? Is she
gonna
be okay?” Delia wiped tears from her face and tried to get control over her emotions.
“Locke slipped her some GHB,” Principal Howard volunteered. “He would’ve raped her, but Chase caught him in time.”
She looked over at Chase now lying on the floor still doubled over in pain. She felt guilty for putting him in so much pain when he had just saved her sister, but she was still quite confused.
“I’m sorry for attacking you, C.J. And thank you for saving my sister. It was a very brave thing for a young man to do,” Delia said, trying to sound as formal as possible. She wanted everyone in the room to know that she was the adult and he was the child.
That there was only a teacher-student relationship between them.