The Watcher in the Wall (6 page)

“Sarah snuck out,” he told Earl, arms up to ward off the inevitable blow. “She’s gone with her boyfriend. You can check her room.”

Gruber braced himself. But Earl didn’t hit him, and when Gruber opened his eyes, Earl was gone.

He heard Earl’s boots in the hall again. Heard him open Sarah’s bedroom door, heard the grunt as he took in the empty bed. Heard the boot steps, the snarl as he searched the room, searched for Sarah, discovered her gone.

Then Earl was back.
“Where did she go, that little slut?”

Gruber didn’t know where Sarah was, but he didn’t let that stop him. He told Earl everything he could think of, the way Sarah’d been sneaking out for weeks, that she was probably kissing Todd somewhere. Making out, petting, all the things Gruber ached to do with her. Was midway through his spiel when Earl stiffened and straightened. Looked up from the bed to the window.

An engine outside, the familiar pitch this time. lights on the bedroom wall. Gravel under the tires.

“There she is,” Gruber told Earl. “
See?
I told you she was gone
.
”

<
20
>

Gruber heard it all.

Earl waited until Sarah had climbed out of Todd’s truck. Until she was halfway up the path to the screen door, turning back to wave good night. From his bedroom, Gruber heard the screen door squeal open. Heard Earl go out of the trailer.

He went for Sarah first. Gruber watched from the window, how Earl cuffed Sarah around the neck, wrenched her toward the house. Heard Earl tell her,
“Get in the goddamn house
.
”
Watched Sarah stumble and fall onto the gravel as Earl steamrolled past her.

Earl was going for the truck, Todd’s truck, Todd sitting in the driver’s seat, going pale like he didn’t know whether to stand on the gas pedal or get out and fight. He did neither, just froze up. Let Earl come around to the driver’s side of the truck and drag him out and start whaling on him.

“Piece-of-shit goddamn dog,”
Earl was saying, punctuating every syllable with a fist or a boot.
“Teach you to lay hands on my daughter.”

Todd wasn’t answering. He didn’t have time to answer. Gruber couldn’t see him from the window, could only see the Ford and the shadows and Earl aiming his punches downward, straightening up now and then to come in for a kick. Sarah picked herself up from the gravel, made a run at Earl, crying. Circled around the front of the Ford and launched herself; it didn’t help. Earl swatted her away like a nuisance fly, sent her sprawling again. Returned his attention to Todd.

Lights were coming on up and down the lane. The neighbors. Earl was yelling and Sarah was crying, and Todd was hollering something, too, from the ground beside the pickup, begging Earl to stop. A lot of noise, too late at night. People were starting to appear in their windows and doorways, just watching for now, but Gruber knew they’d have to step in sooner or later.

Apparently, Earl knew it, too. He stood up from where he’d been beating on Todd, caught his breath, huffed and puffed for a second or two. Told Todd if he knew what was good for him, he wouldn’t come around anymore. Then he grabbed Sarah where she lay crying on the gravel, pulled her to her feet, and dragged her, stumbling, back to the double-wide. The screen door squealed open. Slammed shut. Gruber hurried back to his bed.

He heard the rest of it, though. Earl in the living room, breaking things. Glass, naturally, and heavier stuff, too. The thudding and crashing sounding like the end of the world, and through it all, Sarah sobbing. Pleading with Earl. Crying out when Earl would slap her. This went on for a while. Gruber listened, rooted to his bed. Knew he should feel guilty about selling out his stepsister. Didn’t. Felt giddy, instead.

You did this,
he thought.
You caused this chaos. Maybe you’re not such a little shit stain after all.

<
21
>

“Ashley Frey’s
original profile says she’s from Harrisburg,” Stevens said, “but as Muriel94, she claims to be from Orlando. Is that right?”

“Correct,” Windermere said. “And she told Adrian Miller she was sixteen. But Muriel94 was sixteen nearly four years ago.”

“So maybe it isn’t the same girl,” Stevens said. “Maybe there’s some kind of mix-up with the IPs or something, some kind of coincidence. Maybe there’s a couple different Ashley Freys on this forum.”

“Nope.” This was Mathers, lodged in a corner with his own laptop, scrolling through Muriel94’s chat logs. “This Muriel girl sends a picture of herself in this conversation I’m reading. Looks more than a little familiar.”

Stevens and Windermere abandoned their own computers. Crossed the room to where Mathers was holding up his laptop, a picture of a pretty teenage girl about Adrian Miller’s age, dark brown hair past her shoulders, a bright smile. A school picture. Windermere recognized it instantly.

“Ambriel98 sent that same picture to Adrian Miller,” she said, feeling that churning in her stomach switch to something more electric, her cop instincts taking over. “Three years after Muriel94 sent hers.”

“So either Ashley Frey found the fountain of youth,” Stevens said, “or she’s lying about her age. Who’s she talking to in that chat you’re reading, Derek?”

“Some kid in Texas,” Mathers told him. “Loco459. He tells her his name is R. J. Ramirez. Says he’s . . .” Mathers scanned the page. “Sick of life and everything about it, ready to join his brother in the next world. Seems like Muriel94 is trying to convince him to do it. ‘Do it for me,’ she says.”

“‘Do it for me.’” Stevens looked at Windermere, and his eyes were dark and concerned. “That’s exactly what Ashley Frey told Adrian Miller before he—”

“Yeah.” Windermere felt that tingling in her nerves turn into a buzz, a serious misgiving. She hurried back to her computer, punched R. J. Ramirez’s name into a Google search. The first result gave her what she was afraid she would find: “El Paso Teen Found Dead by Suicide.”

“Stevens,”
she said, clicking through. “Come here.”

Stevens caught her expression, came over fast. Read the news report on the screen. “‘Authorities say sixteen-year-old R. J. Ramirez leapt from a railway bridge to his death early Monday morning. Foul play is not suspected.’”

He looked up. “What the heck, Carla?”

“What the heck is right,” Windermere said, feeling her stomach start to churn. “What else can you give us on Ramirez, Mathers?”

“Muriel94 was trying to convince Ramirez to hang himself,” Mathers said, his nose still in his laptop. “Asked him if his computer had a camera, she could watch him do it. Ramirez was noncommittal, told her he wasn’t sure about the hanging part. Didn’t want his mother to find him.” He met her eyes. “That’s the last conversation they ever had.”

“And a month later, the next angel shows up.” Stevens was reading through Nenad’s username database. “Penemue96.”

“Penemue96 had an online relationship with a fourteen-year-old
from Sacramento, California, Shelley Clark,” Mathers said, eyes on his own screen. “Sent the same picture, same details. Only, this time, Ashley Frey claimed to be from Detroit, Michigan.”

“Shelley Clark committed suicide in November of that year,” Windermere said. “Hanged herself in her bedroom, according to this article.”

“At Ashley Frey’s urging, apparently,” Mathers said. “Again with the webcam, with the rope. ‘Do it for me’ all over again, just like with Adrian Miller. Shit, Carla, who the hell is this girl?”

Windermere didn’t answer for a moment, staggered by the implications. This wasn’t about finding some suicidal mystery girl, not any longer. There was something going on here, something deeper than a couple of kids with a death wish.

“Who the hell is she?” she replied. “The hell if I know, Mathers. But she isn’t a victim, I’ll tell you that much.” She looked at Stevens. “This girl is a goddamn predator.”

<
22
>

Sarah was different
after that night with Earl.

Todd didn’t come around anymore. No longer did Sarah hum and dance around her bedroom, checking her makeup in the mirror, batting her eyelashes, fixing her hair. She didn’t smile at her secret thoughts, or giggle as she wrote in her journal. When Earl went out for the night,
she stayed home. Sat in her room or watched TV, listless. Made sure she was in bed, lights off, by the time Earl’s tires ground over the gravel again.

“Me and Todd broke up,” she told Gruber as they walked home from school one day. Her lip quivered a little, and she bit it, looked away into the distance. “He said he couldn’t deal with our family’s drama. It creeped him right out, he said.”

Our family.
Meaning Earl.

Gruber knew she was fishing for sympathy. Wasn’t ready to give it. Told her she shouldn’t have been running around with Todd like that, anyway. Told her she was acting like a tramp and that she got what was coming.

Sarah turned on him, her eyes fierce. Drew back like she was fixing to slap him. He stood tall, dared her to do it. He was nearly as tall as she was, and just as strong.

But Sarah blinked first. Looked away, her shoulders slumping. Spent the rest of the walk home in silence.

Gruber watched her, knew he’d broken her. Realized he kind of liked the sensation. For the first time in a long time, he actually felt strong. He felt like he’d regained something, something Earl had taken from him.

He felt like a man, not some runty boy.

•   •   •

From then on, Gruber made Sarah his project. Every time Earl hit him, every mean word, he found his outlet in Sarah.

“Why are you so mean to me?” Sarah asked him after he’d broken
into her bedroom, stolen her journal. Left it by the lunch tables in the school cafeteria, watched as someone found it, read it aloud, an audience gathering. “What did I ever do to you?”

She’d come home in tears. Knew it was he who’d done it; who else could it have been? Gruber hadn’t hidden from her. Hadn’t denied it. He’d stood up to her, dared her to do something. Hit him, fight him, tell Earl or his mother. He knew she wouldn’t.

“Don’t you dare tattle on me,” he told her. “I’ll tell Earl about the bottle under the bed. The cigarettes. He’ll whup your ass worse than he whups mine, and you know it.”

She stared at him, tears in her eyes, fists clenched, totally powerless, and he knew the frustration was driving her crazy. Knew the anger was worse when there was no kind of outlet, nothing she could do. Knew it because Earl had made him feel the same way.

“Now the whole school knows about me and Todd,” Sarah said. “Todd won’t even look at me, he’s so embarrassed. He told his friends I’m nothing but a cheap slut.”

“You are,” Gruber told her. “You’re a tramp for doing those things with Todd. You shouldn’t have carried on with him like that.”

Sarah didn’t say anything. Ran off to her room, slammed the door shut, and through the hole, Gruber watched her collapse on the bed, watched the tears come down freely, watched and almost felt decent again.

<
23
>

“So here’s the bad news,”
Stevens told SAC Harris. “Not only is there no record of an Ashley Frey anywhere in our systems, but the picture she sends out to her victims—we’re calling them victims, because it seems to make sense—isn’t even of our subject. It belongs to a young lady named Chantal Sarault. She lives in upstate New York, happily married, a couple of kids. She was shocked when we told her about Ashley Frey.”

Drew Harris tented his fingers. Leaned forward and studied Stevens and Windermere across the desk. “Well, damn,” he said. “Any good news?”

They’d brought the case to Harris first thing Monday morning. Explained the situation—Andrea Stevens’s classmate, the suicide forums, Ashley Frey, R. J. Ramirez, Shelley Clark. Frey’s other accounts, at least two, maybe more. The Special Agent in Charge had been a little miffed at first, at his violent crimes task force’s use of Bureau resources on an unauthorized investigation, but Windermere watched him perk up as she outlined the details of the case, until he was nodding along with her, eyes alert, jotting little notes on his blotter as she talked.

“The good news?” Windermere shrugged. “I mean, at this stage, there really isn’t much good news. We have a handle on Frey’s MO, for starters, and she doesn’t know we’re on to her. Or
him
. Or whoever the hell this freak turns out to be.”

“Regardless,” Harris said. “You can essentially camp out on the forum and wait for the process to repeat itself.”

“While we comb through the rest of the subject’s online personas for clues as to her real-world location,” Stevens added. “She’s cultivated relationships with these victims lasting months, in some cases, so she’s bound to have left some kind of lead behind.” He paused. “I suggest we operate under the assumption that our subject is female until proven otherwise. But Carla’s right. We can’t even be sure Ashley Frey is a woman at this point. She’s been that careful about hiding her true identity.”

Windermere nodded along as her partner briefed the SAC. Tried to project the cool, rational Carla Windermere, the kickass special agent. Inside, she was all nerves and turbulence.

These leads are weak sauce,
she thought.
There are how many other forums out there, and Ashley Frey could be lurking on any of them. We need to track her down fast.

Harris said nothing for a beat. He leaned back in his chair. “You know,” he said, “the legal side of this is kind of murky. According to the Supreme Court, people are within their First Amendment rights to encourage other people to commit suicide. There are state laws that say otherwise, but it’s anyone’s guess whether they’ll hold up in court as constitutional.”

“This is an online predator advising teenagers to kill themselves, sir,” Windermere said. “The subject is giving them the methods and the means, down to the proper diameter of rope they’re best using. Are you saying Ashley Frey isn’t worth our resources?”

“I’m saying it’s a gray area in the eyes of the law, Agent Windermere,” Harris replied. “You track this person down, bring her up on charges,
you might watch your whole case disintegrate on a free-speech argument. You really want to build a whole investigation just to see the courts let her off?”