turned off the monitor when he first tried to draw her into conversation.
She was punishing herself.
Punishment? Where the hell had that thought come from? Kate was trying to prevent Lucy Kincaid’s murder. She still had a chance. Every one of Kate’s computers was working at full capacity. She had all the server space and computer resources she needed. The fastest drives, hundreds of gigabytes of memory. Nothing was slowing her down. Kate would find Lucy and she would save her.
Like she couldn’t save Paige and the others.
Dillon Kincaid was still writing.
My brother Patrick is a computer genius. He can help you. With your skills and his skills, together we can find Lucy before it’s too late. Talk to him, please.
There were good computer people, but no one was as good as Kate Donovan. All Patrick could do would be slow her down asking stupid questions about why she did this, why she did that. And he had a vested interest, his attention would be split. He wouldn’t be focused on the task, instead watching what was happening to his sister.
She typed.
User not online.
She glanced at Lucy Kincaid on the center screen. She was tugging at her restraints, yelling something.
Eighteen years old, her entire life ahead of her. Kate wanted to put a bullet in Trask’s head so badly she could almost feel her finger press the trigger, see the bullet enter his skull, picture his brains splatter on the wall. He deserved torture, but she’d be content with a quick death.
Dillon Kincaid sent another message.
Kate, I know you want to help. You’ve been helping for five years. You lost people you cared about. You’ve been running all this time, but still haven’t forgotten the victims. I have Quinn Peterson’s file here. His private file. I know what you’ve done, and I’m in awe of you. I also know what Trevor Conrad has done to these women-you know him as Trask.
Kate, together we can find him. As I read Peterson’s notes and your messages to him over the last five years, I see who this man is. Arrogant. Ruthless. Remorseless. He’s done this many times. Before Paige. Technology gave him the ability to broadcast his sick fantasies, but don’t think you pushed him into murder.
He’d been killing for years before you and Paige uncovered his crimes. You were going after him because of a missing girl. Well, guess what? If we dig further, we’ll find dozens of women he’s killed. You sent him underground. You’ve already saved lives.
Paige did not die in vain.
Please help me find Lucy. Don’t let her be his victim. Talk to me, Kate.
Her hands shook. She wanted to talk to Dillon Kincaid. He seemed to understand things even her friend Quinn Peterson didn’t.
But she couldn’t. Who was he, really? She couldn’t be stupid. Kate already had a plan, it was solid, she had to execute it.
She typed.
User not onlone.
She didn’t notice her typo until after she hit enter.
Hello, Kate.
She shut down the program, her heart pounding. He’d gotten to her, dammit.
Movement on the center screen caught her attention. Roger Morton walked into view.
The countdown read 44:05:00. Roger unchained Lucy, held her in front of him, his head close to hers. Kate reached over and turned on the volume.
“…pretty for the camera, Lucy.”
“Fuck you,” Lucy said.
“Oh, we’ll do that, sweetheart, I promise. But for now your fans just want a sneak peek.”
With a flick of his wrist, Roger extracted a butterfly knife and sliced open Lucy’s bra. Kate gasped, watched a thin trail of blood where the tip of the knife had nicked her breast.
Lucy stifled a scream and said, “Y-you bastard!”
She struggled. Roger laughed as he easily held her hands tightly behind her. Her struggles made her breasts bounce in the camera, perfect titillation for the sick perverts who watched Trask’s show.
Roger kissed Lucy’s neck and she used her head to wallop his. The hard crunch of bone hitting bone made Kate’s head ache.
“Bitch.” Roger was pissed. He liked feisty, but he didn’t like getting hurt.
Suddenly Roger cried out and Lucy ran out of the camera frame. The shot had been a close-up, but there was no mistaking that she’d kicked him in the balls. She was out of view for one, two, three seconds. Then she fell into view, pushed roughly onto the thin beige carpet.
Trask didn’t show his face, but Kate knew him from his broad build and the short-cropped blond hair. He bent over Lucy, slapped her once, then again, then kneeled as he tied her back down. She fought him, and Roger grabbed her legs. Lucy shouted obscenities, her hand working furiously. She bit Trask on the forearm and he slapped her so hard the side of her head hit the mat, her cheek instantly red with his handprint.
Her hand. Something about Lucy’s hand. She was repeating the same motions over and over. It looked like sign language.
Then the feed stopped, froze.
The countdown read 44:00:00.
“Dammit, I paid, you bastard!” Kate spun around to another computer, frantically typed until she brought up Trask’s secure server and paid him again to watch the feed. It took her nearly ten minutes to get through. His server was getting a lot of traffic today, she thought bitterly.
A message popped up on the screen.
Hello, Kate Donovan. Just wanted to make sure it was you, sweetheart. This one’s free. Enjoy.
“What happened?” Dillon asked. “Why did it freeze?”
Peterson sat at a vacant terminal and typed in a bunch of codes. “We have to pay to watch. I thought this was taken care of.”
A message came up on the screen several minutes later.
Hello, FBI. I see you’ve gotten much better at hiding your identity, but you’re not as good as I am. I don’t think I want you watching this one. You might get the wrong idea. Remember, this is consensual fantasy role-playing, but I’d rather not have to explain it to a jury.
Too bad you don’t know where Kate is. I gave her the feed for free. It’s ironic. All these years she’s been trying to find me, getting close, very close, but all she did was lead me right to her door.
