Until I Met Her (The Emma Fern Series Book 1)

by Natalie Barelli

  I shake my head and put my palms down on the table. “No, that’s fine. You can have my shoes. Do I bring them down here?”

  “No need, we just want to take a look, take photos. There may be one or two pairs we might want to take away with us.”

  “Is it just my shoes you’re looking at? Can I ask that?”

  “No, we’re looking to exclude footprints from all friends and relatives.”

  Footprints. Exclude. They’re lying to me, of course.

  “It’s been a tough month, Detectives. My best friend died, and now I’m being stalked by some insane person. I’m sorry if I’ve come across as . . . uncooperative, but as you can see, I’m having difficulty coping.”

  “We can get a warrant,” Massoud says, “if we have to.”

  “It doesn’t need to come to that. We just appreciate your help, Mrs. Fern,” Detective Carr says. So this “good cop, bad cop” thing is real then, not just the stuff of pulp fiction.

  I stand up from my chair. “Okay, fine. Let’s go take photos of my shoes. This way please,” I say, as if I’m hosting these two guests instead of putting myself at their mercy.

  We walk through the bedroom to the small walk-in closet, which has barely enough room for Jim’s and my clothes. Every time I see it, I think that either we’re going to move, or I’ll put all of Jim’s shirts and suits in the spare bedroom. He’d hate that.

  “Here.” I point down toward the two dozen or so pairs neatly arranged on the floor. “There’s also a couple pairs of sneakers in the front hall, and my slippers in the bedroom. Should I get those too?”

  Massoud pulls a surprisingly large camera from her shoulder bag.

  “We don’t need the slippers,” she says. I bend down to pick up a pair of Nikes that have been pushed below the bottom shelf. I want to be helpful, move things along, get them out of here.

  There’s a hand on my arm.

  “Don’t do that,” Massoud says brusquely.

  “I’ve worn them, all of those, I think, since Bea—you know.”

  “That’s all right, please don’t touch anything right now.” She has gloves on, and she bends down and picks up the first pair, puts them sole-up on the shelf closest to the door. She examines them briefly and lifts the camera to her eye.

  She thinks now I know they’re looking for shoes that have touched a pool of blood, I might quickly interfere or something, scrape a nail against an inconvenient dark red scuff mark.

  I cross my arms against my chest and watch them handling my shoes, taking photos. It’s crowded in here, but I don’t want to leave.

  “We will need to take these,” Carr says.

  He’s holding up a pair of low-heeled black pumps. Not a bad match, actually.

  “Yes, of course. Take what you need.”

  He puts them into a plastic bag and jots something down on what looks like a receipt book.

  “Would you mind?” Massoud is pointing at my feet. I sigh and lift a foot behind me, reach back and remove my shoe. I hand it to her. She points to the shelf, and I do as she indicates, and deposit the shoe on it.

  She turns it around and photographs it, and I repeat the exercise for the other foot.

  “Are you taking them?” I ask, my feet bare on the carpet.

  “No, you can put them back on,” Massoud says. Not a match then. They really do know what they’re looking for.

  I stand in the doorway while they work, and I pull my cell phone from my pocket; I can’t help it. There’s a new message on my dashboard from Amazon, in reply to my zillions of requests.

  Dear Mrs. Fern,

  Thank you for contacting our author relations department. We apologize for the delay, and in future please note that your publisher is responsible for advising us of any errors related to your account.

  We have determined that the reviews being investigated violate our terms of service, and in accordance with our policies, the users responsible have been suspended permanently.

  Please contact us if you have any further questions.

  Regards,

  Amazon Author Relations

  Okay, finally. I breathe and breathe as if my body has been starved of oxygen for weeks.

  Thank the Lord.

  I guess even Amazon agrees that those reviews were “not helpful.” I wonder if Beatrice_pissoff will try again. Probably. She or he just needs to create a new account every few days, and we’ll restart the whole damn rigmarole. The money from the book sales is still coming in steadily, but it’s going to take a long time to get a million dollars together. I’m not kidding myself. All I did just now was buy myself a little time.

  When Massoud has photographed every shoe from every angle, she puts her equipment back in her shoulder bag.

  “We’ll let you know when we can return these.” Massoud’s holding up a clear plastic bag that holds two pairs of shoes. Carr hands me the receipt and asks me to sign it.

  “No problem,” I say, “I’m happy to help.”

  I literally run to the kitchen after I close the door behind them.

  I check my Amazon dashboard again, then I open my email, and my vision goes blurry. There are a dozen or so new emails in my inbox, all with the same subject line.

  What have you done, Emma?

  Will I never get a break? Will they never leave me the fuck alone?

  My hand’s shaking and it takes a few tries before I manage to open one of those emails.

  Liar

  noun

  A person who tell lies.

  Origin: Old English

  I randomly open more emails; they all say the same thing, and they’re all from beatrice_wrotethebook@outlook.com.

  My heart’s beating so hard I can feel it in my throat. I sit on my hands to try to steady them, but my whole body’s shaking, and I can’t breathe anymore.

  I don’t know how long I sit like this, but at some point I find myself standing at the sink, taking big gulps of water from the tap. Then I lean back and stare at the screen over on the table, like it’s some kind of evil object.

  I have to do something. I have to make this stop. Getting the reviews deleted isn’t going to deter this nutcase. I need to make them stop. I have to find a way.

  My despair slowly turns to anger. How dare they, whoever they are? How dare they invade my life? They want money? Of course they do—this is just an ordinary, pathetic little blackmail job. I don’t know what they think they know, but unless they have a manuscript that bears Beatrice’s signature on every page, then they have nothing, and I doubt very much they have that.

  I dry my hands and return to the laptop and hit “Reply”.

  No, wait. Don’t give them anything yet. Think, Emma, think.

  I delete my new message, bring up the browser, and type how to find out who sent an email in the search bar.

  I know that anyone can sign up for an Outlook email account, so that’s probably a dead end.

  The first result is promising: How to track the original location of an email via its IP address.

  All the other results are similar, and half an hour later I start to feel a lot more hopeful. Because unless Beatrice_dofuckoff is some kind of IT professional, it’s likely they don’t know zip about email headers and IP addresses, and have sent me a lot more information than they realize. Once I’ve figured out how to view the email headers, I jot down the IP address for each email, and guess what, they’re all the same.

  I begin to understand the significance of what I’m looking at. An IP address seems to be like a unique serial number attached to a person’s modem or computer, and if you know what you’re doing, you can figure out the geographical location of the computer that was used to access the Internet. That’s how all those kids who download music or movies illegally end up getting caught.

  It seems just about possible that I will be able to figure out who Beatrice_makesmylifehell actually is, or at the very least, where they live.

  I sure hope it’s not here, in this house.

/>   33

  After I called the phone company to change my number, they emailed me a survey to fill out, something along the lines of “Nicole helped you with your inquiry today. How was your experience?”

  Which is helpful because I would not have remembered the young woman’s name; the young woman who was gushing about Long Grass Running.

  “AT&T customer service. May I have your name, please?”

  “Yes, hello, this is Emma Fern speaking. I wonder if I could speak to Nicole? I don’t have a last name, but I think it was Callaghan. I realize it’s a bit of a long shot, but she works in a similar capacity—as you, I mean.”

  There’s a short pause.

  “Can I ask what this is regarding?”

  “It’s just that Nicole helped me last time, and I wanted to—” I have no idea what to say. I feel stupid. I haven’t thought this through at all.

  “Was there a problem with the service you received?”

  “No, not at all, on the contrary. I just wanted to thank her personally. She was very helpful.”

  “I’m sure Nicole will appreciate it, Mrs. Fern. I’d be happy to pass on the message.”

  “No, please, can I speak to her directly?”

  “I’m sorry, Mrs. Fern. There are so many of us working here, and I don’t know who Nicole is, or if she’s working right now, but I’d be happy to check that information in the logs and—”

  “Would you? Check the logs, I mean? You see, I’m a writer, and she knows my book.” I chuckle. “She’s a bit of a fan of mine, so I wanted to send her a signed copy, as a thank you.”

  Lame, right?

  “One moment, please.”

  But incredibly, I may well succeed in my quest, as I’m now listening to what was once referred to as elevator music. Everyone knows what that means, right? And yet has anyone ever been in an elevator that plays music?

  “Hello, Nicole Callaghan speaking.”

  Incredible.

  “Nicole, it’s Emma Fern here. How are you?”

  “Mrs. Fern?”

  “Yes. How are you, Nicole?”

  “Oh, I’m fine, thanks. Is everything okay? With your new number, I mean? It’s not listed—I made sure of that.”

  “Yes, thank you. It’s perfect—thank you so much. You were very helpful.”

  “Oh, I’m glad. Was there something else then?”

  “I—you were very kind when I called, and I thought you’d like a copy of my book. I wanted to sign one for you, and I can send it to your workplace.”

  “Oh, Mrs. Fern, that would be amazing! Just amazing! You would do that? It’s my favorite book, like, ever! Long Grass Running—I love it sooo much! I gave it to my mom, you know, for her birthday. She loves it too!”

  “That’s great to hear. Thank you, Nicole. I’d like to send you a special copy, yes. I was pleased to hear how much you liked it. And your mother.”

  “That’s so nice of you, Mrs. Fern, so nice. I didn’t tell anyone you were a customer, just so you know. I wouldn’t want you to think that.”

  “Thank you, Nicole. I appreciate that. What’s your address? Give me your work address and I’ll mail it there.”

  She reels off the address.

  “I’ll pop that in the mail first thing, Nicole. But listen, you’ve been so knowledgeable, I wonder if you could help me with something else.”

  “Of course, I’d be happy to try. What product is it?”

  “No, nothing like that. It’s for my next novel. I’m researching something called IP addresses. Do you know what they are?”

  “Your next novel? Oh, Mrs. Fern, I can’t wait! What’s it about?”

  “It involves IP addresses for a start,” I laugh, “but I’m not terribly knowledgeable about those things. I thought you might be?”

  “Internet protocols—yes, sure. I’d be happy to help if I can.”

  “Great. So from what I understand, if I were to give you all the numbers for an IP address, could you tell where the computer is? Physically, I mean?”

  “Like the actual address? Like 123 Main Street, Washington, DC?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Um, let me think. You could get the country easily from an IP address.”

  “But more precise than that?”

  “IP addresses get assigned randomly and they change all the time, for us anyway. They get rotated.” She sounds very professional now. “They get assigned to your modem by our servers, if you’re our customer using the Internet. I’m pretty sure that’s how it works.”

  I sigh. I’m barking up the wrong tree here. She’s not the solution to my problem after all.

  “What is it exactly you’re looking for, Mrs. Fern? I mean, I’m sure you could search online and find out everything you need—not that I don’t want to help or anything. I’d really love to. Can you explain a bit more what you want to know?”

  Worth a try, I suppose. “I guess I’m wondering, if I were to give you an IP address, could you tell me how to find out where the person using that IP lives?”

  “I’m pretty sure you need the exact time they were assigned that IP address. Like I said, they get assigned randomly and then rotated again. To get a match, you need to know what time exactly they were online from that IP address.”

  The time—yes, this is great, because I have all the times and dates and Lord knows what else.

  “Okay, that’s really useful, Nicole. Thank you for that. So if you have the IP address, and you have the time and date, what do you do next?”

  “Oh, I’m not sure, Mrs. Fern. I wouldn’t know what to do at that point. I’m sorry.”

  “That’s all right, Nicole.” But it’s not all right; it’s crushing.

  “I could ask my boyfriend if you like. He knows much more than I do about this kind of thing.”

  “He does?”

  “Yeah, he’s a network engineer here. He knows everything there is to know about IP addresses, Mrs. Fern. I guarantee it,” she laughs.

  “Call me Emma, please.”

  “Really? Wow, okay then, Emma.”

  “You would do that for me?”

  “Are you kidding? I’d love to help you, and he won’t mind—he loves talking about this tech stuff.”

  “If I give you the IP addresses and the times, then you can ask your boyfriend? Where they came from? I’ve got all the details right here!”

  There’s a short silence at the other end, then she says, “What would be the point? It’s not real, right? You don’t have actual IPs and actual times? You’re researching this for your novel. I don’t see how Gary can—”

  I don’t know what to do. I’m desperate. I try to think up a reason why, yes, we’re dealing with real IPs here, real people, and I need to track them down, and no, this is not a novel, ha ha, you’ve got me, but I just burst into tears instead.

  “Help me.” I’m trying to hold back the sobs and it comes out as a whisper.

  “What? I didn’t get that, Mrs. Fern.”

  “Help me, Nicole, please.” I feel so stupid, crying like this to a young woman who barely knows me. She’s going to hang up on me, I can feel it, she’ll think I’m crazy, probably dangerous, and she needs to get off the phone pronto.

  “Okay, Emma.” Her voice is steady, deeper, in control. “Tell me everything.”

  So I do. I tell her everything, every little thing. No, I don’t—not everything, obviously. But I tell her about being stalked, and scared, and that I went to the police but they won’t do anything, they won’t listen, and I’m desperate, Nicole, I say, I don’t know what to do, I’m at the end of my rope, I’m not sleeping, I’m not writing. I tell her about the phone calls I used to get and why I had the number changed.

  “This is awful, Emma. You have to be careful, you know. There really are crazies out there.”

  I know, I say, tell me about it, but what can I do?

  “You have to go back to the police, and you have to show them the emails. That’s the first thing, Emma. This is serio
us.”

  “The police say they don’t have enough information, but if I can point them to an address, then they could go and talk to this person. That would make them stop, wouldn’t it?” I say. “No one wants the police on their doorstep when they’ve been sending crazy threatening emails to famous people, do they?”

  “And I bet they’re doing it to other famous people,” she replies.

  “Yes! Exactly! We’re all being scared out of our wits here, Nicole, but we haven’t done anything wrong—I haven’t done anything wrong—and yet no one will help me!”

  “Email me the details and I’ll talk to Gary. It’s just too horrible, Emma. You poor thing! Don’t worry about it anymore, all right? We’ll find out who that crazy person is and send the police after them. They’ll get their comeuppance, you’ll see. Leave it with me,” she says.

  God bless her.

  34

  I feel wretched and relieved all at once after I hang up. Nicole promised she’s on the case on my behalf, and she clearly has excellent customer service skills. A ringing endorsement for the company she works for. God, I’m desperate to lie down, I could curl up right here, on the kitchen tiles. My phone rings and I close my eyes in frustration. I’ve had enough for today. But it’s Jim.

  “Emma! Sweetheart! We did it!”

  “You don’t need to shout, Jim, I can hear just fine. What did we do?”

  He takes a breath. “The Treasury,” he says. He sounds almost reverential.

  “The Treasury? I’m not sure—”

  “The Treasury! Sweetheart, we got it—we got the contract!”

  “Oh my God! Jim, that’s amazing, that’s wonderful! That’s . . . so soon?”

  “Do you know what this means? Do you have any idea what this means?”

  “You’re awfully smart?”

  “You bet! Oh, Emma. You have no idea, this is my lifelong dream come true! I can’t get my thoughts in order. We have an opportunity to change society like never before, Em! Make a better life for all, at the expense of none. I’m rambling now, but you know, we can put in place all these proven theories, finally. As a nation, we’re going to lead the world in productivity and well-being!”