Vanished

by Karen E. Olson

  I am embarrassed by this, by my lack of curiosity. I attribute it to the fact that I have lived without an identity for so long, guarding my own privacy, that I don’t press anyone for information about themselves. I find that people usually end up telling me their stories without any prodding. It’s at this very moment that I realize Zeke has never done this.

  Zeke, however, knows all about me because of my father. He knows where I came from, what my life was like before I became Nicole Jones on Block Island. He also knows about my life now, that I was in Charleston, because he’s been keeping an eye on me through Spencer.

  Spencer. Zeke’s closest friend, but I can see from his expression that he didn’t have a clue about this, either. I am relieved that I wasn’t the only one in the dark.

  ‘You’ve had trouble?’ she’s asking, her face clouded again with concern.

  I nod and tell her about the FBI agents at our hotel. ‘We think Zeke was there, that they were there for him.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Why what?’

  ‘Why do you think the FBI would be looking for Zeke at your hotel? Why wouldn’t they be looking for you?’

  ‘Because I don’t think either Spencer or I are on the FBI’s radar here.’

  ‘Why not?’ she asks.

  Why not is right. I’m not sure I like this line of questioning, because it’s making me think twice about everything. ‘Where is he? Do you know?’

  Again, she’s distracted by something behind me, and I turn but see nothing.

  ‘You can’t be here.’

  ‘You really don’t know where he is?’ Spencer asks.

  She shakes her head. ‘No.’ But there’s something in her expression, something that makes me think she knows more than she’s saying.

  ‘But you had that envelope for us,’ I remind her. ‘He gave it to you.’

  ‘He left it for me with his instructions.’

  ‘Left it where?’ I push.

  Instead of answering my question, she says, ‘He told me about you.’ The way she studies my face makes me realize that whatever Zeke told her doesn’t have anything to do with that envelope. I feel my cheeks flush under her gaze. ‘It’s OK,’ she says, although I’m not certain that it is. I am sure that she knows what happened on this boat all those years ago, how I broke her son’s heart and left him bleeding and for dead.

  He went undercover back then. The FBI said he really was dead, and he disappeared. Is she blaming me for him vanishing again?

  ‘You don’t live here,’ I say as reality dawns. There’s no way she could live here.

  ‘No,’ she says, confirming this. ‘But I got the envelope and a key and a note that said I had to meet you here.’

  He knew we were on our way to Paris enough to plan this. The skimmer wasn’t an afterthought. But where did he send the envelope? Where does she live? I’m about to ask her, but she speaks first.

  ‘If he’d come in person, I would have refused,’ she says, her gaze again settling in my face. I force myself to stay focused. She does blame me. For what, I’m not certain. Maybe all of it.

  This annoys me a little, how she knows all about me and I know nothing about her. I should blame Zeke, but he’s not here.

  ‘Who were those guys who showed up while we were here?’ Spencer asks, interrupting. I’m grateful for the distraction.

  She is all business again. ‘They were lost,’ she says matter-of-factly. I try to see the lie in her expression, but she’s good. Very good. I begin to wonder if Zeke’s father wasn’t the only agent in the family. But we’re not getting anywhere here. She is being too obtuse. No answers mean that we’re right back where we were at the beginning.

  It’s now that I notice the suitcase and bag by the door. ‘You’re leaving?’ I ask.

  ‘I shouldn’t have stayed this long, but I had some errands to run.’ This time I do see the lie. She was hoping Zeke would show up, just as I’ve been hoping. ‘You two might want to get out of town, too,’ she adds.

  Spencer and I exchange a glance.

  ‘Why?’ I ask. ‘We have to find Zeke.’

  ‘It’s not safe for you here. Take my word for it. He can take care of himself.’

  I’ve heard this so many times from Spencer, and maybe they’re both right, but I can’t ignore the nagging feeling that this time might be different.

  ‘Why, don’t you think so?’ she asks me. Concern laces her tone; she really wants to know, and her own doubts are obvious, despite what she says.

  I don’t hesitate. ‘Tony DeMarco’s involved. His daughter, at least. And they know who he is. What he can do. And when he does it, whatever it is they want him to do, they’ll kill him.’ It’s the first time I’ve said this out loud, what I’ve been thinking, ever since we found out about Zeke meeting with Adriana, and the fear overwhelms me.

  ‘They’re after both of you,’ Spencer reminds me, as though he needs to.

  Ellen is nodding. ‘He’s right. And you’re not safe here.’ She walks over to the door and picks up her bag, looking at us expectantly.

  ‘We don’t have anywhere to go. We can’t go back to the hotel; we don’t have passports or credit cards. Just a bit of cash, but I’m not sure how far it’ll go,’ I say.

  ‘You’ve got your laptops?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You’ve got the phone? The one Zeke left for you?’ It’s the way she says it that makes me realize she knows exactly what that phone can do. What was in that envelope. We don’t have to hedge around what Zeke’s been doing.

  ‘You think we can use those compromised card numbers. But the moment we do, it’ll raise red flags with the card companies. With the people who actually own these cards. Why can’t we stay here? He gave you a key, didn’t he?’

  ‘No, you can’t stay here. It’s not safe.’

  ‘And it’s safer to use a compromised credit card?’

  Spencer has been quiet through this exchange, and he lights up a joint. The scent of weed fills the small room. ‘There’s one card we can use and no one will pay any mind to it,’ he says, reaching down into his backpack and pulling out his laptop. He opens it and boots it up. When he realizes I still don’t get it, he chuckles.

  ‘They can’t come after someone who doesn’t exist,’ he says simply, a wide grin spreading across his face.

  It takes me another couple of seconds, and then it dawns on me. I know what he’s talking about. Who he’s talking about.

  Spencer Cross.

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  ‘You’re talking about that credit card?’ I ask, the one that Ryan Whittier used to pay for the hotel. Spencer Cross’s card has been used at hotels all over Europe. One night only. ‘You figure that if we use it one night here in Paris, who’s going to notice?’

  ‘First, we need to see if it’s linked to the same account as the one used at the ATM earlier. Maybe it’s even the same number,’ Spencer says. He’s got the phone next to him, the app open. ‘Show me how you got inside the reservation system so we can pull the number.’

  I scoot a little closer to him and give him instructions.

  ‘There’s a back door in here,’ he says softly, as though to himself.

  ‘Yeah, I found that, too.’

  ‘Fucking weird,’ he says.

  ‘I figured it was because it’s an old system network. It hasn’t been updated.’

  But Spencer’s shaking his head. ‘No. I don’t think so.’

  ‘My God, you’re exactly like him.’ It’s said softly, only a little more than a whisper. Spencer and I both look up and see Ellen Chapman frowning, but it doesn’t have anything to do with her not knowing what we’re doing – at least, I don’t think she does. It’s more than that. There’s something in her eyes, in the way she’s watching us.

  She’s not just talking about me, but about both of us. How we’re like Zeke. She’s not thinking of him now as an FBI agent who can take care of himself, but as that long-ago teenager who hacked into the FBI server and
ended up in jail, where he met Spencer. I wonder how much Zeke has told her about me, about Spencer, about the hacking. While she may know what happened on this houseboat, I’m not sure she knows the whole story. What I did, what Zeke – as Tracker – helped me to do seventeen years ago that resulted in both of us vanishing.

  I’m not about to enlighten her, although she’s probably already figured out that my time in front of a computer screen hasn’t always been for the good.

  ‘How long can we stay here?’ Spencer’s asking.

  If she’d been expecting a different question, she doesn’t show it and manages to compose herself again. ‘Not long.’

  ‘OK. I don’t think this will take that much time anyway.’ This last part is directed to me, and I watch him navigate the hotel reservations looking for Spencer Cross and Ryan Whittier.

  Ellen Chapman shifts the smaller bag over her shoulder and tugs on the handle of the larger one to make it longer so she can pull it behind her. I am not so distracted by the screen that I can ignore her leaving. I get up and go over to her.

  ‘Where are you going?’ I ask.

  ‘Home,’ she says simply, not elaborating. I wonder where that is, if it’s where Zeke grew up or if she’s moved on since then. I want to ask if his father is alive, if they have Christmas and Thanksgiving together, but I would be tipping my hand, showing her that the woman her son has been involved with doesn’t have any idea about his life outside of his job and hacking.

  ‘Are you safe?’ I ask her.

  She smiles, and again I’m struck by the feeling that she is no stranger to keeping secrets. ‘Yes. Thank you for asking.’ She pauses. ‘Don’t stay too long. They’ve been watching this place ever since I got here.’

  ‘Who? Is it the FBI? Or is it DeMarco’s people?’

  ‘Does it matter which?’ she asks, then pulls the door open and steps outside. But she turns for a moment and adds, ‘I hope we have a chance to meet again under better circumstances.’

  Her tone doesn’t give away whether she’s telling the truth. Regardless, I want to say I’d like that, too, but she’s already down the plank and vanishes into the darkness. I have a sudden urge to run after her, to make sure that she’s OK, but I have the feeling that she wouldn’t take well to that.

  I go back inside, closing the door behind me. Spencer is hunched over his laptop, a joint hanging from his lips. His head shoots up when he realizes I’m standing there. ‘I’ve got the card number, all the information.’ He pauses. ‘It matches the card from the ATM.’

  We let that sit between us for a few seconds.

  ‘So he was there,’ I say softly. ‘Ryan Whittier.’

  ‘Maybe. Maybe not.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘We don’t know that Ryan Whittier is using this card. Someone is. But it could be anyone.’

  He’s right. Even though this card was used to make a reservation for Ryan Whittier, he doesn’t have to be the person who made it.

  ‘Let’s just make a reservation somewhere tonight and we can get out of here. We can try to figure it all out later,’ Spencer says.

  I’m all for that, because Ellen’s warnings begin to resonate.

  Spencer’s navigating a travel website, looking for a hotel. I am suddenly so tired I can barely stand up. I pull back the curtain on the window and peer out over the Seine, the moon casting a glimmer of light that skips along the black water. It was a night like this, the night I shot Zeke. The night he showed up wanting to run away with me. Instead, I ran away alone.

  My thoughts circle around, though, to the houseboat and how Zeke’s mother came to be here. Who owns it? Is it a rental, like the one next door? Zeke must know, since he left her the key. But how did he get the key? He can’t possibly have any nostalgic feelings about this place, but maybe it was easier for him to send her here, to send me here. It was a place I’d know, even if he were being cryptic.

  But it again makes me wonder just how he knew where I was. I’ve been careful online. He’s inside my laptop with the remote access Trojan, but Spencer and I set up a strong firewall. Zeke’s talented, but so are we.

  I begin to think, too, about how easy it was to set up a meeting between his mother and me. That was no accident. He didn’t have to ask his mother to bring the envelope. He could have asked a colleague, even paid a stranger a handsome sum to do an errand for him. If he wanted his girlfriend – is that what I am? I suppose I prefer to think of us as lovers, since we’re not teenagers – to meet his mother, it should have been the normal way: over dinner or cocktails. Certainly not on the houseboat where said girlfriend – lover – shot him and left him for dead.

  ‘How about the Ritz?’ Spencer chuckles, interrupting my thoughts. ‘I used to stay at the Ritz back in the day.’ He’s remembering those times as he clicks on the images of the elegant hotel.

  I am grateful for the distraction. I plop down next to him and put my hand over the keyboard. ‘You’re kidding. We need a nondescript place. Maybe we shouldn’t even stay in Paris. Maybe we should just leave. We can go to London. Amsterdam. Somewhere.’

  Spencer looks at me as though I’ve lost my mind. Maybe I have. I pull out my own laptop and do a simple search for our location. I discover the exact address and then put that into the search engine. Spencer’s watching me intently.

  I take a couple of deep breaths as I wait for the page to load. Finally, it does.

  ‘It’s a rental,’ I say, mostly to myself.

  Spencer peers over my shoulder. ‘What are you looking for?’

  ‘Who rented this houseboat.’

  ‘Dude had a key,’ Spencer reminds me. ‘He gave it to her. I think it’s pretty clear who rented it.’

  Still, I maneuver my way around the rental company’s website, trying to find a way inside. The FAQs page is always a good bet, and there are no surprises here. Soon I’m in the source code, and I make myself an authorized user. It’s not dissimilar to getting into the hotel reservation system, but there’s no back door here. At least not one that I can see.

  But no matter where I turn, there is no record of anyone renting the houseboat this week – or even in the last month. There’s a reservation that will begin in three days, but that doesn’t help.

  ‘Why isn’t there a record?’ I mutter.

  ‘He’s FBI, Tina. I don’t think he’s going to advertise that he’s rented a houseboat. He can get into a reservation system as easy as you just did and erase any sign of himself.’

  He’s right, but I can’t explain why I want to know for sure. Why I want to see his name listed as making a reservation. I want to know just when he made the reservation. When he got the key. This wasn’t a random, spontaneous thing. He set it up with his mother. Why didn’t I ask her when he’d given her the envelope? The key? She had luggage. Two bags. She was here longer than just a day.

  Why did he want us to put that skimmer on the ATM? What is so important about that?

  I feel Spencer’s hand on my arm. ‘Stop, Tina. We need to get going. We can continue this later.’

  We’ve come so far, but we only keep unearthing more questions. There are no answers. I’m sleepy; it’s been a long day. Spencer’s right. We can get out of here first and then figure out what our next move will be.

  ‘Did you find a room for us?’

  ‘It’s somewhere near the Luxembourg Gardens. I’ve got the address.’ He holds up the phone to indicate we’ll use the GPS. He’s put his laptop back in the backpack.

  I admit defeat. I reach out to close my laptop but stop when the message appears.

  But it’s not a text. It’s a picture.

  Of the houseboat.

  THIRTY-NINE

  I don’t think that Zeke has posted this picture in my laptop. There’s no reason for him to do that. He already knows that we came to the houseboat. But as I look more closely, this is not a photograph from this afternoon. In the picture, it’s nighttime. Is whoever’s taken this outside right now?

&nb
sp; ‘Someone’s got hold of his computer,’ I whisper to Spencer, as though whoever is snapping photographs is truly within listening distance.

  As he takes stock of this, he grabs his laptop from his backpack and boots it up. He nervously taps his thigh as he waits until it finally springs to life. His fingers move across the keyboard, but suddenly he pulls his hands back as though he’s touched fire, his eyes bright. ‘It’s d4rkn!te.’

  I reach over and turn his laptop around so I can see the screen. It’s not as though I don’t believe him – I do. But I have to see it for myself.

  It’s like looking in the mirror. I can see everything on my laptop screen on Spencer’s.

  ‘Does this mean whoever’s doing this knows we’re on the other side of the screen?’ I ask.

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘So the person we’re watching – d4rkn!te – has managed to insert a RAT into Zeke’s computer and he can see into my laptop. In the meantime, we’re watching the same thing through our RAT in d4rkn!te’s computer. Do you think he has any idea we’re watching him?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Spencer looks a little rattled by this, and probably for the same reason I am.

  Someone managed to sneak a RAT into Zeke’s computer.

  Zeke is one of the best hackers I’ve ever known. I knew immediately when I had a shadow. The signs were subtle, but they were there. How could he not have known?

  Unless he did. But then he’s willingly letting someone else look inside my laptop. Why would he do that?

  I tell Spencer about my suspicion, and he shakes his head. ‘I have no idea.’

  ‘Do you think that d4rkn!te is showing Zeke the picture to let him know that he knows where we are?’

  ‘Might not be about us.’

  I’m not sure what he means at first, and then it dawns on me. ‘We haven’t been here too long. But Ellen has.’

  I think about that for a few minutes, and he’s right. It’s not just me. D4rkn!te is taunting Zeke with photographs of places where his mother has been, too. He’s threatening him with knowledge of both of us. First, it was through the chat room, but now it’s directly in his computer. D4rkn!te is getting closer – to all of us.