Dead Ringer (9 page)

Sasha

Sasha was impressed by the email. Using the parents as a
scapegoat was smart. Parents have the last word in the life of a teenager;
any respectful businessperson would stop pushing. But the real genius was in
how Amanda handled the bridge issue by using one of the options Sasha offered.
Was she actually afraid of heights? Maybe, but that was beside the point.
Amanda didn’t know that this email was only one part of what Sasha was
watching, and a very small part in the grand scheme of things.

If more people knew how to think like a hacker, they’d be
far less likely to give themselves away. Amanda was obviously as clueless as
they came, because she committed the two stupidest sins a guilty person could
commit within hours of sending what she thought was a clever email that would
make it all go away.

First, she changed all her passwords—email, chat,
every single social media platform, and even the checking account her parents
technically ran. It was the single most-common move a suspicious person makes,
and the most ridiculous. If a hacker is good enough to break into your system
once, they’re good enough to do it twice, and your password overhaul tells them
that they absolutely should.

With the password change, Sasha had all she needed to know
that Amanda was worth a very close watch, but those two missteps were nothing
compared to her third giveaway.

When Sasha set up her Englewood High tracking system, she
took pains to build an algorithm that would alert her whenever a single student
updated their privacy settings or changed their usernames and passwords on
every single device or app that they owned. That coding was a two-week process,
and Sasha had to pay one of the more experienced guys in the group to help with
the back end.

“Aggressive move, Phenom,” Syke messaged her when she
explained the goal.

She didn’t trust anyone enough to explain why she’d built
this whole program in the first place, especially not a fellow hacker.

“I need to prove that my theory is right, and I need this
element to do it,” was all she said.

Her suspicion was that more than one person knew what really
happened on the night Sarah Castro-Tanner died and that in every single group
of guilty people, there is one weak link that will give everyone else away.

Now all that extra work and money was paying off, and phase
one of Sasha’s theory was being proven.

Sasha had expected Charlie Sanders to do the same things Amanda
did to her online profiles because they’d been chatting all along about Sarah,
so it wasn’t surprising when he followed Amanda’s every move. What Sasha didn’t
expect was to see two more names follow suit four days later: Katherine Jacobs
and Sean Miller.

It took no time for Sasha to figure out that Katherine and
Sean were the Kit and Miller that Charlie and Amanda referred to in a bunch of
their chats and emails. The twosome was actually a foursome, and the entire
group knew more about the Sarah Castro-Tanner story than what they had admitted
since her suicide. But Amanda had lied to both of them in a recent email. “
Hey
,”
she’d written, “
my dad’s been doing some research and found out that net
security in this town is a mess, guys. He suggested you all update all your
passwords and stuff, and never talk about really sensitive stuff over any
electronic devices.”

She didn’t tell them about the email that Sasha sent, but
she still wanted them to protect themselves. To Sasha, that meant that Kit and
Miller were involved, but Amanda was clearly in charge. For some reason she
wanted to keep what was going on under wraps, maybe because the other members
of the operation would have different thoughts. Charlie seemed to be her
puppet; maybe Kit and Miller weren’t as willing to comply?

Then, not even a week after Amanda talked Kit and Miller into
going radio silent, one of them slipped.

“Your greatest ally in the hacking game is patience,” Syke
told Sasha when she was first setting up her system. “Make your move, make them
squirm, and then sit and wait before you do anything else.”

“How long do I wait?” Sasha had asked.

“As long as it takes for the people you’re tracking to
forget just how scared they are. The minute they feel comfortable again,
they’ll mess up. They’ll forget that there’s a chance their every move is being
watched, and they’ll say something they shouldn’t.”

He was right. Seven days after the group fell silent, Kit
Jacobs sent Sean Miller a chat.

And with that, Sasha had another critical clue in her
arsenal. All the detective reports said that Sarah Castro-Tanner hadn’t spoken
to or made plans with anyone on the day she died. Her parents reported that she
went to see a movie, but that was never proven. Now Sasha knew one more
critical piece of that night’s story: Sarah was invited to do something with Kit,
Miller, and most likely Charlie and Amanda.

It was time for Sasha to make another move.

Laura

It was early Tuesday morning, and
once again Becca had called an editorial meeting to discuss the fact that the
paper only had two articles three days before print. She was not in the best of
moods, and Laura’s pitch was not helping.

“Love the initiative, Rivers, but we’re a school newspaper,
not
The
New York Times
,” Becca said. She had uncharacteristically
removed the half-turkey sandwich from her mouth before speaking. Laura took
that to mean Becca meant business.

“I’m not saying it needs to be an investigation into what
happened to Sarah Castro-Tanner,” Laura argued. “But I saw in the guidance
hallway that September is National Suicide Prevention Month. I’m talking about
an article that discusses suicide more generally—why it can happen, how
it can be prevented, that kind of thing.”

Becca narrowed her already critical gaze. “Why this?” she
asked.

“Because I think it’s important,” Laura said. “I think
people our age really struggle with suicidal thoughts, and we should be part of
preventing that.”

Becca’s face remained taut. “Forget it. We cannot touch that
story. It happened. It’s over. No one wants to read anything else about it,”
she said.

“But it’s still really affecting people. Charlie had just a
few classes with Sarah and he still feels some level of guilt. Shouldn’t
someone be helping people here through that?”

“Maybe, but it’s not going to be us.”

It was uncharacteristic for Becca to shut down a big idea.
Just last week she’d personally pitched taking the entire school district to
task on the fact that the non-discrimination policy did not include protection
for transgender students, but now she was afraid of a story about a huge cause
of teenage deaths in America? It wasn’t like Becca, and neither was the
incredibly serious look on her face at that moment.

“I’m sorry,” Laura said, “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“I’m not upset,” Becca said, but her quick tone suggested
otherwise. “Sarah went through enough. We’re not adding to that drama.”

“But—” Laura started.

“Seriously, Rivers. Drop it.
Now
.” Mad as Becca could
be at all the
Chronicle
staffers, she’d never once used that tone.
Something was seriously wrong.

“Okay,” Laura said. “Sorry.” But the truth was that she was
more curious than remorseful.

“When do you think you’ll have that Charlie Sanders article
in? I’d like to run it before the end of the season.”

“I probably need two or three more sessions with him until
it’s done, and he’s been crazy busy,” Laura said.

“You
need
or you
want
?”

Her tone was angry, not playful, and Laura didn’t appreciate
it.

“I can date Charlie Sanders if that’s what I want to do,”
Laura said. “He is a great guy, and you’d know that if you gave him a chance.
You should have heard how sweet he was being about Sarah.”

Laura didn’t know if she was defending the Charlie she was
getting to know, or the fact that she liked him so much. Either way, Becca
didn’t seem to care.

“You do what you want, Rivers, but trust me when I tell you
that Charlie Sanders didn’t give a shit about Sarah Castro-Tanner.”

“And how would you know that?” Laura fired back.

“I just know,” Becca said.

“That’s a crappy answer.”

If Becca was frustrated before, then Laura’s comment sent
her into a full-on fury.

“Well, you’re a crappy journalist for asking the question
that prompted it. Know when to stop, Rivers, or you’ll never earn the trust of
the people that you want to tell you the truth. Now could somebody else
please
pitch me something we can use?” Becca yelled to the group.

If Becca’s goal had been to discourage Laura from her story,
she failed. Their interaction made her more curious than ever to know about how
this school and town handled what happened to Sarah and why Becca was so upset
about it, and she didn’t need a
Chronicle
assignment to find out.

Charlie

It was already 8:00 a.m. by the time
Charlie made it to Kit’s house and found her and Miller in the bunker—the
group’s term for Kit’s basement, where they spent 75 percent of their time. They’d
have to figure out a way to sign themselves into school late, but that was the
last thought on Charlie’s mind at the moment. Right now he was staring at a
picture that he could barely hold, that’s how hard his fingers were shaking.

“This was
inside
your mailbox?” Charlie asked Kit.
All she could do was nod her head from the spot on the leather, sectional couch
in her basement, where she sat biting at her nails. “When?” Charlie asked.

“Yesterday, I guess? It was in an envelope. My mom left it
on my desk for me. I didn’t see it until I woke up this morning. I…it’s…what
are we going to do?”

The picture was a shot of Kit and Miller sitting in the back
of his dad’s convertible, eating French fries. Kit was smiling her goofy,
full-toothed smile at the camera, and Miller’s mouth was full of
ketchup-covered fries. It was nothing out of the ordinary. But sandwiched
directly between them—added into the photo with careful computer editing—was
Sarah Castro-Tanner, so pale she was almost blue-colored. Her eyes were open,
but she was dead.

Charlie turned the picture over in his hand so that it
didn’t catch his eye again, not that it wouldn’t be burned in his mind for the
rest of his life.

“Where’s the envelope it came in?” Charlie asked. Miller
shoved a small, white envelope into his empty hand and then went back to
pacing.

There was nothing to look at this time. “
KIT
” was printed in small,
computer-typed letters on the front, and that was it. No address, no return
address, and no stamp.

“Someone just dropped this in your mailbox?” Charlie asked.

“Yes,” Kit said, “They were at my house. Charlie, they’re
going to kill me!” She started gasping for air again. Miller rushed over to try
and calm her down. Charlie stayed frozen, watching them both. He had absolutely
no idea what to do.

Minus the terrifying figure in the picture, everything was
familiar. Kit and Miller always sat side by side in the back of the cabs they
took around town before they had their own cars. They never left the diner
without a side of fries to-go, and Amanda was constantly snapping shots of them
eating. She always joked that it was for their wedding slideshow.

Amanda
.
She took this picture
. The thought hit
Charlie so hard, he almost stumbled.
And she lied about the email she got to
cover what she’s doing.

“Kit, have you ever seen this photo before?”

“No,” Kit said, “It’s not real. That’s not from that night.
Amanda didn’t take pictures that night.”

“Wrong,” Charlie said. “I tried to stop her and she agreed,
but then she took them anyway. Don’t you remember? I caught her at the table
and snapped at her. The waitress came over to make sure we were okay.”

Charlie watched Kit’s face fall as the memory registered.
She looked absolutely heartbroken, a feeling he understood. He had been right
all those weeks ago when he accused Amanda of being the one orchestrating the
cruel pranks, and now she’d gone one incredibly creepy step further. The
question was, why?

Charlie sat down next to Kit and Miller. This was not going
to be an easy conversation. Once again, the Band-Aid approach seemed best.

“It’s Amanda,” he said. “She’s doing this to us.”

“What do you mean
us
?” Miller asked.

“I’ve gotten messages, too—all on VidBit, which
Amanda is obsessed with. And Amanda claimed that she’s been getting weird stuff, too,
but hers was nothing like this. Now that you have this, Amanda is the only
person that makes sense. She took this photo and didn’t give it to anyone. She
knows how to Photoshop another image into a picture—she’s constantly
doing it for the posters and flyers she makes for school. And she knows where
you live, of course. What did she say when you called her about this?”

Kit couldn’t bring herself to answer. “She didn’t return the
calls or texts,” Miller said.

“And how long ago was that?” Charlie asked.

“Same time I texted you,” Kit said, her voice small and sad.

“Well, right before I got to your house she texted to say
she was going in to school early and didn’t need a ride,” Charlie said, “so
she’s clearly seen everything on her phone.”

At that, Kit started to cry. Charlie looked over to find
that she’d chewed her nails down so much that her fingers were bleeding.

“This is pretty sick, Charlie. You’re saying she faked all
that stuff about changing our passwords, too?” Miller asked.

“I can’t figure out any other answer,” Charlie said.

“But why would she do this to us?” Kit sobbed.

Charlie’s response was almost instant, and it felt like it
came from somewhere in his mind that he wasn’t controlling. “Maybe Amanda isn’t
the person we think she is,” he said. His words caught Kit and Miller equally
off guard. “Amanda has always had an unstable streak. Remember, everything that
happened with Sarah was technically because of her.”

Suddenly everything started to avalanche in Charlie’s mind. He
hadn’t realized he fully believed Amanda was at fault until he’d said it out
loud, but it all added up. There was what Amanda did to Sarah, and there was
what Amanda did to him long before that. Amanda would say that neither was her
fault and both were to protect their futures. But at the end of the day, she
was at the helm both times. She had the ability to be not just unstable, but
truly evil.