I Can See You (28 page)

“I know,” he murmured. And he did know. “But I don’t
want you to get caught.”

“I’m going to get caught, Noah. I’ll have to give up
what makes me get up in the morning.” She swallowed hard. “And it’s killing me.
But if I stand by and do nothing, I slide back into the dark. I can feel it,
always there at my back, luring me back to where it’s safe. But even though
it’s safe, it’s not right. I can’t expect you to understand that.”

But he did, more than she knew. In his mind he could
see himself clawing his way out of the bottle. Out of the dark. Trying to
escape the demons that had driven him there. Every day he had to renew that
resolution. Every day he staved off the dark.

One day at a time
had always seemed like a corny metaphor. Until it became his life. “I
do understand.” He made himself smile. “It’s why I drink tonic water.”

She drew a quick breath, her eyes widening. “I’m
sorry. I didn’t think.”

He brushed his palm down her arm, just once. “I didn’t
want you to. But you’re not alone and I do understand. Will you keep trying to
get into the Shadowland files?”

“Do you want me to?” she asked and he carefully
considered his answer. She had a purpose and he suspected she’d sacrifice a
great deal to keep that purpose alive. But right now, he was more concerned
about keeping her alive. And out of jail.

“What I want is to stop this guy before he kills
anyone else. Including you. But I don’t want you to break the law. Jack is
right on that. Nothing you give us that’s a product of an illegal enterprise
can be used in court. We could catch him, but have to let him go. And, Eve, if
you did something illegal, I couldn’t protect you either.”

“I don’t expect you to.” She turned suddenly, looking
up with eyes that were almost black. Intense. He couldn’t have turned away had
he tried. “Do you want me to stop?”

Desire surged through him like a storm and he
tightened his hands into fists to keep them to himself.
This is not the
time, Webster. Focus.
“Are you close?”

Her dark eyes flashed dangerously. She felt it too.
“Very.”

He made himself think of Martha and Christy and
Samantha. He thought of Eve, drawn into this mess because she couldn’t,
wouldn’t look away. Then he thought of the other names on her list and wondered
who would be next because a killer was playing a damned game. “No,” he
whispered hoarsely. “I don’t want you to stop.”

She settled. “All right then. I’ll call you when I
have something I think you can use.”

Cautiously he lifted his hand to touch her cheek.
“Earlier, in the Deli…”

Her cheek grew flushed beneath his fingertips. “It
won’t happen again.”

“Yes, it will. And when it does, it won’t be an act.
For either of us.” He took a step back, dropping his hand from her face. “I
need to go.”

She nodded, unsteadily, making his blood churn. “Don’t
forget your hat.”

Noah took his hat from the bookshelf where he’d left
it the night before. Questions filled his mind, too many to ask. But she’d
opened the door to her life and he’d ask a question before she closed it again.
“I read about what happened to you six years ago. But I couldn’t find anything
about why. Why did that man try to kill you?”

“To get to his wife and his son. They’d run away
because he’d beaten them for years. I knew them, loved them both. I didn’t know
who he was at first, but figured it out. I was afraid he’d find Caroline and
Tom and make their lives a living hell all over again.”

“So he was trying to stop you from warning them?”

“Partly, yes. But he had a gun. He could have just
shot me and finished the job. Mercifully. But he didn’t.” She swallowed hard.
“Instead, he stabbed me eight times. Slashed my face open. Nearly filleted my
hand. Then he strangled me.”

“Because it gave him pleasure,” Noah said grimly.

“Yes.” She crossed her arms over her chest, body
language screaming volumes. “I know the kind of monster you’re seeking, Noah. I
stared mine in the eyes as he pulled that twine tighter around my throat. Yours
won’t stop. He won’t stop until you stop him.”

“And you?” He had to force the words from his tight
throat. “Until you stop him?”

Her eyes were dark. Stark. So incredibly alone. “I
didn’t stop my monster. In my dreams he comes back, again and again. I’d do
almost anything to stop yours.”

He nodded hard. “Lock your door.” He waited until he
heard the deadbolt slide into place, then went back to the car where Jack was
drumming his fingers impatiently.

“Are we ready to go to work now?” he asked acidly.

“In a minute.” Noah dialed Abbott. “It’s Web. Eve’s
fine, but she’s had Buckland from the
Mirror
and her advisor’s secretary
on her ass.”

“Where’s her ass now?” Abbott asked dryly.

“We just took her home. We’re going to Marshall to
talk to Lyons and Donner, then work the waffle houses. Has Faye run checks on
Jeremy Lyons and Donald Donner?”

“I’ll check and call you,” Abbott said.

Noah made himself say it. “We need to make a formal request
to the university for their subject files. Eve said each participant listed
their worst fear on a questionnaire.”

“The snake,” Abbott said. “That actually makes sense.
As soon as we make the request, Eve’s going to be the first person they look to
for the leak.”

“She knows that. She’s prepared to take the
consequences.”

Abbott sighed. “Maybe Carleton can help her so this
doesn’t damage her too much.”

“Damage control,” Noah murmured, fighting the urge to
lick his lips. “I hope so.”

Jack’s jaw was tight when he’d hung up. “
Now
we
get to work?”

Noah took one last look in his rearview before putting
the car into gear. “Yes.”

Tuesday, February 23, 10:45 a.m.

Frowning, Harvey watched Webster and Phelps drive
away. “Who lives here?”

Dell was busily inputting the address into the
property tax web-site he’d brought up on his BlackBerry. “Deed’s held by a
Myron Daulton.”

“Webster was here three times last night. She’s
important. I got a picture of Webster walking her inside. Unfortunately, he
didn’t touch her, today or last night.”

Dell snorted. “He sure did at that coffee place. Take
a look.”

Harvey looked at Dell’s camera display where Noah
Webster and the woman were locked in a passionate embrace. “Webster is using
taxpayers’ vehicles on taxpayers’ time to drive his lady friend around. But
that’s not nearly enough.”

“No,” Dell murmured. “It’s not. Not nearly enough.”

“Dell. Remember our plan.”

Dell smiled slightly. “Of course. The plan that’s
working so well.”

Harvey’s hand was slapping Dell’s mouth before he knew
it. “Watch your mouth.”

Dell touched the corner of his lip. “Whatever you say,
Pop.” But his eyes were hard and angry and Harvey wondered how much longer he’d
be able to control his own son.

“Which way are they headed now?” Harvey asked.

Dell checked the navsat screen he held. Planting a
tracking device under each of the detectives’ cars had been Dell’s idea, and a
damn good one. “Toward the city.”

“Then follow. I’m right behind you.” Dell got out of
the Subaru and went back to his own car while Harvey thought about Webster
having a girlfriend. Women were weak. They’d be able to get all kinds of good
information out of her with the right inducement.

Tuesday, February 23, 12:15 p.m.

“Thanks.” Eve glanced up briefly as David put a
sandwich next to her elbow, then returned her eyes to her computer screen. “I
appreciate you doing the shopping.”

“I thought I’d better, since I’d like to eat while I’m
here,” he said. “Are you in?”

“Finally. ShadowCo’s security is better than average.
Took longer than I thought.”

“And? What did you find?”

“What I expected. He altered the avatar files on both
Martha’s Desiree and Christy’s Gwenivere. It’s how he made their faces look as
if they’d been made up. He also changed the rooms in their virtual homes with
the rope and the shoes he left behind.”

“And so? Can you figure out who he was?”

“Not directly. He made these changes using his
victims’ user IDs. But both avatars have been changed the same way. If you dig
deep enough, the graphics are just lines of code. The code gets kind of clunky,
where he changed it.”

“Clunky.” He gave her an amused look. “So he’s an
amateur?”

“Perhaps. The code he wrote gets the job done—the
avatar’s face changed. But a professional programmer would have done it more
elegantly.”

“Now you sound like Ethan,” David commented blandly.
“He likes to say ‘elegant.’ ”

“Ethan taught me a lot,” she said cautiously. To love
Dana could have meant David had to hate Ethan, but Eve knew that wasn’t true.
Still, she was careful not to lavish too much praise on the man who’d made her
guardian happy and her friend miserable.

“Like how to break and enter, virtually. Which can get
you arrested in the real world.”

“Now you sound like Noah.”

“Whose hat is no longer on your bookshelf.”

Irritated, she kept her eyes on the screen. “You get
the stuff to fix my roof?”

“Ordered it. I pick it up after three. I can take you
up to get your car on the way.”

“Thank you. I’ll pay you for all the supplies.” She
had enough put aside. She hoped.

“Miss Moneybags,” he scoffed gently. “I’ll pay for it.
You do know you’re ultimately helping your landlord? Once he kicks you out,
he’ll have an improved roof at no cost.”

“But he’ll learn that he can’t kick people around.
That he can’t kick me around.” Then she understood. “You’re helping because you
don’t want him kicking me around, either.”

“Too many people have,” he said quietly. “You’ve
pulled yourself out of something that would have broken most people. I’m proud
of you.” Her throat closed, her eyes filled. There were no words, but she knew
he understood. “Get back to your virtual B&E. But I want you to give
Webster a chance. That’s my price for fixing your roof.”

He left her alone, but Eve couldn’t focus. She saw
Noah’s face reflected in the window, worried and understanding.
That’s why I
drink tonic water
. She wondered what journey had brought him to the place
of a recovering alcoholic.

She chided herself for being so selfish that she
hadn’t seen, or cared for, his feelings. And for just a second she let herself
remember how he’d tasted when she’d kissed him. How good she’d felt when his
arms wrapped tight around her.

But giving him a chance? No. Not even for David.
Because in the end she didn’t want to hurt Noah Webster or any other nice guy
who was looking for a future, because in the end, there would be none.
Not
with me.
That was Eve’s reality.

She blinked, clearing her eyes so that she could see
her screen. For Noah, she had to be careful. After he’d left, she’d called
Ethan and at his direction had taken precautions, routing through a dozen proxy
servers to make tracing her online movement difficult. But ShadowCo could still
find her, and the blame might fall on Noah.

And that wouldn’t do at all because Noah was a good
man. There had to be a way to stop this monster. Just knowing he’d been in
Shadowland, messing around with avatars, wasn’t good enough. She had to use
what she knew to make him show his face in the real world. It wouldn’t be easy.
Noah’s monster was very smart, so far staying one step ahead of them.
I’ll
just have to be smarter
.

Tuesday, February 23, 2:30 p.m.

Liza sneaked out the ditching exit, the first time
she’d ever ditched class. It wasn’t like it was real class, just a stupid
assembly with a stupid jock. It was making her crazy, sitting in a stupid
assembly when she could be looking for Lindsay. So she left.

“Hey, girl, you gotta light?”

She jerked around, startled. A kid was standing by the
door, hunched over, hands in his pockets. “No. I’m sorry.” Unsteadily, she kept
going. Too little sleep and no food had her light-headed. She had only a few
dollars left and she needed them for bus fare.

The city bus stop was up a block, so she put her head
down against the wind and started walking. The next thing she knew she was on
her butt, her bookbag spilled, and her papers blowing away.

“I’m so sorry. Let me help you.” It was a really tall
boy. No, older. College maybe. He gathered her papers and brought them to her.
“Some of them got a little dirty.”

“It’s okay. Thank you.” She shoved the papers back in
her bag and stood, stumbling at the next little dizzy spell.
Note to self.
Need to eat
.

“Are you okay?”

She looked up. Way up. Liza was five-ten, so this guy
had to be six-six. “I’m fine.”