Harlan Coben - Caught

The names were listed on the bottom. Farley Parks, ever the politician, was front and center. Phil Turnball stood on the right. While Dan was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, both Farley and Phil were decked out for the cover shot of Snooty Prep Monthly. Khakis, collared shirts, loafers without socks-the only thing missing was a sweater tied around their necks.

Okay, so she knew the name of the dorm. Now what?

She could Google every other guy in the picture-the names were listed below-but that could take a while and might not give her what she needed. It wasn't like people listed their freshman roommates on the Web.

Back to it: Wendy started scouring through the Facebook page again. Ten minutes later, she hit pay dirt:

"Our Freshman Face Book on Facebook!"

She clicked the link, downloaded a PDF file, and opened it with Adobe Acrobat. The freshman face book-Wendy smiled at the memory. She had one at Tufts, of course. Your high school yearbook picture along with your town of origin, high school, and-best of all for her purposes tonight-your freshman room assignment. Wendy clicked the M button, jumped two more pages, and found Dan Mercer. There it was, his freshman picture:

Daniel J. Mercer

Riddle, Oregon

Riddle High School

Stearns Suite 109

Dan grinned in the photograph, his whole life supposedly in front of him. Wrong. Probably eighteen years old when this picture was taken. His smile said he was ready to take on the world, and yep, he'd graduate from Princeton, marry, divorce… and what?

Become a pedophile and die?

Did that add up? Was Dan already a pedophile then, at the age of eighteen? Had he abused anybody? Were there tendencies as a college student-or more than that? Had he really kidnapped a teenage girl?

Why was she not buying that?

Didn't matter. Focus. The entry gave her the room number in Stearns. Suite 109. She clicked to the P s to double-check. Sure enough, Farley Parks of Bryn Mawr, P.A., and Lawrenceville School was also in Stearns 109. Philip Turnball of Boston, M.A., and Phillips Academy Andover looking very much as he did today-yep, Stearns 109 too.

Wendy hit the search button and put in "Stearns Suite 109."

Five hits.

Philip Turnball, Daniel Mercer, Farley Parks-and now the two new ones: Kelvin Tilfer, an African American with a cautious smile, and Steven Miciano, who wore one of those ropey necklaces with a big bead in the middle.

The two new names meant nothing to her. She opened another browser, typed "Kelvin Tilfer" into the search engine.

Nothing. Almost literally. One hit from a list of Princeton graduates-and that was about it. No LinkedIn. No Facebook. No Twitter. No MySpace.

Wendy wondered what to make of that. Most people, even the most innocuous, you can find something about them online. Kelvin Tilfer, especially when you consider his roommates, was a ghost.

So what did that mean?

Maybe nothing. Too early to hypothesize. Gather more information first.

Wendy typed "Steven Miciano" into the search engine. When she saw the results, even before she clicked on any of them for details, she knew.

"Damn," she said out loud.

From behind her: "What?"

It was Charlie. "Nothing, what's up?"

"Do you mind if we head over to Clark's?"

"I guess it's okay."

"Cool."

Charlie left. Wendy turned back to the computer. She clicked the first hit, a news article from four months ago from a paper called the West Essex Tribune:

Local resident Steven Miciano, an orthopedic surgeon at St. Barnabus Medical Center in Livingston, NJ, was arrested last night and charged with possession of illegal narcotics. Police, working on a tip, found what was described as a "large haul of illegally obtained prescribed painkillers" in the trunk of the doctor's car. Dr. Miciano was released on bail pending a hearing. A spokesman for St. Barnabus Medical Center said Dr. Miciano would be put on leave until the matter was investigated fully.

That was it. Wendy searched the West Essex Tribune for follow-ups. Nothing. She went back to the Web and found hits on blogs and even on Twitter. The first was from a former patient talking about how Miciano sneaked him drugs. Another was from a "drug supplier" who had turned state's evidence in nailing Dr. Miciano. Still another blog entry came from a patient who said Miciano had been "inappropriate" and "definitely seemed high on something."

Wendy started taking notes, checking the blog sites, checking the Tweets, the postings on various boards, the links to MySpace and Facebook.

This was too crazy.

Five freshman roommates from Princeton. Nothing on one. Okay, subtract Kelvin Tilfer out for a second. The other four: a financial consultant, a politician, a social worker-and now a physician. All four had been taken down by scandals within the past year.

That was a hell of a coincidence.

WITH HIS ONE CALL, Ed Grayson woke up his attorney, Hester Crimstein. He told her that he'd been arrested.

Hester said, "This sounds like so much bull that I would normally send an underling out."

"But?" Ed said.

"But I don't like the timing."

"Me neither," Ed said.

"I mean, I just ripped Walker a new hole a few hours ago. So why pick you up and actually arrest you?" She paused. "Unless I've lost my touch?"

"I don't think that's it."

"Neither do I. So that means that they have something new."

"The blood test?"

"That shouldn't be enough." Hester hesitated. "Ed, you're sure there is no way they found, uh, anything more incriminating?"

"No way."

"You're certain?"

"Absolutely."

"Okay, you know the drill. Don't talk. I'll have my driver take me out. Shouldn't be more than an hour this time of night."

"One more troubling thing," he said.

"What?"

"I'm not at the Sussex County police station this time. I'm in Newark. That's Essex County, a different jurisdiction."

"Any idea why?"

"Nope."

"Okay, sit tight. Let me throw on some clothes. I'm bringing my A game this time. No mercy on these asswipes."

Forty-five minutes later, Hester sat with her client Ed Grayson in a small interrogation room with Formica floors and a bolted-down table. They waited. They waited a long time. Hester grew furious.

Finally the door opened. Sheriff Walker entered, wearing his uniform. Another guy-potbellied, around sixty, in a squirrel gray suit that looked as if it had been intentionally wrinkled-was with him.

"Sorry for the wait," Walker said. He leaned against the far wall. The other man took the chair across the table from Grayson. Hester was still pacing.

"We're leaving," she said.

Walker gave her a finger wave. "Bye, Counselor, we'll miss you. Oh, but your client is going nowhere. He's under arrest. He's going through the system-being processed and held. It's late. We'll probably have the bail hearing first thing in the morning, but don't worry, we have cozy accommodations."

Hester was having none of it. "Excuse me, Sheriff, but aren't you an elected official?"

"I am."

"So imagine when I put my full resources into getting your ass canned. I mean, how hard will this be? Arresting a man whose son was a victim of a heinous-"

The other man finally spoke. "Can we just cut through the threats for a moment?"

Hester looked at him.

"Do whatever the hell you want, Ms. Crimstein, okay? I don't care. We have questions. You're going to answer them or your client is going to get very lost in the system. Do you get me?"

Hester Crimstein squinted at him. "And you are?"

"My name is Frank Tremont. I'm an Essex County investigator. And really, if we could cut the posturing for a minute, maybe you'll get why you're here."