Harlan Coben - Caught

From the ground, Kelvin's eyes finally met hers. Wendy crawled closer to him as he struggled. One orderly shouted at her, "Get away from him!"

She ignored him. "What is it, Kelvin?"

"I told them," he whispered. "I warned them."

"What did you warn them, Kelvin?"

Kelvin started crying. Ronald grabbed at her shoulder, trying to pull her back. She shrugged him off.

"What did you warn them, Kelvin?"

A third orderly was in the room now. He had a hypodermic needle in his hand. He shot something into Kelvin's shoulder. Kelvin looked her straight in the eye now.

"Not to hunt," Kelvin said, his voice suddenly calm. "We shouldn't hunt no more."

"Hunt for what?"

But the drug was taking effect. "We should have never gone hunting," he said, his voice soft now. "Scar face could tell you. We should have never gone hunting."

RONALD TILFER HAD no clue what "scar face" meant or what hunt his brother might have been talking about. "He's said that stuff before-about hunts and scar face. Like he does with Himmler. I don't think it means anything."

Wendy headed home, wondering what to do with this quasi-information, feeling more lost than when the day began. Charlie was watching television on the couch.

"Hi," she said.

"What's for dinner?"

"I'm fine, thanks. How about you?"

Charlie sighed. "Aren't we past fake niceties?"

"And general human courtesy, so it seems."

Charlie didn't move.

"You okay?" she asked him, her voice registering more concern than maybe she intended.

"Me? I'm fine, why?"

"Haley McWaid was a classmate."

"Yeah, but I didn't really know her."

"Lots of your classmates and friends were at the funeral."

"I know."

"I saw Clark and James there."

"I know."

"So why didn't you want to go?"

"Because I didn't know her."

"Clark and James did?"

"No," Charlie said. He sat up. "Look, I feel terrible. It's a tragedy. But people, even my good friends, get off on being involved, that's all. They didn't show up to pay their respects. They showed up because they thought it'd be cool. They wanted to be part of something. It's all about them, you know what I mean?"

Wendy nodded. "I do."

"Most of the time, that's fine," Charlie said. "But when it comes to a dead girl, sorry, I'm not into that." Charlie put his head back on the pillow and went back to watching television. She stared at him for a moment.

Without so much as glancing in her direction, he sighed again and said, "What?"

"You sounded like your father there."

He said nothing.

"I love you," Wendy said.

"Do I sound like my father when I ask yet again: What's for dinner?"

She laughed. "I'll check the fridge," she said, but she knew that there'd be nothing there and so she'd order. Japanese rolls tonight-brown rice so as to make them healthier. "Oh, one more thing. Do you know Kirby Sennett?"

"Not really. Just in passing."

"Is he a nice guy?"

"No, he's a total tool."

She smiled at that. "I hear he's a small-time drug dealer."

"He's a big-time douche bag." Charlie sat up. "What's with all the questions?"

"I'm just covering another angle on Haley McWaid. There's a rumor the two of them were an item."

"So?"

"Could you ask around?"

He just looked at her in horror. "You mean like I'm your undercover cub reporter?"

"Bad idea, huh?"

He didn't bother answering-and then Wendy was struck with another idea that on the face of it seemed like a pretty good one. She headed upstairs and signed on to the computer. She did a quick image search and found the perfect picture. The girl in the photograph looked about eighteen, Eurasian, librarian glasses, low-cut blouse, smoking body.

Yep, she'd do.

Wendy quickly created a Facebook page using the girl's picture. She made up a name by combining her two best friends from college-Sharon Hait. Okay, good. Now she needed to friend Kirby.

"What are you doing?"

It was Charlie.

"I'm making up a fake profile."

Charlie frowned. "For what?"

"I'm hoping to lure Kirby into friending me. Then maybe I can start up a conversation with him."

"For real?"

"What, you don't think it'll work?"

"Not with that picture."

"Why not?"

"Too hot. She looks like a spam advertising bot."

"A what?"

He sighed. "Companies use photographs like this to spam people. Look, just find a girl who is good-looking but real. You know what I mean?"

"I think so."

"And then make her from, say, Glen Rock. If she's from Kasselton, he'd know her."

"What, you know every girl in this town?"

"Every hot girl? Pretty much. Or I'd have heard of her, at least. So try a town close but not too close. Then say you heard about him from a friend or saw him at the Garden State Plaza mall or something. Oh, maybe give her a real name of a girl in that town, just in case he asks someone or looks up her number or something. Make sure no other picture of her shows up on a Google image search though. Say you just signed up for Facebook and are starting to friend people or he'll wonder why you have no other friends yet. Put in a couple of details under info. Give her a few favorite movies, favorite rock groups."

"Like U2?"

"Like someone less than a hundred years old." He listed some bands she'd never heard of. Wendy wrote them down.

"Think it will work?" she asked.

"Doubtful, but you never know. At the least he'll friend you."

"And what will that do for me?"

Another sigh. "We already discussed this. Like with that Princeton page. Once he friends you, you can see his entire page. You can see his online pics, his wall postings, his friends, his posts, what games he plays, whatever."

The Princeton page reminded her of something else. She clicked on it, found the "Admin" link, and hit the button to e-mail him. The administrator's name was Lawrence Cherston, "our former class president," according to his little write-up. He wore his Princeton orange-and-black tie in his profile pic. Oy. Wendy typed out a simple message:

Hi, I'm a television reporter doing a story on your class at Princeton and would very much like to meet. Please contact me at any of the below at your convenience.

As she hit send, her cell phone buzzed. She checked and saw an incoming text. It was from Phil Turnball: WE NEED TO TALK.

She typed a reply: SURE, CALL NOW.

There was a delay. Then: NOT ON THE PHONE.

Wendy wasn't sure what to make of that, so she typed: WHY NOT?

MEET IN 30 MIN AT ZEBRA BAR?

Wendy wondered why he'd avoided the question. WHY CAN'T WE TALK ON PHONE?

Longer delay. DON'T TRUST PHONES RIGHT NOW.

She frowned. That seemed a little cloak-and-dagger, but to be fair, Phil Turnball hadn't hit her as the type to overreact. No sense in trying to guess. She'd see him soon enough. She typed in "OK" and then looked back at Charlie.

"What?" he said.

"I have to run to a meeting. Can you order yourself dinner?"

"Uh, Mom?"

"What?"

"Tonight is Project Graduation orientation, remember?"

She nearly smacked herself on the forehead. "Damn, I totally forgot."

"At the high school in, oh"-Charlie looked at his wrist though he wore no watch-"less than thirty minutes. And you're on the snack committee or something."

She had, in fact, been put in charge of bringing both sugar/artificial sweetener and milk/nondairy alternatives for the coffee, though modesty prevented her from bragging about it.

Blowing it off was a possibility, but the school took this Project Graduation thing pretty seriously, and she had been, at best, neglectful of her son lately. She picked up the cell phone and texted Phil Turnball: