Angela Campbell - Spirited Away

One day she’d taken a look at the hot-pink-haired leather-clad female avatar she’d created in a game – which, let’s be honest, had been her escape to keep her sanity intact, not to mention her one act of rebellion, since video games were not at all lady-like – and wondered why she couldn’t become more like her avatar in real life. Strong. Independent. Unique. Maybe even a little bit snarky. The desire to become those things had grown and swelled until, one day, she impulsively dyed her hair purple and ditched her closet full of dresses for a wardrobe heavy on jeans, combat boots, and skin-tight t-shirts.

And she ditched Paul, too.

Both he and her father had accused her of having an early quarter-life crisis, but she hadn’t cared. She’d felt more herself than she had in her entire life.

She enrolled in computer programming classes, because she’d always had a knack for computers. Afterwards, she got the job at Zach’s agency. And she was almost two years into her five-year plan to save money, get her own house and finally enjoy her fought-for independence.

Patience was all she needed, and not to get mixed up with any serial killer types in the meantime. Because dying before she could get her own place would really, really suck.

Before she could change her mind, she snatched up her phone and punched in the non-emergency number for the Atlanta Police Department. When an officer she didn’t recognize answered, she said, “I’m trying to reach Officer Jack Lanier. He’s been working in Zone 2.”

“He’s on patrol and unavailable at the moment. Would you like to leave a message?”

“Sure. This is Spider, er, I mean Emma. Emma Fisher and—”

“The chief’s daughter?”

Her shoulders sank on a sigh. “Yeah.”

“No kidding. What’cha been up to, kiddo? Haven’t seen you around here in a long time.”

Yeah, well, for one, I’m not a kiddo anymore. “You know. I’m working now.” She cleared her throat. “I’m sorry. I didn’t catch your name.”

“Pruitt. I come over to your house every now and then for games.”

“Oh, right. Pruitt.” She had no idea which officer was Pruitt. The parade of new and old uniforms that came through her house was never ending. “How have you been?”

“Good. Hold on. I’ll patch you through to Lanier’s cell phone. Take care, you hear?”

“Uh. Okay. Thanks.” She blew out a breath, hoping word wouldn’t get back to her father that she’d called into the station. Maybe this hadn’t been the smartest idea she’d had.

“Lanier,” a gruff voice growled.

“Hey, Jack, it’s Emma Fisher.”

“Hey, kiddo, what’s up?”

Enough with the kiddo stuff. Geez. “I have a question. Remember the guy who was here?”

“Yeah, yeah. The neighbour. West. Looked like he’d been on a bender. Why? He been bothering you?”

“No.” Sweet mercy, how did she say this without sounding like a paranoid recluse who spied on her neighbours? She swallowed. “Did you run a check on him or anything?”

“Yeah, standard check. Came back clean.”

“So, no priors or anything?” She drew out her words slowly.

“What’s this about, Emma?”

Drawing in a deep breath, she plopped down onto the sofa again. Here goes . “ It’s just that, well, you know how you always hear after police catch someone for doing something awful, that people will say, ‘I saw something suspicious, but I never called the cops’? And you wonder, why didn’t they call the cops? They could have caught the creep already. Know what I mean?”

There were a few seconds of silence. “You saw this guy do something suspicious?”

“I don’t know.” She sank back onto the cushions. As precisely as possible, she described everything that had happened. “I know I saw a woman in that window, but he claims there was no one in the house. I have this weird feeling I need to tell someone about it.”

“Probably worth checking out. Tell you what, I’ll stop by there in a little while, take a look around. It’s probably nothing, but you did the right thing telling me, Emma.”

Her face felt warm to the touch as she covered it with her hand. Sometimes meek old Emma reared her head and filled Spider with self-doubt. Was she actually doing this? “I appreciate it, Jack; but do me a favour? Please be discreet in case I’m wrong. Please don’t mention this to my father either.”

Last thing she wanted was a visit from her overprotective old man during her vacation from him. There was a point at stake here: the point that she could very well take care of herself without needing him or anyone else to look after her.

They ended the call on Jack’s promise to keep it their secret, and Spider’s chest tightened. What if Noah West had already gotten rid of any evidence because of what she’d said? What if this made him so angry he came after her next?

Grimacing, she rushed to the window and looked at the house across the street. No car in the driveway. How long would it take the cop to get here?

Something wet and warm touched the back of her arm, and she screamed. Charlie shrank back and cowered away from where he’d licked her.

“Charlie! You scared me to death!” Hand over her heart, she reached out to pet the dog, even as she glanced at her laptop. She’d forgotten about her computer problems.

Focus on work. Don’t fret over the possible serial killer next door coming to murder you.

Biting her fingernails, she tried to connect to the Internet again and… nothing.

After she double-checked her laptop’s settings, she got up to reset the router. If that didn’t work, she’d call and check to see if there was an outage in the area. Could be a good excuse to hit up the closest Starbucks and avoid a possible confrontation with Noah.

The computer pinged once, twice, three times. What?

The screen was black except for fast scrolling green characters. It shouldn’t be doing that. Not at all.

She sat down and reached to hit the ESC key when she noticed what those green characters said.

HELP!

DANGER#

HELP!

DANGER#

HELP!

Shrieking, Spider scrambled up onto the couch cushions and clutched a pillow to her chest. Looking around, she only saw the cat stretched out in the bay window and the two dogs curled up on the floor, each staring at her as if she were a lunatic.

Heart pounding loud in her ears, she pointed at the screen. “That is not normal!”

She chanced a lean forward and watched the words continue to fly up the screen. The hair on her nape and arms lifted as a chill settled along her spine.

Enough of that. It was freaking her the heck out.

Her fingers trembled as she held the power button, forcing the computer to shut down. She waited ten seconds and rebooted the machine.

Don’t overreact. There’s a logical explanation for this.

Could be a virus. Some a-hole probably infected her machine and set the creepy message to display upon startup. Shaky laughter bubbled in her chest as she pressed her palms to her eyes. Of course. That had to be what it was. Not anything irrational, like a ghost or demon or anything. Only a virus.

She sagged against the cushions.

Well, crap. That could take a couple of days to clean up. She had work to do, not to mention she wanted to cyber-stalk Noah West. Photographer. Maybe professor. Possible serial killer.

The familiar chime and login screen popped up.

She input the information and everything came up normal, including the Wi-Fi this time.

“Weird.”

A virus scan should have been her first order of business, but she shook her head instead, pulled up the Internet browser, and searched for Noah West, Atlanta, GA to see what hits it returned.