Predator Read Free

shattered into dozens of pieces.
    Any predator with a computer would have been tempted by that Thought Bubble. Why had Ella felt compelled to tell everyone where she was going and when?
    Krista scrolled down as she’d done so many times since her sister’s disappearance and saw Ella’s habits and schedule posted in various Thought Bubbles throughout the day. She’d posted dozens of pictures of herself, some with her school jersey on. Some of her posts mentioned her school, her teachers, her after-school activities, her friends. She posted often during the day, using her cell phone.
    The killer had access to this information, and he was somewhere here, hidden among her GrapeVyne friends. Krista clicked on Ella’s Friends and saw a list with pictures of over eleven hundred people. What had her sister been thinking, to post private thoughts to over a thousand strangers? Why hadn’t Krista realized it and stopped her? She’d tried to give her sister her space, but she should have been spying on her, demanding to be added to her Friends List so she could monitor what was going on.
    She scrolled down through the faces, searching for someonewho looked evil. Someone who could stalk and rape and bury alive a young girl in a shallow grave out in the woods.
    The friends all looked benign and young, but it was subterfuge, she knew. He was there, somewhere. He was watching, enjoying the fallout. He may have even added his condolences to the others on Ella’s Vyne.
    Then it hit her. She could talk to him. If she posted a note to him, he would read it.
    An inner fire hit her face, burned her eyes, tightened her lips. Her heart kicked against her chest. She put the cursor in Ella’s Thought Bubble, and typed,
You think you got away with this, but I’ll find you. I’ll hunt you down like the animal you are.
    She hit send. There was a 140-character limit, but she had more to say. She waited for the box to empty and her note to flash up on the screen. Then she added,
You’ll wish you’d never heard the name Ella Carmichael, and you’ll suffer the way she suffered.
    Then she signed it, Krista Carmichael. She hoped he was reading it already.

Four
    R yan Adkins tapped his pencil on the sole of his tennis shoe, wishing he could bring this meeting to a close and get back to the other work piling up on his desk. There weren’t enough hours in the day.
    His director of legal counsel droned on about the newest lawsuits filed against GrapeVyne. There was one after another, blaming his company for everything from kidnapping cases to Nigerian money schemes.
    “This latest came from the attorney general of Connecticut, charging that we’re not protecting children from typo-squatting.”
    One of the attorneys looked up with a frown. “Typo-squatting? What is that?”
    “It’s when porn sites buy up domain names that are one letter off from the name of a popular site. They rely on typos to get their hits.”
    Ryan’s temples were beginning to throb. “So let’s buy up the typo sites they have for GrapeVyne. Let’s offer them enough to make them sell. What else have we got?”
    “The Internet Safety Task Force has issued a paper called ‘Enhancing Child Safety and Online Technologies.’ You should probably take a look at it. They want us to appoint a director to sit on the task force. Apparently, Twitter, MySpace, and Facebook have done that already.”
    “All right,” Ryan said. “I appoint you.”
    “With all due respect, I have a little too much on my plate as it is.”
    Andrew was right. Ryan turned to the security director, a fortyish man whose hair had turned gray since he came to work at GrapeVyne. “How about you, Jim? Can you do it?”
    “Guess I’d better.”
    “Good.” Ryan slid his chair back and stretched out his jean-clad legs. “Guys, you carry on here. I’ve got a million things to take care of.”
    “Just one more thing,” Jim said. “Have you seen the news about the note that was posted on Ella