Speak No Evil_ A Novel - Allison Brennan [59]
Carina introduced Nick to her brother. “The Kincaid family seems to run San Diego,” Nick said with a smile.
“You haven’t even met half of them,” Carina said. “But Patrick’s my favorite.”
The young cop smirked. “She only says that when she wants something.” He rolled his chair across his small office and picked up a printout. “But maybe I really will be your favorite now. I got details on all three banned members. I printed out their MyJournal pages. No personal information—they didn’t use their real names. One has an e-mail address, and I ran it through the database and hit on a name and physical address.” He handed them another page. “Damon Bader lives in Detroit, Michigan.”
“What are the chances he came to San Diego to track down Angie and kill her?” Carina asked half-seriously.
“Next to none. I called the e-crimes unit and they did some preliminary work. The guy has a record, all misdemeanors, and works as a sanitation engineer. Twice divorced, two kids, and he’s fifty-six.”
Didn’t fit the profile, but they had to cover their bases. “We should check the airlines just in case he’s been out here recently,” Carina said. “And talk to his employer about any recent time off.”
“Consider it done,” Patrick said.
“The other two?”
“The first has the screen name ‘Bondage,’ and I read some of his comments on other pages. Probably the world’s biggest liar, but he claims to have done some wild stuff. If he’s for real, he’s a major contender for us. The other screen name is ‘Scout.’ Again, checked him out. Some heavy stuff, but nothing that popped as threatening. Both were banned on the eighteenth by Angie.”
“This is great,” Carina said, “but can’t we find out where they live?”
Patrick shook his head. “MyJournal is a free site. There’s no verification process. Just create a login and password and you have a profile page. Bondage lists his hometown as USA, and Scout doesn’t list a hometown. The only way I can narrow them down is to trace their comments through the MyJournal server to a local Internet service provider. Then, with a warrant, we can get the payment information from the ISP and locate them that way. But the MyJournal attornies are sticklers about privacy law. I’ve already put a call in to their security chief. It’s going to take some time.”
E-crimes were exploding, and the police department was still catching up with the twenty-first century. When they thought they’d gotten a handle on the casework, another cyberscam hit and they were scrambling for more computer resources.
“The answer is here somewhere.” Carina flipped through the pages of printed material from the MyJournal site. “But we need a hundred people and a thousand hours to find it.”
“Welcome to my life,” Patrick said. “I have some other ideas I’m working on, but I’ll talk to you about them tonight.”
“Tonight?” Carina hit her forehead. “Lucy’s birthday party!”
“You have to be there,” Patrick said. “Or she’ll give you the cold shoulder for the rest of your life.”
“I’ll be there, but late. It’s Angie’s memorial service tonight.”
Patrick nodded solemnly. “I’ll cover for you. But I get your slice of cake.”
“Deal.”
They went back downstairs and while Will filled in the team covering the memorial service, Carina looked at Bondage’s page on her computer and Nick looked at Scout’s on Will’s.
“Bondage says he’s twenty-two,” she said as she investigated the site. “This is awful. I don’t believe in censorship, but I still don’t think this stuff should be allowed. Hey, look at this.”
Nick leaned over to see her screen. When his shoulder brushed hers, a jolt ran down her spine, leaving her with tingles and goose bumps. She licked her lips, then hoped Nick didn’t notice.
“What?” he asked, his voice low as he looked at the screen. “White nylon rope.”
On Bondage’s main page was a picture of a partially clothed woman bound by white nylon rope around her wrists and ankles. The woman didn’t look in distress; she was posed with her lips open and her tongue out, her face heavily made up.
The caption read: I love a woman