The Darkness - Jason Pinter [81]
over to my desk. He laid a series of printouts in front of me.
They looked to be from some sort of Web sites. They were
chock-full of random ruminations, thoughts and pictures.
"What is this?" I said.
"Well," Jack continued, the pride in his voice unmistakable, "I took the list of all of Abigail Cole's online
friends. I did every kind of search imaginable--Google,
Yahoo, LexisNexis, you name it--and cross-referenced
her name along with Web sites that contained photos. I
figured if somebody had access to personal photos, they
might have had access even earlier than when Paulina was
first taken."
"Why would you assume that?" I said.
"Whoever took Paulina wanted her to write that article
to help publicize the Darkness. Which means these plans
have been in the works for a lot longer than the little time
gone by since her abduction. This blond guy needed to
know how to get to Paulina well before he actually did
it, meaning he needed to be sure of who had access to her
daughter's photos ahead of time. So when I did all that...I
found something."
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"A Web site," I said.
"A blog," Jack continued. "Not active anymore, but get
this. It was deleted just three days after Paulina was
abducted. Coincidence, right?"
"Could be," I said. "What makes you think it has
anything to do with this story?"
"The blog was deleted, but a few cached pages were
still available to see. Other Web sites had links to it.
That's part of the reason I was able to find it."
"And?"
"And the blog's creator is a girl named Pamela
Ruffalo," Jack said. "I know you haven't had time to read
all of these pages I printed out yet, but I'll save you the
detective work. Pam Ruffalo either was, or, more likely,
still is Abigail Cole's girlfriend."
"You're kidding me. Her girlfriend posted pictures of
her on the blog?"
"No sir, Henry. Take a look for yourself."
I picked the half a dozen pages up, began to shuffle
through them.
There were about fifteen blog entries on the pages.
They were dated starting about three months ago, and
continued up until the last few days when the account
was deleted.
The posts were fairly specific about their relationship.
According to the second entry, Pamela had met Abigail in
college during a job recruitment fair. They'd both been
online to hear more about an environmental consulting firm,
got to talking, and had dinner at a campus eatery that night.
Their first official date was that weekend. Weekend at
Bernie's, which Pam had rented on Netflix. She marveled
at how they both had an appreciation for bad movies. And
since that first date had gone so well, Pam had ordered
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Jason Pinter
Showgirls, Battlefield Earth and Mother Dearest for her
new romantic interest.
As the relationship progressed, Pam began to post
pictures of the couple on the page. Some of the pictures
were innocuous. The couple out at a party. Watching a
field hockey game together. Sitting under a tree reading.
Some of the pictures, though, were far more intimate.
The first one that caught my attention was the two girls
lying in bed, sheets up to their chins, bare shoulders
visible. The photo must have been a self-portrait taken by
one of the two girls, as a finger smudge obscured part of
the right side of the shot.
In another photo, the girls were dressed up in bustiers
and garter belts. It looked like they were about to go to
some sort of party.
And in another shot, the two girls were snapped kissing passionately. I'd say one thing, they were kind of
cute together.
"These all came off the blog?" I said.
"Every one."
"Were there any photos of Abigail Cole in a bikini? Or
on the beach at all?"
Jack squirmed. "Listen, I know she's a good-looking
girl but I'm not about to..."
"No, that's not why I'm asking. Paulina said when the
guy took her, he showed her a photo of her daughter
wearing a bikini on the beach. Paulina told me the photo
the guy used was private. She said Abigail never posted
it online, and she was clear about that. So where did the