Vicki Pryor. Owen’s cousin. The girl who was shot in the back. Confined to a wheelchair. She graduated from RivCol two years ago and is now studying computer science at MIT with a full scholarship. And the project that got her there? Telecommunications infiltration. In other words, hacking mobile devices.
“Hacking gets you into an Ivy League college?” I say. “I thought it’d get you a one-way ticket to jail.” I glance at Jesse. “Sorry.”
“I’m guessing her project was theoretical,” Jesse said. “If you can show how a device or a system can be hacked, it helps companies build better security.”
“Are you sure that’s Vicki’s specialty?” I ask Chris.
He taps his phone and turns it around. On the screen is a news article about Vicki’s scholarship. It mentions that her project was on preventing tampering with mobile devices.
“It made the local paper?” I say.
“People are interested in survivors. It’s a feel-good story. And I’ve heard a lot about Vicki. Some of the victims’ families stick together. For support.” He sneaks a look at Jesse. “Not all of them do, understandably. For some it helps. For some it’s a reminder.”
“Like I said,” Jesse says, “my parents did join a group. But after a while, yeah, it was just a reminder.”
“I don’t go to the group,” Chris says. “Nella and I weren’t close. But I hear the talk. Everyone’s proud of Vicki. She liked tech before the shooting. Afterward, when she was recovering, she threw herself into it. I don’t think anyone in her family has even been to college. A full ride at MIT is huge. But she’s there – in Boston – not here.”
“What about Owen?” I ask.
There’s a long pause. Then Jesse nods. “Yeah, let’s talk about Owen.”
We spend the next twenty minutes doing just that. We go over everything that’s happened, looking for things Owen couldn’t have done.
We find nothing.
We presume Owen didn’t have the know-how to hack, but Jesse says Vicki could hack the computers remotely. She also has the skills to monitor my phone and see those texts, saying I was meeting Tiffany in Fletcher Park.
The voices in the girls’ bathroom could have been recorded, as Jesse suggested. Vicki records it with a friend and sends the file to Owen. Owen knows I’m in the bathroom, sticks the cleaning sign out front, comes in and plays the recording. Then he has it play in the halls, bouncing from speakers.
After I escaped from the office post-detention, Owen must have taken the doorstop. He said Mr. Vaughn forgot kids in there all the time. He may have even distracted the VP to be sure he forgot me.
Sending that “anonymous” email to Vaughn from my account? Easy. Vicki hacks my log-in information, and Owen sends it while apparently cleaning a computer. Trapping me in the newspaper office? Owen would have the key, along with an excuse for being there late. Switching the newspaper articles? That’d be Vicki, having found a way to remotely access the files.
Finally, there’s my attacker. A guy who was Owen’s size.
“Where does Owen live?” I ask.
“He’s renting a place in the country,” Chris said. “I remember talking to him once, and he said he was moving there, glad to get out of the city.”
“Which would be the perfect place to hold Tiffany.”
“No,” Jesse says.
“No, it’s not?” Chris says.
Jesse looks at me. “I’m saying no to what Skye is about to suggest. She’s going to point out that we need more to take this to the police. They haven’t believed us so far. So we have to go and get a look at the house, see if we can find evidence of Tiffany being held there. Otherwise, the police are liable to tip Owen off by questioning him, which would be dangerous for Tiffany.”
“Couldn’t have explained it better myself,” I say.
Jesse gives me a look.
“Well, is it wrong?” I say. “Any of it?”
He sighs. “No.”
“Then I guess we’re going to need to find out where Owen lives.”
We’re at Owen’s rented house. Like Chris said, it’s outside the city. It must have been a farmhouse at one time – with fields along either side and a forest in the back – but whoever owns the farm now rents the house and just works the fields.
It’s the kind of place you might expect a twenty-year-old guy could afford to rent. It’s big – two stories – but it’s one building inspection away from being condemned. Several windows are boarded up. There’s no front porch or any steps to get to the door.
Jesse pulls into a lane a quarter mile down, one that seems to be for farm equipment. We walk until we’re standing behind trees at the property edge. My phone blips with an incoming text. I quickly turn it to silent and check the message.
Mae: It’s after ten, Skye. When are you coming home?
Me: Soon.
I pocket my phone. The guys are surveying the dark house. There’s not a single light on, and it’s too early for Owen to have gone to bed. The driveway is empty, and I don’t see any sign of a garage.
“He has a car, right?” I whisper.
Chris nods. “An old Honda.”
“The lack of lights and a car doesn’t prove he’s gone,” Jesse says.
“It just very, very, very strongly suggests it.”
“I’m going with Skye on this one,” Chris says.
I turn to Jesse. “Chris agrees that we should sneak up to the house and see what’s going on.”
“Whoa,” Chris says. “I never said —”
“If we cut through the field, we can come out in the forest. Come on.”