The Watcher in the Wall Read Online Free PDF Page A

in to study the screen. Found what they were looking for at the top of the page.
    “Ambriel98,” she read. “Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. ‘Seeking a friend for the big good-bye.’”
    The chat log was dated Wednesday afternoon. Hours before Adrian Miller’s parents found his body. Windermere clicked through and forced herself to read, fighting the sudden wave of nausea that washed over her, feeling like she was watching a plane crash in slow motion.
    AM:
I think I’m ready. I think I’m going to do it today.
    Ambriel98:
It’s the right decision. U’ll be in a better place.
    AM:
At least I won’t be in this place.
    A:
I wish I had your balls.
    AM:
Take them.
    A:
Turn on your webcam if you’re doing it. Like we talked about. You’ll inspire me. You’ll inspire so many people like us.
    AM:
Get ready for the show. See you on the other side.
    AM:
Here goes nothing.
    A:
Do it. Do it for me
.
    That’s where the chat log ended. There was no response from Adrian Miller. Nothing more.
    That was it.
    “The girl talked Adrian into it,” Stevens said, stepping back from the computer. “Goddamn it all, Carla.”
    Windermere was already reaching for the phone, pushing the bad feelings away, the adrenaline taking over. “I know, partner,” she said. “So let’s find her.”
    < 11 >
    “Her name’s Ashley Frey,” Mathers told Stevens and Windermere. “That profile on the Death Wish forum links to a free Outlook account registered in her name. But there’s no real-world address linked to either the email account or the Death Wish profile, so we can’t trace her.”
    “The IP address,” Stevens said. “That’ll find her, right?”
    “It damn well better,” Windermere said. “Mathers, run a trace on her IP address. I’ll get on the phone with Harrisburg PD, tell them to run down any and every Ashley Frey they can find.”
    “On it.” Mathers turned back to the computer, started typing again. Windermere picked up the handset, picturing this Ashley Frey girl somewhere, a length of rope in her hands. Got someone on the line from the Bureau’s Harrisburg resident agency, filled him in and told him to start canvassing for people named Frey. Slammed down the phone just as Mathers came back frowning.
    “Weird,” he told them. “Really weird. I can’t get a trace on her location. This IP address is blocked.”
    “Blocked?” Windermere leaned forward and studied the screen. “No, forget that. Unblock it, Derek. There’s no time.”
    “Too complicated for me,” Mathers told her. “I think we need to call tech.”
    The tech was a young guy named Nenad. Close-cropped haircut, a Superman tattoo on his forearm. He couldn’t do much more than Mathers could.
    “Whatever this girl’s up to, she knows what she’s doing,” he told Stevens and Windermere. “She has this IP address bouncing all over the freaking globe.
Really
doesn’t want to get found.”
    Windermere stared at the laptop. Felt that roiling, churning starting up in her stomach again.
    “She’s using something called an anonymizer,” Nenad told them. “Basically, it’s a proxy server that you can use to shield your Internet usage. Hide out from prying eyes, that kind of thing.”
    “We need a location, Nenad,” Windermere said. “This girl’s life is in danger.”
    Nenad nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “The thing is, this program she’s using is
really
freaking good. Like, it’s the same shit that Snowden guy used when he was whistle-blowing on the NSA. They couldn’t find him, and believe me, they tried.”
    “I don’t know much about modern technology,” Stevens said. “But what the heck does a teenager need with that kind of encryption? This sounds like a little more than a lock on her diary.”
    Nenad scratched his forearm absently, the Superman tattoo. “Oh,it’s much bigger than that,” he replied. “This kind of program, I’d say the only way you’ll find this girl is if she decides she wants to be found.”
    “So the