The Girl They Couldn’t See (Blind Spot #1) (Blind Spot Series)

by Laurence Dahners

  Hax’s mind was already racing through possible structures for a program that might do what she wanted, but then he suddenly sobered. Quietly, he said, “Writing software that’ll erase his hard drive’s probably illegal.”

  “Yeah,” Hallie shrugged again, “so nobody but you and I can know about this, right?”

  Curious, Hax asked, “How are you going to get the program onto his computer?”

  “I think I can hack into it.”

  Hax shrugged, “If you can hack in, why not just find his image folder and delete it?”

  She frowned and bit her lip, “That could take a while. Besides, I might not find everything. And, I wouldn’t be able to erase any external drive backups if his computer’s not hooked up to them.” She got a worried look, “And… what if he hires somebody that’s good with computers to try to trace me. I’m not sure I’m good enough to cover my tracks.”

  “Okaay,” Hax said, stretching the word. “It sounds like you shouldn’t try to hack it onto his computer if that’s the case.”

  Hallie shrugged, “I could hack in from one of the school’s computers… Or I could go with Plan B.”

  Hax frowned, “What’s Plan B?”

  “I’ll leave a memory stick with some girl’s name on it where he’ll find it.” She looked off into the distance, “The son of a bitch’ll jack that right into his computer,” she said, sounding completely confident.

  Hax sat thinking for a minute, his mind running down little programming alleys like they were some kind of maze. He thought he could do it, and if he couldn’t, he thought Roni might be able to help him do the things he couldn’t figure out. Suddenly he wondered just exactly who this program was going to attack. He turned to Hallie, “Who are we talking about here?”

  In a flat ugly tone, she responded, “Vito Castano.”

  Hax barely had time to get a cold sinking feeling in his stomach over the thought of taking on his old enemy, someone who’d left him alone for almost a year now, when he heard Vito’s voice behind him. “That’s right Spaz, me. And you’d better stay away from Hallie, she’s mine.”

  Hax felt a sudden clinch of fear. Then a moment’s disappointment that Hallie might be Vito’s girlfriend. From the angry yet fearful expression on Hallie’s face as she whipped around to look at Vito he immediately realized that, if she was his girlfriend, she didn’t want to be. Finally, he understood that Hallie herself was the “friend” whose pictures Vito had.

  Hallie stood up. So, reluctantly, Hax did as well. He didn’t want to face Vito, but couldn’t stay sitting if Hallie had the courage to stand and deal with him.

  Hallie’s face displayed a mix of emotions, none of them happy, as she turned to say, “I’m not your girlfriend Vito!”

  Vito grinned and gave her a wink, “Didn’t say you were my girlfriend, but you are mine, right?”

  Hax sickly realized that Vito was claiming possession if not friendship. He’s blackmailing her with those pictures! He wondered what she’d say.

  Hallie stared at Vito belligerently for a moment; then her face crumbled. “Yeah,” she said, so quietly she could barely be heard.

  Vito said, “Speak up girl, Hax couldn’t hear you.”

  “I heard her,” Hax heard himself say.

  Vito’s eyes jumped to Hax, “Are you gettin’ wise with me Spaz?” Then, while Hax was still trying to decide whether to respond or not, Vito stepped into Hax’s personal space. That had been a favorite strategy of Vito’s, to step within inches of Hax, forcing Hax to back up or stay uncomfortably close. However, this time when he did it, he stepped down from the broad stair he was on to the one Hax stood on.

  Hax thought Vito’s expression suggested that he was just as surprised as Hax was to realize that, due to differences in their growth rates, Hax was now taller than Vito. Hax had been smaller their whole lives. Hax wasn’t a lot taller now, only an inch or so, but it was a huge change in relative size.

  Hax thought Vito was probably still bulkier and he badly wanted to step back like he always had. He wanted to restore some distance and decrease his discomfort. However, with Hallie looking on, he forced himself to stay where he was.

  The surprise in Vito’s eyes turned to fury. His hands rose. Hax knew what Vito was about to do even before the guy’s hands struck his chest, shoving him back. Hax had no chance of resisting the thrust, but as he fell back, his hands involuntarily rose to grasp the front of Vito’s jacket—just like he’d been taught in his martial arts classes.

  Though Hax knew his coordination had been improving, he still felt surprised when both hands latched securely onto Vito’s lapels. In class he’d frequently missed his grapples. As Hax fell backward, he jerked Vito with him, rolling into Vito and slowing his own fall by forcing Vito’s body past his own. As they both dropped to the ground, Hax finished pulling Vito underneath him. Hax landed on top, Vito cushioning Hax’s fall. Hax’s weight forced the air out of Vito’s lungs with a whoosh.

  Hax thought he felt more surprised than Vito did. Later he thought to himself that he should have followed up. Delivered a few blows to the body, or head, or something. Instead he panicked, jerking back and scrambling to his feet.

  Vito got up more slowly, staying a little bent over and looking like he was struggling to get a full breath.

  Hax fully expected Vito to wait a minute, get his wind, then attack again. However, one of the teachers stepped in, saying, “Break it up you two.”

  Hax didn’t know how to feel. He did feel relieved that the fight was over and he hadn’t been hurt. However, he knew that having the fight broken up just meant he was going to have to live in dread of Vito’s very certain retaliation.

  He felt a touch on his arm. Hallie said, “That was amazing.”

  Despite the thrill he felt at Hallie’s words, Hax’s eyes were fixed on Vito’s furious expression. Though the teacher still stood between them, Vito continued glaring. The bell rang for class and Hax turned and started toward the building. Vito crooked a finger at Hallie and she robotically moved his direction.

  As Hax continued on to his class, he wondered what he could have done to save Hallie from having to go with his worst enemy.

  Against her will.

  Like a slave.

  ***

  “Roni, have you got a minute?”

  His sister looked up at him. She didn’t look like she wanted to waste time on her little brother.

  Before she could say no, Hax said, “I’m trying to help a girl at school.”

  Roni’s eyes narrowed, “It’s not my job to help my little brother make time with girls.”

  “No, no, it’s not like that. Someone’s… like, blackmailing her. I want to…” He shrugged, “I want to help her get her pictures back.”

  Roni frowned, “Pictures? What kind of pictures?”

  Hax lifted his palms, “I don’t know. Embarrassing? Incriminating? But… Vito Castano is making her do stuff because of them.” Roni got a disgusted look when she heard the Castano name but didn’t say anything immediately. He continued, “And you know I hate him, but whether I hate him or not, he shouldn’t be doing that to anyone.”

  “Doing what?”

  “I don’t know. But I think he makes her do stuff…” Hax shrugged again, “It’s like he’s made her his… plaything.” Hax glanced out the window, “His… his slave.”

  Roni closed her eyes. Hax thought she might be thinking about Vito’s big brother Nick. A little shiver ran over her, then she opened her eyes and said, “What do you want me to do?”

  “I’ve been trying to write a program to erase the images off of Vito’s computer,” Hax said, “but I’ve got a couple of things I just can’t quite figure out.” He unfolded his ancient laptop and set it on the desk next to Roni.

  Before Hax could direct her attention to his problem spots, she said, “How are you going to get this program onto Vito’s computer?”

  “Hallie says…” Hax paused, flustered because he hadn’t meant to let her n
ame slip.

  “Hallie Rogers? Her dad’s a locksmith?”

  Hax gave a slow nod.

  “I saw her walking with Vito. I couldn’t believe she’d fall for…” Roni paused and Hax thought it might have been because she was remembering how she’d once been enamored of Vito’s brother. She shook herself, “Doesn’t matter if she fell for him and wants out, or whether he forced himself on her in the first place. If she needs help getting out of a relationship with a Castano, I’m all about helping her.” Roni turned her attention back to Hax’s laptop, but then stopped and looked back at Hax. “How’s she going to get it on his computer?”

  Hax went over Hallie’s memory stick idea.

  Roni got a pensive look for a moment, then shrugged and said, “That should work. Show me your problems.”

  Hax showed her the first one. Rather than studying it and talking it through, she deleted two lines of code and added five more. She did it so quickly he had a hard time following, but he thought he’d be able to figure it out when he got back to his room. He was about to show her the next problem when she jumped back to the start of the program. She scrolled through it, jumping back and forth through several functions. She stopped at his next problem without his prompting. “This one too?” she asked, not looking up. When he affirmed, she added a couple of lines there and continued scrolling forward.

  A few minutes later, she’d gone through the entire program, fixing the five problems he’d been struggling with.

  And two he hadn’t recognized.

  She turned to him, “Hey little brother, I didn’t know you were this good at programming.”

  Wide-eyed, Hax stared at his sister. In an awed tone he said, “Holy shit! You’re… wow!” His eyes went back to the screen, “That was… amazing.”

  Roni gave him a gentle punch on the shoulder, “Of course. I’m your big sister, aren’t I?”

  ***

  Lunch in hand, Hax stepped out the front door of the school and glanced around. Seeing Hallie, he walked down the broad stairs in her direction. He surveyed the stairs without seeing Vito. He walked past where Hallie was sitting, tossing the memory stick onto her book bag, then took a seat two stairs down in front of her.

  “Is this it?” she asked quietly.

  Hax nodded. “The file looks like a tasteful nude of a girl’s back. The program’s embedded within the picture file.”

  “Can I make a copy of it? Without it… erasing my pictures?”

  “You can. It won’t do anything until two in the morning on the thirteenth of November. Then it’ll search for the second file on that stick, the pornographic looking picture of a naked girl. If it finds that picture, it’ll wipe every picture and video file off every hard drive on the computer it resides in. So, all you have to do is delete the pictures of the two girls before November 13.”

  “Wait… so if it’s on my computer, it’s going to wipe my hard drive on the 13th?”

  “No, only if it finds that second picture, with that particular filename. Besides, it wouldn’t wipe your entire hard drive, just the pictures and videos.”

  “So,” Hallie said, sounding like she was thinking hard, “if I copy those two pictures onto a memory stick with some racy pictures of a girl he’s interested in… and he copies the whole thing to his computer… Then on the thirteenth… poof?” she mimed a little explosion.

  Hax nodded. “And if he copies those pictures to an external back up drive, the program’ll wipe the back up anytime the backup’s plugged in after the thirteenth of November. If he restores the backup to his main computer, it’ll wipe his computer again.”

  In an unhappily curious tone, Hallie said, “Why wait till the thirteenth of November? Why not right away?”

  “That way, it won’t happen right after he puts in that memory stick. Hopefully he won’t realize it has anything to do with the memory stick and won’t try to figure out where he got the jump drive.” After a beat, Hax continued, “Besides, what if he’s been copying his pictures to some of his lowlife friends? People he could get the original pictures back from. With a bit of luck, he’ll give his buddies these pictures too and their drives will get wiped on the thirteenth just like his will.”

  “Oh,” Hallie said thoughtfully.

  Hax turned back slightly, but then resolutely faced forward, “Just don’t keep those two pictures on your computer. Not even in the recycle bin.” He thought for a moment, then, worried she might not understand, he said, “So, if I were you, I’d be very careful to know exactly where I put them on my computer. Then when you’re ready to get rid of them, I’d rename the files; then permanently delete them; then empty your recycle bin for good measure.”

  Hax was turning to look at Hallie and see if he thought she understood when agony exploded in his back and his body flew off the stair. He heard Vito’s voice behind him, “Hey Spaz, I thought I told you to stay away from my girl?”

  Even as Hax rolled, coming back to his feet like he’d been taught in his self-defense class, he wondered whether Vito had heard his and Hallie’s entire conversation. Hax stood only to a crouch, turning to face Vito with his arms hanging loose and ready to meet an attack. Hallie was on her feet, pulling Vito’s wrist and saying, “Come on! He was sitting two stairs away!”

  Vito jerked his wrist free. He growled, “That’s too close,” then jumped a stair down closer to Hax, playing his invasion of personal space game again, though this time he stayed a stair above Hax.

  Hax had just seen the school’s security officer come out the front door and look their way. Though Hax didn’t want to act intimidated in front of Hallie, he didn’t want to get in trouble with the security officer either. That’d get back to Hax’s father. Slowly and grudgingly, he stepped back and down a step. Apparently this mollified Vito because the bully turned back to Hallie. In a low voice Vito said, “You stay away from the spaz unless you want to see his face beaten to a bloody pulp.”

  Hax glanced at the security officer who he’d thought would be coming down the stairs to find out what was going on. Instead, the man’s eyes were nervously fixed on Vito. Surely he’s not intimidated by a teenage boy, is he?

  The security guy turned and went back in the building, not just back to where it was warm, where he could turn and keep an eye on what was happening on the steps. Instead, he moved off down the hallway and out of sight. Hax had a feeling the man was scared. Looking all around, Hax wondered what might have frightened the officer, if in fact he’d actually been worried. Hax’s eyes returned to Vito without seeing anything else that made him nervous. What’s going on? he wondered.

  With another angry glance at Hax, Vito towed Hallie up the stairs and toward the building.

  Glad that Vito hadn’t said anything to suggest he’d heard Hax and Hallie’s conversation, Hax wondered whether Hallie’s plan—and his program—would work.

  ***

  Roni was walking down the street on her way home from her martial arts class when she saw Nick Castano go by on the street that crossed in front of her. She’d disappeared before she realized he wasn’t looking her way and probably wouldn’t. Guiltily, she looked around to see if anyone looked freaked out because she’d vanished in front of them. No one seemed to have noticed. She frowned, Since this weird ability seems to consist of being able to keep people from noticing me, maybe it also keeps them from perceiving the moment of my disappearance?

  After another couple of moments thought, she decided that was probably true. However, it might not be true of such a blatant event as appearing right in front of people, so she kept herself invisible. She walked the rest of the way to the corner, intending to reappear as she went around it like she’d done on other occasions. About to go around the corner, she looked to make sure Nick wasn’t looking back her way. Instead, she saw him stepping into the Med Delhi, a small restaurant that specialized in Mediterranean and Indian food. Back when money wasn’t so tight, her parents had taken Roni and Hax there a couple of times because they liked the foo
d. Mario, Nick’s oversized companion, entered the restaurant behind him.

  A sick feeling in her stomach, Roni stayed hidden and walked back down to the Med Delhi. It being late afternoon the restaurant didn’t appear to have any customers. She walked in. Though it felt like an invasion of privacy, she wanted to know how the Castano goons treated other businesses. She’d been worrying that Nick singled out her father’s store because of her. Toward the back, Nick and his pet gorilla were talking to a small man, apparently the owner.

  Roni looked around the restaurant, wondering whether any employees were there to help. Nearing the three men, her eyes tracked back to the owner. The little man trembled with fear. “Please!” he said in a begging tone. “A little more time! I can sell… I don’t know what I can sell, but I’ll find something.”

  Nick said something about having given the man three chances already, then nodded at his beefy sidekick.

  A club appeared in the big man’s hand, apparently pulled from the interior of his heavy coat. It smashed into the owner’s head and the old man toppled to the floor jerking and thrashing.

  So startled by this sudden development that she felt lightheaded, Roni dropped to her knees, then to her buttocks. She panicked, If I pass out, they might be able to see me!

  Nick and the big man turned, walking toward her. Roni pulled in her feet so they wouldn’t trip over her. As they walked by the two men were laughing. The big guy said something about needing more of a challenge.

  Then they were gone.

  Roni got to her hands and knees and scrambled over to the old man, hoping he’d just been knocked out. As she approached, she saw that his crotch was soaked. A stench told her he’d voided his bowels as well. She reached out to him but he threw up, almost spraying her with his vomitus. She jerked back. Looking at his head, she saw his skull had a large area that’d been caved inward when Mario hit him.

  She looked around for the house phone, wishing for a moment her family could afford for her to have a cell phone. Then as she used the phone at the hostess stand to call 911, she thought to be grateful that she didn’t have a cell phone. If she’d called on one, the call could’ve been traced back to her. When the operator answered, she pitched her voice as low and hoarse as she could, saying only, “The Castanos just murdered a man at the Med Delhi.”