Darknet by John R. Little Read Free Book Online

then-old Compaq computer her parents had.
    “Chat time,” she said.
    Part of her wanted to click the close button. She could feel her heart beating, and she subconsciously pushed her chair back and stood up.
    The cursor blinked on and off in the corner of the blue window.
    Pain scorched through her legs, and she sat back down. She hardened her resolve. What could it hurt to just chat?
    At the top of the screen, there was a flashing line of text. “Please wait a moment and somebody will be with you shortly.”
    At least they’re polite , she thought.
    She stood again, this time more slowly, and walked out to the kitchen to get herself a beer. She needed something to calm her nerves. She took the opportunity to listen to the rest of the house. Nothing. If she’d heard either Tony or Avril, she would have hurried back to her computer and closed the screen. Fate would have solved her dilemma.
    But there was no noise. She took a long drink and walked back to the computer, where a message was waiting for her.
    “I can help you.”
     
    * * *
     
    Cindy stared at the message, and for some reason she struggled to understand, she started to cry.
    “How did I get here?” she asked the silence. There was no answer except the thundering truth of her own inability to act.
    When she married Tony, she thought she’d hit the lucky ticket on the train of life. He was strong, handsome, funny, and everybody liked him. He could make anybody laugh and there was simply nothing not to like.
    On top of that, he’d written Summer Drive , one of the most popular songs of the decade. For months, when she was a nothing DJ in a peewee radio station, he’d phone her and talk about his song, but he’d also talk about the future he planned for himself and his band. He never sounded arrogant—just realistic. Cindy liked that he was forward-thinking and planned for his future. She believed the funny, self-deprecating song was the first in a long unbroken chain of hits yet to come, and she loved being part of the ground floor.
    She believed him. Everything. And she loved the idea that she could be part of the dream along with him. When he proposed to her, she jumped into his arms and never wanted him to let go of her.
    Cindy often asked herself how she could have been so wrong, but she knew that Tony only let people see what he wanted them to see. Even to this day, nobody knew the side of him that she lived with, and nobody would believe her if she told them. There was no way he could be the monster she would describe.
    For the first two years, she didn’t leave because of a jumbled combination of bad emotions. She felt the beatings must be her fault, that she deserved them and needed to meet his needs better (somehow). Other times, she thought he was just going through a phase and she’d soon have the man back that she wanted, and in the darkest of times, she thought maybe this was just the way marriage worked and nobody talked about it.
    The truth was, she was afraid. If she left, he’d hunt her down. She knew that as much as she knew anything at all. He’d never let her leave him. It wasn’t in his nature to lose, ever. If she left . . . he’d kill her. Plain and simple.
    Then she was pregnant, and she grew up very fast.
    Tony never beat her when she was expecting, although he came close a few times. Avril was her protection, and sometimes she daydreamed that the baby might change him.
    A month after she was born, Tony broke two of Cindy’s ribs. It was as if the pent up need to hurt her had been brooding inside him and growing bigger with every missed opportunity.
    Once Avril was safely out of the way, Cindy was fair game again. She knew she was a helpless victim, but that didn’t allow her a way out.
    Now, she had another reason not to leave. Not only would he kill Cindy, he’d kill the baby. He told her that one day. They were sitting watching the World Series (an activity only slightly less boring than watching the grass grow in