Page 43 of Before She Disappeared

“She’d been taking it over the summer.”

“Who knew this?”

Emmanuel shrugs. “My aunt and me, of course. I don’t know how much she talked schoolwork with her friends.”

Lotham is staring at the computer screen. “I don’t remember this from our original conversations or having seen anything in the reports on the forensic exam of the computer.”

“You wouldn’t. An online class is an online class. The computer doesn’t matter, the codes to access the class do.”

Lotham picks up his notebook. Angelique’s username is a basic Gmail account, which makes sense. Her password, however, looks like a string of random numbers followed by an exclamation mark. Lotham shares it with me. I glance up at Emmanuel.

“You can remember this?” I ask him.

“It’s a code,” he murmurs. “The numbers stand for letters, from a cypher LiLi made up when we were younger. It reads Doc2Be!”

“As in doctor-to-be?”

“Exactly.”

Lotham makes another note. “This her primary password? The one she uses most of the time?”

“I don’t know. I understand her cipher. We’d send each other coded notes using it. But we share this laptop, and I’ve watched her log in enough times. She knew I knew. What did it matter?”

“Can you see when she logged into the class?” Lotham asks. “Or how many times?”

Emmanuel takes the computer back. “Normally you would check browser history, but given she didn’t log in from this computer to complete the coursework...” He chews his lower lip, dark eyes narrowed in thought. “Ah. Here. When I first logged on last night, it told me the last time I’d accessed the course.” Emmanuel taps the screen, showing a record of date and time.

Lotham makes more notes while I peer closer. “Two weeks ago,” I say. “Three-oh-three p.m.” I glance at Emmanuel. “Does that mean anything to you? The date significant? The time of day? You said your sister likes codes.”

Emmanuel’s fingers fly over the keyboard, but then he shakes his head. “I don’t think so.”

“Walk me through how this works,” Lotham requests, attention back on us. “Angelique logs in to get assignments off the site, then what—completes them in some virtual classrooms, or uploads them from her own computer for her teacher to review?”

“Written essays she completes on her own, then uploads, yes. Tests are more complicated, with additional codes that must be entered by an adult, like my aunt, as protection against cheating.”

“So for this class to be completed, the final must’ve been some kind of written work?”

“Yes.”

“Which she had to upload from a computer,” Lotham muses, “which would give us an IP address. Now that’s something.”

He has his phone to his ear in the next instant, talking to someone about the website, user codes, and issuing a subpoena for additional records. Emmanuel nods along with the conversation, so apparently the technical mumble jumble makes sense to him.

I have a different question. “When Angelique disappeared, did you or your aunt contact this site, tell her teachers she had vanished?”

“My aunt gets e-mails from the site, keeping her notified of Angel’s progress. The courses cost money, so the school wants guardians to be informed. When assignments stopped being turned in, she would’ve been notified. But of all the things for my aunt to answer, worry about...”

“What did Angelique post?” Lotham is off the phone, looking at us again. “Can you pull up the essay?”

Emmanuel shakes his head. “The class is closed out. I can’t enter the course to look at past work.”

“Could you contact the course instructor?” I ask. “I mean, you have your sister’s e-mail and password. Can’t you just... be her and fire off an e-mail asking for a copy of the final assignment back? Your computer crashed right after sending, a virus ate your hard drive, something?”

Both Emmanuel and Lotham appear impressed, so apparently my basic internet skills have some merit.

Emmanuel works the keyboard again. “I can Instachat,” he declares after a moment. “The class professor is listed as being available. Hang on.”

I sip my coffee. It’s almost noon now. I wonder when Stoney is going to arrive and realize I’ve turned his bar into some kind of investigative headquarters. And what he might do or say about that. This may be the shortest job I’ve ever had.

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