Free Dark Web by T. J. Brearton Page A

we need to make sure of that. These kids know each other from the internet. Emails, social networks, and whatever else they do.”
    “Copy that, sir.”
    “Thank you, Trooper.”
    “You got it.”
    Swift hung up and walked back to the interrogation room, which was now occupied by the driver of the Hyundai. This kid was twenty-three. His name was Robert Darring. He looked up at Swift. The look gave Swift a slight chill. He’d seen a face or two like that in his day. This kid was going to be a pisser, not like the Asian kid, but a tough nut.
    Then I’ll have to crack him .

CHAPTER FOURTEEN
    Mike’s hands moved over the keys of Braxton’s laptop. The girls were sitting in the other room, eating snacks and watching cartoons on the TV.
    He opened a new tab in the internet browser and went to Yahoo mail. His gaze swept the screen, registering what was there.
    “Shit,” he muttered.
    Braxton had not kept his email account open with the password stored in memory. Mike clicked on “Sign in” and then sat back for a second, trying to think what Braxton’s password could be.
    Are you serious? You’re looking to hack into your son’s email right now in the middle of everything that’s going on? Are you crazy ?
    Still, he had to try. They were going to go through this laptop, of that Mike had no doubt. A laptop was a modern person’s journal, photo album, record of business transactions — a whole psychological profile, a veritable window on their soul. Braxton had been lying out there in the middle of the road covered in the snow. Some unknown kids had fled the scene. The cops would pounce on this laptop and Braxton’s Kindle, too — anything that connected him to the outside world.
    Mike tried something he thought might work. A couple of years ago Braxton had played Minecraft obsessively on the Kindle. There was a spooky character in Minecraft that just showed up at random, stealing your possessions and destroying whatever you had built. This character looked just like you, but had white, glowing eyes, an expressionless face. It was called “Herobrine.”
    Mike typed in the name and hit Enter. Red text appeared on the screen indicating that the password was incorrect. He tried another one, a character with long spindly legs and arms taken from a terrifying internet meme about a tall man who took children into the woods. Slenderman. But this didn’t work either.
    Okay, made sense. It was a long shot anyway — Braxton had stopped being into Minecraft a while ago. What was he into now? He’d been given the laptop when he turned thirteen, four months before. So something that was important to him since his birthday.
    Mike looked around the room. His gaze fell on the bookshelves, the top of the dresser, the closet. Any moment Hannah would start balking at something, or finish her snack and want more, or the episode of Curious George would end. He stood up so fast the swivel chair spun around. He hunted through Braxton’s things. He looked at the two posters on the wall — both of them from The Hobbit . He knew Braxton identified with the Hobbits to some extent. Unlike himself, Braxton was small. He tried to remember the names of the characters.
    He returned to the desk and tried some different possibilities. Every one of them came up incorrect. He could feel the panic starting to creep up his neck, his heart beating faster. He needed to go be with his daughters. Hell, he needed to go collect his wife. Callie was beside herself, out of her mind with shock and grief. He thought about Callie. She was strong, but her strength had a darker side — she was passionate, a gifted teacher because of her energetic style and her unconventional approach to learning — but this was the mother of all tragedies, the worst thing that could happen to a person, to lose their child, to outlive the love of their lives. He felt despicable and guilty over what he was trying to do.
    What else? What else did Braxton like? What was special