"Dan Mercer?"

I blinked. Female voice. Professional. Deep tone. Sounded oddly familiar.

"Who's there?"

Suddenly there were other people in the room. A man with a camera. Another with what looked like a boom mike. And the female with the familiar voice, a stunning woman with chestnut brown hair and a business suit.

"Wendy Tynes, NTC News. Why are you here, Dan?"

I opened my mouth, nothing came out. I recognized the woman from that TV newsmagazine…

"Why have you been conversing online in a sexual manner with a thirteen-year-old girl, Dan? We have your communications with her."

… the one that sets up and catches pedophiles on camera for all the world to see.

"Are you here to have sex with a thirteen-year-old girl?"

The truth of what was going on there hit me, freezing my bones. Other people flooded the room. Producers maybe. Another cameraman. Two cops. The cameras came in closer. The lights got brighter. Beads of sweat popped up on my brow. I started to stammer, started to deny.

But it was over.

Two days later, the show aired. The world saw.

And the life of Dan Mercer, just as I somehow knew it would be when I approached that door, was destroyed.

WHEN MARCIA MCWAID FIRST SAW HER daughter's empty bed, panic did not set in. That would come later.

She had woken up at six AM, early for Saturday morning, feeling pretty terrific. Ted, her husband of twenty years, slept in the bed next to her. He lay on his stomach, his arm around her waist. Ted liked to sleep with a shirt on and no pants. None. Nude from the waist down. "Gives my man down there room to roam," he would say with a smirk. And Marcia, imitating her daughters' teenage singsong tone, would say, "T-M-I"-Too Much Information.

Marcia slipped out of his grip and padded down to the kitchen. She made herself a cup of coffee with the new Keurig pod machine. Ted loved gadgets-boys and their toys-but this one actually got some use. You take the pod, you stick it in the machine-presto, coffee. No video screens, no touch pad, no wireless connectivity. Marcia loved it.