by Rachel Brady
“There you are,” he said. “I have Clement’s room number. Had to say I was his brother.”
I stole a glance at Jeannie. Our conversation had been put off again. She folded a piece of spearmint gum onto her tongue and winked.
***
After lunch, it seemed nothing had changed in the E.R.’s waiting room except the numbers on its clock. Everything else was as we’d left it, with the notable absence of the lethargic baby and the blood-cougher. I considered that a small victory.
We took an elevator to Clement’s floor and asked directions twice before finding the right corridor. A guard was outside his room, sitting in a chair between a food cart and an empty I.V. pole. He stood when he saw us.
“My name’s Emily Locke,” I said, “Could I see Agent Clement?”
“You a relative?”
I shook my head. “I have information about the case he was working on when he got shot.”
“I’d ask him for ya, miss,” the guard said, “but the nurse said he’s sleeping.”
“It’s important. Could you please check again? Maybe he woke up.”
A middle-aged nurse stopped to join our little hallway group. Her taut lips and darting eyes gave the impression she was more interested in meddling than helping.
“Sorry, miss,” the guard said. “Nature of the job. Can’t leave my post.”
“Is there a problem?” the nurse asked.
I glanced at nicotine-deprived Jeannie, chewing gum at an inhuman rate, and tried to answer before she went toe-to-toe with the nurse on my behalf.
Richard spoke first. “Could you please see if Mr. Clement will accept a visitor?”
She held his gaze a moment, as if establishing her superiority. “Mr. Clement’s resting. You can try back later.”
Beside me, Jeannie collapsed inexplicably onto the food cart, sending dirty plates, silverware, and cups clanging to the floor. The guard stepped back into the I.V. pole and it hit the wall. A plastic cup bounced several times before rolling to a stop at my feet.
Jeannie stooped to gather forks and plastic cups from the linoleum floor. Dried kernels of leftover corn and the crusts of a few sandwiches lay scattered at our feet.
The nurse watched Jeannie toss a handful of silverware onto the cart, and then shifted her annoyed gaze to Richard and me.
“Maybe you should check again,” Richard said.
***
When the guard began to scan me with his hand-held metal detector, I passed my bag to Jeannie. There was no point slowing my admittance to Clement’s room by answering questions about the money. Richard and Jeannie would wait in the E.R. and ring his room if my name were ever called, assuming it hadn’t been lost in the system or I didn’t bleed out in the interval.
Any mental fog Clement might have experienced following his rude awakening disappeared when he saw me. He pressed a button on the controller to his bed and raised the head until he was almost sitting. An I.V. was taped to his wrist, and a bedside computer monitor displayed a real-time trace of his heart rhythm. I couldn’t see any bandages. Whatever damage had been done was hidden under the bland pattern of his hospital gown.
His face was sallow, but I was struck more by its youth than its color. For the first time, I looked at Clement and saw him for what he was: a young professional, in his late-twenties at most. His dark eyes, that once seemed so shifty, were attentive and eager, despite their fatigue.
He listened with interest as I explained what brought me to Houston.
“I certainly had my eye on you,” he said. Even his voice seemed tired. “There’s no employment file for you at NASA.” He gave a disapproving look and added, “But you already know that.”
“You had me checked out?”
“Had to. You showed up at the drop zone on the heels of a kidnapping, then spent a lot of time in the company of my prime suspect.”
I imagined my name scribbled in the margins of Clement’s field notes. A mental image of a thick file with notes about his “prime suspect” followed.
“What’s Vince’s part in this?”
Clement hesitated. “Officially, we can only talk about your part in this. But, off the record, near as I can tell, your friend’s involvement stops at mistaken identity. We’ve been chasing this ring for years. Had a lead in Texas, a pilot named Townsend. FAA records showed only one, Vincent, which is the reason I went undercover at his drop zone. His cousin Trish had become Dalton by the time she got her pilot’s license, so our FAA search on her maiden name never hit on her. Seems our informant had old intel.” He shrugged. “We caught a break. They fly for the same place. In that respect, Vince led us to the pilot we really wanted.”
I let it sink in. Relinquishing my doubts about Vince felt wonderful until I realized what a jerk he must have thought I was.
Clement lifted a glass of water from his bedside table and drank gingerly.
“Back to you,” he said. “When your NASA story didn’t check out, I looked further and learned about your husband and daughter.” He paused. “I’m sorry, by the way, for your loss.”
I nodded.
Clement continued, “Was it ever suggested to you that their accident was related to your involvement in the Reed trial?”
I thought about Wesley Reed—the man who almost sold Mattie at a roadside diner in Austin. The one who got off because I missed the trial. Having my fears articulated by a government agent put a fresh sting into an old wound. His question made it impossible to tell my story in order. I skipped to the meat.
“My daughter didn’t die in that boat wreck, Mr. Clement. She was sold to a couple in Galveston. At least, they were in Galveston four years ago. You have to help me find them.”
Clement leaned forward. I wondered if he should be sitting so upright. He shifted his weight, impervious to the pain he must have felt.
“How do you know that?” His brow furrowed and glanced quickly at his bedside table, then back at me. I thought it might have been a habitual search for a notepad.
I started by explaining what happened at the hangar after he was shot.
“Thanks, by the way,” he interrupted, “for making the 9-1-1 call. My mom will probably send you cookies and Christmas cards for years.”
I smiled. The more we talked, the more normal he seemed. He listened to my story about stowing away on the Otter, and grew intent when I came to the part about hiding behind the crates.
“You see what was in the crates?”
“I tried to find out,” I said, “but Kurt came after me before I could tell.”
I rubbed my shoulder where it had been smashed under the lid.
“Whatever it was, was really hard,” I added.
He frowned. “Weapons, then.”
“Excuse me?”
“With this network, it’s three things.” He counted them on his fingers as he listed them. “Narcotics. Weapons. Human freight.”
Human freight. Clement made it sound like a shipment of tomatoes or lumber.
“Drugs and weapons too? But…” I was too confused to finish.
“They operate in cells, and matrix their resources. Trish’s cell traffics babies, but that’s not all they do.”
“Are you saying Trish was making a weapons shipment last night for another arm of her criminal ring?”
“Perhaps,” he said. “And maybe another arm of her ‘criminal ring’ as you say, was placing a baby somewhere for her.”
He took another sip of water.
“Infiltrating their system has been no small effort,” he added. “I’ve been with the Bureau six years. This cell’s been my whole career, and its parent ring has taken a nice bite into the careers of dozens of other agents.”
“I have something you’ll want to see then,” I said.
The printouts from Scud’s hard drive were in my pocket. I unfolded them and passed them to Clement. He took them with the hand that had the I.V., still giving no indication of pain. Where anesthesia was concerned, it seemed new facts i
n his case were medicine enough.
I walked to his bedside and reviewed the papers with him, describing my suspicions about the columns’ significance. Clement’s eyes followed my finger over the page.
“This entry is Casey Lyons,” I said. “The date matches when he disappeared, and this is his age and gender. This little girl is missing from Houston,” I pointed to the row for an eight-month-old female. “It doesn’t look like she’s been sold yet. Maybe you can find her.”
“Look at those cities,” he said, more to himself than me. “And the names. I can’t believe he actually attributed the crimes.” He was looking at the column that associated names like Kosh and Dalton with the kids they took. “It’s like they’re keeping score.”
It was then I realized what I was up against. I wasn’t only battling the criminal network Clement had described, which, admittedly, surpassed even my worst fears. But I was keying in on something else. I was in this to find Annette and Casey, but Clement’s priority was to bust the ring.
“Is the FBI going to find my daughter, Mr. Clement?”
He looked up from the list.
“I sincerely hope so,” he said. “We want to bring all these kids home.”
“When will you start following up on this list?”
“I’m sure a parallel effort will begin after I brief my office on this new information.” He raised the papers slightly. “My team will want to spend time with you, hear your story. When we have it sorted, we’ll reorganize resources and follow up your leads.”
“What’s that mean? A day? A week?”
Clement cocked his head. “Hard to say at this point. I’m sorry.”
I made a decision then to tell Clement about everything I knew, but not about everything I had. Right or wrong, I’d keep that sack of money because it was my only path to Annette.
Chapter Thirty-four
Forty minutes into my exchange with Clement, a doctor entered his room and told me in succinct but polite terms to leave. She was marking on his medical chart before I stood up from my chair.
“Wait,” Clement said, as I moved toward the door. “This shouldn’t take long.”
I glanced at his doctor, but she ignored me and paced to a computer monitor, where she studied an ECG trace and some changing numbers.
“It’s fine,” I told Clement. “I need to get my leg fixed anyway, and you should rest.” I opened the door and turned to say goodbye.
“Stop,” he said. “You can’t leave.”
He shifted in his bed to sit up, but his doctor protested with a silent pat on his shoulder.
“You shot someone last night. You have critical information about a time sensitive investigation.”
The doctor turned to appraise me.
Clement continued. “There will be a formal interview, at the very least. Immediately.”
“That’s fine,” I lied. We had two agendas, and we both knew it. “How about I come back as soon as I’m stitched up?”
Clement hesitated. “Technically, I’m on medical leave. And the interview should be video recorded anyway. I’ll arrange for you to be taken to the field office. They can handle it there.”
“Of course.” I checked my watch and frowned. “I’ve been waiting an hour-and-a-half and the E.R. is packed. Would it be easier if I came back when I’m done and waited for the agent here with you? Hate to eat up half his day by making him sit around, waiting.”
Clement didn’t answer, but he didn’t stop looking at me, either. I wondered how well the FBI might have trained him to read signs of deceit.
“Miss?” the doctor said, nodding to the door.
“See you in a while,” I told Clement.
His distrustful expression was cemented on my brain as I walked down the hall. I didn’t want to lie, but Annette was more important. I’d risk anything to find her.
I used a pay phone in a waiting room to dial my cell. It was still in the bag I’d given Jeannie. She’d never been one to worry about answering a phone that wasn’t hers.
“It’s me,” I said. “Is Richard with you?”
“Yep.”
“Go somewhere he can’t hear you. Take the bag.”
“Just a sec,” she said, “I’m in a hospital and we’re not supposed to use cell phones in here. Let me go outside.”
“You’re good,” I told her. “Tell me when you’re there.”
A few moments later she said, “Alright, I’m at the drop-off curb. How’d it go with the Fed?”
“I’ll get to that, but first I need a favor. Dig out Kurt’s phone from that bag and find the number for the call that came in from Trish this morning. Should be two calls back, before the one that came from the apartment.”
She talked me through her search of the bag and navigation of the phone’s menus. Finally, she found the number. I read it back to her.
“Fine. That’s done,” she said. “What are you doing?”
“Baiting Trish.”
She didn’t say anything.
“You can’t tell anyone, especially Richard. If he gets involved and my idea doesn’t work, this could be the second career ruined for him.”
“What should I say if he asks who called?”
“Tell him it was somebody from work.” An ambulance wailed on Jeannie’s end. “Thanks for the number. I’ll be there as soon as I make this call. Plant the seed in Richard’s head that I need to give my statement to the local FBI field office next. Tell him we could drop him at his office first. Work out a way to borrow his car.”
“Roger, wilco,” she said. “Good luck.”
I pressed and released the pay phone’s switch hook. The dial tone sounded ominous. I punched in Trish’s number and waited.
“I want to make a trade,” I said when she answered. I tried to keep my voice down.
“I’m listening.”
“For my daughter and Casey Lyons.”
“When?” she asked. Her voice sounded tinny and distant. I was surprised by her cooperation.
“Today.”
“No. Later.”
I wondered why.
“You’ve done more on less notice, Trish. Let’s get this over with.”
“The answer’s no. I don’t trust you. Your friend’s an ex-cop and the airport’s dirty with Feds.”
“I’m not working with them.”
“I don’t believe you. This conversation’s over.”
“Wait,” I said. “You need that cash. If you didn’t, you wouldn’t have bothered to take Jeannie.”
She didn’t answer. But, she didn’t hang up, either.
“You’ll get half when I get the kids, the other half when we’re away, safe. Deliver them, and disappear.”
“It’s a set-up.”
“It’s not.” I paused. “You’ll manage the logistics. I’ll do it however you want, whenever you want.”
I steeled myself.
“How will I get the second half?”
“I’ll put it in a locker somewhere and give you the key. When I’m away safe with the kids, I’ll tell you where the locker is.”
“Maybe you won’t. You could get the kids and then keep the other half.”
“And you could come empty handed, take the first half, and kill me.”
She was silent.
“Are we doing this or not?”
“We’ll see,” she said. “I’ll be in touch.”
I took the elevator to the first floor and walked to the E.R. waiting room, feeling enveloped in a surreal dream. Annette was alive. ALIVE! If I could pull this off, I’d see her soon. Jeannie was in the chairs, squeezed between a nodding sleeper and a stooped old man in an army cap.
“Where’s Richard?” I asked as I walked toward her.
“He left. Said he’d take a cab to work, had plenty to do. He was glad to loan the car so you could go give your statement.”
I was relieved the car had been a non-issue, but also mildly disappointed Richard had left me so easily.
Jeannie
seemed to read my mind. “You’re in capable hands, honey. Don’t worry.”
I forced a smile. “Capable if I need a make-over.”
“I wasn’t talking about me.”
“Who, then?”
She leaned to peer around me. I turned and followed her gaze. Vince was feeding a bill to a Coke machine down the hall. Even from a distance, I could tell he was tired. He was no less handsome for it, though.
I spun back to Jeannie.
“What’s he doing here?”
“I might have called him.”
“How? I don’t even know his number.”
“I got that for you at David’s apartment. You’re welcome.”
“I should kill you.”
The old man next to her chuckled. “Don’t do that,” he said. “She tells good jokes. Kind you can’t take home to mama.” He chuckled again.
I leveled a stare at Jeannie.
Vince walked up beside me, open soda can in hand. I was too humiliated to look at him. The desk attendant saved me. She called my name.
“About damn time,” Jeannie said, loud enough for all to hear. “You want some moral support back there, hon’?”
Despite my irritation, her offer sounded good. I nodded.
She looked from me to Vince. “Take good care of my girl.”
The old man smacked his knee and laughed again.
***
“Jeannie told me what Trish did to your family,” Vince said quietly. We’d been left in my examination area—basically a curtain-lined cubicle with a paper-covered table. “Nothing I’ve thought to say could possibly be appropriate.”
He sat on a stool and let his hands fall loosely into his lap. The grief in his eyes spoke volumes. He understood what Trish had taken. Whether he was sorrier for my loss or for his cousin’s part in it, I couldn’t guess, but I wanted to collapse in his arms.
I dropped my head. “I’m sorry I thought you could have been part of that.”
He stood and crossed the narrow space between the stool and my spot on the exam table. He was wearing the same cologne I remembered from our walk on the beach, something nautical and fresh. I almost trembled when he placed a hand over mine.
“Thank you for coming here,” I added. “I thought I’d seen the last of you.”