Cold Betrayal

by J. A. Jance

  She was glad Leland was sleeping, and she hoped Sister Anselm was, but Ali herself was wide awake and chewing on the way Richard Lowell had been dressed—his spiffy suit and tie, as opposed to the homespun crap and thrift-shop rejects in the box containing Enid Tower’s personal effects.

  It was close to midnight when she sent Stu an e-mail, copying Cami as she did so.

  Richard Lowell paid us a visit at the hospital earlier this evening. I believe Cami said he was probably the guy in charge right now, since he lives in the house closest to the church. I want to know everything there is to know about him.

  Ali

  She had no sooner sent it than a response came back from Stu. Didn’t the man ever sleep?

  Hey, I thought you’d be downloading some zzzzs about now, but I wanted you to know that I got the drone thing handled. A buddy of mine is using drones to do aerial surveys of all BLM land abutting Grand Canyon National Park. I asked him to do the job for us and made it worth his while. Since he’s already done some work in that area, it won’t be any trouble for him to get himself and his equipment where we need them. He’ll be there bright and early tomorrow. Make that today.

  And yes, I’ll start digging on Mr. Lowell. Cami’s right. Since he lives in the big house, he’s probably the big cheese.

  Oh, and did you know B. is home? He called me on his drive up from Phoenix, but he asked me to keep it a secret because he wanted to surprise you. Felt like I was caught between a rock and a hard place. Hope you don’t mind.

  Stu

  Relieved to know the supposed greenhouses might soon give up their secrets, Ali sent her response immediately:

  A tale of two bosses. Not to worry. Thanks.

  Ali

  Having done as much as she could do for the night, Ali rested her head against the back of the love seat and pulled the blanket more tightly around her legs. She had just drifted off when her phone startled her awake. When she picked it up and Kate Benchley’s photo peered back at her from the screen, Ali realized that the bag with Gordon Tower’s cheek swab in it was still in her pocket rather than in a FedEx envelope on its way to Banshee Group.

  “You said it was urgent, and we treated it as urgent,” Kate said when Ali answered. “I know it’s the middle of the night there, but we’ve got a match, and I wanted you to know right away.”

  Ali was still on the groggy side. A match? she wondered. Of course there was a match. Baby Ann was Enid’s daughter, after all. Why wouldn’t there be a match? Maybe the note Ali had sent along with the samples hadn’t been clear. She thought she had said she just wanted the profiles. But the urgency in Kate’s voice put Ali on edge.

  “Don’t worry about waking me. I was still up, sort of, but what kind of match do you mean?”

  “Two of them actually,” Kate answered. “Not exact matches, but near matches.”

  Now Ali was truly mystified. “Matches from where?”

  “One came from a victim from the tsunami in Thailand and the other from a mass grave at the scene of a Colombian drug cartel massacre. I’m looking at the forensics reports right now. Both were female and both were estimated to be no more than six or seven years old. One is a second cousin of the sample labeled Baby Ann and the other is a half sister of the one named Enid.”

  Ali was thunderstruck. “How’s that possible?” she asked. “Baby Ann is barely two days old. She and her mother live with a group of people, a cult actually, that carves out a meager existence in northern Arizona. I can’t imagine any relatives of theirs being able to travel outside the U.S. How could they?”

  Kate took a long steadying breath. “I hate to be the bearer of bad news,” she said. “Those girls didn’t go traveling of their own free will. In the world of sex trafficking, girls that young are the crown jewels. I’d guess they were smuggled out of the United States and sold on the black market for a ton of money. The one in Thailand was found virtually intact and tossed up on a hillside days after the tsunami. The one in Colombia was skeletal remains only.”

  Kate was still speaking when Ali took the phone from her ear. For a moment she stared at it in disbelief. Then, as she tried to suppress her gag reflex, the phone clattered to the floor. Throwing off the blanket and scrambling to her feet, she raced for the nearest restroom. At least she managed to heave the last few undigested bits of her pepperoni pizza into the toilet rather than onto the floor.

  26

  When Ali finished in the restroom and staggered back out to the waiting room, Leland was sitting up on his sofa with Ali’s cell phone clutched in one hand. His white hair stood on end, reminding Ali of that iconic photo of Albert Einstein, but she was too heartsick to mention it.

  Seeing what must have been a desolate expression on her face, he immediately pushed himself to his feet and hobbled across the room to hand over her phone. “Madame,” he said, taking her arm to lead her back to the love seat. “Whatever is the matter? Are you ill?”

  “I am,” Ali said. “I’ll tell you in a minute. First I need to call Kate back.”

  She redialed the number. “What happened?” Kate asked. “It sounded like you dropped the phone.”

  “I did drop the phone,” Ali said. “I had to. I was about to barf my guts out. The whole idea makes me sick to my stomach. How do you do what you do?”

  “It’s not easy,” Kate replied. “And you’re not alone in being disgusted by this. I’ve already been in touch with my contact at Interpol. His name’s Sean Fergus, and he’s part of their international Human Trafficking Division. I told him what I found, and I’m sending copies of the DNA profiles directly to him. Of course, he wanted more details. Since I didn’t have any, I referred him to you. I’m sure he’ll be in touch, probably later today. You need to be prepared, Ali,” she cautioned. “There may be more near matches waiting out there.”

  Ali thought about the names in Richard Lowell’s family Bible, the ones Sister Anselm mentioned that had been crossed out and designated with the initials N.C. The name of Richard Lowell’s deceased wife, Anne, had been whited out of the list, but Ali now suspected that the N.C. notation represented a fate that was infinitely worse.

  “You’re right about that,” Ali said. “I suspect those two victims may be just the tip of the iceberg.”

  “That was Kate Benchley on the phone?” Leland asked when Ali ended the call. “The young woman who did the DNA testing in my father’s homicide when we were in the UK?”

  “That’s the one,” Ali answered. “Sister Anselm obtained DNA samples from both Enid and her baby. We sent them to Kate in hopes that there would be some way of matching their profiles with ones from an unidentified mother and child who were murdered near Kingman years ago. Instead, we’ve found matches to two near relatives, young girls, whose unidentified bodies have been found years apart and half a world away. Kate thinks we’ve stumbled into some kind of international human trafficking organization.”

  “Oh my,” Leland said. “And that Lowell person who was here earlier—you think he has something to do with it?”

  “There’s a good chance he’s the person in charge.”

  During Ali’s phone call, Leland had resumed his seat. Now he stood back up and paced back and forth. “If I’d had any idea,” he said, brandishing his cane, “I’d have given that man a good thrashing on the spot!”

  Sister Anselm returned and looked anxiously back and forth between them. “What’s wrong?” she asked. “Has something happened?”

  Ali gave her a condensed version of Kate Benchley’s call. With an ashen face, Sister Anselm sank into the nearest chair. “What do we do now?” she asked.

  “Kate says someone from Interpol, an agent who deals with human trafficking, will be in touch later today,” Ali answered. “I guess we’ll see what kind of suggestions he has to offer.”

  Sister Anselm rose to her feet. “I tried to convince Mr. Upton to go hom
e, but he was adamant. Since he’s still in the room with Enid and the baby, I believe I’ll go down to the chapel and pray for direction.”

  The nun was almost to the elevator when her phone rang. She listened for a moment. “I’m sure that’s fine,” she said. Hanging up, she turned back to Ali and Leland.

  “That was the hospital administrator. An expectant mother and father just showed up downstairs. Their doctor is demanding access to the maternity floor. The administrator has been forced to declare the crisis over and is in the process of reopening the maternity floor. He’s also lobbying for Enid’s safety and for the well-being of other patients and staff that she and the baby be transferred to another facility without delay.”

  “Are they up to being moved?” Ali asked.

  “Possibly,” Sister Anselm said. “I’ve spoken to their doctors and suggested the possibility of taking them by air ambulance to Physicians Medical Center in Tucson. If need be, once Enid and the baby are well enough to leave the hospital, they can stay with my friends at the All Saints Convent until it’s safe for them to return to this area.”

  Recalling the time Ali had seen the nuns from All Saints in action, she knew that Enid and the baby would be in good hands at the convent.

  “Also,” Sister Anselm continued, “additional security personnel have been authorized for the remainder of the night, so if you two want to go back to Sedona . . .”

  “Absolutely not.” Leland sat back down and folded his arms across his chest. “I’m not leaving. If’s there’s even the smallest chance that either one of those vile men or some of their associates might return, I intend to be here to greet them in an entirely suitable fashion.”

  Despite everything, Ali couldn’t help smiling at that. When it came to being in a tight spot, Leland Brooks was always a good guy to have around.

  “If he’s not leaving, neither am I,” Ali added.

  Resigned, Sister Anselm nodded. “Somehow I already knew that’s what both of you would say.”

  27

  Still churning over what she had learned from Kate Benchley, Ali didn’t doze off until sometime in the wee hours. When she awakened, the first face she saw was B.’s. Standing over her and shaking her shoulder, he held out her phone.

  “Call for you,” he said. “A guy who claims he’s from Interpol is asking to speak to you.”

  In his years of running what had become a global cybersecurity company, B. Simpson himself was accustomed to dealing with Interpol, but he was clearly puzzled about why someone from that agency would ask for his wife.

  Ali took the phone in hand. “Ali Reynolds,” she said, trying to sound as though she hadn’t just awakened out of a sound sleep. While she had slept, the room around her had changed. The security screen on the nursery was no longer closed. Two new fathers had been added to the mix. Nurses were back on the floor, and Leland Brooks was nowhere to be seen.

  “Sean Fergus here,” the caller said. “Sorry to call so early, but this is a matter of some urgency. When Kate Benchley sent over those two profiles last night, it set alarm bells ringing. We have DNA profiles that are similar but not an exact match from over a dozen victims, scattered around the globe. Some of those come from crime scene evidence and autopsies dating back as long ago as the late seventies. Those samples predate DNA profiling and have only recently been brought out of storage to be processed. In other words, there may be more that have yet to be processed. Some of the girls may well be alive, and there may be more dead victims whose bodies have never surfaced. What we do know is this: None of these profiles match up with those of any known missing persons.”

  “That’s because they were never reported as missing,” Ali told him. “Just a moment. I’ll need to go into another room to discuss this further.”

  Untangling her legs from the blanket someone had put over her, she got up and motioned for B. to follow. The maternity-ward conference room was unoccupied, and they made for that. Once B. was inside, she closed the door behind them.

  “What do you mean they weren’t reported?” Fergus was asking. “How is that possible?”

  Ali set about answering that question. It was a good thing her phone had spent the night on the charger. The conversation with Sean Fergus took well over an hour. The phone was turned on speaker, so in the process of briefing Fergus, B. learned the rest of the story as well.

  “You’re saying we have no idea how many girls might have come through that pipeline or how many more are at risk?” Sean asked.

  “That’s correct,” Ali answered.

  “I believe you mentioned that the area where this group is located is rather remote. If so, how are the girls being transported?”

  “We’ve recently learned that there’s an airstrip located on the property,” Ali answered. “My guess is the first leg of the journey is done by air. As to what comes after that and how they’re smuggled out of the country? I have no idea.”

  B. held up his finger, signaling a need to add something. “B. Simpson here. I’m Ali’s husband and also CEO of High Noon Enterprises. One of our security operatives did an aerial survey of the area around the airstrip earlier this morning and located several questionable buildings. Some of them appear to be greenhouses and are evidently being used to grow fresh vegetables for wintertime use. The largest of the buildings, however, is clearly an airplane hangar that is currently unoccupied.”

  “How long is the airstrip?”

  “We measured it,” B. replied. “It’s long enough to accommodate a small jet. An aircraft as large as a Citation X could probably take off and land there with no difficulty.”

  Fergus processed that unwelcome information. “With no idea of when or even if another load of girls is due to be shipped out, I’m urging that we act without delay. I believe the DNA evidence we have in hand is sufficient for us to obtain warrants, but getting things to work across international and jurisdictional boundaries will take time. Before we hand this off to any other agency, I’d like to have more intel than we have now.”

  “Pardon the interruption again,” B. offered, “but my company has done work for Interpol on numerous occasions, usually with a guy named Arturo Bernini in the Cyber Fraud Division.”

  “You know Bernie?” Sean asked.

  “I didn’t know that’s what you called him,” B. answered, “but yes, he’s always been my point of contact. The film footage we have now, taken without benefit of a warrant, is most likely totally useless to you or anyone else. Check us out with Agent Bernini. If you can issue us with appropriately drawn warrants, we can send the drones back in to take another set of films, ones that will be admissible.”

  “Your company has drone capability?” Sean asked.

  B. winked at Ali before he answered. “Doesn’t everybody?” he said.

  “Okay,” Sean said. “I’ll see what I can do. The next step, of course, is to notify local law enforcement agencies about what’s going on and make sure we can count on them for help.”

  Remembering Deputy Amos Sellers standing just behind Gordon Tower and nodding at the other man’s every word, Ali shook her head in response, even though B. was the only one to see the gesture.

  “I’m concerned about that,” Ali said aloud. “The Family is located in Mohave County. Their deputy, the local one who actually works that area, happens to be a member of The Family.”

  “You’re saying we can’t expect any help from that quarter?” Sean asked.

  “Not from the local deputy,” Ali answered. “If he’s part of all this and knows an operation is in the works, there goes the element of surprise. I’m sure even folks at Interpol know about what happened at Waco.”

  “Indeed we do,” Fergus agreed. “What about the deputy’s superior?”

  Ali thought about her phone conversation with Sheriff Alvarado. He hadn’t exactly volunteered information about Amos Sellers’s connection t
o the cult. The sheriff had also mentioned having spent time policing the area where The Family was located although nothing in his bio hinted that Alvarado himself was in any way connected to the group. Still, Ali had some concerns about him that she wasn’t willing to voice aloud at this point. Instead, she chose to hedge.

  “Amos Sellers’s boss, Sheriff Daniel Alvarado, is headquartered in Kingman. That’s a good four hours and more than two hundred fifty miles from where The Family is located.”

  “Big county,” Sean murmured.

  “Yes,” Ali agreed. “It is. I’ve spoken to Sheriff Alvarado on a slightly different but related matter. When the topic of The Family first came up, he wasn’t exactly forthcoming.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He didn’t see fit to volunteer the information that one of his officers is part of The Family. I had to find that out on my own, and that worries me.”

  “It would concern me, too,” Fergus agreed. “Are you implying that Alvarado may be connected to all this?”

  “I’m not saying that for sure, but I am worried that once his department is notified . . .”

  “That the deputy will give away the game. In which case, as you said, we’ll have lost the element of surprise.”

  “Yes, so how do these joint operations usually go?” Ali asked.

  “The most common scenario dictates that we start by notifying the FBI. An official notification from them will then be passed along to local authorities, apprising them of the operation. This case may call for a somewhat less direct approach. Is there any way you could deal with the sheriff on an informal basis and attempt to feel him out?”