SUBMITTED BY: Agent-in-Training Grace Thomas
LOCATION: 12207 Samdech Mongkol Iem St. (228), Phnom Penh, Cambodia
DATE AND TIME: Thursday, May 2, 7:39 p.m.
Brittany exited the elevator on the fifteenth floor of Diane’s building, passed by the two guards, and rang the bell. Tito opened up, and before he could say anything, she pushed past him, walking inside the apartment and toward Diane’s office.
“I know she’s here, so don’t bother making up lies,” she said.
Tito said nothing, but she could hear his heavy footsteps behind her.
The door to Diane’s office was closed, but Brittany didn’t bother to knock. She let herself in and stopped before the antique desk, hands on her hips. “You abducted Spencer and Grace from the hotel?” she asked.
Diane looked up from her computer. “I did nothing of the sort.”
“Everyone saw your thugs carrying them out!”
“Sit down, Brittany, if you want to talk. I don’t look up at anyone.”
“Tough,” Brittany said. “I’m tired of you acting like you’re the most important person in the world. You need to let them go. Now.”
“You dare barge into my office and tell me what to do?”
Normally Diane’s high-pitched voice failed to inspire fear in anyone, but Brittany knew better. “There are witnesses. People recording with their phones. It’s going to be in the press.”
“Two unidentified troublemakers removed from a private conference?” Diane said. “No one will care. Especially when you tell everyone from the main stage that there’s nothing to worry about.”
Was she serious? “What do you expect me to say?”
“I’m sure you’ll think of something.”
“At least tell me where they are,” Brittany said. “They’re my friends.”
Diane tsked, as if Brittany was a foolish child. “Friends don’t spy on you and report to police officers.”
“They’re with a mission group,” Brittany said. “Not the police.”
“They’re part of an organization with international jurisdiction that has been after me for years. I’m not going to let a couple children ruin everything.”
Brittany’s heart raced at this news. “Then maybe it’s time,” she said. “The drugs and the trafficking have gotten out of control.”
“Do you mean that?”
Tears flooded Brittany’s eyes, blurring Diane. “Valeria died because of those drugs.”
“Valeria died because she refused to obey me. Are you going to do the same?”
This time her heart nearly stopped. “What do you mean? Valeria lost control of her car because she was driving under the influence.”
“That was the official report,” Diane said. “See how easy it is to deal with the press?”
“You killed her?” Brittany couldn’t believe it. “Why?”
“Valeria wanted more power than was due her. I call the shots in this business. No one else. Not even Ving. Anyone who gets in my way will be moved out of my way. Valeria got in my way. So, decide now, my dear. You can go back to the conference and do your job, or you can join your precious friends. The choice is yours.”
Spencer and Grace were here? Brittany wanted to see them, but she’d never be able to help them if Diane believed her subversive. “I’ll go. Can I look in on Spencer and Grace first? Make sure they’re okay?”
“Their well-being is not your concern,” Diane said. “Tito, Ms. Holmes was just leaving.”
Tito stepped toward Brittany, but she growled and stormed past him. She reached the living room and looked up the stairs. Glanced back. Tito was still in Diane’s office, so Brittany opened the front door, slammed it, then slipped off her shoes and padded up the stairs. She peeked in and out of every room on the second level. No one was here. How could that be?
She pulled out her cell phone and brought up Spencer’s number, dialed, wondered if he’d bought a SIM card. If his organization had international jurisdiction, he probably had.
“I’ll take that phone, Ms. Holmes.”
Brittany jumped and whirled around. Tito was standing in the doorway. “No need,” she said, walking toward him. “I was just going.”
He shook his head. “Mrs. MacCormack changed her mind. She wants you to stay.”
“I’m not staying here,” Brittany said. “I have a speech to give.”
He grabbed her wrist and reached for the phone. She moved it out of reach, and he squeezed her arm. “Best not to fight me, Ms. Holmes. I don’t want to hurt you.”
She relented and handed him the phone.
“Your purse too,” he said.
She hurled it at him.
He caught it and pushed her into the nearest room. “Thank you, Ms. Holmes,” he said. “Do stay put now. I’d hate for you to go the way of Ms. Silver.”
And he left, shutting the door behind him.
Brittany dropped her shoes on the floor and fell on the bed. She was in trouble now.
REPORT NUMBER: 30
REPORT TITLE: I Break Free with the Help of an Angel
SUBMITTED BY: Agent-in-Training Spencer Garmond
LOCATION: Somewhere in Phnom Penh, Cambodia
DATE AND TIME: Thursday, May 2, time unknown
I sat alone in some kind of cell. It was blacker than the Mystery Sloan’s sedan in there. The only light was a pale strip underneath the door, and it wasn’t enough to see by. I’d walked the perimeter by keeping my hand on the wall and figured the place was about ten by ten. I’d circled the room hundreds of times, trying not to go insane. I didn’t know how long I’d been a prisoner. Overnight, at least. My shriveled tongue and aching stomach warned it might have been longer.
Were they going to feed me? Question me? If someone didn’t let me out soon—or at least send in a bucket—I was going to make a stink. Literally.
I chuckled at my joke, but it also made my eyes water. I clapped my hands against my thighs, trying to bolster my resolve. I couldn’t afford to lose my mind in this place. I had to figure out where they’d taken Grace. She had to be here somewhere too.
They’d taken my necklace and the Band-Aid Isaac had made me put on before getting on the plane yesterday. I was trying not to worry that I might be completely off the grid.
I eventually nestled down in one corner of the cell and dozed off. I woke when the door opened. I squinted at the rectangle of light framing the silhouette of a woman wearing fitted clothing and high heel boots. She pivoted slightly, and the light illuminated her face.
“Hello, Anya,” I said.
“Do you like the accommodations, Mr. Garmond?”
“Don’t you mean Jonas?”
“If you prefer.”
“I don’t. And this room could use a bathroom and a refrigerator.”
“Ah, I’m sorry to have neglected you. There is much happening at present. I’m afraid some details have fallen through the cracks. Bring him out, boys.”
Two men entered the room and lifted me off the floor. They bound my hands behind me with a white rope and moved me out the door. It wasn’t until we were in the hall that I was able to identify the men as Tito and The Rock.
“How you doing?” I asked The Rock. “I didn’t loosen any teeth, did I? Put a white streak in your hair?”
The guy had a shaved head. He completely ignored me. I had to admire his restraint. Had our positions been reversed, I would have at least given him back some lip.
We were in some kind of combination warehouse-office building. They led me down a really long hallway and into a small room. Various weapons hung on the right wall. A circular indentation on the floor to the right had straps to tie someone down. Along the left wall was a table with restraining harnesses. In the middle of the room, spaced about two yards apart, was a single chair that was bolted to the floor a few yards from what looked like a stripper pole. On the wall in front of the chair, a flat screen monitor had been mounted near the ceiling.
This didn’t lo
ok good.
“Do you bring a lot of people in here?” I asked Anya.
“Sometimes.” She gestured to the pole. “Put him there.”
The men moved me to the stripper pole, unbound my hands, then began retying them behind the pole. My heart was beating out of control. I didn’t want to be here. I didn’t want anyone to hurt me. I just wanted to find Grace and get away.
My rising panic was making me breathe hard. I caught myself yet again and took a long breath in through my nose, trying to calm down.
I had to be cool. Shield of faith, sword of truth, shield of faith, sword of truth.
The men finished with my hands and moved somewhere. I couldn’t see them. Anya was fiddling with a remote for the TV monitor. I felt the need for levity.
“You don’t want me to dance, do you?” I asked. “I’ve never been much of a dancer.”
The Rock walked into view on my right, pushing a little cart. He parked it beside the chair. I counted five items on it: a syringe, a two-way radio, a little spray bottle, a handkerchief, and a scalpel. I shuddered. Always the blades with this lunatic.
Anya set the remote on the cart, then removed her leather jacket and draped it over the chair. She sat down, crossed one leg over the other, and peered at me.
“Just look at you,” she said, smirking. “You’ve grown so big and strong compared to the little boy I met in Moscow. Look at those arms.” She flexed one of her own.
“Where’s Grace?” I asked.
“You like her very much, don’t you?”
“She’s my responsibility.”
“You take on a lot of responsibility for someone so young. First it was Pasha. Then it was Jun. Then Nick and Kimatra. Now Grace.”
“I’m not surprised you don’t understand the word compassion,” I said.
“You don’t know me at all,” she said. “I think I might surprise you.”
“I doubt that very much.”
She released a long sigh. “We’ve been through this before, Spencer. I have some questions for you, and this time, I need you to answer me truthfully. Your life depends on it.”
“Don’t you mean Grace’s life, too?” I asked.
She wrinkled her nose. Shook her head. “No. Just yours. Grace is in no danger of death.”
That sounded ominous. “Is she in this building?” I asked.
Anya smiled. “I’m sure you thought I was going to drag her in here and make you watch me torture her.” She fingered the scalpel. “I might have enjoyed that, but Diane had other plans.”
Diane. I swallowed my apprehension. “What plans?”
Anya picked up the remote and flicked on the monitor. It took a while for the picture to come into focus, but when it did, the screen displayed a dark room furnished with only a full-sized bed with an iron frame. Grace was standing beside it, one foot on the mattress and pulling with both hands against her handcuffs that were hooked to a spoke in the headboard’s grill.
My hackles rose at the sight of her. “Where is she?” I asked.
“In one of our brothels.”
A chill ran over me until I shivered. Oh God, help us. “Why would you take her there?”
“Watch and see.” And she got up and walked out of the room.
She left me standing there, arms tied behind the pole, with nothing to do but watch that screen. An hour must have passed. Maybe longer. Grace eventually stopped trying to break the bed and lay down on it, tossing and turning, sitting up and lying down again. My legs got tired, and I slid down and sat on the floor. I nodded off a few times, waking whenever my head jerked.
“Oh, my gosh. Look at you.”
My head popped up, and I looked around. No one was here. But on the TV monitor, someone had entered Grace’s room. A man, skinny, native. He had a greasy ponytail and was wearing pale slacks and a floral print Hawaiian shirt, unbuttoned, his chest bare beneath it. He was standing on one side of Grace’s bed. She had gotten up and was standing on the other side.
“I’m very happy to see you,” the man said.
“Go away,” Grace said.
But he didn’t. He just stood there, hands on his hips, staring. “Wow,” he said after a while. “I like your body.”
“I said get out of here!” Grace yelled.
I stood up and pulled at my restraints, but there was nothing I could do.
“Hmm.” The man walked around to the end of the bed until he was on the same side as Grace. He stopped at the foot of the bed, hands still on his hips. “Nice size. How old are you?”
“Leave me alone,” Grace said. “I don’t want you in here.”
“Okay. I come back later, yeah?” He put his hands together, bowed, Buddha style, and walked out.
Grace sank down beside the wall and started crying. I let my head fall back against the pole, relieved the guy was gone, for now.
“That’s Davuth.” Diane MacCormack’s voice pulled my gaze to the door Anya had exited. “He’s the papasan of that particular brothel. In America, we’d call him a pimp. He’ll teach your friend everything she needs to know to join our organization.”
My stomach churned. “Why are you doing this?”
“This is what Grace Thomas said she wanted. To knowing everything about being a member of the Free Light Youth.”
“You put them in brothels and get them addicted to drugs, so they’ll come crawling back to you for more,” I said, remembering Kimatra’s story.
“The method works very well,” she said. “And it’s not always brothels like Davuth’s. Our set up in the States is much more sophisticated.”
“It’s still illegal,” I said. “And despicable.” All the things Isabel had been telling me about human trafficking—that’s what Diane and the Free Light Foundation was doing. Turning people into slaves. Kimatra, Valeria, Brittany . . . all of them slaves of the Free Light Foundation.
“I’m sure it might seem that way to you,” Diane said.
“Why do it at all?” I asked.
“For the money,” she said. “There’s a lot of money in drugs, I’m sure you know, but there’s even more money dealing in flesh.”
I didn’t get it. “You were teaching at a girls’ school. So you just woke up one day and thought, ‘I know what I want to be when I grow up. A criminal.’ ”
Diane smiled and sat down on the chair Anya had vacated. “I started as a means to take revenge against the Mission League for killing my father, but now it’s more about power and money. When you come from nothing and reach the heights of success I’ve reached, you can’t go back to what you were before, no matter who might suffer.” She gestured to the monitor.
“You’re a hypocrite,” I said. “You got into crime to get revenge, but the cost was ruining thousands of lives. How would you feel if all those people came after you for revenge?”
“I would understand it, at least. You, on the other hand . . . You come after me for no reason other than to please an organization you know nothing about.”
“Yeah, you’re not going to make me feel guilty for trying to stop you. The Mission League might not be perfect, but you’re evil.”
“I don’t have time to sit here and let you insult me. I have some questions. How you answer those questions will determine how soon Davuth will return to your friend’s cell to begin her training.” She picked up the two-way radio and said, “I’m ready.”
I’d been ignoring the raw ache in my chest, but I was out of time. I didn’t know how to play this game. Sure, Mr. S had taught us about blackmail and torture and dozens of scenarios involving each. Over and over he’d made it clear that bad guys rarely make good on their offers, so would it matter if I told them anything? Would I only be prolonging the inevitable? Would telling them what I knew, keep Grace safe? Did Diane want the First Twin dead or alive?
Anya returned to inject me with whatever was in the syringe. There was no point in fighting it, so I didn’t, but inside, my head was screaming. I didn’t want to get hurt, and I didn’t want th
eir drugs in me. The needle pinched, but I didn’t feel any different.
“Something to loosen your tongue,” Anya said.
I didn’t know about that. I just felt angry. Angry at Diane and MacCormack and Anya for being sadistic criminals. Angry at myself for forgetting to tell my superiors about the slumber party. Angry at Brittany for not giving me a better warning. Angry at Isaac and the other agents for not being better than the bad guys. Angry at Kimbal for whatever he’d done.
Kimbal. I had so many questions about him, and I was running out of time. “How long have you known Liam?”
Diane’s eyebrows arched. “You have been a busy spy.”
“I know he worked for you.”
“Not for me. In the beginning, he came to me with a prophecy. To warn me of trouble. But I didn’t listen and nearly lost my life. So when he came to me again, that time with an offer, I paid his fee and took heed. So became our relationship. Until I discovered he was a fraud. By then I had enough information to blackmail him into behaving.”
Kimbal had posed as a prophecy dealer. “He stole my father’s intercession journal.”
She chuckled. “He stole far more than that. He took hundreds of prophecies from databases at the L. A. Field Office. The only reason he was able to do so for so long was because he had been framing another for his actions.”
“My father.”
“Yes. But then he took things too far and had to clean up his mess.”
My mind became cloudy as I tried to figure out that last part. “He killed my mother.”
“Oh, he didn’t mean to kill anyone,” Diane said. “We’d been in a meeting when your mother showed up on the surveillance cameras. She’d been suspicious of Liam for some time and would have caught him if not for our cameras. Instead, we caught her. Liam tied her up, and as we discussed what to do, your father came to the rescue—or rather to his own demise.”
My vision separated, and for a moment, I saw two of everything. Two Anyas. Two Dianes. The drugs were having their effect, but I wasn’t done. “So who set the fire?”
“I’ll ask the questions from here on out,” Diane said. “Let’s start with something simple to test our serum. What is your name?”
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