Larson looked up to me expectantly. Crap, Larson wasn't really asking as much as being polite. Still, I hesitated. We were going to need a translator and maybe even a guide while we were here. Rogers was probably the best choice for that, and I really didn't know if there would be anything in the folder worth burning that potential alliance. I sighed and was about to hand the folder over to Rogers when Larson held out his hand.
Rogers was still pinned to the table as Lei held one hand twisted behind his back, but his eyes widened when he saw Larson's outstretched hand.
"Major?"
"I might not be a field agent, but my security clearance is still active and, if I remember correctly, I have a higher clearance level than you, Captain. That means the appropriate person to see the information inside and make the judgment call on its level of security would be me."
"But you aren't here in an official capacity, that means..."
"Relax Pat, no one's going to know that you didn't clear it first. I'll keep the top secret stuff safe."
Rogers clearly didn't like it, but his body relaxed, "Could someone tell the waihine to let me up?"
Lei dropped down so her body pressed against the back of his, "Why Mr. Rogers, most men would pay a great deal of money to be in your position."
Pat started to resist but hesitated, "Uh."
Lei kissed his neck and I had sudden panic that she was going to feed on him. Lei has never been one who had a tremendous amount of self-control once she gets lost in the moment. My worries were quickly assuaged as she slowly lifted herself off of Rogers and gently righted the position of his arm. Rogers lay there for a second or two as if suddenly awakening from a daydream and not being too sure what was happening.
Superpowers. Definitely superpowers.
Larson was already finished perusing the first few pages by the time Rogers walked over, "These are all written in...what is that Pat...Thai?"
"Yep, its a legal document that...uh oh."
"Uh oh?" Lei asked.
"Yeah, I think I've seen this sort of thing before. Is there another document under this one that is in English, or maybe German?"
Larson looked up confused and then back down to the folder, quickly flipping pages until he found what Rogers had described.
"Got it, and there's a picture of the little girl stapled to the top corner."
Rogers face dropped, "Oh boy."
"What's going on?" I asked.
Larson responded, "I'm no lawyer, but this looks like a legal document that would make Zach the legal guardian of the girl."
"That's exactly what it is," Rogers said disapprovingly.
Larson scanned the rest of the folder, "That's all that's in here." He looked up to Rogers, "What's this all about Pat?"
Rogers sighed, "It's not good. You might not be too open to hearing it."
"If it sheds some light or gives us a lead, then..."
Larson put the folder down on the table and Lei walked over and put her hand on it, "May I?"
Rogers looked to Larson who said, "I don't see anything else in there Pat. I can't read the Thai, but..."
"No, no. It's all right. The folder isn't a matter for national security," he paused, "but discretion may be warranted."
"Discretion? Why?"
Rogers tried to start speaking a couple of times but the words didn't seem to want to come out. When he finally did speak he said, "I think...I think that Zach may have...um...bought the girl as a...you know...a sex slave."
Chapter 18
Larson and I just stood there dumbfounded, but Lei, who had more than a little personal experience in such matters, started looked like she might kill Rogers for having said those words.
"What! What the fuck did you just say? You goddamn, hippie stoner, motherfucker!"
Lei's tirade immediately brought me out of stunned immobility and I tried to calm her. She shot me down before I could take my first step in her direction.
"No! No Steven! No way! I don't even want to hear it! There's absolutely nothing you can say that is going to make me go along with this!"
I held my hands up in supplication, "We need to find him, but..."
"No we DON'T need to find him!" Lei insisted.
"Lei.."
"NO!!!" Lei turned on her heels and walked briskly from the room, shutting the door loudly behind her as she past the threshold.
Larson looked at me, "Do you need to go after her?"
I looked at the closed door and sighed, "That might be a dangerous thing to do at the moment, even for me. I think I'll give her a minute to cool her head."
Rogers gave me an apologetic look, "Um, sorry?"
I shook my head, "She'll be okay," I turned back to Rogers, "Let's get back on subject. Rogers, it's pretty big leap to go from this guy Zach having an application for guardianship of the girl to becoming a slaver and pedophile."
Larson cut in, "Not to mention that this is Zach we're talking about here."
Rogers nodded, " I know, it's pretty damn unbelievable to me as well, but before I was reassigned here I had been working on an anti-smuggling task force in the Middle East and sometimes the goods that were smuggled were people. This kind of thing is more common than you might think, and these guys manage their businesses by exploiting legal loopholes. One of these loopholes is becoming the legal guardian of an underage boy or girl, but not going so far as to adopting them."
"Explain," Larson said sharply.
Rogers sighed, "Try to remember where you are. This isn't the United States. This is Thailand. Sex is basically a commodity here, and it really isn't unheard of for a family to sell a daughter into service with a brothel. They tend to hang on to the boys as they grow strong and can work the fields, but the girls are often viewed as just another mouth to feed that can't pull their weight."
"So they just sell their children off as prostitutes?"
Rogers shrugged, "It's something that is perceived differently here. Here it isn't viewed as much more than a dowry would have been in Europe from the bride's family to the groom's, only here it’s sort of in reverse."
"You think that's what happened here?" Larson asked.
"Yes, but if it is, then it's only part of the story."
"How so?"
"Okay follow this logic. The girl is sold by her family to a brothel, the idea here being that once she reaches a certain age she will have worked off her debt to the brothel and would be free to follow whatever path she wanted. You follow?"
"So far," I responded.
"Okay, so she's being prepped for her first job, or maybe she's been working a while, whatever, and enter some wealthy foreigner who has a taste for young girls and has an eye on this one in particular. Money isn't a problem and the "madam" or "house mom" would know what remained on her debt. She would calculate what her potential profit earning would be if she remained the entire length of her...ah...apprenticeship and the amount is negotiated until a deal is struck and the foreigner now OWNS the girl. The thing is, the foreigner has a problem. How does he take his property home? If the girl is underage, then becoming her "legal guardian" gives her the ability to travel with him and even potential citizenship in his home country. It's kind of like marrying a woman to get her a "green card" back home in America, only this way none of his assets can be inherited by the girl if something were to happen to him. Legally, everything is above board, unless he does something stupid and gets caught with his hand, or other body parts, in the proverbial cookie jar."
"There's a flaw in that line of thinking," I volunteered.
Larson and Rogers turned to me, "What happens when the girl becomes of legal age? The whole guardian thing gets thrown out the window and any benefits the legal arrangement allowed, like the ability to remain in the country, disappear."
Rogers nodded, "Exactly."
"So what happens to these girls?" Larson asked.
"The lucky ones get abandoned in whatever country they were taken to and become functioning illegals unless INS. catc
hes them. Most immigration offices know about the arrangements, but can't do anything about it so they simply give the girls a one-way ticket back to Thailand. More often than not, the madam that sold them to the foreigner will be waiting at the airport with an offer to work her club again, although this time as a regular working girl with less than half the earning potential as the other girls. Most take the offer, as they have nowhere else to go."
"And the unlucky ones?" I asked.
Rogers sighed, "It's never a pretty story. Some are abused, either physically beaten or hooked on drugs to keep them in line while they continue their lives as sex slaves. Others are sold to the local skin merchants or, even worse, to the organ grinders."
I winced, but Larson looked confused.
"What's that?" he asked.
Rogers shrugged, "An organ grinder? They are an especially nasty group of people who are in the business of buying and selling other people with the intention of harvesting their internal organs for black market sale."
For the first time Larson looked like he might be ill. He looked down to the picture of the child and seemed momentarily mesmerized by her face. When he seemed to have regained his composure, Larson asked, "How can you think, even for a millisecond, that Zach might be part of this?"
"I didn't say he was. I said that I thought Zach was trying to buy the girl."
"The implication seems obvious," I said and honestly, I was having my own difficulty keeping the bile in my throat from coming all the way up, so my words came out a little checked, "but is there another possibility we might be missing?"
Rogers looked back to the papers and read for a bit before flipping the page. He scanned the next two pages and his eyes widened when he found whatever he was looking for.
Then his eyes dropped and his face seemed to droop.
"It says right here that Zach bought the girl from Chonpak Boonliang for fifteen thousand dollars, American. She was released from her obligations to the Pink Pussy Nightclub." Rogers made a chuffing sound, "Gotta love the names they gives these places. The whole transaction was overseen by the local constabulary with none other than General Praphasirirat signing as witness."
Rogers looked up from the papers, "I'm sorry, but there's no doubt in my mind, he bought her."
"This makes no sense," Larson was still wrapping his head around the scenario.
I had to go check on Lei. The story that had just been relayed to us was very similar to Lei's own personal history and I knew it was going to hit her hard. I opened the door and was surprised to find her sitting just outside on the doorstep.
She was crying. She had heard every word.
"He's right, you know." Lei spoke with the sobs still present in her voice, "I know we have to find this guy Zach in order to track down Whelan," she wiped the tears from her eyes and stood, "so we find him, get the information we need and then I am going to look the sonovabitch in the eyes as I cut his throat."
I was about to agree with Lei when I noticed a white Land Rover parked on the road less than a quarter mile back from where we stood. Nothing overly unusual about seeing a parked vehicle, even one with the kind of price tag that a Range Rover commanded. The general population that lived in this neighborhood couldn't afford such a vehicle; still, there were enough well to do people in Thailand so the odd one or two would pop up on any given occasion. What troubled me was the fact that this one had one of those sparkly white pearlescent paint jobs that glittered in the light...or at least would have if the majority of the vehicle weren't caked in mud. The only off road driving that the people who purchased that color paint job, would be to drive up onto the sidewalk in order to squeeze around another car.
Lei saw my hesitation, but she thought it was in response to what she had said, "Do not try to talk me out of..."
"Lei," the sound of my words made Lei realize something else was up.
"What is it?"
"I think we have company."
Chapter 19
He didn't know how long he had been moving through the jungle, but he hadn't stopped since he had left the compound. When he came to the river instinct told him to follow it as it flowed and something deep inside him knew that whatever he needed could be found at the river's end. Of course he didn't know what that would be exactly, but felt, more than he knew, there would be answers at the end of his journey.
He had been traveling along the riverbank with all its twists, turns and waterfalls for nearly four hours and his feet were beginning to blister from the dampness of the earth beneath them when the smell of cooking meat filled his nostrils. His stomach growled at the allure of the aroma, but instinct told him to stick to the riverbank. Compromise was achieved when he realized that the direction from which the smell had originated was coming from downstream.
He followed the comforting smell of burning wood and the nearly euphoric perfume of roasting meat for another hour until the breeze shifted and directed his nose away from the riverbank. It was close. Maybe only a couple hundred yards away and his empty stomach negotiated with his reluctant brain to seek out the sustenance.
Hunger won and he made his way through the foliage until the area opened up into a man made clearing and a large collection of huts sitting in a seemingly haphazard pattern throughout the area. The smell was coming from a particularly large fire in the center of the village where two boars were roasting on spits as four women patiently tended to basting the rotating beasts. As the meat turned slowly over the fire the crisping flesh dripped fat from small incisions that caused the viscous liquid to collect, and running over the outside of the boar's skin where it eventually fell away into the fire with a crackle and pop.
Men were arriving with large palm fronds to serve as platters for collecting the roasted meat, and set them next to the women who served as the fire pit masters. Friendly words were exchanged that left the group laughing as they worked and a child ran out of one of the huts to see what the commotion was about.
It was a small girl, maybe five years old and she slammed into one of the men who had delivered the fronds. The man playfully pretended to rebound from the impact and teetered from one side to another before pratt-falling, in a display so over acted it sent the child and women into laughter again.
He could feel something twist inside himself at the sight and the pain was almost more than he could bear. He grabbed at his guts and tried to hold in the pain, but it still shot through him until he was unable to stand or even breathe.
He tried to be quiet but the pain made small sobs pass his lips anyway. He hoped the people wouldn't hear him or, if they did, then they would simply think it was a sound on the wind.
Maybe it was the sound of his muffled groans, or it just could have been the fact that the food was ready, that had brought the old woman out of her hut. She was old, very old, but she still carried herself with an ancient grace and power that belied her years. She had been walking toward the fire pit with a wide smile beaming at the innocent commotion when she stopped in her tracks, her face suddenly growing concerned as she turned to face the tree line where he was hiding.
The sight of the old woman caused the pain inside his core to reside and he pushed himself out of the fetal position he had been laying in to kneel behind enough natural cover to hide himself fully. The old woman tilted her head and closed her eyes as she seemed to "sniff" the air, then her eyes shot open and she glared right at him as easily as if he were sitting in an open field. She said something in the same tongue that the others had been speaking and all of their heads spun to look in his direction, multiple eyes were now searching the tree line.
Then everything was in motion, the men hurried to recover weapons and the women scurried into the various huts and sent out more men wielding gardening implements as armaments. Hoes, sickles and machetes were all brandished as the men gathered in a group then headed toward the tree line.
Suddenly his mind was filled with a jumble of thoughts, all of which came upon him so quickly that he couldn't mak
e sense of any single one. All he could do was follow his instincts and, for some reason, his instincts told him not to run. Instead he stood up and revealed himself to the approaching mob of villagers.
Calmly he walked from the tree line and into the clearing. The villagers started shouting and beaconing at him with their weapons, but he kept walking. When the men could see his face they grew quiet. They weren't stupid, and each man could tell something was "off" about the giant that approached them. It was when they saw his eyes that a raw, primitive fear crept into each of them at a different level, but despite the wide-eyed stares and shaking hands, none of them backed down.
He stopped walking about ten yards from the group, opened his palms to the men and closed his eyes. He tried to remain as still as possible as he stood there and waited. He thought about what the edge of a machete might feel like as it slammed into him and sliced through his flesh and bone. He could imagine the pain, but he didn't care.
His brain wasn't capable enough to realize that he wanted to die, or that he wanted, needed his death to come at the hands of these people. All he understood about the moment was that he needed to behave the exact way that he was. So he waited, eyes closed and anticipating the bite of whatever edged weapon was going to take his remaining life.
There was no sound, but something touched his face and it wasn't the edge of a machete or some other implement, but instead the smooth, soft touch of fingertips on his cheek.
"Open your eyes," a quiet voice spoke to him in heavily accented English that he couldn’t decipher, but somehow the meaning behind the words sunk in and he opened his eyes. Tears ran out like water from a dam that had just burst and he found himself staring into the concerned face of the old woman while the men looked on in confusion.
His legs gave out from underneath him and he fell to his knees as the old woman cupped his face with her hands.
"I know you," she said as she fearlessly looked into his eyes. She inclined her head to the men behind her and shouted something that made all of their eyes wide with surprise. They began dropping their weapons and hurried over to his side to support him.
Madman's Monster Page 13