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“Are you hurt?” she shouted.
One of the girls looked up, and even through the filth covering the glass, Susa
The chain was padlocked, so Susa
Feeling triumphant, she yanked the chain from the back of the trailer, hearing it clank-clank-clank as each link hit the bumper, then the pavement. She threw open the doors and exhaled as ten pairs of terrified eyes sought hers. “Hi,” she said, breathless. “I’m Susa
Interstate 75, Sunday, February 4, 6:20 a.m.
Luke walked up to the horse trailer in time to see Susa
In the thirty minutes he’d been gone, someone had freed the girls in the trailer. Now officers were gently moving them to waiting ambulances, two at a time.
It was triumph. And it was tragedy. In the thirty minutes he’d been gone Bobby had taken yet another life. And she’d gotten away. Too late. Too late.
“How could you?” Susa
The man popped the tape from the camera, then slunk away, sputtering apologies.
“Dumb ass,” she muttered under her breath.
Unsettled and needing her, Luke put his hands on her shoulders and she jumped. “Sshh,” he murmured, soothing himself as much as he soothed her. “It’s just me.”
Her frown disappeared when she saw him, a soft smile blooming. “You weren’t too late this time.” But she sobered when she realized he had not smiled back. “What happened, Luke? What took you so long? Where’s Bobby?”
“Bobby got in a car up at the end of the row. The engine was ru
“I knew she’d stolen the car, but she has another hostage?”
“No. She pushed the passenger out going about sixty. She knew I’d stop. Of course I did, but the passenger was dead. She’d shot him first.”
Her fingers closed over his arm, lightly. “I’m sorry.”
“Yeah. Me, too.” He looked to the end of the rest area to where a man sat in the back of a police car. “Now I get to tell that man his son isn’t coming home.”
“Let someone else do it. Chase will be here soon.”
“No. I’ll do what needs to be done.”
“Then I’ll go with you.”
He almost said no. But after everything, he needed someone to lean on. “Thanks.”
The man got out of the police car as he approached, the color draining from his face when he saw Luke’s expression. “No.” He shook his head. “No.”
“I’m sorry. Your son was shot by the woman who stole your car. He didn’t survive.”
The man took a step back, denial warring with horror. “But we’re going to Six Flags. It’s his birthday. He’s fourteen. He’s only fourteen.”
“I’m so sorry,” Luke said, his heart so heavy he wasn’t sure he could bear it. “Is there someone I can call for you?”
“My wife. I need to call my wife.” Stu
The state trooper who’d been waiting with him gently took the phone from his hand. “I’ll take care of this, Agent Papadopoulos. You get back to your other victims.” The father’s shoulders were now heaving, the sound of his sobs like a knife in Luke’s gut.
Now Luke had one more face to add to all the others who haunted his mind.
Behind him, Susa
“All that father cares about is the child we didn’t save in time.”
“Don’t do this,” she said, urgency giving her voice strength. “Don’t you dare do this to yourself.” She grabbed his arm and swung him around. “In that trailer were ten girls who would have been forced into prostitution and death. Now they’re going home. You stop thinking about the one you didn’t save and you start counting the ten that you did.”
He nodded. She was right. “You’re right.”
“Damn straight I am.” Her eyes narrowed, full of purpose. “Now walk back to your car. You’re going to drive back to Atlanta, sit down with your team, and figure out how to catch Barbara Jean Davis. Then you can throw her into hell and throw away the key.”
He started walking, her arm around his waist. “I’m so tired.”
“I know,” she said, her voice gentle again. “Let me drive back. You can sleep.”
He leaned over until his cheek rested on her head as they walked. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. I think I owed you before. Now we’re even.”
“We’re keeping score?” he asked soberly.
“Not anymore. I think you need somebody as much as I do.”
“You’re just now figuring that out?” he murmured.
Her arm tightened around him. “Don’t be smug, Agent Papadopoulos.”
Interstate 75, Sunday, February 4, 6:45 a.m.
Bobby finally drew a steady breath. The car from the rest stop was ditched. This car was a new one, stolen from a parking lot off the highway. What next? What next?
Ta
Ta
So now what? Susa
I could have killed her long ago. But putting it off had a
Fine, Charles. You’re about to get what you want. I’ll kill her for you. Then I’m gone.
Atlanta, Sunday, February 4, 8:40 a.m.
They’d all regrouped around the conference room table, a strained mix of euphoria, exhaustion, and despair hanging over the team. Ed and Chloe, Pete and Nancy, Hank, Talia, and Mary McCrady. At Luke’s request, Susa
“So we’re still not done,” Pete said when Chase finished. “Bobby’s still at large.”
“We got the girls, alive,” Chase said. “Not only the ones from the bunker, but Genie Cassidy and six others who had been lured from their homes. And that is huge.”
“We also recovered boxes of records from Bobby’s trailer,” Luke said, “showing proof of financial transactions between Bobby and her customers. Names and locations. We can prosecute dozens of perverts who bought children for sexual slavery.”
Chase’s smile had edge. “We provided the FBI with the locations of her truck stop whorehouses, which span from North Carolina into Florida. GBI agents right now are raiding ten different homes to rescue the girls Bobby’s most recently sold, including the girl sold to Darryl Haynes on Friday night.”