Among the Shrouded (16 page)

CHAPTER

24

MIA

“Hey, Mia?  I need to speak with you.  Do you have a few minutes?” her father asked as she stood in her usual spot in the lineup room.

“Yeah.  Of course.  What is it?”

“There’s someone I want you to meet,” he said.

She
followed her father to the basement of the station where suspects were held for questioning and witnesses gave their statements.  He stopped just outside one of the rooms.  The door was shut and yet he spoke to her quietly, as if what he was discussing involved a secret of some sort.

“The girl inside this room showed up here in the middle of the night out of her mind with some crazy story about being held captive by a group of men in a basement somewhere here in the city.  She’s foreign.  Claims she’s from Poland, but her English is good.  She’s
emaciated and my bet is she’s on meth and is delusional.  We filed reports early this morning and the next thing I know I’ve got a message from the commissioner about her.  Apparently he’s interested in what she has to say and wants to know why we aren’t taking her more seriously.  He’s on his way and I wanted you to go in and talk to her before he gets here.”

“
So you want me to check her aura?” she asked.

“Yes, but I also need
more than that.  I need you to talk to her.  I know when girls come in here, you’re the one who usually takes the cases.  Just see if you can get anything serious out of her that doesn’t sound like some sort of fairytale she’s cooked up.  She says her name is Zocha.”

“
Ok.  Sure.  I got it.”

She
opened the door and was unprepared for the sight of the woman who was sitting in a chair facing the opposite wall.  In addition to being filthy, her skeletal frame was draped in an ill-fitting cocktail dress.  The juxtaposition of the fragile woman and the extravagant dress was disquieting and she tried to ignore the way her shoulder blades protruded awkwardly from beneath the material. 

When
the woman finally turned to acknowledge that someone had entered the room, revealing her face for the first time, she could not help but feel disturbed.  She imagined that perhaps at one point the woman sitting before her had been beautiful, but with the garish makeup and sunken eye sockets, she looked to be more dead than alive.  It took everything she had to look directly at the woman, who, despite it all was shrouded in light.

She
sat beside her, placing her own chair close enough to Zocha’s so she could reach her should the need arise.

“My name is Mia,” she began.  “They told me your name is Zocha.  Is that right?”

“Yes.”

“Zocha,
I’m a police officer, and I am here to help you.  I see you’ve already been given something to eat,” she said, pointing to the empty vending machine snack wrappers before her on the table.  “And I also know you have already spoken to some other officers, but if you can, I would like you to explain to me about where you came from last night.”

“
I came from Poland.”

“Okay.  That’s good.  I understand you came here to America from Poland.  Do you remember when that was?”

“Three hundred seventy two days.”

“You have been here in America for over a year?”

“Yes.”

“And where have you been all that time?”

“Locked away.”

“Locked away where?”

“I do not know.  They do not tell us.  I do not know this place,” Zocha wept.

“Don’t cry,”
she said, handing her a paper towel from beside the sink in the corner.

“They don’t believe me,” Zocha cried.  “They think I am pretending, but what I say are true things.”

“What did you tell them?” she asked calmly.

“I told them that
a few nights ago, the men came to take us to the place where we are sold.  It was just the same as every time.  But know this, the longer you are here, the beauty you have, it goes away.  And so they pay less and less for you.  I know my time is coming.  The time when I will disappear, just like the others who don’t come back.  So that night, when no one would pay for me, I knew I had to get away.  Almost everyone was gone and the ones that were left had too much to drink.  So I made myself very quiet and I crept out while they were not looking.  I ran and ran.  I stayed for a few nights out on the streets, in the cold.  I finally asked for help and one woman told me to come here to the police and so that is what I did.”

She
sat in silence as she tried to digest all Zocha had told her.  Finally she asked, “What are they selling you for?”

“For sex of course.  We are sold to the highest bidder.”

“Do you see the men who purchase you?  Can you describe them to me?”

“Some
of the time we are bound and our eyes are covered.  But many times, I saw the men.  They were very confident.  Strong.  Powerful men.”

“Would you be able to describe them so we could draw a picture
or do you think you could pick out their faces from photographs?”

“Yes.”

“Good.”  she paused. As she considered whether or not she wanted to broach another topic with the frightened woman, the door to the room burst open and the commissioner appeared before them.  She immediately stood at attention and welcomed him.

“Good afte
rnoon, Commissioner Dalton,” she said.  “How can I help you?”

“Officer Rosetti,” the
commissioner said, nodding in her direction.  “I’m here to speak with this lovely woman.”

“Okay,” she said
.  “We were just discussing the events that led her here to the station.  I’ll be sure to make a detailed report of our conversation, Sir.”

“I’m sure you will
, Officer,” he said.  “For now, I would like to have some time to discuss the situation with her as well, so if you will excuse us…”

“Yes, of course,”
she said, backing out of the room.  Before closing the door behind her, she made eye contact with Zocha in an attempt to convey that she was safe and that everything was going to be okay.

As she
took the steps to the first floor of the building, she met Jack on his way back to their office.

“What’s up
, Coconut?”

“I just saw the commissioner.”

“What’s he doing here?”

“Apparently he has some inter
est in a woman who found her way here to the station in the middle of the night.  She claims she escaped from some sort of sex ring operation.”

“Is she telling the truth?”

“You mean is she light?”

“Is she?”

“Yeah.  She is.  She’s a shell of a human being, but the light is still there.  I just don’t know why the commissioner would be so interested in her.”

“You know it was one of his pet projects
when he was in Detroit,” Jack said as they reached their office and sat down across the desk from one another.

“What was?”

“Human trafficking.”

“Oh
, really?”

“Yeah.  It’
s part of his platform.  He’s super passionate about it apparently.  I read in one of his briefings, before he was chosen to come here, that he was up in arms about the fact that there are many police departments around the country who don’t want to deal with the women because they are technically illegals.  It’s a grey area in law enforcement I guess.”

“I don’t know how there could be any grey area when it comes to basic human rights, regardless of the citizenship of the person,”
she said.

“You know that and I know that, but we have a constitution to uphold and it is
technically only upheld for U.S. citizens.”

“So sad,”
she said.  “Well, at least that explains the commissioner’s interest in Zocha.”

“Yup.”

She looked at the clock above Jack’s head on the wall.  It was almost three o’clock and a jolt of nervous excitement shot through her body at the thought of seeing Thomas once again.  She pulled several files to take home with her for the evening, including the report on Zocha, and began packing her bag.

“You’re watching the clock!” Jack admonished her.  “That’s not like you.  What’s going on?  Anot
her hot date with the lineup guy?”

“He has a name, Jack.
  It’s Thomas Pritchett.  And yes, we are meeting at the zoo to spend the afternoon together, if that’s okay with you,” she said snidely.

“Jeez!  Sensitive subject!  It’s fine with me
, Mia.  You’re a big girl and I’m glad to see you so happy.  Have a good time.  Just be careful, okay?”

“Didn’t know I
worked with
two
fathers,” she laughed as she breezed through the door on her way to the locker room.  “See ya, Jack.”

“Later
, Mia,” he replied.

Thomas was already sitting peacefully on a bench just outside the entrance gate as she pulled into the parking lot of the Maryland Zoo.  She couldn’t contain the smile that spread across her face and she realized with embarrassment she was nothing short of giddy to see him.

After
parking the car, she made her way across the parking lot and as soon as he saw her coming, he rose from the bench to greet her.

“Have you been waiting long?” she asked.

“Only a few minutes, but it felt like a lifetime.”

She
blushed at his romantic innuendo.

“I
’ve missed you, too,” she said.

He
took her hand in his and they walked together into the zoo.  Instead of taking the tram, they opted to make the lengthy walk to one of the zoo’s most beloved exhibits, the polar bears.  They laughed together as they watched Magnet and Anoki frolicking together in the icy waters of their tank.  From there they explored the African Journey loop.  In the chimpanzee forest, they stopped to observe the humanlike behaviors of the primates.

“It’s fun to watch them taking care of
each other,” she said as a female chimp plucked bugs out of her baby’s fur.

“They j
ust know what to do, don’t they?” Thomas mused.

“If only pe
ople were as intuitive.”

“Like who
, for example?” he asked, taking the bait.

“
Like me for instance.”

“How so?”

“Well, I thought I knew what to do about the commissioner…”

“The one you think is bad?”

“Yes. I thought I was right about him.  Right about him being dark.  But after this morning, I’m beginning to doubt myself again.  I just don’t know what to do.”

“Why
not?  What’s changed?”

“
A woman was brought in overnight.  She claims to have been kept in some underground prison where she was forced to have sex with men for money.”

“Do you believe her?”

“I do,” she replied.

“Okay.  So what does that have to do with the commissioner?”

“Well, I’ve heard of a few other cases like this one over the years.  Cells of human traffickers pop up from time to time.  Unfortunately, too many times the police can’t do anything about it.”

“Wait.  I’m confused
.  Why in the world can’t the police do anything about people being sold into what amounts to modern day slavery?”

“I know.  It’s unbelievable.  You wouldn’t believe the number of women and children in this country that are being bought and sold for labor and sex.  Most of the women come from eastern block nations or the Far East.  They are lured into brothels under false pretenses and then enslaved.  There are language difficulties and physical barriers.  Many times the women are completely helpless.”

“And the police can’t do anything because…”