Denied (16 page)

Twenty-one

A light shone
out of the darkness up ahead.

Lily reached out and grabbed Monster’s forearm, but he remained unruffled.

“It’s okay,” he said. “It’s only Sean and Chapman.”

She breathed out a sigh. “They obviously haven’t found anyone either.”

“No, they’d have let us know if they had.”

The two small groups continued down the line of shipping containers until they met midway.

“No sign of anyone, sir,” said Chapman.

“I gathered that,” Monster replied. “Let’s go and see if there’s anyone inside one of these things.” He turned to her. “Which one do you think you heard voices from, Lily?”

She was pleased he’d used her real name in front of the other men. “I’m not completely sure, but I think it was around seven or eight containers up from this side. And it was only one voice, but if what I experienced is anything to go by, there may be as many as six women in there, possibly even more.”

He nodded. “Okay, let’s check it out.”

Lily lifted her hand to stop him. “Can I just say something, to all of you?”

She felt the eyes of all three men turn to her.

“Go ahead,” said Monster.

She spoke up, feeling like she needed to be a voice for the girls they might find. “These women are going to be terrified. Chances are they’re going to have been hurt, possibly raped, and they’re not going to see you as men who are there to rescue them. They’ll probably think you’re more men who want to use them and who are going to take them off to some other place where they’ll be treated just as badly. Don’t be surprised if they fear you or even if they try to fight you. Right now they’re most likely seeing all men as the enemy.”

“We understand,” said Chapman.

“So move slowly with them,” she continued, wanting to drive home the message. “Be compassionate, be gentle.”

Even if Chapman said he understood, he didn’t. He had no idea. None of them did.

“That’s if we find anything at all,” said Sean.

“I heard something, I know I did. If the women are no longer in the container, they’ve been taken somewhere else.”

Monster touched her elbow. “Let’s go and find out.”

As a small group, with Lily leading the way this time, they ran down to the set of shipping containers where she’d thought she’d heard the voice. Checking the fronts of the containers, she noted that they all looked identical, each of them kept shut with padlocked chains.

“Call out to them again,” said Monster. “They’re more likely to respond to another woman’s voice.”

Lily nodded and approached the first container. “Hello?” she called, pressing her ear close to the ridged, rusty metal. “Is anyone in there?” She hesitated and then lifted her hand and rapped her knuckles against the side with a hollow clang. “We’re here to help. We won’t hurt you, I promise. Just let us know if you’re inside.”

She glanced toward the men. They all watched her expectantly, as though they thought she was going to give them some kind of insight they couldn’t have figured out for themselves.

“I think this one is empty. Let’s try the next.”

They moved on, and Lily repeated the process. She moved along, pressing her hands against the metal as she called out.

“What are you doing?” Monster asked.

“Trying to see if there’s a change in temperature that might signal someone’s body heat,” she replied.

Monster gave a jerk of his chin to the other men, and they followed Lily’s example, pressing their palms low down against the container walls.

Lily continued to call out, “Hello? Is anyone in there? We’re here to help you.” It was hard to tell if she felt any difference in the temperature of the container walls. The balmy night didn’t help, and she’d not gotten any response to her shouts.

With frustration building inside her, and increasingly worried the women had been moved, she said, “Let’s try the next one.”

They stepped away to move to the adjacent container, when she heard the faintest of cries.

She froze. “Wait, what was that?”

Monster frowned and glanced out toward the ocean. “It could have been a bird out on the water.”

“No, I’m sure it was a person.” She hurried back, and banged her palm against the metal wall. “If you’re in there, please let us know!”

“Maybe we should just open the damn thing up,” said Monster.

She looked to him, her eyes wide. “Yes, open it up.”

They moved to the front of the container. Monster pulled his gun. “Everyone stand back.”

White sparks burst around the lock and the shot echoed through the night, the sound bouncing off the walls of the shipping containers, leaving her ears ringing. She’d instinctively jerked her face away at the gunfire, but now she turned back she saw the lock hanging to one side. Monster stepped forward and yanked away the warped metal, dropping the padlock to the ground. With a grunt, he hauled open the big set of doors.

The smell hit her first—ammonia and other bodily odors—and automatically she covered her nose and mouth with her hand.

“Jesus Christ,” exclaimed Sean, rearing away, his nose wrinkled.

She shot him a glare, not wanting anyone who might be inside to feel even worse about themselves.

A sudden light illuminated the space and Lily glanced around in surprise. Monster was holding his cell phone, using the flashlight app to light up the inside of the container. The light was limited, the container still holding pockets of darkness and shadows like a secret.

For a moment, Lily thought the container was empty, but then, right at the back, the light reflected back on a number of pairs of wide, frightened eyes.

“Oh, my God.”

Forgetting all about Cigarette Hands and her mission to see him dead, Lily rushed forward, her thoughts now only with these poor women.

Monster and the other two men followed close behind. The women shied from the light, their hands raised to shield their eyes. It was all exactly how she had remembered it. How strange to think she’d been one of these women not so long ago. She felt as though the experience had happened to someone else.

“It’s okay,” Lily said as she reached them. “You’re safe now. You need to come with us.”

The girls whimpered and cowered away. Lily counted them … four women in total. They all looked young, as they had been before—younger than her by eight to ten years, so no more than girls. She couldn’t imagine how worried their families must be.

Her rage against Cigarette Hands rose up inside her like a snake that had just been stood on and lashed its tail.

She reached toward them. “Please, we need to go.” She noticed their eyes flick past her, toward the men standing behind.

“They won’t hurt you,” she said, trying not to think about the fact one of them had ordered her abduction and put her in this situation himself, and the other one had taken her from right outside of the container only a matter of hours earlier.

Lily put out her hand to the youngest—a girl with dirty blonde hair which hung in rat’s tails around her pale face. “It’s okay. We’re getting you out of here.”

But the girl cowered back, her arms wrapped around herself. “No, the men will punish us if they get back and find us trying to escape.”

“They can’t punish you if they’re dead.”

“They’re dead?” an older girl asked, hope lighting her voice.

Lily shook her head. “Not yet, but they will be. They’ve messed with the wrong people this time.”

“We can’t go,” said another girl. “They’ll come back and know we’ve gone, and then they’ll find us again and make us pay!”

“They won’t come back, and even if they do, you’ll be long gone,” she said, trying not to get frustrated by their lack of action. She put out her hand again. “Please, we need to get you out of here.”

The girls were bare-armed and legged, wearing only panties and t-shirts, or thin summer dresses. Lily didn’t even want to think about what had happened to the rest of their clothing. Their bare skin was filthy and they’d clearly been beaten. She struggled to see where the scrapes and bruises ended and the dirt began.

“We should just haul them out of here,” Sean growled behind her.

Lily’s head whipped around and she glowered at him. “You’re not helping,” she snapped.

She turned back to the women. “Please,” she tried again. “We’re helping you. Don’t let your last action as free women be turning down help when it was offered. Believe me, you don’t want to have to live with that knowledge.”

The blonde girl choked back a sob. Tears cut pale lines in her filthy face. Finally, the girl nodded and reached out and took Lily’s hand. Lily held on tight and pulled her to her feet. She felt like the girl weighed nothing. Was that what she felt like, too? Waiflike, and as though she could blow away in a gust of air.

At the action of their compatriot, the other women began to move as well. Within seconds, they were all on their feet, scurrying toward the exit.

“Thank God for that,” Monster said, and she shot him a look to tell him to keep his mouth shut. He didn’t understand women, or what these particular women had been through, and she didn’t need him making any comments that would get her riled.

With all of the women outside, Lily wished she had some blankets to cover them with. Even though the night was warm, they were all exposed, their skinny arms wrapped around their narrow frames or their hands tugging at the hems of their t-shirts or skirts. As though sensing what she was thinking, Monster took off his jacket and draped it over the youngest and most vulnerable looking girl’s shoulders. The girl jerked at his contact, cowering from him fearfully, but she clutched at the material covering her.

“Come on, let’s get you to the car,” said Lily. “We’ll figure out what to do from there.”

“They took another girl,” the slightly older girl with the dark hair suddenly cried. “About an hour before you came. They’re selling her on to someone. If you’d gotten here sooner, you would have saved her, too.”

Lily’s stomach twisted with guilt. She’d been with Monster, having sex with him. Had she been responsible for the loss of another life because she hadn’t been able to control herself?

“Where did they take her?” Monster asked.

The girl shook her head. “I’m not sure. The men just laughed about her going to her new ‘home,’ and then they argued about something to do with daybreak.”

“There are three options,” said Monster. “The road, the water, or the air.”

Lily chewed at her lower lip. “They put me on a plane, but you know that anyway. I don’t know if they do that with everyone.”

Chapman spoke up. “It might explain why they have to wait until daybreak, though. Perhaps that’s when the flight is scheduled for.”

Lily looked between the two men. “There’s a private airstrip a few miles out of town. Maybe Cigarette Hands took her there.”

Monster checked his watch. “Daybreak is only an hour away now. If we’re going to try the airfield, I suggest we get moving.”

Lily nodded. “Let’s go.”

Twenty-two

They ran back
toward the car, sticking close to the walls of the surrounding buildings in an effort not to be spotted. Though still nighttime, the hour was early enough for people who worked early shifts to be getting ready for work. The last thing they needed was for someone to report them as suspicious and them being stopped by the cops. She didn’t know about Monster, Sean, and Chapman, but she didn’t have a decent explanation for the firearm she was carrying, and she certainly didn’t have a permit.

The girls were all barefoot, but they didn’t seem to notice any discomfort in their hurry to get away. Lily wondered if they should have sent Chapman to get the car and bring it to them, rather than them trying to get everyone to the car, but the women didn’t want to wait around the port for fear of the traffickers coming back. Plus, doing it this way was slightly quicker, and right now, every minute counted.

Her footsteps hit the sidewalk too loud, her breathing harsh in her ears. The feeling of vital time dripping away pressed upon her, and she wished she could do something to go back and reclaim the time they had lost. The sky was no longer the thick black it had been when they’d arrived, but had lightened to a rich purple. Daybreak wouldn’t be far away.

“We need,” she gasped to Monster as they ran, side by side, “to call … the police.”

He shook his head, and glanced toward her. The running didn’t seem to have affected him in the slightest. His cheeks had a slight flush to them, but while she panted for breath, he spoke normally. “We can’t. How would we explain to the police how we found the women? Also, I’m not even supposed to be in the country, at least not in my true identity, and we still need to make you disappear. That’s not going to happen if the police are involved.”

“But what are we going to do with them?” she said between breaths. “The police need to know.”

“If we call the police, any hope you might have of finding and killing the guy you call Cigarette Hands is going to end. You understand that, don’t you?”

She grimaced. Her lungs burned and she was starting to get a stitch in her side. “Okay, no police.” She drew in a long breath and exhaled. “But we need to take them somewhere safe. We can’t just let them wander out onto the streets. Look at the state they’re in.”

They both looked over at the small group of women all huddled together as they ran through the streets like a flock of sheep. The youngest blonde was crying as she jogged along, and the older brunette had managed to wrap an arm around the youngest girl’s shoulders so it looked like they were running an awkward three legged race but without the rope. Monster’s jacket, which he’d donated to the girl, flapped between them.

“What about if I have Chapman drive them to the hospital?” he suggested. “He can leave them outside without being questioned.”

She scrunched up her face with indecision, her stomach twisting. The whole situation made her feel awful, like she was just abandoning these poor girls to whatever might face them next. She wanted to guide them each step of the way, to tell them they could recover and go on to be happy. But her options were limited.

Monster’s fingers touched the back of her hand. “Flower, if we don’t go now, we won’t stand a chance of reaching the airfield in time. No one will ever know what happened to the other girl, and Cigarette Hands will get away. Let Chapman take the women to the hospital. They’ll be in the hands of professionals who will have dealt with situations like this and worse.”

“Okay,” she agreed, and then thought of something. “Where are the men who have Cameron? Why aren’t they here yet?”

“I don’t know. I’ll check, but we can’t wait around for them. If we’re going to do this, we need to do it now.”

She nodded. “I understand.”

As they approached the narrow side street where they’d left the car, an irrational fear that the car was no longer where they’d left it filled her, but they rounded the corner to find the vehicle exactly where they’d left it. She’d hoped to have seen Cameron by now, but there was still no sign of him. It couldn’t be helped. She needed to trust that Monster had told her the truth, and she would see him once Cigarette Hands was dead and the final girl had been rescued.

They reached the street where the car was parked. Sean pressed the button on the key-fob, and the doors unlocked with a clunk and a flashing of headlights. They drew to a stop, all crowding beside the vehicle.

Monster quickly placed a call. He didn’t even need to say anything; the person he’d called speaking right away.

Monster nodded, even though the person on the end of the line couldn’t see him. “Get here as soon as you can,” he said, and then hung up.

Lily chewed her lip nervously. “What’s happened?”

“That was Mason, who is in the other car with your friend. There’s been an accident on the freeway. Must have happened not long after we passed through. Don’t worry, their car wasn’t involved, but the road was blocked and they got stuck in the jam. It’s moving now, so they’re on their way.”

“Good.”

Lily looked between the number of people in their group and the size of the car. “We’re never all going to fit in just one car,” she said. “What are we going to do?”

Monster followed her line of sight. “How far away did you say the airfield is?”

“It’s about three miles from here, according to the guy I spoke to at the Marine base,” she said. “I spent about twenty minutes in the car when I was taken there from here last time, but I was in a pretty stressful situation, so I might have misjudged it.”

“We could leave the girls here for the time being, and go to the airfield. We’ll deal with Cigarette Hands, assuming he’s there, and then come back for the women. Then Chapman can drive them to the hospital.”

“We can’t leave them here alone all that time,” she said in dismay. “They’re too vulnerable.” 

“Don’t worry,” said Chapman. “You guys take the car. I can steal one to drive the girls to the hospital. It can’t be far from here, and I’m less likely to get stopped.”

Monster lifted his eyebrows. “If you do get stopped, you’ll be in a stolen car with a group of abducted women. That’s not going to look good for you.”

“The girls can tell the cops what happened. I’ll say it was an emergency, that I found the girls by accident, heard them shouting for help while I walked by. They said the traffickers would be back soon, so I panicked and took the car.” He gave a shrug. “Sure, I might still look like a criminal, but I’ll be a damn heroic one.”

“As long as you’re sure.”

He grinned. “I’m sure. The girls will back up my story, right, ladies?”

They all nodded obediently. Lily wasn’t sure if the police would even believe the story if it came from their mouths. Considering how disbelieving they’d been of her story, the police would probably just think Chapman had beaten the women into telling that story. But she wouldn’t worry about that now. They needed to get to the airport and stop Cigarette Hands from leaving.

“Okay,” Lily agreed. “It sounds like our only option.”

“Just give me a few minutes,” said Chapman.

He moved away from them, heading up the street. Each time he came to any parked cars, he tried on the doors, checking to see if any of them were left unlocked. Lily watched after him anxiously, hoping no one would spot him and call the police. That was the last thing they needed.

After six or seven cars, a door finally opened.

“Bingo,” he called back to them.

The big man disappeared into the car headfirst, leaning into the footwell of the driver’s side. A moment later, the car’s engine roared to life. Chapman’s head popped back up again and he settled himself in the driver’s seat and then reached out to pull the car door shut. Within less than a minute, he’d maneuvered the car in a three point turn and pulled up back alongside the waiting group. He got back out and stood beside the stolen vehicle. Despite his smart suit, Lily guessed his work life must normally be more along the criminal line of things than a straight job.

What are you talking about?
she said to herself.
He works for Monster. Of course he’s a criminal.

Chapman opened the rear door. “In you get, ladies,” he said with a smile, as though he was taking them on a date.

The women hesitated and all looked to her for reassurance.

Lily gave them a smile. “It’ll be okay. Chapman wants to help you. He’ll take you to a hospital, to safety. I promise. But if you don’t want to go with him, that’s fine too …”

“Lily …” Monster growled, but she ignored him.

“You’re free women. You can do whatever you want. You can come with us—but I wouldn’t advise it. We’re the ones trying to find the men who took you, and I can’t promise that’s going to go well. I’d hate for any of you to be taken again. Or else we can give you some money, and you can make your own way to safety. It’s completely your choice.”

“We’ll stick together,” said the older girl with the dark hair. “And we’ll accept your help, thank you. If it wasn’t for you, we’d still be shut in that hell hole.”

Lily smiled, and this time it felt genuine. “I’m glad. What’s your name?”

“I’m Kristin.”

The younger blonde spoke up. “My name’s Ruby.”

“Sophia,” added the other girl.

“I’m Anna-Louise,” said the fourth.

“My name’s Lily,” she said, looking between them all. “Do you know what the other girl he took is called?”

They shook their heads simultaneously.

“We never really spoke inside,” said Kristin. “The traffickers told us they’d know and punish us if we did.”

Lily nodded. Her eyes flooded with tears and a painful lump formed in her throat. She swallowed against it, and tried to speak. “I know. I was in the container, too, once. That’s why I was able to find you.”

Totally unexpectedly, Krista threw herself against Lily and hugged her tight. Lily fought against her phobia of being touched, especially by strangers. It didn’t matter. This was bigger than that. She could control her phobia and make herself squeeze the girl back. One by one, each of the girls attached themselves to her in an embrace, until they stood in a big, slightly smelly group hug, most of them with tears pouring down their faces.

Chapman cleared his throat. “Sorry, ladies, but we need to get moving before someone realizes their car is running when it shouldn’t be.”

The women detached themselves from each other.

“Thank you,” said Kristin. “When we find somewhere safe, can we contact you again to talk?”

Lily glanced briefly at Monster, who stood by with his lips pressed together. She shook her head. “No, you can’t find me again. I have to vanish after this. It’s not safe for me. But I’ll make sure this is over for each of you. I’ll kill that bastard, I promise I will.”

They didn’t say anything else, just nodded, blinked back tears, and climbed into the car. Chapman got back into the driver’s seat, and all four doors slammed shut.

Monster’s touch on her arm drew her attention. “We have to go, Flower.”

She swiped away her own tears with the back of her hand and nodded. “I know. I’m coming.”

And she watched the car containing the women drive away to safety.