A Girl Undone (12 page)

“Good choice.” Streicker walked over to Mikhaela and held out the passport. She glanced at me, wide-eyed, and I nodded for her to take it. She gulped and shoved it deep in her pocket.

Then Streicker zipped up his parka. “Toss your plates, everyone. Time to go.”

Outside, the girls lined up to climb into the van, and I stood back, watching. Mikhaela looked over her shoulder at me, and I gave her a little wave. Then she darted out of the line and flung her arms around my neck. “Thank you for helping me.”

I closed my arms around her. “Be brave and make your grandma proud. You can do this,” I whispered. She was trembling and scared, but I knew she might be one of the lucky ones who got away. And I’d helped. In my own small way, I’d helped.

Streicker tapped her on the back. “Let’s go.”

She squeezed into the last jump seat, her knees knocking against the cases of pills that made a wall down the center of the van, and I realized what I was looking at. Heart meds. Cancer meds. Embargoed drugs that Canadians desperately needed, but the U.S. was holding back to force Canada not to take in American refugees.

The van drove off, and I followed the red taillights until they disappeared.

Streicker is a smuggler. He knows how to get past the border patrols. If Luke would only agree to go, Streicker could get us both out.

Streicker came up behind me. “You’re jealous of those girls.”

I didn’t turn around. “No, I’m not.”

“You’re lying. You wish you were on that van right now, because you don’t agree with Luke’s plan.”

I refused to answer.

Streicker leaned in until I felt his breath on my neck. “Admit it. You’re going to try everything in your power to talk him out of going to D.C.”

I was trembling, fighting the urge to run for the house, but I shoved my hands deeper into my pockets, and stood my ground. “How can you get the girls over the border when it’s closed?”

“There’s an airfield a few miles from here.”

“You fly them into Canada?”

“No. The plane sets down in Montana near the border. There’s a tunnel that comes up in Alberta.”

“Aren’t you afraid of getting caught?”

Streicker chuckled. “First, the airfield and tunnel are not on U.S. soil. It’s the Blackfeet Nation. Second, no one’s going to rat me out, because everybody’s making too much money.”

“But what about the border patrol?”

“Border patrol’s making more than anyone, but don’t tell that to the tribal leaders.”

Bribes. Corruption. Exploitation.

“But the third and most satisfying reason I will not get arrested for smuggling is that the men who own the tunnel, or what we like to call the White Gold Pipeline, those investors contributed millions of dollars to reelect Fletcher and his Paternalist cronies.”

It took a moment for what he said to sink in. “But the Paternalists closed the border.”

“Funny, how it all works out.”

I felt like I was going to be sick. “So smuggling out a girl helps make money for the Paternalists.”

“Every girl, every pill.” He started to walk back to the house. “God, I love America.”

I waited until I heard the kitchen door close before I turned around. This was one big sick game where the Paternalists won even when they lost. And Streicker didn’t care that they made money as long as he was getting his.

16

Lola was drinking coffee in the kitchen when I walked in. Her sweater sleeves were pushed up, exposing the scars on both wrists. Streicker’s men were taking the girls to Canada, but then what? What would happen to the girls once they got there?

I took hold of Lola’s wrist and flipped it over. “Did he do this?” I said, pointing to the front room, where Streicker sat, then pointing to her scar.

Lola glared at me.

“Did
he
do
this
?” I repeated.

“Don’t be an idiot,” she said, and ripped her wrist away.

“You speak English?”

She gave me a look that could melt skin. “He found me in a garage chained to a wall. He freed me.”

Then she told me about leaving Ukraine for the promise of a nanny job in Montreal, only to find out it was a lie. Two brothers kept her locked in their house, and the harder she fought to get away, the more they beat her.

“How did Streicker get you away from them?”

Lola stirred her coffee. “Is not important.”

I got up from the table. I had no doubt that if someone went to that house, they’d find the decomposing remains of two paunchy, middle-aged men.

When I came into the front room, Luke and Streicker were hunched over together, their heads just inches from each other’s. They were watching the Sportswall, and Streicker was pointing at two of the screens and flipping the sound back and forth between the broadcasts.

A thousand college students at a protest march in Boston had torched a life-sized image of Senator Fletcher outside the Old South Meeting House. The fire-blackened body sagged in a suit and tie from the top of a flagpole.

“Right there. That’s what I’m talking about,” Streicker said.

Luke focused hard on the screens and I sat on the edge of the chair, wondering what exactly Streicker wanted him to see. Then Luke shook his head. “Damn, it’s just like you said.”

Streicker clapped him on the back and my stomach turned. “All you got to do is pay attention,” Streicker told him.

“Pay attention to what?” I said.

Luke turned to me, his face all fired up. “To how the reporters talk about the Paternalists. Like what adjectives they use to describe them. The stations the Saudis own talk about the Paternalists like they’re the real patriots. Even the photos of the Paternalists they use make them look, I don’t know, heroic.”

“But I thought all news stations treated Paternalists like heroes.”

“The Saudis are way worse. And they’re buying up stations left and right. Streicker says they own almost a quarter of all the TV and radio stations in the country.”

“Is that right?” I said.

Streicker smirked. “That kind of media support could put a man in the White House. The man the Saudis want to see there.”

He watched me to see if his message sank in. “Yeah, I can see how that would be a big help,” I said.

Crap. The Saudis had the money and power to get Jouvert elected, and we had only days to get the thumb drive past Homeland Security to D.C. if we wanted to shut Jouvert down.

Streicker was egging Luke on in a way that made me nervous, taking advantage of how angry and lost Luke was right now, and encouraging Luke to ignore the dangers of what was facing us.

“Is there someplace you’d like Luke and me to sleep?” I said.

“There’s sheets and a blow-up mattress in the rear bedroom, but maybe you’d like more privacy?” Streicker tapped Luke on the calf. “You can sleep on one of the cots in the back building—”

“Yeah,” Luke said, “I’ll be fine anywhere. You just—”

“No,” I said. Streicker grinned behind his hand, but I was not going to let him separate us. “Luke and I can share. It’s no problem.”

“Suit yourself.”

“Well, I’m going to bed. You coming, Luke?”

“No, not just yet.”

The top left screen caught my eye, and I gasped. Yates was handcuffed to a wheelchair pushed by an ATF agent. “Suspect Taken to Prison Hospital.” Yates’ nose and eye were still purple and swollen, and his head had flopped to the side.

“Looks like someone beat that poor bastard pretty bad,” Streicker said.

“He hit a tree coming down the mountain,” I shot back. I stood up. “Good night.”

If Luke had looked up, he would have seen how much I wanted him to come with me, but I refused to say it in front of Streicker.

I retreated to the back bedroom and set up the bed, but I couldn’t sleep. There wasn’t any heat coming through the vents, but I would die of hypothermia before I’d ask Streicker to fix it. I curled up under the two blankets on the freezing air mattress and stuck my hands between my knees, trying to stay warm.

Muffled sounds of basketball games and newscasts came through the closed door. Wind whooshed over the roof, and the window blinds sliced the security light outside into sharp shadows on the bare wall and floor.

I didn’t know what to think. Luke was changing before my eyes, almost killing that man when he hit him with the pipe. And the way he acted out there just now, it was as if Luke wanted to learn everything he could from Streicker. Like he was Streicker’s apprentice.

My knees ached from the cold. I slid my down jacket under the blankets and spread it over me.
I wish I knew what to do.

If only Yates hadn’t gotten hurt. If he and I were on the run together, things would be so different. We might have argued about what to do, but we would have worked things out. We would have decided together.

Luke wasn’t asking my opinion or sharing his thoughts with me. He just expected me to do exactly what he thought we should do.

If I stayed with Luke, Streicker could get us both killed. But how could I leave Luke alone with that man? Luke had never known anyone so—untrustworthy.

Luke tiptoed into the room a few minutes later, slipped off his boots, and set them down.

“I’m awake,” I said.

“You having trouble sleeping?”

“Yeah, a little.”

“I’m sorry about Yates. It’s got to be hard to see him like that.”

“At least I know he’s alive.”

Luke eased down next to me on the blow-up mattress, and it swelled, rolling me up against him. He stretched out on top of the blankets. “You mind if I get under the covers? It’s freezing in here.”

“No, it’s fine. Go ahead.” Goose bumps ran up my legs, but that was the cold. Luke wouldn’t try anything. He knew I loved Yates.

Luke stripped off his belt and slid under the blankets. “Damn. No wonder you can’t sleep. Get closer so I can warm you up.”

Coming from Luke, that didn’t sound sleazy. Heat radiated off his body, and I hesitated for only a second before edging up next to him. He wrapped an arm around me. “Go ahead and lay your head on my chest.”

I relaxed into him, aware of how different his body was from Yates’. Yates was long and lean, his muscles toned from swimming, but Luke was broad-chested from years of chopping wood. I felt small, protected, beside him.

“You warming up?” he said.

“Yes, this helps.” It was quiet, and we were finally alone after a day that had been brutally long. “Were you watching the news?”

“Yeah.”

“Anything about us?”

“Nothing new—except they put out a description of me.”

I lifted my head. “No!”

“Relax. They called me a giant, and said I’m six four and two hundred and fifty pounds.”

“But you’re not—”

“I’m betting they talked to Jonas. I used to chase him around sometimes and pretend I was Goliath from the Bible story.”

The sadness in his voice made me ache. “I’m sure Jonas didn’t mean to—”

“It’s okay. Jonas sent the trackers down the wrong trail.”

I laid my head back down.
I’m worried about you. I wish I knew what’s going on inside you.
“Luke?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you okay after what happened tonight—when we picked up Mikhaela?”

He was completely still.

“I didn’t expect you to hit that man so hard.”

“He would have killed her.”

“I know, but—”

“I’m done with trying to work things out peacefully—at least where killers are concerned.”

“But he—”

“Avie. I’m tired. Can we go to sleep?”

“Sure,” I whispered. “Good night.”

Luke was so vulnerable. In the last few days, I’d realized that in some ways he was really innocent, like a little kid, and even though he was probably ten times as strong as I was, I needed to be alert and watch out for him.

Hours later, I woke at the sound of tires crunching through the snow outside the window. The sky was still black, but I got up to look.

The white van rolled slowly past, and I moved to the other window. Peeking through the blinds, I watched the van pull up to the fence circling the back building, where a man got out and unlocked the gate. He held it while the van drove through.

Exhaust clouded my view of people exiting the van, but from their size and how they walked, I knew they were girls. They must have run into trouble getting over the border and turned around.

I balanced on my toes on the icy floor. I heard the back door open, and a few seconds later, Streicker walked into the pool of light around the building. Glock and Luger trotted at his side.

In the kitchen, the microwave hummed, telling me Lola was up. I waited at the window until Streicker reappeared, and then crept over and cracked open the hall door.

I heard Streicker drop his boots, and Lola ask him something in her indecipherable language. “It’s all good,” he answered.

It’s all good? If it’s all good, then why are the girls back?

I strained to hear them, but couldn’t make out anything else they said. Finally, they padded back to Streicker’s bedroom and I lay back down beside Luke.

He turned toward me in his sleep, and pulled me close, and I wrapped my arm over his. Luke was a good guy. He wouldn’t let anything happen to me if he could help it, but he wasn’t thinking clearly when it came to Streicker.

I had to get Luke away from him. The sooner the better.

17

When we came into the kitchen the next morning, Streicker let us know that Maggie’s contact at the DOJ had disappeared five days ago during his regular evening run in Rock Creek Park.

Lola set a tray of hot rolls on the stove to cool. She acted like she wasn’t paying attention, but she closed the oven extra quietly.

“The timing’s interesting,” Streicker said. “You’re pinned down in the church with feds firing at you, and Maggie’s key contact at the Department of Justice goes missing.”

First, Congressman Paul was mugged outside a bar, then Maggie’s secret ally went missing from a D.C. park. “This wasn’t random, was it?” I said.

“Not likely.”

Luke crossed his arms over his chest. His fists were clenched, and I could almost feel him wanting to hit something.