Body Parts (Rye & Claire 1) (18 page)

“Crystal?” Claire waved her hands in an attempt to find her.

“It’s OK, I think I’m in a room of some kind, but there must be bats in here, cause something sure stinks.”

“Just stay where you are.”

“Could you hurry up with the flashlight? I’m starting to get creeped out.”

“I’m going to use the lighter instead of the flashlight to find you and see if I can light the candles again.”

“Fine, please just hurry up.”

Claire spun the wheel on the
lighter causing sparks and a small flame by which she could just see
what appeared to be an oval opening to a small room about six feet high.
She had just made out Crystal’s long hair, when the flame went out.

“Shit.” She shook the lighter for the sound of fluid.

Again she spun the wheel.
Spark, but no flame. And again. Same result. With each flash of spark
she’d take another step into the room, and with each spark she would
catch sight of Crystal’s long hair. But something was wrong, her hair
was dangling, she must be laying down, not on the floor but on a ledge.

“Crystal, you OK?”

“Yeah fine, you’ve got about ten feet to go.”

Her voice didn’t come from
the direction Claire had been following. Puzzled, she put the lighter in
her hip pocket and took out the pen light, pointed it in the direction
she’d been going and turned it on.

Suddenly the room came alive
with dangling hair—long hair, short hair—all hanging from heads in every
state of decay. Bare shoulders, breasts, nude bodies. And with every
shudder that passed through Claire, the light she was holding moved and
the heads danced until Crystal’s scream jolted her into pointing the
light at the ground, but it was too late. Crystal in her haste to escape
barreled into Claire, knocking her to the ground as she ran from the
room.

As she fell, the penlight
flew from her hand. Confused, she lay against the tunnel wall where
she’d fallen, listening to Crystal’s screams fade into the darkness. It
was when they abruptly stopped that she began feeling around the floor
for the penlight, finding instead what she thought was a rock until she
found a wire leading in from one side. She depressed the top of the
rock. Suddenly the room lit up like daylight. Claire got to her feet in a
state of shock. Stacked from the floor to what must have been an
eight-foot ceiling were bodies. Each had its own shelf, and each was
face up with the head at the outside edge of the shelf, hair dangling.
There were no labels, numbers or names. The room reminded Claire of the
catacombs below some of the ancient churches in Rome.

The light came from four
large spotlights mounted onto a metal crossbeam bolted to the ceiling.
As she turned to scan the walls of corpses, one of the bodies caught her
attention. It was on the rear wall, fourth shelf from the bottom. She
noticed something tiny sticking up from between the breasts.

Extracting a pair of surgical
gloves from her butt pack, Claire gingerly grasped the body just under
the shoulders and slid it out a few inches. There in the middle of the
chest were sutures, several sticking up just enough to catch the light.
She’d seen this before. The body had undergone some kind of heart
surgery. Moving from body to body it soon became apparent that each had
undergone major surgery on an organ. She shuddered as she realized that
even in death these were young, attractive women, and that some of the
bodies were hardly a week old. The glint off her little silver penlight
broke her concentration and reminded her that Crystal was out in the
mine somewhere. After retrieving her flashlight, she stepped on the
floor switch sending the room into darkness, as though the bodies had
never existed.

It was easy to follow
Crystal, even with the dim penlight. Instead of going back the way
they’d come, she’d continued up the tunnel leaving footprints. As Claire
followed her progress down the tunnel, the image of the bodies haunted
her, but instead of blocking them from her mind, she re-examined each
one, until she stopped in her tracks and began to count on her fingers.

Each one has a major scar,
she thought holding up one finger, and each one was young, none looked
over twenty-five. Another finger went up. And they were all beautiful,
at least in life. Another finger.

That’s when she made the
connection. My God, she thought, anyone of those women could have been a
porn star and every one of them had been eviscerated.

Claire’s head began to swim
at the realization that these women weren’t murdered for some petty
fracture of a rule, or for money, or an adulterous act. They were all
hired like Crystal and her friend, for a single purpose, and it wasn’t
to perform sex. These women weren’t hired for their youthful beauty, but
for the value of their organs.

“Oh God. When I illuminated the room with my penlight Crystal must have seen her friend,” she said in a whisper.

She was sickened at what
she’d discovered, then a rush of panic washed over her at the thought of
Crystal running blindly through the mine with no light at all, just the
mental image of her friend’s lifeless body.

Claire looked down the
mineshaft and cupped her hands around her mouth. “Crystal,” she yelled.
Then louder, “Crystal!” Her only answer was a faint echo.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

The inside of the suv
was
like a dark oven. With all the windows tinted except the windshield,
the interior was oppressively hot. Rye’s captors seemed not to notice.
The one called Vince climbed across the folded seats, sat behind the
steering wheel and started the engine.

“Just relax, Mr. Rye. I’m
afraid Lewd and Lascivious is located in a rather rough neighborhood.
Another ten minutes and somebody might steal my tires.”

Rye was surprised that the
mob—he was sure these guys were mob—would have a problem with looters.
At first he tried to count the times the SUV turned a corner, but he
lost track. Then he attempted to establish landmarks through the
windshield, but from the back all he could see was sky and the
occasional top of a telephone pole. He finally squirmed into the back
corner of the SUV and settled in for the ride.

“I know what you’re thinking,
Mr. Rye, that we’re taking you for a ride. Well, you’re right.” His
captor began to laugh. “Dude, you been watchin’ too many movies. We’re
driving to a safe location where we won’t be disturbed.”

The big man began to talk
about his sick father as though he were telling a fairy tale to a child.
The tone of his voice changed, but he showed no emotion.

“My ol’ man died and the
doctor said it was the transplanted liver. Contaminated. In such bad
shape, even if he had survived the operation he wouldn’t have lived out
the day.”

Rye figured he had nothing to lose and maybe, if he could get this guy talking, it might somehow aid in his release…or escape.

“How did you figure it was Lewd and Lascivious?” Rye asked.

“Same as you. Off the label
of one of their tapes. When I picked up the liver, it was in an ice
chest in a cardboard box. Vince here delivered the ice chest to the
doctor and said he found a couple videotapes inside it. I watched one.
It was pretty good—for porn. Then I get a call that my papa’s dead and
that the liver was no good. I shoulda known sumpin’ was rotten. The
bitch what made the delivery was really up tight, nervous even. Wouldn’t
let me look at the liver.”

Rye adjusted his sitting
position so he was leaning against the back door; the move wasn’t lost
on his captors. As long as they thought that he could help them find the
woman who sold them the liver, Rye figured they’d keep him alive.

“So, how can I help you find the woman?” Rye said.

Vince handed the other guy Rye’s wallet he’d removed during the pat down.

“Well, Mr. Rye, I see that
you do have a last name.” He paused to read the driver’s license. “Now I
know where you live. Both of us want the same thing, so I’ll give you
three days, then I’ll contact you. If you come through with the details I
want, you never see me again.”

They drove to an empty lot,
gave Rye directions for finding his car and a number he was to call with
information. Vince leaned over Rye and opened the back doors. Rock was
waiting.

It felt good to stand up, and
as he stood up straight, he turned to face his captor. Rock smiled and
snapped off a kick catching Rye in the groin. “No offense, Mr. Rye. You
know, an eye for an eye and all that.”

Rye lay curled in a fetal position trying to look up at Rock.

“Good hunting, Mr. Rye. I’ll be waiting for your call.”

When he caught his breath and knew he wouldn’t puke, he stood up again, slowly. The SUV was gone.

Three hours later, Rye was
experiencing the most uncomfortable ride of his life, pondering all that
had happened from the coach seat of a 737 headed north. Another three
hours and he was home reading the note Claire left him.

“Hello, uh, this is Rye”

The voice on the other end of the phone came alive with recognition, much to Rye’s relief.

“Mr. Rye, glad to hear from you, I didn’t expect to get a call so soon. What can you tell me?”

“20415 Pericolo Lane, Denton Beach, Oregon.”

“How did you get this information?”

“I didn’t, my wife did.
Apparently she traced the license plate number from the van I saw the
blonde get into. There’s just one thing, my wife is already there.”

Rye was clenching and
unclenching his fist, his mind filling with B-footage from a gangster
movie where mobsters sprayed a room with bullets killing everyone in
order to get revenge on just one person.

“Rest assured that your wife
will probably not be hobnobbing’ with the same people we’ll be doin’
business with. But I suggest that you get up there as soon as possible
and get her out. Is there anything else you want to tell me, Mr. Rye?”

“No nothing. Ah, maybe yes there is. I want to wish you good luck; these people are scum.”

“Yeah, we know that. Thanks. Good-bye, Mr. Rye.”

He stood holding the phone to his ear for a minute, listening to the dial tone.

Rye stepped to the door of
the garage looking at his VW bus and the ambulance, thinking of the
four-hour drive to Denton Beach. It was the image of Vince and Rock
getting there first that made up his mind. Twenty minutes later, he was
heading north on I-5, doing ninety, sirens and lights howling and
spinning.

Chapter Twenty Nine

Rosie brooded as she drove
through
the Marin headlands, her midnight transaction already out of mind.
Moonless night drives often triggered her mood swings. This time it was
the argument she had with Simms about bringing in the South American
black market contingency, how he was sure it was too soon for such a big
move. She was deep in thought when an SUV traveling at about twice her
speed, tailgating her with highbeams glaring, honked. She quickly moved
into the slow lane, shoving a fist out the window with one finger
extended.

She was still fuming over her
argument with Simms. Granted, she’d arranged for the visit without
first consulting him, but she figured this way he had no choice. If
she’d talked to him first it would have been a flat out no.

“What do you mean he wants to
visit the facility … and bring what, five, ten, fifteen people?” Simms
had said. “C’mon, Rosie, you know how it has to be.” He spun in his
chair to the right and pulled open the top drawer and extracted a day
planner. “You know it’s an issue of security.” He laid the planner on
the desk blotter, and then pulled up the calendar on his computer. “It
could jeopardize everything, plus we have a new group of women coming.”
He looked from his computer to the day planner. “In five days, we’ll be
swamped. Taping the operations, I control what they see.”

Rosie sat stonefaced, letting
Simms rant. She ran a thumb inside her blouse adjusting her bra,
uncrossed and re-crossed her legs.

“I’m afraid you don’t have a
choice, I’ve already made the arrangements. Peter, these men represent
most of the South American organ black market. This could mean
millions.”

“It could also mean the end,”
Simms dropped his day planner in the drawer and slammed it shut. “Look
what happened with Mason. You recruited him and he almost ruined
everything.”

Rosie was quickly losing her
composure and began to raise her voice. “But he didn’t, did he? And he
became a donor and got the mob off your back.”

Simms suddenly grew pale. “God, don’t tell me you gave them his liver.”

“What does it matter?”

“You were supposed to bring
up that Italian stallion so Clouse could pull his liver for them. Look,
maybe you’re right and it doesn’t matter, and they can’t track us down.
That’s not the point. I can’t trust you, anymore. You recruited Mason
without consulting me and he nearly gave us away. What’d you do, recruit
him with a good fuck? If it weren’t for me you’d just be a nymphomaniac
running a pornographic film company so you could fuck all the actors.
And the actresses for all I know. Shit.”

Rosie stood, placing both
hands on the desk. “That’s not fair, you know about my condition.
Sometimes I can’t help myself. Besides, you’re nothing but a doctor who
lost his license for fondling a patient. My film company gave you the
chance to step back into the operating room.”

Now Simms was on his feet. “You need me, Rosie. Anybody can do pornography but where are you going to find another surgeon?”

“You get more for one
extraction than you made in the first five years of medical practice,”
Rosie yelled. She spun on her heel and marched out of the room. Just
past the door, she turned and leaned on the door jam.

“Oh, and Peter, Cecil Vinci
and his contingent will arrive tomorrow evening expecting to sit in on
the extraction of a liver … don’t disappoint him!”