Moon over Maalaea Bay (6 page)

“What do you mean by positive ID?” Ramirez’s voice still sounded condescending, like he was talking to a child.

That pushed Lee over the edge. “Look, you knucklehead! I have a picture of one of the men and the girl who abducted—”

“How did you know about the girl?” The speaker on his phone popped as each word exploded from Ramirez’s mouth. “We didn’t release that information.”

“Bertha Renner told me when I showed her a picture of the man and the girl, the picture I took with my cell.”

“Brandt, you were supposed to be waiting in your room while we—”

“While you what? Solved the case? Maybe now you can. Do you want the picture and the info, or not? If you aren’t going to act on it, I am.” He was on the verge of saying things he would more than just regret, things with immediate consequences.

“I can have you locked up, Brandt. Don’t try playing maverick cop on me.”

“I’m not a cop, Ramirez. But I’ve probably seen more action on big cases over the last nine months than any of your men. If you’re going to try to stop me, you’ll have to catch me first. Is that really how you want to use your resources right now? Besides, I can go to the press with—”

“OK! OK! Tell me what you have.” Ramirez’s voice softened. “I’ll listen.”

Lee took a calming breath, then related what he had overheard at the restaurant. He recounted in detail Bertha Renner’s response to seeing the picture. And he told Ramirez about the residential area the man and the girl headed towards when they disappeared.

When Lee finished, he waited for a response.

Silence again.

Ramirez cleared his throat. “Sounds like we got our first beak in this case.”

“No kidding.” Lee wanted the words back the moment he uttered them. “Sorry, Ramirez. When the person you love more than life is stolen on your wedding night, it can make a person a little—”

“A little crazy?”

“Yeah. A lot crazy. Look…I couldn’t sleep and found an all-night restaurant. I was drinking coffee and just stumbled onto this. Some people might call it luck, but there are people praying for Jennifer. I don’t know how you see it, but I don’t believe my overhearing this conversation was mere coincidence. Now, do you want the picture of the two suspects?”

“Yes. Of course I want it.”

“I can e-mail it to you right now if—”

“Send it. Ramirez at Maui PD dot com. I’ll make sure it gets a speedy distribution. By the way, a tall FBI agent got here a while ago.”

“Peterson?”

“Yeah. As soon as we’re all on the same page here, he said he’d call you. Thought you would want to know.”

“He has my cell number. We’ve worked together on a couple of cases. Is Peterson with you now?”

“He’s somewhere in the building. I’ll fill him in when I see him.”

“OK. I’m going to hang up now, so I can send you the picture.”

****

Ten minutes later, Lee drove northbound on South Kihei Road, debating what he should do next, when his cell rang. He pulled onto the shoulder and opened his cell.

“Lee, this is Peterson.”

“According to Ramirez you’ve been here a while getting up to speed. Speaking of speed, you must have had a lot of that on your way here.”

Peterson gave a half-hearted chuckle. “Like I said earlier, they’re pulling out all of the stops to get Jennifer back.”

Everything pointed to the fact that Peterson was withholding information, information that could help solidify Lee’s plan. “Peterson, Joe Morrison at National Aerospace told me about how badly you wanted to rescue Jennifer last March. How her rescue had priority over mine. With the terrorists after us, she was a major national security concern. This isn’t about—”

“Lee, don’t ask, because I can’t tell you much. Now, I’m going to—”

“This is more than a mission to stop an international human trafficking syndicate, isn’t it?”

No reply.

“Peterson, I’m cleared above Top Secret, and I have a need to know. She’s my wife. If there’s something else going on here, tell me what you can. Please.”

Peterson cleared his throat. “Lee, this isn’t exactly a secure communication channel. But I can tell you this. A foreign government has agents on the island. We think they might make an offer for Jennifer…a much bigger offer than the trafficker’s clients.”

Lee was too stunned to reply. The nightmare grew more frightening with each bit of information he learned.

Peterson continued. “How they knew about Jennifer’s capture, we don’t know. But as they say, birds of a feather—”

“Not birds. You mean slime of the same shade of green.”

“Something like that.” Peterson sighed.

Jennifer’s recent work on cellular- and wireless-intercept analysis was primarily aimed at tracking terrorists. A picture was coming into focus, a dark, ugly picture. Lee’s gut told him the general answer, and the news media had recently provided some of the specifics. He had to ask the question, even if Peterson wouldn’t or couldn’t answer it.

“The foreign government you mentioned…it’s Iran isn’t it?”

Silence.

“You don’t need to answer. Just find her, Peterson. Please. Just find her…soon.”

What these people would want from Jennifer and what they would take from her to get it—he couldn’t let his mind go there.

10

What were they doing to her? The question shot like a lightning bolt from the clouded thoughts in Jennifer’s mind. The cloudy mind and the feelings were familiar. She had been drugged.

Clarity returned more quickly this time. Was that a good thing? Probably not. Her body was developing a tolerance to the drug. She prayed it wouldn’t become a dependence.

Hands under her arms lifted her upper body. “Hurry,” a hissing voice said, “It’s going to be light soon. We’ve got to get her on the boat now.”

Her eyes popped open. She stared into the face of a man who was lifting her legs and gawking at her. Cook. A quick foot stomp would do some serious damage to his face. She was tempted, but she wasn’t a fool. She needed them to view her as helpless and harmless.

Jennifer raised her head. She looked out the open rear door of a van at a large, wooden crate lying on the ground. The crate appeared to be about six feet by—

“No!” she tried to yell, but her voice was muffled by the tape over her mouth. Panic at seeing the box ignited the fuse. Realization that they were carrying her to it, triggered the explosion in her mind.

For some reason her hands were free. She gestured frantically pointing to the box while whipping her head from side to side.

“So you don’t want to take a trip in the box?” Snake hissed. He dropped her upper body onto the floor of the van and pulled out a knife.

She stopped struggling with the man, but tried to pull the tape from her mouth.

“And now you want the tape off.” He grabbed her wrist and pulled her hand from her mouth. “You weren’t supposed to be awake yet, Miss Universe.”

She reached for the tape with her other hand. The knife pressed against her neck. She stopped moving.

“There’s a quick, easy way to do this without using the box. But first, you’ve got to promise me you’ll be absolutely silent if I remove the tape.”

He pricked the skin on her throat with his knife. “You will remain quiet. Are we agreed?”

When he pulled the knife away from her throat, she nodded.

This guy must have taken lessons from Mack. Or perhaps they were both taught by the same master, the father of lies, the original snake.

Snake placed the cold blade against her neck. “Pull off the tape, Cookie. But Miss U needs to keep her head still or she might cut her own throat.”

Cook pulled the tape from her mouth in one long, steady motion that seemed to peel the skin from her lips.

She closed her eyes, unable to stop the tears.

When she opened them, Snake stared into her eyes. It was a cold, deadly stare, like a viper ready to strike. “No talking except to answer my questions. Is that understood?”

“Yes.” She spoke softly through raw, stinging lips.

Snake pulled her into a sitting position on the back of the van.

Jennifer took in as much of her surroundings as she could despite Snake’s body shielding it from view. In the early morning light, she could distinguish the dark silhouette of a building off to the left. It resembled the old Congregational Church in Makena. To the right was water. They must be in Makena.

“Here’s the plan, Miss U.” Snake’s reptilian voice and his lifeless stare made her shiver. “I stand you up, and then I’ll slip behind you. The knife will be against your spinal cord, you know, that bundle of nerves I’m sure you want to keep intact. We’ll walk together down to the water and up the ramp into the boat. Walk normally or you might never walk again.”

The boat landing in Makena—she was certain of their location. But where were they taking her? Was there still an Amber Alert? Was the island locked down? It must be. They were using the semi-darkness to move her.

“Are you ready?”

He used no S-words, but still his voice sounded like a hiss. She needed to forget about his voice, to focus. Her hands were free for the moment, maybe she could use them to—

“I asked you a question.”

Jennifer felt the breath of the hissing voice on her cheek. She pulled her head away from him. “Yes. I’m ready.”

When Snake pulled her to her feet and slipped behind her, Jennifer peered through the dim light of early dawn at a Catamaran near the shore. How deep was the water where the ramp connected to the boat? Deep enough to dive in?

She felt a tug on her belt. Snake’s hand had gripped it. A stinging chill ran up her spine as he pushed the knifepoint into her skin.

“Walk,” he ordered.

Cook led the way, a few feet ahead of her. Snake walked close behind with a firm grip on her belt. She had perhaps thirty seconds to decide what to do, or it would be decided for her.

Jennifer quickly considered her options as they walked towards the water’s edge. If she tried to escape, they would probably hesitate before deciding to kill her. She was worth a lot of money to them alive, nothing if she was dead. If she surprised them, their hesitation might give her time to escape.

She now had twenty seconds at most. To dive into the water she would have to break Snake’s grip on her belt. Could she deliver a foot stomp without forcing the knife into her back in the process? Could she swim underwater far enough to escape? Too many variables in the equation.

Only ten seconds now.

A voice came from the Catamaran. “Hurry up. The tide’s going out. We’ve got less than four feet of water under us.”

She had only five seconds. But it no longer mattered, unless she wanted to break her neck by diving into the shallow water.

Did she want to break her neck? The thought crossed Jennifer’s mind and lodged there as she walked up the ramp to the boat. Knowing the life she would be sold into, could she kill herself if there was no way of escape? It would be wrong. Life and death choices belonged to God. But would God forgive her if she did? She pushed these thoughts from her mind and tried to cling to the hope of rescue or escape.

She thought of Lee, of being his. One thing was non-negotiable. Whatever it took, she would never belong to anyone but him. She would fight them savagely until she prevailed or they decided to kill her.
Please, God. Don’t let it come to that.

As Jennifer stepped onto the boat, out of sight of anyone on the shore, the restraints were again cinched tightly around her wrists and ankles. The tape was returned to her mouth.

The boat moved seaward, and Snake sat beside her prodding her with his knife. He looked up towards the boat’s captain. “We’ve got only fifteen minutes before it’s too light. You need to hurry.”

“I cannot draw too much attention to us.” The words came from a short, bald Asian man who was at the wheel of the boat. “We will be hidden by the yacht when we unload our…cargo. Do not worry.”

In a few minutes, she glanced out the window. Above her she saw the shadowy outline of a much larger vessel against the steadily brightening sky. The yacht. This must be their client’s vessel, the place where they would sell her, and she would begin her life of slavery. Once again she had missed her chance to escape. Possibly her last chance.

11

Lee gazed out the window of the restaurant into the darkness outside. It seemed that he was looking into the part of his heart where hope resided. Six AM. It was still too dark to see beyond the lighted parking lot. He was all out of ideas for his investigation. To burn up his nervous energy, he was spinning his cell in his hand, contemplating calling Ramirez for an update on the investigation.

The phone rang, startling him. He nearly dropped it onto the floor. It had been silent since 3:00 AM when Ramirez called to tell him the police were following several leads but still hadn’t found the men who took Jennifer.

Lee glanced at the caller ID. A local number. His heart sank. He answered but with a lackluster greeting.

“Lee, this is Granddad. Katie and I are at the airport renting a car.”

“I didn’t expect you this soon.”

“We caught a flight that was delayed from earlier in the evening. It saved us two hours. Do you have any more news about Jennifer?”

He looked around the restaurant at the thirty or more customers. His gut told him to keep his voice down and choose his words carefully. “I stumbled onto some information that may give us a break in the case. We haven’t found Jennifer yet, but let’s rendezvous here in Kihei, and I’ll fill you in. I think we need to do some investigating of our own.”

“Katie and I would like that. We need to do something to help after sitting helpless on a plane for six hours. We’re both sick with worry.”

“Do you know where Starbucks on South Kihei Road is located?”

“I know that area. My cousin runs a boat rental at the marina in Kihei a few blocks from there.”

“Meet me there as soon as you can.”

“OK. But first someone here needs to talk to you.”