Stalked

4

Of all the agents in the Washington Field Office, what were the chances he’d be paired with Jimmy Drescott? Kyle wondered as the Supervisory Special Agent in charge of the Civil Rights squad introduced them.

Kyle had spent the morning filling out paperwork, before finally making his way into the WFO’s bullpen. It looked a lot like the field office in New York where he’d started his FBI career in counterterror, years before joining the HRT. Really, it resembled any other office building in the DC area. Only this particular office happened to be populated by men and women carrying Glock pistols.

“Mac,” Jimmy said, using the nickname Kyle had been given by the HRT. Jimmy stood slowly as the squad supervisor glanced back and forth between them, having just brought Kyle over to introduce him to his new team.

Apparently he’d just missed the rest of the group—two were testifying in court and the other four were out on a case. So, just Jimmy Drescott waited in the Civil Rights squad’s little corner of the bullpen.

“You two know each other?”

“We’ve met,” Kyle said, holding out his hand. The last time he’d seen Jimmy, the man had been lying under a big fir tree in Evelyn’s front yard, a near-fatal knife wound slicing through his neck.

“You moved out of Violent Crimes?” Kyle asked. That was where Jimmy had been assigned the last time they’d met, working a case that Evelyn had consulted on nine months ago.

Kyle was actually a little surprised Jimmy had stayed in the FBI. He’d lost his partner that night, and he’d almost lost his life.

But here he was, standing in the WFO, a neatly groomed beard covering the ugly scar Kyle knew had to be underneath. Otherwise, he looked pretty much the same, resembling a TV version of an FBI agent with overgelled hair, a nicer suit than most agents could afford on a government salary and his jacket open to display his gun.

“Yep,” Jimmy replied, shaking his hand vigorously, as if they were old friends.

Maybe because the last time they’d seen each other, Kyle had helped save his life.

“I needed a change of pace. I figured a new challenge would be good for me.” He grinned widely, showing off straight, white teeth.

Same old Jimmy apparently. Except maybe amplified, if that was possible.

This was going to be interesting, Kyle thought, but what he said was, “Good to see you.”

“Great,” his new supervisor said, looking frazzled as she glanced at her watch. “Because I have a meeting with the Director in twenty minutes. Since you guys are already friends, Jimmy can get you up to speed on the squad’s open cases.”

She nodded at Jimmy on her way out, and he winked back.

Kyle might have thought they were involved, except he remembered how Jimmy had incessantly flirted with Evelyn when she’d consulted on a case with the young agent. It was pretty nervy to hit on the head of the squad, but he’d never pegged Jimmy as shy or subtle.

“You want to talk me through the details?” Kyle asked, rolling his new desk chair over. It had been nearly four years since he’d worked in a bullpen. Half a day at the WFO and he already felt hemmed in. Already missed the rush of adrenaline as he wrapped his hands around a thick rope dangling out of a hovering helicopter and glided to the ground at Quantico. It’s what his old partner would be doing right now, as practice for future missions.

He could get used to the routines of regular casework again, that standard blend of 90 percent hard work and frustration for the 10 percent payoff when you finally got the excitement of closing a case. He could get used to the jacket and tie instead of the cargoes and T-shirts, staring at a computer screen all day instead of carrying sixty pounds of tactical gear. Or so he’d been telling himself ever since he found out he’d lost his spot on the HRT because of his injury. Maybe one of these days, those words would ring true.

“Don’t get too comfortable, Mac.” Jimmy’s voice interrupted his thoughts.

Kyle glanced up, wondering if Jimmy knew about his own near-death experience, and saw Jimmy was hanging up his phone. “What?”

“We’re heading to the hospital.” Jimmy scooped a pair of car keys off his desk and double-timed it for the door. “Possible human trafficking case.”

Kyle stood and followed a little more slowly. Nine months ago, Jimmy had been bubbling over with rookie enthusiasm. Apparently having a serial killer try to slice through his carotid artery hadn’t dimmed it at all.

“Come on,” Jimmy called after him, and Kyle picked up his pace, shaking his head and wishing he could tone down his new partner’s excitement—or borrow some.

“We’re heading to the Neville University Hospital,” Jimmy said as he got into his FBI-issued sedan and floored it out of the underground lot before Kyle had even buckled in. “The victim is a student there. Cop on the scene said they’re going to move her soon—she’s in bad shape, and they’re not really equipped to handle it—but she was insistent.”

“Insistent about what?”

“She wanted to talk to the FBI. The cop tried to take her statement, but the girl knows her stuff. She told him she was reporting a federal crime and wanted a fed on the case.”

“Is she pre-law?”

“At Neville University?” Jimmy snorted. “Maybe, but they don’t have a law school, so I doubt it. You know what the locals call that place, right?”

“I can guess,” Kyle said as Jimmy spoke over him, his voice keeping pace with the speed of his sedan.

“Nepotism U. It’s a good degree, don’t get me wrong, but if you’re local, getting in there has as much to do with your last name as it does your grade point average.”

“Jeez. Watch where you’re going,” Kyle snapped as Jimmy jumped a curb, then raced onto an on-ramp for the I-395 freeway.

“Come on, man, what good is the siren if you don’t get to use it every once in a while?”

“I don’t think taking a victim statement warrants a siren,” Kyle said, even as Jimmy rolled down the window and slapped it onto his roof.

“Doctors want to move her to a new hospital. I want to get her statement.”

“Next time, I’m driving,” Kyle muttered, then asked, “What about a victim specialist? If we’ve got a possible human trafficking victim—”

“You’re right.” Jimmy tossed his phone over. “Pull up Aliyah Aman. She’s good. Have her meet us there.”

“Sure thing, boss,” Kyle said as he dialed, but Jimmy must have missed his sarcasm, because he didn’t even glance over, just punched down harder on the gas.

Faster than Kyle had expected, even with Jimmy’s racetrack speeds, they were on campus, winding through the cobblestone roads at just above the posted limit. Students started to cross at random spots instead of crosswalks, and jumped back as their sedan didn’t slow. They passed frat houses that resembled castles and an administration building that boasted the kind of intricate architecture that spoke of old money.

“Here we go,” Jimmy said, sliding into a parking spot in front of a more modern building. “The Neville University Hospital. Let’s find out what we’ve got.”

Kyle grabbed his arm before Jimmy could get out of the car. “The victim specialist is still twenty minutes out.”

“Fine. Let’s at least see if the cop is even right or if we’ve got a totally different situation. If we need to wait to question her, we’ll wait.”

He couldn’t argue with that logic. Dropping Jimmy’s arm, Kyle followed him inside.

The smell hit him first, that antiseptic scent mixed with stale air and sickness. It took him instantly back to a month earlier, when he’d woken up in a hospital in California, pain in his shoulder and numbness in his arm. As the room had come into focus, he’d seen Evelyn first, looking panicked in the chair at his bedside. Then he’d seen his partner on the other side, and the expression on Gabe’s face had told him instantly. He was hurt badly enough to put his whole career in question.

Pushing the memory aside, he glanced around the much smaller hospital he was standing in now. The emergency department was bustling, but most of the people in the waiting room looked bored rather than in distress. Staff behind the counter gossiped as he and Jimmy approached and showed their credentials.

“We’re here to speak with Tonya Klein,” Jimmy said, flashing a big smile at the college-age student behind the desk.

“Is that a real badge?” the girl replied, her eyes widening as she glanced from Jimmy to Kyle.

“It is,” Kyle said. “Can you take us to Tonya? We need to speak with her.”

“Of course, sure,” the girl replied, flustered as she led them down the hall, through a few doorways and toward a room with a police officer sitting on a chair outside.

The officer looked little older than the students he was supposed to protect. He stood slowly as they approached, scowling enough to make the girl back up as she gestured to the room, telling them, “That’s Tonya’s room. The doctor thinks she might need to go to the Inova Fairfax Hospital. She’s real beat up.”

She continued backing away as the officer thrust out a hand, which Jimmy shook.

“I’m with campus police,” the officer said. “I took the call. I tried to take her statement, but all she’d do was demand you guys.” His face flushed an angry red as he continued, “Didn’t matter how much I explained the law to her. She thought she knew better, little bi—”

“She said she was the victim of human trafficking?” Jimmy pulled his hand free, which seemed to take real effort.

The officer huffed an ugly sound through his nose. “Yeah, but it’s pretty obvious what’s really going on.”

“And that would be...” Kyle stepped forward, getting in the guy’s personal space a little, pissed off by his attitude.

The officer’s attention shifted to him, and Kyle could actually see him trying to decide which of them would win in a fight. He figured he’d won when the guy stepped back and muttered, “She’s just a prostitute. Probably got beat up by her pimp.”

“You get much prostitution at Neville?” Jimmy asked.

The officer’s scowl returned. “On campus? No. But there are slums close by. She could have wandered in.”

“I thought she was a student at Neville?” Kyle asked.

“Yeah, well, maybe tuition was a little much for her. I’ll let you guys take it from here,” he said, animosity pouring from him as he strode away.

“Now there’s a guy I’d hire to protect a campus full of college students,” Jimmy said, rolling his eyes as he pushed the door open to the hospital room.

Kyle almost walked into his back as Jimmy stopped short right inside the doorway.

Jimmy’s mocking tone was gone, replaced with a softer, more subdued voice as he said, “Tonya Klein? I’m Special Agent Jimmy Drescott with the FBI’s Civil Rights squad.” He moved over a little and added, “This is my partner, Kyle McKenzie.”

The woman staring back at him could only do so through one pale blue eye, webbed with red from a burst blood vessel. The other was swollen completely shut, and dark purple. Her cheek was swollen, too, and covered with a bandage. Blood still caked her hairline, where her long dark hair had been shaved so a doctor could sew up the kind of cut that might have come from a broken bottle. Her hands, resting on the stark white sheet, were bloody and bruised, a few fingers splinted. Defensive wounds.

Whoever had attacked her, one thing was certain: Tonya Klein had fought back hard.

Good for you, Kyle thought. Regardless of what her story was—whether she was truly a human trafficking victim or if she’d been pulled into prostitution some other way—both pimps and traffickers knew how to make it hard for anyone to get out. Most of them gave up, learned to take the beatings and other abuse, just to survive.

“Thanks for coming,” she croaked in a tone that had Kyle looking at her neck.

As she lifted her head, he saw it. More bruising, this time on her neck, and it explained not only her voice but also the damage to her eye. Strangulation victims often showed hemorrhaging to the eyes. And he could actually see the darker spots in the bruises above her collarbone where fingers had pressed in.

This hadn’t been the kind of beating meant to teach a lesson. Someone had wanted Tonya Klein dead.

He caught Jimmy’s eye and the younger agent nodded, then told Tonya, “We have a specialist on the way. Her job is to make sure you have all the resources you need. We can wait for her to get here before we start—”

“No,” Tonya barked, and Kyle tried not to cringe at the cracks in her voice.

It was painful to listen to her talk. He couldn’t imagine how badly it hurt to do it.

“Do you want us to wait for a family member to come and sit with you?” Jimmy asked.

“No. They’re all back in Alabama. It’s too hard for them to get up here.”

“Do you want to try to write it down?” Kyle asked.

“No. I just want to tell you, before...” She cut herself off, then began again, keeping her attention firmly on the sheet as she spoke, her voice flat and emotionless. “I was trying to get out. They’d warned me about what would happen, but I couldn’t take it anymore. I tried to go to the police. But they came after me and...” Her hands fluttered into the air, revealing more bruises snaking up her arms. “They said there was only one way out. And that was a body bag.”

Her voice was flat as she said it, as though she’d heard similar threats often enough that it hadn’t surprised her. Or—a cynical agent who’d heard it all before might think—as though she couldn’t generate real emotion because she was making that part up.

“Okay.” Kyle eased himself into a seat next to the bed, careful to keep his distance as he took out a notepad. “Is it all right if I sit here?”

She gave a small nod.

This was an intense reentry to regular casework. When he’d worked counterterror, he’d seen some human trafficking—it was a common way to fund terrorist operations—but he’d never been the one sitting in a hospital room, taking victim statements.

Jimmy pulled up a seat on the other side of her bed as he asked, “Do you know who attacked you?”

She shook her head, cringing and clutching her side with her splinted fingers.

“How many people attacked you?” Kyle asked. “Would you be able to describe them?”

“They wore ski masks. There were two of them, but I don’t know who they were.”

“Okay. Could you tell if they were male or—”

“Yeah, they were men,” Tonya interrupted. “Not even all that big, either, but they could hit.”

“Did they say anything to you?” Jimmy asked.

She shrugged, a short jerk of her shoulders that made pain flash in her eye. “Just what I told you. About how there was no getting out.”

“Do you remember the exact words?”

“He said, ‘We warned you about trying to leave. There’s only one way out, and that’s a body bag.’ And then they started punching. I swore to myself that it didn’t matter what it took, that I was finished. But I knew they were going to kill me in that alley and...” Her voice broke. “I told them I’d come back—I begged—and they said it was too late. And then one of them hit me with a bottle that was lying in the alley. I passed out after that. I’m not sure what happened, if they just thought they’d killed me or—”

“Two students saw you. They scared off your attackers and called 911,” Jimmy said.

“Now what?” Tonya asked. “Because I read where sex trafficking victims can be protected, that the FBI will go after whoever is behind it.”

“That’s right,” Kyle said slowly, glancing at Jimmy across the bed. He could see the skepticism in Jimmy’s face, and he tried to keep an open mind. Nothing about this suggested human trafficking yet, but colleges were the new recruiting grounds, so he wasn’t ruling anything out.

“Let’s backtrack a little bit,” Jimmy said. “To before today’s attack. What can you tell us about your situation, about the people threatening you?”

“I...” She shook her head, her hand tightening against her side as she looked at the bed instead of them. “I don’t know who they are. I got an email at first.” She flushed, then said, more quickly, “There was a video attached. A video of me and it was...”

When she didn’t finish, Jimmy asked, “A sex video?”

“Yeah. But I didn’t take it. I never would have slept with the guy if I knew he was taping it. The email said it would go out to everyone I knew if I didn’t show up at this warehouse outside of town. I didn’t know what to do. I thought about going to the police, but I didn’t want anyone to see the video. But I was thinking about it, anyway, when I realized the email was gone. I don’t know what happened to it. I didn’t delete it, but it just wasn’t there anymore.”

“There are programs that can delete an email after it’s been viewed,” Jimmy said, frowning as he jotted notes.

“So I had nothing, no proof, and I figured the police wouldn’t believe me if I just went to them and said the email had disappeared. But they still had the video, so I went to the meeting. I thought they were going to ask for money—not that I had any—but they didn’t. There were a couple of guys there and they made me...” She trailed off, then whispered, “It might have been the same two who attacked me today—their voices were familiar, but I can’t be sure. Anyway, when I got back to my dorm, there was an envelope under my door. There were pictures of my family inside, from when they came with me to orientation and the special scholarship luncheon—I’m a scholarship student. I can’t afford this place. Even with the scholarship, I had two jobs. Anyway, after that, I just did what they told me.”

“Were there threats against your family?” Kyle asked.

“Not specifically,” Tonya said. “But they didn’t need to say it. They knew who my family was! I wasn’t going to risk it.”

“Did you try to go to the police before now?” Jimmy asked.

“No. I quit my jobs—the other thing in the envelope was instructions. They told me to stop working, and there was some money to cover my next tuition payment, so I did. I wasn’t supposed to tell anyone. They said they were watching all the time.”

“Do you still have the envelope?” Kyle asked.

She shook her head, looking up at him for the first time since she’d started telling her story. “No. They said to destroy it, and I was scared they’d know if I didn’t.”

“Okay,” Kyle said, subtly glancing at his watch and wondering where the victim specialist was. “Can you tell me who you were sleeping with in the tape? And how long ago did this happen?”

“It was—” She cut herself off, suddenly lurching forward, clutching harder at her side.

“Are you all right?” Jimmy asked. “Do you want me to get a doc—”

“No, I’m okay,” Tonya said, leaning back against the pillow. But just as fast, she jerked forward again and her heart monitor went off.

It took so long for anyone to respond that Kyle almost ran out to get them, but finally a pair of nurses came in, and pushed him and Jimmy out of the room.

As they stood in the hallway waiting, Jimmy asked, “What do you think?”

“I don’t know,” Kyle admitted. “It’s pretty obvious someone tried to kill her. But as for why? Her story could be true.”

“Or she could be looking for federal protection for some other reason,” Jimmy said. “She admitted looking up information about the FBI providing resources for human trafficking victims.” Before Kyle could agree, he added, “Or she could be a prostitute who wants to get out, but doesn’t want to admit she was ever breaking the law, so she makes up a claim of being forced into it.”

“That’s possible, too,” Kyle said, but the petite college student didn’t seem like a typical prostitute. Still, if her story was true, blackmail was an unusual recruitment method. “We should get more specifics on the warehouse she mentioned,” he said just as a pair of doctors came racing down the hall and into Tonya’s room.

One of the nurses walked out a minute later and told them, “You might want to come back tomorrow. She’s got to go into surgery.”

“What for?” Jimmy asked.

“We suspect she has internal bleeding.” The nurse started to head past them, still jotting notes on her clipboard, and when they didn’t follow, she snapped, “Come on. You’re going to need to move. They’re about to take her up to the surgical floor.”

“All right.” Jimmy pressed his card into her hand. “Have someone give us a call when she’s out of surgery.”

Kyle followed him out of the hospital, Jimmy texting away on his phone. “Aliyah got caught in traffic. I told her to head back and we’d call her when we can come for another interview, but that I think it’s a no-go,” he said.

“You think she’s lying?”

“Not entirely. But it sounds way too amateurish to be a human trafficking setup. Not that it couldn’t work, but there are a lot of potential holes. Not to mention that whoever took the sex tape used to blackmail her had to be involved, meaning there’s a personal connection. If you ask me, this is some kind of revenge scenario. Definitely needs follow-up, but this is probably a case for the local police.” He tucked his phone away and picked up his pace. “Come on. Let’s see if anything else came in while we were here.”

“Sure,” Kyle replied. “But toss me your keys.”

“What for?”

“I’m driving back. And we’re not dropping this so easily. I want to talk to the two students who called 911, and get their side of the story. Whether or not we’re talking about human trafficking, someone tried to kill this girl. And I want to know why.”

5

“Haley’s still alive,” Sophia repeated, staring slack-jawed at the note that had appeared at the station.

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Evelyn said. “We don’t know when this note was written. And we don’t know if Haley was coerced.”

“If it’s legit,” Sophia said grimly as she finally looked up from the note, “then we’ve got a whole different case to investigate.”

“Are we sure someone didn’t just copy Haley’s handwriting?” Quincy asked from over Evelyn’s shoulder.

The three of them were crowded around the note, no one touching it because they didn’t want to add prints—or smear any. Other cops stood at a distance, necks craned as they tried to get a look.

“We can have a handwriting expert at the FBI take a look,” Evelyn said. “They should be able to tell us if it’s Haley’s writing or an imitation. They might even be able to identify signs of coercion, although with a note this short, I don’t know.”

“Really? They can tell coercion from this?” Quincy sounded skeptical as he read the note aloud. “‘Stop looking for me. I’m safe, but I won’t come home for another beating from Stepdaddy. Let me go.’”

“Maybe,” Evelyn replied, then turned to face Sophia. “You know the case best. Does this sound like Haley’s voice to you? Is this how she’d talk? Is that what she called Pete?”

“It is,” Sophia said slowly. “Her friends all referred to him that way, said it’s what Haley called him, in kind of a mocking way. They didn’t get along, but none of her friends thought he was abusive, at least not that they were willing to tell me. But what about the last part? ‘Let me go’? Am I the only one creeped out by that? Shouldn’t it be just ‘leave me alone’? Why ‘let me go’? This is the kind of language people use when they’re waiting to die.”

Her phone beeped and Sophia pulled it out of her pocket, then swore. “Well, let’s push coercion right up the list,” she said, then turned her phone toward them and pushed Play on a video attached to an email that went by too quickly for Evelyn to read.

Bill Cooke’s craggy face filled the screen, pressed close to what was obviously a camera on a home computer. He looked furious, and he was wearing the same clothes he’d been in when they’d stopped by his house earlier in the day.

“My name is Bill Cooke. My daughter, Haley, ran away from home to escape abuse from her stepfather. This bullshit about a stranger stalking her is just that—bullshit. She’s out there somewhere, and I want her to know I understand, and I support her decision.” He’d been staring down during most of the talk, but he suddenly looked up and stared directly, intently, into the camera. “Haley, you do what you need to do, honey.”