“I don’t need that,” I said, still trying to puzzle out what she meant.
“You will. You think you know, but you don’t. You have no idea what you’re headed into.”
“It’s an auction—”
“Of children, Lincoln. I know you think you’re this big tough, can deal with anything guy. But I’m telling you. You don’t know. Slave auctions are one thing, but these men and women are purchasing stolen children for sexual pleasure. They do things to these kids.”
Wren grabbed my chin when my eyes drifted away. “Listen to me, Lincoln. Keep your guard up. Keep yourself detached. Don’t try to rescue anyone, and don’t try to buy anything.”
“It’s just—”
She made a disgusted noise and pushed me away. “It’s not just anything. Get going. Remember what I just said. We’ll talk when you come back.”
In that next heartbeat, it was clear she wanted to give me a kiss on the cheek, but held herself back. I also wanted to smirk—so she did find me attractive. But she didn’t kiss me and I didn’t allow the smirk out. Nothing happened.
Vance was waiting at the door for me as I turned and marched out of the room. He had all the doors and elevators timed to take me out of the apartment and out into the car.
The location pinged on my phone through the messages app. They were insane about their security, and we hadn’t been told where we would be going until just now—just as we were leaving to wait in the car for their message.
“I can’t believe you’re still after this woman,” Vance grumbled as he slammed his driver’s door.
“I want her.”
He glanced at me in the rearview. “Are you kidding? She just literally threatened your life for fucking around with her. Why do you think pursuing her is a good idea at all?”
“I like things I can’t have, you know that,” I answered.
He put the car in drive and pulled away from the curb. “This isn’t things you can’t have, Lincoln. This is a woman, who has a lover, and will soon have a daughter. You can’t just interject yourself into her life.”
I leaned back and smiled at him. “Didn’t you hear what she said? I have to convince Fischer.”
“Why are you so hellbent on this? She’s sending you into the lion’s den with that. You think he won’t tear you limb from limb for asking to fuck his girlfriend?”
Turning my head, I watched the city go by outside the car. Why was I so hellbent on this? The woman was clearly smitten with Fischer Skillman and I didn’t blame her. I thought him beautiful too, but I could tell he didn’t tip the scales in my direction. He was smart, and he was dedicated.
And I was still driven toward Wren like a pole in a pile driver. It didn’t make sense. She would fall into my illegal category.
“I don’t know if I want to just fuck her, Vance,” I said. “She’s…magnetic.”
“She’s in a relationship, Linc.”
“And I can’t be part of that?”
The words spilled out before I could stop them and shocked the complete shit out of me. Vance too, by the deathly pale look on his face.
“Linc…”
I didn’t know what to do. Did I want to be pissed I didn’t get to her first? Did I want to punch something because she wouldn’t let me in? Did I want to scream she was mine and I would do anything to spend time with her?
The image that ripped through my head when she shook my hand in my office flickered through again.
Wren hadn’t reacted to the images at all, so I figured it had been an undigested bit of beef, a blob of mustard, a crumb of cheese, to borrow from Charles Dickens. I wasn’t convinced she didn’t see it—the sensation of sharing had nearly overwhelmed me along with the vision. She had flinched at my touch, but I couldn’t prove anything. She had been too convincing in her denial.
Still the images that had flashed through there were compelling. Standing next to Wren, clearly allied with Fischer, all of us holding flaming goddamn swords felt right. It wasn’t some weird Dungeons and Dragons fantasy, either. It was right and it had been real.
Had been?
I scrubbed a hand down my face. “This is fucking ridiculous,” I snapped.
“You’re telling me?”
We drove on in silence for a few minutes, and I stared out at the lights flickering as we headed down the Vine.
“Linc?”
Looking up I found Vance’s eyes in the rearview.
“Don’t do this, man. Don’t go after her. If you really think you want her that much, you’ll respect what she has already and leave it alone. You’re an upstanding person, Linc, even if you do come off as an asshole sometimes. You don’t do things like this.”
“I know.” It was all I could manage.
Pushing everything out of my mind about who and what Wren was to me, I focused on the task ahead. There was a pipeline of child sex slaves I had to focus on, and figure out how to finally rupture for good.
The car traveled out past the zoo, further and further out on the Schuykill, out to the Turnpike beyond King of Prussia to a crappy looking warehouse closer to Reading than the rest of civilization.
It was an old, old building that looked like it could fall at any moment. The front of the building had a keystone set in it, with the date 1870, and it looked it. Something told me there was more going on.
Vance nodded as he pulled the car into a spot next to another Town Car. I took a moment to straighten my tie and jacket, make myself look more professional and presentable.
For a children’s auction.
This was foul.
“I’m not keen on this, Lincoln,” Vance said once we were out of the car and heading for the warehouse.
“We’re here to find out things. Where they get the kids, who buys them, where they live. Connect the dots of who’s who in this mess. I don’t want to be here either, but it’s important. You know my thing about illegal.”
“Yeah, boss, I do.” He snorted.
“Good. So we’re just on the listen and observe plan here. I think this will be over in about an hour, and we can head home and report. Start working on a plan.”
“You got it, boss.”
“You going to call me that all night?”
“You know it, boss.”
“Fuck.”
Wren was right.
I was not ready for this. I would never be ready for what I was seeing here. It was utterly destroying me.
The large plush chair I was sitting in held me still, and I was grateful for that. Else, everyone around me would have seen my entire body trembling—either from rage or fear or disgust or just from being overwhelmed.
We’d almost booked it when I saw the first pet.
Pet.
A fourteen year old girl wearing a leather collar and a heavy chain that bent her head. Her leash was held by her master’s manservant. She was barely dressed—no, she wasn’t dressed at all. Her small pubescent breasts were bared and she was wearing nothing more than a small skirt. I was sure there was nothing under it. She had on tall lace boots with stiletto heels. She was on her knees, sitting back on her ankles, hands folded on her lap. She was…blank. There was no one there.
Christ.
And that was just the start. There were fully dressed, fully naked, pierced, tattooed, scarred, burned, whipped, cut—one small boy, probably not all of ten years old, had his genitals in a CBT device.
Who the fuck did that to a child?
I was introduced as Mister Castor, and was paraded around to all the different men and women who were there, both with and without their pets.
There were passed canapes.
There were butlers with champagne flutes.
There were glossy fucking brochures about the kids to be auctioned.
Vance held onto the last one. I flipped a hand and allowed him to page through, trying to give the impression he was to look for something I might like.
It was hard for him to disguise his disgust, too.
Almost an hour went by in casual conversation, laughing, enjoying each other’s company. The canapes were gone, the wine was flowing and finally someone called all of us to the main event.
Vance handed me a slip of paper. “You’ve been assigned a seat. I made it clear you weren’t buying tonight, so it’s a little back from the main area.”
I didn’t answer him. I was too afraid I might puke if I did say anything. Instead, I just nodded and followed the groups of men and women into the auction.
A crappy asshole who went by the name of Mr. Kelly walked in next to me with a shit eating grin and a twelve year old following him on a leash.
He was decent enough to allow the boy to walk.
“I’m hoping to find my little pet here a companion. I do so want to watch them entertain each other.”
“That sounds like a fine idea,” I answered, wanting to hang myself for the comment.
“Command performances.” He nodded, eyeballing the stage in the center. “I saw several young women in the catalogue that would do just fine for Antonio.” He tapped his copy of the handout. “Remember, there are burn barrels on the way out for your man to drop these in. Nothing printed leaves!”
He walked off, the young boy in tow, to a chair much, much closer to the stage than mine was. As soon as I was seated, I motioned Vance down.
“Make sure we can get one of those catalogues out of here, even if you have to strap it to your leg.”
“You got it, boss,” he answered.
A young girl, no older that ten, walked up to me and offered me a drink off the tray she was carrying. Her eyes were dead like so many others in this place. I accepted and she moved on.
The chair was comfortable. That was the best thing I had to say about any of this.
Mr. Frankford—one of the men I recognized from my day to day life—came to stand next to me as everyone shuffled around.
“Mister Castor, if you’re interested in actually purchasing at our next event, I’d be happy to lend you one of my boys or girls so you can get a feel for what you really enjoy.”
“Thank you, Mr. Frankford, but I have a good idea of what I like and don’t like.”
“I have to admit, Mr. Castor, I never thought you’d be the purchasing kind. You seemed too…flighty and undecided.”
I grimaced. He knew me too. This was now going to have continue outside this house of horrors. “I need something to tide me over when things are too insane at work. Needs and all that.”
“Indeed.” He grinned.
I realized I had an opportunity to ask a real question at that moment. “I wonder…” I began, and glanced around the room. “Will all the lots be sold this evening?”
“Not likely,” Frankford answered.
“So if I like one and they aren’t sold, I have a chance to purchase at a later date?”
“It’s a risk.”
Sipping the wine, I nodded. “I see. What happens with the unsold lots, then? I would imagine they would be eager to disabuse themselves of the merchandise.
“Usually, they are. They are moved into the rental program.”
Pretending to think for a moment, I let the silence linger. I knew he wouldn’t leave until I dismissed him. “So I would reach out to whom for purchase later?”
“First the organizer here, and then you’d have to talk to Madame Juniata. She would know whether they were disposed or moved to the rental.”
Vance choked on the air. I nearly did as well. He covered well.
“Disposal? That seems like a waste of good money,” I managed.
“Some just aren’t worth the effort to train. Too wild, too opinionated, too old, not what’s in demand. But there are a few who can be useful even if they aren’t purchased. Madame Juniata handles those now. She’ll break them and send them into the stable.”
“So if one catches my eye, I can speak to her about perhaps reserving them?”
“No reservations, Mr. Castor. Never. They are either bought, sent to rental, or disposed. There is nothing else. You might be able to convince her to sell one out of the rental stable, but no promises.”
My eyes flicked around the room, and I nodded once. “Understood.”
The lights flicked once and Frankford stepped back. “Enjoy the show, Mr. Castor.”
“You as well, Mr. Frankford.”
Tugging on the leash of the pet he’d brought, he walked toward his own seat. The pet, a teenage boy he’d castrated, crawled along behind him.
I was not ready.
Someone, somewhere tapped a gavel on a podium. I could finally make out the outline of someone standing in the corner behind one after I squinted a bit. The entire room settled in seconds of the tap, and the lights were turned down.
“Thank you for coming this evening, ladies and gentlemen. We’re ready to begin our auction. Please take your seats, and remember there is no discussion during the auction.”
It took a moment for all the people to settle, and then the lights came up. They focused, blindingly, on the stage. It was hard to see anything else save for that space and it was totally on purpose.
“Ladies and gentleman, again, there is no talking, and please use your paddles to bid.”
And then hell really began.
A struggling young boy of seven was pushed into the light and made to stand there.
He had tousled blond hair and watery brown eyes. His face was wet and he was stark naked, showing off his little, non-sexualized body. He was skinny, and pale and I could almost taste his fear in the air.
Vance’s hand squeezed my shoulder and I looked up at him. He was as pale as I knew I was, and just as horrified about what we were seeing.
They would destroy this child, just to fill some perverse desire they had every ability to control—but choose not to.
Instead, they indulged it.
I wanted to kill every single motherfucker in the room.
Vance squeezed my shoulder again. He knew what I was thinking. He was thinking the same thing, but we had to go along. We had to not just rescue one child, but all of them. We had to stop more from becoming victims.
A figure in a chair close to the stage answered the call on the first bid, and he eventually won—for a staggering amount of money.
The next was a young girl, no more than ten, weeping and trembling. Another man in the back answered the first bid and she went for another staggering amount of money.
Next, a teenage boy, trained and wearing a collar. Not castrated, dead eyes.
He was won by Frankford, for another staggering sum.
I ordered a double scotch neat.
I wasn’t ready for this.
I knew Frankford. I knew who he was outside this place, outside this house of perversion. I knew his name, his wife, his children. I’d seem him smile at a banquet, clap for his daughter’s recital, kiss his wife, high-five his son.
And he had just bought a teenage boy as fucking sex slave.
Nothing anyone could have told me would have come close to preparing me for this.
The scotch went back in two hard swallows.
“Boss,” Vance warned.
“This does not count.”
“Sip it, boss,” he finished.
Right. That’s why I had brought him along. Calm, cool, collected. Keep me on track.
All thirty of the children were purchased. No one would be disposed of, no one was going into the stable.
I had zero ability to sort out if that was good or bad. I plastered on a curious smile when Vance leaned down and told me it was time to go. He managed to guide me through the crowd to the doors, exchanging pleasantries on the way to make sure we didn’t come off as outsiders.
I sat in the car and he managed to climb into the driver’s seat and pull away. We made it to the first exit on the road back before he had to pull off and have a complete breakdown.
Vance’s face was wet with tears and his body shook with wracking sobs as he stood at the front passenger fender. He wretched,
at least four times, losing everything in his stomach.
Watching him, I was numb.
I had not been ready.
Lily
I didn’t like Paige Domingues.
Not this version of her, anyway.
But, she was dedicated to what she did, and we sat in the car in front of the suburban house in Northeast, waiting for the two patrol cars to show for backup.
She’d been very humble and contrite when she called me for assistance. And since she was one of our major civilian associates, I couldn’t find it in me to turn her request for assistant down.
“The family just hasn’t been answering,” she said, looking at the papers clipped inside her folio. It was her nervous habit. “I just want to let them know that Doctors Skillman and Warner are interested in adopting the boy.”
“Have they ever done this before? Would they have taken him on a vacation without letting you know?”
“They’re a new foster home, but they’ve been amazing to this point. On time, reliable…I was thinking about upgrading them to emergency infant placement. That good. It’s hard to find people you trust with that.”
“Now?” I asked.
She flicked her eyes to the porch with the light on and living room glow beyond. “I need to see Ben before I say anything that might…”
“Incriminate them?” I snapped. “I think they’re doing a fine job of that on their own.”
She looked up and there was a vulnerability there I hadn’t seen in her before. “I am usually an excellent judge of character. I have approved families for foster and adoptions when no one else would because I could see they were right for the job or the kids. So that these people seem to be failing this benchmark hurts me. Right in the heart.”
“Not as much as Skillman and Warner will hurt you if something has happened to Ben.”
“Fuck,” she whispered quietly. “I know.”
Exchange Page 7
