Deadly Exchange

by Lisa Harris

  “And you think he could put an end to this?”

  “I think it’s worth trying.”

  Kayla hesitated, still not willing to risk her father’s life by getting someone else involved. “Let’s check out Mercy’s apartment first. If she’s not there, we’ll talk about calling your friend.”

  * * *

  On any other day, Levi would have loved exploring the city. While he’d traveled extensively, Amsterdam had never been one of the cities he’d visited. The canals, old bridges covered with parked bicycles, the tall old houses...

  He glanced at Kayla’s profile as they headed toward the tram, not surprised at all that she’d ended up here working with formerly trafficked women. She’d always been compassionate, with a heart for others. And it seemed that all these years later, that compassion had only grown.

  There was only one thing he wasn’t sure how to handle. If she didn’t agree to get help, he was going to have to consider doing it without her blessing. Because he knew enough about the situation to realize that they were in way over their heads. If they didn’t get support from the authorities, the chances of her father’s abductors making good on their threat rose substantially.

  “Do you think they’re out there watching us?” she asked, rubbing her elbow.

  “It’s possible.”

  They could be anyone. The man standing on the corner carrying a briefcase. The twentysomething sailing past them on a bike. They could be in the crowd watching the street performers or drinking coffee next to the canal. Absolutely anyone could be watching them. Stalking them.

  He stopped beside Kayla in front of a blue-and-white tram; she quickly paid the fare for him, then scanned her ticket in front of a card reader. They headed toward the back of the tram, past blue chairs and a handful of passengers. As far as he could tell, no one was paying attention to them, but there was no way to be sure.

  “Do you have any idea why someone would target Mercy in particular?” he asked as they slid into a couple of empty seats.

  “She never spoke much about her past, though there was a man she mentioned once that she was afraid of. It sounded to me as if he was obsessed with her, but I have no idea who he was or what he looked like. I don’t even have a name.”

  “How long has she been with your program?”

  “She came to us about three months ago, originally from Nigeria. She came to us broken but eventually decided to stay and work with the program.”

  “So you’re one of her mentors.”

  The automated voice on the tram announced their destination.

  “This is our stop.”

  Five minutes later, they entered an apartment building and walked up a steep set of stairs to the third-story apartment. Kayla knocked on the door of number five.

  Nothing.

  “I’m assuming no one’s home. The girls have a class tonight and normally aren’t back until after eight,” she said, knocking again on the door. “I have a key, but I never thought I might have to use it. Not for this.”

  When no one answered the second knock, she pulled the key from her bag and opened the door.

  Kayla froze in the doorway. “Levi...they’ve already been here.”

  Levi stepped into the space behind her. The small living room and kitchen area had been trashed, leaving no doubt that whoever was after Mercy had made it here first.

  “Why would they break in?”

  “I’m assuming the same reason we’re here. Trying to see if they can figure out where Mercy is in case motivating you doesn’t work.” He stepped over a pile of books scattered across the floor. “How many girls live here?”

  “Five. Evi, my co-worker, told me that all the girls are accounted for except Mercy.”

  “And if they had Mercy, they wouldn’t need your father.” He stood in the middle of the room, not wanting to touch anything in case they decided to get the police involved. “I know this is tough, but you’re doing some incredible things with these women. Don’t forget that despite everything that’s going on.”

  She shot him a half smile. “I won’t, but this...this is a reminder that these women had become nothing more than commodities.”

  “Why don’t they just go to the police themselves?” he asked.

  “Because prostitution is legal here, they are given contracts, but then they have to pay them back and the terms are impossible.” She caught his gaze. “The girl that was recently found dead? She was convinced she couldn’t go to the police because they weren’t to be trusted and nothing we said could change that. I don’t want that to happen to Mercy.”

  He followed her as she walked through the living room toward one of the bedrooms.

  “This is Mercy’s room,” Kayla said. “She shares it with one of the other girls.”

  A couple of the dresser drawers weren’t completely shut. There was a pile of clothes on the floor between the two twin beds, and the closet clearly had been gone through.

  “Mercy doesn’t have a lot of things, so while I’m not 100 percent sure, it looks to me like she left in a hurry. Her suitcase is gone, along with her toothbrush and other personal things.” Kayla turned to Levi. “She had to have known someone was after her. And when they couldn’t find her, they went to plan B.”

  “But why didn’t she call one of you?”

  “I don’t know,” she said.

  “Has she been acting strange? Jumpy?”

  “No...nothing that I noticed.”

  “Where might she have gone if she were scared?”

  “Normally, she would have called me or Evi.”

  “What about other friends in the city?”

  “I don’t think she has many. Most of the girls don’t make friends. They’re slow to trust. That sense of survival isn’t easy for them to shake.”

  “So we have to figure out where she might have gone,” he said. “Because if we do, we’ll have a chance at finding her and your father.”

  The floor creaked above them.

  “What’s up there?” he asked.

  Kayla shook her head. “There’s an attic you can access via a staircase in the back of the house. We’re planning to remodel it and make it into a fourth bedroom eventually, but for now, it’s just used for storage.”

  “Mercy could be hiding up there.” Levi started for the steep staircase. “Or it’s become the perfect hiding place for whoever trashed the apartment.”

  He ran up the stairs, hoping he was wrong and it was Mercy. But Kayla had hinted at what these people could do. As far as he could tell, murder wasn’t just a threat. It was a line they wouldn’t hesitate to cross if they didn’t get what they wanted.

  He stepped off the staircase and onto the attic floor. A figure lunged forward at him, swinging a knife and winging Levi’s upper arm in the process. He took a step back, knowing he had to assume that the intruder wanted to kill him. He could see it in his eyes. Hand-to-hand combat had completely different rules from a shoot-out, and he had no weapon. And while the best defense might be to run, he wasn’t going to risk Kayla’s life in the process. His only option at the moment was to subdue the intruder.

  The man faced him from the center of the dusty attic that contained a few dozen boxes, mattresses and a few pieces of furniture. He was taller by a good three to four inches and at least twenty pounds heavier, giving Levi another disadvantage.

  There was no time to think, only to avoid the man’s next lunge. Levi ducked to miss the move, but from the determined look on the man’s face it seemed clear he hadn’t expected them to show up. With the only option to fight or lead the intruder into a possible encounter with Kayla, Levi grabbed a small coffee table, braced it in front of himself and charged.

  Four

  Kayla hesitated as Levi disappeared up the staircase ahead of her toward the attic. Maybe she’d made the wrong call insisting
they didn’t alert the authorities, because they clearly needed all the help they could get. Her father’s life depended on it. But on the other hand, they had legitimate reasons for following the orders of her father’s abductors. She knew enough about the men who had trafficked Mercy to know they weren’t people to cross and they weren’t afraid to follow through with threats. She’d seen firsthand what people like them did to their victims.

  And now she was seeing their destructive lifestyle affect her own family all over again.

  God, please... I can’t let them hurt my father.

  She drew in a sharp breath and squeezed her eyes shut for a second, willing the dark memories to disappear. Authorities had found her sister in a filthy room, draped across the bed. Fifteen years old and her life had ended by those who’d forced her into the sex trade.

  And now, if they didn’t stop them this time, Mercy could end up being yet another victim. She wasn’t going to let this happen.

  Someone shouted from the attic above. Glass shattered. Shoving aside her fears, she drew in a deep breath and took the stairs two at a time, trying to calm the terror racing through her.

  Seconds later, she stepped onto the cluttered attic floor. The intruder stood ten steps in front of her, swinging at Levi with a knife. She watched the blade slice down Levi’s arm. A trail of red followed. She fought to catch her breath. They had no weapons. No easy way to stop this man. But she had to do something.

  “Levi?”

  “Kayla...get out of here. Now.”

  She heard his words but kept searching for a weapon. Ducking under one of the wooden beams running the length of the room, she grabbed a broken chair, picked it up, then ran forward and slammed it into the man’s side. Pushing away the chair, he lunged at her with the knife. But the distraction had been enough. Levi moved closer to the man, disarming him in one fluid motion.

  The man wasn’t finished. He swung around in the small space. Kayla turned to avoid him, but she wasn’t fast enough as he ran into her, knocking her into one of the low ceiling beams. She heard Levi shout as stars exploded into the darkness around her.

  “Kayla?”

  She couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t move. She forced her eyes open. She needed to get up. She could hear someone tearing down the stairs. They needed to go after him and find out who he was. Find out why he was in the girls’ apartment.

  “Levi?”

  “Kayla...Kayla, I’m right here. Can you open your eyes?”

  She groaned softly as her eyes blinked open. Levi hovered over her, fear clear in his eyes. He should be running after the man.

  “He’s getting away.”

  “It doesn’t matter. Are you okay?”

  She mentally went through her body—arms, legs, torso... The only thing that seemed to hurt was her head. “You always said I owed you for saving my life that day when we encountered that bull. Now I guess I owe you again, but in the meantime, he got away. I’m sorry.”

  “Forget it. I just need to make sure you’re okay.”

  “I’m fine. Really.” She reached up and touched the back of her head, then slowly turned over on her side. “I think I’ll just have a goose egg.”

  He was studying her eyes. She squirmed, far too close to those mesmerizing blue eyes of his.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Checking to see how much damage he did.”

  “I said I was fine.”

  “I’ll be the judge of that. Your pupils seem normal along with your eye movement, and your speech seems normal as well.”

  “Thank you, Dr. Cummings.”

  “Funny, but I’m serious. How’s your vision? Anything blurry?”

  “No, because really, Levi, I’m okay.”

  She breathed in his spicy cologne. Fought the urge to reach up and touch a strand of his blond hair. He was hovering way too close.

  “I need to take you to a doctor—”

  “No,” she said. “I just need a minute or two for my head to clear. Then I’ll stand up.”

  He complied while she looked around the room. The knife lay on the floor a couple feet from where she’d fallen. And that wasn’t all that was there. “What do you think he was doing here?”

  Nothing was making sense anymore.

  He picked up a metal box and opened it. “Looks like spy gear. Audio recorders... And it’s not cheap. Looks like he was planning to do a bit of surveillance if we didn’t come and interrupt things.”

  “Why now?” she asked.

  “Maybe they’re not convinced we can find Mercy ourselves. Maybe they saw this as a backup plan to finding Mercy, by listening to the girls’ conversations.”

  She waited for her head to stop spinning before she let him help her up, once again trying to ignore his nearness. Maybe she just needed some fresh air.

  “I need to find another place for the girls to stay until all of this is over.”

  “What about the knife?” he asked. “It might have fingerprints on it that could lead to whoever’s behind this.”

  “I suggest we report the break-in to the police, but leave out the abduction. At least for now. With my father’s life at stake I don’t want to risk it.”

  He glanced toward the door. “Do you think you can make it back downstairs?”

  She nodded, knowing he was still worried. Knowing he wanted to protect her. But she wasn’t sure he could put an end to what was happening to her this time.

  “You’re hurt as well,” she said once they reached the bottom of the stairs. She reached up and touched his shirt where blood had stained the sleeve.

  “It’s nothing. I’ll clean it up later.”

  She knew he wanted to shrug it off like it really was nothing. She knew he was already trying to figure out their next move. It was how he worked. How he’d served his country. He gathered information and came up with the most logical plan. But this time her father’s life was on the line, and it terrified her.

  And then there was Mercy. Kayla’s entire world was focused on saving these girls.

  He moved to the sink, wet a couple of paper towels and tried to clean up his arm.

  “Stop,” she said, crossing the floor. “You’re just making a bigger mess.”

  She studied the three-inch-long cut, thankful it wasn’t deep enough to need stitches, then ripped off the already torn sleeve to make it easier to clean. “Sorry, but this is going to sting.”

  “You know this is—was—my favorite shirt.”

  “I don’t remember you being so vain.”

  He let out a chuckle, but all she could think about was that at least they were both alive. And that they had to figure out a way to make sure her father and Mercy stayed alive as well.

  “Thankfully the knife barely nicked you. You would have needed stitches if he’d done any more damage, but as it is, I think you’ll be okay as long as I can drum up some antibiotic cream and some sort of bandage.”

  “How’s your head now?”

  “I think I’m feeling clearheaded again.” She glanced at the clock above the kitchen sink. It was already after seven. And they still had no idea where Mercy was.

  She dug around in one of the cabinets. “I remember a first-aid kit... Here it is.”

  She pulled out a strip of gauze, a bandage with some tape and a tube of medicine.

  “What is that?” he asked, pointing to the gel in her hand.

  “The closest Dutch version of Neosporin I’ve found. No antibiotic, but it will help it heal.”

  “I’ll take your word for it.”

  A minute later, she was finished. “So now that you’re patched up, what’s next?”

  “We have to figure out where Mercy would go. Who else does she trust? Where would she run if she was afraid for her life?”

  The handle of the front door rattled. If they were back... />
  * * *

  Levi grabbed the knife out of a wooden block on the kitchen counter, then headed for the front door, wishing he were better armed.

  Seconds later a young woman, tall with dark hair and green eyes, appeared in the doorway with a backpack slung across her shoulder.

  “Levi, wait...” Kayla quickly stepped between him and the girl. “This is Ana. She’s one of the girls who lives here.”

  “Kayla...” Ana glanced around the living room then back to the two of them. “My key got stuck in the door. What...what’s going on?”

  “There was a break-in,” Kayla said.

  Levi followed the girl’s gaze to his scraped-up arm before she spoke. “A break-in? What did they steal?”

  “We don’t think they stole anything. We think they were looking for someone.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Kayla glanced at Levi before answering the question. “Mercy’s missing and someone’s trying to find her.”

  “Missing?” Ana’s face paled as she sank onto the couch, dumping her backpack on the floor. “He’s still looking for her, isn’t he?”

  Levi took a step forward. “Who?”

  Ana shook her head. “I don’t know. I just know that Mercy’s been scared. For a couple weeks now, she’s been screening her calls, leaving at different times every morning to go to work and making sure no one follows her.”

  Kayla sat down beside her. “Why didn’t she tell me? That’s why we’re here. To help. To make sure something like this doesn’t happen.”

  Ana rubbed her palms against the worn couch. “I know, but she was scared and didn’t know what to do. She trusted you, but she was afraid she was imagining things.”

  “And if she was right? If someone was following her?” Kayla asked.

  “She was afraid you would get the police involved.”

  “Why is she afraid of the police?” Levi asked.

  Ana hesitated at the question.

  “It’s okay. He’s here to help,” Kayla said.

  “Where she comes from—where most of us come from—the police are often a part of what’s happening. Everyone takes the money and looks the other way. They are not on your side. That might not be true here, but sometimes...sometimes it’s just easier to run.”