Mortal Crimes 1

by Various Authors

  “Absolutely.”

  The dog led the way, running ahead, stopping until they caught up, then running ahead again. They were almost to the hangar when Logan shot his hand into his pants pocket and pulled out his phone.

  “Sorry,” he said to Debbie. “This should only take a second.” He pretended to hit a button, then moved the phone to his ear. As he spoke, Roger loped over, and nuzzled his hand. “Hello?….Yeah, I’m here now….What? But I thought….Are you sure that’s what Tom wants?….Okay. Okay. No problem.” He hung up his fake call, grimacing.

  Debbie took a step toward him. “Everything okay?”

  Logan ran his hand over Roger’s head, then said, “Well, no, actually. I’m so embarrassed. My client’s changed his mind, and decided not to go. I feel horrible for having made you come out at this time of night, but it looks like we won’t need a plane in the morning after all.” He closed his eyes for a second. “It’s not the first time he’s done this, so I guess I should have expected it. I’m really sorry.”

  “No, no. Don’t worry about it,” she said. “It happens more often than you’d guess. At least you know about us now. I could still show you the plane, if you’d like.”

  “I’ve taken up too much of your time already. But I guarantee you when the Japan trip comes up, you’ll be at the top of my call list. I owe you that much.”

  “We’d definitely appreciate the business.”

  He let her show him out, gave the dog a final pat, then apologized again as she locked the front door behind them. Not surprisingly, she was parked in the same lot Logan was.

  Logan got into his El Camino, started it up, then pulled out his phone and pretended to be talking again. He didn’t know if he was getting good at it or not, but he did seem to be doing a lot of talking to dead air that night. As Debbie drove by, he gave them a wave, then slipped the phone back in his pocket once they were out of sight.

  Three minutes later, he was sitting at Debbie’s desk, typing in roger1207. In no time, he found the file for the charter flight Elyse was on. Interestingly enough, the client—Mr. Robert Andrews—had stated that he and his associates were escorting the sick daughter of a businessman home. Only home wasn’t Tokyo. That was merely a fuel stop.

  Home was Bangkok, Thailand.

  The country right next door to Burma.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  THE FIRST FLIGHT Logan could fly out on was at 12:55 p.m. on Cathay Pacific. There’d be a plane change in Hong Kong, and by the time he reached Bangkok, it would be nearly midnight the following day. In the best of circumstances, he would be at least fourteen hours behind the people who had Elyse, but he thought it prudent to assume the difference would be closer to sixteen.

  Would that be too late? As much as he tried not to think that way, the thought did keep creeping in.

  His father was true to his word. He and his friends came to Logan’s motel room before he left and gave him an envelope containing five thousand dollars in cash.

  “If you need more,” his dad told him, “just let me know. I expect you to check in every day, too.”

  “Don’t,” Logan said. “I’m not going to stop whatever I might be doing just to let you know what’s going on.”

  “I didn’t mean that, but—”

  “Dad, please. If I can, I’ll call. If I can’t, I won’t.”

  Harp was going to say something else, but Barney put a hand on his shoulder. “Do what you need to do, Logan.”

  Logan nodded his thanks.

  “And just in case,” Barney said, handing him a small bottle. “Sleeping pills for your flight.”

  On the way out, Logan stopped by Tooney’s room. Elyse’s grandfather was sitting on the bed, his packed bag on the floor near the door. As soon as Logan left for the airport, he and the others were all heading back to Cambria.

  “Are you doing okay?” Logan asked, sitting down beside him.

  “I’m happy she’s still alive, but…am still worried.”

  “I’ll…I’ll bring her back.”

  Tooney looked at Logan and tried to smile. “I know you will.”

  Logan patted him on the arm, then stood up. “I gotta go.”

  “Thank you, Logan,” he whispered. “Thank you.”

  Logan didn’t know what to say, so he simply nodded and left.

  Outside, Dev was waiting next to the El Camino, ready to drive Logan to the airport, then take his car back up the coast.

  “Thanks for all the help,” Logan said once they were on the road.

  Dev shrugged like it was no big deal. “I assume you just want us to hold on to everyone?”

  Logan hesitated. “Eventually we’re going to want to turn them over to the police, but I don’t want to do that yet. Let’s see if I can learn anything that can help us out first.”

  “Okay.”

  “That is, unless your people do mind.”

  “They don’t mind.”

  They fell silent for several blocks.

  “Dev, I need to ask you for a little more help,” Logan said. “I’m hoping someone you know might have contacts in Bangkok who can assist me. Probably someone who—”

  He stopped as Dev pulled a piece of paper out of his shirt pocket, and handed it to him.

  “What’s this?”

  “What you just asked for,” Dev said. “A phone number. When you get there, call it.”

  “A friend of yours?”

  “A friend of a friend.”

  Logan hoped he’d say more, but in typical Dev fashion, that was it.

  “So you were expecting me to ask for help,” he said.

  “If you didn’t, I would have given it to you anyway. Tooney’s a good guy. Find his granddaughter, Logan. And if you can, make the ones who took her pay.”

  ________

  Logan wasn’t sure how long after his plane had taken off that he fell asleep, but he knew they hadn’t reached cruising altitude yet. Barney’s pills really worked. By the time Logan woke, he’d been out for seven hours. Which was nice until he realized he still had about another seven to go before the plane was due to land in Hong Kong.

  He filled some of the time by working on his laptop. In the morning before he’d left the motel, he’d received an email from Ruth containing Forbus’s latest information on Burma. Not having time to look at it then, he’d saved it to his hard drive. He’d also found some stuff online about Elyse’s mother, Sein, and saved those to the computer, too. Now that he had nothing else to do, he was able to go through most everything.

  Ruth’s Burma info didn’t really add much to what he already knew. Decades of repression, peppered with occasional bouts of protest that were always put down. The latest had been in the fall of 2007 after the government had raised fuel prices, putting further strain on a population that had very little money in the first place. This time the Buddhist monks in the city of Rangoon had gotten involved, leading the protest until government thugs had put a stop to that. Logan could understand why Sein had such a passion for trying to free the people of her birth country.

  When he’d looked her up online, there had been hundreds of links. Human rights websites, Burma-centric websites, news articles, interviews. There were also several dozen videos of talks she had given, and a couple of television interviews. He hadn’t downloaded everything, but those he did, he watched.

  He was surprised that she didn’t look much different than the girl he remembered from twenty years before, and was impressed by her intelligent, matter-of-fact delivery. He’d expected more emotion, more rhetoric, but her calm, confident demeanor was so much more effective than any ranting would have been.

  She talked about the crimes the Myanmar generals had committed, the deaths they had been responsible for, and the stranglehold they had on Burmese lives. Then she talked about her mother, how Thiri had gone to support Aung San Suu Kyi in hopes of making Burma a place her children could come back to without fear.

  “Though they took her life, they did not take what
her life was about. Her dream is still alive in me, like it should be in you. When tyranny and oppression are imposed on one person, they are imposed on us all. We must not stop until our brothers and sisters enjoy the same freedoms as we do.”

  It was all pretty heavy stuff. Logan was almost glad when his battery ran out of power.

  After a few hours’ layover in Hong Kong and a second flight—this one only two and a half hours long—he finally landed in Bangkok.

  It didn’t take long to clear immigration and customs, and soon he was in a taxi on the way to a hotel his dad had booked for him online.

  Logan had been to the country once before, in the summer between the Army and college. It was long enough ago, though, that he didn’t recognize most of what he saw on the drive.

  The Angel City Hotel was a little boutique place, five stories high with a dozen rooms on each floor. While the building itself might have been old, the interior décor and the front façade were all new. Logan’s room was surprisingly large with tiled floors, a king-size bed, and a bathroom he could have set up a cot in, all for less than the price of a room at a discount motel back home.

  He took a shower and changed his clothes. Though it was around 12:30 a.m., his body clock was telling him it was only 10:30 in the morning. His stomach was also sending him the message that it wanted to eat now.

  When he’d arrived, there’d been a lot of activity on the street, despite the late hour. Dozens of food vendors were set up along the sidewalks, while several of the shops were still open. As he went back outside, his intention was to pop over to the 7-11 he’d seen across the road, and pick up whatever he could find to munch on, but the aromas coming from some of the nearby food carts drew him over.

  A lot of the people he used to work with were skittish about eating food from street vendors, especially in developing countries, but Logan never was. Perhaps if he’d ever had a really bad reaction, he might have thought differently, but he hadn’t. So he picked out a couple of skewers of pork, a fried rice patty, and a bowl of vegetables and noodles. He then sat at one of the temporary tables that had been set up near the carts.

  As he knew it would be, the food was delicious. It was also dirt cheap. If he kept eating like this, the WAMO boys were going to get most of their money back.

  When he finished, he did a quick calculation in his head. Though it was the earliest hour of morning here, it was still afternoon in D.C.

  “Logan, you’ve got to stop calling,” Ruth said in a strained whisper when she answered his call.

  “I know, but at least I’m using your cell.”

  “I told you not to call me on it either!”

  “Sorry. Were you able to keep track of the plane?”

  She remained silent for several seconds, then said, “After Tokyo, it went to Taipei, then Bangkok.”

  Though he knew from the records at the Midwin-Robb office that the plane had been scheduled to come to the Thai capital, it was nice to hear it independently confirmed. “Do you know what time it arrived?”

  “Around noon, local time.”

  Noon? He wasn’t sixteen hours behind. He was only a bit more than twelve. It wasn’t particularly great news—twelve hours was still half a day—but it was better than he’d hoped.

  “Great. Thanks, Ruth. And thanks for the Burma info, too.”

  “You can thank me by never calling me again.”

  She didn’t give him the chance to respond before disconnecting the call.

  As he stood up from the table, he pulled out the piece of paper Dev had given him. The polite thing to do would be to wait until morning to call, but he didn’t have time to be polite.

  He dialed the number. Unfortunately, the only thing that answered was a beep. There wasn’t even any greeting or instructions. He left his name and number, hoping he was actually being recorded, then hung up.

  Okay. So, now what? The best answer he could come up with was sleep. He might not get a chance later, so he knew he should grab it while he could.

  Back in his room, he took one of Barney’s pills, and stretched out on the bed, staring at the ceiling. As he started to slip under, the image of the man carrying Elyse into the plane played across his mind. He tried calling to her, but she didn’t even look up. Then the scene at the plane gave way to Elyse in a cap and gown, then those were replaced by a simple dress and wings growing from her back. Then even the wings faded away, and the girl was no longer Elyse. It was her. She was standing near the tan wall, tears flowing down her cheeks. As she began moving away from him, he yelled out. But it only made her run faster, and faster, and—

  Logan’s phone vibrated on the nightstand. With some effort, he pushed open his eyes, and picked it up.

  “Hello?”

  “Logan Harper?”

  “Yes.”

  “You called me.”

  What? Called who?

  Then, through the haze of the pills he’d taken, he remembered the number from Dev. He’d been expecting a man to call him back, but the voice belonged to a woman.

  “Yes. Yes, I did. I’m sorry, but I don’t know your name.” He paused, waiting, but apparently she wasn’t ready to share that information with him yet, so he went on. “I got your number from a friend in California. He said you might be able to help me.”

  “I’m familiar with your situation, Mr. Harper.”

  He sat up, his senses coming back to him. “You are?”

  She remained quiet.

  “Then you know a girl’s life is in danger,” he said. “It’s been a long time since I’ve been in Thailand. I don’t have any contacts, and I don’t speak the language. I’m looking for someone to point me in the right direction. I was hoping that maybe you—”

  “Be downstairs in ten minutes,” she told him, cutting him off. “You’ll be picked up.”

  The line went dead before he could say anything else.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  LOGAN WAS OUT in front of the Angel City Hotel seven minutes later. His mind was still cloudy with sleep, but moving around was helping a little.

  He scanned the road in both directions. The number of people on the sidewalks had thinned, and many of the vendors had left. Off to the right, he saw a pair of headlights turn onto the street. He edged closer to the curb, anticipating that it was his ride. As it neared, he could see it was a taxi, but it raced past the hotel without the driver even glancing in his direction.

  In the distance he heard thunder, and looked to the sky. It was cloudy, but at the moment there was no rain. He wondered if he should go inside, and see if they had a spare umbrella at the reception desk, but just then a motorcycle taxi, like one of the hundreds he’d noticed on the drive from the airport, pulled to the curb. Like most of the other drivers he’d seen, this one was a younger man wearing an orange vest.

  “Harper?” the driver said, catching Logan off guard.

  “Yes.”

  The kid nodded at the empty space on the seat behind him. It certainly wasn’t the ride Logan had been expecting, but if that’s what the mysterious voice had sent for him, so be it.

  He climbed on, then grabbed each side of the seat to maintain his balance as they took off, helmetless, down the street.

  The way his driver weaved through traffic, Logan half wondered if the kid had a death wish or something. He lost count of how many times they came close to hitting or being hit by another vehicle, but, scientifically, he would categorize it as a lot.

  The wild ride went on for nearly twenty minutes before they finally stopped at the side of the road. The street they were on was wide but quiet, making Logan think that Bangkok was finally starting to wind down. The buildings that lined either side were packed right up against each other. Most of the lower floors were occupied by businesses, none of which seemed to be open during the middle of the night. The upper floors—most of the buildings were at least five stories high—looked more like apartments. A few had lights on, but the majority were dark.

  The driver po
inted at a door directly across the sidewalk. There were no markings on it or nearby to indicate what might be inside.

  The moment Logan hopped off the bike, the driver drove off, leaving him standing alone on the sidewalk. He walked up to the door not knowing if he should knock or just go in. He decided to just open it. If it turned out he should have knocked, he could apologize after.

  Instead of leading into a room, though, the door opened onto an empty staircase that went up one level and ended at another closed door. The incline was steep and the treads were narrow, so he watched his step as he made his way to the top.

  He tried opening this one, too, but it was locked, so he was forced to knock.

  There was a delay of several seconds, then the door opened into a small, dimly lit room. As soon as he stepped inside, the door closed behind him. He looked back. A short, thin Asian man wearing a crooked smile stood facing him.

  “Please,” the man said, his voice strained like his throat had been injured. He pointed at the opposite side of the room.

  Logan turned back around, and realized the wall the man was motioning to was actually just a dark drape.

  “Please,” he repeated.

  Logan walked over and pulled the drape back. Beyond was a large, loft-style room. It was considerably brighter than the entry room had been, mainly due to dozens of candles scattered throughout the space. The room had that over-the-top decorated feel: orange end tables, fur-covered cubes, a sculpture made of old computer parts, bar stools in hot pink, and paintings on the walls that were the definition of abstract.

  There were also ten people. Men mainly, but also a few women, and all Asian. They’d all been talking when Logan first stepped in, but quickly stopped and were now staring at him.

  “Please,” the thin man said behind him, urging Logan on.

  Once they crossed the room, the man showed Logan to a chair near where the others were sitting.

  “Mr. Harper,” he said, introducing Logan.

  “Hi.”

  “Hello.”

  “Sawadee, ka.”

  “Welcome.”