“You did the stirring, Capri, when you wrote
Sexual Predator.
”
“I wish I’d never written a word of that damned book.”
“It’s made you rich and famous. It’s what you wanted.”
“What I want now is peace. That’s all, just some peace, just the chance to let this whole thing go away.”
“Who’s been getting to you, Capri? One of the big shots? Felton, maybe, or Mandeville Slayton?”
“These are powerful people, Justice. Dangerous people.”
“They’re pedophiles who prey on young boys and justify it as sexual freedom.”
I heard him shudder.
“If only that was all.”
“Enlighten me, Randall.”
“You already know enough to be in trouble. Quit while you’re ahead, for Christ’s sake.”
“You loved Rod Preston, didn’t you?”
I listened to him draw in several problematic breaths before he spoke again.
“He was like a god to me.”
“You were what—twelve, thirteen? A kept boy, being used by a middle-aged man.”
“That may be true. I loved him anyway.”
“You knew what love was at that age?”
“I worshiped him, Justice. All I thought about was being near him, feeling him touch me, being able to touch him back, feel his strength. A boy can want that, you know, even if he’s not yet a man.”
He laughed sadly.
“It wasn’t about sex. What I felt when I was with him was much more powerful than that, more powerful than anything I’ve experienced before or since.”
“Then you grew some hair on your body, and he began to lose interest in you.”
“You make it sound so cold.”
“Wasn’t it?”
I got no answer to that.
“It fits the classic pattern of a pedophile, Randall. It must have been painful for you.”
His voice grew soft, vulnerable.
“It was horrible when he stopped loving me. I wanted to die.”
“Tell me about it, Randall.”
“Why? Why do you need to know?”
“If you feed me some solid information, maybe I’ll stop snooping around, asking so many bothersome questions.”
“Somehow, I doubt that.”
“I guess our conversation’s over then.”
“All right, I’ll tell you some of it.”
“Some is better than none.”
“Rod started bringing other boys around when I was fourteen, younger boys.”
“They had the same feelings for him that you did?”
“God, no. It was for the drugs, the money, the chance to ride the horses. Most of them were from broken homes, absentee fathers or no fathers at all. Abusive backgrounds, that kind of thing. It was difficult for someone like Rod to find boys. He was recognized, he had to be careful. Still, he found enough to keep himself occupied. When I turned fifteen, he was completely finished with me, at least sexually.”
“But you couldn’t give him up.”
“It seemed inconceivable.”
“You remained close?”
“He liked the company. Now and then, if he’d been drinking heavily, we might fall into bed together. But it wasn’t the same. It was just gratification for him. After a while, I gave up trying to make him love me, even though he said he did.”
“You started finding boys for him, as a way of being useful.”
“It was a reason to be around him. It gave me a place in his world.”
“It must have been around that time that he brought George Krytanos back from Europe.”
“His real name isn’t Krytanos. He isn’t a gypsy boy from Europe. Rod made that up as a cover. Stanley Miller brought him to Rod, said he needed a home. They handled it through lawyers, hush-hush. That’s all I know about it.”
“You must have resented a young boy coming into Preston’s household like that.”
“I suppose I did, at first. But George was such a pathetic child. It was difficult to hate him.”
“As you got older, into your twenties, Preston started paying you for your procurement services, calling it public relations work for accounting purposes. There were a lot of canceled checks in the files Charlotte gave me, for quite a bit of money. You must have worked very hard at it.”
“I became indispensable to Rod. That was the idea, to make him need me, need my services. It worked for quite a long time.”
Several seconds of silence passed.
“Then we had a problem.”
“What problem was that, Randall?”
“The mother of one of the boys found out. Rod had to pay her a great deal of money to buy her silence, keep her from going to the police. He was terrified—you can imagine what it would have done to his career. He realized he had to find a different way to get the boys he needed. It was too dangerous picking them up on the street, even if I was the go-between.”
“When was this?”
“Seven, eight years ago, I suppose.”
“What about the Internet? Isn’t that where most pedophiles look for kids?”
“Rod had a friend who’d been caught in a child sex sting. The law enforcement agencies were doing more and more stings. Rod considered the Internet too risky.”
“That’s when you got the idea of bringing a number of well-heeled pedophiles together, creating a discreet network that could generate a fresh supply of kids. Felton, Slayton, Dr. Miller, the others.”
“How did you know about that?”
“I found a list of names and phone numbers in one of the files Charlotte gave me. It was in your handwriting. Freddie Fuentes was the key, wasn’t he, Randall? Fuentes had access to so many immigrant kids who were desperate for money, maybe even the promise of a green card down the road if they were good boys and kept their mouths shut.”
“You’ve got about half of it right, anyway.”
“So fill me in, Randall. I’d love to complete the puzzle.”
“Like I said, Justice, you know too much already. I’m taking a risk just talking to you.”
“I’m curious about the blond boys Mandeville Slayton likes. They don’t seem to fit the pattern. Or maybe they’re Russian, blue-eyed immigrants that Fuentes happens across now and then.”
“I’m not saying any more. I’ve said too much as it is. I only called to warn you that you’re treading dangerous ground.”
“The part that baffles me is why none of them blows the whistle when they get older, after the group has finished with them. Edward T. Felton, Mandeville Slayton, Dr. Stanley Miller—these are wealthy men we’re talking about. How do they manage to buy so much silence, Capri?”
“For God’s sake, Justice, drop it, let it go.”
“I imagine you’re just a little bit concerned that all this might become public, that your role as the pimp for an exclusive pedophile ring might be exposed.”
“If that were all it was, Justice, I’d be thankful.”
I heard something new in his voice, something that sounded like dread, maybe even shame.
“What is it, Capri? Is it you’re so afraid to talk about but want so badly to confess?”
His voice trembled.
“It started innocently, I swear. I just wanted to find a willing boy now and then for Rod, so he’d still like me, so he wouldn’t completely cut me off.”
“Innocence is relative, I guess.”
“After I got the others together, and Fuentes became involved, it got out of hand, completely out of control.”
“Be more specific, Capri. You’re not making sense.”
There were several seconds of silence, and then he began to sob.
“Tell me, Capri. Get it off your chest.”
“I swear, it was never supposed to happen the way it did!”
There was a sudden commotion at Capri’s end, then the line went dead, and I was listening to a dial tone. I stood there with the phone pressed to my bare flesh, wondering what it was I’d just heard. Then I sensed Oree padding barefoot across the floor behind me. He placed a hand on each of my shoulders.
“What was that all about?”
“I’m not sure.”
He took the receiver from my hand, replaced it in its cradle.
“Then come back to bed. You’re with me tonight, remember?”
I didn’t move. He wrapped his long arms around me from behind, pulling me to him. I felt his naked body pressing against me, his soft genitals against my tight buttocks, his warm skin against the prickly surface of mine.
“You can’t save every kid in the world, Ben.” He withdrew his hands, placed them on my upper arms, gently turned me around. “Come back to bed. I’ll give you a nice massage, the full treatment. The Oree special, no extra charge.”
I allowed him to lead me by the hand back to the bed, allowed him to lay me down, put me in the position he wanted. He told me to close my eyes, breathe deeply, let all the tension out with every breath, let all the worries go. Then I felt his hands on me, and the sensation of a man’s hands on my bare skin, after so long, was startling and wonderful. There’s nothing better, really, than being touched in an intimate way by someone who loves you, giving in to it, accepting it, letting the walls come down, the boundaries fall away. Yet I still wasn’t sure I could go through with it, make love to Oree in the full sense, with abandonment, connection, completion. His strength was one of the most beautiful things about him, but I’d come to realize only lately that it also frightened me. It occurred to me that I may have always been intimidated by strong, confident men, and drawn to those who were floundering in some way, who needed help. Maybe because my father had been so strong in his own troubled way, and so brutal, and I needed to always be in control, always the dominant one, just like him, hiding my weakness inside. Maybe the virus played a part in my resistance, too, and the way I’d contracted it. Rape is not something one easily forgets when it’s time to try loving again, not even for a man who’s perfected the art of pretending he’s tougher than any blows life has to deliver.
As Oree’s hands worked on me, alternately kneading and caressing, I wasn’t sure I could go through with the act when the time came, give myself completely to him, without limits, the way one must if a union is to be made. I didn’t know if I could ever fully love him like that, or any other man. Yet I knew that what he was doing felt good, and that I trusted him, which seemed like a beginning.
“Chucho, I need you to state your name very clearly into the microphone and spell it slowly for me, please.”
Templeton’s voice came to me through her cell phone as I listened at my kitchen table, taking notes. Then I heard Chucho recite his name, first and last, hesitating once or twice as he mentally translated the letters from his native Spanish into the English he’d learned phonetically.
I could imagine him sitting at a wide, polished desk in a book-filled office on an upper floor of Times Mirror Square. He might even have been in one of the offices I’d visited years ago when one of my more controversial pieces was being vetted by an eagle-eyed attorney before publication. Templeton had picked Chucho up that morning on her way in, asking me to wish her luck, reminding me that she was about to take sworn testimony in a developing story that could blow the lid off the city if the
Times
had the guts to print it. Then she’d driven off in her fancy convertible with the all-important witness named Prettyboy beside her, while I’d retreated to the apartment to await the secret phone connection she’d promised to set up before the taped interview began.
“Chucho, you know that I am Alexandra Templeton, a reporter with the
Los Angeles Times?
”
“
Sí,
I know.”
“And you are here voluntarily, to tell us your story at my request, while we tape that story with this machine for an article I intend to write?”
“
Sí,
I know that.”
“And you swear that what you are about to tell me will be completely truthful?”
“
Sí,
I promise, only the truth.”
“Chucho, tell us when you first came to the United States and what happened to you.”
Below my kitchen window, I could see Fred mowing the grass while one of the cats meandered about the yard sniffing flowers. It was a fine spring day, balmy, with a light breeze, lulling—almost enchanting.
“I first come to
Estados Unidos
I think about five years ago.”
“When you were thirteen.”
“Yes, I was just thirteen. It was maybe almost six years. I am eighteen now since February.”
“Why did you come to Los Angeles, Chucho?”
“I come to get work.”
“Your father’s dead, is that correct?”
“My father is with Jesus, yes.”
“So you came north to support your mother and your three sisters.”
“Mi familia, sí.”
“Since you were so young, what kind of work did you expect to get?”
“I can do many things. I work in the yard, I help clean the houses, I work in the restaurants, whatever people need me for. Maybe I even get jobs in construction, cleaning up, carrying things. Thirteen is not young for hard work, for a Mexican.”
“You knew some Mexican people who had come north before you?”
“Everybody I know, the man, the woman, they come here to work. It is good place, very good money. Everybody is rich here. Everybody in Mexico know that.”
“Did you find work?”
“
Sí,
I find a little work, maybe two, three days a week. Some days, I stand on the corner with the other Mexican guys, the Guatemalans, and maybe no one take me for work sometime. Maybe because I am so small, skinny.”
“You were living with your aunt and uncle in Orange County?”
“
Sí,
with my mother’s sister.”
“Then what happened?”
“One day,
la migra,
they come to the corner where we wait to get work, and they chase me and take me away.”
“Explain what you mean by
la migra.
”
“Immigration, the men who arrest
ilegales
like me. Is not a real word, like in the
diccionario.
Is word we use for immigration guys.”
“Agents of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, the INS?”
“Immigration,
sí. La migra.
”
“What happened after they picked you up?”
“They take me with the other men and the boys to this place like a jail, and they ask us questions. They want to see our papers, but we got no papers, or maybe some, they got papers that are not the real ones but the ones we buy. So they tell us they will keep us for the time when we see the judge.”
“A deportation hearing?”
“
Sí,
what you just said.”
“You were well treated?”
“They treat us OK. We get food and we can shower, watch TV. Some Mexican guys, they can talk to lawyers, but I got no lawyer. I figure they just send me back to Mexico, then later I come back again, like everybody do.”
“You were kept in the jail with older men?”
“
Sí,
all of us together. They do that with kids; it’s a trick.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“They put the kids with older guys, because then the parents, they come to try to get the kids out because they afraid for them. Then grab the parents also. I tell them
mi madre
is in Tijuana, but they not believe me. So they keep me, thinking maybe some time she will finally come for me, and they can grab her.”
“That’s not legal any longer. The law has changed.”
“Maybe, but then, five, six years ago, they do that to kids. Sometimes they even put them in the big jail with the very bad criminals to make the parents come.”
“How long were you kept in custody?”
“I do not know that word.”
“Custody—locked up.”
“Maybe eight, nine days, I not sure. They tell me at first that they keep me for a long time. But Mr. Fuentes, he come and take me away.”
“Are you referring to Freddie Fuentes, an INS official?”
“Sí.”
“How did you know his name was Freddie Fuentes?”
“When he come to where they keep us, I hear him call that way by They call him Mr. Fuentes, and one of them, he call him Freddie.”
A phone rang in the background. I heard the voice of an older man, presumably the
Times
lawyer, speaking briefly and asking that all calls be held. Then Templeton was talking again.
“Why did Mr. Fuentes take you out of there?”
“He come in and look around at all the young guys they have there. And he see me, and he look at me longer than the other guys. Then he tell the other
agentes
that there is mistake, that I do not have to stay there, that I am to go with him.”
“Go with Mr. Fuentes?”
“Sí.”
“Mr. Fuentes was speaking in English or in Spanish?”
“English. The
agentes,
they all American guys. White guys, black guys, chicanos like Mr. Fuentes.”
“And your English was good enough that you understood what they were saying?”
“
Sí,
I speak some English then. My sister Gloria, the oldest, she learn English in high school and she teach me before I come
el norte.
”
“Tell us what happened next.”
“Mr. Fuentes, he take me away in his car.”
“Where did he take you?”
“We go to see the doctor, to be checked out.”
“Do you know the doctor’s name?”
“His name is Dr. Miller.”
“How do you know that?”
“Mr. Fuentes, he say to us, ‘This is Dr. Miller, he is going to examine you.’”
“There were other boys with you at Dr. Miller’s office?”
“First, Mr. Fuentes take me to a big, old house where he get three other boys and we all go together to the doctor.”
“How old were these boys?”
“Like me, twelve, maybe thirteen. One boy, I think he was eleven.”
“And the doctor examined you?”
“
Sí,
he have us take off our clothes and he check us out.”
“And after that?”
“They stick the needle in us, in our arm, and get our blood, to see if we have any sickness. Two of the boys, they cry, and then Mr. Fuentes, he take us to McDonald’s. We get to order anything we want—cheeseburgers, milk shakes, everything. The smallest boy, the youngest one, he get sick in the bathroom because he eat too much. Then we get in Mr. Fuentes’s car again and he take us for a long time out to where there is no city and where it is very hot.”
“The desert?”
“The desert,
sí.
”
“Do you know exactly where this was?”
“No, because I sleep while Mr. Fuentes drive. So I not sure.”
“Where did you go in the desert?”
“Mr. Fuentes, he take us to this big place, I do not know how you call it, like a big house except it has these big doors that open in front that Mr. Fuentes drive in, and inside is a big place where there are cars and stuff and the house is built all around it.”
“A courtyard?”
“No comprendo.”
“Describe this large building in more detail if you can.”
“It has two floors and is made from big rocks.”
“Stonework?”
“
Sí,
stones.”
“Go on.”
“It have many rooms, I think maybe twenty, thirty rooms. At the big doors where the cars go in, on each side at the top is a thing like this. Here, I draw them for you.”
I heard the rustle of paper, a pencil scratching. Then Templeton spoke.
“A pointed tower, or turret, on either side of the big gates at the front of this compound. Twin towers.”
“
Sí,
two towers, just like I draw.”
“Who else was at this big house, or compound?”
“A guard and three ladies who clean and two people in the kitchen who cook and feed us, and two more people who watch us when it is day. Sometimes, drivers come with big, fancy cars to take us away.”
“Were these people at the compound around the clock?”
“No comprendo.”
“Twenty-four hours—these people were there all the time?”
“No, just one guard and one woman to watch us at night. Unless the drivers come to take us. And sometimes Dr. Miller and Mr. Fuentes come.”
“The day that Freddie Fuentes first took you there, what happened?”
“He take us in and we get our own bed in this big room where there are other boys like us.”
“Mexican boys?”
“Mexican,
sí,
and Guatemalan guys, but maybe some China guys, two of them, and even a guy with blond hair, but he is not a gringo. He is a Russian guy.”
Faintly, in the background, I could hear Templeton flipping the pages of her notebook.
“Would this be Jimmy?”
“No, Ricky.”
“Of course, that was several years ago. Jimmy is more recent.”
“I do not understand.”
“I’m sorry, Chucho, I’m talking to myself. OK, you were given a bed in what sounds like a dormitory-style setting. And after that?”
“Mr. Fuentes, he get all the boys together, the new boys, and he tell us that we are very lucky, we are going to get to stay in this place for maybe a year, maybe two years. Later on, if we be good, we get to have our own room, with our own TV. I never have a room before, just for me, and I get very happy when I hear this.”
“What else did Mr. Fuentes tell you, Chucho?”
“He say that we are going to get very good money that will be saved for us to take back to our families. He tell us that we will have many thousands of dollars, American dollars, and all of us get very happy. And Mr. Fuentes, he say that this is very good place to live, that only a few boys get to come here, very special boys. He say that we will have very good food always, and the doctor, he will take care of us, that the doctor is like our papa.”
“This would be Dr. Miller?”
“
Sí,
Dr. Miller. And then Mr. Fuentes, he show us all the toys and the place where we can swim and we like it very much. One room, it is very big and it has only video games, the best video games I ever see. I cannot believe I am in this place, that I am so lucky. It seem like God, he finally take care of me, and I think, I am going to be very rich, I am going to have so much money for
mi familia.
”
“The other boys, they were also happy?”
“
Sí,
there were many boys there, maybe
veinte,
I think.”
“Twenty boys.”
“
Sí,
twenty, maybe one or two more.”
“Tell us about what you did there, at Dr. Miller’s big house.”
“For maybe one week, we just get to do what we want. We swim, we play the video games, watch TV, just do what kids do. One day, Mr. Fuentes, he take a bunch of us to a big park where they have the water, the big slides, and we play there all day.”
“A water amusement park?”
“
Sí,
and Mr. Fuentes, he give us all money and say we can buy whatever we want. Hot dogs, ice cream, anything. It is like the best day I ever get, you know?”