Surrender: Keeping Her in the Dark Vol. 4 (2 page)

“Gerald, you don’t have to do this. None of you have to do this. This is my fault. I’m sure they told you what I am being accused of,” I stood up. “You don’t have to stay if you don’t want to. I’ll understand.” I heard a vacuum outside and went to the window. Trig was cleaning out his car and John was wiping his car down.

When I turned back around Rosa was standing behind me.

“I have worked for you for a long time, Mr. Hastings. I have known you since you were a little boy. I don’t care what they say. I know what I have seen and been a part of.” She grabbed my face in one hand and squeezed my cheeks together giving me duck lips.

“You might want to be a bad man, but I know you are not. We all know you are not.” She smacked the side of my face. “You are a good boy,” she said. “You just need some babies!” she was quick to add. Rosa rarely spoke in English. It was usually when she was very upset and she usually didn’t make sense.

“I don’t want you to lie for me. If they ask you something I want you to be honest,” I said.

“I don’t have to lie. I know nothing of the things they talk about. All I know is what I see. And I see a man that loves his wife and does everything he can to make her happy. I see a man that has not only taken me in as an employee after his father died, but also lets me live in his guest house. I see a man that hired my family. A man that lets me bring my grandchild to work, that stood as a groomsmen in my Raymond’s wedding and let Sofia and Raymond both have their weddings here.” She moved so she could see Gerald.

“This man walked your wife down the aisle when she felt she had no one to do it. She has no father and didn’t want her mother’s boyfriend, so she asked him!” she pointed at Gerald.

“Do you think for one second Gerald would have done that if he thought she didn’t really want to marry you? The only duress she was under was over her dress, location and guest list. So you made it easier for her and had 2 weddings. Would a man do that if he was trying to cover up something?” I didn’t answer her but I looked over at Gerald.

“He loves you like you are his own son,” she grabbed my face again. “You are a good boy. We loved your parents and we love you too.” She lightly smacked my face again. “So let them come and I will tell them whatever they want to know.” She went back to the kitchen and started ranting in Spanish.

I nodded at Gerald and he nodded back. He came to me and patted my shoulder.

“I have seen you grow from a boy who only thought of himself and how much fun he could have, to a man that loves his wife and his family. I have seen a man who thought he would be alone, accept the people around him into his heart. I walked Norah down the aisle and gave her to a man I have come to love and respect. Nothing they can say will change that, son.” When he added the ‘son’ on the end I could feel the tears in my eyes.

“Now please, when this is over, get that young wife of yours pregnant, so Rosa will have more grandchildren to love,” he patted my shoulder.

“I will try, I promise you that. I will try.” The list of good things about me sounded really good. But I didn’t know how good they would sound stacked against the bad things I had done.

My phone rang and I jumped to answer it.

“Hastings?” It was Tom with news about Norah. I grabbed my keys and wallet and ran out the door.

I arrived at the station and Tom was waiting for me.

“What? What’s going on? Is she ok?” I asked.

“She’s fine.” He took my arm and walked me to private room.

“Liam, it isn’t you that they want. They have a vague understanding of your particular situation and are willing to make you a deal for your cooperation.” I took a seat at a small table and Tom sat on the other side.

“What do they want?” I asked.

“They want Randall and the 2 men Randall worked for as well.”

“I don’t know who Randall worked for. I didn’t know he worked for anyone. I thought he ran his own business,” I said.

“Well he does. But he gets his girls from a man named Abdul Amir. According to him, he is the right hand man for Rashad Salam. Salam is a major player in the human trafficking world. He lives in Paris so he very well could have been responsible for Norah’s kidnapping and appearance in the auction.”

“Well I can’t help with them. I vaguely knew Randall. I can give them his address and all the information about the party.”

“Can you tell them how you found out about the party?” he asked. I shook my head. That wasn’t an option. Will was my connection to the party. I wasn’t about to hand him over to the police. So far Will had managed to escape this persecution. I didn’t want him and Jane to have to go through this. He was a prick and she was dumber than dirt, so it was a good chance they would both end up in jail.

“I can’t.”

“Why?” he asked.

“Tom, I found out through a friend who has nothing to do with this. He has a similar situation as mine. I won’t get him involved.”

“Liam, telling them about the party isn’t enough. They need a bigger fish to fry or you are going down.” I nodded because I understood. But it didn’t change my mind. I couldn’t give up Will. Will wasn’t a master mind human trafficker. He was a sick fuck who went to an illegal auction knowingly and bought his girlfriend. But I was actually proud to say he had learned the error of his ways and was done with that world now, or at least the illegal part. I wasn’t about to have the authorities hunting down all the women he had purchased just so they could disrupt their lives.

Handing Will to the police wasn’t going to help them.

“Let’s go talk to them. See what it is they want from you. But please Liam let me do the talking. Don’t let them rattle you. They are going to try to bait you by using Norah against you. Please, I’m begging you, try to control yourself.”

We were led into another room and left to wait. A young man came in and offered us some water and said the officer would be in in a minute.

“Where is Norah?” I asked. Tom looked over at me.

“She’s in another room. She’s fine.”

“She better be,” I said just as the same man that had taken Norah from our home walked in followed by a woman.

“Mr. Hastings, I’m sure your attorney has explained to you our deal. In exchange for your help with some bigger players, we will strike a deal with you,” he paused and they both took seats in front of us.

“I want to see my wife,” I said bluntly.

“Your wife is fine. You can see her when we are done here.” This man wasn’t making a great first impression nor was he making me want to help him.

“Now, Mr. Hastings before we get to how you can help us. I have a few questions for you.” He wrote something on a piece of paper in the file he laid on the table. “Can you tell me how you met your wife?” he asked and then looked right at me.

I didn’t like him. Not his tone, not his demeanor and certainly not his questions. He was the kind of man that asked a question even though he already had the answer. He just wanted me to hang myself.

“We were set up on a blind date through mutual friends,” I said. He gave me a look that suggested he didn’t believe me.

“We met in an online chat room,” I joked again.

“We were introduced through a Single Christian Church group.” I could do this all day.

“Her mother and my mother were in the same knitting group.”

“Mr. Hastings,” he finally relented.

“Detective, please. He isn’t going to answer any questions about his relationship with his wife until we know the deal you want to make.” I tried to contain myself. Having someone question my relationship with Norah was not the way to get on my good side.

“Fine. Fair enough.” He slid some pictures across the table.

“This is Randall Emerson. He is a minor player in a sex trafficking ring. He’s fairly new and not well trusted in the community. He owns casinos, brothels and sex clubs all over Europe. We have made contact with him before, usually for loan sharking or illegal drugs. Not until the party did we know he was involved in the buying and selling of women. Now we need whatever information you can provide to us about him.”

I proceeded to explain that a mutual friend whom I would not name had been approached by Randall and invited to the party. I told them Randall had heard about my situation and wanted me to come to the party too. I told him that my friend didn’t want to get involved until he found out that there was going to be an auction at this party too.

“So this friend you don’t want to name told you about the party?” he asked. I nodded. “Why?” he shrugged his shoulders.

“Because he knows that I have a lot of money and he thought maybe I could do something to help the girls being sold,” I crossed my ankle over my knee.

“Help the girls being sold?” he sounded smug. “Like you helped your wife?” he asked. I didn’t move. I didn’t blink. I simply cleared my throat.

“Detective, I am going to say this one time and one time only. People tell me that on my happiest of days I am no joy to be around. So how do you think I am going to be if you keep trying to drag my wife into this? I suggest that you keep my family out of this. For both our sakes,” I said.

“Are you threatening me, Mr. Hastings?” he asked.

“No sir I am not.” I was not threatening him. I was very serious.

“Mr. Hastings, you can sit there and play the hard ass all you want. But the bottom line is if you don’t cooperate with us, we are going to charge you with human trafficking, kidnapping, rape and forced prostitution.” I still didn’t budge. “We can also charge your wife with prostitution.” I blinked when he said that. Not that I gave in, I actually blinked.

“How can you charge me with forced prostitution and her with prostitution? If I am forcing her then she isn’t doing it willingly,” I said. He started to say something but Tom wouldn’t let him.

“Detective, please get to your point. My client is willing to cooperate but he isn’t going to talk about his relationship with his wife or the person who told him about the party. If those things were all you were interested in you would have charged my client already. Please tell us what you want?” Tom said.

“I want Abdul Amir and Rashad Salam.” He slid the pictures of the men across the table.

“I don’t know them,” I slid them back.

“I know. But you are going to get to know them.” It was starting to make sense.

“We have information from a man we have working on the inside that there is going to be another auction. An auction much like the one you attended 2 years ago and don’t want to talk about now.” He paused and I didn’t blink.

“These men were responsible for that auction.” I looked closer at the pictures. “Yes, Mr. Hastings, these men are the men that sold you your wife,” I didn’t like the smug way he spoke. It reminded me too much of myself.

“We want you to go to Paris, meet with Amir and Salam, and wear a wire.”

“And for that my client gets immunity?” Tom asked.

“For that, your client will get a suspended sentence and a hefty fine.” I nodded in agreement.

“There is one other thing,” he said. I raised my eyebrow to him.

“Do you know a man by the name of Nick Meyers?” just the sound of his name made my skin crawl.  

Chapter One

Norah

“You made a deal?” I asked. Liam was sitting at his desk in the study typing away on his laptop and shuffling papers.

“Yes,” he said but didn’t look up.

“When do you leave?” I asked.

“Four days.”

“What do you have to do?” I couldn’t believe after what we had both been through over the last 12 hours he was just sitting at his desk typing. He hadn’t said much since leaving the station. Besides our quickie in the car on the way home he had said very little.

“I have to meet their guy, who will introduce me to the bad guys. I’ll then try to become friends with them while wearing a recording device in the hopes they will incriminate themselves.” He still wasn’t looking at me but wrote something on a piece of paper, shuffled more papers and kept typing.

“You’re telling me that they have been investigating these men for years and they still can’t prove human trafficking?”

“Apparently not.” He looked up at me briefly. “They can prove other crimes and I’m certain they will arrest them for those crimes if they can’t prove the trafficking. But they really want the sex crimes charge.” He went back to his work.

“Why do they need you if they have a guy on the inside?” It didn’t make sense to me. If they had a guy on the inside then why did they need Liam? I wasn’t as trusting of the detectives as Liam seemed to be.

“Their guy hasn’t been trusted in the backroom meetings or even been able to score an invite to an auction. I guess this is a very hard club to join.”

“But they think you will be trusted?” I asked.

“Yes. Given my history,” he paused and looked up at me again, “our history,” he corrected. “They think I will be accepted.”

“Is this going to be dangerous?” I already knew the answer but I wanted to hear his words anyway.

“Yes.” He didn’t elaborate.

“Well…”

“Norah, please. I have all this work to do. Can we please talk about this later?” He stopped typing and took off his glasses.

“We only have 4 days. There isn’t time for later.” I paused.

“What are you going to do about the Nick situation?” I asked as he ran his hands over his face.

In our very brief discussion in the car Liam informed me that Nick had been the one to rat out the party. They assumed he received an invitation as well but instead of attending he decided to turn it in. Liam informed them of our history with him and that he felt Nick had informed them of the party because of him. Nick hated Liam and wanted what Liam had. It made sense to me.

He went back to typing.

“I will handle Nick Meyers after the authorities are off my back.”

“What does that mean?” I stood up.

“Norah,” he sighed.

“So let me get this straight, you are going on this undercover, covert mission for the UNDC, then you’re coming back here and going after Nick?” He didn’t say anything.

“Let me handle Nick while you do your thing,” I put my hands on my hips.