“And you think you do?” she said, eyes flaring.
Before I could answer, Julie came by with my coffee and Lily’s milkshake.
“I do.” It was such a contradiction to see her sucking on a milkshake with whipped cream and a cherry on top like a child while we were talking about one of the most vicious clubs in La Playa. “I need to tell you a story.”
Lily looked at me with those big brown eyes and took a long drink from her milkshake. I’d never wanted to tell her what I was about to say, but it was something she needed to know. I’d done my best to shield her from the realities of the life we led, but it was time for her to know the truth.
“Remember when you were in the 6th grade, there was a girl at your school that was a year ahead of you? Annie McConnell?”
Lily pushed the empty milkshake aside just as Julie came over with our order. The plate was barely down when she grabbed a fistful of fries and shoved them in her mouth. “Yeah. She was killed when her family went on vacation in South America. It was some kind of boating accident or something?”
“Yeah, that’s the one. Except she wasn’t killed in a boating accident.”
“She wasn’t? That’s what everybody said.”
“I know. Principal Carlson met with the police chief and they came up with a cover story to tell the parents so that no one would freak out about what really happened. That kind of shit can destroy a community.”
“What really happened?”
“Annie was at McDonald’s after school one day with her friends.”
“Yeah, we all went there after school. It’s one block away.”
“Right. So on her way home from McDonald’s someone grabbed her from the parking lot.”
“That doesn’t make any sense. That parking lot is near a Target and a shoe store. Someone would have seen it.”
I shook my head. “The guys who grabbed her were pros, Lily. They waited until she went around the corner of the shoe store and then grabbed her, put a bag over her head, and shoved her in the back of a van within thirty seconds. She didn’t even have time to scream.”
I could see the information processing in Lily’s eyes as she continued eating.
“Within two hours she was on a plane to South America.”
“Why South America?”
“Because, Lily. She was a pretty, white, twelve-year-old girl. Probably a virgin, too. The kidnappers sold her for a fuck ton of money.”
“Theysoldher? To who?”
“That’s what sex traffickers do, Lily. They sell people. They sold her to the head of a massive child prostitution ring in Columbia.”
Lily stopped eating. “So, what happened to her then? Is she still there?”
“No. She was there for two days and she tried to escape. They shot her in the back and left her body in the desert.”
“How do you know all this?”
“Hawk told us. He knew the guy who kidnapped her. He was bragging about it.”
She shook her head. “That’s horrible. But I don’t understand what it has to do with me?”
“Do you know who did it? Who kidnapped a twelve year old girl and sold her to be raped and sex trafficked and killed? Do you know who did that, Lily?”
“Who?”
“El Diablo. The very guy in the Las Balas who is sponsoring your boyfriend Scorpion.”
Lily’s face went pale.
