Turkmenistan authorities increase border security to stop trafficking of women into Iraq and Afghanistan.
Closing my eyes, I see Joey. Scared. Abused. Bloodied. Twenty-two, and kidnapped to be sold down in Mexico. Because I wouldn’t talk to her.
If she’s in trouble now—if she has been taken by traffickers—I have to do something. I have to find her.
Pushing to my feet, I grab my jacket from the back of the door. I have to make some calls, and I do not want these records on Second Sight’s phone bill.
Sinking down into my recliner with a brand new burner phone from the local Stop-N-Shop, I dial numbers I memorized twelve years ago when I left the Marines. I don’t even know if Nomar’s still alive, let alone using this number. But I have to try.
“Identify yourself,” the rough voice with the hint of a Spanish accent says.
“Master Sergeant Ford Lawton. U.S. Marine Corps. Retired.”
“Where’d we meet, Marine?”
I close my eyes, resting my head against the back of the chair. “Al-Faw Peninsula. Satisfied now, Lone Ranger?”
Nomar chuckles. “How the fuck are you, Ford?”
“Not good.” The coffee burns my throat, but I doubt I’ll be sleeping any time soon, and it’s either this or suck down gin and tonics until I’m dead to the world. “I need some intel. You still running covert ops in—”
“This better be a fucking secure line if you want to finish that sentence…”
“It’s a burner phone run through multiple anonymizers. How much more secure you want me to be, asswipe?” Slamming the coffee cup down on the end table, I watch, unable to move, as some of the black liquid splashes over the rim and drips onto my beige carpet.
“Take a pill, man. Yes. I’m still in charge of ops in Uzbekistan.” Nomar sighs over the line, and for a minute, I feel ancient.
I remember when calling overseas meant the perpetual hiss of static and long delays after every sentence. “Five days ago, a Doctors Without Borders group went dark outside of Sayat. They were headed for Turkmenabat, but they never got there.”
“Shit. And they hired you?” Nomar’s whistle grates along my spine.
“No.” Clearing my throat, I lean forward and lower my voice. As if whispering will somehow make what I have to say untrue. “I know—knew—one of the doctors. We…fuck. We were engaged back in our twenties. She’s missing, Nomar, along with six others. I have to find her. And I need your help to do it.”
3
Ford
With every passing minute, the tension gathering between my shoulder blades intensifies, and by the time I stand in front of Dax’s door, it feels like there’s a knife digging into my back.
Dax looks like hell, and the apartment is completely dark when I stride through the door. “VoiceAssist: Lights on, sixty percent. It’s after eight, Dax.”
He shrugs and ambles into the kitchen, his limp a little more pronounced than I’ve seen it lately.
“Beer?” he asks.
“Sure.” I can’t force out more than a one word answer, and he arches a brow, highlighting the scars around his eyes.
“What’s wrong?”
I take the bottle and follow him to his spartan living room before sinking into a single chair across from him. “You’re scary, you know that?” After a swig of beer, I let out a long, slow breath. “I thought I was hiding it pretty well.”
“It’s in your voice. Spill.” He drapes his arm across the back of the couch and stares straight through me. Despite not being able to see, he always knows right where to look. It’s like he’s seeing into my soul.
“Joey’s missing.”
“Joey?” Leaning forward, he shakes his head. “Sorry, but who is he?”
Anger stiffens my spine, and I push to my feet and start pacing the room, needing to do something…anything…to distract me from the images running through my mind—all the things those assholes could be doing to her right now. “She.” I pause for another sip of beer before I clarify. “Josephine Taylor? The woman I was dating when I joined the marines?”
