“Are you kidding?” I asked her.
Slow shake of her head.
“Then what?”
“Katarina said she was hurt, as well as her friends. He was going to call the police, but she said that by the time the cops got there, they might be taken to another place. So he did the only reasonable thing, and instead of alerting the authorities, he helped each girl out of the basement and then loaded them in his friend’s SUV and took them to the ER.”
“And then just came back here?” Ian yelled, turning to look over at Shawn. “You came back?” he bellowed again.
“I’m house-sitting,” Shawn called over from where he had his arms full of crying young women. “There’s plants and fish in there I’m responsible for.”
“Of course there are,” Santos said drolly.
I groaned.
She cleared her throat. “Early this morning, our office was contacted by the hospital, and so my team and I—we’ve been looking for these girls—got the break we’ve been waiting for. The girls came over for the summer on student visas and basically disappeared. We’ve been on the trail of a trafficking ring out of Belgrade that we were fairly certain had them—fake education programs are their thing—but we were never able to put names and faces to those responsible.”
“But now you can.”
“Yes, now we can. But the girls only agreed to talk if we came back, with all of them, and made sure the horrible men didn’t do anything to their angel.”
“Angel?” Ian asked.
“Shawn,” she clarified, in case we hadn’t caught that.
I glanced at Ian. “He told the girls his real name?”
“Of course he did,” Ian grumbled in disgust. “Why wouldn’t he? No one taught him procedure in the least.”
Santos said, “I ran the fingerprints in the house. First set came back to the owner, the girls said no, not him, and when we ran the second set, here comes Corin something––”
“Peterson,” Ian offered.
“Peterson,” Santos repeated. “But when we ran him through our system trying to figure out who their Good Samaritan was, we got nothing, and then here you guys come up the driveway, wearing the star. Not hard to put together.”
No, it was not.
“So,” she began, looking at us like we were the B team. “He’s in WITSEC, right?”
“He is,” Ian replied dejectedly.
“Well then, what kind of lame-ass protective service are you guys running up here? I thought Sam Kage was the Chief Deputy. Did he retire?”
I cleared my throat. “No, ma’am.”
Her eyes slowly widened as she understood the magnitude of what had happened. “Oh, somebody’s dead.”
“You have no idea,” Ian agreed.
It was a shitshow all around. I was thrilled that Shawn saved the girls, but Brodie was fish food, and Rodriguez would be lucky to keep his job. Ian murdering them both before Kage got the report would be a blessing.
Most people would say,upon meeting Chief Deputy Sam Kage, that it was the imposing height of six-four and all the hard, heavy muscle he carried on his frame that made him look a bit scary. For me, it had always been the scowl. Somehow he was able to convey with a look both his anger and disappointment. Layered on top of that, for good measure, was the judgment that he was staring at an idiot. I never forgot how that felt, and I did everything in my power to make sure I was never on the receiving end of his glare.
I missed my father every day. He had been, without a doubt, one of the gentlest of men. He never got angry, he got disappointed. I was hardwired to not want to let down men I admired and respected. This feeling had never been more pronounced, after my father, than with Sam Kage. I would rather have a root canal without anesthesia than be the bearer of bad news that I myself was responsible for creating. So I was a hundred percent thrilled to not be the one in his crosshairs. I was neither Brodie nor Rodriguez, who’d both put a witness in danger through apathy, neglect, and laziness. I had no idea why they stopped keeping track of Shawn Pelham, but it would be their last mistake.
Brodie and Rodriguez were at their desks when Ian and I walked in with Shawn, Ian beside him and me behind them, carrying Shawn’s backpack and rolling his suitcase. It was all he had in the world.
“What the hell?” Brodie snarled at Ian.