Dark Horse

16

Despite the fact that every law enforcement agent in Palm Beach County hated me, I did still have contacts in the profession. I called an FBI agent I knew from the field office in West Palm. Armedgian and another agent had coordinated with PBSO narcotics on a case that involved heroine dealers in West Palm Beach and a connection in France. Armedgian had handled all the work between our respective offices, the FBI liaison in Paris, French authorities, and Interpol. The case had lasted six months, and in that time, Armedgian had become not only a contact, but a friend-the kind of friend I could call and ask for information.

I called him at the end of the day and reintroduced myself. It's Estes. Remember me? We'll always have Paris… Of course, he said, though there was a pause first, and a tension in his voice.

I asked him to get me what he could on Tomas Van Zandt and World Horse Sales from Interpol. Again the pause. Was I back on the job? He thought I'd left the profession, after… well, after…

I explained to him I was helping out a friend who had gotten mixed up with this character in a business deal, and I'd heard the guy was a crook. I wasn't asking for anything but to find out if he had a record. That didn't seem too much, did it?

Armedgian made the customary noises of complaint and fear of discovery and censure. Federal agents were the kids in school who really did worry that going to the lavatory without a hall pass would put a black mark in their permanent records that would ruin their lives. But in the end he agreed to do the deed.

Tomas Van Zandt hadn't become what he was overnight. It wasn't unreasonable to assume if he had terrorized one girl, he had terrorized others. Maybe one of them had dared to go to the authorities. Then again, part of his control over Sasha Kulak had been the fact that she was a stranger in a strange land, and probably there illegally.

It made me furious to think about it. He was a predator preying on vulnerable women, whether they were his employees or his clients. And the truly infuriating thing about that was the fact that vulnerable women often either refuse to see the danger in a man like Van Zandt, or convince themselves they have no recourse but to suffer through. And a sociopath like Van Zandt could smell that a mile away.

I picked up his business card and looked at it. It was late, but I could still call him on his cell phone, apologize again for Irina's behavior, ask to meet him for a drink… Maybe I'd get lucky and have to kill him in self-defense at the end of the evening.

I was reaching for the phone when something hit my front door with force. My hand went for the Glock I'd laid on the table to clean. My mind raced through scenarios in the blink of an eye. Then the pounding started and a small voice penetrated the wood.

"Elena! Elena!"

Molly.

I pulled the door open and the girl fell inside as if she'd been blown to the house by a hurricane. Her hair was matted with sweat. She was as pale as parchment.

"Molly, what's wrong? What's happened?"

I guided her to a chair and she melted into it like a limp noodle, so out of breath she was panting.

"How did you get here?"

"My bike."

"God. It's the dead of night. Why didn't you call me if you needed to see me?"

"I couldn't. I didn't dare."

"Have you heard something from Erin?"

She pulled off the jacket she'd worn tied around her waist and fumbled through the folds of cloth. Her hands were shaking violently as she fished out a videotape and thrust it at me.

I took the thing to the VCR, rewound it, and hit the play button. I watched the drama unfold as I knew Molly had, but with a quality to my sense of dread I knew she didn't have because she hadn't lived as long as I had or seen the things that I had seen. I watched her sister knocked to the ground and shoved into the white van. Then came the voice, mechanically altered to disguise or to frighten or both: "We have your daughter. Call the police, she dies. Three hundred thousand dollars. Directions later."

The picture went to static. I stopped the VCR and turned to look at Molly. Molly the Mini-Exec was gone. Molly the adult in disguise was nowhere in sight. Sitting at my table, looking small and fragile, was Molly the child, twelve years old and terrified for her big sister. Tears trapped behind the lenses of her Harry Potter glasses magnified the fear in her eyes.

She was trying very hard to be brave as she waited for something from me. That almost frightened me more than the video had.

I crouched in front of her, my hands braced on the arms of the chair. "Where did you get this, Molly?"

"I heard Mom and Bruce fighting about Erin," she said quickly. "When they went out of his office, I went in, and I found it."

"They've seen it."

She nodded.

"What did they do?"

The tears rolled out the sides of the glasses and down her cheeks. She spoke in a very, very small voice. "Nothing."

"They didn't call the police?"

"Bruce said he would handle it. Then he sent Mom to bed." She shook her head in disbelief. I could see the anger rise up inside her, bringing color to her face. "And he went for a drive to clear his head, because he had a bad day! I hate him!" she cried, slamming a small fist on the table. "I hate him! He won't do anything because he doesn't want her back! Erin's going to die because of him!"

The tears came in earnest now, and Molly fell against me, throwing her arms around my neck.

I've never known how to comfort people. Perhaps because I wasn't taught by example. Or perhaps I had always taken my own personal pain so deeply within me, I wouldn't allow anyone to touch it. But Molly's pain was overflowing, and she gave me no choice but to share it with her. I closed my arms around her and stroked her hair with one hand.

"It won't be up to him, Molly," I said. "You've got me, remember?"

In that moment I knew real fear. This was no longer a case I didn't want with a probable outcome of no big consequence. It wasn't a simple matter of working a job. I had a connection to this child in my arms. I had made a commitment. I who had wanted nothing more than to hide with my misery until I could find the nerve to check out.

I held her tighter, not for her, but for me.

I made a copy of the videotape, then we put Molly's bike in my trunk and headed for Binks Forest. It was nearly midnight.