Tears of the Innocent

Trail of Tears Book 3

by Melodie Thomas

Tuesday, September 21, 2010 — Santa Rosa City, Philippines

Adeline Javier was just three weeks past her twenty-first birthday, and departing on her first real adventure. At five foot three, and barely one hundred pounds, Adeline was nothing short of beautiful. She had the high cheekbones and perfect facial structure of a model, though with a lighter complexion than most Filipinas. Her long straight black hair reached the middle of her back, and her eyes, though black, glimmered like diamonds under her naturally long eyelashes, and were mesmerizing to most that looked into them. Though a ‘C’ cup breast size is considered moderate in most of the world, but on her slender Asian body they seem slightly large, and gave her the womanly figure envied by all who saw her.

Being the oldest of five children, Adeline knew she had the responsibility to help support the family. Her father died of a heart attack two years earlier, and her forty-four year old mother did the best she could, but it wasn’t nearly enough. The day after her birthday, Adeline took the bus into Manila with a friend to visit with an employment agency. They needed to fill out an application, have their picture taken, and just see what opportunities there were. Nothing came out of the day except a great outing for a couple of friends. However, a week later the employment agency called Adeline and asked her if she would be interested in overseas work. They told her there was an agency in Dubai that was looking for models, and they had seen her picture and were interested in her. They also told her that even if the modeling job did not work out, there were many hotel and waitress positions in Dubai if she was interested.

Adeline was excited about the opportunity, but, as with most in her world, didn’t have the money to travel. The agency offered her a credit in advance that would cover her plane ticket and some living expenses that she could pay back from her salary, with interest of course. Adeline jumped at the chance and fidgeted with excitement as she tried to work out the arrangements with the agency on the phone. The agency told her they would book a ticket for her to Dubai, and that she needed to come to Manila two days before the flight to finish the paper work and arrangements.

Forty-four year old Tessa Javier wrestled with a number of emotions as she listened to her daughter excitedly describe the offer that she had in Dubai. At one time in her life, Tessa had also been a young and beautiful girl, full of life and excitement. However, the hardships of many years in poverty, trying to raise five children and the loss of her husband had taken a huge toll on her. When she was twenty-one, she was also the beautiful one, with long dark hair, and a slender body that never reached one hundred pounds. Now she was closer to one hundred and forty pounds. Her long hair had given way to much shorter hair, and her beautiful smile replaced by dull discolored teeth that were now outnumbered by the gaps of the missing teeth.

“Listen, my daughter,” Tessa spoke in Tagalog to an over excited Adeline. “It is good to be excited, but you must be careful at the same time. You will now owe a debt, and people can control you and make you do things you don’t want to do because of the debt.”

“I understand, Momma. But this is real work and a real career,” Adeline answered with the same excitement.

Tessa smiled and patted her daughter’s hand. “Yes, this could be a great thing for you. You are beautiful enough to be a model, just be careful.”

Tessa understood the excitement her daughter was feeling, but also understood the dangers that could await her. Twenty-five years earlier, Tessa was in her daughter’s shoes and going overseas for work with a head full of dreams. However, her dreams turned to nightmares when she found herself working in a bar, and selling herself to men, because she had a debt and that was the work she was required to do. For two years she did that work, and work like it, in various countries. Then she met a man, a man who was handsome, rich, and sweet. He was from England, and he took a liking to her, hiring her from the bar once or twice per week, treating her special. Though he was much older than she was at the time, he claimed to love her, and always treated her with kindness, respect, and care. She found herself falling in love with him, or the image of him and the life he could give her.

Over time, her Englishman paid off her debt, and then asked her to stop working in the bar and stay only with him. She was happy to do that because she hated the bar life, but loved the way he treated her. He gave her money to send home, bought things for her, and even talked about marrying her. For two months, her life was like living in a dream. Then her visa expired, and she was forced to return to the Philippines. Her Englishman took her to the airport, kissed her goodbye, and promised he would come find her. The last she ever saw of him was when he waved to her after she passed through Immigrations. Eight months later, his daughter Adeline was born, but she had never been able to contact him again.

The truth about Adeline’s father was buried deep in the family, and not even Adeline knew. Tessa’s husband married her when Adeline was less than six months old. He had been a longtime admirer of Tessa’s, and accepted Adeline as his own, but like so many in the Philippines, he was a goodhearted man, but stricken with the same level of poverty as the rest. He did what work he could, mostly as a taxi driver, until the stress took him away two years ago.

Adeline was sitting in a window seat in the economy section of a Boeing triple seven, as the plane lined up for its final approach after the eight hour flight from Manila. She arrived in Manila two days earlier, completed the paperwork, and signed the credit agreement, which required her family home be used as collateral against the credit. She wasn’t too worried about the credit as she knew there was a way she would find work and pay it back, but the risk to her family left a hollow feeling in her stomach.

Her first night in Manila, she was taken to a house near the airport where she would stay the next two nights. She also met three other girls that would be traveling with her to Dubai in search of their own dreams. The four girls rapidly became friends. As with the majority of Filipinas, they immediately shared Facebook pages, phone numbers, and family pictures. They were disappointed to find all of their tickets were purchased separately, and none of them would be sitting together on the flight. However, since they were looking for the same agent in Dubai, they agreed to meet just before Immigrations and stay together until they found him.

With a mixture of excitement, fear, and awe, the four new friends held close to each other as they made their way through Immigrations and into Baggage Claim. This was the first time any of them had been out of the Philippines, and the sights, sounds and smells of the new environment had all of them jittery with excitement. As soon as they reached the Baggage Claim area, one of the four had figured out how to connect their phone to the free Wi-Fi, which started the round of picture taking and loading of the pictures to Facebook, so all of their friends back home could see.

With baggage collected, they made their way through Customs and entered the main terminal. They were told to look for a sign with the name Dinihari on it as that would be their contact agent. The sea of signs that greeted them was nearly overwhelming. There must have been a hundred people in the main terminal holding up signs, looking for one lost traveler or another.

“Over there,” Christine announced after the four had been looking for five minutes.

Christine Ocampo was, in Adeline’s eyes, the most beautiful of the four girls. She was a little taller than Adeline was, but with the same delicate features. Adeline was really hoping there was more than one modeling position available, because she just knew that Christine would win if there were just one.

“Ladies,” the man holding the sign greeted with a smile, “I am your driver Dinihari. Welcome to Dubai.”

All of the girls greeted Dinihari, and followed him as he led them out of the terminal to a van that was waiting in the parking area just outside of the terminal. Upon reaching the van, each girl in turn had to have their picture taken beside the van that had the simple words ‘Dinihari Transport Services’ on the side. Once the luggage was loaded all of the girls jumped into the van, taking the two rear seats, so each could have a window. The ride lasted about twenty minutes, when Dinihari parked the van in a parking structure next to a sprawling mall complex. Dinihari unloaded the luggage and then instructed the girls to take the elevator to the second floor and go to the office of Lantra Studios. After shaking hands with Dinihari, and with luggage in tow, the girls headed for the elevator.

Lantra Studios was the third door down from the elevator when the girls reached the second floor. Of course, a series of pictures needed to be taken outside the door before the girls were ready to enter. Once the pictures were done, they entered the office and greeted by a woman that appeared to be of Indian or Arab descent.

“Hello,” the woman greeted from behind a counter, “I am Nurul, and welcome to Dubai.”

The girls all introduced themselves as Nurul looked them over carefully.

“Girls,” Nurul interrupted the chatter, “I know it has been a long day of travel, but there are still some things we need to get done today. All of you will have your initial photo shoot today.”

A round of smiles and clapping interrupted Nurul for a moment and caused her to smile.

“If you will follow me, I will take you to the dressing room where we already have the wardrobe set up for you. I want you to help each other with your makeup, hair, and clothes fitting. We will then bring you into the studio individually and as a group, where we will have two photographers. You will be very busy for the next couple of hours, but do your best to keep up and follow instructions. Any questions?”

Without questions, Nurul led the girls to the dressing room and the next three hours passed in a flurry of activity. Adeline was completely worn out by the time the last photo session was finished. They had been photographed in evening gowns, short skirts, bikinis, one-piece swimsuits, and everything in between. They were constantly getting directions from the photographers to show more cleavage, show less cleavage, show more leg, show less leg, look this way, and look that way. Now hurry and change to the next outfit. It was three hours of constant running, changing makeup, changing hair, changing clothes then back to the studio. Adeline noticed that as the day neared an end, she and Christine were called to take more pictures, for close ups, different poses, sometimes wearing the same clothes over again.

But now it was over, and all four girls had collapsed into chairs in the dressing room, too tired to even talk about the day. Adeline felt she had done well. The fact that she and Christine were called back for extra pictures gave her hope. She was hoping that meant they were the two finalists. Though right now it didn’t really matter, she just wanted to lay down somewhere and rest.

“You guys did a wonderful job tonight,” Nurul said walking into the dressing room. “I know you are tired and hungry, but it was important that we got this first shoot done. Now, we have a van that will take you to the house you will be staying in for the next couple of days. It may take a day or so before we know what will be needed, so just go rest and relax.”

Quietly the girls gathered their belongings and followed their driver to another van. All signs of the earlier excitement were gone, replaced with exhaustion. They were taken to a condominium on the eleventh floor of a complex they could not pronounce. Once reaching the condo, they were shown a room with four beds, where they would be staying together. After dropping their luggage, they went to the kitchen where food was already prepared, with the only thoughts in their minds was getting something to eat, followed by sleep.

Saturday, September 25, 2010 — Dubai,

Two days after the photo shoot, Nurul came to the condominium and met with all four girls in what she called the good news and the bad news speech. The good news was two of the girls were chosen by the modeling company. The bad news was only two girls were chosen by the modeling company. Adeline and Christine were the lucky two they chose. Nurul tempered the bad news to the girls that did not get the modeling jobs by telling them she had found them other work, as hostesses at a local club, and they needed to pack their bags right now and meet the driver in the parking garage as their work started today.

Though disappointed, the two girls were still excited to have work and rushed off to their room to gather their things.

“Now, you two lucky girls,” Nurul said with a smile after the other two had left, “will have a few extra days to wait. The company will be fetching the two of you Saturday morning. So you need to have your bags packed and ready to go.”

“Ate,” Adeline asked, “what are we supposed to do until then? We both have a credit and need to send money.”

Nurul smiled as she pulled two envelopes out of her purse, “Not to worry. Here is a bonus for you for the photo shoot you did when you arrived. There is enough here to pay some of your credit, send some home to your family and still have a little for you to spend here. You can stay here, in this house, and you will not be charged rent. Keep this as our secret, and just be ready to go Saturday morning.”

Each envelope contained a thousand Dirham, which was more money than either had seen in one place in their lives. Their two friends had shared goodbye hugs, promises to stay in touch on Facebook and wished each other the best of luck, before heading off to their own new adventure. After their friends left, Adeline and Christine were given permission to walk to a nearby mall where they could send some of their riches home, and some to pay on their credit.

Right after breakfast, both girls were packed and ready when there was a knock on the door. Their housemother answered the door and a good-looking dark skinned man entered the house.

“Good morning, Ladies. I am Ammar, and I will be your host for your journey.”

“Hi, Ammar,” Christine answered, “I am Christine and this is my friend Adeline.”

“I see that you are already packed,” Ammar said as he gently shook hands with both girls. “Then we should be going as it will take some time to get there.”

With Ammar’s help, the girls loaded their luggage in his car. Through the nearly hour drive, Adeline watched the seaport getting closer and closer.

“Are we going to be by the ocean?” Adeline asked leaning between the two front seats so Ammar could hear her.

“Actually, better than that,” Ammar responded smiling into the mirror. “You are going to be on a boat for most of the day.”

“A boat?” Adeline asked with concern in her voice. “I don’t like boats.”

“You don’t like boats?” Ammar responded with a laugh, “why not?”

“Because I don’t know how to swim,” Adeline answered shyly.

Ammar laughed, “I don’t think you will have anything to worry about. Wait until you see the boat.”

Adeline sat back and looked at Christine with a worried look on her face. Christine was not looking that happy with the news either, but both were quiet as Ammar maneuvered the car through the pier traffic to a parking area.

“Now,” Ammar said as he finished parking the car, “if you want to just call that a boat, then there is nothing else I can say.”

Ammar was pointing to a sixty-foot white yacht moored at the end of the pier. The yacht had two levels of windows, a large flat open stern, and a series of lounge chairs set up on the bow.

“We are going to be on that?” Christine asked with awe.

“Yes you are,” Ammar answered. “Now let’s get your things, get you on board, and introduced to everyone.”

The luggage was quickly unloaded, and even Adeline was awe struck by the yacht. She had only seen such things in pictures, never in person, let alone been on one. As she followed Ammar, she noticed that Christine had fallen a little behind them. Turning, she saw Christine taking a picture of the yacht with her phone.

“Come along now,” Ammar called behind him as he reached the gangplank that lead to the yacht.

Christine was still fumbling with her phone as she hurried along trying to catch up with Adeline, then following her up the gangplank.

Behind the forward windows on the first level of the yacht, was a lounge area that contained a number of plush chairs and sofas. Standing at the windows watching the new arrivals walking up the pier were two men. Both were tall and well built. Both had blond hair, deep blue eyes. and the facial structure of a Scandinavian. Both also had large smiles on their faces.

“Very nice,” one of the men said with a heavy accent. “Which do you prefer, Peder?”

“I will take either, Svien. But you know the choice is only by luck, which cabin they choose.”

Svien smiled and held out his closed fist to his brother, “Yes, but it will be a very good week either way.”

“Yes it will,” Peder answered giving his brother the fist bump. “Yes it will.”

Ammar led Adeline and Christine below deck and down a hallway towards the bow of the boat. He stopped at a pair of doors that were opposite each other in the hallway.

“Here are your rooms,” Ammar said as he opened one of the doors.

“Oh my goodness!” Adeline exclaimed as she peeked inside the room.

The cabin was large with a king sized bed in the middle, a writing desk and a sofa. There were two small round windows to the outside.

“We can share that bed with room to spare,” Christine added peeking around the corner as well.

Ammar laughed, “No need to share, there is a room for each of you.”

Ammar opened the door across the hall and the girls were stunned to see another room just like the first.

“You just need to pick your room and start unpacking,” Ammar added with a smile.

“Our own room?” Adeline said in surprise.

“Yes, just pick one,” Ammar repeated.

Adeline was already partially in the first room so she just continued to step the rest of the way in.

“I guess I will take this one then.”

Christine smiled, “Then I will take the other one.”

“Very good,” Ammar said with a smile as the girls entered their rooms. “One thing, I will need to take your cell phones.”

“Our cell phones, why?” Adeline asked.

“They will interfere with the navigation and communication equipment on board, just like in an airplane,” Ammar explained then raised his hand, “Before you promise me to just keep them turned off, the safety rules are we don’t allow them to be in your possession. I will put them in the ship’s vault on the bridge and you can get them back when we dock again.”

Neither girl like the idea of giving up her cell phone, but both reluctantly handed them to Ammar.

“Very good, now if you want to get yourselves unpacked, I will go tell the captain we are ready to go.”

Both girls pulled their suitcases the rest of the way into the room and Ammar pulled both inward opening doors closed. As they latched, he also locked them and twisted two other locking latches into place, preventing them from being opened from the inside. As he came back out on deck, the forward and aft docking ropes were already being released, and he could hear the rumble of the yacht’s engines. Half way down the gangplank, exiting the boat, Ammar turned and waved to a man in a white uniform that was on the forward portion of the second level. The man returned a lighthearted salute. Ammar turned to continue down the gangplank, but as he did he reached over the side of the railing and dropped both cell phones into the ocean.

Inside the forward lounge area, both Peder and Svien watched Ammar leave the boat, and then watched as the gangplank was removed. The boat slowly started sliding away from the dock. Soon forward motion could be sensed and the yacht’s captain eased the yacht into the harbor and began their estimated eleven-day journey.

“Well, my brother,” Svien said with a smile, “I think we should go introduce ourselves to our cabin mates.”

“Indeed,” Peder replied, “it has been a long week, and I need a release.”

With a laugh, both men walked through the lounge towards the center of the boat. Using an internal hallway off the lounge, they reached the stairs to take them to their cabins on the lower deck.

On the main bridge, the first officer was alone, manning the helm as the yacht reached the open channel leading out of the harbor towards the open sea. He expertly maintained steerage between the navigation buoys as he reached up and flipped a switch on a small speaker mounted on the instrument panel in front of him.

“Who are you and why are we locked in here?” he heard the female voice through the speaker.

“You were locked in here so you could not leave,” the voice of one of the Norwegians answered. “As for who I am, I am the father of your first baby.”

“What baby? I don’t have a baby.”

The first officer could hear the Norwegian laugh, “You will soon.”

“Let go of me! Stop it! What are you doing?” the female voice could be heard screaming.

The first officer’s face broke into a smile at the sound of tearing clothes and the pitiful cries that followed. Suddenly the sound disappeared as another hand reached around him and turned the speaker off.

“It is bad enough what is done to those poor girls,” the yacht’s Captain said stepping away from the first officer. “We don’t need to be listening to it.”

“They are just a couple of breeders, and we get well paid to deliver them,” the first officer responded. “I never hear you complain about the money.”

The Captain cracked a small smile, “No, I don’t complain about the money, but I also tell myself they aren’t being raped down there right now.”

“Just look at it this way, they are starting their lives as mothers, and if everything goes right, by the time we reach Malaysia, they will both be pregnant, and we earn the bonus.”

The Captain nodded, “Taking money from the Devil.”

“True, but the Devil pays well.”

The Captain patted the first officer on the shoulder as he walked past him, “I can’t argue with that, but I don’t have to listen to it.”

Sunday, November 7, 2010 — Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

The key to avoiding the majority of the questions on why you are someplace is to act like you belong there, even if you don’t. That was exactly the plan as she entered the hospital on that sunny Malaysian afternoon. With her black hair up in a tight bun, wearing thick black rimmed glasses, shorts and a simple white tee shirt, she walked past the help desk and admissions desks carrying her backpack, and reading the screen on her phone just like any nurse, doctor, or medical assistant would when going to work. Even the fact that she was Caucasian would only raise a mild interest, as there were a large number of foreign medical personnel on staff at many of the Asian hospitals. The only thing that could be considered out of place was the four-inch high heels on her feet. Though a couple of people looked up at her as she passed, no one questioned her or asked her if she needed assistance as she entered the hallway full of elevator doors.

After pressing the down button on the elevator, she casually leaned against the wall and continued to read the screen on her phone as if it was the most interesting novel she had ever seen. However, her eyes were not on the screen, which was just the dummy screen of a nonworking phone, but carefully scanning the hallway in case someone was following her. She was in a dangerous place, and she knew it. Escape would be difficult if she was caught, but the mission was critical, at least critical to her.

An elevator chimed behind her. Turning, she stepped into the empty elevator and pushed the ‘B1” button that would take her to the staff locker room. As the elevator door opened into a room with a long row of lockers and hangers, she again strode out and turned to her left as if she knew where she was going. The time of day had been selected to minimize the number of people that would be in the locker room. It was two in the afternoon, too late for lunch and too early for shift change.

As she walked past the rows of lockers, she was carefully watching for occupants, until she came across a completely empty row. Turning quickly to her right, she continued to walk with purpose down the row, but now instead of looking at her phone, she was looking at the lab coats that hung on her left. About half way down the row, she spotted four or five that had stethoscopes rolled in one of the pockets. Quickly checking the sizes on the lab coats, she found one that would fit her, pulled it off the hanger, and draped it over her left arm. She quickly turned back to the direction she came, strode to the end of the row, and turned towards the elevators. However, she didn’t stop at the elevators, instead she walked past them and into the women’s restroom she had seen earlier.

Entering one of the stalls, she placed her backpack on the small shelf behind the stool, opened it, and removed a fair sized ladies purse that had a long shoulder strap so the purse would hang about the small of her back with the strap over her shoulder. She pushed the now empty backpack into the corner and forgot it. The pack was sterile, she bought it just for this use and there was nothing in it that could be traced to her. She put the lab coat on, pulled the stethoscope from the pocket, and looped it around her neck. She then pulled on a pair of blue hospital gloves, and shouldered her purse so the strap covered most of the nametag on her left breast.

Leaving the restroom, she grabbed a clipboard that was lying on a table just outside the restroom, tucked it under her left arm, and entered the elevator. She pressed the button for the fifth floor and stepped to the back of the elevator car. Two other people got on the elevator on the third floor, both nodding cordially to her, and then turned their back to face the elevator door. When the door opened on the fifth floor, she followed the other two passengers out except they turned right for the nurse’s station, and she turned left.

As she exited the elevator, she pulled the clipboard out and started flipping through the pages as she walked towards the next adjoining hallway. She almost had to bite her tongue to keep from laughing when she realized she was reading the toilet-cleaning checklist, but no one else needed to know that. She turned left at the next hallway without slowing, but carefully glanced up from the clipboard to see the single police officer standing guard outside the room she was going to. She carefully studied him as she approached. He was wearing the standard dark blue street uniform with a utility belt that held a .38 caliber revolver, tethered to his belt, as was standard for most Asian police officers.

“May I help you, Doctor?” the officer addressed her in heavily accented English as she approached.

“I just need to do a quick vitals check on the patient,” she said without looking up from the clipboard.

“I will need to accompany you, Doctor,” the officer said as he started to open the door.

She smiled to herself, as not only didn’t she mind if the officer followed her, she needed him to follow her.

“Not a problem,” she said looking up for the first time with a smile.

The officer opened the door and stepped inside holding the door for her. She followed him in, spotting the single bed in the room that held an unmoving man, surrounded by a lot of equipment. She stepped out of the way so the officer could close the door and as she did, she stumbled slightly on her heels. The officer pushed the door closed and reached out for her in one motion.

“Careful, Doctor,” the officer said as he caught her right arm.

She allowed herself to be pulled closer to the officer while she held a surprised look on her face.

“Thank you,” she smiled and a heartbeat later brought her right knee up into his groin with enough force to lift him off his feet.

The officer gasped with pain and surprise as she took a partial step back, grabbed his hair with her right hand, and pulled his head into her rising left knee. The impact sounded like a watermelon hit with a baseball bat, as the officer’s head snapped back and he collapsed to the floor unconscious. She quickly removed his utility belt, pulled the handcuffs, and tossed the rest of the belt aside. Rolling the officer the rest of the way on to his stomach, she pulled his arms behind him and cuffed them together.

Collecting her clipboard, she walked over to the bed and looked down on the man attached to all of the machines.

“Hello, Robert,” she said softly with a smile. “I am so disappointed that you won’t know that it was me that killed you, and I so much wanted you to know that.”

She stood and looked at him for a moment while gently brushing his forehead.

“You raped me for years, and you turned me into a freak. I bet you never figured it would come back to haunt you. Well, here I am dear Robert, you just don’t know it.”

She reached back to her purse with her left hand and slid a six-inch silver double-edged dagger from a side compartment. She transferred the dagger to her right hand, brought it back over her head where she grabbed her right hand with her left and brought it forward like swinging an axe. The dagger made contact with the center of Robert Brajovik’s forehead, and with only a slight hesitation as the sharp point cracked through his skull, buried to the hilt in his brain.

She stood there for a moment admiring her handy work, but realized the life support systems would be alarming quickly and she needed to leave. Grabbing the clipboard, she stepped over the fallen police officer and exited the room. Moving quickly back up the hallway, again reading her clipboard. She just reached the elevator as she heard the public address system announce an emergency in the room she just left. As the elevator door closed, she caught the fleeting glimpse of people running in the hallway past the elevator.

She quickly stripped the lab coat and black glasses, depositing them into a pile on the floor. Opening her purse, she removed a carefully folded light blue summer dress, which she put on over her shorts and tee shirt. Following the dress, the black wig she was wearing was added to the pile on the floor, leaving the skullcap on her head. The black wig was replaced with a shoulder length wig of red hair. Finally, she removed a smaller clutch purse and a pair of wide rim sunglasses from the larger purse before adding it, along with the useless cell phone, to the growing pile on the floor.

As the elevator door opened on the first floor, she stepped out with the sunglasses on, fresh orange/red lipstick on her lips, carrying only the clutch purse, and headed for the entrance to the hospital. She knew it was only a matter of minutes before the doors would be sealed by security as they looked for the black haired nurse that had been seen on the fifth floor. It would only be a few minutes later that someone would discover the stuff in the elevator, so her current disguise was only designed to gain her the few precious seconds needed to exit the hospital. Once she was on the streets of Malaysia, she would be nearly impossible to find. She had just reached the exit to the hospital, when a quick glance over her shoulder revealed hospital security personnel converging on the doors. Without breaking stride, she pushed through the doors and entered the hot afternoon sun.

No one questioned her or challenged her as she left the building. She walked two blocks down the main road from the hospital before turning left on one of the side streets she found earlier. Halfway down the side street, there were some garbage dumpsters for the local businesses. As she passed the dumpsters, she quickly stripped the red wig and skullcap from her head, tossing them into one of the open dumpsters. As she continued walking, she removed the five small pins she had used on her own hair, letting her own light brown hair fall freely down her back, nearly reaching her shoulder blades. Using her right hand, she fluffed her hair as she exited the side street onto another main road. Reaching the sidewalk, she walked up to the curb and raised her hand to flag down a passing taxi. It took only minutes before she was in the back seat of a taxi, on her way back to her hotel.

Her next set of moves were already planned, as she reviewed them in her mind. Her suitcase was already packed at the hotel. She would collect it, check out of her room, and catch a different taxi to the train station. That was when the realization settled into her mind, she had no place to go. Anya would not be coming for her, there was no home base to return to, and she was on her own.

That realization came with a mixture of emotions ranging from ecstatic happiness to fear. She was free of the Brajoviks, but she was now stuck in the world as a freak, with no plan, no home, and only a little bit of money. What was she going to do now? She had a ticket on the train to take her from Kuala Lumpur to Johor Baharu. But then what? She was traveling on a U.S. passport, which only had less than three weeks left on her current visa stamp, even if it was a fake stamp, it still had a deadline.

She left the island a little over a week ago, when Anya decided that the capture of her husband Robert, was too big of a risk, and she was sent to kill Robert. Anya had given her five thousand U.S. dollars and instructions to terminate Robert, go to Johor Baharu, wait one week and then cross into Singapore where Anya would meet up with her and return her to the island. However, all of that changed the day before when she saw on the news the joint U.S., Malaysia assault on the island and the destruction of what the news was calling a terrorist cell. Attempts to use the emergency contact methods for Anya had failed, and then the news reported the death of Anya Brajovik.

Friday, November 12, 2010 — Johor Baharu, Malaysia

She had been here for five days now, as was the original plan. Tomorrow she was supposed to cross into Singapore, but there wasn’t going to be anyone there to meet her. After she paid for the hotel that she had been staying in, she would have a little less than three thousand U.S. dollars remaining. Hotels in Singapore were much more expensive than Malaysia, so going there was not to her advantage. Though the problem should have resulted in a simple solution, don’t go to Singapore, it wasn’t that simple for her. Follow instructions. That’s what had been programmed into her for years, ever since the Brajoviks had kidnapped her. So, even knowing there would be no one to meet her in Singapore, the impulse to follow the last instruction received was powerful.

She knew how to deal with things that changed during a mission, on those topics her mind was clear. Do whatever was necessary to accomplish the mission. Escape if you can, but accomplish the mission, and don’t be captured alive was primary. Nothing else mattered. Everything that happened before and after the mission was dealt with for her. She didn’t have to deal with that part, just follow instructions. Now it was different. She had to develop her own plan, but she didn’t know what to do, where to go, or how to get the money to survive.

These were the primary thoughts in her mind as she sat at a little local restaurant about two blocks from her hotel, having a meal of chili prawns and rice, served on a banana leaf. The food should have been very good, but she gave it no thought as she ate. It was a little after ten at night, and she was supposed to be crossing into Singapore in about two hours. But why? That was what she was instructed to do. How could she ignore an instruction? Maybe she should cross over and spend only a single night. Then the final instruction would be executed, and with no further instructions she would be free to do as she wanted.

With these thoughts still hammering at her mind and her meal finished, she paid the bill and started the walk back to her hotel. The streets in this area were dark, which suited her fine, as she didn’t have to worry about people looking at her. She was about half way back to her hotel when her senses overrode her thoughts with the fact that she was being followed. Her situation awareness went to hypersensitive as she noticed three males following about thirty feet or so behind her. She quickly did a tactical review of the situation and realized that if a confrontation were to happen, this would be the best place for it. The street was dark, there were no other people on it, there would be little to explain.

She intentionally slowed her pace to allow those behind to move closer. As the distance closed to ten feet, she stepped aside, looking down at her shoe as if there was something wrong with her heel. This also allowed her to turn slightly and see those behind her, three males, early to mid-twenties, blue jeans, torn white tee shirts and tattoos on each arm.

“Hey, pretty lady,” one of the men addressed her in English with a heavy accent as they approached. “What are you doing walking our street alone this time of night?”

“I just finished my dinner and was going back to the hotel,” she answered softly with a smile.

“You know we have a street tax here for foreigners after dark. Have you paid your taxes?” the same man asked with a smile as he approached to within four feet of her.

His two companions separated and moved around her covering three points of her escape route.

“Really?” she answered with a surprised look. “I had not heard about that tax. How much is it and how do I pay it?”

“Oh, I think it will cost you all the money you have, and probably some time with that sexy body of yours as well,” the man said as he stepped forward pulling a seven inch knife from his belt.

She noticed that neither of his companions approached her. They were expecting her to try to run and they would catch her. She relaxed her body and watched the man with the knife in front of her. He held the knife with the blade outward, with his palm up. He wasn’t an experienced knife fighter, just a stupid kid with a sharp toy. She waited until he had the knife only inches from her, still holding it in a threatening manner, before she lunged forward with her right leg and drove her right elbow into the man’s throat, while grabbing his knife hand with her left.

The impact to his throat crushed the trachea and larynx, which shut down his ability to breath. His instant reaction was to release the knife and try to bring his hands to his throat. She caught the knife in her left hand as he released it. She held the knife with the blade point downward and her fist closed on the handle. She continued her forward motion by bringing her left leg around so that her back was to the original knife owner, who was now trying to breathe with a crushed trachea. As her back bumped the first assailant, she brought the knife downward and behind her, slicing deeply into the man’s thigh and hip region.

The other two men were still standing flat footed as their partner collapsed to the ground behind her. The one on her right was the first to react. He was holding some kind of black club in his left hand. He leapt forward, swinging the club at her head. She leaned backwards as the club passed her face harmlessly. As he reached the end of his swing and started to reverse directions, she stepped forward partially blocking his arm movement, but sweeping the knife blade towards his throat. As she slipped past him, she felt the knife contact with something soft, and then felt it scrape something hard. As she turned away from him, she could see the spray of blood coming from his throat as he dropped the club and grabbed for his draining life.

She focused her attention on the third man, who was stepping away from her and pulling a small automatic pistol from his pocket. She knew she had only one option as she flipped the knife into the air, catching the tip with her right hand. Snapping her arm like a whip, she launched the knife at the third assailant, and immediately launching her body at him as well. She knew that accurately throwing a knife in a combat situation was only successful in the movies, but also knew that anyone that had a knife thrown at them would duck. That hesitation was the edge that she wanted.

Surprisingly, the knife actually hit the man blade first, but the rotation of the knife prevented it from penetrating. Instead a deep gash was cut on his right breast area. His reaction was the same as if the knife had penetrated, he dropped the gun and grabbed for the spot on his chest. A heartbeat later, she slammed her elbow into his right jaw, knocking him in to a half spin, landing face first on the ground. She leapt into the air, pulling both feet up, and landed on the fallen man with both of her knees between his shoulder blades. She heard the snapping of ribs and the cracking of bones as he let out a gasp and then lay motionless.

The fight was over in less than ten seconds, as she checked the scene around her. The first man was lying on his back, eyes open, and his tongue hanging out. The second was still moving but lying face down in a growing pool of blood. She picked up the pistol and knife. Checking each man quickly, she found two extra magazines for the pistol and almost two thousand Malaysian Ringgits. Taking the money and the weapons, she crossed the street and went an extra block out of her way to approach the hotel from a different direction.

As she approached the hotel, she entered enough lighted areas to see that she did have some blood on her clothes, but not that much. She would just have to try to cover it with her hands until she could get to her room. Fortunately, no one questioned her as she made her way to the elevator and up to her room. She quickly stripped out of the blood spotted clothes, and put fresh ones on. She pulled her suitcase out. Her decision had been made for her. She was going to Singapore tonight.

Thursday, November 25, 2010 — Tucson, Arizona

My attacker stepped forward with his right leg, and I saw him launch the punch at my head at the same time. Slipping slightly to my left I swept the punch away from me with both hands, but grabbed his wrist with my right hand as his fist went past my head. I pulled on his punch, keeping him moving forward, as I brought my right knee into his midsection, lifting him off the ground, and then letting him collapse in a heap at my feet.

The second attacker was trying to get around his fallen buddy as I launched a sweeping roundhouse kick with my left leg aim at his exposed ribs. The kick found its target, and the impact caused him to fold slightly to his right as my foot found the floor again and I stepped forward delivered a straight punch to his sternum area that dropped him to his knees.

The third attacker was moving on my right, but he was carrying a stick, a piece of wooden closet rod about three feet long. I turned to face him as we maneuvered for position on each other. He lunged forward swinging the stick in a backhanded motion towards my head. I leaned back allowing the stick to pass in front of me. I watched the stick all the way through its arc. As it reached the end of the swing and started forward again I made my move.

I jumped forward, facing the stick, trying to put myself inside its swing path so I could catch his arm. Suddenly the stick changed direction, and went straight down. Before I could react to the change, I was suddenly hit in the stomach with what felt like a sledgehammer. The impact picked me up and dropped me on my butt a foot from where I had been standing.

“Daniel,” Master Chung scolded standing in front of me while I tried to catch my breath, “how many times I tell you? This is a stick. It is not your enemy. Do not focus on the stick!”

He then leaned over and thumped me, not so gently, on the top of the head with the stick as if trying to drive his point home. How a guy that was a foot shorter and fifty pounds lighter than me, let alone being in his fifties, could hit so damn hard was something I could not figure out. All I knew was I was glad to be wearing the padded vest.

After returning from Malaysia, and the final battle with the Brajoviks, I took stock of what had happened to me over the past year or so, and some of the close calls encountered. I decided that I needed to improve my fighting skills. Working for Trail of Tears was putting me in some situations where I needed to defend myself, or members of my team, but since I was no longer an official officer of the law, I could not carry a weapon. I found Master Chung’s studio in Tucson and went to investigate.

“What style do you teach?” I asked him in our first discussion.

“Style?” He responded. “I don’t teach style. You want style you go to my wife’s dance class. I teach you to fight, however is necessary.”

I liked the gruff Chinese man from the initial meeting, and when I returned for the next class, he and a few of his students put me through some evaluation training. Because of my past military and FBI training, I had some basics. They decided that I would be put in the advanced class. The only thing that I felt advanced at was being their punching bag.

My humiliation at getting my butt kicked again was the end of the class session for the day. I slowly pulled myself to my feet and headed for the showers. Not surprisingly, I found a footprint sized red mark on my stomach, even though I had the padded vest. Damn, that guy could hit hard. I finished my shower, dressed, and stumbled my way out to the Vette.

Parking in the garage, I dropped my gym bag on the floor just inside the house, walked straight to the couch, dropping face first onto it. I laid there and groaned for a moment before I felt a pair of hands slowly rubbing my back.

“Rough day as the punching bag?” Lin asked as she rubbed my back.

A moan was all I could get out, but her hands felt good on my back.

“Well, you have about two hours before we need to go, so maybe you should take a nap.”

It was Thanksgiving Day and Lin and I were to drive up to Phoenix to have dinner with my mom and Brenda. This was Lin’s first experience at the tradition of gorging oneself on great food that was celebrated in the US.

Lin Vin Wei was my fiancée from Singapore, this being only her second time in the United States. Though it was not really a secret, most people didn’t know, or didn’t realize that Lin Vin was not born a girl. Lin is what is known as a full post op male to female transsexual. However, very few people could tell by looking at her. She is a little tall at five foot seven inches, but she definitely has the figure of a female, a soft sweet voice and her long straight black hair fell to the middle of her lower back.

We had met on my first trip to Singapore, and a relationship started almost immediately, though her past was a secret to me at that time. There was absolutely nothing masculine about her and nearly everyone that knew her thought of her as a beautiful Asian woman. After completing her sexual reassignment surgery in Thailand, long before I met her, she had all of her identification and birth certificate changed to ‘female’, and anyone that met her knew her only as a woman. I can say for certainty, to me Lin Vin is all woman, and a beautiful person.

“I think,” I said as I sat up in the couch and pulled Lin down onto my lap, “if I were to go lay down there are things I would prefer to do besides sleep.”

Lin smiled and kissed me, “You are a big teaser. You know that?”

“Why do you think I am teasing?”

“Unless you got a sudden stamina boost, you’re beat.”

I kind of shrugged and smiled, “I guess I can’t argue with that, but that doesn’t mean the desire is not there.”

I pulled Lin to me for a deep kiss. Lin was only on a visitor visa and she would have to leave the country long before our wedding. We already had the paperwork started for her immigration visa, but the date for our wedding was set for June of the next year. Lin always wanted to be a June bride, so Lin is going to be a June bride, even if it means waiting six months. We’re going to the Philippines for Charlie and Maria’s wedding in December, but was not sure how we were going to avoid being apart until the wedding.

Having Lin around the house for the past weeks was the most natural thing. It was like she had always been there, always belonged there. She made herself at home immediately, and having a woman’s touch did wonders for the look and feel of the house. It felt like a home. Surprisingly, the pictures of Stephanie that I had kept on the mantel were still on the mantel. Lin only moved them and added a few other decorations that made it feel more natural.

Stephanie had been my girlfriend before she was killed. I suppose I could call her my girlfriend, though we never really did any of the normal boyfriend/girlfriend things. Actually, when we first met even being cordial to each other was a challenge. However, somewhere along the way, a relationship started growing between us, despite all efforts by me, and others, to prevent it.

Stephanie wasn’t always a girl. Up to the time she was kidnapped by the Brajoviks, Stephanie was known as Steven. However, the Brajoviks were kidnapping young men, and through the use of drugs, torture and forced feminization, turning them into programmable robotic assassins. Stephanie was found, left for dead, in the Arizona desert, and the case was given to my partner and me, since we worked for the FBI out of the local office.

My tolerance for anything remotely connected to homosexuality, or what I thought was connected to it, was at or very near zero. Even though what happened to Stephanie was totally against her will, I had a very difficult time accepting it, and our initial meetings were contentious at best. However, as much as I fought it, I found her attractive, and the more I got to know her the harder it was for me to think of her as anything but a woman.

Stephanie’s and my entire time together was focused around the case of finding the Brajoviks. Our relationship grew, and we both declared our love for each other. We kissed, we slept in each other’s arms, but we never had sex, never had the intimate physical relationship that most boyfriends and girlfriends share, but then she was gone. Killed by the very people that took her, and changed her into what she was.

I told Lin the pictures didn’t need to stay, to which she replied that she owed more to Stephanie than she could ever repay. No, Stephanie’s pictures would stay right where they were. As a compromise, I made sure there were a couple of pictures of Lin on the mantel as well. For some reason this made her cry, but she said it was a good cry. I am not sure I understand that.

We had not taken on any new cases since returning from Malaysia. I wanted some time off to spend with Lin, and Charlie was still recovering from his wounds. Sunan was the only one that really stayed active, but not on anything new. After returning from Cambodia, Sunan stayed in Malaysia to work with any of the remaining victims from the hotel not yet released to return to Cambodia.

Sunan Nankakarn was an American born son of an American mother and Thai father, thus held dual citizenship between the US and Thailand. He was also a victim of the Brajoviks kidnappings and forced feminization in Thailand. He had been kidnapped, and partially feminized when he was rejected by the organization. He woke up one day on a the bench of a bus stop in Thailand with breast implants and wearing a dress. Lin and I met him while investigating another lead in Thailand, after he had completely reversed the effects of the feminization. As a result of his experiences, he had a passion for fighting trafficking and I offered him a position on my team.

Charlie and Maria were getting married in the Philippines on the eleventh of December, and Lin and I would be going to the wedding. We promised Mary Beth we would stop at the headquarters of Trail of Tears in Sacramento before going to the Philippines to review anything new that we should be looking into.

Charlie Swenson had been my partner since joining Trail of Tears a little over a year ago. He met Maria in Singapore on the same trip that I met Lin, and there was an instant attraction between the two of them. Maria was from the Philippines, and at the time she met Charlie, she was attempting to escape a life of forced prostitution. In the beginning, I can’t say that I was a supporter of their relationship. I had heard too many stories about the poor young girls of some Asian nations, and their drive to find foreign husbands. However, the more I was around Maria, and then watching her care for Charlie when he was shot in the hotel in Malaysia, the more I started thinking that Charlie was one lucky man.

The drive from Tucson to Phoenix was almost mind numbing to me, probably because I had done it so many times, and took the beauty of the desert for granted. Lin, on the other hand, was always excited with the trip. The view of the open desert was simply fascinating to her. Growing up in the concrete and steel jungles of Southeast Asia, the concept of so much open country was amazing to her. For this trip, I had to promise her that we would stop on the way home the next day so she could take pictures, to avoid having to stop on the way to Phoenix.

We were about an hour into the two-hour drive when my cell phone rang. Mounted on the dash, connected to the hands free Bluetooth device, I could see the caller ID and could not help the smile that formed on my face.

“Abdullah, my friend, how are you?” I answered the call.

Abdullah Abdullah was the Director of the Malaysian Police, Criminal Investigation Division. We had met after tracing the center of the Brajoviks kidnapping operation to an old hotel on the outskirts of Kuala Lumpur. We quickly became friends with Abdullah, and I had a huge amount of respect for his abilities. During the final raid on Brajovik’s island, Abdullah had been shot in the leg. The wound, and the fact that I had to carry him over my shoulder while running from a missile attack, resulted in the need for a titanium rod to be installed in his leg. They were able to save the leg, but Abdullah’s days as a field cop in Malaysia were pretty much over. However, he would still run the show from his office, just having others pounding the streets for him.

“Hello, Daniel,” Abdullah’s voice came through radio speakers in my car. “I am doing better than I was the last time you saw me. Is your beautiful bride with you?”

“I am here, Abdullah,” Lin answered with a smile of her own. “How is your leg?”

“Let’s see, how would my friend Daniel answer that question? It has not fallen off yet, but some days I wish it would,” Abdullah laughed at his own joke.

“You have not gone back to work yet have you?” I asked.

“I never stopped work, Daniel. I just don’t go to the office. Instead, I drive my wife crazy here at home. No, I have another five weeks in the cast, but they told me I could start being more mobile on it in another week or so.”

“Since it is, what, five in the morning there, I am assuming this is not a social call?” I asked.

“I am afraid that time of day means little to me now, since sleeping is only something I can do for short periods. However, this is a working call with the social pleasure mixed into it,” Abdullah answered.

“Okay, what can we do for you?”

“We have something here that might be of interest to you, so I thought I would share it. As you know, we have been trying to find our mysterious lady that helped bring Robert Brajovik’s life to a sudden end, with little luck. About two weeks ago, three of my fellow countrymen, who did not work in the most respected of businesses, were found beaten on a street in Johor Baharu. Two of the three were dead, and the single survivor had a broken back and is paralyzed from the neck down. Our survivor claims he and his friends were attacked by a Western woman.”

“Our lady friend?” I interrupted.

Anya and Robert Brajovik, along with some help from some CIA people, specifically Raymond Lattimer, were kidnapping men, brainwashing them, force feminizing them and turning them into nearly robotic assassins. Lattimer, who I knew for the longest time by the name of Smith, was shot by Anya Brajovik during the final raid. He was still alive when I carried Abdullah out of the house just minutes before a cruise missile strike leveled the majority of the island. Lattimer was billed as a hero by the press in the aftermath. I was never too sure what his true involvement was.

The entire Brajovik cell was wiped out with the raid in Malaysia with the exception of one. There was one remaining active assassin from the cell, and she went by the name of Lucy. We had no idea where she was at the time of the raid, or even sure if she was still alive until her picture was captured on a hospital security camera the day after the raid. The day Robert Brajovik was killed in the hospital.

“Probably, but I doubt she was the one doing the attacking. I say ‘probably’ because yesterday my field investigation team did get picture identification from a local hotel that the girl we are looking for stayed there. Once we had the identification, we were able to get a copy of the passport used to check into the hotel. The name of the passport was Lucy Johnson, and the picture matched our girl.”

“I don’t want to sound critical, Abdullah, but why did it take two weeks to reach this point? This sounds like typical police work and should have only taken a day or so.”

“Unfortunately, Daniel, this type of thing is not that uncommon in Johor, and our local police department wasn’t looking at it as anything beyond typical gang violence. Eventually it did make its way into the national database and my department caught it.”

“Okay, so any idea where she went?”

“Yes, according to our immigration records, the person holding this passport exited Malaysia and entered Singapore a little after midnight on the day of the attack.”

I glanced at Lin and saw her watching me.

“I have contacted my counterpart in Singapore,” Abdullah continued, “but since no laws have been broken there, I don’t think we are going to get much more than telling their officers to ‘keep their eyes open’ kind of response.”

I was quiet for a few minutes watching the road and pondering what Abdullah was telling us.

“What are your thoughts, Daniel?” Abdullah asked.

“I guess, mostly, I am trying to figure out what she is doing. She is on her own. No support structure and no one to call for help. What is she going to do?”

“That is the primary reason I am calling you,” Abdullah said. “She is out of my country now, so there isn’t much I can do. However, she is still very dangerous, and running uncontrolled. I can only imagine what she is thinking or doing. You need to find her Daniel, and get her off the streets, as you would say.”

“Yeah, but I’m not really sure how I can do that. I’m not a cop, and especially not a cop in Asia. I will have Lin call her uncle and let him know what is going on, and I may ask Sunan to take a break and go to Singapore for a few days to look around. However, that is just looking for a needle in a haystack.”

“Are the two of you planning to be on my side of the ocean anytime soon?” Abdullah asked.

“We are going to Charlie and Maria’s wedding in December,” Lin answered, “then probably stopping in Singapore to get a few more of my things.”

“Sadly, I will miss Charlie’s wedding, but I plan to make yours. June, right?”

“Yes, June eleven,” Lin answered with a smile.

“Okay, if you find you have an extra day or so, stop by Kuala Lumpur and have a glass of wine with me.”

“You are drinking wine and taking pain medication?” Lin asked with concern.

Abdullah laughed, “My dear lady, wine is my pain medication.”

We said our goodbyes and broke off the call. The rest of the way to Phoenix Lin and I talked about Lucy. What would she be thinking? What would she be doing? I had no idea what the effects of the brainwashing would be without the controller still there to give directions. I needed to find someone that understood such things and ask, but I had no idea who.