“Ah,” he said. “Understood.”
He pulled the jeep away from the curb and started across town. When she remained quiet he glanced her way, noticing her erect posture and the worry lines stretching across her forehead. “I appreciate you doing this. I’m sure it takes you to a place you’d just as soon forget.”
Selena shrugged. “I grew up knowing there were things I had to do for my family. Even as a kid I knew my looks were part of who I was. They would take me places other people couldn’t go. Some people have brains. Some people have looks. You use what you have.”
Otto pulled into the trauma center parking lot and thought about his own daughter, Mina, married with kids. He’d not raised her to value looks over brains. But he wondered if this young woman didn’t have a point. You took your gifts, whatever they were, and you used them. He turned off the engine, thinking about Josie and her take on this conversation. Had she been here, he was fairly certain she’d be lecturing him about some part of his thinking. He smiled at the mental image of her scowling face and realized how much he appreciated her perspective. He hoped like hell he could get her out of her current predicament.
They walked through the sliding glass doors of the trauma center and Otto turned to Selena, worrying suddenly that the plan was too off-the-cuff. “Would you like to go over questions? Talk about the information we’re looking for?”
“No. I don’t want to sound like a cop. I want them to know I’m here to help them.”
“Right,” he said, nodding, hoping it would work.
Otto asked the receptionist if Vie Blessings was available. Ten minutes later she bustled into the lobby wearing her bright purple scrubs and pink glasses. She extended her hand to Otto, and he introduced her to Selena.
Vie pointed to her own spiked hair and smiled. “I know Selena well. She keeps me looking good.”
“Nice to see you,” Selena said.
“We’re here to check on the young women from Guatemala,” he said.
“Physically, they’re okay. Dehydrated, mostly, but nothing serious. Mentally, I can’t begin to think how horrible this has been for them.”
“I’m trying to balance their need to recuperate with our need to catch the bastards who are behind this.”
Vie nodded. “Absolutely. I understand.”
“Selena has offered to talk with the women, to get a different perspective. Can you allow that at this point?”
“I think that would be fine. The doctor from Odessa can’t be here until tomorrow. It may do them all some good to talk about their situation.” Vie narrowed her eyes at Otto. “The women are two to a room. I’m not sure how you want to meet with them.”
“Do you have a lounge or empty staff room that they could meet in all together?”
She looked uncertain. “We don’t usually allow patients into the lounge, but I can just let the staff know it’s off-limits for an hour. Do you think that would be enough time?”
Otto nodded. “That would be much appreciated.”
*
Fifteen minutes later, Selena found herself entering a nurses’ lounge where four women in hospital gowns sat around a table looking dazed. Vie had entered first and introduced Selena in English, but two of the women clearly couldn’t understand her.
Selena sat down at the table and took a long calming breath. The expressions on their faces took her back several years, and she realized the officer had been right. She did not want to relive the feelings she’d put behind her, but as she looked into the terrified eyes of the four women staring back at her, the fear grabbed hold and closed her throat so that she could barely speak. She felt a hand on her shoulder and turned to see Vie smiling kindly at her.
Selena cleared her throat and spoke in Spanish. “I’m so sorry for what’s happened to you, to all of you. I’m here to try and explain things. So you know what’s happening. So you won’t be so frightened.” She stopped, suddenly aware she had no idea what was going to happen to them. No one had any idea what was going to happen to them. They were one more casualty in a world where monsters preyed on the desperate.
They stared at her, probably too tired to hope she could really help, but also too desperate to turn away.
“I’m from Venezuela,” Selena said. “I came here like you did. I paid my way. People lied to me. Stole my money and my dreams. Men treated me like an animal. My life was gone.” One of the women shifted in her seat and looked away as if she didn’t want to confront the subject matter, but Selena continued. “I learned that when people said they wanted to help me, it was usually a lie. The police. Other girls. People who said they wanted to find me a job and place to live and food to eat? They took advantage of me. Made me do things that made me ashamed to even be alive.”