Yes, Magdalena had seen a lot of horrible things in her thirteen years—sights that would have probably killed another girl her age. But the babbling cries of despair that washed under the big red door said this was far, far worse.
And then, as if thinking about it made it so, the red door creaked open and Lupe walked in, shutting it quickly behind her. The horrible woman wore her customary tube top and cutoff jeans that were so short the pockets hung down past the frayed fabric. A ring of dark purple bruises encircled her neck, testifying to the fact that even a bottom bitch was not immune to the brutality of the man who ran her life. The tattoo of a grim reaper covered the inside of her left thigh. The flesh of her right was adorned with the skeletal figure of La Santa Muerte, a patron saint of narco traffickers, and, Magdalena had discovered, traffickers in human cargo as well.
Brandishing the whip back and forth with the whistling flourish of a swordfighter, Lupe took a moment to look from shattered girl to shattered girl. Everyone cringed at the noise. Each of them had felt the sting of the awful rawhide whip. Teodora began to wail, leaning forward to cover her face. Lupe struck her hard across the back, warning her to shut up. At length, the woman’s black eyes settled on Magdalena. She skulked across the room, towering above the trembling girl while she prodded her with Ratón.
Lupe cocked her head to one side, a show of counterfeit pity. Magdalena could smell the seething contempt as the woman stood over her. “Come, little one.” She hooked a finger toward the big, red door. “It is your turn.”
15
Dr. Ann Miller perched on the edge of a smooth leather chair and shot a glance at the clunky digital watch that dwarfed her slender arm. The black plastic monstrosity was waterproof and practical in the woods, but it looked incredibly out of place among the three women and one man working at their desks in the smallish White House office. The guy was young—probably still in college and rumpled in appearance—but the women were dressed to the nines in stylish blouses and elegant if sparse jewelry—not a clunky watch among them. Compared to them, Miller may as well have been wearing a bathrobe. Her Kühl khaki slacks and oversized buffalo-plaid wool shirt were perfect for a canoe trip on the Shenandoah—but now she just looked ridiculous.
Hired by the Central Intelligence Agency for her uncanny ability to recognize and recall patterns, Miller didn’t work at Langley or even Liberty Crossing, home of the director of national intelligence and the National Counterterrorism Center. Her office was in a satellite location, hiding in plain sight. The other tenants of the nondescript building just off Twelfth Street in Crystal City certainly guessed she was with some government agency—probably because they were from some other government agency. That’s the way it was in the shadow of the Pentagon. It was better than Langley, though. Her office had easy access to the Crystal City underground, where she and her other mathematician buddies could walk when the weather got crummy—and far enough away from all the bosses that she could dress down on Friday, something she was seriously regretting at the moment.
Miller had a doctorate in applied mathematics from Duke and was certainly smart enough to realize that the information she’d found regarding payments made by a Hong Kong investment firm through an Australian mining company to a bank in Central Africa with accounts linked to Boko Haram would eventually garner her a meeting with some muckety-muck in the intelligence community. Gears in D.C. turned slowly, especially after lunch on a Friday, so she didn’t expect to hear anything until Monday at the absolute earliest.
She’d kicked the information up her chain of command via a secure e-mail, then eaten a yogurt and some blueberries at her desk while she continued with her work. She’d just turned off her computer to call it a day when her desk phone rang. Her supervisor, a nervous sort who was always fretting about his career, said she was needed for a briefing and a car would meet her downstairs. She was not to bring any files. A copy of her e-mail had already been sent over. Miller was not one to try to get out of work, but it was five o’clock on a Friday. She mentioned the Shenandoah canoe trip she had planned with her boyfriend, hoping the fact of her casual Friday dress might postpone the meeting until Monday. The supervisor told her not to worry, though it was clear from the audible gulp on the other end of the line that he was worried enough for them both. He hung up before she could ask him just who it was she was supposed to brief.
Miller took the time to scrape the last few spoonfuls of yogurt out of the cup, figuring it would take her ride a few minutes to get there. She was surprised when she saw a black Crown Victoria waiting curbside along Crystal Drive. Must be some super-important muckety-muck, she’d thought. The bigwigs didn’t usually stay this late when a weekend was looming. Just her luck that she got a workaholic to look at her information. Probably an assistant to some assistant team leader at Langley or Liberty Crossing. When the Crown Victoria turned off the Jeff Davis Highway to head east across the 395 bridge toward D.C. proper, Miller asked the driver where they were going.
The answer made her teeth ache.
She’d been ushered in through the East Gate and met by a man she recognized from television as the White House chief of staff. Mr. van Damm saw to it that she was given a visitor’s badge bearing the large letter A signifying that she had an appointment, and then ushered her into the President’s secretaries’ suite, between the Oval and the Cabinet Room.
The situation would have been laughable, really, if it hadn’t been so terrifying as to turn her entire digestive tract into molten lava. She’d never met a mathematician who’d been summoned on short notice to the White House. It was an honor, but Miller only wished she’d taken the time to change into something that made her look a little less like Paul Bunyan’s Mini-Me.
The secretary who was seated nearest the door to the Oval Office must have noted her discomfort because she offered a motherly smile. “Everyone who comes here gets nervous, Dr. Miller,” she said. “Even the generals.”
“Thank you,” Miller said, licking lips that had not been nearly so chapped a half-hour before.
The secretary leaned in, keeping up the perfect smile. “The President really is a kind man,” she said. “You are here because you’re an expert. Tell him what you know—but don’t be afraid to tell him what you think.”
Miller was thinking that she didn’t know if the President was kind or not, but he sure hired kind people—and then the high muckety himself opened the door to the Cabinet Room.
“Thanks for coming, Dr. Miller,” President Ryan said, smiling and motioning her into the room with a wave of his hand. “I understand you’ve found something interesting.”
She couldn’t help but notice that he looked very tired.