Chapter 11

“Got a tipoff on the missing Thai girl, going to need your team to go in and get her,” I said to Greg, back in my old Volvo and barreling down the freeway. Well, as fast you could barrel down a freeway here this time of the day, which was about twenty mph, and it wasn’t exactly getting me anywhere quickly, but I was heading there. Not like she was going anywhere, was it?

“Just texted you the address.”

“Got it. On my way now,” Greg said.

Wonder of wonders, I made it there before him, but I wasn’t going in without him, so I double parked and waited. I did notice him when he arrived though. Him and another car, four of them piling out, cars parked either end of mine. Card access only, no concierge, and I followed them through as Greg flashed his ID and forced some old dude who was leaving to card the entrance for us. Card the elevator for us too.

She was there, huddled in one of the bedrooms, looking up, smiling happily the way she’d been trained to greet the next john, when we burst through the apartment door. Amanda Somri looked every inch one of Johan’s upmarket teenage whores, hair dyed blonde, wearing nothing but a sparkling little bikini, a fluorescent pink cat-ears headband which made her look even younger than she was, and a sheer silk gown that hung loosely from her shoulders.

I did wonder if the rug matched the drapes, but Johan had probably had her waxed. Most of his johns ‘d like that bare look, but blonde? They might like a little variety too. I almost wanted to fuck her myself and find out, and from the looks on their faces as they glanced at her, so did a couple of the guys on Greg’s team. Can’t say I could blame them. In person, Amanda Somri was hot enough to power an entire aluminum smelter all by herself. She just about radiated sex. No wonder Johan had wanted to hang on to her for as long as he could. He musta been making a small fortune from her.

Turned out she’d had no idea she was alone in that apartment.

She’d been too scared to leave her room unless somebody told her too. She was sitting there watching some crap on Netflix, ‘n waiting for the next client to arrive and fuck her, and she was showered, and ready, lip gloss done, lubed up the way she’d been taught, pussy and ass, all silky olive skin and makeup that only another girl’d spot, ready to fuck, the way she’d been trained to to be ready for every client who walked into her room to fuck.

“We’re the police, Amanda,” Greg said, wrapping a coat around her while his team started the search of the apartment. Wasn’t any point, the other bedrooms had been used, but no girls there, and the rooms had been cleared. Wasn’t going to mention the place had been sanitized. They had to think they were doing their job.

“Get her into something decent we can walk her outta here in willya, Mal,” Greg said, coz he knew I usually came prepped. Never wanted to take those girls back to their parents dressed like the little hookers they’d been working as. Bit hard for the parents to handle, and the way Amanda Somri was dressed, I knew her dad wouldn’t handle it well. Greg left it to me to get her outta those “clothes’’ and into a tracksuit and some white cotton panties and a matching bra I’d brought along.

“Can I take my clothes from here?” she asked after we were alone.

“Sure, if you want,” I said, kinda surprised, handing her that little bag I’d brought that change of clothes for her in, watching, just a little bemused, as she used the bag to cram in the lingerie Johan musta bought for her along with some of the outfits hanging in the closet. Guess she wasn’t gonna have too hard a time getting over this.

If she had a boyfriend to go back to, guess he was gonna have a really good time once she was back from the clinic and settled in back at home. If she didn’t, looked like she planned to find one, and from the way she was packing away those G-strings and bras and stuff, she wasn’t gonna wait too long. Wouldn’t be too many psychological issues for that clinic to deal with here.

I better mention that to them.

And yeah, she was bare as a baby’s bottom.

Maybe I shoulda said bare as a teenage hookers pussy?

I didn’t say it, but I sure as fuck thought it, and she musta seen that look.

“They all liked me waxed,” she said, real nonchalantly, like waxing was an everyday thing for a girl her age, and she wouldn’t have had much to wax away to start with. “They liked blonde, but they all liked it waxed more.”

“What about you?” I asked, curious. She was handling this real well.

She giggled. “I like waxed too.”

She looked down. “I think I’ll keep waxing.”

I guess after a couple of months of working for Johan, none of those girls I took home blushed over shit like that. Eight weeks or more of putting it out for johns anyway they wanted it? Modesty wasn’t exactly a word that featured in the vocabulary of any of Johan’s girls by the time I got them back home to their momma and their poppa. Or in Amanda Somri’s case, to her poppa.

Guess her poppa wasn’t gonna notice. Hoped he wouldn’t, anyhow.

“Men all like it more that way.” She was real matter of fact.

I smiled. “I know.”

“You do?” she asked.

I nodded and she giggled. Guess she wasn’t that traumatized at all.

“You sound like you handled all this pretty well,” I said, still kinda bemused. First time for everything, I guess.

She shrugged, and I did kinda look. Nice boobs on her. Not that small, and kinda attractive. The sorta boobs that did bounce a little when you were fucked hard, and she woulda been. Guys were guys. They’d fuck a girl like her hard just to watch her boobs bounce.

“It wasn’t so bad,” she said, piling up more clothes on the bed. More than my little bag could handle. She eyed me and shrugged. “It wasn’t so good to start with, but I like it now.”

Yeah, I really was gonna have to talk to that Clinic before they started with her.

“There’s a couple of shopping bags in the corner if you want to pack it all up.” I pointed.

“Thanks.” She took them, ‘n that did it. She left that closet friggin’ empty, ‘n some of what she packed woulda made me blush, ‘n I had ten years on her.

Girl that looked like Amanda Somri? She’d have been fucked real hard, but she didn’t look to cut up about it. None of my business once I got her back to her dad, which reminded me...

Greg’s team were doing their business, and while they did theirs, I did mine, and I called her family. Well, her dad. Fuck knows where her mom was. He’d never mentioned her, apart from saying she was in Europe, and she’d never contacted me. Guess she didn’t give a rat’s ass about her girl.

“Hello, Mr. Somri,” I said, watching her as she slipped into that tee and the tracksuit I’d brought along for her. Se wore the bra I’d brought along, but she’d kinda wrinkled her nose at it. “Mallory Kwon here. Got some very good news for you.”

“Amanda? You’ve found her?” He knew my number and my voice. He shoulda by now. I’d been updating him on progress every day for two months. Must’ve seemed like eternity to him. Wasn’t even going to think about what it’d seemed like for Amanda. Didn’t seem like she was stressed about it though. Guess she’d adapted. A lot them did. Had to, really. Wasn’t like they could do much about it and I guess a lotta them just made the best of it, best they could, and that generally meant making sure the johns had a real good time.

Johan had said Amanda was one of his big earners.

I didn’t want to think about that at all.

“I’m with Amanda now,” I said. “The police are here too. I found her, and she’s safe. We’ll have her back at your home in an hour, maybe sooner.”

“I’m at home,” he said. I could hear him choking up. “Waiting. Can I speak to her?”

“Of course you can.” I said. “She’s right here.”

“It’s your dad,” I said to Amanda, holding out the phone.

“Daddy? Is that you, Daddy?” She was already crying. Nothing wrong with that. We all gotta deal with shock in our own way and I guess leaving here would be a shock. Amanda Somri cried.

She gave me a smile and winked.

Me, I knew how I dealt with shock, and it was usually terminal. Had been the last few times anyhow. Real therapeutic watching them turn into pet food and I was starting to get pretty good with all that equipment Raoul used. Amanda Somri winking at me through those tears? That was a shock I couldn’t deal with by going terminal, at least not on her, ‘n after thinking about it for a second, I grinned.

Nope, no need to worry about Amanda Somri at all.

I took out my backup phone and called the clinic while Amanda babbled away to her dad. Started making arrangements. They knew the story, and I’d already got her dad’s agreement, signed, on paper. Hope. I’d been selling hope, and I’d delivered. Amanda Somri was going home to her poppa, instead of being moved on to another pimp, and another, and then another, a chain that usually ended with just another statistic, just another name crossed off that missing person list after the body turned up somewhere.

Or just never turned up at all.

Nope, Amanda Somri was going home, and she was one of the lucky ones.

She was still talking to her dad, still crying crocodile tears as we moved her out of the house and into the back seat of my old Volvo. Straight home, Greg leading the way in his black Ford Explorer that looked exactly like what it was. An unmarked cop car.

No police car taking Amanda Somri to the precinct. No police interview. No police medical examination. Straight home. Sitting there with Greg, talking to her dad, I recommended we go ahead and check her in to the clinic I worked with right away, and of course he’d already agreed. Discreet, they understood what she’d been through. I’d already explained all that. She’d get a very thorough and very private medical, along with whatever treatment and therapy she needed, and I’d get my cut.

Given what that clinic charged, that cut was good money all on its own.

Yeah, another successful recovery. Got her to the clinic with her dad, got her checked in, got my final payment transferred, and left Greg there to deal with closing his case. Mine was already closed, and I headed off to have a chat with the Chinese boy’s dad. He wasn’t gonna like what I was gonna be telling him. We’d see if he paid the deposit.

He did. Turned out he wanted him back. Couldn’t argue with that, myself.

I’d walked out, called Galen, and yeah, I reserved the kid.

His ass might not be quite as tight but hey.

He’d be going home, eventually.

Business as usual.

Time for a late lunch, after the Chinese boy’s dad. I needed it. My blood sugar was real low and I had a few calls to make to other parents before I packed it in for the day. The usual daily bullshit to let them know I was working on getting their little darlings back. I’d tracked down almost all of them and paid the deposit, so they all were good to go except for that one I was still looking for, but I had a couple of leads now. That, and I was expecting another call from Greg soon, coz one of my contacts had called while I was working my way through the traffic.

Given me the heads-up that he’d just taken delivery of a new girl. Yeah, we were at that point where I was getting real tight with some of these dudes. Win-win, that was how everyone was seeing this, ‘n I felt good about that. Didn’t feel too good about the girls of course, but fuck, these dudes were gonna get the girls they needed, regardless. Supply and demand at work, that’s how it always works, ‘n at least I made sure there were some happy endings.

Wasn’t happy endings right now for that girl that the dude’d called me about, but it would be when I got her back home to her momma and her poppa. Local pickup, some teenage Chinese girl, teenage high school girl, ‘n she’d been taken out of a real sketchy club she’d sneaked out of her family’s house the middle of last night to go to. She’d gone there with some guy, so the dude told me, and the guys on the door who should never have let her in had eyeballed her and let her through.

Had to have been a bit of quick teamwork by everyone when she walked up.

Fuck knows what that girl had been thinking, going to a club like that with some guy she barely knew. Maybe she’d heard about it, it did have a rep as an edgy place, but then again, maybe not. I knew the place and it was edgy, but it was dodgy too. Real dodgy. Guess she was trying to act older than she was for that guy she’d gone there with or something fucking stupid. Well, she’d sure learned her fucking lesson by now.

You just can’t stop silly little bitches being silly little bitches. Ask me how I knew?

“Ho’s name’s Tiffany Ko,” my dude said, and I got the story from him.

Been in that club less than ten minutes and the hyenas had pounced. The two of them had been slipped a couple of roofies in their drinks by one of the guys behind the bar. Guess nobody had told the date to watch the drinks being poured. He’d probably been trying to impress her or something by acting tougher than he was and taking her somewhere edgy. Maybe he thought that was gonna get him into her panties.

Sure as fuck didn’t work for him, he’d been tossed out on his ass and left unconscious on the sidewalk. Guess nobody’d taught Tiffany Ko not to go into dodgy clubs with some guy she barely knew. Not the sort of thing her parents would’ve ever thought about, I was real sure. Hadn’t even met them yet. Hadn’t been called in yet, but I could pretty much guess the type.

Conservative, strait-laced. Never imagined their little darling sneaking out of the house to meet a guy in the middle of the night. They never did. They’d never have imagined their little darling would even have wanted to go out clubbing with that guy either, let alone to some club as dodgy as that one. Least of all at her fucking age. Fifteen year olds. They think the world’s a safe place, especially if they grow up in that kinda sheltered environment.

Fuckin’ dumb-ass liberals got a lot to answer for.

“Jesus wept,” I’d said as my dude laid it out. At least I’d have all the background when Greg walked me in to deal with the parents.

Gone down in seconds, my dude said. The bouncers had let them in. The barman had slipped them those roofies and the barman’s buddy had been right there to walk her straight outta that bar the moment the roofies hit her and her date. Out, around the corner and into his car, and she’d spent the rest of the night being fucked by that dude, the barman and the bouncers after they got off, and and a couple of their buddies from the bar. That was before they flipped her over to the dude I knew, and him and his team, they’d been gangbanging her all day. Tiffany Ko was gonna be wide open for business tonight, ‘n she’d know what was expected from her by then.