It took Alan nearly three hours to reach the outskirts of Charleston, West Virginia. He had only made one stop along the way to get fuel, a coffee to go and an ice cold bottled water.He referred to the Pilot’s GPS navigation system to see how much further he’d be on I-77 until the Route 119 south exit, which would eventually take him to Wayneston. It was pitch dark out and he knew that locating Fowler’s home at this time of night could be challenging. But he also knew he had no time to waste. A few miles later he spotted the exit sign and instinctively gave the SUV a little more gas.
As he noted the hilly terrain, he recalled the last time he’d been to Charleston and realized it had been nearly twenty years ago. He and a friend had gone to a rock concert at the Civic Center, but he couldn’t remember which band he’d seen. He had always thought of Charleston as an enigma because it was so different from rest of the Mountain state, except perhaps for Huntington. West Virginia as a whole seemed such a backward, obscure place because it epitomized the term Appalachia and the negative socio-economic connotations implied—visions of hard times, moonshine and feuding hillbillies in tiny pockets of humanity dotting the dense mountain ranges. The state’s capital on the other hand was populous, modern and situated in a much lower elevation. He had a feeling that by the time he reached the tiny town of Wayneston, the influence of the city would be most likely be somewhat diminished.
Fifteen minutes later, he was crossing the Kanawha River and heading into the suburbs of Charleston. There were quite a few new housing developments along the highway, something he had not expected to see. Perhaps Wayneston wouldn’t be as obscure as he’d thought. In another half hour or so he would find out.
He had to remain on Route 119 all the way to Wayneston so he decided to give Beth a call to update her on his progress. He scrolled to her number in his contacts and reached her voicemail. He had no sooner left a message that she clicked in on the line.
“Hey, Alan! Sorry—I couldn’t get to the phone on time.”
“No problem. Just thought I’d bring you up to speed on the case. Have you got a moment?”
“Sure—I had a nice long talk with Maddie earlier today and she told me that Nadiya is actually doing pretty well at the safe house. She said unlike most of the girls she has encountered who had been used as sex slaves, Nadiya is one of the few that is readily willing to share her experiences with somebody. A lot of them don’t get to that stage for a very long time, if ever. Others are so afraid they’ll get caught by their former pimps that they just clam up altogether. She said that Nadiya actually has a decent chance of coming out of her experience intact.”
“I’m really happy to hear that. Nadiya had said something to me during the drive to the city that made me think there was some hope for her and it looks like I might have been right—I wish I could say the same for Elena.”
“What do you mean—have you spoken to her? She still hasn’t returned my calls and Maddie told me she’s also tried calling her but hasn’t had any luck, either.”
“Elena actually called me earlier today.”
Alan proceeded to tell Beth about the call from Elena and how both Viktor and Popov have become suspicious of him. When he told Beth about the beating Elena had endured, it broke her heart.
“I’m serious, Alan, I don’t know how much longer Elena will be able to survive the situation she’s in.”
“What do you mean?”
“When a woman has been beaten and abused for as long and as often as Elena has, it sometimes suggests that her pimp is considering terminating her. If this Viktor starts thinking that the law is on to him, he may not wait around much longer before he decides to remove incriminating evidence. Which in this case would be Elena.”
“By ‘terminating her,’ what exactly do you mean?”
“I mean ‘eliminating her,’ as in killing her—or having her killed.”
“Shit, are you serious? That’s awfully extreme.”
“I know, but it happens more often than you think. These enslaved women are considered expendable commodities by their owners, not human beings. The easiest way to avoid prosecution is to simply have the girls disappear forever.”
“God, I sure hope you’re wrong about that.”
“Me too. So how is the case going? What’s happening?”
“Well, I finally got what I think is a big break—I found out where Polina is being held.”
“No shit? That’s great news, Alan—so where is she?”
“In West Virginia of all places. I am heading there now as we speak.”
“How did you find that out?”
“Sort of a long story—I’ll tell you later. That would be the good news. The bad news is that I’m not sure what I’ll be going up against once I locate where Polina and the girls are. I’ve got to admit, I’m more than a little apprehensive because knowing a crime is being committed is one thing but getting justice done can be quite another. I don’t even feel like I have the law on my side, for one thing. I mean, take into account what happened with Elena: there I was in a brothel in New York City where a woman had been abducted from her country, sold into slavery, forced to sell her body, and beaten to a pulp on a regular basis by her pimp. But what could I legally do about it? Nada—zip! Because for one reason or another, the cops couldn’t be involved.
“Then I case out where the man who’s probably the king pin of this sex trafficking gang lives and damned if I don’t find yet another exploited woman living there with him. But I go through his house with a fine-toothed comb and find absolutely nothing that could incriminate him. Plus, the girl is unwilling to leave the place for fear of her parent’s lives. So I get lucky and get the girl out anyway, but that isn’t going to be enough to put this bastard behind bars. You see what I’m saying? How and when am I ever going to get any legal help on this case, once I find where those girls are being held?”
“I hear your frustration, Alan, and I sympathize. I told you from the beginning that the laws right now are anything but conducive to combating the human trafficking situation. It’s a travesty! Which is why so many people like Viktor and this Popov character get away with it. The laws simply aren’t in place in most countries or states for law enforcement to actively pursue the trafficking issue. Drug trafficking, plenty is being done. Human trafficking, an entirely different story.
“It’s ironic isn’t it that so much is being done about the drug problems yet so little is being done about the human slavery problem. There is something terribly wrong with that! Which is exactly why people like Maddie Fulton and myself do what we do—to try to make a difference and see that these exploited people get some justice finally.
“Anyway, I’ll get off my soapbox now. One thing in our favor is that Polina and the other girls are minors who have been kidnapped. Those are serious charges that law enforcement can work with. Why can’t you simply tell the police where the girls are being held and they in turn can investigate the situation?”
Alan said, “On paper that sounds good but I don’t think it’s going to be as easy as that. I mean, I can’t just blow into this little town and tell the authorities that there may be some kidnapped girls in some guy’s house and expect the locals to jump right on it. At best, they will want to hear enough evidence to justify a search warrant right from the get-go. And even if I can convince them to serve a warrant, getting one can take days, sometimes weeks. By then it will be too late.”
“Hmm, I see what you mean.”
“I don’t really have any concrete evidence, Beth—just speculation and theories. Unless you want to consider a computer-hacked name and address I acquired along with a hunch that there is a crime being committed. I don’t think they’re going to buy it.”
“Well, all I can say is that I have faith in you, my friend. And if there’s any way to pull this off, you’ll do it.”
“Thanks for that vote of confidence. I know that whatever I do I must do quickly. Those girls could be sold any minute, or for that matter may have already been sol
d. This Popov guy is no fool and is a master at covering his tracks. If he thinks there’s the slightest chance that I could be on the trail of these girls, he will do whatever he can to make them go away ASAP.”
“Please be careful, Alan. It sounds like you’re dealing with some hard-hitters.”
“I will. I’ll give you a call when I find something out.”
“Okay. Good luck.”
“I’m gonna need it,” Alan replied.
Alan took a swig of his tepid water, reached over and patted Pan’s head. “Well girl, we’re just gonna have to do what we can do, right?”
She glanced over and barked.
Alan laughed, thinking how nice it was having his companion here with him. This brought on thoughts of Julie and how much he missed her. He knew he would never be able to love anyone like her again and had resigned himself to that fact. His mantra had become the old saying, “better to have loved and lost than to never to have loved at all.” This helped him get through the pain, but at times left him feeling emotionally void.
He turned the volume on his CD player back up and heard the chorus for Hey Jude. He wondered if it was just coincidence that the song with the line “take a sad song and make it better” was playing at that moment or if he had just gotten a spiritual message from Julie. He smiled at the thought and suddenly felt much better.
* * *