To this I just say, “The pipeline.”

“Exactly. Vukovic said the Serbs pass them off. I imagine whoever they pass them off to passes them off again. Finally, they will be sold into slavery.”

“Do they ever escape?”

“Sometimes. Not terribly often. But if they escape their captors in a foreign country they are treated like illegal immigrants by the local governments. They have no rights, they are just shipped home. There is no witness protection, so if they say anything to the cops, the traffickers will know.

“The sad part is that many who escape return home to the same hardships they were drawn away from. Women and girls are often revictimized, time and again.”

I think of Liliana Brinza, and I hope this doesn’t happen to her again.

“Christ,” I say.

“The people running the pipelines and other systems like it have this down to an art. The way stations are hellholes, but they are also refuges. Food, music, the bonds made between the captors and women, the drugs administered to them. It’s all part of the plan. These young women and girls go into a system that has been honed for hundreds of years. Thousands of years.”

And here I am, getting in the middle of all this.

She sighs loudly now, then asks, “How can we possibly locate them in a city the size of Dubrovnik?”

“I have an idea. But you may not like it.”

“Anything. I’ll do anything to find out who is responsible.”

“I was hoping you might say that.” I breathe out a long sigh, knowing this idea isn’t great, but it’s all I have. “We use you as bait.”

She looks up at me slowly as I drive. “Bait?”

“Look, the cops have been tainted at each stop on the pipeline. Not just here in Mostar, but in the other locations, as well.”

“Yes.” I can tell she gets it. “So . . . so you are saying I go to the police in Dubrovnik and start asking questions?”

“Exactly.”

“About my sister?”

“I wouldn’t do that. If there is one chance in one hundred she could still be alive, you will endanger her by letting the opposition know you are looking for her. She just may become too incriminating for them to keep around.”

Talyssa thinks about this for a long time. “I can’t do that. I think she is gone . . . but without a body, I do not know for sure. So . . . what do I say?”

“Tell them you know about the pipeline, and you know about the Consortium.”

“But . . . what do I know about the Consortium?”

“Nothing, really, beyond the name. Throw that out there. Ad-lib. Like I did back there with Niko.”

“And then what?”

“Then return to your hotel and let me take over. They’ll come for you, I’ll get you out before they take you, and then I’ll be there to see who they are and where they go.”

She sits in silence a moment. I start to waffle. I even consider telling her we’ll think of something else because this is too dangerous. But I know there is nothing else.

She knows this, too. “Yes. That is the best idea.”

“Not sure it’s the best idea, Talyssa, but it’s pretty much the only idea I have.”

“When do we leave for Dubrovnik?”

I’ve turned on the highway through high hills towards mountains in the south. “We’ll be there in a few hours.”

She nods and we drive on.

I’ve made it out to her like our plan will be much easier than I envision things, because if Dubrovnik is, in fact, the next stop along the pipeline, the people who run this thing are going to be looking for us there. The same guy—me—shot up one of their way stations and then snatched one of their police conspirators, so it’s no great leap to assume I’ll turn up again at the next stop in the line.

If they normally had five guys with guns around the girls, now they will have fifteen. If they would normally send two guys to pick up Talyssa when they realize she’s on to them, now they will send six.

My involvement in this whole thing has made it more difficult for everyone—victim, friend, and foe alike.

Nice work, Gentry.

This is going to get complicated, and it’s just me and the accountant with the missing sister against an opposition we haven’t even identified yet.

Yeah, any way you look at it . . . this blows.

FOURTEEN

   Kenneth Cage sat in a plastic chair, staring at the girl dancing in front of him. She moved with grace, but with a look of intensity on her face that would tip off an expert that she was struggling to remember her moves.

She stopped and bowed, and the crowd clapped politely.

Ken Cage, on the other hand, stood up and cheered.

Juliet was his twelve-year-old daughter, after all, and as far as he was concerned, she was magnificent.

Soon he sat back down and watched the next girl at his daughter’s ballet recital take the stage.

He knew he’d be stuck here for another hour, but just as he steeled himself to endure the rest of the damn dancing, his phone vibrated in his pocket. Heather glared at him as he looked down to it, but when he saw who was calling, he turned away from her and left the room.

His bodyguard moved into position behind him, radioing the driver of the Mercedes outside that the principal was moving.

But Cage didn’t go to the G-Wagen. Out in front of the Hollywood dance studio, he moved over to a bench and answered the phone in an angry tone, while his bodyguard remained a few feet behind.

“Not the best time, Jaco.”

“Sir, I need this encrypted.”

The American sighed, tapped a couple of keys that encrypted the call on his end, and said, “What’s up now?”

“It’s about the Balkans.”

“I told you to handle that.”

“I need someone who can make a decision, sir.”

Cage sat on a bench by the parking lot, his head sagged. “Dammit,” he said, while looking around to make certain no one was in earshot. “What’s the fucking problem now?”

Jaco’s voice was its usual businesslike tone. “It was thought the killings in Bosnia were associated with an assassination attempt on the man running the way station. Something unrelated to the pipeline.”

“Some uber assassin, right?”

“Yes, sir. But if that were the case, we’d expect that man to be long gone from the area where the killings happened, and we’d also expect him to pose no more threat to the pipeline.”