Unspeakable Page 7

  Harper dropped her hand from her hip so as not to scare the girl. “Just someone who doesn’t want me down here.”

  “Clearly.”

  “Thanks for—”

  Her words cut off as Destiny bent and reached for something from the floor at Harper’s feet. The girl’s eyes narrowed, then widened, recognition flaring in their dark depths as she continued to stare at what Harper realized was the photo that had fallen from her pocket. “Do you recognize that guy?”

  “Yeah. He was just here with me.”

  Bile rose in Harper’s throat, but she swallowed it back and reached for the photograph of McClane. “How long ago?”

  “’Bout ten minutes. He gave me extra to stay in here for a while and make it sound like we was goin’ at it.” She nodded toward the photo. “What are you doing with that picture?”

  Harper tried not to be disgusted by the thought of McClane getting it on with this stripper but failed. Miserably. She stuffed the photo back in her inner jacket pocket. “Looking for him.”

  “You the wife or somethin’?”

  She huffed. “Not even close. I just need to ask him a few questions.”

  The brunette crossed her arms over her chest and drew back a step. “You’re a cop.”

  Harper forcibly relaxed every muscle in her shoulders and face so as not to give off a threatening impression. “Not anymore. I was fired.”

  “For what?”

  There was no sense holding back. Not when Harper needed this woman to tell her where McClane had gone. “Sexual harassment.”

  Destiny’s lips curled in a full grin, and the tense line of her shoulders relaxed. “No shit?”

  “No shit. I think my accuser called me a praying mantis.”

  Destiny laughed. “Was it true?”

  A bitter taste burned the back of Harper’s mouth. She shrugged. “Depends on who you ask. Me or the dick with elephant balls.”

  Destiny laughed harder.

  At least someone was entertained by the situation. “Now the guy,” Harper said, hoping to get the woman back on track. “Any idea where he went after you . . . you know, finished?”

  “Oh, we didn’t do nothin’.”

  “You didn’t?” A hope Harper did not like lifted her voice a full octave. She quickly cleared her throat, hoping the stripper didn’t notice.

  “No. He wasn’t interested. Not that I didn’t try.” She held up a hand as if telling a secret. “Between you and me, I think he might be gay.”

  Russell McClane . . . gay. The thought tumbled through Harper’s mind.

  No way. He didn’t give off the gay vibe at all. And her opinion had absolutely nothing to do with McClane’s rugged good looks and dark and mysterious persona.

  She gave her head a swift shake, trying not to imagine him naked and in the throes of passion all over again. “So if he didn’t bring you down here to get busy, why were you in this room with him?”

  Destiny shrugged. “He wanted information.”

  “What kind of information?”

  Destiny bit her lip, her expression growing serious and somber.

  Harper knew where this was going. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a fifty.

  Destiny frowned. “He gave me hundreds.”

  “Of course he did. He’s probably a criminal. I’m ex-law enforcement. You can either take this fifty and tell me what you told him, or I can call my friend at PPD and tell him about this classy establishment.”

  With a scowl, Destiny swiped the fifty from Harper’s hand. “You didn’t have to go getting all bitchy. We was having a nice conversation till you brought in your cop friends.”

  No, they were having a long conversation. One she didn’t have time for. “So what did you tell the guy in the picture?”

  Destiny heaved out a heavy sigh. “He was lookin’ for a girl. A young blonde.”

  “And?”

  “And . . . I told him everything I knew. That sometimes we get young girls waitin’ tables in here, and then they disappear.”

  “Disappear, how?”

  Destiny pursed her lips.

  Harper tipped her head. “C’mon. All I have to do is make a phone call.”

  “All I had to do was tell those goons you were in this room with me.”

  Shit. She was right. “Why didn’t you?”

  “Because they’re pricks. I don’t like ’em.”

  Harper blew out a breath and pulled three twenties from her pocket. “This is all I have left.”

  Destiny’s eyes brightened, and she plucked the bills from Harper’s hand. “That’ll do.” Tucking the bills into her bra, she said, “I told him I saw the girl in the club about a half hour ago and that I saw her come down here with him.”

  “Him who?”

  “Mihail.”

  “Who’s Mihail?”

  Destiny shrugged. “Another prick. But you can’t miss him. He’s got a shaved head and a weird accent. Anyway, I told that guy in the picture where Mihail probably took her, and he gave me more cash to hang out in here alone for a while without him, then he left.”

  Harper’s pulse picked up speed. “Where did you tell him they went?”

  “Into the tunnels. That’s how Mihail gets all of ’em out.”

  Holy shit. Harper glanced back toward the door. “How do I get to the tunnels?”

  “There’s a door at the end of the hall that takes you to—”

  “Thanks.” Harper reached for the door handle, already thinking ten steps ahead, hoping McClane and that girl weren’t so far in front of her she’d never find them. “I really appreciate all your help. You’re all right, Destiny.”

  “Of course I am. That mean you ain’t gonna call the cops on me?”

  Harper grinned. “Definitely not.”

  The hall was empty when Harper peeked out from behind the door. The heavy bass was still thumping, and people were still going at it on the other sides of the walls, but she barely noticed this time. Her attention was fixed solely on the door at the end of the hall that was thicker and heavier than all the rest.

  Her heart beat hard and fast as she moved toward it. She half expected it to be locked from the other side, but when she reached for the handle, it turned easily. Quietly, she tugged the door open a crack and peered into nothing but darkness. Glancing down, she spotted a cement platform roughly four feet square and a metal ladder that descended into the abyss.

  Her instincts told her not to go down there alone. She had no idea what she was walking into. But before she could step back and close the door, voices echoed from the stairs at the other end of the hall again. Voices that sounded eerily similar to the ones who had been looking for her.

  Before she could change her mind, she moved onto the cement platform and tugged the heavy metal door closed behind her. Then she drew her gun and hoped like hell this wasn’t the dumbest thing she’d ever done.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Harper shivered in the dark tunnel where she’d stopped a good thirty yards from the ladder to wait and listen.

  It was pitch black down here. The ground was dirt, the walls some kind of brick or cement blocks, she couldn’t tell which without a light, but she wasn’t about to flip on her phone, not until she knew she hadn’t been followed. No one had come down the ladder after her—not that she’d been able to tell—but she wasn’t completely convinced she was alone. Leaning against the cold wall, she held perfectly still with her weapon drawn and pointed back the way she’d come as she’d done for the last five minutes.

  An eternity seemed to tick by. An eternity where the only sound was the thump of her heartbeat pounding in her ears. When another few minutes went by without a single sound, she finally lowered her weapon and let herself breathe.

  Her gaze strayed the other direction, deeper into the pitch-black tunnel. These had to be the famous Shanghai Tunnels of Portland. She’d heard about them, of course. Everyone in the Rose City had heard of them, but she’d never seen them in person. She glanced up
at the ceiling she couldn’t see, remembering what her father had told her. That back in the mid-1800s, Portland had been called the Unheavenly City because businesses had installed trap doors, known as “deadfalls,” that led to the tunnels. The deadfalls were used to drop unsuspecting victims into the Portland Underground, where they were often held in prison cells before being tossed onto ships leaving the city, where they were used as free labor.

  Supposedly, the tunnels had been boarded up back in the 1940s, all except for a few that were still open for tourism. A shiver rushed down Harper’s spine at the thought that a new, vile criminal element now existed in the city’s underbelly, using the tunnels not to transport people into forced servitude on ships but to abduct and move innocent young girls into the sex trade.

  Harper knew all about Portland’s sex-trafficking statistics. The city was a national hub for traffickers for a multitude of reasons. First, the location was a boon. Two interstate freeways ran right through the city—one running east, the other running north and south, from British Columbia to Mexico. Portland had a major port, receiving ships from all over the world thanks to the Columbia River and easy access to the Pacific. And it also housed an international airport with multiple flights leaving the country on a daily basis. On top of all that, the city was well known for having a tolerant attitude toward the sex industry, with more strip clubs per capita than Las Vegas and a lax attitude when it came to sex workers, both legal and illegal.

  Dan Rather had once famously called Portland “Pornland,” and Harper knew the news anchor hadn’t been far off the mark. But that was a dangerous thing when you took into account the city’s other major attraction as a hip and progressive metropolitan area that attracted a number of youths. Not just twentysomethings right out of college who were searching for work in an open-minded job market where marijuana was legal and every lifestyle you could imagine was encouraged, but also runaways and homeless kids. Kids, Harper knew, who were naive and innocent and could be easily sucked into the high demand for sex workers in the city.

  A sick feeling rolled through Harper’s stomach. If McClane was involved in any of that . . .

  She swallowed hard, not wanting to think about McClane’s role in the trade, especially if his “role” included recruiting underage girls. Yeah, she knew good looks sometimes masked an evil monster, but tonight she wasn’t chasing that monster into the dark. She wasn’t stupid. If she had stumbled onto an underage sex-trafficking ring, she was not dumb enough to get herself kidnapped as well. Then she’d be no help to Melony Strauss or any other unsuspecting young girl who’d crossed McClane’s path.

  Telling herself she’d find another way to figure out just what McClane was up to, she turned back toward the ladder. But she drew up short when a female scream echoed at her back.

  Harper pulled her gun and pointed the weapon into the darkness with both hands wrapped around the grip. Her adrenaline surged, and her heart kicked up in her chest. The scream died out, leaving nothing but an eerie silence that made the hair on her nape stand up straight.

  Shit. She hadn’t imagined that. The scream was still ringing in her ears, even if it had been silenced. Which meant whoever had made it—the young kid—was closer than she thought.

  Shit.

  Instinct screamed at her to leave, to come back with help. Releasing the gun with one hand, she fumbled through her coat pocket for her cell, powered up the screen, blinking at the flash of light, then hit Callahan’s number.

  “No signal” flashed on her screen.

  “Dammit.”

  Her phone’s light illuminated the dirt floor, scattered rocks, and brick walls. Above her, wood braces held up the ceiling.

  Indecision warred inside her. She glanced back the way she’d come, and at the ladder that led to freedom.

  Another scream echoed from the opposite direction and was again abruptly cut off.

  Her heart thundering in her chest, she stared down the tunnel as far as her light could shine. By the time she got above ground where she could get a signal to call Callahan, the girl would be gone. She knew it in her gut. Vanished into thin air, just like Melony Strauss. She couldn’t let that happen. Not when she could do something to save her.

  Even though it went against her better judgment, Harper braced the phone against the side of her weapon so its light shone ahead of her, and she slowly headed down the tunnel toward the sound of that scream. She was careful as she walked, watching for rocks or boards or anything that would cause her to trip and fall and give herself away. The tunnel narrowed until it was only wide enough for two people, the walls changing to cement blocks rather than bricks. After traveling what she suspected was several blocks in nothing but darkness, the tunnel curved to the left, and she spotted what she thought was a light ahead.

  Her adrenaline soared. Slowing to a stop, she hit the light on her phone and tucked it back in her pocket. Gripping the gun again in both hands, she shifted closer to the cement wall and inched her way toward the corner and the light, which was growing stronger with every step.

  The tunnel widened again. The walls here were brick once more, the ceiling arched instead of flat. Muffled voices drifted her way. She couldn’t make out what they were saying, but she recognized the low timbre, telling her whoever was speaking was a man.

  A whimper drifted to her ears. A whimper that sounded as if it had come from a woman. Or a girl. Followed by a man’s voice saying, “Leave her alone. You want to deal with someone, deal with me.”

  Holding her breath, Harper stepped closer to the wall and peered around the corner. And nearly gasped at what she saw.

  McClane stood not twenty yards away, in the middle of the tunnel with his hands up. Beside him, a girl with auburn hair who looked to be no more than fifteen stood cowering, her hands up as well, her head hunched, her shoulders shaking from fear. Across from both of them was a slim man with a shaved head, holding a flashlight in one hand and a gun in the other.

  Harper only had a split second to assess the situation. The guy with the gun was yelling in a language she didn’t recognize. If she didn’t do something fast, the girl was going to get hurt.

  She stepped out from the behind the corner, gun held high and trained on the shooter. “Drop it. Now.”

  Heads twisted her direction. She saw the way McClane’s dark eyes widened when he spotted her. But her focus was locked on the other guy. On the one who was already shifting his gun in her direction.

  She recognized the wild look in the man’s eyes. She’d seen it on the street before. His finger moved to the trigger of his weapon. She lifted her gun. “Don’t do i—”

  His light went out, dousing the tunnel in darkness. The girl screamed. Harper’s pulse raced, and she fumbled for her phone in her pocket. A grunt sounded ahead. Then a crack. She wrapped her hand around the phone in her pocket, and—

  Something hard slammed into her side, knocking the air from her lungs. She stumbled and flew forward.

  Shouts echoed in the tunnel. Her body hit the far wall with a whack. Her weapon flew from her fingers, and her head smacked hard against the unforgiving stone, sending pain spiraling across her skull. Dazed, Harper slumped to the ground, groaned, and tried to push herself up from the dirt floor. Some kind of commotion was happening in the darkness. She could hear grunts and cracks and the sounds of a fight coming only feet from her. She managed to stagger to her feet in the darkness. Squinted to try to see. Then felt two hands close over her shoulders just before a menacing voice at her back muttered, “Stay down, bitch.”

  Rusty plowed his fist into the jaw of the man he assumed was Mihail—the one who’d had that fucking gun trained right on him and the girl. He couldn’t see a damn thing in the dark, but he wasn’t about to give this prick a chance to get the upper hand.

  Pain exploded across his already-battered knuckles and up his arm, but holding the dick by the shirtfront with one hand, he drew his arm back and threw another right punch that landed solidly on bone.

&n
bsp; The man grunted. Behind him, a shuffling sound echoed. He slammed his fist into the guy’s face again, part of him pissed at what the guy’d planned to do with the girl, and another part—a part he didn’t like—even more pissed that Renwick’s investigator had followed him down here.

  Who the hell did she think she was?

  A gunshot echoed through the tunnel like a bomb blast, bringing every thought to a halt. Rusty released the dickhead he’d been beating on and whipped around. The guy slumped to the ground at his feet. Eyes wide, Rusty looked for the girl, only it was too dark to see shit. He scrambled for the phone in the pocket of his jacket, flipped the light on, and sucked in a breath.

  When Mihail had killed the lights, Rusty had known it was their only chance, and he’d thrown himself at the man. The gun had gone flying, but he hadn’t cared. Now he did, though. Now, the girl held it in both of her shaking hands as she backed up several steps with wide, horrified eyes. Feet away, a second man—who must have shown up in the middle of the chaos—was lying facedown in a puddle of blood.

  Fuck. Me.

  He glanced quickly down at the guy at his feet, bloody and bruised and barely moving. Confident he was no longer a threat, he stepped over him and moved toward the girl.

  She whipped his way, the gun shaking in front of her, and pointed the weapon right at him.

  “Whoa.” Rusty held up his hands. “Careful there. I’m not here to hurt you.”

  “I-I don’t b-believe you.” Her whole body trembled. She backed up another step. “S-stay away.”

  Rusty knew all about trauma. What this girl was going through now was bad, but it could have been a thousand times worse. “I know you’re scared,” he said calmly, taking another step her way. “But you can trust me.”

  “Stay back!” She scrambled away from him, stumbling on a rock, then righting herself with one hand on the cement wall. The gun in her hand shook harder, and a wild look filled her eyes. “I mean it!”

  “Okay.” Rusty stilled, not wanting to do anything to send her into a panic. Or rather, a worse panic. “Okay, whatever you want. I know you’ve been through a lot, but all of that can be over now. All you have to do is trust me.”