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“Alright. Let’s find out what this poor child had to endure.” Ashley made sure that Bree was available, as well as Calla and the rest of the medical team. Everyone would be able to assist in this, but it would be up to Gracie to break through and see that she’d been made to believe she was being tortured.
Stepping outside the room, it was late in the evening, nearly midnight. Ashley looked down the long hallway, smiling at her big husband, leaning his chair back against the wall. No one was going to get by him. Walking toward him, he stood, pulling her into his arms.
“You alright, baby?” he asked.
“I am now,” she smiled. “I’m exhausted. Will you take me home?”
“That’s why I’m here.” As they left the building, heading out the back of the hospital, Ghost, Ian, and Nine were standing in the darkness talking.
“What are you guys doing up past your bedtime?”
“Oh, you’ve got jokes. Who would have thought?” smirked Ian. “We’re checking on the patient.”
“She’s with her parents right now,” said Ashley. “We’ve given her something to help her sleep, and I hope it works. Whoever had that girl did a number on her. She is convinced that rats were biting her feet, they burned her back with something, and that she was being whipped. The thing is, she’s only been missing for sixteen days. They were able to bend her mind in that amount of time.”
“Is that severe?” asked Nine.
“I’ve never seen a study that shows it could be done so quickly. The bigger question that you need to find out is why they’re doing this to kids. What do they hope to accomplish by convincing a bunch of teenagers that they’ve been tortured.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“We’ve seen a lot of sick, strange things in our days, but this one just might take the cake,” said Ghost. “Someone tats kids, kidnaps them, then convinces them that they’re being tortured and are in pain. How? And why?”
“I have no fucking clue,” said Nine, shaking his head. “This is almost reminiscent of the torture that was delivered during WWI and WWII and the psychological torture delivered during Vietnam. Could this be someone with a military background?”
“It’s possible,” frowned Gaspar, “but why? Gracie was one of the first kids taken. We still can’t talk to her, but when we can, we need to know if she saw anyone else or heard anyone else.”
“Here comes Callan,” said Ian. “Hey, brother, what’s up?”
“I just saw another one. Same shit, different day. All of these kids are between seventeen and twenty-one. They’ve all asked for something very specific but were given that symbol. This was a young man, nineteen. He’s a freshman at the College of New Orleans. He said the other night, he thought someone was following him, so he ducked off, going home a different way.
“When he got home, his roommate was there, which was unusual because they’re on different schedules. This kid is from Taiwan and knew right away that the marking wasn’t right. That’s when he called me for the appointment. He’s had other tattoos in the past, but this time, he asked for something on his ankle. The tattoo artist convinced him the ankle would hurt like a bitch and told him to get it on his shoulder.”
“Which is what he did?” asked Ghost.
“More or less. He already had several tattoos on his back and shoulders, but this guy was able to squeeze it in.”
“And this was your friend, Imron?” asked Nine.
“No,” said Callan, shaking his head. “That’s what’s so fucking weird about this. This guy said he was tattooed by a short guy, about five-seven, maybe one-sixty. A little thick around the middle. He said he had more piercings than tattoos, but he had plenty of those as well.”
“So, now we’re looking for two, possibly three, tattoo artists. This fucking sucks,” said Ghost.
“I reached out to the NOPD to see if they had any young officers that we could borrow,” said Gaspar.
“And?” came the chorus.
“And we are not a priority right now. In their eyes, there has been no crime committed yet. No one has been harmed, the kids are considered runaways at this point, and there are no bodies. We’re on our own with this.”
“We cannot use our own fucking kids,” said Nine. “We’d have to use the girls, and they’re all just too young.”
“We’re still waiting to see if anyone has an old teammate willing to help out. Until then, I say we continue to go into the city and see if we can find these tattoo artists,” said Ghost. He looked up to see Ashley coming in the door. She waved with a sad smile.
“You okay, honey?” asked Ian.
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “I’m supposed to remain objective with these cases, but this one is killing me.”
“Sit down,” said Gaspar. He led her to a chair and poured a cup of tea for her. Opening the refrigerator, he grabbed a sandwich and some vegetable slices, setting it in front of her with a napkin.
