Page 12 of Beaches

“It was nice,” she said. “I think he gave it to me so he could do what he wanted.” Kelsey nodded again, trying to keep the smile on her face.

“Is that the only time someone did something nice for you?”

“No. The men on the island. They gave me a name. They said a few names and asked me if I liked them. They didn’t get mad at me if I didn’t like it. They gave me a name.” She smiled at the room, and they tried their damnest to smile back.

“I think that’s a very good thing. I like April, by the way. It’s a beautiful name. That was a good thing. Bad things are like the beating that man gave you. The fact that a man kept you a prisoner, not allowing you to bathe or eat the way you should. Those are bad things. Those are the things these men fight.”

“You must fight a lot,” she said casually. “There are a lot of bad things where I live.”

The room became deadly quiet as April just stared at her feet. They were scratched and raw, never having seen a pedicure in her life.

“Tomorrow, Faith, Erin, Ashley, and I will take you to do something nice. We’ll get your nails done like ours,” she said, wiggling her fingers at her. April had a big smile on her face, nodding. “Then, we’ll do some shopping and get you some clothes that you might need.”

“I’m getting sleepy. Am I allowed to sleep?” she asked.

“April, you can sleep any time you like. Most people sleep at night when it’s dark out,” said Ian.

“Should I sleep on the floor or outside?” Again, they could hear the low grumble of Gaspar. When it got louder, they realized it was all the men.

“You will sleep in your very own bedroom with a big, soft bed,” said Faith. “I’ll take you up there and show you where everything is.”

“Good night, April,” smiled Kelsey.

“Good night?” she repeated with confusion. “You’re wishing me to have a good night?”

“Yes, honey. I’m wishing you the very best night of your life, with many more to come.” When Faith held her hand, taking her upstairs, Kelsey looked at her stepfather and started to cry, falling into his arms.

“I know, honey. I know.”

“Dad, she was abused more than any woman we’ve ever treated. She can’t be more than twenty, and I think it’s been going on for at least twelve to fifteen years.”

“We’ll find them, Kels,” he said, rubbing her back. “I think she might have given us a clue, and we didn’t realize it.”

“What’s that?” asked Gaspar, frowning.

“She speaks English. Only English. That means that whoever owned her, whoever trained her, only spoke English to her, and the others around her only spoke English as well. We’re dealing most likely with an American, Englishman, Australian, or some other dominant English-speaking countryman.”

Nine looked down at his phone, then up at the rest of the team.

“Trak and the others are in the air. Stay tuned.”

CHAPTER NINE

“This girl is going to need more care than we can provide,” said Ashley. “She’s grown up with no knowledge of anything outside of the hell she was living in. She can’t read or write, she’s never seen a television or radio, she’s never read a newspaper or book.”

Nine looked at Kelsy and the other women.

“When you helped her to bathe, what is her physical condition?”

“Like I told Dad,” said Kelsey, “it’s some of the worst damage I’ve ever seen. That’s only the outside. I didn’t dare attempt to do a pelvic exam. Not here. I asked her. I asked her if she would let me look at her, down there. I tried to explain what I was going to do, and she thought I’d paid for her. She thought I was going to touch her like those men did.”

“Jesus,” muttered Wilson. “She said she swam to that lifeboat. Swimming through an ocean with coral reefs, sharks, jellyfish, everything, isn’t something for the faint of heart.”

“Wilson, she had no clue what was out there. In this case, her ignorance was her friend,” said Faith. “She didn’t know what a shark was or a coral reef. She said she’d learned to swim in the water by where they kept her. They were allowed to wash off every few days in the water.”

“That’s helpful information to pass along to Trak. That means where they are held is near the water, a lake or maybe even the ocean,” said Ian. Erin came down the steps, looking exhausted as she fell into Nine’s arms.

“She’s asleep. She spent ten minutes turning the lamp on and off. She didn’t know what it was like to have light when she slept. She’s never slept on a mattress before.”

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