HARD FAL Page 3

His smile returned, this time revealing his teeth. Some said Oshiro resembled a hyena. They were wrong. Mako shark would be more like it. Once he was committed to something or someone, nothing could force him from his path. A lot like Lucy that way. “Wanna go out with a bang? Then I have the perfect case.”

  Chapter 3

  “WANT TO TELL me why you’ve brought two civilians into my squad?” Lucy asked, glancing through the glass walls into her office. This was a secure area. Civilians never came here.

  “Technically,” Oshiro drawled, “only one and half civilians. The man is Seth Bernhart.”

  “The Assistant US Attorney?” Lucy squinted at the back of the man’s head. “I thought he quit a few years back?”

  Oshiro frowned, turned her so their backs were to her office. “Burned out was more like it. Was working in Atlanta doing some of the initial Innocent Image prosecutions.”

  Innocent Images was federal law enforcement’s intensive effort to identify the victims and perpetrators in child pornography. Because of the sheer volume of images, early on, before computer algorithms were created to help ease some of the burden, it required being closeted in a small, dark room, scanning pornography over and over for clues, hours on end.

  It messed with a lot of law enforcement officers’ heads, even after mandatory counseling and periodic psych evals were begun.

  “Walden worked Innocent Images in Atlanta, before he came here,” Lucy remembered.

  “He and Bernhart worked together. Most prosecutors never want to see the evidence, say they need to compartmentalize, focus on the trial. Not Bernhart. He was the young hotshot newbie headed for the fast track to DC, wanted his fingers in every pie when it came to his cases. Then he got in over his head with one case and it swallowed him whole.”

  Now it was all making sense. “June Unknown. Everyone was obsessed with that one, even Walden.”

  They both knew Isaac Walden was the most levelheaded agent around. Nothing upset the man’s equanimity—at least not since Lucy had met him two years ago when she came to start the Pittsburgh SAFE squad. But he never talked about his time in Atlanta. She’d thought it was because his wife died there—a sudden stroke on Thanksgiving eve four years ago, while Walden was working late at the office.

  “Bernhart left the US Attorney’s Office after he prosecuted several of the men who had June Unknown’s images,” she continued. June Unknown was the reason why the SAFE squads were created; in the hopes that a multi-agency, multi-jurisdictional approach to child molestation and other sexual felonies would be more fruitful in capturing the worst of the worst.

  Lucy’s squad had more than proven successful. Too successful, maybe, as other agencies such as ICE began to shoulder some of the burden, using the tactics and strategies she and her team had developed. “The actual perpetrator was never arrested, right?”

  “Never found. But there’s more to it than that. A lot more.” He glanced over her shoulder into her office. “Want to hear it from him?”

  “You know they’re pushing me out, shutting us down. If we can’t close this case—” It was bad enough leaving all their other open cases for local law enforcement or other agencies to take over. But one that Walden was personally involved with? She couldn’t let him down.

  Then she nodded to herself. Walden. Clever man. That was the point. He knew she’d never let him down, knew she needed something to focus on, maybe even thought this case was big enough to save the squad from the budget axe.

  It wasn’t, of course. But Walden also knew that Lucy specialized in finding ways around the rules.

  Oshiro clamped one of his beefy hands down on her shoulder. Just hard enough to get her attention. “This isn’t about you or your squad, Guardino. This is about saving a life. More than one. You up for it? Or were you planning to sit around twiddling your thumbs until the brass kicks you to the curb?”

  He was half-joking, half-serious. Which pissed her off. She shrugged his hand away and stalked past him to her office door.

  Behind her she heard him murmur, “That’s my Lucy Mae.”

  Irritated—Oshiro really belonged more in feudal Japan with his heavy-handed tactics than on the streets of Pittsburgh—she pushed the door open so hard it slammed against the wall behind it.

  Bernhart and the woman sitting beside him both jumped. He came out of his chair, angling his body to shield her.

  Who was this damsel in distress? she wondered, even as she regarded the former Assistant US Attorney. She’d last seen him at the San Diego Conference on Child Maltreatment a few years back, giving a report on his new tactics of using civil reparation suits against pedophiles and how they could help law enforcement and prosecutors obtain confessions. Then he’d appeared young, cocky, handsome. A crusader whose passion was contagious.

  The man before her now still had that same fire blazing in his eyes but his features, always angular—hawkish, she’d heard a defense attorney describe him, although that might have been more about his prosecutorial style—now were gaunt, as if he’d lost more weight than he could spare.

  He nodded to her and slid back into his seat, and Lucy got her first good look at the woman with him. She was in her mid-twenties, long blonde hair pulled back in a ponytail that made her appear waifish. No makeup, simple green jersey dress and matching cardigan. But her eyes—there was nothing young or innocent about them. Pale blue, they looked washed out, as if they’d seen too much.

  Haunted. Lucy had seen that same expression on so many victims, she’d lost count.

  Walden stepped forward to make introductions. “Supervisory Special Agent Lucy Guardino. You already know Seth Bernhart. And this,” he indicated the blonde, “is June Bernhart, aka, June Unknown.”

  The Girl Who Never Was: Memoirs of a Survivor

  by June Unknown

  What Happened in the Mall on the Day I was Born For the Second Time

  I WAS BORN in a mall on a rainy day in June. I know it was raining because while I was in the back of the van, I heard it thrumm-thrumming on the roof. And then when we got to the mall, even though Daddy parked between some Dumpsters near a rear entrance before he opened the van’s door and lifted me out, a few drops splashed against my skin.

  I’d seen and heard rain, but never felt it before. Rain was like biting into an apple—a red one, not the hard green ones—crisp and clean with promise.

  Daddy had me dress up that morning, told me not to get dirty, so he carried me across the black pavement that was shiny slick with water, his feet splish-splashing. Then he opened a door and we were inside, the rain and outside smells—so many, so different than home!—locked away behind us.

  He set me down, adjusted my skirt and collar, grimaced at my hair which had curled loose from its ribbon during the long, long ride in the van, twisted his face in the look he sometimes got when I didn’t perform as expected for the camera and he’d have to do it all over again, but then shrugged. “It’ll do.”

  I knew better than to say anything—he hadn’t asked me a question. Baby Girls should be seen and not heard. That was the rule.

  He took my hand and dragged me down an empty hall with ugly lights that hurt my eyes and hard floors that made each step feel like a slap. My shoes pinched—I’d grown too much since last time I wore them for a Dress Up, but that usually didn’t matter since when we played Dress Up at home I never was walking anywhere.

  The hallway was different than the hallway at home. That hall goes from the front door—which I never go near, it’s a No Touch—past the living room and dining room back to the kitchen.

  This hallway now, walking down it with my toes pinched together and Daddy tugging my hand, it’s all brown and gray, and worst of all, noisy. Like there’s a big TV blaring at the end of it where the bright light gets even brighter and I want to close my eyes and cover my ears. I wish Daddy had never brought me here. I don’t even know what a mall is and suddenly with all the noise and lights and smells, I don’t want to. I want to go home.

 
; There’s a weird feeling in my stomach—like I’m hungry, which I am because Daddy ate breakfast but he didn’t feed me any, he does that sometimes when he says I look fat or if he’s afraid I’ll throw up during a performance—but this feeling doesn’t stay in my stomach, instead it drags me down from the inside out, just like I feel when Daddy gets upset because I’ve been a Bad Girl and I’m waiting to see what he’s going “to just have to do about it.”

  I think back but can’t remember being a Bad Girl. I’ve been a Good Girl, honest, I want to tell Daddy, but I can’t say anything because he hasn’t asked me, so I drag my feet and squeeze his hand and look up at him, hoping he’ll look down and give me one of his smiles. I live for Daddy’s smile, the one that makes it all the way to his eyes and wrinkles his face. I’d skip breakfast, lunch, and dinner, wear pinchy shoes, play any Dress Up or other game he wants to see him smile at me like that.

  He doesn’t smile. He doesn’t even look at me. Just yanks my arm. Hard. Rushing me down the hall to the noise and light. Then I see people. Strangers like the ones on TV. They’re walking past the opening at the end of the long hall and I can’t see to the end of the space past them.

  Now I feel like throwing up. Dizzy, off balance. I’ve never been around any real life people except for Daddy. I’m scared, want to run, but he crushes my hand in his.

  We reach the end of the hall. The ceiling stops here and beyond it there’s a big space, like outside but when I twist my neck to look, way, way up I see another ceiling, this one filled with curvy windows, high up, higher than the trees in our yard, higher than the mountains beyond them, I think.

  People, lots of people, too many, moving too fast, too close. I can smell them, all different smells, sharp and fake, churning together. The taste of their smells makes me gag.

  The noise hurts my ears. It slams at me so hard I close my eyes, squeeze them hard, wishing it would go away and when I open them again I’ll be home, safe in bed with Daddy.

  He shakes me. Hard. I open my eyes. Daddy is crouching down, his face twisted. Time to shape up, Baby Girl, that look says. So I do. I stand tall, chest thrust out, arms folded behind my back, smile for the camera on my face.

  “See that table?” Daddy points out into the open area, the place that makes me feel dizzy and scared. I look past the people to see that there are bright colored lights and windows surrounding the space and in the center there are a bunch of little round tables. I smell food—burnt sugar, meat roasting, spices I don’t recognize—and my stomach growls.

  But Daddy asked a question. Did I see the table? I look again, make sure I’m telling him true. There, the one with no people at it, back in the corner near a trash can. “Yes, Daddy.”

  He hands me a coloring book and crayons—brand new!—and twists me so I’m facing away from him and toward the wide open space and the strange people and the table.

  “You’re going to sit there and color. You will not leave until a man comes and tells you to draw a picture of a green elephant. Then you will go with him and do what he says. Understand?”

  No. But no is never the right answer. I want to ask so much more but Baby Girls are to be seen and not heard so I can’t.

  “Yes, Daddy.”

  He’s behind me, his head over my shoulder so he can make sure I’m looking at the right table. I feel his breath on my cheek, smell his smell—pancakes and syrup—and I’m not sure why but tears are spilling from my eyes and everything is blurry as I blink them back.

  Baby Girls don’t cry. Not unless Daddy says it’s okay.

  He gives me a little shove from behind and pushes me forward out of the shelter of the hallway into the space. I go a few steps—Daddy said to, so I have to—but slowly, hoping he won’t notice me being Bad, I inch my head back so I can look over my shoulder.

  He’s gone.

  I’m terrified by the people, some of them coming so close I could touch them. I’ve never touched anyone except Daddy, never in my whole life. And no one has ever touched me except him.

  No one has ever talked to me either. When I was little I used to think the people inside the TV were talking to me, but Daddy said to stop being stupid, so I did.

  I get to the table. Climb onto the seat. The top of the table is sticky and there’s a dirty napkin stained with ketchup. I don’t want my new coloring book to get dirty too, so I try to clean it up before I set my book down. I can’t throw the napkin away because Daddy said to sit and color and not leave.

  So I do. For a long, long time. So long that I wet my pants and my mouth is dry and my stomach knotted with fear and hunger and missing Daddy and wondering who the green elephant man is—will he take me back home to Daddy? I want Daddy, I hate this place, I want to be home, I want these people to all go away, I want to use the toilet, I want to get clean, I want the noise to stop, I want my Daddy…

  Then the lights go dim. There’s the rattle of metal and I look up to see people pulling down gates over the food places. A few of them are staring at me.

  While I sat and colored—I’ve filled in all the pictures and drawn a bunch of my own in the spaces in between—people have come and tried to talk to me, but none of them were the green elephant man, so I said nothing, just sat and colored like Daddy told me to.

  Now two more people are walking over to me. Policemen, like on TV. They walk different than the other people. One’s a man, one’s a woman. I blink and stare up at the man, hoping he’s the green elephant man and if he is, that he’ll take me back home to Daddy.

  He talks a lot. So does the woman. But no green elephant. So I sit and color like Daddy told me to even though I have to pee and I’m afraid I’ll wet my pants again and I don’t want to do that in front of the police. Police shoot you and yell and put handcuffs on you. I’ve seen it on TV.

  Daddy said to be a Good Girl, so I’m trying really, really hard.

  But they grab me up and no matter how I kick and scream, they don’t listen, they just take me away, away from the table Daddy told me to sit at, away from the green elephant man I’m supposed to listen to, away from home, away from Daddy.

  That day was the last time I ever saw him.

  Chapter 4

  LUCY WOBBLED A bit on her cane, searching for a comfortable position. Walden noticed and stepped forward, sliding a chair out for her at the conference table. They both knew she’d come back to work too soon, just as they both knew she couldn’t stay away another minute. She remained standing, assessing their civilian guests.

  June Unknown. Every law enforcement officer working crimes against children knew her story. Nightmare was more like it. Abandoned at a mall when she was nine or ten—no one knew her true age. Just as no one knew her true name or where she came from or how long the man called Daddy had held her captive.

  Hell, back then, when they first found her, they didn’t even know about the pornography. Daddy didn’t release that out into the pedophile community, once again selling June’s innocence to the highest bidders, until after she was discovered at the mall. Given that the images were later found piecemeal and out of order, mixed in with tens of thousands of other images, no one pervert owning the entire collection chronicling June’s childhood on one computer, it had taken law enforcement almost a decade to identify the girl in the Baby Girl collection of images as the girl found in a mall without a name.

  “June Bernhart?” Lucy’s gaze was on Seth as she asked the question.

  “We became involved and were married after I left the US Attorney’s Office. Obviously, it’s not public knowledge,” Seth answered. Seth’s voice was one of his best weapons—sure to mesmerize juries and the media. Combined with his distinguished looks and obvious passion for his cases, he could easily have left government service for a seven-figure income doing on air commentary for TV.

  Instead, he’d quit to represent a single client in expensive civil cases mired with jurisdiction and procedural pitfalls. A single client who was his wife. Talk about career suicide.

  Lu
cy pivoted to stare at June. The younger woman met Lucy’s gaze without flinching, the most relaxed person in the room despite being the center of scrutiny.

  Seth cleared his voice and laid his hand over June’s on the table, giving her a quick, reassuring squeeze. Lucy carefully lowered herself into the chair and drew in her breath. This woman before her, she was why Lucy did her job—why she was compelled to return to work, no matter the cost. It wasn’t sexy work, didn’t grab front-page headlines like tracking terrorists, but it was important work.

  She might only have three days left before her squad was officially terminated, but damn it, she was not going to deny a victim like June Unknown any assistance she could offer. “What can I do for you?”

  June opened her mouth but Seth patted her hand and spoke. “You know the civil suits I’ve been pursuing on behalf of June?”

  “Asking for reparations from anyone found guilty of possessing her images. My understanding is that it might go all the way to the Supreme Court.”

  “The lower courts have upheld the findings in our favor for the most part. So far we’ve sued eighty-three defendants and won judgments adding up to over ten million dollars.” He paused. Not for breath, rather for dramatic effect. “But that’s eighty-three defendants out of fourteen hundred twenty-seven convicted of possessing images from the Baby Girl collection—not to mention the untold tens of thousands more who have yet to be brought to justice.”

  Lucy raised a palm. “You’re preaching to the choir. We know how rampant the problem is.”

  So of course the powers that be were eliminating the SAFE program, she didn’t add, focusing on Seth and June.

  “It’s not about the money. Our hope is that if the Supreme Court upholds our verdicts, this strategy of pursuing civil reparations might become a useful weapon for law enforcement to threaten defendants with during plea bargain agreements. In other words, what June and I are doing is important not just to victims but also prosecutors and law enforcement officers. Not to mention the legislation it might spawn to further protect victims’ rights.”