Three, Two, One (321)

She stops. And it doesn’t take a mind reader to understand why. “They have shit on you, don’t they?”

She tips her head up and takes a deep breath. “It seems you have a lot in common with them.”

I narrow my eyes at her. “How do you figure?”

“Because they have an affinity for filming girls as well. Only they set us up. They filmed me doing drugs. Having sex. And…”

“Just fucking say it, Blue.” I want to pull her hair out right now.

“And babysitting.” Her words are so soft, I almost miss them. My heart actually skips a beat. Maybe two. “Only it’s not babysitting, Ark. That’s just the code word.”

I’m reaching for her throat to throttle her, but she misunderstands and sinks into my chest, wrapping her arms around me. Holy fuck. Just keep cool, I tell myself. Just keep cool. “What’s babysitting, Blue? Come on now, just tell me. You’ve said this much, might as well get it all out.”

“We weren’t sex slaves, Ark. We weren’t whores, or strippers, or mistresses. They kept us for babies.”

The blood is pounding so hard in my head.

“And when a girl had a baby, they took it and gave it to someone else. They sold them, Ark. And the girl was paid to give the baby up.”

Disgust runs through my veins. Bile rises in my throat. “Did you sell a baby, Blue?”

“No. I never got pregnant.” And then she drops her head and cries. She falls to the floor on her knees. Her hands cover her face and then she lowers her forehead to the ground and wails.

I just watch her for a few seconds, and then I snap out of it. “Come here,” I say, picking up her too-thin body and carrying her back to my bedroom. I lay her down on the bed and climb in next to her as the sadness pours out of her in heaving sobs and rivers of tears.

“Shhh,” I tell her, putting my arm underneath her so I can keep her close. “Calm down, OK?” I drag my fingers up and down her arm to try to soothe her, but she’s lost control.

This is the girl we found out in the rain. This is how she should’ve reacted that day. This is the reaction that never came. Because she never admitted to what happened to her. She couldn’t.

No one knows when Zoey Marshall went missing, but all of North America heard about it the minute they realized. It was on every nightly news report last year. And from what Blue says, that was months after she was actually gone. There were rewards and heartfelt pleas for her safe return on the news by her family. Vigils were held outside the ambassador’s home in DC and her family’s home in Canada.

It was a multi-national affair and lasted about three months. And then no one ever talked about the missing college grad again because she made a YouTube video telling people she was on a writing sabbatical in some rainforest. There was some buzz, but then it all died away. People forgot all about Zoey Marshall. She simply disappeared.

I stroke her hair as she begins to calm down. “We should call them, Blue.”

“No,” she says, hiccupping. “I will not disgrace my father like that. I will not let them read that contract.”

“What contract?” Jesus Christ.

“We all signed one. It was a big production. It was videotaped. And they had me stand up and recite it out loud. Pledging to sell my baby to a man who was present in the room, but wearing a mask to protect his identity. There’s no way I will disgrace my father like that.”

“Why did you do it, though? I don’t understand.” How? How could this girl sell an unborn child?

“I was looking for my best friend, Janine. Remember?” She tips her head to look up at me. “It was fake, Ark. I knew she was pregnant, but then she disappeared. I figured the only way I could have any chance of finding her was to get with the program. They didn’t know who I was back then, I had the fake ID. But week after week of doctor visits and not getting pregnant—”

“Wait.” I stop her here. Because I need to know. “How were they trying to get you pregnant?”

“He fucked me. Every night while I was ovulating. It was like a perk of the contract, I think. He was the leader.”

I have to close my eyes for a moment to process this. I take a deep breath. “The leader of what?”

“The baby-selling ring.”

“And he needed a baby from you?”

“That’s what he said. I didn’t know who he was at my contract party, everyone was wearing masks. It was like a masquerade ball. Everyone but me was dressed up.”

“So when did he find out who you really were?”

“When they discovered I had gotten a Depo shot the day before I was contracted, I thought for sure I’d be in and out in a week or two. The shot lasts for about three months, and there’s no way to stop the effects once it’s given. I thought… I thought I was so smart, Ark. I really did.”

I continue to stroke her arm. She’s calming down, but my heart rate is speeding up. “But they know the tricks, I’m sure.”

“Yeah. It only took them a few days to figure it out with a blood test after they got suspicious.”

“And then what happened?”

“They locked me up. Took my fingerprints. And they said they ran my face through some facial recognition program. But that might’ve been bullshit.”

“So they knew you were Zoey.”

“Yeah. And then the leader kept me as his… personal…”