Broken Boys_The Extractor Page 3

  The old guys still played golf together, and Bowman was the only one on the force who knew about Marty’s heart condition.

  “He’s fine. This is about a client who was just arrested in front of my office.”

  “What’s his name and what do you want to know?”

  “Isaac Lovejoy. I need to know why he was picked up.”

  “Give me a minute and I’ll call you back. I’m on patrol and in the middle of something.”

  “Thanks.” She hung up, then realized she should have apologized for bothering him at work. The fact that she understood that now was proof that the magnetic therapy was working. She started the car and headed home to discuss the case with Marty. Halfway there, she changed her mind and drove south to the Columbia YMCA on Barbur Boulevard. She’d only been inside the facility once to play basketball when she was younger, but she remembered how to find it. The humiliation of the game surfaced too. People had assumed that because she was tall, she could play, and she’d given in to peer pressure. So much physical contact with strangers! She’d hated every moment and never done it again.

  At first glance, nothing about the building’s exterior had changed except that the gray concrete had faded over the years. But as Rox strode into the building, she realized they’d added a sunroom-style foyer in the front. Lipstick on a pig, as Marty always said. Inside, she glanced around the main lobby. The same tall, curved counter and the same cluttered bulletin board on the opposite wall. A family stood in front of the reception area, blocking her view of the staff behind the desk. On the drive over, she’d considered several approaches, then decided to stick to observing Carrie in her work environment. Gathering real intel about the correctional camp would likely have to wait until the fellowship visit.

  The smell of chlorine from the pool, mixed with sweat from the gym, hit her hard. How could anyone work here? The family at the counter moved on, and Rox got her first view of the staff. A tall young man without an ounce of body fat and a petite, forty-something woman with strawberry-blonde hair and deep cleavage. Carrie Lovejoy?

  Rox turned toward the bulletin board to look preoccupied while she watched the receptionist out of the corner of her eye. She needed just enough information about Carrie to pretend to know her when she visited the church to ask about the correctional program. What if she could find out with a phone call? The Common Community Fellowship probably had a secretary who answered the phones. Rox tried to recall if she’d ever been inside a church. Yes, once when she’d stayed the night with a friend when she was ten. The first and only time she’d done a childhood sleepover.

  A burst of laughter from the front desk startled her. The receptionist’s petite body produced an unnerving volume of noise. The young man beside her laughed politely, said “Good one, Carrie,” then turned away to look busy. The phone at the counter rang, and Carrie answered in a deep, breathy voice. Overall, she seemed a little unsuited to working in an environment focused on children. More important, had someone at the YMCA recommended the wilderness program to her? Rox was tempted to walk up to the counter and ask, but she wasn’t wearing one of her disguises.

  Using her work phone, she called the front desk, then trotted up the steps and out of sight as it rang. Carrie’s voice came on the line. “Columbia YMCA.”

  “Hello. I’m looking for help with my teenage son. Do you have any behavior-type programs?”

  “Not specifically, no. We focus mostly on sports, and crafts, and summer camps.”

  “You mean like those wilderness camps for troubled kids?”

  “No, we only offer fun activities, like swimming and hiking and campfire stories.”

  “Oh, right.” Rox stopped climbing and turned back, wanting to watch Carrie’s face now. “Do you know of any behavior-based wilderness camps? I’m at my wits’ end with my son.”

  “I can relate to that.” Carrie paused, then lowered her voice. “I do know of one, but it’s exclusive, and I can’t tell you much about it.” She looked a little worried.

  “Exclusive how?” Rox was genuinely puzzled.

  “I’m probably not using the right word.”

  “Give me a name, please. My son needs help.”

  “Ridgeline, but you—”

  An older man suddenly strode out of a nearby office and hurried up to Carrie. The receptionist looked flustered. “Thanks for calling,” she mumbled, hung up, and turned her attention to the guy in the button-up shirt.

  Damn. But at least she had a name for the program now. Rox hustled down the steps and out into the glass foyer. She didn’t want to seem like a lurker. Carrie’s use of the word exclusive was concerning. It probably meant secretive, and that didn’t bode well. Still, Rox was encouraged that she would soon have the full name and contact information for the correctional program—which she needed to even start her specific research.

  She headed back to her car, thinking the trip had been worthwhile. She could identify Carrie now and was pretty sure that Josh’s mother didn’t know the physical location of the camp. But Carrie might be able to provide the name of the transport service she’d used to have her son picked up. Maybe one of the thugs could be bribed. Or seduced. If the program used its own carriers, that tactic wouldn’t work, and finding the camp might be ridiculously time-consuming. Unless she could track down a previous client—either a teenager who’d graduated or the parent who’d sent him. What if the program required a nondisclosure agreement? Even if the parents signed them, the kids sure didn’t.

  As she started the engine, her personal phone rang and she glanced at the ID. Bowman. Rox answered quickly. “Hey, buddy. What did you find out?”

  “Isaac Lovejoy was picked up for violating a restraining order. He’ll probably be arraigned and released.”

  “Against Carrie, his ex-wife?”

  “Yes. Is that it?” Bowman wasn’t much of a phone talker and probably still on duty.

  “For now. Thanks.”

  “Later.”

  They both hung up and Rox drove out of the parking lot. Even though she was relieved that her client hadn’t assaulted his ex, she still had to consider whether she could trust him. She’d secured the first half of the fee, but he might be the type to cheat her on the extraction bonus. But she couldn’t worry about that. If Josh was being physically abused or was suicidal, as his dad thought, she had to help him. Her biggest worry was that she wouldn’t find the camp in time.

  Chapter 6

  Wednesday, July 5, 5:30 a.m., Central Oregon wilderness

  Josh woke to someone shouting, “Get up, you lazy fucktards!”

  He couldn’t move. He’d had so little sleep, and his body hurt everywhere.

  “Get up!” A boot slammed into his shoulder.

  The pain jolted him to life. Josh sat up and pushed off the tarp. In the early light of dawn, the high-desert mountains surrounded him. He was in the middle of fucking nowhere, with practically nothing, and no one cared. His parents had sent him here to die a slow, torturous death.

  “Move!” Ace kicked him again. The bearded man was a sadist, and Josh visualized stabbing him in the eye with a sharp stick. If he could only find one. Because he had no way to sharpen anything. All he had were the clothes on his back, a small shovel, and a tarp. He’d never been so dirty… or so tired… or in so much pain. Yet he pushed to his feet. He’d tried resisting the first week, but he’d been kicked, slapped, starved, and humiliated. The physical stress of the oxy withdrawal had been nothing compared to the everyday life as a Ridgeline “student.” Now he just wanted to die, but he wanted it to be quick. Maybe today he would find a way. He hadn’t been sure he deserved to live even before coming here.

  “Get your morning duties done and be ready to go in five!” The camp counselor tossed a snack bag of granola and a pair of boots at him, then moved to the boy three tarps away and kicked him. “Let’s roll!”

  Counselor! Like hell he was. A bullshit title for a bullshit program. These people were getting shitloads of money to drag
teenagers around the desert mountains and abuse them at every opportunity. Well, not everybody got abused. Just the kids like him, still wearing the brown shit T-shirts because they wouldn’t cooperate with every little stupid rule. Josh pulled on the boots, which they took away every night so he couldn’t run, then grabbed the tiny shovel and headed off to dig a hole to crap in. Without toilet paper. He’d been tearing off tiny pieces of his shirt to wipe with when he needed to. Other kids used leaves and rocks, but those had both left him too sore. Around him, a few campers had made little fires to heat milk to soak their granola in. They’d earned the privilege by kissing ass at every opportunity. So far, he hadn’t even earned the right to carry a water bottle, and his throat was so dry and scratchy it hurt to swallow.

  Back at his tarp, he wolfed down the gravel-like granola anyway. He would need it for the ten-hour daily hike that came next. But the food they gave him was never enough, and his body was starving.

  “Dude, aren’t you sick of taking his shit?” Another camper—inmate!—named Trevor walked up. Unlike him, the guy was small and blond, but still, another middle-class white kid. They all were. “Just try a little harder,” Trevor said, “and you’ll get some protein. You’re wasting away.”

  They were all losing weight, but Josh had given up hope of earning any honey for his granola or salt for the beans they fed them every night—let alone beef jerky. “Ace hates me, so there’s no point.”

  “No he doesn’t. He’s like that with everyone the first couple of weeks.” Trevor had passed into phase two and wore a green T-shirt to show his growth.

  The counselors all wore red. Bloody bastards! “I’m getting out of here the first chance I can,” Josh whispered.

  “Escape?” Trevor let out a harsh laugh. “Didn’t they tell you on the first day that no one ever escapes, at least not for long?”

  “Yeah, I heard that, but I’ll die trying.”

  Trevor grabbed one side of Josh’s tarp. “Come on. Don’t be late.”

  Stunned by the gesture, it took Josh a moment to respond and grab a corner. A surge of gratitude washed over him as they folded the tarp. No one had done a kind thing for him in the ten days he’d been here. This was day eleven… of hell on earth. Josh pulled the tarp over his shoulders and pushed the shovel through the straps on his back. They carried the equipment everywhere, and most nights they made camp in a new place.

  After a day of orientation at the base camp, his group had hiked thirty grueling miles, only stopping to eat and sleep when it got dark. He’d been in withdrawal and had puked all day. Ace hadn’t stopped once for him. Ben, the other guide, had offered him water to rinse his mouth, but that was it. Every day since had been just as brutal. Josh hated his mother for doing this to him even more than he hated Ace. His dad might have signed the papers, but he knew this was his mother’s boyfriend’s idea. Curtis had been complaining about his behavior since the day they’d met.

  “Let’s go!” Ace shouted.

  Josh jogged over to the line forming. They started every day by running for an hour. Could he do it again? It never got easier. But if he fell or tried to stop, Ace would kick him and humiliate him. Josh amazed himself every day with the things he could force himself to do. He suspected that was the point. But they weren’t curing his addiction or making him a better person. If an opportunity to escape opened up before he got a chance to kill himself, he would take it. When he was free, he would head straight for the nearest oxy dealer to take away his pain. After that, he would confront his mom just long enough to spit in her face. She had let thugs kidnap him from her house!

  Ace was suddenly shouting at him. “Your tarp is too damn sloppy!”

  Oh hell. Another excuse to harass him. Josh pulled off the straps to start over with it.

  “What do you say?” Ace demanded.

  Josh ground his teeth, trying to decide what was harder—the words or the painful consequences of not saying them. He made himself choke them out. “Thank you for pointing that out to me. I’ll take care of it.” They called the forced response radical acceptance, some misguided behavior modification bullshit.

  “Make it fast!”

  Josh refolded the tarp as quickly as he could, knowing this effort would look even worse. But it didn’t matter. Ace had already jogged back to the front of the hiker line.

  From there, he shouted, “Let’s have a good day, students! If no one falls or gets behind, you all get Vanilla Wafers with dinner.”

  No one responded vocally but Seth turned and stared at Josh.

  Fuck! Peer pressure again. If Josh messed up and the group lost the privilege, Seth would punch him. Or throw feces under his tarp.

  A minute later, Ace took off running and the ten boys followed. Josh’s bruised feet ached with every step and his stomach growled with an angry need. The sun came up behind the mountain, and a soft pink light filled the rocky landscape. Josh hated this place—with its endless red dirt, scrubby bushes, and dry pine trees—wherever the hell it actually was. He’d been blindfolded for the whole trip, and it had taken at least six hours.

  When he’d arrived at the base camp, it had looked like a desolate outpost of tents, tarps, and plastic tubs. After ten days in the wilderness, it now seemed like a luxury spot he couldn’t wait to get back to. But he would never see it again. Completing this phase of the program was impossible for him, so he had his eye out for a cliff to jump off today. Death would be a sweet escape.

  Chapter 7

  Wednesday, July 5, 8:05 a.m., Portland

  Rox finished her dance workout—the only exercise she did, besides an occasional summer hike—then took a quick shower. In front of her closet, she hesitated. She now owned a purple dress and a dark-green sleeveless sweater but hadn’t worn either yet. Neither seemed professional enough for a workday. She pulled on a cobalt-blue sleeveless blouse and black pants, then blow-dried her short wavy hair. The morning headache, a side effect of her treatment, started to subside.

  As she shut off the noisy dryer, Marty’s familiar knock echoed down the hall. Rox pulled on black sneakers, hurried toward the front of the house, and called out “Clear!” A law-enforcement term that meant safe to enter. She’d had to institute the policy after Marty walked in on her and Kyle one morning. A pang of longing hit her hard. Kyle had been a great guy—and one of the best sex partners she’d ever had.

  The door burst open and her stepdad hustled in, carrying two plates. “I have bacon and cinnamon rolls.”

  There were also benefits to having him as a close neighbor. “Yum!” Rox started for the kitchen, then stopped. “What’s going on? You’re softening me up for something.” Understanding—and using—manipulation was a new skill too. She hoped it would stay with her when the treatments were over.

  “Nope. Just being nice.”

  He was saving the request or bad news for later.

  “Good. Let’s eat. I want to get rolling on this case.”

  Marty poured coffee for them both and they sat at the kitchen table. After Rox reached for a frosted roll, Marty asked, “What did you find out last night? I know you’ve got something.” He’d been on a date the night before so they hadn’t talked about the case since Lovejoy had first called.

  “Tell me about your evening first.” SiriKaren was a new girlfriend, his second in six months. Before that, he’d been alone for decades, most of it spent raising her and Jolene. Rox was happy that he was finally dating.

  “We had dinner and went dancing, like always.”

  “That was your fifth date with her. Maybe you should invite her to stay over.”

  “Maybe you should mind your own business. Some of us think it’s important to know each other before we take our clothes off.” Marty shoved a bacon strip in his mouth and chewed loudly.

  Rox laughed. “Life is short, old man.” She immediately regretted saying it. His heart was damaged and he might only have six more months. Or he might have six years—if he took care of himself.

  “I know.
I like SiriKaren. We’ll get there.”

  Rox grinned and bit back a comment about little blue pills. “Here’s what I learned in my meeting with Lovejoy.” She chewed a cinnamon roll as she ticked off the main details. “Isaac Lovejoy co-owns a restaurant where he works as a chef. His son Josh was probably picked up by a transportation service and escorted to a wilderness camp in northern Nevada or Utah. I got the name Ridgeline from the mother, who works at the YMCA.” Rox washed her roll down with coffee. “And Lovejoy was arrested outside my office yesterday for violating a restraining order.”

  Marty scowled, his bushy eyebrows coming together. “Against his ex-wife?”

  “Yes, but he has no history of violence. Or anything. He’s clean.”

  “Still, not good.”

  “I know. I plan to check him out more thoroughly.”

  Marty rubbed his hand across the table. “This surface needs refinishing. Maybe with some bamboo. We could do your floor with it too. I love the bright look of that stuff.”

  Rox snapped her fingers. “Focus. We have an extraction to plan.”

  Marty rolled his eyes. “You’re worse than your mother.”

  Ouch. “I’m not really anything like her.” When Rox was thirteen, Georgia had left all three of them for a role on Broadway and had never come back. She’d visited, sent lovely gifts, and made promises, but never lived with them again. Marty had only come into Rox’s life as a stepfather when she was six, but they’d bonded and he’d continued to raise her like his own daughter even after the divorce. But Jolene, her baby sister, had been his biological child, and Jo’s death had knocked Marty’s heart off-kilter for a long time.

  “I know you’re not. But Georgia used to tell me to focus, and you caught me off guard.”

  Rox didn’t remember that. Had she picked it up subconsciously as a child? Why would it surface now? Because of the treatments? She let it go. “Back to work. I did some research last night and discovered that the program is called Ridgeline Wilderness Health.” She scoffed out loud. “As though putting the word health in the title makes forced hiking and camping a positive thing.”