The Death Box by J. A. Kerley Page B

from the capital of Honduras. And for the frosting on the cake …” Morningstar snapped her long fingers and the bracelet became a three-centimeter-square piece of jewelry.
    “There’s this, a tin medallion stamped with the Nuestra Señora de Supaya, the patroness of Honduras.”
    “A serial psycho who targets Hispanics?” I said, my mind racing. “Mainly women? That’s what you’re saying we have here?” I was springing to conclusions: a killer from the same culture moving in areas he knew, using the native language … But Morningstar had other experience and shook her head.
    “How much human trafficking did you see in Mobile, Detective?”
    “Almost zero.”
    “South Florida is the entry point for a fair amount of human cargo from the Caribbean and the Southern Hemisphere. Europe, even. I think we’re seeing a delivery that went wrong.”
    “This trafficking …” I said, suddenly feeling like the last runner in the Boston Marathon. “Where can I find out more?”

17
    Morningstar made me an appointment with an expert. The next morning I threaded through lunchtime traffic up to the University of Miami, parking outside the Sociology department. I jogged the steps to the third floor and found an empty reception office. Classes, I figured.
    “Hello?” I called down a short hall with several doors. “Professor Johnson?”
    A woman rolled out a door in a wheelchair. That was the first thing I noticed, the second was the eye patch. She was of African heritage and looked to be in her mid forties, moon faced. Her hair was long and braided with bright beads and she beckoned me to her office. “You must be Carson Ryder,” Victoree Johnson said in a voice infused with Caribbean rhythms.
    “We were handling a case initially thought to be a serial killer, but Dr Morningstar—”
    “She told me the details. Have a seat.”
    I sat in a chair, she rolled around to face me. The office was small and jammed with books and bound reports.
    “Was that your opinion, Professor?” I asked. “Human trafficking?”
    “Hondurans, mostly female and too poor for regular dental work … add that to the quantity of bodies and I’d say it’s probable these people died together rather than being murdered by a maniac, though whoever trafficks in humans is as cold-blooded as any serial killer.”
    “It looks like sixteen or seventeen people died. This has happened before?”
    “In the Southwest it’s becoming common. As the borders tighten, the coyotes – human smugglers – turn to more desolate crossings, like the deserts. Remember the old westerns, Detective? The man on horseback in the desert looks down and sees a bleached cattle skull in the sand? Today he’s more likely to find a human skull.”
    I suppressed a shudder. “Is there much trafficking in the US?” I asked, aware of my country’s often dishonorable trek from slavery to freedom.
    “The US is not Eastern Europe, or Thailand, or Russia,” she said. “but if there are places where people, especially women, are used in vice, trafficking is there.”
    “Trafficking for sex, then.”
    “Sexual slavery is the mainstay of human trafficking in the US, women brought here as sex machines. They’re forced to work until they fall apart, at which point they’re replaced with another machine.”
    “Are they kidnapped from their home countries?” I asked.
    “Most are as willing as contestants on American Idol , seeing the US as offering money, a glamorous life, beautiful places to live, delicious foods in every direction. They’re easy prey for vultures who ply the villages, men who seek out youthful girls and boys with wide dreams. The typical line is that they get here and do some simple work – gardening, cleaning – for a couple months. After that they have no obligation.”
    “The garden never appears.”
    “They arrive to be told they owe thousands of dollars and can work it off with sex acts. Refusal brings beatings, rapes, starvation, drugging.