Before She Disappeared(80)

“Livia is manufacturing, Angelique marketing and sales.”

Lotham nods. Cars are not moving. He gives it another ten seconds, then flashes his grille lights. The car in front of us does its best to squeeze over. Lotham threads through a narrow opening between the clogged lanes, gets to the first turnoff, and takes it. I have no idea where we are, but I like his style.

“Here’s what I don’t get,” Lotham says. “Wouldn’t Angelique’s first customers be her own friends? Think of the DommyJ model. He probably signed up for the summer program just so he could sell to his fellow teens. Enter Angelique, who we’re saying sold enough to have thousands in cash but never approached her own social circle? That seems odd.”

I sit back grumpily. Then, remembering my conversation with Charlie: “Maybe she and Livia sold online. The international IDs are done that way. And these are two girls who’ve both been described as quiet. Internet sales would work, while further compartmentalizing this new criminal activity from their real, college-aspirational lives.”

“Possible. But that introduces more infrastructure. How are they getting paid? Money transfers? Bitcoin? They’d need to have bank accounts and they’re both underage.”

“Not according to Angelique’s fake alter ego, Tamara Levesque.”

Lotham eyes widened slightly. “Shit.” He bangs the steering wheel with his hand. “Of course. We examined the Levesque ID for forensic clues, then overanalyzed it with the help of Angelique’s brother for coded messages. Maybe, all along, the breadcrumb was the name itself, Tamara Levesque. A lead on Angelique’s secret life, which has clearly gotten her and her friend in trouble.”

“Oooh.” I finally get it. “As in Angelique doesn’t have bank accounts and Livia Samdi doesn’t have financial records, but Tamara Levesque . . . Oh, oh, oh.”

“Damn sleep deprivation,” Lotham mutters. “I’ll get on it, the second after I drop you off.”

I sigh heavily. So much happening right now. On the cusp of so many answers right now.

“We still have a problem,” Lotham says, finally able to pick up a little speed as he cuts through a maze of tiny side streets. “Assuming Livia and Angelique were doing this together . . . Why did Angelique go missing first?”

“She was posing as Livia. Trying to protect her from . . . someone.”

“And it took that someone three months to realize he had the wrong girl? That’s not a very bright someone. Besides, if you’re a criminal who wants to move in on their new and improved fake ID business, wouldn’t you just grab both of them?”

I have to think about it. “If Livia is the design genius behind their operation, then she’d be more valuable than Angelique. Maybe that’s why she appeared so scared. Maybe Angelique volunteered to take the meeting in Livia’s place. When the bad person discovered the subterfuge, they kept Angelique and used her as leverage to force Livia to work for them.”

“Then why take Livia three months later?”

“Ummm . . . coercion only works so long? Or operations had grown so fast they needed Livia at their immediate disposal? Maybe they have Livia shut up somewhere, designing a million fake IDs a day, I don’t know. And Livia’s now the collateral being held against Angelique. Hence Angelique has resurfaced to perform other, smaller tasks, because as long as they have Livia, they know she’ll return to them.”

“There’s a lot of assumptions in that theory,” Lotham informs me. “On the other hand, playing the girls off each other is a tried-and-true strategy. Used by human traffickers everywhere. In fact, it’s often easier to kidnap two people rather than just one, as it gives the kidnapper more leverage over both of them.”

“Those poor girls,” I murmur. “For Angelique this whole thing probably started as a way to strike back against the asshat that hurt her bestie. For Livia, maybe it was all about impressing her new friend, inserting herself deeper into Angelique’s world. And for their troubles, the two of them have now been kidnapped, while most likely being forced to engage in some kind of criminal activity, license forgeries, something. I don’t know if I could handle that kind of stress. Especially eleven months later.”

Lotham nods, arrives at last by the side door of Stoney’s. “So, to recap, we have the victims, Angelique Badeau and Livia Samdi. We have a possible criminal activity—fake IDs. Which still feels small potatoes to me. Thousands a month, versus the hundreds of thousands that can be netted through drugs. So who would be into something like that and have enough incentive to kidnap and hold two teenage girls for nearly a year?”

“What about this brother? Not Johnson. The other Samdi brother who appeared at the rec center?”

“The tall, sinister guy?” Lotham shrugs. “I’ll do some asking around. Chances are the gang taskforce has a name.”

“I saw him.”

“You saw him?”

“The first time I visited Boston Academy. Skinny Black dude, with a fashion sense that’s at least twenty years out of date. I’d just wrapped up talking to Kyra and Marjolie when I spotted him across the street. He was watching me.”

Lotham turns in the driver’s seat, his shoulders massive in the confined space. “And you were going to mention this when?”

“What was there to mention? I was at a public school in Roxbury and a Black guy stood across the street. Hello, there’s a shocker. Frankly, he had more grounds to report the strange white woman accosting students in the corner deli. I didn’t realize his presence had any kind of significance. Let alone that he might be Livia Samdi’s long-lost brother. For that matter, I didn’t know about Livia Samdi. But he definitely knew I was there.” I hesitate. “I might have seen him a second time, as well.”