"Good morning, Melissa."
The woman turned in the direction of the familiar voice, one she had not heard for several years. The blindfold Melissa Mitchell wore prevented her from seeing her ex-husband's face. She had been told this morning to place the blindfold over her eyes, handcuff her wrists behind back, and be outside her house at 10 AM. A car was waiting outside and two men led her to the back seat and drove her to wherever she was now. Melissa had followed the directions after receiving the second set of photos and videos of her daughter Susan being abused by the headmaster at the exclusive private school she attended, West Valley High.
Melissa had sent Susan to West Valley three years ago. She thought she was protecting her daughter by sending her to the private academy. Due to the number of students of politicians and industry leaders who attended the school, security was tight. Outsiders were not allowed on campus, which Melissa thought would keep her daughter safe from the kind of men who had driven her husband away men away. But when she saw the first set of photos, she knew she had been horribly wrong. The photos of her daughter were horrific and she thought immediately of going to the authorities. But the letter made it clear that Susan would be dead before the police reached campus.
The second package had included a link to a website, where Melissa watched in horror as her daughter was physically and sexually abused on camera for any man with a credit card. The vacant look in Susan's eyes told Melissa that she had to do whatever she was told to try to save her daughter.
All of this was Melissa's fault, she knew. Well, actually, if she was honest, it was Marcus' fault. He had told her he fallen in debt due to a gambling problem and had been recruited by a drug cartel to use his software company as a way to launder drug money. Marcus had devised the scheme many years ago, using back doors in the software he wrote for financial institutions. It was that scheme Headmaster Krutz had discovered Melissa was using to fund Susan's tuition and he was using that information to blackmail Susan into sexual slavery.
After Marcus had mysteriously disappeared six years ago, Melissa had maintained the scheme. The cartel Marcus had worked for had made it clear she needed to continue to use her job as a financial analyst for a large banking company to continue laundering money or else she and Susan would be murdered. Melissa had done as she was told, but had begun siphoning off money into a special off shore account for herself and Susan. Some of it was used to pay Susan's tuition to West Valley, which was how the Headmaster had come to entrap her daughter. The rest was designed to allow Melissa and Susan to run away once the girl finished school. It had seemed like a perfect plan.
But those plans had been ruined when Krutz found out about the embezzlement and taken Susan captive. Now Melissa wondered why her ex-husband had returned and how he was still involved in all of this. Melissa had married Marcus when Susan was just an infant. Susan's biological father had been killed in an auto accident shortly after she was born. Marcus had worked alongside Melissa when he was installing his software and the two struck up a relationship shortly thereafter.
Marcus told Melissa she could remove the blindfold and handcuffs. They were in a hotel suite of some kind. The drapes were closed and the room was dark. "I suppose you are wondering why I am here after all of this time," Marcus said. "Unfortunately my duties with the cartel required me to leave the country for some time due to certain, well, entanglements. The less you know, the better."
Marcus paused and looked at his ex-wife. "I have to say I am very disappointed in you, Sissy," he continued, using the nickname he had always called her. "Stealing money from the cartel for your personal use was not a smart idea. You're lucky my colleagues didn't just kill you and Susan. Lord knows they wanted to when they found out."
"Marcus," Melissa said softly, finding her voice, "you have to get them to stop torturing Susan. Do what you want with me, but please leave her alone." The woman started to sob. Marcus maintained his steady stare. "That is out of my hands now, Sissy. Your actions caused that and there is nothing I can do now to stop it."
What Melissa Mitchell didn't know was that Marcus Torres wasn't a software engineer with a gambling problem that led him to launder money for drug dealers. He was, in reality, the American head of a South American drug cartel. He had been involved in the cartel since his father brought him into the business. He had used his software expertise to develop a complicated method of moving money around various financial institutions as a way to hide the cartel's business dealings. It was in that role he had met Melissa Mitchell and recruited her into his scheme. Using his cover, he had been able to maintain the web of financial impropriety using Melissa to protect himself. Melissa didn't know their entire marriage was built around Marcus' scheme.
Melissa pleaded again for Marcus to talk to his colleagues to stop Susan's abuse. Torres cut her off with a hard slap across her face. In 10 years of marriage, he had never hit her in anger. "Enough," he said. "Your daughter's fate is of her own doing. Stephen will either break her and turn her into an obedient slave girl worth a pretty penny when we sell her or else he will simply break her. From what I have heard, she is nothing but a slut anyway."
