Page 30 of Never Bound

“Max’s father?” she asked.

Erica nodded.

“Oh, fuck yes,” I exclaimed.

Milagros smiled from behind her wine glass.

“For what it’s worth, many of us in the abolitionist community have also been suspicious of Max Langer for some time.”

“Really?”

Erica pressed her lips into a firm line. “Let’s put it this way. He wouldn’t be the first corporate bigwig to loudly espouse progressive values while secretly undermining them at every opportunity,” she explained. “Now about that warehouse that was transferred to your father.”

Louisa slumped low in her chair in shame.

“It doesn’t mean he’s involved,” I said quickly.

Louisa’s eyes immediately snapped toward me.What?

“He’s a slave owner,” said Erica. “That’s not meant to be a reflection on you, Louisa, but it puts him under suspicion.”

“Not necessarily,” I spoke up. Louisa was still gazing at me, lips parted in unconsciously sexy surprise, and it made me suddenly frantic to keep her attention. As if I’d lured a shy chipmunk out of her burrow and was now desperately throwing out nuts and seeds in her path to win her over before she scurried out of my reach again. Even if one of the seeds had to be defending the guy who owned me, whipped me, and granted me roughly the same level of personhood as his programmable kitchen appliances. “That is to say, um—what’s to prevent Langer from lying to him about what’s going on? Maybe Langer thinks that with all his debts, he’s so desperate for a big score that he won’t look that closely at what his partner’s really doing.”

Both women looked skeptical.

Erica cleared her throat. “Look, Louisa, I know he’s your father, and you love him, but—”

“This isn’t up for debate,” I cut her off. “I know Louisa, and she knows her dad. If she says he’s not involved, I believe her.”

The girl across from me was still hunched low in her chair as if she were in a plane that had been nosediving into some mountains—but someone had just pulled up on the throttle.

Keep going, keep going, keep going.

“Besides,” I continued more energetically. “If Langer bought the gardener, he owns at least one slave, so at the very least, he’s a liar and a hypocrite. It’s not much of a stretch to think he’s not being honest with her dad, either.”

If you’d only bothered to ask, I could have told you that.

Of course Louisa could have told me that. The problem was that a week ago, I wouldn’t have believed it. I believed it now.

Erica, for her part, looked from me to Louisa—two equally determined expressions daring her to disagree—and reluctantly gave in. “Well, we don’t have any substantial proof that he’s involved, so for now, we’ll operate under the assumption that he’s not.”

Louisa heaved a sigh of relief.

“However, I’ll have you note that any slave can be looked up by typing in their number, which you know. What you may not know—because the pro-slavery lobby doesn’t want you to—is that there’s a reverse lookup, where you type in the owner’s name and it gives you a list of which slaves, if any, they own. And I’m afraid Max Langer isn’t listed in that database. Either personally, or through any of his companies. However.”

“However?” Louisa asked. She was leaning forward now. But she wasn’t looking at Erica. She was looking at me in an almost normal way.

“However,” Erica continued in a tone that would have sounded at home in her lecture hall. “We’ve known for some time that people with the means set up shell companies offshore and purchase slaves using those. That way, the owners won’t be publicly associated with slavery when doing business in places where it isn’t legal or popular. So the fact that he isn’t in the database isn’t the final word. But of course, those accounts are untraceable, so for now, we’ve hit a wall there.”

“What about this Resi that my sister mentioned?” I pressed on. “The one she claims is going to free us all? You said you found something on her, too?”

“I’m getting to that,” Erica replied. “You told me you zeroed in on Langer because he and some of his executives were in Brussels when your sister went missing. I contacted one of my colleagues in Europe to comb through some news items from around the same date, and I’m going to show you what he sent over. Let’s see if the same thing jumps out at you that did at him.”

I scanned the screen. “Tresa Hahn,” I said finally. “Felony sexual assault and soliciting a minor.”

“Tresa?” Louisa asked.

“It’s German,” I explained. “Resi is a nickname.” I sighed. “Iknewit sounded too good to be true. Turns out Maeve’s valiant rebel leader is actually a sexual predator.”

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