up to all this time, but I figure youâd rather not talk about it.â
Connor smiles. Sheâs got that right.
âYouâre not mixed up with that awful Starkey person, are you?â
Connor grimaces and canât hold her gaze. âHeâs actually my fault. My own little wind-up psychopath.â
âHmmph,â says Sonia, and mercifully doesnât ask for details. âYou may have wound him up, but heâs not following anyoneâs marching orders but his own. We all have our accidental monsters.â
Connor looks back to the letter-filled trunk and finally understands why heâs still here. Whatâs been holding him back.
âWill you ever send them out?â he asks.
Sonia sits at her desk, leaning forward on her cane. âI suppose if the time is right to unveil the printer, the time might be right for a postal run.â Then she pauses, checks to see that no one is coming up from the basement, and proceeds to read Connorâs mind.
âBut you donât want me to mail yours, do you?â
âNo, I donât.â
âBecause youâre thinking you might deliver it yourself.â
Connor takes a deep breath and slowly lets it out. âIs that just me being self-destructive again?â
âI canât say . . . but it would seem to me that wanting to bring closure is anything but self-destructive.â
He looks to the trunk one more time. âWhatâs the use? Like you said, Iâll never find it in there anyway.â
âNo, you wonât.â Then she opens her top desk drawer and pulls out a single envelope. âBecause itâs right here.â
Had she pulled out a stick of dynamite, it couldnât have felt more dangerous.
âI went fishing for it the night you came back. I thought you might want it eventually.â
She hands it to him. His handwriting. The address where he grew up. On the back is the ripple of dried saliva where he licked it closed two years ago. He cannot yet tell if this letter is an enemy or a friend.
But now that heâs holding it in his hand, thereâs something he knows beyond the shadow of any doubt.
God help me . . . before this is all over, Iâm going to face them. Iâm going to confront my parents. . . .
Part Two
----
Here Be Dragons
From The Telegraph :
GIRL SMUGGLED INTO BRITAIN TO HAVE HER âORGANS HARVESTEDâ
By Steven Swinford, Senior Political Correspondent 10:00 PM BST 18 Oct 2013
The first case of a child being trafficked to Britain in order to have their organs harvested has been uncovered.
The unnamed girl was brought to the UK from Somalia with the intention of removing her organs and selling them on to those desperate for a transplant. . . .
The case emerged in a government report which showed that the number of human trafficking victims in the UK has risen by more than 50 per cent last year and reached record levels. . . .
Child protection charities warned last night that criminal gangs were attempting to exploit the demand for organ transplants in Britain.
Bharti Patel, the chief executive of Ecpat UK, the child protection charity, said: âTraffickers are exploiting the demand for organs and the vulnerability of children. Itâs unlikely that a trafficker is going to take this risk and bring just one child into the UK. It is likely there was a group.â
According to the World Health Organisation as many as 7,000 kidneys are illegally obtained by traffickers each year around the world.
While there is a black market for organs such as hearts, lungs and livers, kidneys are the most sought after organs because one can be removed from a patient without any ill effects.
The process involves a number of people including the recruiter who identifies the victim, the person who arranges their transport, the medical professionals who perform the operation and the salesman who trades the
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