18th Abduction (Women's Murder Club) Read Online Free PDF Page A

pulled a photo from behind a rectangle of clear plastic, then held the photo so Joe could see the picture of a young man in his twenties, laughing, bouncing a baby in his arms.
    “You see how much love?”
    Joe said. “I do.”
    Anna said, “This is not in question, Joe. Petrović was the commanding officer of the destruction of my town. My poor husband was hanged,” Anna said. “They cut my little boy’s throat. Thousands were murdered, and Petrović killed many with his own hands. Why should my family be dead while he is alive and free?”
    Joe said, “The words for these crimes are just inadequate.”
    She nodded and went on, “You know, after Petrović was released, there was a big protest. Then it was said that he was killed.”
    “I read that, too. His body was found quite decomposed in a river. Look, Anna, I’m just asking. Is it possible that Petrović was killed and the man you saw yesterday looked like him? Reminded you of him?”
    “It
is
him, Joe. Don’t you think I would know?” She held the palm of her hand a few inches from her face. “I’ve been
this
close to him. Under him. You understand?”
    “Oh, God. I’m so sorry.”
    He was more than sorry. He wanted to kill the guy who’d done this to her. Kill him slowly.
    Anna said, “I also believed that he was dead. Now I know it was a mistake or a lie or a covering up. Petrović left Europe. Someone must know how he did that and maybe helped him.”
    “I checked with Interpol last night, and there are no warrants out for him, nothing to prevent him from using his passport.”
    Anna said, “When he was military, he wore his hair very short. His hair is longer now. He’s put on thirty pounds. Otherwise, he looks the same. He is fat and healthy. He has an expensive car. Seventy-five thousand dollars, Joe. Where is he getting his money?”
    Joe couldn’t answer her question. Ten minutes of research had told him that Petrović might have changed his name and flown legally to the United States. The FBI had no jurisdiction over an ICC-charged war criminal who, for whatever reason, had walked.
    “Do you mind if we take a ride?” Anna said.

CHAPTER 10
    The drive was three blocks down Steiner, three blocks on Fell, in under three minutes.
    “Over there,” Anna said.
    Joe pulled up to the curb, and Anna rolled down her window, saying, “That’s where I saw him.”
    She pointed to a Victorian house, pale yellow with dark blue trim, well cared for. “He was coming down the steps like he owned America.”
    Anna turned to Joe, pulled back the curtain of hair that had been hiding her scar. “He did this to me. After he raped me, when I called him all the names I could think of. I wanted him to shoot me. I wanted to die. He used his lighter ….”
    “You were in the hotel?” Joe said.
    She shook her head. “I can’t talk about that.”
    She didn’t have to say more. Joe had been with the FBI in Virginia when the Serbs had slaughtered the men of Djoba, captured the women, and kept many in a school, calling it a rape hotel. The point had been not only to humiliate anddishonor these Muslim women and girls, but to impregnate them with the children of their enemies.
    Anna’s voice broke into his thoughts as she called his name and pointed to a Jaguar parked a hundred yards up the street.
    “That’s his car,” she said. “He’s home, inside his house. Can you just go in there and shoot him between the eyes?”
    “No. I can’t. Stay here.”
    Joe got out of the car and took a picture of the house, and then the man that Lindsay remembered from his photos as a husky, red-faced hog came out the front door of the fancy yellow house. He walked rapidly down the steps while talking into his phone.
    Joe aimed the phone’s camera at Petrović’s face, but his features were largely hidden by the phone in his hand. And then he was getting into his car and pulling out onto Fell Street.
    Anna was out of the car, crying out to Joe, “That’s him.