was in her bed wearing a pretty pink robe, and her devoted sister Ronnie was beside her. Balloons floated above the footboard, a great number of flower-filled vases were lined up on the windowsill, and Conklin and Jacobi were seated at the side of her bed.
A cheer went up for me and Joe when we came through the doorway. If I’d been connected to a mood monitor, the green line would have spiked. It felt that good.
Conklin introduced us to Susan.
“This is my partner, Lindsay Boxer, and FBI special agent Joe Molinari.”
Susan was lovely, with strawberry blond hair and pale skin and a smile that showed how glad she was to be alive.
She said, “I’ve heard so much about you, Lindsay. I think I would recognize you anywhere,” and stretched out her arms. “Thank you so much for everything.”
I hugged her, and so did Joe. We told her we had just left Anna, who was speaking and recovering.
There was relief and some laughter, and for a moment I felt giddy, as if I’d been drinking champagne. Anna and Susan were alive! I was still having aftershocks from the takedown at the house on Pine, but this was a welcome bright moment.
And finally we had to get into the hard part.
Jacobi said, “Ronnie. Would you mind if we spent about five minutes alone with Susan?”
Ronnie murmured, “Not at all,” and exited gracefully.
Jacobi asked Susan to tell us how she’d come to be in that house on Pine, and to explain her connection to Petrović.
We were all gathered in chairs around her as Susan told of meeting a man at the Bridge, Tony Branko. She talked about how he’d bought her drinks, took her out to dinner twice, and then offered her a loan. Later he told her how she could pay it back. She said it was debasing, that the amount she owed escalated due to interest, but she thought she was nearly paid up. But no.
And she skipped from dancing at Skin to the night she and her friends Adele and Carly were abducted. She described the endless days and nights in the apartment, and she spared no detail; the darkness, the rules, the faceless men, what they demanded, and the punishments.
Susan skimmed over the deaths of Carly and Adele, but I felt her unspeakable pain. She was saying so much without saying it all.
When she reached the most recent part of her story, the second abduction, she said, “Anna fought Marko, but he’s a soldier. He kicked her, picked up a chair, and slammed it against her head. I didn’t fight. I was sure he would kill us. He tied us both up and shoved us under the stage. I tried to kick through the boards, but it was hopeless. A lot of time went by. I told Anna we were going to get out, and Anna didn’t answer me anymore. Her breathing was so faint, and then I heard men’s voices. ‘Is anyone here?’ I screamed and screamed.”
Finished with her story, Susan stopped talking.
There was a silence that no one knew how to break.
So Susan did it.
She said to all of the cops grouped around her bed, “How can I help with your case against these bastards? What else do you want to know?”
I said, “The man you know as Tony Branko has a get-outof-jail pass from government agencies here and overseas. We need evidence that he committed a crime. We need your help with that.”
Susan let out a long breath, thought about it for a second, and said, “Tony is out of jail now?”
“Yes. He’s free and enjoying his wonderful life.”
She said, “Well, I don’t know if I have evidence. I don’t have photos or recordings or anything like that. But I can tell you that he raped all of us repeatedly. Him and Marko.”
“We know him,” said Conklin.
“Good. And some of the waiters at Tony’s were in on it. They lived in that house and they all … did what they did. We couldn’t get out, you know? They kept us locked up and they hurt us. We didn’t know when we might die.”
Susan’s voice broke, and tears spilled down her cheeks. It was terrible to see the transformation from the happy young woman she’d seemed to be only moments ago. All smiles and flowers.
I wondered if she’d ever truly be all smiles and flowers again. Still, like Anna, Susan Jones was a fighter.
And she was alive.
“You’ll testify to what they did to you?” Jacobi asked