little chin and forced her to look into his face. He barked something at her, then he dropped back into the crowd behind her.
“They are beaten if they don’t make eye contact with potential clients.” Niran spoke softly as they walked.
They were close enough now to see the girl was crying. She seemed desperate to avoid the eyes of passersby. Too terrified, too hurting to look up. Even if it meant a beating, apparently.
Annalee caught a determination in Niran’s eyes. He took a few running steps through the crowd and put his hand on the girl’s shoulder. Annalee and her family were just a couple feet behind, but they stopped. This was Niran’s territory.
Whatever Niran said, the child nodded. Tears trickled down her cheeks. And like that the angry Thai man was there at the girl’s side. He shouted something at Niran and then Niran whipped out his wallet. The police had given him a badge, a way of identifying himself as an informant.
Anything could happen at this point, Niran had told them. But a trafficker would rather lose a child slave than lose his freedom. And Thailand’s government was very hard on convicted sex traffickers.
It only took a few seconds for the Thai man to understand what was about to happen. Niran already had his cell phone out. Like a seasoned athlete, the perpetrator turned and ran for his life. He was halfway down the block when Niran stooped and talked again to the little girl.
She was still crying, her black eyeliner running down her face. Niran turned to Annalee’s parents. “We need to get her to safety. The child told me she’s been that man’s slave for three weeks. He said he’d kill her if she got away.”
Before they took the girl back to the van, Niran directed her to the nearest bench. When she was seated, the child’s feet didn’t even reach the ground. Annalee looked around. No one seemed to notice the scene playing out here. Tourists, too busy bartering for a better priced T-shirt to see a child sex slave being rescued. Too busy to notice other trafficked children mixed in with the summer crowd.
Annalee and the group formed a shelter around Niran as he worked. He said something to the girl and she ran her hands over her cheeks and nodded. Niran removed the heels from her young feet and slipped them into his backpack. From inside one of the pockets he pulled out a pair of sandals and gave them to her.
Her hands shook as she slid them on.
And in that single act, the child no longer looked like a sex slave. She was a girl in need of safety and shelter and family. With the change of shoes, the child looked like she might be Niran’s daughter. Niran motioned to Annalee. “Hold her hand, please.”
Annalee took the child’s hand and at the same time, the girl looked up. Her eyes welled with fresh tears and then she did something Annalee hadn’t expected.
The girl smiled.
“It’s okay.” Annalee figured the child didn’t speak English. But she had to try. The girl clung to Annalee’s hand. As if her life depended on it.
The group hurried down the street with Niran in the lead. Even still Annalee wasn’t sure what would happen once they reached Niran’s van. Would the child really go with them? She was young and thin and scared, but she didn’t know them. Annalee and her family were clearly not from Thailand, and Niran was a complete stranger.
Still, the child didn’t hesitate.
Niran helped her into the van and forty minutes later they drove through a set of double gates to a sprawling compound. Part of that time, Niran talked on the phone, no doubt preparing his team for the arrival of the girl. Behind the chain link and razor wire was a large white brick building. The place wasn’t glamorous but clearly this was the safe house. More like a safe hotel. They parked and a woman met them as they got out of the van.
“That’s Som, his wife,” Annalee’s father explained to the others.
The woman took the girl and gave Annalee’s group a traditional greeting. Hands together and a slight bow. As she left with the child, Niran turned to them. “She looks forward to meeting you later.”
They walked toward the front door. Annalee still couldn’t believe it. “How… old is she?”
Niran gritted his teeth. “Eight years.”
Like someone had kicked her in the gut, Annalee reeled toward her mother. The child was