her. This developed city wasn’t the sleepy place she had expected.
Niran pointed out highlights as they made their way to Patong. “Everyone lost someone in the tsunami. It doesn’t matter how many years go by, we remember.” He slowed the van and pointed to a park just ahead. A battered boat sat on a cement platform. “That police vessel saved eighteen adults from the waters that day.” He nodded. “There are many tributes.”
As they drove into Patong, the building fronts changed. The signs and displays looked seedier. Cheaper. Same with the hotels. Niran pointed again. “Hotel rooms here are a mere fraction of what they cost at the beaches of Karon and Kata.” He set his jaw. “Many rent by the hour.”
They parked in a big lot at the beginning of a long stretch of road where outdoor market vendors lined the sidewalks. They stepped out of the vehicle. Niran gathered them close, as if the passersby might hear them. “This is Bangla Road.” He stared down the roadway. “Here we rescue children every week.”
A bad chill ran down Annalee’s arms.
“What are we going to do?” Austin was only sixteen, but he had a heart for their parents’ ministry. He always had.
“We will walk.” Niran pointed toward the busier parts of the street. “Make eye contact with the children and you will see. They know who I am. If they are afraid, they will look away.”
“These children are property,” Annalee’s father added. “They are owned by dangerous people, men in most cases.”
Niran nodded. “You will take my lead.”
Annalee looked at Tommy and for a few seconds their eyes held. The reality of this was clearly more than either of them could believe. She walked between her parents and Tommy stayed by Austin.
Their pace was slower than Annalee expected.
Not four buildings down Bangla Road, she spotted a pair of young teens walking toward them. The girls wore skimpy short skirts, bikini tops and high heels. Nothing like the typical beach attire worn by most women on the street.
Annalee felt her heart skip a beat… something was wrong with these girls. The situation was obvious, like Niran had told them. Annalee’s dad stopped and she and her mother did the same thing. But Niran hurried on. That’s when Annalee saw the men.
One trailed the girls. The other leaned on a nearby tree with a cell phone. Before Niran could say something, two white men in bold Hawaiian print shirts walked up to the girls. The guys looked like tourists.
The distance between them was too great for Annalee and her family to hear what was being said. But in seconds the man with the cell phone was at the girls’ sides. The two white tourists passed what looked like a handful of cash to the man with the phone.
And just like that, the girls took a hard turn toward a hotel, the tourists close beside them. A few doors down they disappeared through the doorway of a building. In English, the sign read, MASSAGE PARLOR.
Annalee felt sick to her stomach. Did that really just happen? The man with the cell phone met up with the guy who had been trailing the girls, and again money seemed to be exchanged.
Niran looked heartsick, but he kept walking. The others caught up to him. They had missed the chance to help the two girls. Annalee had a feeling there would be more.
Bangla Road bustled with an ethnically diverse mass of tourists. Most of them seemed to be looking for a kind of fun that was illegal in other countries. Niran had told them the nights were worse. The things that could be bought and sold would hurt their hearts. He kept the details to himself. He didn’t have to say anything. Here in the Phuket sunshine, the sex slave industry was in plain sight.
Five more buildings and Annalee spotted a thin girl in the crowd ahead. She was walking toward them, and like the two others, this one wore high heels and heavy makeup. But as they got closer, Annalee gasped and covered her mouth. The child couldn’t have been more than ten years old. Dirt streaked her see-through shorts and top, and her hair was teased to twice its normal size.
Suddenly a Thai man, maybe fifty years old, came alongside her and shoved her. Hard.
The girl fell to the ground and scrambled to her feet. Blood trickled from one knee and terror screamed from her eyes, but she didn’t cry out. The man grabbed her