Curing Erica's Phobia Ch. 06

"Was he..." Eric started, but Joann raised a hand effectively silencing him.

"You said they might be discussing business. Did you get a sense of which one might be in charge?" Joann asked.

Erica's brow furrowed. "I think they seemed like equals. That's why I said they were friends, at first."

"Okay, that helps. Can you tell me about the rest of the party?" Joann tried to capture Erica's downcast gaze again, but Erica backed away, coming up against the other kitchen counter and staring at the floor. "It could help," Joann offered.

Erica sucked in a deep breath. "The crowd slowly started to disperse. I'm not sure where they went, if they left or if they went to rooms. It was a very large house." Her eyes were tracing the pattern of the vinyl flooring. "Juan was sitting, chatting with people, feeding me bites of food. He asked me what I would like." She rubbed her palms against her yoga pants. "It was late, I was tired. I said 'I'm thirsty, Master.' I'm sure it's not what he wanted me to say." She straightened, gathering strength. "He picked up his drink, whiskey or something, and made me drink it all. Then he kicked another woman that was kneeling nearby and made her crawl to refill the glass. I was crying, trying not to cough. The alcohol burned my throat. She came back with another glass, and Juan handed it to Victor, Vincent, whatever, as he grabbed my head, forcing my mouth open while the other guy poured the whiskey down my throat."

Erica closed her eyes. "I couldn't help it. I coughed so hard, I threw up. Juan tied my hands behind my back with an electrical cord, then he and the other guy took turns face fucking me. I couldn't breathe, I was trying to hyperventilate, and Juan kept saying 'This'll cure you.' And then the other guy, Victor, was saying..." Her eyes flew open. "He was saying 'You used to like this, bitch.'"

Her eyes were staring into the distance, but slowly, they sought out Joann. "'You used to like this,'" Joann repeated. "He knew you from before."

Erica snatched up the photo on the counter, staring at it. She shook her head in frustration. "I don't know how I can ever hope to remember these faces. I obviously didn't want to remember them before. And I don't want to remember them now. I don't want to remember any of it." She threw the photo down so that it slid off the counter and to the floor.

Eric picked it up. "Maybe we're going about this wrong."

Erica simply sagged against the counter. "There's a right way to dredge up this ugliness?"

"What happened after that party?" he asked, ignoring her question.

She shrugged. "Juan apologized. Profusely. He said he'd had too much to drink and I'd been so good and he never meant for all that to happen. Yada, yada, yada."

"And you forgave him."

She shrugged uncomfortably. "Yeah. He was really sweet afterward."

"And you forgave Da for hurting you. When you were little. When he made others hurt you. When he showed you the Christmas trees."

Eric put the photo of Victor down on the table. He picked up the photo of Juan. "You forgave him and you remembered him, even from back then." Erica frowned. He picked up the photo of Reznick. "You forgave him and you remembered him." He picked up the photo of the accountant. "You forgave him because he brought you books, he tried to help you, and you remembered him. You said some of the men just hit you because Da insisted on it. He was conditioning you to equate pain and pleasure. Maybe if we focus on those men, the ones that didn't want to be there, didn't want to hurt you, it will be easier for you to remember. And just maybe, they will be more willing to cooperate and bring him down."

"Da? You think he's behind all this?"

Eric smiled at her. "What do you do for a living, Erica."

She gave him a quizzical look. "I'm an HR specialist. You know that."

"Exactly. And who better than an HR person to perceive chain of command?"

She shook her head slightly, her puzzled frown etched deeper. Then her face cleared and she slapped her forehead. "Juan and Victor. Interacting like equals."

"Indeed. Two upper-level management types with the same boss. Da. Like me and Joann." He gave an exaggerated duck as she threw a scowl his way. "Okay, not quite equal," he conceded with a grin. "But maybe we can expand our photo gallery to lower level and imprisoned people from the original ring. Maybe some of them are out now and active again. Or went into the Witness Protection program. What do you say?" Joann was still scowling, but she was pulling her phone out.

"Now, while she's trying to track that down, let's see if we can figure out that song," he suggested, pulling out his own phone. He typed off a quick text to someone, and a moment later his phone beeped. He winked at Erica as he answered the call. "It works wonders when you tell them it's a matter of life and death," he confided.

"Yo, dude. Remember 'Name that Tune?'" He paused and held the phone away from his ear. "It is. She's gonna kill me if you can't help. No, it can't be just any app. The song is probably foreign. Like maybe Eastern European. She doesn't remember the words. Okay, got it. Thanks man, you're a life saver. No, really!" Eric looked at the phone's screen and shrugged. "He hung up on me. How come people are always hanging up on me?"

"Three guesses," Joann muttered as she waited on hold on her own phone.

Eric grinned as he began searching for the app with his phone. "Found it," he exclaimed after a moment and started the download.

"I hope you're not charging that to the task force," Joann warned.

"Of course not. Not till I submit my expense report anyway." A few minutes later, he was drawing Erica into the living room area. "I can't wait to try this. All you have to do is hum the tune and it will figure it out." Erica looked skeptical, but he was putting his phone up to her face and she rolled her eyes and began humming. A moment later, he looked at the list of potential songs the app provided and tapped one. "I bet it's this," he guessed, then hit his volume button. A hauntingly sad yet hopeful song filled the room.

Erica's eyes immediately filled with tears. "Mama," she whispered. She had been picking restlessly at the gauze bandage on her hand, but Eric captured her hand and she haltingly began singing some of the words, barely above the earlier whisper. When the song finished, the room fell silent for a few moments.

"Can we run again this afternoon?" she asked softly, looking hopefully at Eric.

"You do know it's raining, right?" he asked, rolling his eyes.

She just shrugged. "It's Seattle."

"We'll see," he said, and she looked at her lap, taking that for a 'no.' "Can you play then song again, then?"

He eagerly obliged.

****

Shortly after they'd eaten some lunch, Eric bargained with Erica to lay down for a while - she still refused to sleep - and in return, they would share what information they'd been able to garner from her memories. She had come back out of the bedroom at one point when several file folders were delivered to the apartment. Eric had steered her back, taking her into the bathroom to show her the dark circles under her eyes, and further explaining that they needed to review the information before they could share it with her. She had reluctantly laid back down, toying with the bed spread in boredom.

When she slipped back out of the bedroom a little later, John had returned to the main room and was pouring through the file folders that had been delivered. Eric shook his head at her in exasperation, but grinned nonetheless. Joann had disappeared, apparently back to the spare bedroom to rest, and the psychologist was on his cell phone in the back hall. Erica wondered if he was talking about her, or some other case requiring confidentiality. Either way, his deep voice was kept very low as he spoke.

She went to retrieve a bottle of water from the fridge and looked at Eric expectantly. "Let's wait for Templar," he replied to her unspoken question.

"Why? In case I freak out?" Her voice was dripping with sarcasm and she knew the lack of sleep was taking its toll. She even contemplated taking the offered sleeping pills come night, but none of the pills the doctors had ever given her had worked as prescribed, and she had no reason to suspect that had suddenly changed. She scowled at no one in particular and slumped into a chair.

Eric sat down beside her. "Because he has given some thought to the best way to present the information. Me, I'd just throw it all in your lap and say 'Take a gander.'" He gave a big grin, and despite herself, Erica felt a small answering smile spread on her lips. She turned and concentrated on the label on her water bottle, pulling at a corner of it. A few minutes later, Templar came back into the room and joined them. He looked at Erica sternly.

"You need to understand that what we are sharing here, is to help you remember other things, possibly to correct misinformation that we have. But much of this is very incomplete. In some cases, it is simply leads that were being followed, that may be completely false. It's important that you don't let what is here color your memories. Or worse, create memories."

"I know," she said impatiently.

He sighed. "Knowing is one thing. Erica, look at me." He waited steadfastly until she complied. "The fact that you were able to hide memories of virtually your entire childhood from yourself, and frankly, from me when I first tried to treat your fear, indicates that you have a very strong mind, a powerful will. Just because you're starting to remember now doesn't change that."

"I don't feel strong," she muttered. "If I'm so strong, why am I afraid all the time?" she demanded more firmly.

"Maybe you have good reason to be afraid. Fear isn't a sign of weakness. Like fight of flight, fear is a coping mechanism. It can be a very appropriate mechanism. It can protect us. It protected you from terrible memories that you couldn't do anything about, that you couldn't fix, especially as a child. But now you have the means to fix things, in the form of these people here, the task force. Now, your coping mechanism needs to be remembering, as completely and accurately as possible.

"When you were a child," he continued. "You went toward the pain, to try to fix it for others, to protect them from pain. Even with Juan, the pain fixed your fear, and you went toward it, toward Juan to fix it. Now, I want you to go toward the pain of your memories, and then we will be able to fix things. But I want you to understand one thing, Erica. You can say no. I won't like it," he conceded. "I think you are strong enough to do this. But you are the true judge."

"Just do it," she said abruptly, reaching for one of the folders. Templar grasped her wrist, gently but firmly.

"I have a process," he explained. "Perhaps it is my hubris, but it seems to work well for others, so let's try it here. I want to start with what might strike you as the darkest, most difficult memory, but also the one you can do least about. One that can't be fixed in any resultative way." She gave him a puzzled frown. "Your mother," he supplied. "She is dead. Nothing we do here can bring her back to life. You didn't witness her murder, so you can't even bring the killer to justice. But you might be able to help." He searched through the folders until he found the one he wanted.

"You were living in a small city south of Sacramento. We found the records of her murder, spoke to the police there. They had asked for help from the California Bureau of Investigation when they came up empty. By the time the CBI came in, the trail had gone cold, the case was never solved. They were quite excited by the potential to solve it, though, even after all these years. They've already dived back into the evidence they have. Anyway, it's a quiet city, lots of migrant farm workers, that's where they were looking at first, because of where you were living." He pulled a picture out of the folder. "Like I said, these will be the hardest memories." He laid the picture in front of her. It was a crime scene photo of the one room apartment, her mother's lifeless body was mostly draped, her blonde hair spread over a dark stain on the rug, one arm reaching out. Erica touched the photo, the tip of her finger touching the lifeless hand.

"She was reaching toward me," she whispered. "As he carried me from the room, she reached out, and called to me." She closed her eyes, her face etched with pain. "It was her last act of defiance. She called me Katarina."

Templar waited a beat, then said, "What else do you remember?"

Erica opened her eyes and blinked rapidly to clear the tears as she studied the picture. "Da was standing here," she said, pointing. "And two other men were holding her, one kind of behind her and another holding her other arm."

"Would you remember those men, if you saw them?"

"The one holding her arm, maybe. The other was hard to see."

"What about the man carrying you?"

Erica shuddered. "He was often with Da. Da called him Jack."

Templar pulled another photo from the file. "I called in a favor and had them scan this one, too. This is for you. It was in the apartment, when they were investigating." He handed her a photo of her blonde mother, holding an equally blonde child.

"Me?" Erica asked in wonder.

"Yes. Katarina."

Erica jumped to her feet and ran into the bedroom. Eric followed her more slowly. He found her sitting on the edge of the bed, dabbing at her eyes with a tissue. The print of the photo was set on the nightstand, carefully out of teardrop range. Eric sat beside her on the bed.

"As soon as things calm down, we'll go and get a frame for it."

"Thank you," she whispered. "I'm sorry. I'm not doing very well, am I?"

"Are you kidding? You're doing great. You've already remembered more about that day. And Templar thinks this would be the hardest one for you. So, hey, it's all easy from here on in." He grinned and she just shook her head with a faint, if teary, smile.

"I still want to go for that run," she said, ruefully, trying to dry her eyes. When he didn't answer, though, she looked over at him and frowned. "What? What aren't you telling me?"

"It's good news actually." Her brow furrowed in puzzlement. "They're taking you more seriously."

"What?" she asked, now totally confused.

"About Juan," he conceded. "That he might try to come here."

"I don't understand," she exclaimed in frustration. "I thought he was in Dubai."

"There was no evidence that he was ever there. We think the plan was, if you showed up, to put you on another flight, somewhere else, where he might have been waiting or where you would have been held. At some point, maybe after the plane landed, maybe even before it left Seattle, they knew our agent was a plant." He took a deep breath. "There's a chance Juan flew into Mexico today. They're not sure yet," he added quickly. "He sent an email just a bit ago. It bounced off a lot of servers, but they think it might have originated in Mexico." She just looked at him. She didn't have to ask the question. "All it said was, 'I'm coming for you.'" He waited for her to blow.

"And if he can make it to Mexico, there would be nothing to stop him from getting here," she concluded quietly. She suddenly stood up. "Let's get back to it." Eric watched with concern as she strode back into the outer room. This time, though, she went to the fridge and found a bottle of wine, staring defiantly at the psychologist as she poured herself a glass. He frowned slightly, but didn't say anything, and when she sat back down at the table, all she said was "Next."

Templar picked out another, much thicker folder. "This concerns something we have much more information on. The raid on the house in Las Vegas." Eric came to sit beside her, putting one of his hands over her bandaged one.

"And why do you think this is one of the hardest memories for me?" she challenged.

"I think it's when you stopped forgiving your Da," he answered. "When you stopped remembering him. Children have a hard time letting go of their love for their parents, even the cruelest parents imaginable. You stopped remembering your mother, when your Da convinced you that she left you. That she never loved you. You stopped remembering your Da when he risked your life to save his own."

"Oh," she said softly.

"I want to 'tell' you the story of that night, a compilation of the reports, if you will. Then you can tell me if you remember more, or something different."

She shook her head. "Wouldn't that be like creating the memories for me? How could you trust what I say after that?"

"Normally, I wouldn't," he explained. "But this has all been settled in the courts. We have your statement taken that night, such as it was. You were already blanking things out. And frankly, even if you remembered other things without prompting, they probably wouldn't stand up in court. To put it bluntly, a defense lawyer would have a field day with your 'recovered memories' versus what you testified to back then. So, let's just assume from the get-go that whatever you remember here won't make it to court. That doesn't mean it won't help us make a case that doesn't require your testimony. But above and beyond all that, like I said, you have a strong mind and a powerful will. And I think you want to remember, now. That makes me trust you."

Erica straightened in the chair, though her eyes were downcast. "I'm listening."

He watched her closely for reactions as he recited. "The original warrant was issued for unlicensed prostitution at the house. The FBI suspected that more was going on, but that was what they could produce, working with the Clark County Sheriff, to justify the raid. The raid was scheduled for a time when a number of other people were expected to be there, according to an informant. People involved in some of Reznick's other business interests."

"I don't understand," she said, when he paused. "Why wouldn't he have licensed his..." she hesitated, wondering where she fell in this greater scheme of things. "Prostitutes, if it was legal in Nevada."

"Because his prostitution business catered to 'eclectic' tastes," Templar answered. "The sorts of sexual activities the state would not have approved of."

"Like me," she murmured.

"Like you," Templar agreed without hesitation.

Erica gasped as Eric's hand tightened about her bandaged hand, though his anger was directed at the psychologist. He immediately released her and apologized, though he glared at Templar, who simply glared back. "Go on," she said grimly.

"The information they had was that the building was a large, ranch-type house with three stories and one or two basements. The upper floors catered toward more 'vanilla' prostitution, guest rooms, etc. The meetings were supposed to be occurring on the main floor."

"And the basements?" she whispered.

"According to the informant, that was where 'less standard' forms of entertainment occurred."

"Like me," she said again.

"Yes," Templar said, flashing Eric a warning look. Erica didn't notice; she was intent on studying the wood grain again.

"So what happened," she asked, with just a touch of her little girl voice.

Templar cocked an eyebrow, but continued.

"The FBI took the lead. They used thermal imaging to figure out where people were in the house. They had floor plans. Unfortunately, they weren't up-to-date."

Erica cocked her head, though her eyes didn't leave the table. "The entrance to the basement, at least, the one I came and went through, was disguised."

Templar nodded, even though she wasn't looking at him. "Yes. He had blocked the original access, then added two more, but hidden. They knew of one from the informant. He thought there was a second, and thought there was a subbasement, but never had a chance to find them."