MIAMI : FOUR MONTHS AGO
Horatio Caine entered his office, finding the morning mail on his desk. He hung his coat up on a coat rack, and then sat down, sorting through it. He froze when lifting a letter from the district court revealed a letter from Syria. It was thin and had postmarks from Iran, Iraq, Egypt, several African countries, Brazil, Chile, Mexico, a small border town in Texas and had been chewed as it went through postal hell to arrive on his desk. There was no return address or name on the envelope.
He picked up a letter opener and carefully opened it. Horatio unfolded the letter inside, catching a napkin that drifted from it. His breath caught – he knew that writing. Reading the napkin made him almost behave abnormal; he had to resist jumping from his chair and run out of his office to find Calleigh, or Eric, or Natalia, or just the first lab tech he saw and screaming Ryan was alive.
He carefully sat it down on top of the envelope and turned to the letter: I find your name through your newspaper on Internet. I find when Ryan went missing. He is in Moscow in drug house kept prisoner. Chrissie controls there. She say they marry, he tells me he never marry. She hurt him often for making her angry. Ryan very sad and cut arms a week ago. When brought home from hospital, I tell him now I send letter and he promise not to hurt. I ask for help here to save him. I do what I can.
There was no signature.
"H?" Delko said.
He looked up. Delko stood in front of his desk with a worried look.
"Are you okay? I've been saying your name for five minutes and—"
"Ryan's alive."
It took Delko a minute to grasp what he was just told. "Where?"
"Moscow. Someone is helping him. I need you to start making phone calls to Moscow." Horatio handed the letter over. "Start with the American Consulate there, see what they can do to help us. If they can't help, call the Russian consulate here. If they won't help, we'll figure out what to do ourselves."
Delko took the letter, reading it. He dropped the case file he was holding on Horatio's desk and left.
Horatio picked up the napkin. "We're coming, Ryan. Hold on a little longer."