Chapter 27
Sayla
T he basement was cold, the air around us damp and heavy with the scent of concrete and old dust, but I barely noticed. I was too focused on the tiny bodies pressed against me, their warmth was the only thing anchoring me to the moment. Kaida had finally fallen asleep in my lap, with her little face turned into my stomach and one hand still curled into my hoodie like she needed to hold on even in her dreams. Kairo was tucked in close too, curled against me and into his sister as well—like keeping her safe was part of how he coped.
He hadn’t spoken in a while. His little face was buried against my chest, but I could feel the uneven rhythm of his breath. It hitched every now and then, like he was fighting tears or fear, or both, too young to understand what to do with it.
I leaned my head down and whispered softly into his hair. “You’re going to be okay, baby. I’ve got both of you. No one’s going to hurt you, I promise.”
He nodded against me just once, the movement small but sure. Then, in the quietest voice, he said my name as if it meant safety, and he trusted I could fix everything simply because I was here. And, God, I wished I could.
“Roque’s going to find us,” I whispered next. “He’s coming, and when he does, we’re going home. I’ll ask Auntie Heidi to make you and Kaida your very own cakes—any flavor you want. And we’ll order burgers or pizza. Maybe both.”
Kairo lifted his head just a little and murmured, “Both.” Then, after a pause, “Fanks.”
That broke me a little. Even in this terrifying place, not knowing where we were or who had taken us, he was still the sweetest, most polite little boy. And Kaida—my fierce, loving girl—was the kind of child who would sleep through fear if she thought I needed her to. They were so small, so brave, and I had never loved anything more fiercely than I loved them in this moment.
Then we heard the footsteps, slow and deliberate, moving overhead—along with the creak of floorboards and two voices speaking quietly. I couldn’t make out the words, but they were getting closer.
I stiffened, instinctively pulling the kids tighter into me as the footsteps stopped just above the stairs. My heart pounded so loudly that I was sure it could be heard through the floor. Kairo went rigid against me, and Kaida stirred, sensing the shift in the air even in her sleep.
The door at the top of the stairs opened with a groan. A moment later, the light in the stairwell flicked on, a harsh fluorescent glow flooding the room as a man began to descend.
I squinted into the brightness, shielding the kids as best I could. My breath caught as I registered the figure—tall, stocky, moving with purpose. Then I saw the person behind him, another man, thinner, holding a clipboard.
But it was the glint of silver on the first man’s belt that made my breath catch in my throat. He had a badge—shiny, official-looking, gleaming under the harsh light of the stairwell. Relief surged through me so quickly that it nearly knocked me sideways. Maybe Roque had already found us.
Another set of footsteps followed the first two, these slower and heavier. A third man descended the stairs, carrying a small stack of pillows, a bundle of folded blankets under one arm, and a plastic bag that crinkled in his hand. Without a word, he dropped everything on the floor a few feet from us—pillows, blankets, juice boxes, and what looked like individually wrapped snack bars. His gaze swept over the kids, then landed briefly on me. There was nothing behind his eyes—no cruelty or warmth—just a hollow indifference. Then he turned and walked back up the stairs, his footsteps retreating without pause.
I didn’t move, not yet.
The man who’d come down first didn’t follow. Instead, he crouched down, reached under the bottom step, and pulled out a wooden crate that’d been tucked into a shadowed gap. I mentally kicked myself for not checking every inch of this place earlier, but at the time, keeping the kids calm and collected had taken everything I had. Still, it stung, I hated missing details.
He dragged the crate across the floor and flipped it upright, then sat on it like he had all the time in the world. His eyes settled on us, blank and unreadable, and when he finally spoke, his voice was calm, almost philosophical.
“Sometimes people do things they don’t want to,” he said. “But to survive in life, you have to. It’s one of the first rules no one teaches you. You either become the hunter or the hunter, surely you understand that.”
I didn’t answer. I looked instead at the cop who stood behind him—arms folded tightly over his chest, his face unreadable, and his posture loose but alert. He didn’t react to the man’s words at all, he just stood there, as if nothing happening in this basement concerned him.
The man on the crate tilted his head slightly, the corners of his mouth twitching like he was waiting for something. Then he said, “Take my associate here—Officer Briggs, for instance. He chose to become the hunter. He decided he wouldn’t be the one running.”
He turned slightly like he was inviting Briggs to speak for himself.
Briggs didn’t hesitate. “No regrets,” he confirmed with a small, smug smile. Then his eyes shifted to me, the expression behind them sharpening like broken glass. “I don’t appreciate feeling hunted by Roque and his band of do-gooders.”
The man on the crate nodded once like they were in perfect agreement. “Neither do I.”
I looked back at him, memorizing every detail like the sharp cut of his jaw. Slowly and meticulously, he smoothed down the front of his shirt. There was something about him that tickled the edge of familiarity, but I couldn’t place it.
“I’ve been rude,” he sighed after a beat. “We’ve met under less-than-ideal circumstances, but introductions are important. My name is Vincent Russo, you may have heard of me.”
I didn’t blink. “Can’t say that I have.”
Briggs let out a soft, sarcastic laugh. “What about Titian?”
Roque never brought his work home. He kept it all locked away behind his steady, quiet strength—especially around the kids and even more so around me. He didn’t talk about ongoing cases or mention names or details. I knew it was his way of protecting us from the darkness he dealt with daily, and I appreciated that even if it meant I was often in the dark. So, when Briggs said the name Titian , it meant nothing to me. It was just one more piece in a puzzle that I hadn’t even seen the edges of.
But the way he said it—the smugness in his voice and the way his eyes watched me like he was waiting for something to click—told me everything I needed to know. It was an important name meant to hold weight.
I didn’t even have to speak. Russo’s eyes scanned my face, reading the confusion there with a flicker of disappointment.
“Shame,” he murmured, glancing sideways at Briggs. “I really wish you hadn’t said that.”
The shift in the room was subtle but immediate. The tension in the air thickened, stretching tight around us like a rope drawn to its limit. My spine stiffened, instincts flaring to life as the basement suddenly felt smaller, more closed in. I didn’t know what game they were playing or what they expected from me, but it didn’t matter.
Because one thing was clear: these men didn’t want me to understand, they wanted me to be afraid. I’d spent years learning to hide fear behind calm words and steady hands, and with two scared little ones depending on me to stay strong, I wasn’t about to let fear show. I wasn’t going to give them that power.
I tightened my hold around Kairo and Kaida, my voice steady despite my pulse hammering in my throat. “What do you want with us?” I asked, keeping my tone as even as I could. “There was no reason to take the kids. Whatever your issue is with Roque, they have nothing to do with it.”
Russo didn’t flinch. His expression didn’t shift into guilt or regret or anything remotely human. Instead, he looked mildly amused, like I’d just asked a rhetorical question, and he was humoring me with a reply.
“There was every reason,” he said smoothly, gesturing lazily with one hand. “When a rat’s cornered—like Roque is right now—he starts getting desperate and makes mistakes. He tries to chew his way out of the trap.”
He leaned forward slightly, voice dropping into something colder. “I want to be the trap. And when he gets caught, I’ll release him in a way that benefits me .”
I watched him closely. “You want him to work for you.”
That made him smile. Not a pleasant one, either—it was all teeth and calculation, the kind of grin you’d expect to see right before someone got sold off or buried.
“Exactly,” he agreed, as if we were just two people discussing business over coffee.
Briggs let out a sharp snort behind him, arms still folded. “He’ll never do that.”
For the first time, Russo’s expression cracked. It was just a flicker, but it was there—the irritation that slipped across his face like a shadow. He didn’t turn to Briggs, didn’t snap or scold, but when he spoke, his words were steel.
“He will,” Russo said tightly. “If he wants his woman and these kids back in the same state he left them in.”
My stomach twisted, but I didn’t let it show.
“And don’t forget,” Russo added, glancing at Briggs this time with a quiet warning in his eyes, “what happened to Topper. Everyone thinks they’re untouchable until they aren’t. Every action against me has a consequence.”
The air shifted again, the temperature seeming to drop a few degrees. My mind scrambled to make sense of the pieces. I still didn’t understand everything, but I was starting to connect the dots, and I didn’t like the shape they were forming.
Russo turned back to me with a slight, condescending shake of his head. “Unwise of Roque not to fill you in on what’s going on,” he murmured like I was an idiot for being kept in the dark.
But I just smiled, calm and sharp as a blade. “He didn’t tell me because life’s too short to fill it with bullshit.”
Russo’s brow lifted slightly like I’d amused him more than he’d expected. Then his eyes drifted down to the kids—Kaida still asleep, Kairo watching him warily from under my arm., and his smile faded.
“In that case,” he said, “we’ll leave them alone. For now.”
I didn’t relax—not even a little.
His following words came low and were pointed. “But don’t mistake my politeness for weakness. Others will find that out soon enough.”
I caught the brief flick of his eyes toward Briggs and instantly knew—whatever punishment Russo had in mind for insubordination or arrogance, it wouldn’t be verbal. Judging by the smug expression still plastered across Briggs’s face, he hadn’t figured it out yet.
I just hoped that whatever Russo had planned wouldn’t happen where the kids could hear it. Because something told me it would be the kind of lesson you didn’t walk away from.
Briggs lingered a moment longer, his eyes flicking back to me with that same smug arrogance, but it didn’t quite reach his posture after Russo’s warning. Still, he couldn’t resist getting the last word.
“Roque deserves what’s coming to him,” he muttered, his voice low and bitter. But I didn’t miss the way his jaw tightened or the flicker of unease that crossed his face when Russo had mentioned Topper earlier. Whatever had happened to that man clearly hadn’t been clean.
Russo didn’t even bother looking at him this time. He clicked his fingers once, sharp and commanding and jerked his chin toward the stairs. “Leave.”
Briggs hesitated, clearly not used to being dismissed like that, but he turned and made his way up after a beat. Russo followed without another word, and I watched them go, keeping my breathing steady, refusing to let myself spiral into fear now—not in front of the kids.
They reached the top, and just as Russo was stepping through the doorway, I heard the sudden trill of a phone ringing.
“It’s him,” he said, almost to himself, then answered without waiting. The door swung shut behind him, but not before I heard him speak into the phone.
“We have them.”
The words sent a chill down my spine.
I stayed still for a moment, listening and waiting, just in case someone came back—but the silence held. As soon as I was sure, I looked at Kairo, his eyes wide but steady, and nodded toward Kaida, who was still sleeping soundly in his arms.
“Hold onto your sister, baby,” I whispered. “Keep her safe for me for a minute, okay?”
He nodded quickly, his arms tightening around her like it was his mission.
I grabbed the blankets and pillows that had been dropped earlier and bunched them around the kids, tucking them in close and secure, trying to make the space warmer, safer, and softer. Then I stood and moved to the wooden box Russo had used as a seat.
It was heavier than it looked, but I dragged it beneath the window without waking Kaida. I climbed onto it carefully, balancing on my toes, and reached up toward the tiny, grimy window on the wall. The moonlight from outside was faint, diffused through years of dirt and dust, but I still tried to peer through.
Even standing on the box, balanced on the very tips of my toes, I couldn’t quite see out the window. The light barely filtered through, casting a dull glow into the room, but beyond that, there was nothing. No shapes or movement, no signs of where we were. Just gray light and a growing sense of isolation.
I pressed my hands to the cold edge of the frame, trying to lift myself higher, even just a little, but it didn’t help. With a quiet sigh, I lowered myself onto the box, the wood creaking softly beneath my feet. Frustration tightened in my chest, hot and sharp, but I forced myself to breathe through it. Letting it get the best of me wouldn’t help the kids.
When Russo had answered his phone, I’d wanted so badly to believe it was Roque on the other end—that he’d somehow tracked us faster than anyone expected. But the way Russo had spoken had proven it wasn’t that kind of call. His tone hadn’t held wariness or caution—it had held pride and satisfaction. He wasn’t trying to outmaneuver someone dangerous, he was reporting in to someone he worked with. Someone hefeared.
And then there’d been the words.
“We have them.”
Not “I have them.” Not “They’re here.” We.
That one word had told me everything—he wasn’t at the top of the food chain. He was part of something bigger—an organization or a network of men pulling strings from the shadows. Whoever he was talking to, Russo had been reassuring him and letting him know that now, with me and the kids locked away, they had power over Roque.
Except they didn’t.
Because Roque wasn’t the kind of man to break under pressure, he wasn’t someone you could hold hostage by proxy. If anything, they’d just made the worst mistake of their lives—because now, Roque would burn the world down to get us back. I knew him and saw how he protected people he barely knew. He carried the weight of others' pain like it was his own.
I turned my gaze back to the window, the dull light casting long shadows across the basement. Maybe I couldn’t see out of it, and perhaps it didn’t lead to a quick escape or hold some obvious clue, but it was something. It was a flaw in the walls built to keep us here, and when Roque came for us, he’d be searching for every crack in their plan.
I just had to find a way to help him spot this one. Because no matter what Russo thought, this wasn’t power, it was desperation disguised as control.
And Roque would never stop until we were safe.