Chapter Ten
I never should’ve switched places with Fallon.
I shouldn’t’ve let my need to have Calista close override my good sense. But the thought of Calista being out of my sight while we’d be surrounded by dangerous men had the potential of giving me an ulcer.
Then she had to go and mention the one movie I hated. This after we’d had a little scuffle. It wasn’t the fight; Calista had handled herself better than I’d thought.
It was hearing that fuckwad tell fuckwad number two to grab Calista and get her to the car that had me spiraling.
She was not safe in this city. Women in general were not safe.
All it would’ve taken was one thing to go wrong, and Calista would’ve been dragged away.
And instead of dragging her ass back to the penthouse to get her safe like I wanted to, we were ascending stairs into another unknown situation, with more dangerous men who wouldn’t think twice about snatching her.
“Stay sharp,” I told her as we approached the door at the top of the stairs.
“That’s the second time you’ve said that to me in the last five minutes,” she groused.
Obviously she had no idea what those men on the street wanted.
“Do you speak Hindi?”
“No. Do you?”
“Speak it, no. Understand enough to get by, yes.”
I pulled out my phone and shot off a text to Pete that we were in position.
He’d knock on the door once as he passed if it was clear for Calista and me to enter, twice if we were to hold, and three times if he needed backup.
Now we waited.
“What’d the men say when they saw us?”
Smart.
“Nothing worth repeating.”
There were a few moments of silence before she pressed. “It was about me, wasn’t it? That’s why you beat the hell out of the guy instead of just knocking him out like you did the first one.”
Fuck.
“Like I said—”
“I don’t get you,” she interrupted. “You’re like this big gruff asshole superhero. You don’t like me—”
“I never said I didn’t like you.”
Thankfully, that shut her up. The woman was too smart for my mental health.
The stairwell was quiet. No sounds coming from the other side of the door. No beds banging on the walls from sex. No groans or screams. Either this building was soundproof, or something wasn’t right.
“Something’s wrong,” Calista whispered, even though moments ago she was speaking normally.
Why did she have to be so fucking remarkable? No, she was astute. She had good instincts. That wasn’t remarkable; that was skilled and good at her job. She didn’t impress me. I didn’t find it wildly attractive she could read a situation.
Absolutely none of that was filtering through my mind while I pulled up Fallon’s text thread and tapped out a message.
It’s too quiet here. Where are you?
At the end of the alley. I have eyes on the target. No prize yet.
Holding position.
Copy.
“What are you thinking?” Calista asked.
“Fallon’s got eyes on Pete. No sign of Kiara yet.”
“What if what’s behind that door isn’t the first floor of the apartments?”
Fucking Shep and his favors.
“What do you mean?”
“What if it’s the lobby or the laundry room or more retail space?”
This wasn’t the US; space was at a premium. It wouldn’t be wasted on laundry or a lobby. Not in this area. But damn if she wasn’t on to something.
“Six stories,” I started, and closed my eyes to picture the building from the outside.
“Eight individual balconies on each level. The first floor doesn’t have the same balconies.
It has a gallery with chain-link fencing from the knee wall to the overhang roof.
I thought it made sense, that enclosure to keep the girls locked in, and it does, but they don’t take johns to that floor. ”
“So you’re thinking that’s where he keeps the girls when they’re not working?”
“Yeah.”
I reached into my back pocket and fished out my lockpick kit. Two seconds later, the shittiest lock I’d ever worked was cracked.
“That was easy,” she drawled.
I knew the life she lived, the business she was in.
She didn’t need the lesson. Still, I educated.
“No passport. No money. If they do get out, where are they gonna go? The police? Authorities are bought off. Ask a tourist for help? What are they gonna do? These women are stuck in a way they’ll never get unstuck, and they know it.
So they don’t try to escape because if one of them is brave enough to try, she’ll be brought back and made an example of in front of the others, then she’s back out a few hours later, beaten to shit, taking cock, but she’ll do it fucked up. The lock is symbolic, not functional.”
“How evil does a person need to be to . . .”
She didn’t finish that statement, and I understood why. Just saying the words made acid churn in your gut. The mere thought of what these people were forced to do, what they endured night after night, day after day, was too much to comprehend.
I replaced my kit for my phone in my pocket and sent another message to Fallon.
On the move. Look up, first floor fenced in. We’re moving up a floor.
Copy. Still no prize.
I put my phone away and relayed, “No Kiara yet.” I twisted the doorknob. “Stay—”
“Sharp,” she hissed. “Warning. Next time you tell me that shit, I’m gonna show you how sharp I can be and shank your ass.”
Shank.
Goddamn, she could be cute.
I beat back my smile and nodded.
Slowly, I pushed open the door.
I barely had it open a few inches when the smell knocked the breath out of my lungs. I heard Calista’s gasp, felt her moving behind me, likely adjusting her shayla to cover her nose and mouth. Not that the fabric would hide the stench, but I got the sentiment.
I pushed the door open a little more. Stained mattresses on the floor and cots came into view. Crumpled sheets, small piles of clothes, but no women or guards.
Slaves didn’t get the day off.
With a nod, I stepped over the threshold, holding the door for Calista. Her hand tapped mine, I moved, and she slowly and gently closed the door.
The room was filthy. Filthy in a way it would never be clean. The putrid smell of sweat mixed with desperation and depravity coated the air. Human waste intermingled with the misery.
The impulse to burn the building to the ground and free the ghosts that haunted these walls was hard to fend off.
“Do you have matches?” Calista sneered.
Good Christ, it was like this woman shared my brain.
“Come on,” I grunted, and carefully maneuvered around the trash toward the door farther down the wall.
No lock on this one.
I took a moment to listen for any sounds behind the door, but in the silence, all I could hear was the cries of the women who’d been trapped in this room. Their grief. Their fear. Their souls keening.
“Mason?” Calista’s voice cut through the quiet.
The doorknob was sticky. I knew it was too much to ask that the tackiness was from grape jelly, but still I hoped.
Like the first, this stairwell was lit by one light bulb at the base; it illuminated just enough to see the steps and the door at the top.
My phone vibrated.
With my clean hand, I reached back to grab it, then, one-handed, I unlocked the device and read the message.
No prize. We’re taking a walk. Be back in thirty.
I tilted the screen so Calista could read it.
“Damn,” she whispered.
“My hands are dirty. Take my phone and respond.”
She’d just slipped the phone out of my hand when the door at the top of the stairs opened.
Calista immediately fisted the back of my shirt and yanked it while she shuffled back. I held the door as it closed, turned, and followed Calista back to the other door.
We slipped back into the first stairwell, and I kept the door propped open a crack with my boot.
“Tell him we’re back in position one with company. No backup yet,” I whispered.
I watched as Calista tapped out the message.
Holding at position one. We have company. No backup needed.
On standby.
Copy.
“Want me to keep this?”
“Yeah.”
Calista shifted behind me and down one step. I went back to the crack in the door, hoping I could see or hear something.
It took a few moments before I heard a door opening, then closing. The crying was next. Then rapid-fire Hindi.
I was catching bits and pieces, enough to understand someone had hurt whoever was speaking, but not enough to paint a full picture.
A second female voice told the first to stop crying and clean up.
“Krpaya, Kiara.”
Please, Kiara.
Calista’s fingers curled into the waistband of my pants before I heard her short nails clicking on my phone’s screen.
Then in English, “You know. I have to tell.” The voice sounded pained. That had to be Kiara. “Clean.”
“We’ll take them both.” That came from behind me.
Of course Calista would want to take both. One girl was going to be hard enough to control and smuggle out of the area.
I turned my head, leaned down, and at the same time, Calista leaned forward and crowded me. Once I had her ear, through the fabric I whispered, “Text. We have the prize plus one. Side entrance now.”
She started nodding after the word text, and by the time I got to now, she was doing it rapidly.
Simple and stupid, famous last words.
My attention went back to the two women. Kiara was telling the crying girl to hurry and clean. Her pleas were frantic now. As a senior girl, she would be responsible if the other girl didn’t get back on the street. She’d be punished. I could practically feel Kiara’s fear.
We needed to hurry. As if on cue, Calista tapped my shoulder.
I looked back over my shoulder while at the same time, Calista was coming up on her toes. Her mouth collided with my jaw. Instead of flinching, her lips brushed over my cheek.
It was not my proudest moment. Neither was it reasonable how my body reacted to her lips on me.
But there it was, a flash of awareness. A spark that if stoked would blaze wild and out of control.
A flicker that needed to be doused immediately, and it didn’t help when Calista’s whisper came out breathy.
“Fallon said two minutes.”
Jesus. Fuck me.
“We’re gonna have to be quick. You grab the smaller of the two.”