Chapter 5 #3
“It is,” he agreed, “but that doesn’t mean I’m happy about adding to your trauma. Maybe if we had spoken more back then, it would have been easier.”
“It would have been easier for you because I could have … You could have cleared up more issues, but I don’t know that it would have been easier for me,” she noted.
“Some things are just difficult to explain. And, when you have people you can’t really say very much about, it just makes it that much harder. ”
She groaned. “I need to use the bathroom.” He stepped back. She got up and walked to the bathroom, then turned at the door. “Do you think we’re really safe?”
“We are safe for the moment because I have two of my men outside the house right now,” he told her, “and we’ll switch off. So, it’s a good time for you to wake up so I can explain. If you come out in a little bit, and I’m not here, Trent or Oakley will be, and now you’ll know why.”
“Jesus,” she whispered. “I would definitely freak out if two strangers were in here.”
“It’s not time to switch out yet,” he added, “but I can have you meet them right now.”
She nodded. “Let’s do that. If I wake up to two strangers in here, you know what’ll happen.”
“I do know. With each switch, my guys will both need to grab some sleep too.” He walked her to the door, sending Trent a heads-up text.
He expected Oakley to be out there, but instead Trent was at the door. He stared at her, as she stood in her big fluffy robe that she found hanging in the bathroom.
She smiled at him and reached out a hand, formally introducing herself. “Hello, I just didn’t want to wake up to a stranger or two in the middle of the night.”
Trent smiled. “That’s fine. I wouldn’t want you to wake up and think that I was anything other than here to help.”
Hayden asked, “Any issues? Why isn’t Oakley here?”
“He went to check out something.”
“Check out what?” she asked, her tone sharp.
Trent eyed Hayden, and he nodded. It wasn’t right to keep things from her when her life was on the line. “We have a visitor outside right now.”
She swallowed at hearing that news. “I gather this is something that you guys think could be a bigger problem.”
“Could be but we’ll detain him, let the locals deal with him. We won’t let things get out of hand.”
She didn’t say anything at first, just nodded. “Thank you.” Then she stepped back into the safe house.
Hayden looked over at his buddy. “Three hours.”
“You better take four. You haven’t had any sleep.”
“Three is fine. You and I both know we can function on that.”
“Functioning on it is one thing, but excelling is much harder.”
Hayden glared at him, but Trent wasn’t fazed by that at all. “It’ll be fine,” Hayden replied.
Trent muttered, “Uh-huh.”
Hayden walked back inside, shut the door, and found her standing in the living room.
“Surely you’ll get more than four hours of sleep, won’t you?”
“Probably not,” he replied. “Sometimes we get three hours, and we’re damn happy about it. That’s just life.”
She shook her head. “I didn’t mean to cause all this trouble.”
He studied her. “I’m not sure you thought about yourself at all while entering a dark warehouse. I mean, you were meeting somebody, right? You never did tell me who that was.”
“Now I’m not sure who I was meeting, but I had hopes to find out more about Cleo. I knew Arlene Cuddy, the admin from my school, was involved. I wanted a chance to talk to her too, hoping she would open up about it. Maybe even slip up on something.”
“Because you thought Arlene was being coerced into doing this?”
She looked at him and grimaced. “I guess that was foolish, wasn’t it?”
“It’s not only foolish but it’s dead wrong.
She is involved in a big way,” he stated.
“I get that the soft-hearted part of you thinks that she had to be forced to be involved and deserves another chance. However, you also have to wonder how many women she sent into terrible human trafficking circumstances, all for money or some political affiliations or just a damn power grab.”
She kept her gaze on him, her jaw working.
Still, she needed to hear this. “We can only make excuses for people for so long before they are deemed exactly as they are—downright greedy criminals exploiting an opportunity to take advantage of young women and their very wealthy families. And that’s what Arlene’s been doing this whole time.”
“You think she texted me?”
“I doubt it was her contacting you,” he clarified, “but we need those numbers if you have them.”
“I should have it on my computer,” she shared, “but I never even thought to give it to you.”
“And we were so focused on everything else,” he replied, “I didn’t even think to get it from you. So, we will rectify that tomorrow, first thing.”
She smiled at him. “Sure, as long as you get some sleep.”
“I’m going to bed but not until you do.”
He stood firm until she sighed and nodded. “I think you’re probably way worse at controlling things now, aren’t you?”
He shrugged. “I do not give in easily when it’s something important,” he declared, with a finality in his tone.
“You’re safe with us tonight. So, let’s both get whatever sleep we can get and let tomorrow bring what may.
We’ll deal with it then.” And, with that, they both turned and headed off to get some sleep.
He curled up on the couch, knowing that sleep was just a few minutes away, then closed his eyes and crashed.