Chapter 20
Chapter Twenty
The ambulance blocked the only exit exactly as planned—angled across the asphalt, hazards pulsing, the back doors open while Hayes played the part so well, Buddy almost believed it.
Engines rumbled behind them. Three black SUVs.
One holding Fallon. And one holding the men who thought forcing the choice would break him.
Dawson stood at his side at the parking lot edge, posture so tight it could snap.
Somewhere behind them, Trent paced in sharp, uneven lines, one hand pressed to his side, the other shaking with fury he couldn’t burn off.
His voice cut through the air once—raw, terrified—but Buddy didn’t turn. He couldn’t. Not without losing focus.
Fallon’s last message burned in his head, anyway.
It dug under his ribs like wire.
He keyed into comms. “Status.”
Dove answered first. “Keaton and I are staged down the bend. No interference. Hayes can hold another thirty seconds.”
“Sterling?”
“Eyes on SUV Two.”
“Fletcher?” Buddy asked.
“With Bingo. Ready to roll.”
Buddy nodded once, breath clipped, controlled. Fallon was out of sight but not gone. Not yet.
Dawson touched his arm. “When they split, we won’t be tailing Fallon’s vehicle. We’ll let Fletcher take that one.”
Buddy exhaled through his nose—a sound that wasn’t a laugh and wasn’t agreement. “Try to keep me off it.”
“I mean it,” Dawson said. “You love her. You’re not capable of being objective.”
Buddy turned just enough to meet his eyes. “If it were Audra in that SUV, you’d already be behind the wheel.”
Dawson didn’t deny it. “Fine,” he muttered. “But keep your head clear. and I’m driving.”
“That’s fair.”
“Hayes is ready to move the ambulance,” Fletcher said.
“Let’s go.” Dawson jogged toward his personal vehicle and jumped behind the steering wheel. “We follow Dove and Keaton, and we stay a safe distance behind them.”
Buddy wasn’t about to argue.
The ambulance began rolling back, clearing the lane. Hayes made hand gesture, a subtle signal—move—and the three SUVs pulled forward in a slow, synchronized glide before gaining speed.
Each team followed their respective SUVs. Buddy couldn’t see shit inside.
“Vehicle two northbound,” Sterling said. “Going the speed limit. Nothing out of the ordinary.”
“Vehicle three also heading north,” Cullen added.
“Vehicle one heading east,” Dove confirmed.
Dawson clapped his shoulder. Quick. Hard.
Buddy’s pulse hammered as Dawson pulled out into traffic, far enough behind to look harmless, close enough to pounce the second he had an opening.
This wasn’t surveillance.
This was war.
And Buddy Ballard wasn’t losing a single one of them—not Fallon, not Linda, not the girls whose names he didn’t even know yet.
Not today.
The road thinned as they left the town limits, the noise of the fundraiser falling away behind him. Live music faded into engine rumble. Laughter into wind. The shift in sound sharpened the world around him—like someone had twisted a dial and stripped everything down to threat and motion.
Dawson’s SUV hummed under them as he guided it six car lengths behind the vehicle Fallon had been forced into. Any closer, and they’d tip their hand. Too far, and Buddy would lose sight of her. Neither option sat well. Nothing about this night sat well.
Buddy kept one hand braced against the dash, the other curled tight in his lap. Fallon’s SUV drifted through the last stretch of marina traffic. Every time its brake lights flared, Buddy’s chest locked.
His phone vibrated.
Unknown number. But he knew who it was, and in that instant, the world narrowed to the screen.
Buddy answered. “Hello?”
A low chuckle slid through the speaker—soft, pleased, dangerous.
Like EJ had been waiting for the moment Buddy picked up.
“There he is,” EJ said, his voice a lazy coil of satisfaction. “I was starting to think you’d let someone else answer your calls.”
Buddy’s molars ground together. He kept his gaze locked on the SUV ahead—the one that held the woman he loved—while the monster behind the voice dripped poison into his ear.
“What do you want?” Buddy asked. Not polite. Not patient. A barely leashed snarl.
“Oh, don’t rush this,” EJ said. “I want you to understand where we stand.” A pause. A breath. Like he was savoring the moment. “You really think you can follow me without consequences?”
Buddy’s fingers dug into his knee. He didn’t look at Dawson. Didn’t blink. “Where are they?”
“Who? The girls? Your girlfriend? Or Linda?”
“All of them.”
“Well, Linda,” EJ said lightly, like they were discussing the weather. “She’s right here with me. Terrified little thing. She begged for her son, you know. Thought he, or you, or some guy by the name of Dawson might come and save her.”
The air left Buddy’s lungs in splinters of terror. He forced it back in.
“And Fallon, well, you know she’s here, too,” EJ said. “And she’s exactly what I hoped—what I remember—brave, stubborn, still trying to keep her chin up. I’m almost disappointed I have to break her… but rules are rules.”
A white-hot flash detonated behind Buddy’s ribs. His voice came out low, lethal. “If you so much as touch her—”
“Oh, I’ll do far more than touch her,” EJ said. “But we’re getting ahead of ourselves.”
Buddy’s heartbeat slammed against sternum, tight, pounding, a war drum in his own chest.
EJ rustled something on the line—paper, maybe. Buddy’s gut clenched.
“Linda and Fallon are lovely bargaining chips. But I’m feeling generous tonight. So, here’s my offer.”
Buddy’s jaw locked. “Say it.”
“I have thirty girls,” EJ said, soft a penitent looking for absolution. “Thirty. Lost. Forgotten. Easy to move. Easy to keep. They cry like ghosts when the lights go out.”
Buddy’s stomach turned to ice.
“This is your choice. It’s always been your choice.” EJ’s voice warmed, almost affectionate. “I’ll let the girls go… but then I keep these two. Or, I kill the girls and let these two go. Simple.”
Buddy’s pulse stuttered, then roared back harder, as if bursting through a dam. “Where are the girls?”
“You care more about them than your lover? Your friend's dying mother? Interesting.” EJ laughed. “That’s a twist I didn’t expect.”
Buddy’s vision whitened at the edges. Blood raced in his ears. Fury climbed his spine like fire.
“I didn’t say that.”
“What are you saying?” EJ asked, but it was more of a taunt than anything else. “Simon tried to teach you how this works. Shame he didn’t get far. You locked up the errand boy, not the man he worked for.”
Buddy’s breath hitched—once—before he forced it steady. “What do you really want?”
“For you to make your choice.” The words sliced like a knife. “Tell all your teams to back off. Stop trailing us. Call everyone off. You do that, and I pull over and let Fallon and Linda walk away. Alive. I swear it.”
“And if we don’t?” Buddy asked, even though he already knew.
“Oh, then they die first,” EJ said. “And the girls go next.”
Buddy’s throat closed. Rage and terror fused until he couldn’t tell one from the other. “You expect me to choose between—”
“No.” EJ cut him off, tone turning almost tender. “I expect you to lose. You’ve always been good at that.”
Buddy’s fingers curled into a fist so tight his nails bit into his skin.
“Choose who dies. Or everyone does,” EJ said. “You’ve got ten minutes.”
The line went dead.
Buddy’s world detonated. “Fuck.” He slammed the dashboard hard enough that Dawson flinched. The second hit was worse—fist connecting with plastic and metal until pain streaked up his arm. “Son of a—fuck!”
He couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t see anything except Fallon trapped behind that blacked-out glass. Linda beside her. Thirty girls whose names he didn’t even know.
Dawson grabbed Buddy’s forearm, yanking him back before he put a hole through the dash. “Look at me.”
Buddy didn’t. Couldn’t. His rage was a living thing—clawing, burning, ripping its way up his throat.
“That sick bastard—” Buddy gunned the heel of his hand into the glove box this time, harder, breath breaking. “He has Fallon. Linda. Thirty fucking—Jesus Christ—thirty girls—”
“Buddy.” Dawson’s voice sharpened into command. “Reign it in. Focus.”
Buddy’s chest seized. He sucked in air, but it didn’t feel like enough. Didn’t feel like anything.
“He wants me to choose.” Buddy’s voice cracked. Then it hardened into something carved from bone. “He actually—he thinks I’m going to choose.”
“He’s trying to break you,” Dawson said. “So, don’t break.”
Buddy dragged both hands over his face, shaking. “I can’t lose her. I can’t lose any of them.”
“You’re not losing anyone,” Dawson said, steadier now, the kind of calm that came from years of dragging men back from cliffs. “Use your head. Not your fear.”
Fear. No—worse. Memory. Simon’s case. Georgia. The pipeline.
Those hidden bulkheads sealed with marine epoxy.
The blue-gray silica dust under that girl’s nails.
The trail that had never quite added up.
Blue Heron.
Bluewater Restoration.
Blue Coast.
Blue Reef.
Blue Horizon.
Shells stacked head to tail up the coast like breadcrumbs meant to mislead.
And then Decker—quiet, broken Decker—murmuring about Miami, about his childhood tied to the Barbaros, about the shipping yards and the way boats came in heavy and left light.
Containers.
Ports.
Buddy’s breath caught.
A click—small, sharp—sounded in his head.
He reached for his phone with hands that still shook. “Mia,” he whispered as he pulled up her contact information.
She answered before the first ring finished. “Hey, Buddy. Hayes called a bit ago, and I’m already in the system—”
“Pull the last set of invoices from Bluewater Restoration,” he said. “Look for transfers connected to port facilities. Cross-reference Quincy Bellows with shipping manifests in Miami. Check for spelling variations. Anything close.”
“On it.”
Every second she typed, Buddy’s pulse hammered harder.
“Nothing for Quincy,” Mia said.
Buddy’s gut dropped—
“—but—hold on—Quinn Porter Bellows—but it looks like it might be just Quinn Porter now.
Buddy’s spine went rigid. “Say it again.”
“Quinn Porter. Female. Previously, Quinn Bellows, and she was married to EJ Vance. She owns a shipping company operating out of the Miami port. High-volume containers. Restricted processing yards.”
Buddy’s throat went dry. Dawson swore under his breath.
“Buddy,” Mia said, voice tightening, “this looks bad.”
“Yeah,” he rasped. “It should, because it’s fucking human trafficking at its finest.”
“We have two team members in Miami. Nick Sarich, who you know, and a new guy named Parker Udell. They can be at the port in ten minutes.”
“I need to call Flager with the FBI. We need to make the trafficking charge stick.”
“That’s gonna take some work, but I can send him what I have,” Mia said. “I’ll also work some magic and get him more. Methods might be questionable, but I’ll make them as legal as possible.”
“Do what you need to.”
“Nick has contacts with the Miami PD. He also knows the local fed there. He’ll loop them in,” Mia said. “Let me go. This will take time. Do your best to stall.”
“Got it.” Buddy ended the call and pinched the bridge of his nose.
Dawson leaned in toward the comm. “You think that’s where the girls are?”
“I think,” Buddy said, “they’re already packed and waiting to disappear. I believe the second I choose, they’re either dead, or they’ll be moved.”
He didn’t let himself feel it. Not yet. Not the terror. Not the grief. Not the fury threatening to tear him apart.
“Or he could be playing you and he’s just gonna move the girls anyway,” Dawson said. “To stick with the football analogy, the audible’s been called, and the taunt, you can’t save them all, might not mean death.”
“I know,” Buddy said. “Simon once told me he’d rather not kill product.” He swallowed thick bile that felt more like tar lodged in his throat. He hit Flagler’s contact information.
“Ballard,” Flagler answered on the second ring. “Tell me you’ve got something.”
“I’ve got a location,” Buddy said. “Miami port. Shipping containers under Quinn Bellows. EJ’s ex-wife.
High-volume lanes. Restricted access. And I’m following EJ right now.
He’s got Fallon and Linda Mallor. We’ve got him on kidnapping.
All I need you to do is make possible to get into that shipping yard, and make it fucking legal.
Mia Sarich is sending you intel. We’ve got two Aegis Network operatives in the area.
They’re contacting local PD and local Fed. ”
Silence—sharp, heavy.
“Buddy,” Flagler said slowly, “if you’re wrong, I’m about to blow about ten million dollars’ worth of political capital.”
“I’m not wrong.”
“You’re guessing based on shell companies—”
“I’m not guessing, and Mia will send you everything she’s got, but you need to move fast, or those girls will disappear before Dawson can slap the cuffs on EJ,” Buddy snapped.
“He’s moving product. He always has been.
Simon wasn’t the mastermind—EJ was. And ‘Bluewater Restoration’ doesn’t restore shit. It moves it.”
Flagler exhaled. “Christ.”
“Fallon and Linda stay alive,” Buddy said, voice thickening with the weight of his decisions, “but those girls? They don’t get that chance if we’re late. They’ll be sold to the highest bidder and disappear forever. Or die. I am not letting that happen.”
Flagler muttered something Buddy didn’t catch—something sharp, federal, furious. “Fine. I’ll burn every favor I’ve got. I know people at Miami PD, too. I’ve also got Harbor Patrol, DHS, Coast Guard—I’ll get them all. We’ll converge on the port.”
Buddy sagged back into the seat, breath shaking. “Thank you.”
“Ballard,” Flagler said, voice harder now, resolute instead of cautious, “if you're wrong, it’s my career. If you’re right, I’ll owe you some serious shit.”
The call ended.
Buddy stared ahead at the black SUV carrying Fallon into the dark. His heart hammered like a wild beast. He tapped the comms in his ear. “Dove, Sterling, you read?”
“What’s up, boss?” Dove asked.
“Copy,” Sterling said.
“Dump the SUVs and come to my location.” Buddy glanced in Dawson’s direction, who nodded, as if he knew exactly what he was thinking. “Dove, try to get around in front of us. You’re gonna have to haul ass to do that.”
“Won’t be that hard,” Dove said. “We’re on the highway, headed northeast.”
“Sterling, tuck in behind me until told otherwise.”
“Consider it done,” Sterling said.
“I’m not giving him what he wants.” Buddy rubbed his neck. “I’m going to trust that Nick and Flagler can deal with the situation in Miami, and we’re gonna turn the tables on this asshole.”
“Sounds like a plan to me,” Dawson said.
There was no way Buddy was going to actually choose between anyone.
He was choosing all of them.
Or he’d die trying.