Chapter 22
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
DIORA
My job wasn’t to wait. The plan wasn’t for me to stick around. I was supposed to go busting down doors and taking buyers out, yet Elliot asking me to stay changed everything.
I walk toward the plastic wall that separates the kids and the buyers.
I need to get to the other side. Enyo and Elliot walk out the door, the shouts and sounds of bone breaking and fluids spraying the wall have the building in disarray.
I hear the screams of fear from the staff and the sounds of crying kids.
How the hell am I going to get them out?
I watch as girls in the same dress as mine run past the room, and I grab one of their arms, pulling her out of the crowd and into the room.
“This is our chance—” she cries and tries to pull my arm along with her, but I dig my heels in, yanking her to a stop. Her head whips back at me with confusion written all over face, but I don’t give her the time to ask why I’m not running.
“How do I get the kids out?” I ask. The words can’t come out fast enough. There is chaos, and I hear the boots of more security guards coming. Trying to stop people from running. But none of it will matter. Not once they find out their boss is dead.
“Someone else will get them—” the girl sputters, trying to yank her arm from my grasp.
“Answer my question or this blade goes in your neck.” It’s shiny and clean of blood, but it won’t be for long if she doesn’t tell me how to get these kids out.
“The remote. There’s a button on the remote that will lift the glass. Please let me go,” she cries.
“Go.” I push her away and turn back into the room with the trapped kids.
The black remote he had in his hands lays forgotten on the couch. I snatch it up and press a button, all the buttons, until the glass starts to move and the cries muted by the plastic become loud.
Oh my god.
Ohh my god.
These kids. Boys, girls, some as young as six, some almost as old as me.
I don’t say anything as heads snap toward me. Tears and snot and sorrow cover the faces of every kid here, and I don’t have the time, let alone the capability, to comfort them.
With the pressure of their gazes, I nod one single time and turn around, leaving the glass open and hoping these kids will take the chance and follow me.
“I’m here to… save you. Let’s go.” The words come out clunky and unnatural, but the kids nod, anyway. Like, even if they don’t believe me, they already know there isn’t anything better for them here.
I stay at the threshold as I guide the kids to leave the stage. They each step off the platform and through the opening, older ones guiding younger ones, and I am hit with an unfamiliar sensation.
My breath gets caught in my throat, and I whip my face away from the kids.
Are there tears welling up behind my eyes right now?
Of all times to be emotional. Saving these kids, kids like me, who aren’t quite right, I just didn’t think I’d feel this way.
Watching them. Knowing they were recruits for Mrs. Jay, like me, but had a very different fate.
“Little Crane, let’s go.” Elliot stalks back into the room, covered in blood and heaving.
I nod and look back at the row of ten kids.
“How many more rooms do we have?” I ask as the kids huddle around me. I wonder if the buyers of each room heard all the commotion and left.
“Seven,” he whispers as his eyes fall on the kids piling around me.
One wet hand touches mine, and I want to recoil at the contact of tears, maybe snot, but I don’t.
I look down to the little boy with blond hair and blue eyes who grabbed my hand.
His other hand is in his mouth, and tears fall from his eyes in a never-ending stream. I’m angry. I’m angry for him, for them.
I don’t have the strength to pull my hand away from him. The little boy follows me like there’s a string of glue holding us together.
Seven more rooms over the span of four floors, with probably just as many Strays in them.
Shit.
I follow the guys down to the next floor, the Strays following tight behind me. My knife is pulled and ready as we bust down the door to the next room.
Buyers are lounging on the couches, barely awake, as they laugh and wave their fingers, pointing to the little girl on the stage.
I let go of the boy’s hand as I pounce, unable to control the hate running through my veins. How dare they treat their lives as if they are nothing. Objects.
I can’t pretend I know what the Strays need or that I could give it to them, but Juliet would. She’d be the best mother, the best guardian, she’d know what to say. She’d be able to comfort them.
That’s why she’s good.
After the buyer on the couch closest to me dies, the other buyer jumps up from the couch, or tries to. He lands in a heap on the floor and I’m on him. My knife jabs into his neck, and his life withers away as he bleeds out.
Finding the remote for this room, the plastic lifts, freeing another set of kids and Strays, the same crying and fear permeating the air. I nod and they follow. What is telling these people to follow me? I’m not sure, but I’m glad it’s working.
I wonder if Juliet saw this, saw me, if she’d be proud of me. I’m being good.
I’m being good. It feels… nice.
Seven rooms. Seventy kids. Endless amount of bullets, sweat, and tears. We are done. The wind from the car window blows my hair from my face, which is reverting to its curly state. As dirty as the three of us are, I feel amazing.
We dropped the kids off at a recovery shelter in Wisconsin, and we’ve been on the road back to Michigan since.
The little boy wouldn’t let me go after we got back down to the lowest floor and we were getting ready to leave the mansion. He stuck tight to me until we got to the shelter and another woman gently pried him away from me.
Kids have never liked me before. Even as a kid, other kids stayed away. They knew I was different. I don’t blame them for staying away; it may have been more survival instinct than dislike or hate.
I didn’t need any other kids. I had Juliet. She is all I ever needed.
Though, holding his hand, even as I killed people, filled my hand with a warmth I miss. I want to hold his hand again. Protect him again. Keep him with me. But I can’t. Not when his dealer is still hiding in plain sight.
Maybe I like kids more than I thought.
“We did it.” Enyo’s voice is a mix of a laugh and a yell, and his smile radiates in the car and even Elliot is smiling. “We fucking did it.”
“They’ll be free,” I murmur. I know the guys may not have heard me, but it doesn’t matter.
“We still don’t know who was running it, though. I know damn well it wasn’t Calix,” Enyo says, furrowing his brows. Elliot meets my eyes through the rearview mirror for a split second.
He’s not looking at me to make sure I don’t spill. The question blares in his eyes of whether he should tell Enyo it’s Mrs. Jay behind this. But I keep my face blank. I can’t tell him what to do, Enyo isn’t my brother.
“We saved the kids, and that’s all that matters,” Elliot says. His gaze moves out the window, and I get to see his side profile. Though this is a joyous moment, he works his jaw, his eyes hard.
Enyo’s involvement puts a damper on things, but I’m not sure why. He doesn’t know that it’s Mrs. Jay behind the trafficking ring, but it seems as if there is… is more to it?
Loud ringing overpowers the sound of the wind, and Elliot curses before answering the phone.
“You’re on speaker,” he says, rolling the windows up.
“So, you thought you could go off on your own operation and I wouldn’t find out?” Mrs. Jay’s voice fills the car and covers my arms in chills. Shit.
“Hello, Mother,” Enyo says with a roll of his eyes, which he makes obvious through the rearview mirror. I watch the Sons as their facial expressions change from annoyance to something worse: fear.
“Meet me at Office Two when you guys get back. All three of you.” She doesn’t yell, but her voice is hard, and it doesn’t take a genius to tell she’s mad.
The hairs on my arms rise, and the tension in my neck intensifies as the click of Mrs. Jay hanging up registers. The fresh, free air from moments before becomes suffocating as something close to impending doom covers my skin.
I lean my forehead on the headrest of Elliot’s seat in front of me. He slides his hand between the door and his seat, and I take his hand in mine. His hand is warm, but in a different way than the little boy earlier. This kind of touch I crave.
I knew the risks coming into this, but now that it’s time to face the consequences, my skin is itchy. The anticipation crawls like spiders over my skin, and I grip Elliot’s hand like I might lose it.
What if I do?
What if Mrs. Jay takes him away from me? And even worse, what if he lets her?