by Diana Scott
The woman's cries broke him inside, he wanted to help her, he needed to look for an escape route, return to the original plan but his nerves clouded his reason. Anne's despair was his own despair. He had to do something, he came to think of pouncing on the giant but in his condition he would only give Anne a few seconds advantage before the three of them were dead.
“We'd better get going,” Blackman spoke with apparent confidence and Suraj looked at him in distress.
Reed tried to contain the breakdown of voice due to his own nerves as he watched Luka walk out the door with Anne on her back.
“Everything is finished here. I will join you on the ferry. Suraj go get my car. Now!”
“I'll take you," Falconi replied suspiciously.
“Asshole, my legs are tired and I need my wheelchair, or are you going to carry me in your arms?”
Falconi scratched his neck and Suraj ran towards the exit door. Reed continued talking to Falconi and Bruce trying to distract them.
“We must get out of here before the gallery is discovered.”
“I won't leave without Cleopatra's Jewels,” Bruce replied annoyed.
“They have to be in another gallery. We'll investigate and attack again, but we can't take any more risks.
“Blackman is right, we must go and reorganize.”
Bruce nodded in annoyance as Reed watched through the shed window as Suraj ran a gun in hand through the exit door trying to catch Luka's Goliath.
He had managed to distract them so that they would not suspect their friend's early disappearance but he doubted that he had been fast enough to save her. If something happened to her... he tried not to think. If he did not save her his heart would stop beating at that very moment. The past, revenge, suffering, everything would stop making sense if he lost her life. A world without her would not be a world. Without her the sun would stop heating, the flowers would be cheap paper and the Moon would be a dull dark star. No, she could not die... She did not...
Suraj ran as if there were no tomorrow until he reached the giant that was trying to drag the woman to a back open space.
"Keep fighting Anne, I'm done, I'm almost done. He thought as he watched the woman twist under the giant's hands and kick him ceaselessly.
Luka was holding her by the hair high and was about to kick her when an accurate shot to the back of her neck knocked him down instantly. Suraj breathed as he saw his superb aim as he approached Anne's side. With the impact of the bullet she was fired a few metres from the bloody dead man. The woman shouted desperately and Kumar wanted to hold her by the arms to calm her but she did not let go.
“No! No, let me go...”
Suraj tried to reassure her, but her voice drove her even more mad.
“Let me go, don't kill me, let me go. I won't say anything.”
“Anne, wait, you're going to hurt yourself.”
The inspector tried to hold her, but at that moment he was punched in the back and another in the face as he turned.
Maurizio knocked him down and took Anne's exhausted body in his arms.
“Shh... honey, it's me. You are safe.”
Anne recognized his voice instantly but could barely see it. The swelling in her face prevented it.
“Maurizio?”
“Yes, honey, it's me. Don't move, I'll take you to a doctor.”
Anne clung to her neck as she was carried in her arms. She leaned her head on her savior's chest and cried uncontrollably. She had been saved, Maurizio was there.
“Don't cry, they can't hurt you anymore.”
Did he mean Reed? Were they all dead?
The pain pierced her chest and her stomach shrank with grief, but she didn't want to ask. Maurizio had taken a risk and saved her, she wouldn't ask about the traitor of his heart.I didn't want anything to do with him. Blackman just died that same afternoon.
Maurizio deposited Anne's body on the stretcher of the ambulance that was waiting for them and closed the door for them to take her urgently to the hospital. As he ran towards his car, he looked up to see Suraj caressing his jaw as he smiled at him in the distance. He watched him get up to leave and thanked him that the crazy plan of those two assholes had worked or now he would be mourning the death of a woman whose only mistake was to work on a Saturday.
The inspector got into the car and accelerated behind the ambulance, Anne was badly beaten and wanted to be by her side. The moment she was discharged, he would keep his promise. He would take her away. If Blackman wanted to give her up, he wouldn't stop him. No matter how covert the mission was, that Blackman asshole didn't deserve a woman like Anne. If it depended on him, she would never know the truth or at least its totality.
Suraj approached the Porsche to the door and saw the despair in his friend's cold eyes. Falconi was still inside finalizing details with Bruce.
“She's fine. Everything went according to plan and...”
Reed felt the air returning to his lungs and the stars of the night shining again. He got into the car and couldn't help but collapse. Tension and excess standing hours with the orthosis were taking its toll.
Suraj looked at him with a frown as he noticed how the sores were bleeding and had passed through his trousers. That effort would cost his damaged legs dearly.
“We must remove that device before we get to the Ferry.”
“Take me to the hospital.”
“Oh no, not at all, not at all.”
Reed simply focused his desperate eyes on the agony of not knowing and Suraj cursed loudly.
“We have no alibi! She will be seen. If we just show up like that, we'll be accused of at least ten crimes.”
“I have to see her, I need to know how she is. Those motherfuckers smashed her face and who knows what else they've done to her,” he clenched her fists so tightly that his knuckles were marked by the pressure.
“If we don't take that Ferry to France, Bruce and Falconi might become suspicious.”
“We'll come up with something. Brother, I have to see her. If she was Jane, you'd do the same.”
“I don't know what you're talking about...” His voice was lost behind the wheel.
“Come on, Suraj, you're as lost as I am. Those women have ruined us.”
Reed tried to smile with the snap, but the pain in his leg wouldn't let him.
“All right, I'll make a few calls to try to clear the area. I hope Maurizio can help us, but it will only take a few minutes. That's all.”
“I think it's perfect.”
“Damn it, I hope when we're in jail someone remembers to bring us cake,” Suraj spoke annoyed and Reed smiled sideways.
“I don't know if they'll bring us cake, but I promise to cover your back when you shower....” His friend looked at him curiously as he drove at full speed to the hospital.
“You know, that cinnamon color of yours is tempting, you'd be a sweetheart among the hooligans of the prison.”
“I shit on your father!”
“Me too, my friend, me too,” He replied while the two of them laughed.
Reed never spoke again the whole trip. He was nervous and badly hurt. His legs hurt like hell but he thought this was insignificant with respect to what Anne should be going through. He swore silently that he would kill Falconi. He hated him for his past but never thought he could do it even more.
Those two criminals would pay for every drop of blood his girl had spilled, and if that earned him a direct ticket to hell, then the demon would open the doors because he was willing to enter.
I have to go
“Either you get in the damn chair or we're leaving right now!”
Suraj was too tired and nervous to fight his friend's whims, and he knew from the moment he got out of the car that the idea of not wearing the brace for walking wasn’t so crazy. As Raymond had announced, his legs were no longer responding and it was likely that after the last effort he made to try to save her, his legs would never respond again. He shook his head like it was a lesser evil. Now, all that
matters was her.
“Maurizio has cleared the area for us. The doctor is about to give her the report. We must hurry.”
Reed nodded as Suraj pushed his chair at full speed. They had to get there in time to hear the medical report and then run away before the guards came back or there would be no escape.
“Back door. Room 212. Here we are.”
Maurizio had kept his word and left the door open so that the two intruders could hear the medical report. The Italian had warned them that she was fine but it was not enough to stop Reed in his desire to see her. In the ambulance, she was given her first cures and there was no greater damage than huge bruises of a deep blue-gray but Blackman didn’t trust him and Maurizio couldn’t wait to take Anne out of the country and forget that Reed existed. The doctor was about to leave but Maurizio wanted the two spies hiding behind the door to hear him loud and clear.
“Then you says it's just contusions. Are you sure?”
The doctor looked at him with the face of "this man is a fool" but did not express it out loud. On the contrary, very kindly, he clarified it in a polite way.
“You don't have to worry. She is perfectly all right. She will stay for a few days for observation, but only as a preventive measure. Very soon you will be able to take her home.”
The doctor said goodbye and Maurizio sat down satisfied with Ane. The woman was lying on the bed lost in her thoughts. The blood was gone, the nurses had helped her take a shower, but the bruises on her face and eyes were so intense that the Italian cursed aloud.
“Honey, you must rest, I will go to sleep.” He spoke with all the tenderness he could near her ear.
“Please don't leave me.” Anne's trembling hand reached his, and Maurizio clung to her contact. “Don't leave me....”
“All right, all right, I'll stay if that's what you want, but, honey, you must try to rest.”
On the other side of the door, Reed felt his guts turn with every "honey" said by the Italian. He was a possessive man, he loved that woman and damn it, he had to bear to see and hear how he conquered her under his nose.
“Do you know that he deceived me?”
“Honey, don't think about it now.”
“She's fine. We must go," Suraj muttered to his friend's ear, trying to convince him.
“Reed... he deceived me.”
Blackman stopped the wheelchair when he heard his name, he wanted to hear her, and his friend snorted annoyed at seeing that they were not leaving.
“He wanted to kill me, he wanted to see me dead...”
“I don't think so. We'll talk when you're better.” The Italian tried to dodge the questions.
“Yes, it was like that, you weren't there. You should have seen him, all he thought about was getting rid of me.” Anne lifted her face inflamed with blows and Maurizio felt pain at seeing her. “You know, I loved him... I loved him like I never loved anyone.”
Anne shed a tear and Reed broke in two behind the door.
“I fell so in love that I felt that the world was painted in colors and it was for us. I loved him unconditionally, I only wanted his affection,” she continued in tears. “I justified each one of his behaviors, I forgave, I accepted, I loved him hoping to heal each one of his wounds.”
“Anne I...” Maurizio didn't want to hear her proclaim her love for another man.
“No, let me finish.”
“It's true that I loved him like no one else, I don't intend to deny it, but now I hate him with all my strength.”
I don't care if he escaped or not. Today Reed Blackman just died for me.
“Anne... you should know that he...”
“No! Please don't. This is the last time his name is pronounced between us. I want to start a new life, one in which he doesn't exist. I hate every second of his memories and every minute we spent together. I regret having met him and if I could I would tear him out of my mind and my memories.”
The woman breathed agitated but was not ready to finish. She wanted to make her position very clear.
“You will never tell me about him again. Reed Blackman has never existed between us.”
Reed on the other side listened to every harsh word as he covered his face with one hand so that no one would see his heart breaking and the silent tears that covered those deep, cold blue eyes. The only woman he ever loved, the one who taught him to be human, the one for whom he died of love, hated him and it was all his fault. He wanted to scream, run, hit, kick but he was prostrate in a damn wheelchair. His time had passed. They would put an end to this stupid plan, stop Falconi once and for all and carry Anne Foster in her heart until the end of his days. He, unlike her, knew that Anne was everything he once dreamed of. Anne was an undeserved gift and life was taken from his by proving that she was right, he was not worthy of her love.
“We must go,” Suraj pushed the chair and they left without talking.
His friend wanted to tell him something, he tried to be optimistic but Reed's condition was devastating. He was devastated and Kumar cursed in a whisper, Reed didn't deserve what he was living, life had beaten him too much when he was a child to have to endure another setback like this.
“When it's all over you can explain her everything. I am sure she will understand. Anne is a sensible woman. It will only be two more days.”
Reed didn't answer. The knot in his throat barely let him swallow. He had lost her and this time for good. Maurizio would take her and give her the life he could never give her. He would cover her with kisses and she would give him each of the smiles that were once his.
Reed clenched his fists and felt that the true meaning of life had just escaped through his fingers and it’s much more than any whiplash from his father.
You don't hurt anymore.
“Brother, leave him alone. He is dead.”
Reed kept hitting Falconi's inert body, which lay dry on the ground. He wanted him to respond. Years of pain begged for unsatisfied justice. In the middle of the raid, the very unfortunate man had tried to flee but Blackman threw himself on him, pushing him hard towards the hard ground. The trafficker's head crashed dry against the cold concrete and stopped breathing instantly. Reed cursed out loud. He wanted to hit him as hard as he had hit his girl, but it was too late. Falconi was leaving this world the way he had lived, without honor. The mastermind of his darkest desires for revenge and owner of his most repugnant nightmares, no longer existed.
Reed breathed agitated. He wanted to scream, howl, take revenge... and above all, release the memories of a child who didn’t deserve to learn what he had learned.
“Let me help you...”
“I'm fine. I'm fine!”
The man stood up thanks to the assistance of the walking brace and, at first, it even seemed that he had succeeded but his legs, too exhausted, made him slip.
“Fucking hell!” He was about to fall on the dead man if it hadn’t been for Kumar's quick reflexes.
Both looked at the dead body inert but with different conclusions. When Suraj was thinking of a finished job, Reed could only imagine what his future would be from now on. Years of hating, cursing, and fearing were laying on the cold, damp ground of a port of doom. Now what?
The captain in charge of the special forces and responsible for the raid, approached the two men seriousness in his face.
“The operation is over. Watchmaker was stopped when he was trying to slip through the marshes. His assistant could not control the car and we were able to intercept them without major inconvenience.”
“Assistant?” Reed asked curiously because he though he knew the answer.
“The Journalist Marc Olson was driving the car.”
“Of course,” Suraj said, putting the pieces together.
The captain looked at Falconi's inert body on the ground and spoke in a deep voice.
“This one wasn't so lucky.”
“That's what it looks like. Let's complete the paperwork and go home. I need a shower and a vacation,” the captain nodded in a
greement with Kumar's words.
“And the women?” Reed asked without stopping distilling hate towards the immobile body.
Suraj cursed loudly for his clumsy forgetfulness and waited nervously for the captain's reply.
“All six have been taken to the hospital. There they will be attended and they will verify that they have not suffered any damage, then they will be returned to their homes in the first plane available.”
“There were seven. In the last shipment there were seven, not six!” Reed spoke in anger at the captain's absent-mindedness.
“The seventh one didn't arrive. The poor girl, afraid of her fate, took her own life before she arrived.”
“Fucking bastards!” Suraj cursed loudly while Reed tightened the bridge of his nose.
He had risked everything for these young women. He abandoned the love of his life in that hospital in order to save those women, and now one of them was dead.
“Yours and detective’s work has been impeccable,” the captain sentenced by seeing the overwhelming sense of guilt reflected in Reed's gaze.
“Not for that girl.”
“Sir, if I may," the captain said confidently, "in this job some are bad and some are good. You and the detective are on the good side, but you can't always save all the victims. With your work of these months you have saved a total of eleven young girls from the worst of their fate. You should be proud of that.”
The captain handed a folder of forms to the detective and left where he came from. Two of his men covered Falconi's body and deposited it in the back of a military jeep, leaving a huge cloud of dust as it got lost along the way.
It was all over. Falconi was dead and with him went her hateful presence, the trafficking of innocent girls, his disgusting teachings to an innocent child, and above all, she was no longer in danger.
Falconi would never threaten or touch her again. Reed closed his eyes dominating the hate that enveloped him as he remembered the wounds inflicted by that pig on his girl. If he were not dead, he would kill him again but with his own hands and not thanks to an unfortunate fall. That wretch deserved to suffer much more.