by Kelly Moore
We all sit in the waiting room chairs. Remington studies the map, and Rebel’s hand grips the arm of the chair as if he wants to crush it. Silence hangs between all of us as we sit and wait for word on Sean.
Finally, the door swings open, and Dr. Manning comes out.
“Sean will recover, but he’s got a long road ahead of him. I was able to stop the bleeding in his brain, but I couldn’t repair his eardrums. I’m sorry, but he’s deaf, and I’m not sure what the long-term effects will be for him. He lost some mobility in his left leg, but I think in time he’ll get it back. We won’t know for sure until he fully wakes up, and I can assess him.”
Rebel hangs his head and wipes his eyes.
“I’m sorry. I did all I could for him.”
“I know you did. Thanks for coming. I’m sure he wouldn’t still be here if you didn’t.” He sniffs back his emotions.
“At minimum, he would’ve been in a wheelchair for the rest of his life. I wish I could’ve done more for his hearing, but the impact shattered his eardrums. I’ll stick around for a few days and watch him recover.”
“Thanks, I appreciate it.” He sticks out his hand to him.
“You look like shit. Why don’t you go get some rest. I’m going to keep him comfortable until morning. He’ll never know you’re here.”
“I’ve got too much on my plate to think about sleeping. I need to save the woman I love from an enemy. The same enemy that did this to my brother.”
“Let us do that, sir,” I say. “Stay here until Sean wakes up, and then you can join us.”
He runs his hand through his hair. “I need to find her.”
“I’ve found them, sir, and I know exactly how to get to them.” Remington holds up the map.
“Sounds like you should trust your team. Being too close to the situation might make it worse.” Ashe grips Rebel’s shoulder.
“Maybe you’re right, but if you don’t have Fallon recovered by morning, I’ll be coming for Nina.”
Chapter 13
Fallon
“What is this place?” Maxim shoves me through the rusty door hanging from one hinge.
“I’ve already told you. Home,” Nina snaps.
The sun is starting to break through the day, but the trailer is still dark inside. Nina yanks open the tattered curtains, and dust flies in the stale air.
“You don’t live here.” The dirty floor creaks, and I think I’m going to fall through it.
“This is where I grew up.” She pulls open a door. “And this is where my hell began.” I walk through, and there’s a double bed with rotten-smelling, bloodstained sheets still on it. No headboard, just a frame. “And, that’s where I slept.” She points to a bare, torn-up twin mattress with a dingy yellow pillow on it. “That was a step up from what I started with.” She drags me by the hand to the fridge. She opens it, and the door of the old white box falls to the floor. It’s empty. “This is how it always looked other than a few beer cans on the shelf.”
A chill runs over me, not of fear, but of dread. “Did you bring me here to feel sorry for you that you had a shitty upbringing and that’s why you’re so evil?” I know in my gut this isn’t the reason. I’m not sure I really want to know why.
She laughs and plops down on the brown plaid couch that has springs hanging out of the cushions. “You think we're a product of genetics or our upbringing?”
I look at a faded picture on the wall of a woman holding an infant, and a little girl is tucked by her side. Not your normal family picture. The mom is rail-thin and the little girl's hair is a mess, and her clothes are unkempt. A blanket obscures the face of the baby. “I think at some point, we chose the person we want to be, regardless of our upbringing,” I finally answer her.
She pats the cushion next to her, and it lets out a moldy smell. “So, tell me sweet Fallon, if you were raised in this shithole, with a rotten corpse of your father, and a mother who was either drugged up, drunk, or had her legs spread wide for every man, and giving her daughter the same fate, you think you’d be as untarnished as you are?”
“I can see why it motivated you to want money, but you didn’t have to do the things you’ve done to get it.” I sit beside her, and Maxim hovers, watching us both closely.
“So, you think something good could’ve been grown from here? Men coming in and out at all hours of the night. Your own mother selling you to get her drugs. A child who had to steal for food and clothing?” Her eyes flicker with smothered emotions.
I look around the small room and picture the things she’s saying. “I can’t imagine a life like that.”
She snickers. “Thanks to me, you never had to.”
“I don’t understand.” That sinking feeling is back with a vengeance, and a wave of panic rolls over me.
She gets up and takes the picture off the wall. “Try this on for size. A little girl having to take care of a nameless little sister because her own parents didn’t want her. I had to feed her, change her diapers, and take care of all her needs, and I couldn’t even take care of myself. I was busy trying to steal food from dumpsters and putting my own mother back together every morning.” She hands me the picture.
“What happened to her?” Nausea runs through me in waves.
“Some handsome fireman found her outside the station. That’s the last I saw of her.”
“So you saved your sister from your same fate?” Hot tears burn my eyes, threatening to take over.
“I grew up. I was very smart and got a scholarship to the best college. I learned all the ins and outs of genetic testing. I searched for my sister for years.” She stands over me. “I finally found her.”
God, please don’t let it be. “I’m her,” I whisper, and I can’t stop my lip from shaking. “And I was with the man you betrayed.” It’s all starting to make sense now.
“The man I loved. The only man I’ve ever felt anything for.”
My hand shakes with the picture grasped in it. “You said he loved me because I looked like you.” My voice is as shaky as the rest of me, including my insides.
“That’s right. See, I wasn’t lying. He saw me in you. That’s what attracted him to you.”
“That’s not true. We are nothing alike.”
“And you have me to thank for that.”
I stand. “You tried to kill me several times.” The realization of how dark-hearted she is rattles me even more.
She brushes a tendril of my hair off my shoulder. “You took my life, but as we’ve discussed before, if I wanted you dead, you’d already be in the ground.”
“This is about getting back at me? You saved me from all of this just to torture me?” I lunge toward her and Maxim steps between us, holding me back.
She smiles a sickly smile. “Do you know I used to call you Cinderella? You know how the evil stepsisters felt about her.” She walks around Maxim.
“I wasn’t your stepsister.”
“No, but you ended up with the handsome prince. How ironic.”
“You don’t really want Rebel. You just don’t want me to have him.”
“Now you’re getting it. I knew you were a smart girl.” She taps a finger to her temple.
“All this time. All the people you’ve hurt was to get back at me.”
“That was only part of it, the rest I did for the sheer enjoyment of making money.”
“You stole innocent young girls like Fiona and ruined their lives.”
“I think if you checked the background of all the alleged innocent girls, you’d find that their lives were nothing to begin with,” she snickers.
“And you think you saved them?”
She shrugs one shoulder. “Maybe.”
“You’re more vile than I thought.”
She rears back and slaps me across the face. “How dare you judge me after you’ve seen this place and what I did for you.”
I hold my red-hot cheek. “That’s just an excuse.” I walk around the trailer. “I’m sure it was awful, and I’ll f
orever be grateful that I didn’t have to grow up feeling unloved or hungry, but there’s no way I would’ve turned out like you. I chose who I wanted to be as an adult.”
“You became your environment. You have no idea who you really are. Let me make it clear to you,” she spits out in anger. “You’re the daughter of a drug-dealing whore, who wanted nothing to do with the sight of you. Your so-called father never even held you in his arms. Born to two wretched, selfish people, and may I add, beyond worthless.” She steps up close to me. “And, a sister that loved you enough to let you go and take the abuse that you would’ve received.”
“Why didn’t you stay with me that night at the fire station?”
“I didn’t have a choice. I had to take care of them. Someone had to make them pay for their sins.”
“Who’s going to make you pay for yours, Nina?”
“The sin of saving you?” She huffs. “I think you owe me.”
I reach out and touch her hand. “I’m sorry that your life was so horrible. No child should ever have to live like this. You should’ve been loved and cared for and cherished every day.” I feel sorry for the child inside her that should’ve been adored.
She jerks her hand away, and I see glistening tears in her eyes threatening to rain down. “I don’t want your fucking pity!” She storms out the door, and Maxim stands guard. I slowly walk around looking at every detail and grip the picture frame in my hand. I still can’t believe the baby in this picture is me or that any of this is real. She lived in a nightmare that she saved me from. There has to be a way to save her back. She was never shown any love or kindness. It’s no wonder she’s a narcissistic monster. But…she’s my sister. I have to try to help her regardless of what she’s done to me.
I peek outside the curtain and see her pacing in the dirt, talking to herself. I’m sure she has an inward battle going on inside her. I open and close drawers, stopping when I find a photo album. The pictures are stuck under clear plastic sheets. They’re old and yellowed, but they’re of a young couple that appear to be in love. I peel back the plastic and take the picture out. It’s dated before either one of us was born. “What happened to this happy couple that made them terrible parents?” I whisper to myself and tuck the picture into my back pocket, along with a school picture of Nina. She looks to be kindergarten age. I find one picture of me that looks like the day I was born here in this run-down trailer. I’m wrapped in a sheet, lying on my mother’s belly. My father is next to her smoking a cigarette. Nina must’ve taken the picture. This is all so surreal. I feel like I’m living someone else’s nightmare. Josie and I had such a happy childhood. We loved each other deeply, and poor Nina had no one. Not one person that loved her, until Rebel.
She storms back inside the trailer. “You have one last chance at freedom. I’ll give you enough money to disappear for the rest of your life. All you have to do is promise never to see or talk to Derrick or his team again. Take someone with you if you have to. I’ll never harm them or you. But if you break our deal, I’ll kill every one of them.”
“I thought part of the deal was that you’d turn yourself in?”
“That’s off the table.”
“So, you’ll be free to continue trafficking young girls?”
“I’ll stop. I’ll keep all my business dealings legit. I give you my word.”
“Your word means nothing to me.”
“How about the word of your sister. I’ll turn over a new slate.”
“Why? Why should I believe you?”
“Because I don’t want you to think of me as a monster.” Sincerity fills her eyes, along with unshed tears.
No, she deserves to be punished for the things she’s done. She doesn’t get to walk away because I feel sorry for her. I’ll make her think we have a deal. “Deposit the money in my account, and after that, I’ll walk away.” I stick out my hand.
“I knew you were like me. Money is far too enticing.” The ungodly Nina is back with no signs of tears left. She shakes my hand, and my stomach rolls. “I’ll have Maxim get cash. You need money available so that Derrick can’t track you. I’ll teach you how to disappear without a trace.”
Chapter 14
Thorn
“We’re all set, Captain,” I say, looking over the gear that Theo brought us.
“I’m counting on the four of you to bring Fallon back alive.” He looks at each of us. Combined, we’re a force to be reckoned with. “Thorn, you lead them. Mad Dog, you arm them with what they need. Remington, show them the way.” He turns toward Theo. “You bring Hazel back unharmed.” Rebel presses a finger into Theo’s chest.
“I will, sir.”
He pulls me aside. “This mission is no longer to bring Nina back alive. Do you understand me?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Don’t let harm come to any of these men,” he adds. “Keep me posted, and if you aren’t back by the time Sean wakes up, I’ll be joining you.”
We all make our way to the rooftop to meet the military chopper landing to pick us up and take us to a remote area in Washington not far from Forks. We buckle in and devise a plan based on the map.
“As soon as we land, we should be able to make it on foot to this point in fifteen minutes. We’ll have the advantage of the sun not rising for another thirty minutes. Theo, you’ll line up here in the woods to take out any unwelcome visitors. Remington, you’ll check for explosives and disarm them. Mad Dog, you’ll take out the man that’s been with Nina the entire step of the way. I’ll protect Fallon and take out Nina. We’ll back each other up.”
They nod in agreement, and we ride in silence. This mission can’t end soon enough. I want to get back and check on Lauryn. Who am I kidding? I can’t wait to get back to see where things are headed between the two of us. She’ll take some convincing to give us a chance, but I know she has feelings for me. It’s written in her body language the few times we’ve been together. I’ve had my career as a SEAL; I need more now. I want a woman to come home to every night. Not just any woman, but Lauryn. I long to feel her legs wrapped around my body with nothing in between us. We can sneak around or get it out in the open. I’ll leave the decision up to her, but I won’t be going to bed alone again with her this close to me. This entire situation with Fallon and Rebel has made me realize I can have both a career and someone to love. I’m tired of being lonely.
I’ve been lost in my own thoughts so long that I’m taken off guard when the pilot says we’re ready to land. We grab our gear, put on our vests, and load our weapons, having them ready to go. Orange streaks are on the horizon. “Daylight will be here soon. Let’s get a move on it,” I order, and our feet hit the ground running.
Remington leads the way through the woods and up the side of a mountain. He stops almost full run and hits the ground. We all follow suit. I crawl up next to him.
“There, just past the trees. Two men are standing guard at the entrance.”
Six old, falling down trailers are scattered down a dirt road. A forgotten dumpster is sitting near the back of the so-called park, creating a stench.
“You used to live here?” I ask him, covering my nose.
“That one.” He points to the one by the dumpster. “Dear old dad used to cook up his meth in the shed behind the trailer.”
I pull my weapon from my belt. “Someday, you’ll have to tell me all about it. For now, go scope it out for explosives.” He crawls away mumbling something about his father blowing himself up.
Theo maneuvers next to me. “I can take these two jokers out easily.”
“We need it to be done silently. If Nina’s in there, we don’t want to spook her and force her to do something stupid.” I look over my shoulder at Mad Dog. “You stay close to me, while Theo takes care of them.”
Theo takes out a small tin from his bag and smears black stripes on his face, then moves stealthily toward the guard. He sneaks up behind one, slitting his throat before the other knows what happened. The second one, Theo comes out of n
owhere and the last thing I see is the guard's boots flying in the air.
The radio on my belt chirps. “Thorn. I found two different bombs set up. I’ll start disarming them, but be careful. There may be more.”
“Got it,” I respond. “Theo, watch your step and keep an eye out for more men.” I motion for Mad Dog to follow me. We get to our feet and work our way toward the trailer with guns high. We scatter behind a rusted-out abandoned car when the door of the trailer flies open. Nina paces up and down the length of the leaning mobile home, talking to herself.
“I can take her down,” Theo radios.
“No. We don’t know for sure that Fallon is inside, and if we kill her, we’ll never find out where she’s holding her.”
“Roger that,” Theo says.
A few minutes later, Nina goes back inside.
“I want complete silence. No shooting until absolutely necessary. We don’t know how many men she has.” Mad Dog nods, and the door opens again. It’s the same large man that’s been seen with Nina. He heads toward the SUV parked outside the trailer.
“Stop him,” I order Mad Dog, and he takes off on foot. I make my way to the side of the trailer and slide quietly along the dirty wall. I hear Nina talking to someone inside. Just before I open the door, a honking noise comes from the SUV. Mad Dog and the guy are wrestling inside. “Damn it.” I fling open the door, and Nina has her arm wrapped around Fallon’s throat from behind, and a gun pointed at her head.
“Pretty boy back to save you.” Nina smiles. “Drop it.”
“Don’t do it, Thorn. She’s not going to hurt me,” Fallon says.
“Don’t count on it!” Nina snarls and presses her fingers deep into Fallon’s neck, choking her.
“Let her go,” I say, laying my weapon down. I don’t want a repeat of last time with Fallon bleeding on the ground.
“Seems like a familiar sight. Derrick’s always sending you in to save his girl.” She looks around me. “Where is he?”