by Kishan Paul
Their gazes locked. Although too dark to read her expression, when she opened her mouth and screamed, “Tanush,” the agony in her voice chilled Ally’s soul and pierced her ears. She dropped to her knees on the bed beside the man as the woman continued scream after scream of the same word. Her desperation, terror, devastation, all of it made evident in the two-syllable cry echoing through the halls.
“I told you not to do that.” He hadn’t moved from his spot but disapproval etched in his features.
“What is she yelling?”
“Her baby’s name.”
A new woman’s scream mixed with the mother’s. “Shut up!”
He waved at the wall. “Now she will get punished because of you.”
The curses of the woman they called Madam rose louder as she neared.
“I didn’t mean to…” Ally gazed at the one-foot space above the wall between their rooms as the mother’s wails grew louder.
“But you did, and there’s nothing any of us can do to stop it.”
She pressed a hand against the rough wall, willing the crying woman to be quiet. Her heart thudded against her chest when the rattling of keys and the squeak of the shoes swished past her room. By the time the padlock of the door beside them unlocked, Ally’s nails dug into the hard grout.
“Please. Madam. Have mercy. A baby needs his mother,” the woman managed through her sobs. “Let me hold my baby. Let me feed him at least.”
An icy wave of understanding chilled Ally, making her shudder as the mother begged for her baby’s life.
“Take your fucking hands off me,” Madam snarled. The loud thud of a weight slamming against a hard surface had Ally on her feet trying to reach the woman on the other side of the wall.
The man beside her grabbed her wrist and yanked her down to the bed. “If you try to intervene, you will make this worse for her, me, and you.”
“Ungrateful bitch. You should be thanking me for sending him to a home where they can properly care for him. The noisy brat was costing me five thousand rupees a day.”
“Tanush’s home is with me,” the mother moaned.
“You want him back?” The way Madam asked the question, the hint of humor in her voice, it was clear she’d uttered the words before, and it was clear the price she’d quote would be a heavy one.
“Anything. I will do anything you say, Madam,” she begged. “Just give me my baby.”
“Checkmate,” the man whispered.
Ally yanked her wrist from his grip, understanding exactly what he meant.
“Repay me every penny I’ve invested in that baby’s care, then you can take him home.”
“Stupid woman.” The man shook his head. “They’ve already sold him off by now.”
“That’s a smart momma,” Madam hummed.
By the time padlock was shut and secured, Ally was crouched by her door, staring through the bottom gap in time to see Madam and the mother move down the hall.
“Come. Let’s get you earning so you can buy your Tanush back.” Madam’s angry tone had been replaced with a calm saccharine sweet one.
Ally focused on both women, searing their details into her memory.
“But first, let’s get you cleaned up and in new clothes.” Madam’s jeans and black sandals moved past. Her toenails were painted bright red, a silver ring hugging her right pinky toe. A few feet behind her followed the still-crying mother. The cuffs of the mother’s salwar were a deep red with green leaves printed across them, her feet bare.
Ally didn’t know Tanu’s mother’s history or the details of how she wound up in her hell, but she had a sickening feeling how the story would end. How many more stories like hers filled the rooms of the halls around her?
Long after the footsteps faded to silence, she kept her cheek glued to the sticky floor. Three rooms were across the hall from hers. Each had different-colored doors, one red, another green, all faded and chipped from age. The bottoms of the doors hung crooked, probably from being hastily installed. The blue one directly across from hers caught her attention. A palm-sized sticker of a single-eyed, green, two-legged monster was haphazardly pasted on the edge of it. She remembered the character from a popular children’s movie Jayden once obsessed about. And from the gap below the door, someone stared back at her. It was too hard to make out anything about their features, but she didn’t have to see to know hopelessness dwelled in their eyes, in their souls.
The nauseating reality that behind each door she’d find similar captives washed over her while the understanding of why they were imprisoned and the horrors of what they must have already endured burned through her veins. This was a different kind of hell than her time with Sayeed.
The world sometimes seemed like an ugly stage where monsters ruled as puppeteers forcing the helpless to bow and move to their every whim.
“Don’t feel too bad about the mother. It was inevitable,” the man in her room announced.
Inevitable? His resignation and acceptance did nothing to cool her disgust. Tiny fingers poked out from beneath the stickered door. Her chest tightened. This was about so much more than saving her son’s life.
“Who’s in the room with the stickers across the hall?”
“Ahh, you mean the Penthouse Suite.”
Her brows narrowed at his description.
“Nikki. A child. They’re saving her.”
“Saving her?” Ally repeated his words, not liking the implications.
“She’s five, maybe six at the most. Spends her days in there hugging the same little red pillow she came in here with. People will spend a lot of money for a night with her. So, they’re keeping her clean, treating her better than the rest of us, until they strike the right kind of deal.”
A vision of the child emerged. One of a small girl who sat silent and alone on her bed. Her chest tightened at the image. No amount of feathers and cotton stuffed in crimson fabric would protect her from the hells of this world, and yet she tried to do exactly that—her way of clinging to what little innocence she could.
Innocence.
It no longer applied to Nikki across the hall, by no fault of her own. They’d ripped her from her family, forced her to grow up faster than she needed to.
Ally swallowed the bitterness and moved away from the door. She thought about Sayeed, Sharif, and their father, Rizwan. They created this hell, and now all of them were dead. The problem was that for every monster usurped of their oppressive rule, several arrived to replace the one. It felt like for each string of bondage snipped, ten more were tied.
Ally’s thoughts floated to Eddie. He’d come for her. And when he did, she’d have to convince him to help. To be the good for the little girl across the hall, as well as for Tanu’s mother, and the man who sat on the bed a few feet away watching her, as well as the other victims in the hell she now shared. “I am going to get out of here, and when I do, I will take all of you with me.”
He dismissed her words with a wave and shuttered his lids. “I’ve seen firsthand how effective you are. It’s best for all of us if you don’t jump on ideas. Tanu’s mother is being cleaned up because of you.”
“They cleaned you up too.”
He flinched as if she’d slapped him. “I’m their best producer.” He winked. “As long as I keep performing, I live in this private luxurious VIP Suite. I get a hole in the ground to do my business, not a bucket like the rest. And—” He smoothed down the collar of his shirt. “Better clothes.”
She seated herself beside him. “What’s your name?”
The corner of his mouth lifted as if she’d said something funny. “Which one?”
They had a lot more in common than she’d realized. “When I was born, my family named me Alisha.” Her thoughts filtered. “The man I loved called me Ally. And when I was kidnapped the first time, they called me Sara.”
She stared at the wall across from her, knowing she had his attention. “I was taken twice and got away both times, but… After the second escape, after th
ey’d killed my husband and forced me into hiding, I had to pick a new name. One Wassim didn’t know.”
He gazed into the distance. “Do you like the new one?”
She shook her head. “It’s not who I am.”
“Who are you?”
She considered the question, thinking of the list she’d acquired through the years. “Ally,” she whispered.
“Hello, Ally. My name of choice is Khalin, and welcome to my hell.”
She shook his offered hand. “How did you get in to this hell, Khalin?”
A shadow fluttered across his face. “I loved the wrong person.”
“Do you regret loving her?”
He tilted his head and surveyed her. “How quickly you assume my love was a she.”
“I did.” Ally’s cheeks flushed. “I’m sorry. Love is love.”
“If only everyone believed the same.” Khalin smiled a sad smile. “But he was worth the moments we spent together.” He glanced at her. “And you? How did you manage to gain access to hell a third time?”
Jayden’s face filtered into her mind and with it her mountain of worries about him. “It’s a long story.”
Khalin laughed softly. “They always are.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
HOLES AND GAMES
Long after Om left the room, Eddie remained by the window, Alisha’s words ringing in his ears. My son needs me. The heat of anger consumed him; it made the back of his eyes burn. He ran a hand through his hair, pulled out the cell Sin gave him, and made a call. There was no way he’d let goodbye be an option.
By the time he disconnected, he’d returned to surveying the world outside the glass, in particular, the four-story building in the distance. A little after three in the afternoon in a cloudless sky, the sun poured out its energy in full force. There was something ominous about how its rays reflected off the jewelry store. As if taunting him with the fact the big ball of fire itself couldn’t penetrate Wassim’s shields.
The phone in his grip vibrated. He answered the call and continued to observe the jewelry store. “I’m here.”
“Good. I don’t have a lot of time.” Rafi’s voice burned his ears, evaporating what little calm he’d just had.
“You little fucker. If anything happens to—”
“I’m not risking my life to call you so you can waste it threatening me,” Rafi said before Eddie could finish doing just that. “She’s alive and in a safe place. They won’t mess with her until Wassim arrives. Which should be later this evening. I’m assuming you’ve figured out who the mole is.”
His response cooled some of the rage consuming him. Eddie pinched the bridge of his nose. “You knew who it was. Instead of telling me, you called her last night and talked her in to this. You allowed this to happen.”
“Yes, to all of the above. It was the only way to get Wassim here.”
“You lied to me and took advantage of her situation,” he hissed.
“If you think that woman is someone who can be taken advantage of, you really don’t know her. She’s aware of what she’s doing,” Rafi whispered. “Now unless you want her dead, I suggest you shut up and listen.”
He kicked at the chair in his path and rested his back against the wall. “Talk.”
“Wassim had a different plan for today than you did. One that had him nowhere near Mumbai. What would have made its appearance at the drive instead would have been gun-toting killers and a van full of IEDs. They were going to kill as many people as they could, including Sara, and make it look like a terrorist attack.
“I managed to strike a deal with them. Seeing as how I had contacts at the nursing building, I told Adil to put pressure on the leak to discuss an alternative plan, let her do her speech, and then I’d personally hand Sara over to him—a gesture of my eagerness to impress the new boss. No one got hurt. Wassim agreed, and when I told Sara, she agreed as well.”
Fury rolled through Eddie. “It never occurred to any of you to share these plans with me?”
“It occurred to me, but as long as your team was compromised, I couldn’t risk the information getting back to Adil. Look, I only have a few more minutes before they notice I’m missing.”
He slammed his eyes shut and sucked in a breath. “I need details.”
“Asset and I entered through the southbound entrance in the garage approximately one and a half hours ago. There are four armed guards in that quadrant. I’ve counted seven hostiles on the interior and about a dozen more on the exterior of the building. There are hidden sections on every floor, all on the east side of the building. I haven’t been able to count how many innocents they have, but my guess is it’s closer to a hundred. I’m about to set up additional cameras so Sin can have eyes inside the building, and you can make a better plan.”
Eddie didn’t respond. Didn’t tell him the plan already in the works. This was about hearing what information Rafi would share and so far, his information added up with what Sin and Kerry had told him. “And where is the asset now?”
“East wing. Third floor.”
Eddie pulled out the tracker to confirm his details.
“Like I said, Wassim hasn’t arrived. They won’t touch her until he does. But when he does pay us a visit, it will be with an undisclosed number of additional guards and intent to kill, so this will not be a fair fight. Just remember, we need Wassim alive.”
Rafi paused a beat. “There’s one more thing.”
Eddie raised a brow. “I’m listening.”
“Adil keeps a woman caged in his flat. I’ve only seen her once. The cage is in the back room. No one’s allowed in there. Other than the bars, the only other items in there are a bed, a bathroom, and the girl. She’s not allowed to speak. Attractive, round face, long hair, about five five at the most, missing a pinky toe.”
Eddie knew exactly who Rafi described.
“I wanted to help her, but I couldn’t afford risking my cover to do it.”
He nodded his understanding. “But we can.”
“Adil’s otherwise occupied here. It shouldn’t be hard. I’ve sent you the information about his residence and pictures of the interior. You should be able to get in their place without being noticed.”
A click later, the call ended.
The tracker in his grip and the phone still glued to his ear, Eddie stared across the distance. Lies swirled around him. He drowned in them, and because of that nothing had gone the way they were supposed to. He shook his head, trying to shake off the emotions consuming him away. The only way she’d come out of this alive was if he shut those feelings down. But the rage and frustration were screaming, demanding to be heard, to be addressed.
Eddie turned to the wall beside him. The partition was built to separate the giant room into smaller ones. He slammed his fist into the material. The force of his assault left proof of his frustrations. He stared at the hole in the wall in silence.
The FBI, Interpol, ASHA, he’d talked with each in the past hour, and the conversations brought him to the same realization. It was a game—for all of them. A high-stakes one where the end justified the means. In this case, the means equated to Alisha’s life. They used her as a pawn. And the sad truth was had she not been the cost, he’d have agreed with Rafi. Apprehending Wassim and Mudir was worth a loss or two of life. He was no different from them. Eddie reeled his fist back, disgusted in himself as much as everyone else, and punched the wall a second time. His knuckles burned. The tightness in his chest lessened, making it easier to breathe.
He rested his forehead against the surface and picked out the pieces of drywall hanging from the destruction and remembered a different hole punched into a different wall by a different man. He wiped the dust and blood off his knuckles and flexed his fingers at the irony. Both reactions were inspired by the same fucking woman.
A knock at the entrance pulled him out of his fascination with his injuries. He glanced over at the door and Tay. The kid ran a hand through his hair, staring everywhere but at Eddie and t
he damage he’d just done. Damage he had no intention of discussing. He sucked in a breath and planted his hands on his hips. “I need to talk to everyone. Minus Om and Sai.” He thought about the sharpshooter positioned across the street from the jewelry story. “Get Moose on too.”
He waited until Tay disappeared to contact Sin. Turned out she had been right about him needing her help.
By the time the others joined him, he’d finished his call and a plan had been set in motion. Eddie placed the receiver next to his face and pressed the button. “Moose you there?”
“Here.”
“A few days ago, I was notified by outside sources that information about our activities was being leaked to Icom. Information only members of our team would have been privy to. This leak is why I kept the details about your mother’s arrival in the country quiet until yesterday.” He inspected each of them before he continued. “We now know Omar was our mole.”
“Fuck.”
Eddie took in the anger, hurt, and confusion on their faces. “In our line of work, we’re supposed to trust our team, our brothers. Trust they will have our back. Trust they will keep us alive, be our eyes when we’re blind. Having a mole among us not only breaks our trust, it weakens us. Make us vulnerable. And the shittiest part of all this is that, although I’m pretty sure Om worked alone, I’m not a hundred percent sure,” he confessed. Eddie filled his chest and shook his head. “Which means I am going to have to continue keeping things on a need-to-know basis with you. You are going to have to have more faith in me than I can afford to have in you. I trust each of you with my life, but this isn’t about my life.” He let the words sink in before he continued.
He sat his ass on the corner of the table and crossed his arms. “Wassim and Adil have your mother. Sai is out of commission for now and Om…is done.” He oscillated his attention from each of them. “We have gaping holes in our mission. We are working blind. Hell, at this point, all we have is that the van that transported her is parked in the Palaza Jewelers garage, and she is in the building.”
