Crimson Desert

by Melissa Jane

“Hector told me he was going to send a small army of men to find and kill Ethan so I set my own plan in motion to pretend to kill him myself. I told Hector I knew the location and would be gone for a couple of days to settle the debt. He couldn’t have been more pleased. He trusted me. That’s the only reason why this plan worked, Laila, because I had never given him reason to doubt my intent. He raised me as a son, he had no reason to believe otherwise. When I returned, Juan took great pleasure in tarnishing your faith in me by gloating about me killing your brother. I never intended you to know Ethan was supposed to be dead. I saw what it did to you, but I couldn’t tell you otherwise because that same night Hector announced Alexsonov had finally agreed to take you in place of the missing girls.”

  She looked up at me, tears streaming down her soft cheeks. She looked awful, but simply beautiful at the same time.

  “Hector was never going to release you, Laila. And if I’d told you Ethan wasn’t dead and anyone suspected in the slightest, it would have fucked up and ruined everything. We would both be in the ground right now. I saw it break your heart and I could do nothing but watch and take the hate you threw at me. That night I had no choice. I had to get you out. I kept saying you needed to trust me and to stop with the questions, but you persisted to the point where I realized any more talk of Ethan would fuck things up. I knew I couldn’t get you out quietly any other way. I’m sorry I did what I did, but my options were limited. After temporarily shutting down the camera system, I drugged you while you slept and had Jorge in on the deal to sneak you from the house.

  “It was best to keep you in the dark so you remained mad at me, to be convincing for anyone who found us. It was still unsafe to tell you while we were on the run or at Danny’s because I knew if we were found, the truth would come out. Juan would make you talk, believe me, he would, if he even got that far. Frankly, he would have known immediately something was up just by looking at you and seeing you were happy and not distraught at losing your brother. And I was right, to keep up the charade because the asshole found us shortly after we left. Besides you running off and almost getting us killed, the plan thus far had gone smoothly. I had to wait until Ethan was right in front of you, across the Mexican border, for the truth to be revealed. And so here we are.”

  Ethan reached forward and took a hold of his sister’s trembling hand. I wanted to be the one to comfort her, but I knew she would have none of it.

  Ethan had been quiet throughout my whole confession, but now he was seething. “You left her there in that house!”

  “I did my best to protect her.” It sounded weak and I knew it.

  “Well, your best wasn’t good enough, was it?”

  He stood and walked toward me, his chest puffed out ready to engage in battle. “What I don’t understand, Aiden, is why you didn’t remove her from the house earlier and I mean as soon as you found out she was my fucking sister!”

  My patience was wearing thin, but I was still determined to reason with him. “Hector and Juan are my family, Ethan. I had already risked so much with the girls we rescued. I was hesitant to double-cross them again so soon, especially if they discovered a trend. But when I saw the way they were treating Laila I knew I had to do something. That took time! You can’t just walk out of Hector’s house and not expect him to notice his most prized possession is walking in tow.”

  “She’s my fucking sister, Aiden! How the fuck could you have been conflicted about what to do?”

  Ethan’s self-righteous anger incited my wrath. That fucker was just as involved as I was.

  “Perhaps if you’d fucking rang your sister before you went into hiding, she wouldn’t have come looking for you,” I spat back. “I didn’t put her in that house – you did.”

  “So now it’s my fault? I see, so while I was getting those girls away from becoming victims of trafficking, dodging every mother fucker corrupt Mexican I saw in case they had some connection, you…” – he jabbed his finger into my chest – “… couldn’t even deal with your own fucking brother and father.”

  An absence in the room caused the argument to immediately cease. We both looked to the chair to see it empty. Laila was gone.

  “Fucking hell! Where did she go?” Ethan’s aggression quickly turned to panic.

  “I don’t know, but she won’t last ten minutes out on her own.”

  Chapter Three

  Laila

  Pure rage almost catapulted me down the cement stairs in an urgent need for fresh air. Curse that god damned broken elevator. The locked, barred windows and musty, stale air mixed with Aiden and Ethan’s testosterone face-off was just too much. During my stay in the house of fucked-up horrors, I had held out faith that Ethan was only knee deep in shit because he was righting wrongs. He wasn’t a bad person at heart. In fact, sometimes he had too much heart for his own well-being. In this situation, I was caught between a rock and a hard place. I wanted to un-live what had happened to me yet at the same time I wouldn’t wish the devastating fate on the two young girls. Ethan had saved them from a life of misery and torture. I was proud of him.

  Then there was Aiden. His explanation had cut deep, whether it was meant to or not and his apology had broken my heart. Why? Because I had played the fool and placed my trust in a man with an agenda. An agenda that was kept from me for weeks.

  I wanted desperately to believe in his words. He had risked his own life and deceived his family just to get Ethan and me to safety. I really had no leg to stand on when holding a grudge. I shouldn’t even be mad. Yet, an irrational part of me still was.

  I was still hurting from a barrage of physical and mental abuse. Hearing the truth now was just brutal.

  Aiden was no better than the two men left behind at the mansion. He had willingly watched while many women, naive and innocent to the world, had passed through those doors. He also witnessed their demise as they quickly learned there would be no return or freedom for them. The same would have happened to me if I was not Ethan’s sister.

  “You going out alone?” A thick Spanish voice broke through my thoughts as I passed the lady at reception. There was something about her from the very beginning that had grated on my nerves.

  Nothing had changed.

  “None of your business,” I spat. Her tone didn’t indicate she cared for my safety so I didn’t care for her questioning.

  The fresh air hit my face the moment I stepped out of the hotel, the warmth caressing my skin. It was a welcome feeling after having to spend a night in that filthy, and I suspect contaminated, hole for so long. Closing my eyes, breathing in deeply, I absorbed the soothing sensation and willed my body to relax.

  I was free.

  Telling myself that was easy. Believing it was a lot harder. Other than my sprint down the dark, deserted road three days ago, I had not been outside for so long.

  As I walked through the streets, my ability to remain calm was hindered by Aiden’s face plaguing my thoughts. His words taunted me, memories of us together now made me feel great shame. My trust in him had been based on a lie from the very start. A part of me was screaming to just get over it. He had saved me and I should be grateful. The other half wasn’t so forgiving. Just when I thought I couldn’t be any more humiliated, I was proved wrong.

  His eyes had been pleading with my own, like he was trying to convince me there had simply been no other way. But was that really true?

  Quite simply, I was torn.

  Torn between the Aiden I had made love to and the Aiden I had left behind at the hotel. Images that accompanied his handsome face were of the intimacy we shared. The way he touched me, passionately kissing my neck, his lips trailing down to my breasts, his deliciously warm breath tingling my skin. He had felt so good and a part of me had fallen… hard.

  Reality, however, was a snarled-faced bitch.

  The real Aiden lived in a corrupt world where the value of human life was determined by how much the highest bidder was willing to pay for his sexual needs. Aiden’s career was to protect th
e men who bought those helpless women. By association, he allowed women to be degraded and abused and at the same time he let the corrupt win.

  A strong hand gripping my shoulder frightened me from my thoughts, a mangled scream escaped my lips as I tried to shrug myself out of its grasp. The person behind only held on tighter until I felt his fingers digging painfully into my flesh. Being after midnight, the streets were virtually empty, so counting on public intervention was a false hope. I was an idiot, plain and simple. I should never have left the hotel. Believing I was now safe had been a foolish thought.

  “Get off me!” I yelled, attempting to shrug myself free.

  An arm wrapped tightly around my shoulders pulling me back against my attacker’s chest while the other clamped firmly over my mouth, muffling my pleas. Swinging my elbow back into the man’s stomach, I only met hard muscle, having little to no effect. Seconds later, I was dragged away from the safety of the street lights and into the looming darkness of an alleyway. When we shifted behind a small protruding wall of a garage, the man kicked my legs out from beneath me before lowering my body onto his lap. I struggled desperately against his hold, but he offered no leeway. Instead, the calloused hand tightened over my mouth as the sound of a car went slowly past, the headlights illuminating part of the opposite wall. My attacker squeezed me close against his chest, his heart pounding against my back. My own heart beat in sync with his as the car came to a stop, yards from where I was being held.

  “Shhh,” the man said gently next to my ear. He was referring to my heaving nose breathing that even to me blocked out almost all other noise. The rancid smell of nearby rotting garbage skips filled my lungs with every intake causing my eyes water. What felt like a lifetime later, I finally heard some movement that stilled us both in an instant.

  A flash light shone down the alley and I watched as the yellow ball danced around the cement and bounced off the walls. Eventually, the light disappeared and I couldn’t help but feel any chance of salvation had left along with it.

  “Stay still,” the voice whispered in my ear.

  I rolled my eyes at this instruction. Clearly I couldn’t go anywhere. My left leg had long since gone numb and my back was sore from being twisted. I wanted nothing more than to just stand up and shake out the creases in my body.

  But we didn’t move. My breathing became even heavier with frustration, but the hand on my mouth and the arm around my shoulders only pulled me in further.

  The rustle of footsteps down the opening of the alleyway thickened the atmosphere again. A faint buzzing sounded between us and the man behind me cursed. He shifted me slightly so that I sat on his thigh, the vibration buzzing under my ass. With the shift in position, the noise became muffled and less distinct.

  Thick Spanish accents barking out orders broke the silence of the night. I couldn’t understand what they were saying, but I could make out their no-nonsense tone. With their flashlights dancing before them, they continued down the alleyway stopping only a meter from where I was being held.

  “Shh,” I heard again in my ear.

  I didn’t need to be told again. I now knew that the men with the flashlights were not my friends. Keeping perfectly still, too scared to even breathe, I fought against the sickening dread forming in my stomach. Were they a part of Hector’s crew? Had they found us? Eventually, my body no longer wanted to listen to my mind's instructions and I started to tremble. I was shit scared knowing that this would be another predicament that could spell my ruin.

  The men stood in the same spot talking for a few more minutes when I saw a cigarette butt land only a few feet away from me, its red embers still glowing. The pounding of the man’s heart behind me was adding to my own anxiety and didn’t subside as the voices headed back down the alley. We didn’t move until the car pulled away and the headlights disappeared.

  The hand around my mouth finally loosened its grip and I took the opportunity to scoot along the rough cement ground to get away from him.

  I should have known.

  Aiden studied me with concerned eyes, but even in the darkness I could tell his face was deadly serious.

  “Next time you grab me like that, could you at least whisper in my ear that it’s you? I don’t need to always be drugged or manhandled!”

  “Why did you leave?” He ignored my question, but his voice was soft.

  “Why did I leave?” I replied incredulously. “Did you not hear what was coming out of your mouth? Aiden, you fed me to a pack of wolves and you expect me to stick around?”

  He looked hurt at my accusation.

  “I didn’t feed you to the wolves. I was trying to keep you safe until the best opportunity arose for me to get you out.” He reached out a hand to touch my leg, but I moved it away avoiding him. He took a deep breath before continuing. “Don’t you see, Laila? You can’t just wander the streets alone and pretend evil doesn’t exist. You can’t be so naïve”.

  “I of all people know about evil. I lived with it for a month. I experienced all it had to offer and more. That evil almost killed me.”

  “Then why just take off like you don’t have a care in the world? Like there isn’t danger lurking behind every corner for you? What are you even doing out here?”

  “Fresh air. Enjoying my freedom!”

  “Your freedom will be short-lived if you pull a stunt like that again.”

  He rose to his feet before extending a hand to me. Despite my hostility toward him, my leg had not recovered its feeling so I accepted his offer.

  “I need to talk to you, Laila, but for the moment, both our lives and your brother’s are in danger, so we have to be mindful of every step we make. We can’t just go gallivanting around town, pretending we have the luxury of freedom because we don’t. We need to go and warn Ethan back at the hotel.”

  He placed his hand on the small of my back to guide me. I didn’t shrug him off. Deep down I knew he was right. The last thing I wanted to do was let history repeat itself and end up back at the mercy of Juan and Hector.

  That was, of course, if they didn’t shoot us all on the spot.

  “I’m sorry, Aiden,” I said, offering an olive branch.

  He gave a genuine sympathetic smile. “I know you don’t trust me, Laila, but right now I really need you to.”

  Nodding simply, I allowed him to guide me back to the hotel in comfortable silence. It took us some time to get back and up until this point had been completely unaware I had walked such a distance in my anger-fuelled daze. We stuck to the shadows as we snaked our way back through the streets, becoming statues consumed with paranoia when ominous-looking cars drove past.

  What Aiden had said was true.

  We weren’t safe and we could trust no one.

  Without warning, Aiden came to an abrupt stop as we rounded a corner, causing me to collide against his back. His arm stretched behind his body, his hand tightly clasping mine.

  “What is it?” I whispered, unable to see around his large frame.

  He pulled my hand so I stood by his side. “That’s our hotel.”

  Both our gazes were directed to the glass window frontage allowing us a full view of what was going on inside. Two men took up the most of the space in the small waiting area. One stood looking noncommittally through the brochure rack on the side while the other discussed something heated with the rude receptionist.

  “Are they the same ones with the flashlights?” I asked, feeling rattled by the scene unfolding.

  “Quite possibly, and I’m almost certain there are more scouring the area.” Hearing his words, my stomach twisted. This couldn’t be happening. Not again!

  We watched as the man talking pulled something from his side pocket and slid it across the counter to the woman. She took it from him and offered a gratified smile.

  The men left without another word to the receptionist and after climbing back into their car, they took off slowly down the road.

  “Stay behind me,” Aiden ordered as we skulked across the roa
d. The lady had her back to the door and was blissfully unaware of the two of us approaching. Our footsteps were light and we moved with stealth-like precision. I wasn’t entirely sure what we were doing or what I expected to happen, but I didn’t have to wait long to find out.

  We had only just crossed the threshold when Aiden pulled a Glock that had been concealed by his jacket from the back of his pants. Before I had time to even question his motives, he had flicked the safety catch and pointed the gun directly at the woman behind the counter. She turned quickly at the sound of the clicking noise, but was too slow to react. A loud crack erupted though the small space, piercing my eardrums. Crouching on the ground, my gut threatened to spill its contents from the unexpected violence I had just witnessed.

  The woman fell against the wall behind her, blood blooming across her left shoulder as she sank to the floor in a heap. Something metallic and out of sight clattered on the tiles as she moaned in agony.

  Aiden stalked across the room as I remained rooted to the spot, shaking from fright. It had all happened within a blink of an eye and my brain felt like it was struggling to play catch up. Aiden had rounded the counter and was standing over the fallen woman, his Glock still pointed at her.

  “What are you doing?” I said, failing to disguise the panic in my voice. I knew she was a bitch, but he didn’t have to shoot her.

  He ignored me as he interrogated the woman slumped on the floor.

  “What did he say?”

  “Aiden leave her alone,” I stressed, “you can’t just shoot any–”.

  “Would you prefer she shot you first?” he interjected, turning his head a little in my direction, but careful to keep his eyes locked on the woman.

  “What are you talking about?”

  He kicked at an object on the ground and I watched dumbfounded as it slid across the tiles. It was a small revolver. I felt light-headed and my throat grew dry as realization dawned.

  “You were going to shoot us?” I asked indignantly. What did we ever do to her?

  “Not you, girl,” she began. “Him.” She pointed a lazy hand at Aiden.