by Jay McLean
I was so fucking close to her, and I didn’t even realize it.
There are also images of where they presume she’d been sleeping, made noticeable only by the outlined stain of where her body had lain. There were no blankets, no pillows, not even a fucking mattress. Next to the stain was a five-gallon bottle of water that—according to the report—was replenished only once a week, just like the cans of food littered throughout the space. She was given just enough to survive but wasn’t given anything to eat with. She ate with her hands, hands that were permanently cuffed and attached to a long chain that was bolted down onto the cement floor. Her only saving grace was that they continued to give her the meds that Tiny kept supplying, but they didn’t monitor it like they should have.
The report states that she’d tried to escape once. She clawed at that bolt until her fingers bled, and when the enforcer returned and noticed the bloodstains surrounding it, he left and returned with a bag of cement and water. He held a gun to her head and watched while she went to work, applying more cement to where she was chained to, inevitably putting the final nail in her own coffin.
At the words attempted suicide, I stop reading.
I can’t see through my fucking tears anyway.
But I can see it in my mind, picture her there, fading away, dying a slow death...
Because of me.
I realize I’m shaking now, my fingers trembling as I bring them to my eyes, wipe away the liquid guilt.
I take one more look at the photograph of her taken post-rescue. It’s similar to her mug shot, only it’s full-body, and I can see her bones protruding from every angle, see the bruises on her wrists left by the cuffs.
I close the file.
Stare ahead.
My mind races with too many thoughts I can’t focus on one.
“There’s one more.” I don’t know how long Bailey’s been standing there, leaning against the doorway, no doubt watching me sitting behind a desk going through the emotions linked with every horrendous image, every horrifying word I’ve forced myself to read.
I look up at her, her figure blurred by my weakness. “I don’t know if I can see any more.”
“What?” She kicks off the doorframe. “You can’t handle it?”
Shaking my head, I keep my eyes on hers as she walks toward me. “No,” I answer honestly.
“That’s too bad, Nate,” she says, her tone flat. “You don’t have a choice.” And with that, she drops another fuckin’ photograph on the table between us.
My eyes drift shut, and I try to breathe through the pain.
Inhale.
Exhale.
“Look at it!” she whisper-yells, and I can feel the strain of her words fighting for fortitude.
I open my eyes, crack open my heart for her. Then I lower my gaze, glance at the picture. I’m quick to look back at her because it isn’t what I was expecting, and I don’t want to see it.
“Look at it, Nate!” she snaps, slamming her palm on the table.
I give her what she wants, what she seems to need, and focus on the still image of us taken from the security camera of our basement. It’s of her. Of us. Making love. We’re naked, and she’s sitting on my lap, with her back arched, head back, her eyes closed in pleasure. My mouth is on her breast while my hands grip her hair, tugging gently.
I sniff once, muster whatever strength I have left to meet her glare.
She’s disgusted.
Contempt.
And I’m empty.
Broken.
“Where did you get this?”
She crosses her arms. “It was slid under the front door of the house where you dumped me.”
I cringe at her words.
“Along with a note,” she adds, her teeth clamped shut as she speaks through her anger.
“What did the note say?”
“That they knew who I was. They knew what you did and what we were doing. They said that if I didn’t find a way to get Tiny to stop coming by and go with them willingly… they’d…”
I exhale through my nose, every single muscle tense. “They’d what, Bailey?”
“They’d kill you.”
I can’t look at her anymore. “Bailey…”
“So, I did what they wanted…”
I drop my head in my hands, fist the strands of my hair. Pray that she doesn’t hear the single cry that forms in my throat.
“I did it for you, Nate.”
19
BAILEY
“So Franco and Benny… they’ve had access to the cameras this entire time…” Tiny mumbles, pacing what we call the “evidence room.”
Nate sits in a chair, his head in his hands. He hasn’t moved since Tiny and the agents joined us, hasn’t said a word.
“How long have you had the cameras?” Brent asks, his back against the wall, his arms crossed.
“The ones at Nate’s parents’ house were set up by his dad before he died, and I put up the ones at Bailey’s right before she moved there.”
Nate’s shoulders lift with a heavy inhale, but he remains silent.
“And where were you getting the equipment from?” Brent asks. “A store or…”
“Just… a guy.”
“A guy?”
“Yeah, a guy.”
“So they’re stolen?” Perceval scoffs.
Tiny shrugs. “I don’t know,” he retorts, sarcasm dripping in his tone. “Want me to call him and ask?”
Brent again: “How do you know the guy?”
“Through Benny,” Nate finally speaks up. “It’s all through Benny.” His gaze flicks to Tiny before landing on Brent. “They probably want access to everything to make it easier to pin on me when shit hits the fan.”
“Oh.” Tiny lets out a disbelieving snort. “So we’re just telling them everything now?”
Nate shrugs as he gets to his feet, his entire demeanor dejected. “I have nothing left to lose, man, but if you want out, go for it.”
“What does he mean by everything?” Perceval asks.
Nate ignores this, and, instead, walks out of the room and returns a moment later with an armful of guns. After handing Tiny his weapons, he turns to Perceval. “I just need one.”
“One what?”
“One reason not to go to them right now and put a single bullet through each of their fuckin’ brains,” Nate says, his tone so flat it’s terrifying.
I hate this version of him.
The one I fear.
Perceval’s eyes are clear, his words concise. “I’ll give you two,” he states. “One: you kill them, someone else will take their place. There’ll be other girls. It won’t end just because you end them.”
Nate’s throat moves with his swallow. “And two?”
Perceval works his jaw. “I don’t get my little girl back.”
The silence that fills the room is palpable. Until: “Uhh, Boss Man?”
All eyes go to Tiny, who’s pointing at one of the missing persons’ posters.
“You know her?” Perceval asks.
“Holy fuck,” Nate whispers, his eyes narrowed. I watch his fingers flex around something in his pocket, but he doesn’t reveal what it is.
Tiny yanks the sheet off the wall and holds it closer to his face. “Look at that; her name actually is Dana.”
Perceval raises his voice; his words rushed when he says, “Where is she?”
“We have her,” Nate mumbles, glancing at me.
Brent steps between us. “How? Where?”
Nate lowers his head. “She was staying at the house that Bailey...”
“We need to get to her,” Perceval says. “We need to question her.”
“And take her back to her family, right?” Tiny questions.
“Yeah, yeah,” Perceval responds. “Of course.”
“Let’s go,” Nate tells Tiny, who folds and pockets the poster.
Tiny follows him out of the room. Then we all do. Nate’s not the one in charge here, yet his presence is that of a k
ing. He and Tiny make it to the front door before Brent orders, “You need to give her to us!”
Nate’s shoulders tense, and he turns to him. “You’ll get your chance,” he tells Brent before moving toward me. He stops only inches away, towering over me, and it takes everything in me to stand my ground, to not rear back, not run and hide. The warmth of his breath hits my forehead, and words catch in my throat when he raises his hand, the tips of his fingers brushing against mine.
I cannot move.
Cannot breathe.
His heated touch trails up my arm—each second feeling like an eternity—until his fingers are on my neck, his palm flat against my cheek.
I suck in what air I can manage and release it in a silent sob that has my eyes filling with tears of longing, of mourning something that once was so real and so raw and so achingly beautiful.
My hands ball into fists while his nose runs the length of my cheek and across my ear. “Ti amo,” he whispers, “mia bella ragazza.”
I choke on a gasp, and when I open my eyes, he’s already gone, too far out of reach.
Not that I’d want to…
He opens the door. “Tomorrow. Ten a.m. You can get the girl from the salon,” he says, not bothering to look back.
I’m numb from his touch, from his words.
“Speaking of the salon…” Brent calls after him. “Is she going to be a problem?”
Nate freezes just outside the door, his back turned. “Who?”
“Your wife.”
My entire body goes slack.
The door slams without a verbal response.
Next to me, Brent sighs. “Bailey?”
I stare at the void Nate left behind.
“Bailey?”
He has a wife.
A life.
A future.
All things I’d been stripped off.
“Bailey?!”
I snap out of my daze and look up at Brent. “Huh?”
“It’s been a long day,” he says, a sad smile marring his features while he runs a hand up and down my arm. “You want to stay here tonight?”
I look at the closed door, then back at Brent. “Yeah,” I say, nodding. “I don’t want to be alone.”
20
NATE
“Drive,” is all I say when I get into the black SUV. It’s no real surprise the agents showed up just outside the salon at precisely 10:00 a.m.
“Where’s the girl?” Perceval asks, turning to me from the front passenger seat. Neilson, behind the wheel, puts the car in park—his way of telling me we’re not going anywhere.
Too bad for him, I hold all the cards. Besides, I’m all out of patience. And I’m fucking tired. I’d spent all night tossing and turning, trying to push away the images of Bailey chained up and… I needed to get out of my head, and the only way I could do that was through booze and drugs, and I came close. So fucking close. But then I thought about her and her final words to me: I did it for you. And so I got up, got dressed, hit the gym—my only outlet—and made a promise to her using the same words.
I’ll do it for you.
I made small amendments to my final plan, and now I’m sitting here with two fucking feds, wound too fucking tight, and I’m struggling to keep it together.
I blink hard to fight the fatigue. “You’ll get her; I just have a couple of requests first.”
“That wasn’t part of the deal,” Perceval says.
“I wasn’t aware we had a deal,” I scoff. “And you better start driving before people get suspicious.”
“I told you this was a bad idea,” Neilson mumbles as he pulls out of the spot. “And I thought you weren’t into mind games, DeLuca.”
“I like some games,” I tell him, kicking my legs out as far as they can go. I try to relax into the seat and slump down a little. “I like chess.”
Perceval heaves out a breath as he looks out the windshield. He’s pissed because I’m getting under his skin. If only he knew what it was like to live in mine…
I say, “The pawn’s my favorite.”
He eyes me through the rear-view mirror but doesn’t speak.
“See, at the start of the game, it can be two steps forward, one step back, but in the end, we all have the same goal, right?”
“And what’s that?”
The sound of my knuckles cracking fills the cab. “To take down the empire.”
“This motherfucker,” he murmurs to Neilson before turning to me. “What are your requests?”
“I have two.”
“Of course you do.”
I stare out the window, watch the world fly by as we pass Logan Square. “I need access to Bailey,” I tell them. “Unlimited and unmanned.”
“That’s not going to happen,” says Neilson.
Ignoring him, I say, “You guys are busy. I’m sure you can’t always be there for her, but I can. I need to be her first point of contact.”
“You need to be, huh?”
I exhale, low and slow, and let my shoulders fall with the force of it. “No one’s going to care more about her safety than me—”
Neilson clears his throat.
“—and this way, if anything happens, if she’s somehow found out, it’s not tied to you, and you can carry on with your investigation. No one has to know your involvement in the bigger picture.” I sit taller. “It’ll just look like I put her there to stop Parker from getting info on me for the detective.”
Neilson makes a sharp left while Perceval ponders this information. Dropping his head, he grips the back of his neck. “Give him the phone,” he tells Neilson.
My pulse skips a beat.
Neilson white knuckles the steering wheel. “No.”
“Give him the goddamn phone,” Perceval deadpans.
Neilson glances at me before focusing on the road again. “Give us the girl first.”
Fuck this shit. “Drop me off here.”
“Neilson, hand it over.” Perceval’s words are an order this time.
Neilson reaches into his suit jacket pocket and reveals an old flip phone. “A burner?” I ask.
Perceval nods. “Neilson’s been using it to keep in contact since she moved into the apartment. She’s under Madison.”
“Madison?”
“That’s her name now,” he informs. “The contact in hers is Sara.”
I flip open the phone and go through the contacts. The only one in there is Madison.
“What’s your second request?” Perceval asks.
We drive past the salon again. We’re going in circles.
I tell him, “Short of murdering someone, Tiny and Ashton are granted immunity from everything.”
He turns to me, his eyebrow quirked. “And you?”
“I really couldn’t give a shit what happens to me.” Besides, I don’t plan on being around for the downfall.
After grabbing a notepad and pen from his pocket, he says, “I’ll start the paperwork, but I need full names.”
“Can’t you look that up?”
He rolls his eyes. “I can, but you’re right fucking here, so...”
“Mark Angelo Wade.”
“And?”
I stare down at my knuckles, bloodied and bruised from going one-on-one with a hundred-pound bag. “Ashton Elena DeLuca.”
He stops writing, glances up at me. “I don’t know if I can make full immunity work.”
“You’re going to have to.”
“I need something more here, DeLuca,” he says, shoving his notepad and pen back in his pocket. “You know this business. It’s give and take.”
“You give me your word you’ll do what you can, and not only will I give you the girl, but I’ll give you the addresses of every drug house linked to Franco.”
“I told you,” says Perceval, “we’re not interested in the drugs.”
Shrugging, I tell him, “I figure at some point the girls probably age out, become too used, too damaged. Where do you think they throw them after that? If Bailey…” I
trail off, the instant ache in my chest making it impossible to finish the thought.
“All right,” Perceval says with a nod. “We’ll get the DEA involved so it doesn’t come back to us.”
A beat passes before Neilson speaks up. “Want to tell me where the fuck I’m going?”
“Multi-level parking garage on Sixth.” I flip open the phone again, go through the call log. There are dozens of back and forth calls between them, not a single one missed.
“What floor?” Neilson asks.
I check the messages, and all air leaves my lungs.
“DeLuca?” Neilson yells. I look up at him through the rear-view, watch as his eyes flick to the phone in my hand. His brow dips, and his lips thin to a line. He knows exactly what I’m seeing, but he won’t say it out loud.
“Third floor,” I mutter, holding his gaze.
When he looks away, I go back to the phone, to the last set of messages:
Madison: I met a Ky.
Sara: Good.
Madison: I miss you.
Sara: Me too.
21
BAILEY
Sara: Fire escape.
Madison: It’s locked. Don’t worry.
Sara: Which room gives you access again?
Madison: Bedroom. Why?
Sara: Flick the light on and off twice.
Madison: ?
Sara: Just do it.
With a yawn, I check the time. It’s close to midnight, and even though the bed should be where I lay my head down to sleep, I just can’t find comfort in it. Rubbing my eyes, I get off the couch, move to the bedroom, and do what a good little pawn is supposed to do. I flick the light on and off twice.
Madison: And?
I stare at the phone, waiting for a response. When nothing comes after a minute or so, I start to head back to the living room, but a knock on the window stops me. Then a text comes through.
