Authors: Steve N. Lee
Tags: #Action Suspense Thriller
She turned.
But Mateusz was stronger than she’d bargained on and was already on his feet.
He heaved a mighty haymaker at her head.
She flung up a block to stop it, but too late – it glanced off her steel forearm guard and clipped the side of her head as she twisted away.
Tess staggered back. If she hadn’t been moving away already, she’d have been down and in deep trouble.
He stormed at her. Hurling punches with both fists.
Tess was so well-trained that without even thinking, she analyzed Mateusz’s punching. He kept such a steady rhythm, she slipped and ducked each one, while moving around to her left to get the angle she wanted and the opening she knew would come for an easy finish.
He flung another haymaker and stepped around to swing again.
Now she had the angle.
She slipped inside his next punch and powered in a cross to his body, a hook to his temple, and an elbow uppercut to his jaw.
He staggered to the edge of the deck.
Tess thundered a kick into his gut.
He toppled over the handrail and crunched onto the rail of the deck below on his back. His body bent in two the wrong way and then toppled over and smacked into the concrete dockside.
Tess stood still for a moment. Breathed. Let her mind and body calm after the storm.
After a few seconds, she dashed over to the red container that wasn’t lashed down with metal rods. On its right door, GDXU 6664219 was stenciled in black.
Tess smiled. She’d found Cat. Found Cat and God only knew how many other poor women.
With no padlock or seal to break, Tess levered up the handle on the first of the two locks barring the right-hand door and swung it around. She then tried to lever the second handle up out of its metal latch. It stuck, metal screeching on metal. She strained to open it.
Whimpering and panicked voices came from inside.
This really was it. She’d really found Cat.
Tess hit the handle upward with her palm. Again and again. Each time she hit it, the panicked screams grew louder. Bit by bit, the handle shifted until it was finally free.
The handle finally unlatched, Tess grabbed it to swing it around and free the women.
A shot shattered the stillness.
Tess cried out. As if she’d been hit in the back by a baseball bat, she smashed into the door and then collapsed to the deck.
Elena screamed. A guttural scream drenched in despair.
Pain tearing through Tess’s body, she gazed up, lying on her back.
Artur Bartosz, the redheaded man with the seadog face, stared at her. With one hand, he gripped Elena’s arm, while his other held a revolver to her head.
He cocked his gun. “On your knees, hands behind your head.”
Tears streaming her face, Elena gazed at Tess. “I’m sorry. So sorry.”
Wincing with the pain, Tess clambered up to her knees and put her hands behind her head one on top of the other.
Glancing at Kuba’s lifeless body, Artur clucked his tongue. He studied Tess. His lined face became even more lined, as if he was deep in thought.
He grimaced with disappointment and shook his head. “You could fetch a good price. But… you’re too dangerous. If you killed one of my customers you’d ruin me.”
He took his gun away from Elena’s head. Aimed it at Tess.
Images flashed into Tess’s mind. Images of her home in Manhattan. Of what had happened there. Of who she’d dreamed of finding for so very long, who she’d dreamed of punishing for what felt like her entire life. She’d dedicated the best part of ten years to acquiring the skills to handle any violent situation. But now…
Tess glowered at the gun, at her death.
She was on her knees. A gun aimed at her. Twenty-five feet between her and her attacker. She’d never cover the distance before he pulled the trigger.
She hadn’t intended to, but she’d sacrificed the justice she’d dreamed of seeing back home, for a chance to reap justice here. And she’d come close. So very close. It felt good knowing she’d tried. So goddamn good.
Tess smiled a peaceful smile at Elena. Let her know it wasn’t her fault. And waited for the bullet that would end her life and her dreams of vengeance.
But Elena lunged. She grabbed Artur’s gun hand and sank her teeth into it.
Cursing in Polish, he hurled Elena to the deck. And his gun blasted. Blasted. Blasted!
“No!” Tess screamed, even as her body was leaping up on autopilot, carrying her into battle once more.
She sped across the twenty-five-foot gap at Artur. As he swung his gun around to end her, she leapt into the air.
All in one flowing motion, she caught his gun arm under her left arm and pinned it to her body, clamped her legs around his waist, and hammered her right elbow into his face.
His body jerked under the force of her blow and a shot thundered away into the night sky.
He staggered back and as he smashed into a yellow container, his gun boomed its final shot. But he didn’t go down.
He flailed at Tess with his free hand, a punch hammering into her side where his first gunshot had hit her.
She cried out, pain ripping through her torso as if she’d been shot for real. Without meaning to, she relaxed her hold on him.
Both arms now free, Artur grabbed her and crashed her into the container door. He locked his hands around her throat. Squeezed.
Tess’s face twisted in pain as she struggled to breathe.
Artur sneered in her face.
He was going to kill her. She had only seconds before he either cut off the blood to her brain or crushed her windpipe. Either way, if she didn’t get him off her she was dead. Right here, right now.
Cupping her hands, she flung her arms out wide, then whipped them inwards as hard as she could. Her hands smashed over Artur’s ears.
He screeched as his eardrums burst, shooting intense pain straight through his head.
Tess fired an upward elbow into his jaw.
He crunched into the deck with her on top of him.
Tess heaved her right hand far back and let fly with a gigantic punch right into his face. Her steel-gloved fist shattered the bones in his nose. Blood splattered over both of them.
She punched again.
Her fist tore into his face time and again, pulverizing bone, pulping flesh. She pounded, unleashing fury for all of the innocents this monster had abused.
Tess screamed. A scream of rage laced with despair. And she punched and punched and punched and punched.
Finally, gasping for air, exhausted, she stopped and slouched forward.
Artur didn’t even look human – his entire face was caved in, like a pumpkin that had been beaten with a mallet.
Panting, Tess rolled off him. Crawled over to Elena. Took the woman’s head in her lap.
Blood pooled across the deck from the three holes in Elena’s torso.
Tears running down her face, Tess shook her head. “I told you to wait. I told you. You promised you would.”
“I-I heard gunshots. I th-thought” – Elena spluttered blood – “thought you needed h-help.”
Tess brushed Elena’s hair off her forehead. “But I told you to wait. You promised.”
Her hand shaking, Elena cupped Tess’s cheek. “You’re a g-good person, Tess.” She spluttered again. “I’d be s-so proud if you w-were my daughter.”
Tess choked hearing such words. Her chin quivered. But she struggled to be strong for Elena.
With her hand trembling, Elena pointed toward the container Tess had been opening. Her voice wavered. “Catalina.”
Tess gently laid Elena down so she could rest on her side to watch, then pushed to stand. She yelped and clutched her ribs under her right arm. Her bulletproof vest had stopped the bullet from penetrating her body, but it couldn’t stop the impact – the pain suggested it had cracked at least one rib. Holding her right side, she lurched over to the container with the lantern.
As Tess heaved open the container door women shrieked inside. Tess shone the lantern in. Engulfed in gloom and eerie shadows, twenty or thirty bedraggled women huddled together at the back of the container.
That was more than they’d had space for in Krakow. Had they stuck more than one woman in a room, or did they have a network of ‘hotels’ across the country and all the women were shipped en masse?
Beckoning to the women, Tess said, “It’s okay, you can come out.”
The women exchanged anxious glances.
Tess used the only Polish she knew which might help – please.
“Poprosze.”
Outside, in the distance, a siren wailed.
Maybe thinking the police were on their way to save them, a blonde woman let go of the brunette next to her and edged toward the door.
Tess coaxed her forward with a wave of her hand.
“Poprosze.”
She stepped to one side so the woman could see the world beyond.
Warily, the blonde tottered out.
Seeing one of their kin escape, others tentatively followed.
Once outside, some women cowered in the clearing’s corners, overwhelmed and crying to themselves; some clung to each other, not knowing where to run to; some clambered down the ladder or dropped over the side of the gangway, desperate to be anywhere but there.
“Tess?” called Elena.
Tess looked back.
The blood-soaked lady reached for her.
Tess scampered back. Cradled her again so she could see the women leaving the container. Despite Elena’s illness, despite her bullet wounds, she smiled. Smiled like a child at Christmas expecting to find a gift they’d longed for.
The wailing sirens drew closer. Many sirens.
Elena clasped Tess’s hand. “Go. I’ll w-wait for Cat.”
“I’m not leaving you.”
“You have to. You’ll g-go to p-prison. They won’t c-care you saved all these w-women.”
“I’m not leaving you.”
Woman after woman nervously crept out of their cell. They each gazed up at the moon, at the heavens, and freedom.
“Please, Tess,” said Elena. “Leave me.”
“Shhh. Watch for Cat.”
A girl in jeans and naked from the waist up staggered out of the container, her arms clutched across her chest. Then a small woman with a bloody face and a filthy yellow dress hobbled out. And then there was only darkness looming from the container’s doorway.
“Catalina?” Elena said, her Christmas smile replaced by a frown.
“I’ll find her.”
The sirens raced up the dockside. Closer and closer to the ship.
Wincing with each movement, Tess again lurched over to the container. She peered inside. Empty.
Anguish hit Tess as if the bullet had blasted through her vest.
“Oh God, no.”
The traffickers didn’t only have other ‘hotels’, they obviously had other women on other ships.
Tess slumped against the door, her legs so wobbly she thought she was going to collapse. She’d sacrificed so much. They’d
both
sacrificed so much. And this was what they got? She punched the container but immediately flinched and grabbed her side.
Her head hung, she turned to Elena.
The lady had fallen onto her back, eyes staring straight up.
“Elena? Elena!”
Tess dashed to her. Cradled her.
“No.” Tess hammered her fist into the deck. Her chest shuddered as she sobbed. “No!”
Somewhere on the ship, she heard police officers shouting, women screaming, panic and commotion.
She had to escape.
Had to get away before they found her.
Tears blurring her vision, Tess glanced around.
She had three choices: leap overboard into the Baltic Sea and swim to safety, praying her broken ribs wouldn’t cause her to sink to the seabed; fight her way off the ship through the police, praying there wouldn’t be too many trigger-happy heroes; stay with Elena and throw herself at the mercy of the law, praying it would overlook the six men she’d slaughtered and not slam her in a dark, dirty hole for the rest of her life.
Guns drawn, police officers swarmed over the ship, barking commands and herding everyone together. They entered Tess’s metal clearing.
Konrad Nowak’s partner pulled their ambulance alongside the two already parked beside the docked container ship. He gaped at all the police cars scattered along the dockside. In all his seventeen years as a paramedic, he’d never seen anything like this.
Climbing out of his ambulance, he shot a quick wave to his colleagues Felix and Kasia as they loaded a woman on a gurney into the back of their ambulance.
Scrambling around to fetch one of his own gurneys, Konrad scanned the ship. Police officers scoured the vessel, their flashlight beams slicing away the night. But cars and officers at a crime scene were nothing new. No, what made this different was the tens of distressed women being corralled together near the stacked containers on the dock.