The porn basket
The driver and I sat perfectly still, waiting outside the second building where Servario would be met to exchange cash and guns with the worst people in the world. They truly were the monsters your mother warned you about when you were a child. The worst of men that laughed in the faces of victims as they took everything they wanted. The sort of men who respected no one and feared nothing.
They made my blood boil.
I sat there, tapping my perfectly sculpted nail against the rim of the window, waiting for him to reappear.
The driver didn't make a sound. He sat perfectly still.
I sighed, drawing his face up so he could see me in the rearview mirror. “Shouldn't be too much longer, ma’am.”
I nodded, pulling out another dose of my amazingly poor Southern accent. “Y’all are awfully polite for such bad people.”
He lifted his eyebrows. “We are bad?”
It made me smile my response. “Reminds me of home. We always like to say the nicest thing and mean the worst.”
He chuckled as if he knew what I was talking about. He leaned into the back, I assumed to tell me some funny story about how his people in the Middle East also did this. What I got was a hand up the skirt.
I tried smiling and turning him down politely. “Sir, please. Let’s not get into any trouble, huh?” I swatted at his grabby octopus hands and arms, but his size won over.
He slid into the backseat as if he didn't think Servario was coming back anytime soon. I had stashed one thing and one thing only on my body. The only weapon I had. I remembered it from training; a woman’s best place to hide a weapon was her hair. I lifted my hand, pulling the long, thin silver pin I had used to hold my half twist in place. I let him slide his hand down the top of my dress the way Servario had done and stabbed quickly into his temple, sliding away from the stream of blood as he collapsed.
I contemplated leaving the thin sword-like hairpin where it was, embedded into the side of his head, but it was my only weapon. I dragged it out, feeling his body twitch next to mine as he died slowly and his grip lessened.
I slumped him onto the floor of the backseat with a huge amount of effort, ripping my dress a little but not caring the slightest. Running my hands over his warm body, I searched for a piece but there was nothing. He was unarmed. I jumped into the front seat, feeling around the car for a gun. Finally, I opened the trunk and sighed when I discovered a cache of weapons. He had grenades, handguns, and assault rifles. My best chance was with some handguns, but I grabbed a grenade just in case and tucked it into my cleavage.
I turned and ran toward the direction I had seen Servario walk when he left with Harry, the man who had been hugging him and calling him Gustavo.
The streets were busy, even there in the industrial part of town. I hurried past several groups of people.
I stopped walking and listened for any sign that they were left or right on the street lined with buildings. The heat had sweat plastered to my forehead and underarms, and I dearly regretted not wearing underwear.
A red light inside a building caught my eye. The outside was sandstone and old looking, even charming. But the inside had several red lights glowing through the windows. To me a red light always meant prostitutes so I decided to give it a go and see what happened.
My heels clicked against the beautiful street as I rounded the side of the building to the back. A single steel door with dark-green paint sat there, looking awfully lonely, considering the larger doors had been at the front of the building. I tucked my guns, pulled my hairpin out, and thumped on the door. It hurt my knuckles to do it.
I rapped again, only harder. The door groaned as a large man opened it, giving me an odd look.
“I’m here to meet Harry. I have the virgins.”
He scowled, about to say something, but I jumped, driving the hairpin into his temple, right where I’d lodged it in the driver. He staggered back, but I pulled him forward and let him fall onto the street. I really hoped I was right as he died. I pulled the hairpin out of his head, wiped it on him, and crept inside the building. I closed the door, letting my eyes adjust to the dark and creepy glow of the red lights.
A sound near the back of the large open-warehouse-style building drew my attention that way.
I slipped my shoes off and tiptoed over the pale stone floor. When I got to the back, there was a long hallway with nothing—just silence and lights, thankfully not red ones.
At the end of the hall there was an entrance with a sign in Arabic. I twisted the handle slowly, peeking past the thick door. It was a waiting room with seats made of leather and a basket of magazines, only they were not like the ones my doctor and dentist had. They were porn. What kind of office had a porn basket?
I closed the door, slipping the hairpin back into my hair, trying my best to ignore the human remains on it, and pulled a gun. Ever so softly, I slinked down the hall, searching for the answer to the question of who keeps fucking porn in the magazine basket. The answer came in the second hallway, behind the first door I cracked open. Peering into the small slit, I realized it was just like the office we had raided and saved the sex slaves from last time. I knew this would be the exact same situation. I would open doors and find horrors I couldn't unsee.
Leaving the door ajar and my heart closed, I crept into the room, pulling out my hairpin and stabbing as the frightened eyes of the victim being assaulted closed. She didn't see the horrors I committed upon the man tormenting her, just as I overlooked the ones she was suffering through.
I lifted a finger to my lips—a bloody finger. She shook, sobbing and scared. Needle marks scarred her arms and a black bruise marred her face. “Are you American?”
She nodded, heaving when she heard me speak, “Just stop crying and follow me. I’ll get you out.”
“My sister—” Her Southern accent bothered me, like she had been one of the girls I was selling.
“Okay.” I sighed. “We’ll find her too. Just shut up, please. We can all cry and drink some scotch on the plane ride home.”
She stood on filthy feet and shaky legs and followed me from the room. She leaned against the wall in the hallway as I interrupted the occupants of room number two. It was much worse—a horror show—but both men were dead within seconds. I dragged the young girl, who was maybe nineteen, from the room. She collapsed into the sobbing arms of the other girl.
“Is this your sister?”
The first girl shook her head as silent tears rolled down her cheeks.
I turned and started toward door number three, scared of what we would find. Each door got worse as we went along. The sex of the slave changed a couple of times, but the age stayed very close to twenty. It was sick and disturbing, but I thanked God for their ages. I didn’t need to see a small child in the arms of a grown man. There are things you cannot drink away. I knew that already.
We cleared a whole hallway without any interruptions. That made me suspicious. So I led them all into a room, the sobbing and traumatized mess they were, and whispered, “I will be right back. Do not make any noise and do not leave this room. I will be back.”
Not a single one believed me. The hollowness in their eyes and the acceptance of their fates told me they might even be beyond saving.
I snuck down another corridor until I reached a large area. Men were laughing and playing cards. I could see them through the slight crack in the open doorway. Servario was one of them. Guns sat on the table as they laughed and joked.
My heart was racing, imagining the worst of him. He wasn't in trouble. He wasn't scared. He was drinking scotch and smoking a cigar. He was fine and I was a mess.
I turned, certain he had a reason for staying and laughing while the driver sexually assaulted me. Not even mentioning the sexually assaulted teenagers down the hall. Whatever that reason was though, I didn't give a flying fuck.
I
could not risk anyone for the good of the world. It wasn’t who I was.
I stalked back to the room I had left the teenagers in, opening the door slowly. One of the boys jumped at me, but I caught his weak arm in my hand. I lifted a finger to my lips.
They gripped one another and followed me back to the green door. We slipped out onto the road, each of them crying and sobbing and wanting to kiss the ground, but I shook my head. “Kiss American soil when we get home. Right now, we gotta go.” I started to run at a light jogging pace back to the car with the dead driver. I grabbed my cell phone from my clutch in the backseat and dialed 9-1-1.
“JESUS CHRIST, EVIE! WHERE THE FUCKING HELL ARE YOU?” Coop was calmer than I had imagined he would be. He was only screaming and swearing, not threatening to kill me himself.
“Running back to the Burj Al Arab in Dubai.”
“OH THANK GOD, YOU’RE STILL HERE! YOU SCARED THE HELL OUT OF ME! WHERE ARE YOU? I WILL COME AND GET YOU!”
“Just stop freaking out. I can meet you on the beach by the hotel. Bring a boat that can take about fifteen teenagers in bad shape.” I clicked the phone off and continued running. I opened my Google Maps and put the hotel into the link. We ran through the side streets and across main intersections. They were dressed in sheets and blankets and not one person stopped for us.
No one cared about the group of people who were clearly injured. Not that it would have done a fucking bit of good. I would have killed anyone who stopped as it was.
When we made it to the beach I almost started crying too. The sand and rocks on my feet were soothing and amazing, like a sign that I might actually make it back alive with the kids—the kids I couldn't turn and look back at. The kids I didn't want to mother, regardless of the desire I had to do it. I just couldn't. The horrors in my mind, lurking behind my eyes, were too fresh. I needed a minute and a drink and maybe some heroin.
But I didn't get any of that.
I turned and pointed at the seawall along the beach. “Sit there and talk to no one. Unless I come, you are a shipwrecked group of sailing kids who are awaiting your parent chaperones. That's your story.”
One of the boys nodded, giving me a look. “Who are you?”
“Someone who can sneak you in and out of countries without telling anyone. That's all you need to know.” It wasn't even the truth. If I was honest I would have hugged them all and cried about their wounds and made them a tea. That was more who I was. The bitch who killed all those men, that bitch wasn't me. She was a trained assassin who came out when I needed her. Her only demand was that I looked the other way when Gustavo Servario unbuckled his pants.
It had taken us half an hour to get to the beach so I had to pray that Coop would hurry and arrive any second before the most dangerous men in Dubai figured out I had stolen their precious imports.
I paced the beach, repositioning the guns in the back of my dress and attempting to flush out images that were burned into my retinas.
I forced myself to look at them, all of them. They were a straggly looking bunch of teenagers. It was the horror movie version of an Abercrombie and Fitch commercial. I could have cried but I didn't. I focused on the fact that they were alive. Yes, the worst things that could be done to a person had been done to them, but they were alive.
The girl I had rescued first was sitting on the far edge. She had a look on her face that told me I hadn’t found her sister in the group. I flinched when I thought about the plan forming in my head, but when a boat came along the harbor, I knew I had to go back. I had to. Coop and Luce hit the wharf with intensity, running down the beach. The kids behind me cowered, but I ran to the two people racing for us. Jack stayed with the boat, talking on the radio. Luce and Coop both wrapped themselves around me, hugging hard. Luce trembled when she spoke, “Quite the find, Evie.”
“You have no idea.” I glanced back at them. “You have to get them out. They need to be taken back to US soil, now. You guys need to go, before they find out they’re gone.”
Coop gripped me, trying to get me to look at him. “Are you okay?”
“No.” I shook my head. “I will be when they’re gone and there is no chance of them going back. They’re just kids.”
Coop lifted my chin, holding my face and staring deeply into my eyes. “Get in the boat. I will find Servario. Or better yet, we leave him behind and let him sort this out on his own. He has connections enough to get out.”
I almost nodded, almost taking the path of least resistance, but the idea that I left the dead driver in the car made me shake my head. “I have to go back. I sprung a trap and left him there to be blamed for it all.”
Coop rolled his beautiful blue eyes. “He has hung you out to dry tons of times. You owe him. Let’s go.”
“Right.” I stepped back. “But that's not me. I wouldn't ever leave someone behind. I don't believe in leaving someone to fend for themselves. I’m not you or Servario.” I turned and ran back into the dark toward the kids. “Go to the boat. These are American agents. They will take you to safety.”
I fled, hearing footsteps behind me on the sidewalk when I got back up there. My feet burned and ached from running barefoot, but I had endured worse pain than that before. At least I had worn a comfortable dress. I stopped at a busy streetlight, the one we had gotten lucky with on the way to the beach. Luce caught up with me. She huffed next to me, making me feel better about my fitness level as I wheezed and waited for the light.