Page 181 of Beautifully Ruined

The door takes three of Gino’s men to kick down, and it’s a sitting room, sparse, empty with another door beyond, and suddenly someone runs out, opening fire. I push the girl down, firing back as her guard jumps in front of her, taking a bullet.

Enzo and his uncle’s men shoot the two men dead, and we swarm in, leaving Macy and her guard behind. He looks like he’s still breathing, but I don’t care.

There’s only one person on my mind. Vi.

The room, the rows of cells beyond?

Empty.

“This way,” shouts one of Gino’s men. Stairs. We race up them, someone radioing in to Gino.

I push my way to the front.

If she’s dead, I’ll burn the place down. I’ll hunt down and kill every last motherfucker involved.

We come up, out, onto a floor? An area? I don’t know where we are. We’re in the boroughs of New York, but it feels like we’re in a hangar.

No. Not a hangar. There are crates.

And there, as we round the corner, are chained naked women.

I zero in on one. My heart wants to burst as my stomach twists.

Vi. My Vi. Naked. Chained. It should be by rights a fantasy. It’s a nightmare. There’s a bruise starting on her face and tear tracks.

Two more men come running, but Gino’s men shoot one dead and maim the other. Ten women. All naked. All beautiful, but Vi, my beautiful Violet, she’s alive.

My knees give way, and I stumble, hitting the ground, but I get up and run.

Next to her is Gianna.

All around me is shouting, but I drown them out, looking around for a key to undo the locks.

Fuck it.

I drop my pack, not caring about my computer and dig past my lockpicks for my keys and a certain small key I keep there.

It’s generic. Police and law enforcement issued. Something every kinky bastard should own.

Handcuff key. I unlock all the girls, and then I rip off my jacket and throw it around Vi. Pulling her close. Enzo appears and wraps Gianna in his. One by one, Gino’s men strip shirts and jackets and wrap them around the naked girls. And then Enzo sits as someone talks on a phone to Gino.

Again, I don’t care. I don’t care if he owns me. I hold Violet as she shivers and cries in my arms. I just whisper sweet words to her, tell her how much I love her, tell her she’s fine, tell her nonsensical things. And I’m not sure if I’m calming her or myself or both.

“Cade.”

I stop talking and look over at Enzo who has his computer open.

“Fuck, the information your little Ghost got us? Gold, fucking gold.”

“Cade, he…he… said we were being sold to the highest bidder,” she says to me. They stripped us, chained us, and left us here. He’s coming back. I know it. A-and Walsh was here, too…”

Thomas is the ‘he’ she’s talking about. But I look to Enzo again because this sure looks like a trafficking point. Chain them, leave them, and then put them in a crate for delivery to a site to sell. We must be a few buildings down from the fishing store, and the back opens up, I’m betting to an area trucks can be driven down here and loaded up.

I have an inkling what Enzo found. “Trafficking?”

“Man, it’s not just trafficking, this is an international ring, and we’ve just cracked it open. It’s all on the files, and your virus will infect anything else they touch from these files. Copy them and destroy the computer upstairs, and your virus hitches a ride?”

I kick my bag to him. “You can do it remotely. It’ll upload in seconds. They shouldn’t know we’re here yet.”