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CHAPTER 7

JAXSON

“Help!”

A muffled voice echoes through the night as we wade through the shipping containers to find the one our intel says holds human cargo. This is the fourth country we’ve raided since we rescued Aurora, and we’re all tired. The son of a bitch at the helm of the organization keeps evading us. Every time we think we are close to eliminating him, he slips through our fingers. Despite this, we have managed to recover almost fifty trafficking victims.

I hold up my fist. “Did you hear that?”

All of our heads swivel when a thump reverberates to the left of us. Switching to hand signals, I form a circle with my thumb and pointer finger and hold it up to my eye indicating to my team to be on the lookout for hostiles and then wave them forward to the storage unit.

Pop. Pop.

Our guns are equipped with silencers, but the guard falls from the roof of the container. Immediately, boots stomp across the pavement toward the dead body. We duck into another row as shouts in Russian fill the air and bright flood lights penetrate the darkness that hovers over the giant box.

So much for the element of surprise.

“That pissed them off. They’re fanning out,” Thomas translates quietly. “There’s at least six on the ground. Three coming from the north and three from the east.”

“Roger that.” I duck to the south, lift my hand, and wave forward for everyone to follow. We circle around so we’re on the backside of the unit a few rows down. The floodlights are sitting on each of the four corners of the container holding the victims. “Bennett, can you get close enough to take those bulbs out?”

Bennett grins. “I thought you were gonna ask me to do something hard.”

Before I can deck him, he takes off. The shattering of glass reaches our ears, and sudden blackness descends upon us again.

Thomas chuckles. “They’re going back to the front of the box.”

“We could cut a hole in the back of the container and get people out that way,” Carver offers.

“Too loud,” Hudson interjects. “Plus, we have no idea what shape they’re in. Are they gonna be able to walk on their own, let alone be quiet?”

“Hudson’s right,” I agree. “They know we’re here. Might as well have some fun.”

Bennett jogs back to my side. “Oorah,” he whispers. “There are six hostiles total.”

“Thomas, you and Carver take the left,” I order. “Hudson, you’re with me. Bennett, get your ass on the roof and cover us.”

“Roger that,” they say in unison.

We edge closer to the unit, our backs plastered to the wall. Carver cups his hands, and Bennett slips his foot in. With a push from Carver, Bennett scales the eight-foot wall with ease. I give the signal, and we make our way toward our targets.

I step around the corner first and come face to face with a giant behemoth Russian.

“Who the fuck ar?—”

I pull my arm back and strike with my fist in his carotid artery. His eyes roll into the back of his head before he falls forward, landing flat on his face.

“That was anticlimactic,” I mumble, pulling out my marine-issued Cold Steel SRK from its sheath. I lift his head off the concrete and slice his neck like a hot knife through butter.

Blood pounds in my ears, and adrenaline pushes me to seek another target to destroy. Carver is grappling with someone but seems to have the upper hand. A shot rings out, and a body drops behind me. I look up to Bennett, who is saluting me behind his sniper rifle. Thomas stabs another man in the heart repeatedly before putting a bullet in his head. Two more shots ring out, courtesy of Bennett. Bodies litter the ground, but we don’t have time to focus on cleanup.

“Hudson, get those doors open,” I command.

Hudson pulls the bolt cutter out of his pack and cuts the padlock off. Bennett flips off the roof, ready to assist with the victims. Thomas and Carver lift the latches and swing the doors open.

The rancid stench of urine and feces hits us like a brick wall. One girl stands, clutching her torn shirt around her while everyone else is slumped against the wall. Hudson shines a light into the container, and the female places her hands in front of her face to shield her eyes.

“Please,” she begs. “I want to go home.”

I move forward slowly. “We’re here to take you home. What’s your name?”

“Alexis,” she sniffles.

“How old are you, Alexis?”

“Fourteen.”

Red clouds my vision. Growls from my men penetrate the air, and Alexis shrinks back.

Hudson rushes to her side. “We didn’t mean to scare you, sweetheart. We’re Marines, the good guys. Don’t worry, we’ll take you home.”

“Promise?” she asks, hopeful.

“On my life,” Hudson promises.

He leads her out the open doors, and the rest of us wade through the throng of bodies. Their eyes are unfocused, in a zombie-like trance. Thomas tries asking them questions, but none of them are responsive.

“Including Alexis, we have twenty-two people. Appears to be at least three males, and the rest are females,” Bennett reports. “I don’t know for sure, but based on looks alone, I think Alexis is the youngest.”

“How are we getting them back to the boat?” Carver inquires. “They’re in no shape to walk out of here.”

“You’ll have to put your hotwiring skills to use,” I say with a smirk. “I saw a flatbed by the observation tower. You and Thomas head that way. Keep an eye out. We have no way of knowing if they called for backup.”

“Roger that,” they say.

I survey the bodies slumped against each other, and one catches my eye. “Hudson!” I call.

Hudson runs toward me, and I point at the woman in a blue dress with her arm bent at an unnatural angle. Hudson sidesteps me, leans down, and presses his fingers to her neck to check for a pulse.

“Motherfucker,” he mutters. “She’s dead.”

“Fuck!” I tug my hair at the root, but the pain doesn’t ground me enough. I focus my attention on the steel panel, pull my fist back, and slam it into it over and over again until Hudson wraps his arms around my chest and pulls me out of the container.

“Enough!” Hudson yells. “You’re fucking pissed. I get it. But losing your shit isn’t going to help the ones who are still alive. You could’ve scared the fuck out of them.”

I hang my head, knowing he’s right. Pain radiates up my arm, and my hand begins to swell.

Hudson looks at my hand and shakes his head. “Dumbass,” he mumbles. “That’s broken.”

“We were too fucking late,” I snarl, as he wraps my hand so I can’t cause further damage to myself.

“Yeah,” he agrees. “We lost one, but we still have twenty-one we rescued. That’s still a win. Now, let’s get them home safely.”

Twenty-one more people to add to the forty-three we already rescued. How many more are out there waiting for a hero to save them? How many more will lose the battle before we can get to them?