The man’s knees buckled beneath him. I reached out, caught him before he could land with any sound, and laid him across the floor. The entire thing took less than thirty seconds. I looked over at the girl, her mouth gaping, her eyes huge in her head.
“He’s only knocked out,” I told her, “so we must move quickly. Stay directly behind me. Stay as soundless as possible. Listen for my instructions. Obey without hesitation.”
She nodded her answer.
Breathe.
I opened the door as noiselessly as possible, peered through the doorway, noted there was no one around, and slipped through, with my young victim close behind me. I walked toward the door with the staircase, tucked the girl against the same wall, opened the door quietly, and scanned the stairs. Clear. I signaled for the girl to follow me and she did. We descended to the ground floor. I scoured the walls for any escape other than the storefront but found none. I took a deep breath and moved the curtain that separated the back from the front and quickly examined it. No one in the immediate vicinity. I crouched down low, running to the opening to the street. I searched the street for the trafficker who’d brought me up, but it took a second longer than I felt comfortable to find him. He was standing on the same corner.
Breathe.
I swung the girl up unexpectedly but she kept her mouth shut. I folded her into my chest as snugly as possible and walked the opposite direction of the solicitor, heading toward the opposite side of the street, getting lost in the crowd, but I knew I wasn’t clear until I’d left the street itself. I went left, followed by two more, knowing Finley would be most likely waiting for me there. I found her, An, and Phong pacing outside a shop. Phong was talking animatedly on his own cell. An’s hand was on Fin’s shoulders as Fin furiously pounded her fingers against the cell phone she carried to connect to the Bluetooth.
I walked up behind them.
“Fin!” I yelled.
Time seemed to stand still as she whipped around my direction, bursting into tears. I put the girl down next to An, who began attending to her. I zipped my hoodie up as Fin rushed me, tears streaming.
She pounded at my chest. “Why would you do that to me?!” she yelled. “Why?” she bawled. “I thought you were dead, Ethan!”
She broke down, sobbing into the fabric of my jacket, and I wrapped my arms around her. She kept hitting me, but it was losing steam. The adrenaline left my body with considerable quickness, making my body tremble. I was afraid to talk in the moment. I needed to calm her first. Calm myself as well. I smashed her hard against my body, laying my hands at the skin just underneath her shirt, at the small of her back, as she cried into my shoulder, repeatedly asking why.
I kissed her at the temple and pulled back just enough to look into her face.
“I’m so sorry,” I told her. Her eyes were red, tinged with a sadness I’d never seen, and my heart broke for her. “So sorry,” I told her, my voice dropping an octave in sincerity.
She swiped at her eyes and sucked in a breath. She looked left and her eyes swelled open at An checking the girl over and speaking to her softly, at Phong talking on the phone in Vietnamese.
“Did you save her?” she asked, pointing at the girl.
I nodded.
“Oh my God,” she said. She inhaled and brought her hand up to her chest. The other reached for my hand.
Unexpectedly, shouting came from the direction of the shop that fronted for the illegal activities involving my poor little girl, and my head followed the direction of the drama. I became aware of myself once more, yanking Fin close to me. I got ready to run but noticed the poor girl didn’t have shoes on so I was forced to let go of Fin so I could pick up the girl once more.
“We have to go,” I told the group.
In a flash, all five of us barrelled through the crowd, running toward our original meeting spot.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Ethan
“Here! Take a left here!” I looked down at the jostling young girl in my arms. “You okay, kid?” She nodded, though her eyes were wide. “Almost there,” I assured her, cutting right on Kim’s street. “Finley!” I yelled when she fell back out of my view.
“What!” she said from behind me.
“Keep up, Fin!”
“I’m trying!” she said, irritated.
I glanced back. She rolled her eyes but sprinted forward, falling in step beside me.
We arrived at Kim’s three minutes later, breathless. Phong, An, and Fin banged on the gates until they opened. Father and Kim were on the other side, a look of bewilderment on both their faces.
When Kim’s eyes shifted to the girl in my arms, she yelled, “Trời ơi!” Oh my God!
She rushed up to us as I set the girl on the ground, and she assisted the girl inside her home. An followed her to help, which left Fin, Phong, Father, and myself standing there in silence.
“What happened, boyo?” Father asked quietly, the shock still on his face.
“The man invited me in,” I said. “I couldn’t help myself. He seemed like the devil incarnate and I couldn’t leave without saving at least one of them,” I explained, my heart racing.
Fin, apparently reliving the moment, started trembling.
“How-how’d ya get ’er out, son?” he asked, stunned.
My eyes shot to Fin’s, silently pleading with her to understand.
“Fin told me not to go in,” I began. She looked away, her eyes glassy, and bit her quivering bottom lip. “There was just something so off about the guy that I felt desperate to help any girl I could, so I walked in. He took me upstairs to this shady-looking hall full of closed doors,” I told them, the memory making me queasy.
“What was your plan?” Phong asked, unable to help himself.
“I, uh, didn’t have a plan,” I answered him.
Finley let out a choking sob so I grabbed her without thinking and swung her head into my chest.
“It’s upsettin’ the lass. No more,” Father said.
“No!” Finley tore away from me to face him. “No,” she said lightly, “I want to hear this too.”
Father nodded at her and their faces turned toward me.
“I paid him the money and went into the room. The girl,” I began, but my voice broke. I cleared my throat. “The girl,” I said again, “she-she was altered. Something awful has happened to her, Father.” I squeezed Finley as close to me as possible. “I couldn’t leave her there.” The emotion in my voice dropping my tone. “I had to take her.”
Father placed a hand on my shoulder as we stood under the lamplight over Kim’s drive, the night pitch black around us save for the blazing band of light encircling us. A dichotomy of light and dark.
“I understand, o’ course, son,” he told me, squeezing my shoulder. Kim called for Father from her door. “’Scuse me,” he said.
He turned and walked toward the house. Phong followed, leaving Fin and me under the spotlight.
I kissed Fin’s tear-stained cheeks, eyes, chin, forehead, jaw—all the while breathing her name. I kissed her until I felt her sigh.
“I saw you in her,” I told her. “I saw you, and I just could not leave her, Fin.”
“I see that now,” she said. “I see it.”
“Are you still upset with me?”
She shook her head, her hair falling around her shoulders and over my embracing arms.
“I don’t like you risking your life like that. I hate it, actually, but I know why you did it. I feel why you did it, Ethan. It’s why I came here. I came here to save them,” she said, a hitch in her throat, “because I couldn’t save myself. So thank you for saving her.” She placed her hands on my cheeks. “Saving her feels like you’ve saved me. A little piece of me feels like I’m one step closer to saying goodbye to that cracked Finley, that fragile Finley.”
I grasped her to me. “God, what I wouldn’t give to have saved you then, Fin.”
She pulled away so she could see my face. “Can’t you see?” she asked. “Yo
u are saving me.”
We all rode back to Hạ Long Bay with lighter hearts, yet the triumph felt marred as we could feel the shadows of all the other children we weren’t able to steal away that night.
I walked Finley up the Slánaigh winding staircase, her head at my shoulder and my hand at the small of her back. Reluctantly, I kissed her chastely at the door and with pins and needles in my hands, ran as fast as I could to my room of the boathouse, but not for rest.
No, I had plans.
I was going to earn the honor of loving Finley Dyer, and I knew just how to do it.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
I said goodnight to Father so he knew I was there and it gave him the pretense I was in for the night. One foot in front of the other, I scaled the small dock walkway to my room, and sat at the edge of the bed, waiting for Father to fall asleep.
When an hour had passed, I checked for my knives in their sheaths and for the key to the bike on Slánaigh’s shell drive. Very carefully, I exited my room, shutting the door as quietly as I could. I stepped into the small boat tethered to the room I stayed in, took the paddle, and made my way to the little shore. I did this so my body weight didn’t shift the dock walkway to the shore and wake Father when I left.
It didn’t take me long to get to the beach, and when the boat breached the water, I jumped out, pulling it up farther on to the shore, before tucking it behind some foliage to avoid questions in case someone from Slánaigh came along. I prayed they’d miss it wasn’t in the water if they did.
My adrenaline pumped in my veins when I pushed the hanging plant-fall hiding the cove the boathouse was in. I wondered to myself, curious if I was making the best decision in leaving once more.
The rush I got from saving the little girl that night was too incredible not to do again. I’d never felt more accomplished than I had that moment I took her in my arms and physically left her hell behind us. I was so tired of our fruitless busts, overturned so easily by unfortunate circumstances or thwarted by bought police or judges. We’d saved only ten girls in the span that Fin and I had been at Slánaigh, and it just wasn’t enough for me. I understood Father had to work within the parameters of the laws, even if those laws weren’t being upheld unless it meant to do him damage. I understood a man in his position was bound by his vows. He was required a peaceful intervention, within reason…
But I wasn’t.
I lifted the bike off its stand, pulled it back, and pushed it toward the end of the shell drive, not starting it until I’d been sure I was far enough away I couldn’t be heard from Slánaigh. I drove until I found a space near the night market and parked, chaining it to a nearby tree.
I pulled up my hood, kept my head down, and started walking.
What are you doing? It’s not too late to just turn around, dude. Just turn back around, go back to Slánaigh, and go to sleep. Work with them. Who knows? You might get a good bust tomorrow. I argued with myself for ten blocks, trying to convince myself what I was doing was beyond idiotic. Yet I never turned back. I was determined to see if my method would be more effective than Slánaigh’s, because I had no intentions of working within the law.
You can always abandon the idea if it goes wrong anyway. If it doesn’t go well, you just won’t do it again.
“You like girls?” a man asked me.
I turned toward him and all my earlier doubts burned away with his one grotesque question.
“I love girls,” I told him, my blood boiling. I tempered my facial expression. “What ya got?” I asked.
“Many ages,” he explained. “Whateva you want.”
My hands itched to remove a knife. “Take me to them,” I told him.
His eyes brightened up. “Only hundred dolla,” he said excitedly.
“Whatever,” I said, no intention of letting it get that far.
He pointed toward an alley and gestured for me to follow him and I did, with no hesitation. I was as eager as he was it seemed but for very different reasons. I smiled to myself, pulling my hoodie farther over my face.
He knocked on a door situated in the middle of the alleyway, and I stuck my hands in my hoodie pockets to give them something to do. I breathed deeply, steadily.
One in front of me. Weak, easily overpowered.
Breathe.
A man answered the knock. Five foot six, maybe seven. Medium build. Squints. Bad eyesight. Nearsighted. Favors his right leg.
Breathe.
I peered behind him and took in two more men, both sitting at a table playing cards.
Guy on left. Small build. Automatic weapon strapped to back. Holding cards with his right hand. He’s left-handed. Gun’s on the wrong shoulder for quick access.
Breathe.
Guy on right. Older. Mid-forties. Lean. Barefoot. Sipping coffee. Winced. Steaming cup.
Breathe.
Two exits including this door. Only one guaranteed street exit. Estimated guess the other door connects to the girls. Unknown number of men behind closed door.
“Right through here,” the guy who opened the door said.
Breathe.
Go.
I pushed the street guy into the guy who answered the door, stunning them. Swiftly, I elbowed the solicitor in the back of the head, felling him with a sudden, dull thud. The other’s eyes widened and he charged me, but I sidestepped him, tripping his bum leg, pushing his head against the jamb of the door, and slamming the door against his ear. He was out.
Breathe.
By this time, the men sitting were just realizing what was going on. I took two steps their direction, grabbed the guy’s hot coffee and threw it in the face of the man with the gun. He screamed in agony.
Breathe.
While he scrambled, I pushed the heel of my boot into the bare foot of the man on the right, sending his head forward as he tried to tug his leg out from underneath my boot. I took advantage of the movement and slammed his forehead into the table, knocking him out cold. I spun around the gunman with ease, twisting the strap of his gun around his neck, effectively choking him off, keeping him quiet.
“Shhh. This will only hurt for a moment,” I told him, before slamming his head into the table, knocking him out as well.
Breathe.
Without hesitation, I dragged the one in the doorway inside, and closed the door. In four steps, I was at the second door, bracing myself against the wall where the door would open into me.
I waited but no one came to their rescue, leading me to believe they were it. I reached for the handle just as it began to turn, though, so I laid flat once more. A white man peeked his head through.
“Uh, what’s going on?” he stupidly asked the roomful of unconscious men.
Breathe.
“Nothing,” I told him, smiling. He turned toward me, his eyes wide.
I grabbed the top of his head, grappling a handful of hair. He squealed like a pig as he pitched forward into my knee. He fell to the floor, passed out. I waited a moment for any others, but no one came.
Breathe.
I grabbed a bat leaning in the corner of the room closest to me before throwing open the door. I tossed it over my shoulder and propped myself against the jamb, looking through to gauge the environment.
Breathe.
One hall. Six doors. All interior. Only exit is the entrance I came through. Knowing this, I stalked to the end of the hall, anticipating that if any men might be hanging in their rooms like cowards came out, they’d automatically look toward the door that entered the main room.
Breathe.
I let the bat fall into my hand. With one swift kick, I dropkicked the last door.
Breathe.
Empty.
Breathe.
I kicked the second.
Breathe.
One girl. Seven or eight. Fearful eyes. Alone.
Breathe.
Third.
Breathe.
One girl. Ten. One man. White. Fifties.
My eyes blazed at him. “Get the fuck o
ut,” I gritted. He ran like the gutless piece of shit he was. “Stay,” I told the girl.
Breathe.
Fourth. Empty.
Breathe.
Fifth. Two girls. Both around nine. No men.
Breathe.
Sixth. One girl. Seven. One white man. Forties.
Breathe.
He was trembling.
“Please!” he shrieked. “Please don’t kill me,” he begged. “Please,” he whimpered. “I’ll give you whatever you want,” he cried. “Anything.”
I tossed the ends of the bat back and forth on one hand. A habit I’d picked up when I was bored at baseball practice in high school. I did it carelessly. I wanted him to know I was just as eager to slam the end in his face as I was at playing.
“Leave,” my voice grated after a moment. He scrambled up, buckling his pants, making me sick to my stomach. I caught him by his shirt collar when he tried to squeeze past me and threw him against the wall. I laid the thick part of the bat against his neck, using my forearm to drive it in painfully. “Come here again, touch another girl again and I’ll know it. I know who you are,” I lied. “I’ll tell them all,” I finished. I leaned my weight into the bat, cutting off his air. “Now get the fuck out.”
I released him after a moment’s pause. He shut the front room door behind him.
Breathe.
Breathe.
Breathe.
“Time to go,” I said softly. I threw the bat to the ground and rounded up each of the five young girls. In all of their faces, I saw my Finley and felt ill. “Come on,” I urged them. They obeyed, their faces devoid of life. They had no idea who I was or what I was. They only knew to obey.
I led them out, checking each man quickly before examining the alley for anything suspicious. When I was confident it was clear, I gathered two girls’ hands and encouraged the remaining three to follow. I looked down and noticed blood running down one of their legs.
“I’m so sorry I didn’t get here sooner,” I told her.
She looked up at me, her face blank.