Deadly Desires

Caught

I've always found it slightly hilarious that the same organisation that kills people for money also saves them. Morals can always be bent and moulded for a high enough price it would seem.

Regardless, I follow behind Addison quietly as we walk inside the building together. Lotus wasn't able to grab a lot of briefing on the situation, all we knew was roughly eight women were being held in this abandoned office building. It was considered a holding place for sex trafficking.

If we didn't get all the women out safely and kill the people who were handling them then they'd be sold off to their buyers where they're almost impossible to find. Worst case we may even suffer the same fate as them. I shudder at the thought as I and five other agents canvas the area.

It's eerily quiet as I step off the elevator on the fourth floor. Silence could mean a thousand things in cases like this one: the girls had already been moved and weren't here, or maybe they were here but their silence meant nothing terrible was currently happening to them. My heart hurt as I thought about all of the possibilities.

I promise I'm coming.

I nudged open the first door on my right, gun poised, but it was empty. I shut the door and began working through them.

When I opened the third door I saw a young woman sitting on a dirty bed, she was shivering and crying in nothing but a thin white slip gown. My eyes scanned the room but it seemed she was alone. We made eye contact and she quickly opened her mouth as if to scream but I waved at her frantically.

"Shh, it's okay. I'm here to help you. We're here to get you out. My name is Ivy, what's yours?" I kept my voice soft and soothing. I couldn't imagine what she'd been through.

"...Mary." She whispered and I smiled softly.

"Okay Mary, can you stand and walk over to me, we're going to get you out."

She nodded and walked over shakily, I whistled quietly and Addison quickly rushed over, she and Lana were here to get the girls out.

I swallowed the dryness in my throat as I continued to walk down the hallway, she couldn't have been older than twenty. Poor girl, she'd never be the same.

I cleared through the rest of the floor and walked up the stairs as I reloaded my bullets. As I walked down the hallway my heart began to race, there was no one on this floor either.

Gabriella came up behind me with a smile, "We found three other girls so far, just wanted to let you know. Only four left. Though there's been no sign of their captors it's odd."

I nodded as she walked down the other hallway, I paused to push open the door in front of me. I was greeted by a person, just not one I expected.

Nikolai stood in the middle of the room, staring at me. He looked caught, he clearly hadn't known I was here and the thought perplexed me.

"What are you doing here?" I whispered to him, so I wouldn't alert Gabi.

"I could ask the same of you," He replied cooly.

I hadn't seen him in a week, not since he saved me from jail. I didn't like the fact I owed him. But I was still so grateful he had decided to save me. I would surely be dead now or at the very least in a jail cell being defiled by those officers. I knew what their plans for me had been.

"I'm saving girls."

"As am I, what a coincidence." He replied, dryly. I shot him a look.

"Ivy! Everything okay?" Gabriella called out and I paused, as did Nikolai. He was armed I knew that. But if I called out to Gabriella we could take him I was sure of it. And if we didn't kill him immediately we could at least transfer him to Lotus and interrogate him.

But I owed him.

"Yes, everything is fine," I called out, shutting the door behind me and joining Gabi in the hallway as we continued to walk down the hallway. I'd have to trust Nikolai really was here to save those girls. 

In the next hour, we found two more girls ourselves and the others had found the remaining two on the lower levels. Though we never found their captors, when asked the girls said they had all taken off. It had been five men surveilling them.

It was strange and barely made any sense. I wondered if Nikolai had anything to do with the disappearance of the men. It wouldn't have been hard to believe he had been killing the men while we rescued the women. 

But at least we managed to save the girls.

The youngest out of all of them, only fourteen called out to me while we were helping them into cars.

"What happens to me now?" She asked me, I stared into her pale blue eyes with a heavy heart.

"We'll take you to a hospital where some nurses are going to make sure you're okay. And then we'll call your family-"

"No! You can't. They'll be horrified, I'm all broken now. They won't want me..." She said quietly, looking down at the floor.

My heart stung in my chest as I bent down in front of her, and gently held her hands. Forcing her to look me in the eyes. 

"You know what I think? I think you might just be the strongest person I know, you aren't broken honey, you might have a couple of chips and kinks in your armour but you are not broken."

"I never once tried to fight them off me, I didn't fight them or attack them or scream or call for help. I just froze, I practically let it happen to me. I'm not brave or strong like the others." She said, looking at me with hopelessness.

"But don't you understand? What happened to you, that was the worst act of cowardness. You were raped, there is no rule for how you're meant to act or what you're meant to do. The only thing you had to do was survive and you did. You survived, you're here sitting in front of me and you're alive. And that is the bravest thing I've ever seen."

She nodded slowly as she reached out to hug me and I squeezed her gently.

"You'll be alright, it might take a long time but one day you'll look up and realise you're okay."

"I'll never forget you." She whispered.

**********************************************************************************************

I tucked some hair behind my ears as I stood in line at the coffee shop, I hated waiting in queues. It was the most tedious thing I've ever endured.

"Next!" The barista called out as I walked over and smiled at her.

"Hi, can I have a blonde iced latte?"

"Yep, that'll be four dollars, just wait over there."

I nodded as I took a step back and stared at the wall aimlessly.

"Excuse me?" A girl called out, I turned to her and smiled.

She was pretty with dark brown hair and bright green eyes, the same colour as mine.

"Hi sorry, I just moved here and I wanted to ask you if this cafe has wi-fi?"

"Oh yeah it does, and it's free," I say to her, smiling a little.

"Okay perfect, I'm Juliette by the way." She says, smiling at me.

"Nice to meet you, I'm Ivy. So how come you moved here?" I ask her, as my eyes slide over to the server. I'm going to be late for work.

"I just became a lawyer, moved here for the firms." She said, laughing a little at herself.

A lawyer? Yeah, no I couldn't get mixed up with anyone involved with the law.

"Oh that's nice..." I say, trailing off. Luckily, my phone rings so I have an excuse to dash off.

"Hello?" I say, looking around.

"Ivy it's Lana, guess what!!" She says into the phone with a noticeable tone of excitement.

"What?"

"We got him, your little serial killer boyfriend. He was on a mission and we got tipped off, he's here at Lotus. We're going to start interrogating him for information in twenty minutes. Thought you'd love to know."

Holy fuck, they had Nikolai.