Page 82 of Strangers in Love

If I didn’t get there first.

I still meant what I’d said to Cain about putting the hostages first, but I wasn’t going to walk away if I had the chance to take some of the bad guys out.

“Listen up,” Cain said as he walked into the room. “We’ve got a way in.”

I pulled my thoughts away from the past and focused on the present. Cain went over to the pictures we’d laid out on one of the beds. Google Earth was a wonderful thing. We’d been able to access and print images from various heights, allowing us to see a wide overview as well as tight shots of the building where the auction was taking place.

It wasn’t much to look at, but this morning, Dez had learned that it was an underground club. Based on the things he’d been told, this was the type of club that not only looked the other way when it came to trafficking but participated in it. There was a good chance that at least one of the hostages would be sold or given to the club in exchange for letting the auction be held there.

That had me asking myself a question that I guessed the other guys were thinking too.

Knowing that the hostages we were after would probably not be the only ones at the auction or in the club, would we go in with the intent to rescue just the four who’d been held with Aline, or would we risk everything to save as many as possible? There was no way to say which would cause more damage.

Or which would have the worse guilt.

“The club has a back entrance for workers.” Cain pointed to a spot on the map. “It just so happens that there’s a woman whose son works in the kitchen there. She wants him away from it before he gets pulled into the shit that goes on, and she thinks if we raid the place, it might be a wake-up call for the kid.”

“Might be dangerous for her and the kid,” Bruce said, uncharacteristically somber. “I don’t think these guys will be forgiving to any inside man, so to speak.”

“It won’t come back on them,” Cain said. “Because we’re going to take the place of a couple employees, including her son, and we’re going to knock them out to do it.”

“She’s okay with us knocking her son out?” Dez asked.

“She suggested it, actually,” Cain said with a hint of a smile. “I got the feeling she’s had–”

“Do we really need the family history?” The question slipped out before I could stop it, and I immediately regretted it. Now that we were down to the wire, the control I’d gained in the army seemed to be stretching thin. “Sorry. Just on edge.”

“You’re right,” Fever said. “We’re not here to play family therapist. If this gets the kid to wise up, great, but he’s not our goal.”

His matter-of-fact statement sounded a lot nicer than how I’d worded it, but the point was the same. If I couldn’t put my need for justice ahead of the hostages, then we couldn’t put some strangers ahead of them either. Maybe I was being an asshole to think that way, but that’s how it was right now.

After a moment, Cain nodded. “Point made.”

“What do we know about the layout?” Dez asked. “Any idea of where we’ll find our people, or are we doing another room-to-room search like we did with Aline?”

“These auctions take place in a back room that’s usually where they pimp their sex workers, but that’s not where the hostages are kept before they’re sold,” Cain continued. “According to my source, the basement is split into two rooms, one for drugs and weapons, and one for the people theyown.”

The look of disgust on his face when he said the last part did more to help me stay focused than anything else. The men and women we’d left behind in Iran were here because we hadn’t gone back for them. They weren’t just our responsibility because we’d chosen to take on the mission. It was because we’d made a series of choices that had led us all to this point.

“Where are we snatching them?” Dez asked. “Basement or back room?”

“Both,” Cain said. “We’re going to split into two groups. Bruce, you’re with me. We’re going in quiet, disguised as employees. Dez, Eoin, Fever, you three will take the stairs straight to the basement.Notquietly. You’re going to make like you’re going after the drugs and weapons. And take down anyone who gets in the way.”

He glanced at me, and that look told me that he’d set this up the way he had to give me the chance to get some justice while doing what we’d come here to do. I wasn’t going to complain. Hell, I wanted to thank him for it.

“Are we stealing their shit and dumping it somewhere, or are we going more for noise and body count?” Fever asked.

“Trash as much as you can,” Cain said, “but don’t get yourselves trapped. If there’s anyone down there, you get them and get out as fast as possible.”

“And while they’re doing that?” Bruce asked.

“You and I are going to be in the back room, or as close to it as we can get,” Cain explained. “When the shit hits the fan, we’ll take advantage of the chaos and get anyone there.”

“And if someone objects?” Bruce’s eyes had a hard glint to them.

“Then we persuade them that it’s a good idea not to get in our way.”

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