Page 112 of Rescuing Aria
She allows Storm to check her for injuries, though her eyes never leave me, as if afraid I’ll disappear.
“Wolfe?” Jenny asks Jon quietly.
“Marcus got to him first,” Jon explains. “Unknown status, but significant head trauma. Dining room, east wing.”
“Mac, Blaze, check it out.” Jenny dispatches the men with a gesture. “The rest of the house is being secured. We found three more girls locked in rooms upstairs.” Her gaze shifts to the nameless girl being treated by Storm. “We’ll get them all proper care.”
“Thank you,” I say, meaning it with every fiber of my being. These people swooped in to save not just me, but everyone they could. No calculations about who was “worthless” or expendable. Just rescue, pure and simple.
Her radio crackles. “Wolfe is alive, barely. Medevac is on the way.”
“And the guards?” Jenny asks.
“Those who surrendered are secured. The rest…”
Jenny turns back to us. “Extraction in five. We need to move before local authorities respond to the alarm.”
Jon keeps his arm around me as we follow Jenny toward the exit. Outside, the night air feels impossibly fresh after the blood and violence of the house. Tactical vehicles wait in the circular drive, engines running.
“What happens now?” I ask Jon as he helps me into one of the vehicles.
“Now,” he says, his voice gentle, “we get you somewhere safe. The rest—the truth about your father’s operations, about what happened to your mother—that will take time. But Guardian HRS has resources. We’ll find all of it, expose all of it.”
The nameless girl is guided into our vehicle, Storm still tending to her. She sits close to me, as if I represent her only constant in this chaos.
“What’s your name?” I ask her softly as the vehicle begins to move. “Your real name, not what they called you.”
She hesitates, as if the question is dangerous. Perhaps it has been, until now. “Hope,” she finally whispers. “My name is Hope.”
“Hope,” I repeat, taking her hand in mine. “You’re free now. Really free.”
As we drive away from Wolfe’s estate, leaving behind the blood, secrets, and lies, I realize something profound. For the first time in my life, I too am truly free. Free of my father’s control, of the legacy he tried to force upon me, of the gilded cage he built around me.
THIRTY-ONE
Jon
“Walk me through it again.”CJ’s voice carries no judgment, just the detail-oriented mind of a professional piecing together fragments of an operation to form a complete picture.
I lean back in the uncomfortable metal chair. Guardian’s debriefing room hasn’t changed since my first mission eight years ago—same gray walls, same surveillance cameras in each corner, same table designed to make you shift your weight every ninety seconds.
“Marcus had Aria at gunpoint.” My voice remains steady despite the images flashing behind my eyes. “He already discovered the documents I found in Wolfe’s office—proof of his involvement in organ trafficking, his role in Rebecca’s death. Evidence that would destroy him.”
Jenny nods, fingers tapping notes into her tablet. Across from her, Forest remains still, weathered face revealing nothing.
“He was aiming at Aria when the team breached the main entrance.” The scene replays in perfect clarity. “Multiple shots fired. Marcus took at least three to the chest. Dead before he hit the ground.”
What I don’t mention: the relief that flooded through me when Aria emerged unharmed. The savage satisfaction when Marcus’s eyes went blank. The way my hands didn’t shake, not even once, as I held Aria while her father’s blood spread across imported marble.
“And Wolfe?” Forest asks, the first words he’s spoken in twenty minutes.
“Marcus bludgeoned him in the dining room.”
CJ’s eyes narrow slightly, catching something in my tone, perhaps. He’s trained operatives to compartmentalize and report facts without emotion, but this mission crossed every line between professional and personal.
“The girl?” Jenny prompts.
“Hope,” I correct automatically. “Not ‘the girl.’ Not ‘the asset.’ Hope. A prisoner. She helped Aria escape and came with us during extraction.”
