Page 36 of Tristano

“I don’t blame you,” Declan mutters.

I pull my head up and murmur into her ear. “I’m proud of you.”

Declan meets my eye, and I can see his silent apology. “I have to ask…”

Serena starts shaking her head before he can even ask. “They never raped me. They wanted to keep the inventory as intact as possible as far as I could tell. I did anger them once and demanded more water. He said something about putting us on the dark web and selling us off. They took photos too.”

Closing my eyes, I take a deep breath I hadn’t realized I had been holding. Thank God she didn’t have to go through that again. If they had raped her, I would have gone crazy knowing I couldn’t keep her from that a second time.

“I’m glad. For your sake. We will have to look into this dark web stuff. We have been checking it, but none of you girls have shown up on there yet,” Declan tells her.

“What happens now? I mean to the girls.”

“Now we start reaching out to the ones with families and getting them home. For the others, we will work on getting them help and to where they want to go. Give them a fresh start at life.”

“I like that,” she murmurs softly. “Mandy doesn’t have a home. I don’t want her to ever have to worry again. Can you make that happen?”

“Yes. I promise. I will set her up with a job and give her a paid-for apartment. I will make sure she never has to worry again. I promise.”

“Therapy. Make her get therapy too. She’s going to need it,” Serena murmurs.

“We will. What about you? Are you going to reach out to work?”

“Dec…” I warn, anger seeping into my tone.

Serena squeezes my arm. “It’s fine. I expected him to ask.” She pauses as she thinks it over. “Did they ever report me as missing or anything?”

“A report was filed by an uncle…” I trail off.

“Uncle Ben. He’s a family friend who took me in when my grandfather passed away. He’s also the chief of police in Jersey City and my boss,” Serena informs us.

“So he knows you’re missing,” Declan states.

We fall silent as we let her think about that.

“I can’t tell him where I was or what I was doing,” she finally admits. “He told me to not pursue the missing girls anymore. I went on my own against his wishes. That’s how I was taken. I didn’t have a team with me. No one watching my back.”

I grit my teeth. “Why didn’t you tell me? I would have come and watched your back. You can’t go off on your own.”

She sniffles. “I know. I didn’t even think to call you. That’s my cop side of life. You’re the gray area. I don’t mix you two. It never even occurred to me that you might come for something like that.”

“Maybe that’s the issue. You are leading two lives. You’re at the fork in the road now. You’re going to need to make a decision,” Declan declares.

“Declan, don’t pressure her. She can do whatever she wants. It will never affect us.” I growl.

“It already is. She didn’t come to you for fear that you being a part of that life would either get her in trouble or get you in trouble. She can’t keep leading this secret life. She needs to make a choice.” He crosses his arms over his chest.

“She has all the time in the world to decide what she wants. Even if she decides to stay a cop forever and even turn me in, I’m still going to have her back. Stop making it seem like she can’t have her cake and eat it too.”

“She can’t.”

“STOP!” Serena yells, making us both shut up. “She is sitting right fucking here and can make her own decisions. Tris, I get why you are defending me, but Declan’s right. I’ve always had one foot on each side of the law. I can’t live this way forever. I have a lot to think about.”

I pause. “Thank you, Declan. I appreciate your advice. I’d like some time to think things over.”

He nods. “Of course. I’m not trying to pressure you. Really, I’m not. I just want what’s best for you both.”

“I get that and appreciate you looking out for Tristano. He needs friends like you.”

---