“Here.” She thrust the packages at Giselle. “Eat and drink. You need to keep your strength up. It will help with the healing.”
Giselle took them tentatively. She stared hard at them, then set them on the bed. Fists clenched, she asked, “How much do they cost?”
Taryn stopped what she was doing and studied her. Giselle must have taken her look as a challenge because she flinched and dropped her gaze. She looked up almost immediately and stared at Taryn defiantly. “What does this all cost?”
Ah. Taryn leaned against the dresser, arms crossed. About half the girls asked. The other half were usually too scared. The question broke her heart every time. “This rescue? It’s free.”
Giselle shook her head. “I don’t believe you. Why are you doing this? Is it a trick?”
Taryn spread her hands wide. “It’s not a trick. Not a trap. I’m doing this because I was once like you.” She turned sideways and tugged down the neck of her shirt. “You see this scar?”
Her finger traced the thick, ragged scar on her left shoulder blade. “I got that when I cut out my own chip.” Echoes of the pain she endured when she dug it out raced through her body. She closed her eyes and forced the agony back into the past where it belonged.
Giselle gasped.
“That was my first step to getting out of this life.” Taryn didn’t tell her that she’d been caught and chipped again. That would send the poor girl screaming.
She tugged her top back in place. “The rescue is free. Mostly free,” Taryn corrected. “Removing the chip, getting you a place to live, training you on new skills? All free. Once you’re on your feet, we’ll come to an arrangement. Each woman pays me a bit of their salaries.”
Taryn held up a hand to forestall the accusation that she’d become their pimp. “Real jobs. Some work in offices, others get jobs in restaurants or hospitals. The funds are used to pay it forward and cover expenses for the next girl I rescue.” She paused. “And each of them owe me a favor.”
“What if they don’t agree to that? What happens then?” Giselle asked, a tiny fire in her tone.
Taryn shrugged. “Nothing.”
“Now I know you’re lying. No one does something for nothing.” Giselle surged for the door.
Taryn’s right arm shot out to block her. “If a girl doesn’t want to help after I’ve helped her, that’s fine. I don’t like it, but I don’t take it out on her. When I say nothing happens, that’s the truth. If her pimp comes after her, I do nothing. If she gets into trouble, I do nothing.” She stared hard into Giselle’s eyes. “Now do you understand?”
Giselle never dropped her gaze. Fear and hope and disbelief warred in her eyes. She nodded.
That wasn’t enough. “Out loud.”
“Yes, I understand.”
“Do you believe me?”
Giselle hesitated this time, thought it over. Another positive sign. “I’m not sure.”
“Fair enough. Now, do you want me to put the chip back in and you can forget all this happened?”
“No. No!” The young woman stared at the blood-covered chip laying on the bed in horror.
“Good answer,” Taryn said. “Here’s what happens next.”
Wearing a clean pair of gloves, Taryn cleaned up the chip. Giselle’s pimp might have coded it to her, but she wanted as much of the girl’s genetic material off it before releasing it into the wild. She didn’t want any trace of herself on it either.
“Please don’t scream,” Taryn said when she finished. “This is the kind of gross part.”
“Grosser than cutting that out of my leg?” Giselle’s laugh held the slightest bit of hysteria.
“Yeah, sorry.” Taryn waved the girl toward the back of the room, then opened the front door. She scanned the area for people, then crouched and reached for the cage hidden in the shadows to the left of the door.
This was the last step before they left the hotel and it was the part Taryn hated most. She wrapped her fingers around the cage’s handle and pulled it into the room.
She closed and locked the door, all while keeping the cage at arm’s length.
“Oh my god, is that a rat?!” Giselle squealed and retreated into the bathroom.
