My hands that aren’t shaking.
The basement door looms ahead, industrial and heavy.I press my palm flat against the cold metal and close my eyes for half a second.On the other side of this door are people who’ve been treated like cargo.Like goods.Like the children I couldn’t save in that warehouse in Moscow.
You’re not there.You’re here.And here, you can make a difference.
I nod to my team.We breach.
The room beyond is worse than I imagined, and I’ve imagined plenty.Makeshift cots crammed together.Buckets in corners.Eyes that have stopped hoping blinking against our flashlights.
“Fifteen,” I breathe into comms, scanning the space.“Repeat, fifteen.Eight adult females, seven minors.All alive.”
“Copy that,” Dave’s voice comes through, tight but filled with seething fury.“Medical team is ready at extraction point.”
I crouch in front of the nearest group—a woman clutching a girl and a boy against her chest.Her eyes are wild, terrified.She doesn’t know if we’re salvation or a different kind of monster.
“You’re safe now,” I tell her, keeping my voice low and even.“We’re getting you out of here.All of you.”
Her blank expression makes it clear she doesn’t understand my words.But something in my tone must translate because her grip on the children loosens slightly.She nods, points to her and the kids, then whispers, “Spasibo.”She thanks me in Russian.
“Secondary sweep complete,” Tommy reports.“Two additional contacts neutralized.Building is clear.”
“Team Bravo, begin extraction,” I command.“Let’s bring them home.”
We work quickly, efficiently.Women and children are guided toward the exits, wrapped in emergency blankets, handed off to the medical team waiting in unmarked vans.Some walk on their own.Others have to be carried.
One little girl, no more than six, reaches for my hand as I lead her toward the door.Her fingers are tiny and cold, and they wrap around mine like I’m the only solid thing in her world.
I don’t freeze.
I hold on tighter and walk her into the night, toward safety, toward freedom.
Fifteen people who won’t be sold tonight.Fifteen people going home instead of into hell.
Because I didn’t freeze.
The next hour passes in controlled chaos.Serena coordinates the cyber cleanup, ensuring every digital trace of tonight’s operation disappears into the ether.She’s magnificent.She’s sharp and focused and utterly unbreakable despite everything she’s been through.
When the last victim is loaded into the last vehicle, I find her standing beside our SUV, staring at the retreating van like she’s seeing something I can’t.
“Lucia Rossi is in that van,” she says quietly.
I move to stand beside her, draping an arm around her shoulder and hugging her tight.“You did this!”
“Her family probably thinks she’s dead,” Serena says, her voice muffled against my chest.
“She’s not dead.Because of you.”
She shakes her head.“Because of us.Because you didn’t freeze this time.”
The words hit somewhere deep.She’s right.In Russia, when everything went sideways, I turned to stone while children died.Tonight, my mind stayed sharp.Clear.Present.
Because I had something worth being present for.
“Get in,” I say, opening her door.“We’re done here.”
The drive back to our temporary residence, in a Syndicate safe house in Brookline that even Giovanni doesn’t know about, takes forty minutes through empty early-morning streets.Serena spends most of it on her laptop, monitoring police frequencies, ensuring our operation stays invisible.
I spend most of it watching her.
