ANNA
I knew it.
I knew I got it right.
I couldn’t help the tears pouring down my face. I couldn’t help the way I clung to Brutus when he was finally out of that cage. Harnessed like a fucking animal.
I never wanted to see it again.
I had put the pieces together, of course. The interrogations were much too soft. Or maybe I just watched too much television. I heard some of the other girls in their interrogation rooms around the same time I had to answer all of my questions. And the entire time, there was always one of our police officers in the room with us. Not just the DOJ agents, but an actual officer posted up in the corner.
That was my first inkling that something wasn’t quite right.
The spaghetti dinner was another cue. They allowed all of us to gather in a room together so that we could eat a hot meal. That wasn’t protocol, that much I knew for certain. It was hard to get Char to eat. The poor girl looked like she was thrown right back into the clutches of the trafficking ring. And when one of those officers tried giving her a plate of spaghetti with parmesan cheese on it, I spoke up about her lactose intolerance before theyeven set the damn plate down. The garlic bread had cheese on it, too.
That prompted me to go with them so that I could watch them make her food.
It was the only way we got her to eat.
It was while we ate that I told the women my theory: I was pretty sure the arrest was staged. But I didn’t quite get the reaction I assumed I would. I figured most of them would have jumped at the fact that this was planned. That the guys knew what was happening.
They pretty much all stayed silent, though.
I couldn’t blame them. This entire saga culminated into something we didn’t see coming. And I knew they were thinking what I was thinking: why tell us everything else, but not this? None of it made sense. It made for some hard interrogation moments, because if I zoned out in the middle of questioning, I knew they did, too.
One time, I even heard Char crying down the hallway.
But when the interrogations stopped and we were told that they would be released, that was when Jasmine fired off questions. That paralegal mind of hers was sharp, and before we knew it, the DOJ officers who took our testimony spilled their fucking guts.
The guys were arrested as a distraction just in case my home was being watched.
Before I could even ask the question, one of the DOJ officers told me that an entire team of agents was posted up in the shadows and woods around my home, waiting to see if anyone would strike it in retaliation. They were sure as shit the ring knew where we were all hiding out, and apparently one of Brutus’s demands was that they did everything in their power to make sure my home was safe while we weren’t in it.
Goddamn it, I loved that man.
“Anna, let me know when you can hear me. Anna, let me know when you can hear me. Anna, let me know when you can?—”
“Sorry,” I whispered.
His thick fingers stroked through my hair, and I felt at home. “No need to be sorry. I’ve got you.”
“King!”
I turned my head toward Char’s chirping sound long enough to see my brother barreling down the hallway toward her. I perched my cheek against Bee’s shoulder and watched with a sort of sideways look as the two of them collided in the hallway. My brother scooped her up like she was nothing but a wounded bird. She curled against him, and for the first time since the shattering of my windows woke me up, I smiled. It was a small one. My teeth didn’t even make an appearance. But when my brother sank to his knees with that woman in his arms, I knew I’d have to get to know Charise a little more.
Because it looked like she’d be sticking around in the family for a while.
Brutus stood with me in his arms. He turned us toward King, and that was when his gaze raised.
“Anna,” he said breathlessly.
“King,” I whimpered out.
He placed Char down long enough to move toward me, and I wiggled out of Bee’s embrace. I ran toward him, not caring about what I looked like as he held his arms open for me. I rushed into him, hitting him so hard that he grunted when I wrapped my arms around him.
“Oh God, I hate you so much for this,” I whispered.
“I expect to catch hell for a while,” he muttered.
