𝐔𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐑 𝐇𝐈𝐒 𝐌𝐀𝐒𝐊

𝟏𝟓 | 𝐃𝐎𝐔𝐁𝐓

𝐌𝐘 𝐒𝐇𝐎𝐄𝐒 𝐃𝐑𝐈𝐏 𝐖𝐈𝐓𝐇 a slippery redness I've spent the better half of my childhood and adult life learning as I step over the body of a former member. The cloth usually tucked in my pocket is between my fingers as I clean off his and my own blood from my split knuckles.

The force of my punches had done nothing for my internal quarrel.

It took longer than I expected—made me and my team spend more hours than necessary on them, but the bastards who started up a brothel under the Spanish mafia's name all those months ago were now bodies buried in concrete—a desecrated gravesite.

I step over another figure, then four more, and make my way to the right side of the basement of Hotel Alatorre. Fifty women, battered and beaten, are lined up along the walls, each of them having a calm discussion with a social worker and witness protection holder on my payroll as they talk about what the men I just submerged put them through while working here.

I'm not stupid enough to believe that this is the only place these fuckers ran their business out of because I have unwillingly given them too many resources for them to toss all of their eggs in one basket. I am counting on my workers to get to the bottom of this and to get the information out of these women so that their fellow sisters never know what it's like to be sexually controlled.

I approach the shaft for the elevators and put both hands on my suit jacket, stripping the black from my skin. I'm soaked in sweat, but it might be a better look than the red staining my light purple undershirt and black tie. I drop it to the ground, ready for it to be burned with the rest of the clothes and forms down here, and try to look presentable as I approach the women.

"Ladies," I say, gathering their attention.

I feel an impressionable weight on my chest as all one hundred pairs of eyes, the women and their workers, turn to face me. I know that it is my organization's name that put them here, so I take in the heat of their glares, and the wear in their eyes, and clear my throat. 

"What these men who died here today did to you, is unforgivable," I start, "I take full accountability for their actions. While I can never take back what they made you do, I can give you back your lives. The workers standing before you today are here to help protect you and bring you to safehouses where you can recover in peace before reentering the world. You may stay as long as you like. You will each be financially, emotionally, and socially taken care of for as long as you may need to feel as if you are yourselves again. I am so sorry for what happened to you."

The women all blink at me in unison.

Some of them are glaring at me, angrily seeking a way in which to gut me in the very spot I stand, and I can't lie and say that part of me doesn't want them to take my gun from its holster and finish the fucking job. Some are teary-eyed and emotional—some are looking at me like they owe me their lives, and it sends a feeling of disgust straight through my body.