I scan the files, cross-referencing with the map I’ve been building. Red pins mark confirmed sites. Yellow for suspected ones. The network stretches farther than I thought—across cities, borders, even oceans. But I’m getting closer. The site Ivisited today links directly to a holding facility two hours south. A name keeps popping up in the logs—Lot 27 – High Value.
My stomach knots.
It could be her.
But it’s not her.
Just another nameless girl—one more broken body in a sea of hollow eyes and haunted faces. I stare at the screen, willing it to change, to give me something—anything—that leads to Nell. But all it gives me is more proof of how deep this rot goes.
My phone buzzes on the desk.
Talia.
She’s been checking in more often lately. She knows how close I am to the edge. This mission was never supposed to be personal, not with Darcy anyway, but now it’s a razor pressed to my throat. Tactical precision is slipping, and she can feel it.
I take a long pull from the whiskey bottle, the burn grounding me just enough to answer.
“Hey, Talia,” I say, leaning back in the chair, eyes aching from hours of staring at the screen.
“How you holding up out there?”
“Still breathing,” I mutter. “Got more intel on the Broker—shipment logs, movement patterns, a few aliases. But it’s thin. I don’t think it’s going to give me much before the auction.”
She’s quiet for a beat. Then, “Did you manage to confirm where they took her after?”
I exhale slowly, rubbing a hand over my face. “Not yet. But we know the Broker bought her. That much is confirmed.”
And that changes everything.
If he’s holding her personally, she won’t be in the next auction. They don’t usually move girls once they’ve been brought that fast—not unless they’re trying to erase a trail. Most of the time, they keep them for weeks. Sometimes longer. Conditioning them into little puppets. Breaking their souls and sometimes their bodies.
I clench my jaw.
“I need to be ready,” I say. “If she’s still in his possession, I’ve got one shot to get her out before she disappears again.”
Talia’s voice softens. “You’re not alone in this, Cam.”
But I am.
Because no one else knows what it’s like to see her face in every girl I couldn’t save.
“We’ve got eyes on a couple of auctions too,” she says, her voice back to its usual steel. “If anything useful surfaces, you’ll be the first to know.”
“Cheers Talia.”
I end the call with Talia and let the silence settle. The kind that winds in your bones when you’re standing on the edge of something irreversible.
I turn back to the laptop, the map still glowing on the screen. The Broker’s compound—if you can even call it that—isn’t just a house. It’s a fortress dressed in luxury. Gated perimeter. Private security. Surveillance on every corner. But I’ve studied the blueprints, watched the patterns, traced the routines.
There’s a weakness.
There’s always a weakness.
I pull up the satellite images, overlaying them with the floor plans. The loading dock on the east side is the only blind spot—no cameras, minimal lighting, and a rotating guard who disappears for a smoke break every night at 2:17 a.m. like clockwork.
That’s my window.
I start sketching the plan in my notebook—entry, sweep, extraction. I’ll need to disable the alarm system first. The breaker box is in the maintenance corridor, just off the kitchen. From there, I can move through the servant’s wing—it’s less guarded, easier to navigate.
