No, no, no—
This was about human trafficking.
And Mila’s name was in the middle of it.
She didn’t vanish.
She was stolen.
I couldn’t breathe.
I couldn’t move.
I stared at the page, waiting for it to correct itself. Waiting for something to shift, to fix, to undo.
It didn’t.
It just sat there.
Telling me exactly what had been done to her.
All this time, I never knew what happened to her. One day she was there, and then she wasn’t. I searched. We all searched. But there was nothing—no leads, no sightings, not even a body to mourn. For years I thought maybe she ran away, maybe someone killed her in a moment of madness and buried the evidence deep. My mind invented every possibility except the truth. Never once did I consider that someone could look at a three-year-old child and see a price tag. That she might have been trafficked—sold, passed around like contraband, her name stripped down to a number on some ledger. I’d convinced myself she was already gone because the alternative was unthinkable.
Suddenly I was on my feet, stumbling into the bathroom. I fell to my knees in front of the toilet and threw up hard. Violently. My stomach heaved again and again until there was nothing left but bile and acid and the kind of pain that lived in your bones.
My hands shook. My vision blurred. And for a moment I didn’t even feel anger—just grief. Deep, howling grief that threatened to rip me open from the inside out. My brain conjured her image—tiny, innocent, helpless. Just a little girl. My little sister. Sold. Used. Hurt. Over and over until she probably didn’t survive it. And that thought alone made me sick all over again. I gripped the edge of the toilet and emptied whatever was left.
I’d killed the cop who compiled this. I’d taken out the judge who pursued the case. I’d shut down the only people who were trying to stop the horror. And why? Because I thought I was doing my job? No. The truth was uglier than that. I never asked the right questions because I didn’t want the answers. All I ever cared about was the money. The kill order. The next payday. The rush of being needed. I didn’t think. Didn’t look twice. I was so fucking sure I was above it all. That I was the sharpest weapon in the room. But I was blind. Willingly blind.
I stood up sharply, the towel falling to the floor. Rage ignited in my chest like a struck match, sudden and all-consuming. I stormed into the living room, eyes scanning for the first thing to obliterate. The standing lamp met my wrath—snatched by the neck and flung and hurled across the room without a second thought. It shattered against the wall in a flash of glass and ceramic.
The table went next. I kicked it until wood splintered and something stabbed into my foot. I didn’t care. I was already bleeding.
I stormed into the kitchen, ripped open the fridge, and grabbed the vodka. I drank half the bottle before I could think,burning my throat, my gut, anything that still worked. I smashed it against the wall, glass raining over the floor like frost.
I grabbed the biggest knife from the block. I didn’t want to cut. I wanted to destroy. I tore back into the living room and stabbed the punching bag. Once. Twice. Again and again until my shoulder screamed and my wrist went numb. Then I dropped the knife and pounded the thing with my fists.
A scream tore out of me—raw, guttural, primal—rising from somewhere I didn’t know I had. I didn’t care if the neighbors heard. Let them listen. Let them wonder what kind of beast lived next door.
I dropped to my knees, gasping, sweating, shaking. The taste of metal in my mouth. My eyes burning. The room wrecked.
Mila.
My baby sister.
I pulled on a fresh pair of boxers and track pants, then reached for a white tank top and zipped up my jacket. My feet slid into boots without thought, muscle memory carrying me to the door. I wasn’t thinking in any conscious way—I was moving on instinct. Like a loaded gun that had already been cocked and fired, the path forward was inevitable.
I holstered my gun before I grabbed my keys and got out of the door.
I got behind the wheel and headed toward Pakhan’s estate, the engine humming like a war drum beneath my rage. The city blurred around me—buildings, lights, everything bleeding together in the periphery while my thoughts sharpened to a single, lethal point.
There was no one else left to blame.
And I wasn’t going there to talk.
The car barely stopped before I slammed the door and stepped out. My boots hit the gravel like gunshots. I didn’t bother to hide it—didn’t bother to fix my face or my posture. I didn’t care whosaw me. I walked like I had death in my hands and no intention of slowing down.
The mansion loomed ahead, golden light spilling from the windows, mocking me with its warmth. My hand was already at my side, fingers wrapped around cold steel. The gun came out as naturally as a breath.
