Page 8 of Defending Van

The final strike was angled so that it landed vertically along the horizontal marks, hitting every single one of them. Dizzy from the pain, when he finally let go of her, Makayla landed in a heap on her cut-up clothing. She was breathing hard, fighting to stay conscious, but she heard him when he stood above her, looking down at her and sneering.

“Maybe this will teach you a lesson you won't forget, and next time you’ll cooperate like a good little girl,” he told her as he began to walk away.

“I wouldn't count on it,” she slurred.

For a second, he paused, and she was sure he was going to come back and deliver more blows for her being insolent. But he didn't, he just walked out of the room. One of the other men rolled her off her clothes, and they gathered everything up and followed black eyes out. Leaving her and the other women alone with their pain, humiliation, and fear.

No matter how bad the outlook was, Makayla wasn't giving up. There had to be a way out of here, she just had to figure out what that was.

August 25th

4:37 P.M.

His bad mood had only grown throughout the day.

Now Van was scowling as he drove through the busy afternoon streets toward the café where he was meeting his boss, Falcon Oswald. The Oswald family were billionaires who were well respected throughout the special ops community. They hadn't grown up rich, the opposite, in fact. They'd grown up on an off-grid farm, raised without anything from the modern world.

That had all changed when the oldest sibling, Eagle, then freshly turned eighteen, left to join the military. Their farm was attacked, and the oldest daughter, Raven, still bore the physical scars from that day, but she’d saved her family’s life, and they’d entered the real world. Inheriting a fortune, Eagle remained in the military while ensuring his five younger siblings were all well taken care of. All three Oswald boys—Eagle, Falcon, and Hawk—had joined the military, along with middle sister Sparrow. After a career-ending injury took him out of the SEALs, Eagle decided to use his wealth to form his own private security company. Now, Prey did everything from black ops missions, to undercover, to search and rescue, to K9 work, to a team that specialized in apprehending serial killers. Not only did Prey and the Oswald siblings save lives, but they also donated millions a year to various charities.

Part of working for Prey was becoming part of their extended family, something Van had always resisted. He hated his biological family, and he wasn't on the lookout to replace them with anyone. Not even people he could see were objectively decent human beings, and who he respected.

Usually, he avoided in-person meetings with his boss, preferring to send encrypted emails with video footage from his hidden cameras that he thought should be further examined. He also sent details to Prey of the women he thought had the lowest chances of surviving their ordeal, because from time-to-time, Prey would send in someone to purchase one of the women from Azure instead of having to wait to rescue them once they’d already been sold.

But today’s meeting was unavoidable. With both Nathan and Mateo out, and everything within the organization shaken up by the abrupt departures of two of their team, he felt like a face-to-face was necessary.

Parking his car, he didn't bother searching around to make sure he hadn't been followed. If he’d noticed anyone on his tail, he would have driven around until he lost them before coming here.

Once inside the café, it didn't take him long to spot the large man with the dark hair and piercing blue eyes. Falcon gave off the same kind of energy as Van himself did. That kind of stay away from me if you know what's good for you vibes that most people, even without specialized training, were able to pick up on.

Only Falcon was softer these days. Meeting his now wife Hope when he rescued her from a trafficking ring had changed something fundamental in Falcon. Then having their three daughters, seven-year-old twins Addison and Adelia, and two-year-old Azalea, had further lightened him. While that darkness was still present, and it slipped out every so often, Van had seen the man with his family, and he was like a completely different person.

While he’d always maintained that he didn't believe in love, maybe it did exist, it just wasn't for everyone. Because there was no doubt that Falcon loved his wife and little girls, and he’d seen the way Hope looked back at him. Pure love and devotion.

“Coffee, black,” he told the waitress buzzing around the mostly full tables as he made his way to the back corner where Falcon was sitting.

“You came,” Falcon said.

“Told you I was, why wouldn't I?” he asked. Maybe he didn't feel emotions like a regular person, but he wasn't a liar.

Falcon shrugged. “Wouldn't be the first time you bailed on a face-to-face meeting.”

“Always tell you when it’s not necessary,” he reminded his boss. He already knew that Mateo and Ally had survived the car explosion, he’d used his encrypted phone to alert his boss that Mateo had left. Falcon had sent him a short text a few hours later telling him that Mateo was out, but he felt it was the polite thing to enquire about the man’s well-being.

Not because he cared. Because he didn't. But they were colleagues, even if they’d never met before they both took the job with Azure, and it would make him seem even less human than everyone already thought he was if he didn't at least ask.

“He okay?”

“Mateo?” Falcon asked.

“Who else?”

“Yeah, he’s good. Ally too. Both shaken up, and Ally was struggling to hold it together, but they have each other, and they’re going to be fine. We did a second debrief of them today, got everything out of them that they knew, thought, or suspected, and added it to the profile we’re building of the man we’re looking for.”

“We don’t need a profile, we need a name.” Since Falcon’s younger brother Hawk had married a woman whose job it was to assist police in identifying suspects by profiling the victims, he knew the whole Oswald family had started to take profiling a lot more seriously. On the other hand, he wasn't interested in the whys, only in stopping criminals from doing what they did.

“And this could lead us to a name,” Falcon insisted.

“Whatever. I'm glad they’re both okay.” Which was true. Just because he had no personal feelings toward either Mateo or Ally didn't mean he wished them harm. If they thought they were happy together then good for them. “What about the other two?”