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Another scream came from inside. Then another. Human voices.

“There are people in there.”

I ran toward the container. Raze caught my arm.

“Demi, wait. There may be a second charge.”

“They’re burning.”

“And you won’t help them if the entire container explodes in your face.”

A fist struck the metal from inside. Once. Again. The third blow was weaker.

I tore my arm free. Raze swore and followed.

Zeno shouted for bolt cutters. Raze searched the dead driver for another switch while Gianni’s men covered the road.

Greco’s officers emerged from the quarry and secured the surviving gunmen.

No one waited to be told what mattered most as we crowded around the container.

The fall had twisted the doors into the frame. One locking bar had bent through its bracket. The other had buckled inward.

Zeno jammed a pry bar beneath the first handle. Matteo took the second.

“Together.”

They pulled. The metal groaned but didn’t open. Smoke leaked through the seals and rolled around their hands.

The screaming inside sharpened. Someone hammered against the wall. The blows slowed.

I climbed onto the container and examined the damaged hinges. Heat pressed through the soles of my boots. Smoke burned my eyes.

Matteo climbed up beside me with a cutting tool.

“It’ll take too long.”

“Use a breaching charge.”

“We don’t know where they’re standing.”

I pressed my ear against the metal. Heat bit through my skin. Voices crowded the other side.

“Move away from the doors,” I shouted. “Get to the far end.”

The pounding stopped. The voices continued.

I repeated the order in English, then in the Romanian I remembered from women who had passed through the parish shelters.

“Far end. Cover your faces and stay down.”

A voice answered in Romanian.

“We cannot see.”

“Follow the wall with your hands. Keep moving until you reach the end.”

Raze fixed a narrow charge along the outer frame. Matteo ordered everyone back.