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“These kids don’t have a family. Not really,” the man that was protecting them said bitterly. He held out his hand, “Hi, I’m Gavin and I work for a shelter downtown. Those are kids that have been in and out of the shelter almost their whole life.” He explained.
I wiggled out of Troy’s arms and shook Gavin’s hand with a smile. “What gift do you carry?”
He looked at me with widened eyes. “What-?”
I smiled once more. “If you’re trying to hide it, it’s no use. I’m sure you have for some time now, but normally the non-gifted show some kind of reaction to…all this,” I flourished my hand around me. “And I just so happen to know someone that bears the same mark as you…and she’s gifted,” I took Troy’s hand and made him view Gavin’s shoulder blade.
I heard Troy’s soft intake of breath as he recognized Jemmy’s mark as well.
One of the other teams started moving the children out of the trailer after the area was deemed secure. I watched as this team moved flawlessly, loading the children ages seven to sixteen years old into a van.
“Stop!” I called out as I saw a larger man carrying Alex towards one of the vans.
Troy and Jaxson went to put a restraining hand on me. “They’re going to be okay and you will probably see them again,” Jaxson said reassuringly.
“No,” I said forcefully. “I won’t leave Alex…I can’t.”
I made my way towards Alex and the guys reluctantly followed. I know they were just humoring me. They had no clue that somehow, some way, this boy was related to me. I didn’t need a blood test to see and feel that he was my brother.
“Hey, Brown,” Jaxson nodded toward the burly guy.
“Hey, Jaxson, Troy,” his eyes assessed me, and I could see the look of interest that entered his eyes, which baffled me. When I left the house earlier I had put on skinny jeans, a pair of boots, and a simple green cashmere sweater. After the night I had, I knew I must look like a hot mess. “Who’s this pretty lady?”
“This is Blake, but she’s spoken for,” Jaxson said laughingly, but I heard the warning in his voice.
“Oh,” the guy let out a disappointed sigh. “The cute ones always are.”
Alex was watching our interaction with interest. “Come on, Alex, you’re coming with me.”
“Blake,” Troy said gently, “we have standards and procedures we have to follow. I know this is hard, they’re never easy, but he’ll be okay.”
I ignored the pain in my ribs and I took Alex from Brown’s arms. Brown was too shocked at my quick movements to offer much resistance. It made me sick to my stomach how light he was. Ella was considered petite for her age group, but Alex was beyond petite. I could feel his bony arms, ribs, and legs as he wrapped them around me. He wasn’t accustomed to getting consistent meals.
I turned, putting my face up against Alex’s. “I am not leaving without him,” I said firmly.
The guys stared in shock at Alex.
“What’s going on here?” Will asked as he came up behind me. “We can move out now. We’re done here. Team Sw
ipe is coming in right now.”
I had already been told Team Swipe’s primary mission was to act as a cleanup crew. They would swipe the whole location where the children or teens were found, look for any evidence we may need to properly identify them, and if it happened to be in an area where the non-gifted witnessed the extraction they would wipe their memories clean of what they had seen. I was reassured that it was painless and the next morning the witnesses would wake up like they had drank too much the night before and blacked out.
“I’m not leaving his side, Pops,” I stated as I turned around.
I could see the surprise in his eyes too, and I could see he was coming to the same conclusions I was. I had a sister out there and now I had a brother. That was three of us, that we knew of, and Horatio had taken an interest in all of us. It made me wonder if he knew more about me than I did.
I buckled Alex into the seat beside me as Jaxson took the seat on my other side. He seemed reluctant to let me go. I knew it was because he just found out Tom had been there.
Remy was now driving as Will was on the phone the whole ride home. He had let the placement team know that Gavin would be accompanying the children to the processing facility and he was to be given a car to come to Remy’s afterwards. Gavin agreed to allow him to ‘pick’ his brain after he ensured we weren’t creeps out to hurt the children and after he made sure that the children were settled in to their temporary homes.
Will had called Drake and asked him to throw together something for us to eat. After the amount of energy we used tonight, we were all famished and Alex clearly needed some sustenance.
I didn’t pay much more attention to the phone calls he was making as I turned to Alex. “How did you get in that trailer?”
He leaned against me and looked up at me trustingly. “My dad sold me to some men.” His eyes filled with tears and I could tell it was hard for him to talk about this. “A few weeks ago, I started hearing people…in my head. My dad thought I was crazy. He took me to the hospital. The doctors started doing some tests and didn’t know what was wrong with me, When we were getting ready to leave, some doctor came up to my dad and told him he would pay him to take me off his hands.” His lips curled in contempt. “Dad can’t hold a job down. He’s always getting fired. The doctor gave me to some rich guy in a suit and he took me to that trailer.”
“Do you remember what hospital you went to? Do you think you can point him out if we showed you a picture of him?” Troy asked quietly as he turned in his seat.
