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Kairo and I are knocked back and I throw my hand out to protect his head from hitting the concrete, and it takes what feels like hours to reorient myself enough to check on the other guys.
Hades is lying still next to me, blood dripping down his temple. Lee and Rook were both thrown several feet away but are already getting up, looking relatively unharmed aside from some minor cuts and burns.
“Is everybody alright?” Benson shouts. I’m barely able to hear him over the ringing in my ears, but I nod anyway. “Good! We need to get y’all to the hospital right now! The tactical team lead on Roman’s op just called me and some shit went down.”
My head whips to the side and I immediately regret the move when my vision swims and nausea rises. Fuck, I think I might have a concussion.
“What do you mean,shit went down?” Rook rasps, staggering over to drop next to me before pulling me into a side hug.
“I mean, Blake was hurt, and we need to gonow. I don’t have any specifics, just that she was heading into surgery,” he says urgently.
At that, we all crawl to our feet as quickly as possible. Which, admittedly, is about as fast as a snail crawling through molasses in winter. Eventually, we make it up and support each other into the car. Benson was the farthest from the explosion, so he drives while we call our dads.
Pulling up to the hospital twenty minutes later, we’re no closer to figuring out what just happened.
How did we get the wrong address when everybody else got the right one?
Nurses rush us through the emergency room and into several bays to get checked out. Hades and I have minor concussions, but everybody else is fine, thankfully. Rook is absolutely losing it in the room next to mine, so as soon as the doctor gives me the go ahead, I rush in there to calm him down.
“Where the fuck is she?! Where’s my goddamn Omega?” he shouts.
The nurse helping me down the hall whispers as she lets me into the room. “They’re going to sedate him if he doesn’t calm down. The last thing we need in here is a feral Alpha.”
I don’t bother acknowledging her as she leaves, I already know. “ROOK,” I bark. He thrashes in the Alpha nurse’s hold. “Rook, man, you gotta calm down. We need to get to Blake, and you can’t be there if you’re sedated for acting like a rabid raccoon on trash day.”
His movements finally slow down as his eyes lose some of their feral gleam. Smiling, I gently grab his hands and pull him out of his arm-prison. He sighs and sends me a grateful look. “Thanks man. I needed that,” he whispers, pulling me into a classic Rook bear hug.
I nod, enjoying the moment with one of my best friends.
“Let’s go get our girl.”
ChapterThirty-Two
BLOW MY COVER
Roman
At the same time across town
My phone has been ringing off the hook for hours, but I’m so deep into this op I can’t risk answering for even a second. I’m just putting it away after silencing it when my partner looks at me suspiciously. “Problem?” he says in his thick Russian accent.
Schooling my expression, I send a bored look his way and scoff. “Of course not, Andrei. Let’s just pick up this whiny brat and get her back to the boss so I can scope out the skin at the club tonight.”
God, after this I’m gonna need a yearlong vacation and a fucking raise.
I’ve been undercover in this trafficking ring for more than two years. And I spent the five years before that begging the Bureau to let me form a team to infiltrate their ranks after I caught that tiny girl in Asheville and did a deep dive on her.
Truthfully, I didn’t find much, which set off all kinds of red flags. I learned her name was Blake Connolly. She was ten years old, and she was now an orphan, being tossed into foster care after they presumed her parents were dead. They ruled the fire in their home as arson, but the girl was so small the police knew there was no way she had set it herself given the lock on theoutsideof the attic door.
The parentsconvenientlydisappeared. I’ve seen enough trafficking cases in my career to know a fake backstory when I see one. And given the fact that Blakealsodisappeared a year later without a trace? Something didn’t add up. I’ve spent any free time I had the last seven years looking for her, and I don’t even really know why. Something about her reminded me of Rook and his friends, and my instincts were demanding I keep her safe after watching her make the three-story drop that day.
I haven’t seen her since, but I also haven’t been able to look in the two years since I started this assignment. As soon as it’s over tonight, I plan on starting the search again. Based on my math, the girl should be eighteen, so maybe I’ll catch a break and she’ll resurface so I can bring her home and have mama help her out if she needs it.
I’m brought out of my daydreaming when we pull up to the auction house. I’ve been here several times in the past, but it still shocks me every time I see it. We’re in an upscale residential neighborhood and the house is a white colonial style with dark blue shutters. There are kids playing in the street, and women are being fuckingsoldout of this three-story family house.
We get checked in and are informed that the auction will begin shortly, and that previews are available on the tablet sitting on our table. Andrei is drinking already and scoping out one of the waitresses, so I grab the tablet and start scrolling. There are only a few women being sold tonight, something about this being a “late batch” or some shit.
They present the women in what basically amounts to a dating profile. Their height, weight, age, scent, and things like eye and hair color are listed, but there are also photos. I flip through, not really looking, since the raid will happen before they actually removed anyone from the premises. Suddenly, one specific picture catches my eye and I quickly flip back to look at the profile.
