Brad squints, straining to think. “I don’t fucking know. All I can see is red.”

  Blood. What happened after Beau left the yard with Brad? I’m out of the room like a rocket, flying down the stairs. I rush into the kitchen and find Ringo staring at my pasta bake dubiously with Otto and Len.

  “ Danny and James. Where are they?” I demand, making them all look at each other. But no answer.

  I growl my frustration and go to my purse on the stool, rummaging through and finding my cell. I see a few missed calls from Esther but ignore them in favor of calling Danny. He doesn’t answer. Neither does James, not the first time I try, or the second or third. “God damn them!” I yell, just as my phone rings in my hand. My heart lunges. And drops when I see Esther calling me, not Danny or James. I place a hand on my forehead, closing my eyes and breathing easy, trying to sound as calm as possible. “Hey,”

  “Hi,” she says, sounding chirpy. Because she’s back. “Where is he?”

  “Danny?” I look at the others, who, again, toss looks between each other, starting to get worried too, all going to their phones.

  “Yes. You said he was picking me up from the airport.”

  “Oh God,” I murmur, giving Ringo pleading eyes. I can’t take this anymore. The constant worry. Stress. My blood pressure sky-high.

  “What’s happened?” Esther says, not sounding all too easy breezy now. “Rose?”

  The cell is suddenly gone from my hand and Otto is guiding me to a stool to sit me down, taking my phone to his ear. “I’m leaving to get you now,” he says, not releasing my arm. I’m becoming breathless. Pathetic! I should be used to this torture by now. Not knowing. Fretting.

  “Someone get Doc,” Ringo yells.

  “No.” I wave a hand. “He’s busy.”

  “Rose, every drop of color has drained from your face.”

  Is it any wonder? “I’m fine.” Breathe, breathe, breathe. I cannot fall apart. I must not fall apart. I know my husband. It would take a nuclear bomb to kill him. Oh God. Why am I talking such shit? He’s human, like me, like everyone. One bullet in the right place—instant death. I’m really not fine. I throw my head between my legs and pant.

  “Rose?” His voice drifts into my hearing, and for a moment I wonder if I’m imagining it. But then I hear James asking where Beau is, and I fling my head up and find my husband in the kitchen, his wetsuit pulled down to his waist, his hair a matted mess of salt and wind.

  “What’s up?” he asks, peeking nervously around at the crowd all watching him.

  “Esther’s waiting for you to pick her up,” Otto says, and Danny frowns down at his cell.

  “She’s texted me. I didn’t see it.”

  “I’m going to get her,” Otto tells him—tells him—a look of pure daring on his face as he passes. Go on, it says. Tell me not to go.

  Danny heeds the warning. “Where’s Brad?” he asks.

  “In his room,” Ringo pipes up quietly. “He’s okay.”

  He nods and I, with a lack of anything else to do but lose my shit—and I’m so tired of doing that—get off my stool and drag the oven dish toward me, starting to spoon out the pasta and slap it on plates. I pass some to Ringo and Len, who both take it gingerly, and put the rest back in the oven to keep warm for the others. Then I head for the TV room to help Goldie and Beau.

  Danny’s body turns with me as I pass him. “I’ve had a really shit day at work, baby. I’m starving.”

  “Yours is in the dogs,” I spit as I leave the kitchen.

  “That’s probably a blessing.”

  I stop, outraged, and stare ahead, weighing up my options. Punch him.

  Or . . .

  Punch him.

  I turn.

  And find him grinning, his scar deep, his blue eyes gleaming. Asshole. I look at Ringo and Len, who both quickly shove forks full of pasta into their mouths to stop them laughing. Fuckers.

  I’m at a loss, my relief making way for anger. And if the pasta doesn’t get it, Danny will. I go to the oven, yank it open, pull out the dish, and pile two plates high with pasta before I go to the French doors and open them. “Cindy, Barbie,” I call. They soon come running and sit at my feet like good little girls, their stumpy tails wagging. I tip the plates, sending the pasta to the ground with a splat, and they gulp it down in a few greedy mouthfuls, licking their lips. I smile and pat their heads. “Away,” I say, sending them off before pivoting and breezing back into a silent kitchen.

  He's still fucking smirking. “Why the hell are you laughing?”

  “Because, my beautiful wife,” he says, lighting up a cigarette, “seeing, hearing, and being the brunt of your rage is a fuck load better than seeing and hearing your distress.” He moves in, seizes me, and drapes me back across his arm, exhaling a plume of smoke above my head. The smell is comforting.

  And just like that, I soften. He knew bringing those girls here would risk triggering me. I’ve fought it so hard. He’ll know that too. “I was worried. Why didn’t you answer my calls?” The second I utter the word, his phone starts dinging, and he looks down at it, turning the screen to show me the notifications that have just this minute come through. Missed calls. From me.

  “I must have dropped service for a few minutes.”

  “Well don’t,” I snap.

  “Where are the women?”

  “Girls,” I say. “They’re girls, Danny. One is barely twenty-one, and she looks like one of the eldest.”

  He flinches and returns me to vertical, taking another pull of his smoke.

  “They’re in the TV room,” I go on. “Doc’s checking them over and then Beau’s taking them upstairs to shower and change. Goldie’s ordered pizza.”

  He kisses me, bombarding me with his comforting mild smell of nicotine, and starts walking me out of the kitchen. We find James in the entrance hall with Beau’s arms and legs wrapped around every part of him. He looks up from his place in her neck, but Beau remains exactly where she is. Buried. The doors to the TV room are open, and Doc is handing out pills. Meds for pain. Not meds that’ll help these poor women forget their trauma.

  “Beau mentioned one of the girls is British,” James says to Danny. “She knew who we were.”

  Danny’s eyebrows jump up, and he cranes his neck to see through the double doors into the TV room. “The redhead,” I say, pointing to her on the couch. “She’s bright. Well-spoken. Her name’s Pearl. She’s twenty-one.”

  Danny breathes out, long and stressed. “I guess we should call the police.”

  “What?” I blurt, looking up at him. “The police? Why?”

  “What else can we do, Rose?”

  “There’s ten of them,” James says, backing Danny up.

  “They’ll be deported,” I say, my tone shaky. “And fall straight back into the hands of corruption. You can’t do that to them.” I stand back, pointing at myself. “I can’t do that. I can’t let them be taken away and not know what’s happened to them.”

  “Their families,” Danny says quietly, hesitantly. “They’ll have families waiting for them to be found.”

  “What if they don’t?” I feel James and Beau watching on, respectfully quiet. “I didn’t,” I say, then point at James. “He didn’t.” Then I point at Danny. “And if you were given the option to be returned to your stepfather, would you have gone?”

  His jaw visibly clenches. I’m certain I’ve made my point, but just in case . . . “Where would you be now if Carlo Black had not taken you off the streets?”

  “I get it,” he grates.

  “Good.” We’re all fucking orphans in one sense or another.

  “So what do we do?” James asks, looking back into the TV room, as if to remind himself how many lives are currently in our hands.

  “Those with families, we arrange reuniting them.” My husband has a private jet. That simplifies things no end. “Those who have no families, we give them options.”

  “What options?”

  “They go into police custody or they don’t.”

  “And if they don’t?” Beau asks, knowing where I’m heading.

  “We help them,” I say, leaving them all in the entrance hall to absorb the facts. I retrieve my cell from the kitchen and download a translation app as I head back to the TV room and cast my eyes around the space, to the faces of the girls, to the eyes full of fear and uncertainty. All I want to do ease them. Reassure them. I look over my shoulder when I feel Danny behind me. He’s leaning against the door jamb, watching me, his face straight.

  I go to my cell, type into the app YOU ARE SAFE, and slowly work my way around the room, translating it into Russian, Serbian, and Slovenian. I don’t bother with Romanian. The girl is only just coming round. Each girl I show my screen to either trembles, cries, or hugs me, and the lump in my throat grows by the second until I’m at Pearl. I don’t show her my screen, but she sees my face with perfect clarity.

  “What happened to you?” she whispers, pulling her tank strap up her shoulder.

  I can’t tell her that I likely faced worse than she has. I can’t devalue her trauma. But the truth is, I did. These girls have been saved before they were conditioned for the life I endured. I swallow and sit next to Pearl, as Goldie leaves and Beau enters. I don’t tell Pearl what happened to me. No one needs to hear that, especially not a young woman who was on the cusp of becoming what I was. A sex slave. A punching bag. An empty vessel of a human. Plus, Danny is in the room, and I can’t send him over the edge. He stares at me for a few moments, then he gives me a small nod and backs out. Today, I have to be the strong one. Today, I protect and shield him. I’ve got this because I know he cannot handle anymore.

  “Who was that?” Pearl asks.

  “That was The Brit.”

  “Your husband?”

  “Yes, my husband.”

  “Another man was trying to carry Anya.” She points to the unconscious girl, who has now come around and is sipping water. “I was trying to keep up but was struggling. He helped me too. My legs were dead. But he didn’t leave me.”

  “Brad,” I say without thought. “Brad was helping you. He was shot.”

  Pearl swings alarmed eyes onto me, her hand covering her mouth.

  “He’s okay,” I say, settling her, admiring her beautiful, vibrant hair. It’s the only thing on her that isn’t dull today.

  “Can I see him? Say thank you?”

  I nod, smiling mildly. Oh my. All I can see is red. Brad wasn’t talking about blood. Pearl is a beautiful young woman. Young being the operative word. “I’ll take you later. First, we figure out what happens next.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, we reunite everyone with their families.” I know better than anyone that deportation is risky. “The last thing I want is for any of you to fall into the wrong hands again, so we’ll manage that.”

  “I have no family.” Pearl clears her throat and levels a sure look on me.

  “No one?”

  She shakes her head. “I left London to backpack across Europe. I met a man at a hostel in Albania. He asked about my family, my friends.”

  Jesus. “And he took you.”

  “When he established I wouldn’t be missed.”

  My God, what is this world we’re living in? “Your parents?”

  “Murdered. Burglary gone wrong. The man was arrested on the scene. Druggy just looking for his next hit.”

  Jesus Christ. “I’m so sorry.” I take her hand, for what good it is, like a gentle squeeze might make everything okay. And weirdly, it might. “Will you help me communicate with the girls?” I ask. “I’ve forgotten names already. Where they’re from.”

  Pearl nods on a snivel.

  “I speak a little Romanian,” I say without thought.

  “You do? Where did you learn Romanian?”

  I blink, checking the room, worried Danny might have heard me. “In a previous life,” I say quietly, forcing a smile at Pearl.

  And I accept in this moment that she isn’t going anywhere.

  * * *

  A few hours later, everyone is showered, changed, watered, and I think Beau and I need therapy, a ridiculous thing to claim. But, Jesus. We know all the girls’ stories. Eight came from good families which, when we called, were out of their minds with worry. Missing people’s cases had been opened, and police in various countries involved.

  Reunited.

  But Pearl and Anya? They remain at the mansion and will do for the foreseeable future. The eight other girls have gone to stay at a hotel by the airfield overnight and will be flown home tomorrow, where loved ones await their return.

  Insane.

  Insane but real.

  After settling Pearl and Anya into a spare bedroom together, Beau and I plod down the stairs, exhausted but energized at the same time. I get a glass of water and Beau drops onto a stool. And then she’s up again fast on a gasp. I watch, alarmed, my water at my mouth, as she zooms across the kitchen.

  Into the waiting arms of her eccentric Aunt Zinnea. “You’re here,” she sobs, clinging to her like she could go under if she lets go.

  “My darling, I’m here. Always here,” she breathes, eyes closed, hugging her niece tightly. “Why didn’t you call me? I would have come straight away.”

  Beau sniffles and breaks away, wiping at her nose. “So much has happened, and . . .” She steps back. “Wait, do—”

  “James called me.”

  Her shoulders drop. It’s relief. “He did?”

  “Of course he did.” She takes Beau’s hand and leads her to the island, sitting her down. “I know your father and I didn’t see eye to eye, but he’s still my brother. Was my brother. Oh, how terrible!”

  “They said he was in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Beau says, and Zinnea visibly recoils. She should. If Beau pursues this, it could be a disaster. “I think they’re lying to me, Lawrence. And now Ollie’s missing, and a new cop’s shown up asking questions.”

  He doesn’t even correct her for using his birth name while he’s his alter ego. That’s how worried Lawrence is by Beau’s splurge of words. He just looks at her in sympathy.

  “Did you actually travel in that?” I ask, motioning to her canary-yellow fishtail dress, needing to give Zinnea a moment, time to think about how she might approach this.

  She looks down her front, as if she might have forgotten she’s wearing the blinding monstrosity. “This old thing?”

  “You bought it last Easter,” Beau pipes in. “It’s barely a year old.”

  “Oh, did I?” Zinnea, rests a hand on her chest, feigning thinking, and I laugh in disbelief, going to her, welcoming her back with a kiss.

  “Good luck,” I whisper in her ear, feeling her squeeze my hip in reply, then I go in search of my boy, finding him in his room on his bed, his phone, as ever, glued to his hand. I’m blessed with his attention when I walk in, and it is all I can do not to throw myself at him and hug the life out of him. Today has been a constant, cruel, consistently painful reminder of a past life I’m slowly accepting I will never be allowed to forget. But I also feel so . . . accomplished. Lucky. The shit aside, I feel like I’ve done something worthwhile. Not be a wife or a mom or a friend. But something for someone else. I feel like I’ve done something that might change the world in a tiny way.

  “Hey, Mom,” Daniel says, tossing his cell aside and getting up. His dark hair is wildly overgrown, and adorable on him. My lip wobbles, and I quickly get it under control.

  “Hey, baby.” My arms lift of their own volition, beckoning him to me, and it’s as if he appreciates in his selfish, teenager head that I need a moment. Just a moment. He comes to me and hugs me and, God, he’s gotten even taller in the time I’ve not seen him. A week. That’s all. But after all the years I missed out on, a week feels like so much longer.

  “You okay?” I stick my nose in his hair and smell St. Lucia. The sea, the air, the salt and sand. I miss being there. But more so, I’ve missed this boy. I hate that the only connection we’ve had is via technology that he barely uses for me. But I get it. I just miss him.

  “What’s going on?” he asks. “Who were all those women?”

  I freeze, my smile falling. I’m so glad he can’t see my face because it’s currently twisted. “Just a few friends who needed help.”

  “Oh, please, Mom.” He breaks away and looks at me with eyes too knowing and earnest for a thirteen-year-old kid. And now he can see my face, and since my son isn’t blind or stupid, he can see the sheer shock and awkwardness I’m feeling. I knew I wouldn’t be able to hide this life from him forever, but I was banking on a few more years and a little more maturity so that when I give him my story—our story, Daniel’s and mine from the moment he was born—he might comprehend that this life we’re in, Danny’s job, our family, is a blessing, and how me meeting Danny was what saved me. Saved me and reunited me with my son. “I know what Mister does,” he goes on in a matter-of-fact, almost nonchalant tone.

  Shit. I am not prepared for this. It’s been an emotionally draining day at best. “You mean jet skis.” Please say yes.

  “He’s mafia, Mom. Everyone knows it.”

  “Everyone?” I squeak, rather than laughing at the absurdity of his suggestion, or even denying it.

  “Yes, everyone. Even Barney’s dad knows.”

  “Oh.” Someone help me.

  Daniel rolls his eyes at me and goes back to the bed, collecting his phone and showing me the screen. An article about James and Danny fills it. “Who showed you that?” I ask, swiping it from his hand.

  “Barney.”

  I suddenly don’t like Barney. “Well, just so you know, this journalist is a bad, bad person.”

  “Has this got anything to do with Mom and Da—I mean Hilary and Derek separating?”

  My God. “How do you know about that?” I practically screech.

  “She called me. Said she’d moved out of town. But Derek is still in Miami.”

  What the hell do I tell him? That the people he knew as his parents for ten years bought him on the black market? That because of that, Derek got caught up in a whole other fucking mess trying to get Danny killed? “I don’t know anything about that.”