Chapter 21
Leo
Gino and I were standing close together in the dark. There were binoculars pressed to Gino’s eyes as he peered to see into the shopping mall, through one of the large open windows. We’d been staking out the place for over an hour now, watching for any signs of Marco and his men. Gino had arranged for a dozen paid men to help us with this attack and they were all in position as well.
“This is it,” Gino said and I clenched my jaw.
Somewhere inside the mall, there were a group of children and women who had been imprisoned by Marco and his men, and tonight was the night that they were going to be traded off to another party for money. The plan was to intercept the deal and hopefully capture Marco. What we were going to do with him after we captured him was a discussion that Gino and I hadn’t had yet. I knew what Gino wanted to do—he wanted payback for his own father’s death.
We heard the sound of cars approaching and we watched quietly.
There were three cars, one of which I recognized as Marco’s. Matteo and Francis got out of it, followed by Marco. Even though it was dark and we couldn’t see very clearly, there was no mistaking it was him. From the other two cars, more men poured out who we didn’t recognize. Some of them were the men from the buying party, undoubtedly.
All of them started walking into the abandoned dark building, in all probability to go check on the people who were going to be trafficked.
We had decided to give them a few minutes, allow them to build up a false sense of security and get engrossed in the trade-off. Gino’s binoculars were still fixed to his eyes, looking to see when the perfect opportunity would be.
A few minutes went by, and I had my gun tightly clutched in my hand. I already knew that we outnumbered those men. We would take them by surprise and these guys would not stand a chance.
Gino raised up his hand and pointed at the mall, which was the signal for attack and we rushed in with our guns pointed forward. Shots rang out from either side, but inside the mall, the men were outnumbered. My first targets were Matteo and Francis and I shot each of them in the leg and they fell to the ground.
Men on both sides were putting up a good fight, but we had taken them by surprise and we were more in number. Within just a few minutes, most of the opposition was already on the ground while the others stood with their hands up in the air, including Marco.
In the dark, I could only see his eyes. They were narrowed and angry as they glared at me but he hadn’t said a word yet. Three years later and I was still haunting him.
“We’ve got it covered here, you should go check on the kids. Go!” Gino shouted. I bit back a response, but I knew he was right. I needed to get the women and children out of here.
With my gun still clutched in my hand, I ran up the steps of the building, looking behind each locked door till I finally found the room where the prisoners were being held. When I burst through the door, they all cowered together, pressing themselves into a corner of the room.
In the moonlight streaming in through the broken window in the room, I could see their unwashed, scared faces. Most of them were children, some of them adult women, and they were all bundled up together, afraid of what was to come next.
“It’s okay, we’ve come here to set you free. Don’t worry, don’t be scared,” I said to them, lowering my gun. Most of them didn’t speak English. I could sense that they were mostly refugees and poor immigrants who had been kidnapped off the streets.
“We will find your families, you’ll be free to go back home, don’t be scared,” I crouched down in front of a small girl and reached for her shoulder. She flinched and then started crying, throwing her arms around me. I didn’t know if she’d understood my words, but she could sense that we had come to bring her to safety. As I held her in my arms, I thought about Sofia and what I would have done if my daughter was in this situation. All I felt was anger. Marco didn’t deserve to live.
“Leo!” I heard Gino’s voice. He was running up the steps, coming to look for me.
I stood back up and went out of the room.
“They’re in here, I’ve found them!” I exclaimed as he ran towards me. He was out of breath and immediately, I could sense that there was something wrong.
“It’s not him, it’s not Marco!” he shouted, shaking his head with his nostrils flared.
“What the fuck are you talking about?” I growled, rushing past him, back towards where the others were being held by our men. Gino followed me.
“It’s an imposter, Marco’s body double. I realized it when I shone a flashlight to his face,” Gino was shouting behind me as I ran.
“No! It’s not possible! I saw him with my own eyes!” I growled, running back into the room. The man who I thought was Marco was standing with his hands up in the air. Gino shone a flashlight on him and I felt my body stiffen. Gino was right, this wasn’t him.
“What the fuck is going on?” I growled, turning to him.
“I got it out of Francis. Marco found out about us, that we were planning something, and he sent an imposter in his place to fool us,” Gino said.
“Why would he do that? Why would he want to fucking fool us when he knew we would win?” I asked, clenching my jaw. Gino shook his head and the answer came to me like a rock falling on my head.
“He wanted to keep us busy,” I said, answering my own question.
***
I didn’t stop to hear what Gino had to say or what he was going to do with the imposter. I knew I had to get to Isabella and Sofia. I drove at break-neck speed, running every traffic light and swerving through traffic until I got to the apartment which was supposed to be a safe house. The one that Marco was never supposed to find.
I ran up the stairs until I got to the door. We had assigned one armed man to stand guard at the door, but he was lying on the ground now in his own pool of blood.
I jumped over him, crashing through the door and when I stumbled in, I saw that neither Isabella or Sofia were in there. The place had been ransacked, their bag was missing, the sheets on the bed were jumbled up and on the ground. There had clearly been a struggle.
“Fuck! Fuck!” I growled and I picked up a coffee table and crashed it to the floor where it broke into smithereens. Where was I even supposed to begin looking for them? It was obvious now that Marco had kept a watch on Isabella; he had followed us to the safe house and waited until the coast was clear.
In order to keep Gino and me busy, he had followed through with the trade off at the shopping mall but sent an imposter instead. While over here, he had kidnapped Isabella once again, and this time, with Sofia in tow.
Where was he going to take them this time? Feeling frustrated, I sat down on the edge of the bed. We had come so close to happiness, to getting away from him, to destroying Marco once and for all. But it was just an illusion; it felt like Isabella and I were never going to be able to have that happy family we were dreaming about.
My cellphone rang in my pocket and I answered the call, hoping it was Gino with some new positive developments.
“Leo, it is so good to hear your voice again, son.” It was Marco.
I jumped up from the bed, clenching my fists into balls.
“Where have you taken them? Where is Isabella? Where is my daughter?” I growled, spittle flying out of my mouth. Marco laughed, a quiet calm laugh, like he knew that he had won.
“You don’t have to worry about them, Leo. I’ll take care of them. You better give up now, boy, because you will never see your girls ever again,” he hissed and before I had a chance to say anything else, he had already ended the call.
I growled with anger, flinging the phone away from me. I should have known better—Marco was always two steps ahead of me.