I’ve been sitting in this room for probably close to an hour, but no one has come to talk to me yet. It doesn’t look like the dark, sinister interrogation rooms I’ve caught glimpses of on television shows. There’s no bare bulb hanging over the table and no fake mirror on the wall that they can watch me through.

Fear keeps splashing around in my gut like waves tossing around a small boat on the open seas. I try not to let it overtake me, but I want to lean over and hyperventilate. I want to scream. I want to bang on the door and cry until they let me out of here. But I know none of that will help me. It’s no use. I’m trapped. Again.

No, this space is bright. Almost too bright. The multiple fluorescent lights overhead make me want to shield my eyes. The desk is similar to my family’s old kitchen table and the chairs could have easily been taken from a classroom. On the opposite wall is an unblinking eye of a camera, recording my every move.

Not that I’m giving them much of a show. Occasionally crossing and uncrossing my legs and fidgeting with the space on my finger where my ring should be isn’t exactly interesting for them to watch.

The door silently opens and my head pops over to watch an officer I haven’t met yet walk in with some papers in his hand. He’s taller than average with silver hair and milky blue eyes.

“Hello, I’m Officer Parks.” He sounds bored and never lifts his gaze from the page he’s reading. “I’ll be asking you a few questions today.” He shuts the door behind him and takes a seat across from me.

I don’t say a word. He hasn’t asked me anything yet and I’m not sure if I should speak. I just watch as he keeps reading, acting like we’re not even in the same room. Just as I wonder if he’s ever going to say anything the door opens again.

“Sorry.” A woman looks over at the aging policeman sitting across from me. She smiles at me brightly and comes over to the table. “Hey, I’m Sofia. Well, Officer Martinez.” She holds out her hand to me and I shake it gingerly. I’m surprised to hear her Spanish accent roll from her tongue. With her rich, brown hair and deep mahogany eyes, she makes me think of how much different my life could’ve turned out if I had become a legal citizen of this country.

She takes a seat beside her partner, the man who still hasn’t uttered a word. His silence makes me uncomfortable. I don’t know how to read him. His expression is stony as he finally lifts his eyes from the page and pins them across the table on me.

“Let’s get this started.” He sounds like this is the millionth time he’s gone through this routine and he couldn’t possibly find it less interesting. “For the record, state your name, your age, and your country of birth.”

“I am Ella Garcia, I’m twenty-one years old, and I was born in Colombia,” I answer obediently.

“Oh, we would’ve been neighbors.” Sofia’s eyes light up. “I was born in Ecuador, but I came here when I was very young,” she explains.

There’s something about her that makes me relax. Listening to her familiar accent, seeing the kindness in her eyes, the tension in my muscles eases as I relax into the chair.

“I’ve never been to Ecuador,” I admit, “but I’ve heard it’s very beautiful.”

“Okay, enough chit-chat. How about we get into how you found your way into America, Ella.” Officer Parks snaps the focus back to his case.

“My father crossed the Úsuga Clan in Colombia.” I stop and peer across the table at Sofia, who shakes her head knowingly. “My mother and two brothers paid the price for his betrayal. I hid under the bed as they raped her and then killed them all.” I try not to think about my words. I don’t want to feel attached to them, to the images. I just can’t let my mind go there right now.

“I’m so sorry,” Ms. Martinez whispers.

I nod, swallowing the lump rising in my throat. “Thank you. So, my father knew I would suffer my mother’s fate if he didn’t get me out of the country. He had business ties to a family here and paid a coyote to have me shipped up here in the back of a truck with a bunch of other girls. I was the oldest one and that was six years ago.” More thoughts I try to push away, knowing full well that the lives those children were thrust into made mine look like paradise.

“Okay, so you didn’t come up to stay with family? You went to a business associate’s house? What kind of business?” Officer Parks frowns at me.

“Human smuggling business.” I bite my tongue, not sure if I should tell them. Should I spill everything about Sylvia’s job? Should I tell them how she buys girls, the younger the better, and sells them into sex slavery or off to rich psychopaths who are probably much worse? Part of me fears like I’ve been trained to for years now, that if I give up too much, somehow she’ll find me and make good on every single threat she’s screamed in my face over the years.

“You said this was six years ago?” Sofia furrows her brows. “So you were, what? Fifteen when you came here?”

“Yes.”

“And you said the other girls, they were younger?”

“Yes.”

“How much younger?”

My thoughts jump back to the dark heat of being locked inside of the back of the long haul truck. The other children were several years my junior. Many of them clung onto me since I was the oldest, like a child clings to their mama.

“I would guess the youngest was eight and the next oldest after me was twelve.”

“Do you know if they were also being placed in homes?”

“No, they were not.”

Sofia and Officer Parks exchange a glance.

“Tell me, Ella, what have you been doing for the last six years? You haven’t gone to school, right? Have you been working here?” the man with the icy blue eyes asks me.

“I’ve been working, but I didn’t get paid. Most times I wasn’t allowed to leave the house or eat more than one meal a day. I cooked, cleaned, ran errands and basically did whatever I was told,” I admit.

There’s that look again. The officers are having a silent conversation in glances.

“Ella, do you know what the woman’s name was that you lived with?”

“Yes, her name is Sylvia Thurston.”

“And do you know how she made her money, Ella?”

“Yes, ma’am.” I swallow and force myself to be brave. There’s nothing she can do to me now. I must tell the police what a horrible person Sylvia is so maybe they can stop her from harming more children. “She bought very young girls and sold them into unpaid prostitution. They became slaves. She never talked to me about it, but I met some of them and she constantly threatened to do the same to me if I stepped out of line.” My voice wavers as I make the heavy confession, releasing a burden from my soul so dark, so completely horrid that as soon as the words finally tumble off my tongue I can’t help but break down and sob.

I shelter my face in my hands, letting my tears fall into my palms, and my shoulders shake ruthlessly. All of the years of tears I’ve been swallowing come gushing out like water from a broken levy.

“Okay, um, I’m going to need you to hang tight. Officer Martinez and I need to discuss some things, but we’ll be back, got it?” he gruffly asks me.

I nod, still unable to get myself under control. All the faces of the kids I’ve met and watched be taken away over the years swirl through my mind. I don’t know what’s going to happen to me, and right now I don’t even care. As long as the police do something to stop yet another girl from being processed by Sylvia and shipped off to the most disgusting men in existence, I will be happy.