Page 18 of Rage

While I know it’s the strange lighting giving her this near-demonic look, my stomach twists anxiously.

“You ok, Daze?” I ask her curiously, reaching up to tuck a strand of her dark hair behind her ear. The other side of her head she keeps shaved. That, along with the piercings that line the outer shell of her ears, give her an edgy look that she’s been sporting since she blew back into my life.

She reaches up and gently takes my chin. While I can’t see her eyes thanks to the shadows, I can feel them searching my face.

“I’d be better if you told me what you’ve found,” she admits after a moment.

I sigh. “If I had something, you know I would tell you.”

“Youdohave something,” a deep rumbling voice says from behind me. “Your screen has been blinking for the past few minutes.”

I twist in my seat to look over my shoulder to find Drake sitting up on the bottom bunk, his hands behind his head, watching the both of us. He’s a dark silhouette back there, but a foreboding presence nonetheless.

“How long have you been up?” I ask, keeping my voice low.

“Like I could sleep with your fingers tapping on the screen like a psychotic woodpecker,” Drake replies.

I frown. “You could’ve said something. I would’ve gone and sat in the driver’s seat or headed up to the roof.”

Before Drake can reply, Daisy reaches out and takes my chin again. She jerks my head around, but instead of turning me to face her, she forces me to look at my screen.

“What does that mean?” She demands.

Leaning forward, I study the private message that’s popped up. Immediately, I realize that a few of the members on the discussion forum I’ve been lurking in have started up a private group chat and I’ve been accidentally roped in.

Slowly, I scan through the messages. They’re coded, that much is clear. But these guys aren’t geniuses. The dark web might be full of criminals and evil people, but that doesn’t mean that any of them are all that smart.

Just as I get to the end of the chat, it suddenly vanishes as if it was never there.

“What the fuck?” I mutter, my fingers returning to the keyboard as I try to drag it back up. It’s a fruitless attempt. The conversation is gone and all the information with it.

Thankfully, I’m good at retaining information.

“I need a piece of paper,now!” I snap. Daisy scrambles around the couch, maneuvering around the table that’s bolted to the floor, and hurries over to a cupboard. A few seconds later, she returns with a small spiral notebook and a pencil. Taking it from her, I quickly scribble down everything that I can remember.

“None of that makes sense, Owen,” Daisy points out when I’m finished.

I don’t answer her. The words are gibberish, but I’ve seen this type of coded message before. Slowly, the letters and numbers begin to rearrange themselves in my head. It takes a few minutes until the pencil starts to move again, but when I’m done, I sit back and smirk.

“IknewI had something big,” I say to no one in particular.

Silently, Daisy stares down at the message. There’s not much that needs to be said. The horror is all laid out before us. Even without saying a word, I know where Daisy’s head is. She’s sinking, quickly if the cold air around us is any indication, into the dark places of her mind. The thing is, that darkness doesn’t just hold her there in its cold depths, it changes her.

I push aside my own disgust at what we’ve found to focus on the woman beside me. I study Daisy. Her gaze is locked on the information I’ve written down, but I have a feeling she’s not seeing it anymore. The stiff way she’s holding herself tells me she’s probably not even breathing.

“It’s going to be ok,” I assure her softly.

Daisy looks from the notepad to my face. “Theydon’t know that.”

She’s right, the ten women in that cargo container onboard a freighter sailing across the Pacific Ocean and headed to a small port off the coast of Washington don’t know they’re going to be ok. They’re trapped, scared, and facing an unimaginably horrific future. Having been held hostage herself, Daisy has special insight into what these women are going through. She escaped, but not without some scars, both mental and physical ones.

Reaching out, my fingers wrap around Daisy’s wrist. The contact seems to unthaw her. Slowly, Daisy’s shoulders lower and she releases a long breath.

“We’re going to get them out of this, Daze,” I vow.

The RV rocks slightly as Drake gets out of bed and joins us. He peers over my shoulder and reads the message.

“Fuck.”

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