Balancing the bag of takeout on my hip, I pushed the door open and stepped into the empty hallway. Now the question was, where should I start. I checked the mailboxes by the door, but none of them said 'Britton', that probably would have been too easy. So, absent any other options, I decided to just knock on the closest door. The young man who answered was not my target, and he seemed confused as to why I was there. He turned back into the apartment and shouted,

“Hey, Chris, did you order food?”

“No!” drifted out from the apartment.

“Sorry, I think you’ve got the wrong place,” he turned back with an apologetic smile.

“Damn, my app must be glitching again,” I replied with mock frustration. “I know the address is in this building. I’ve delivered to the guy before, but he met me outside last time. Maybe you know him? He’s got red hair?”

“Oh! You mean the cute guy in 203, Shawn?”

“Yes! That’s it,” I smiled. “Apartment 203, you said?”

“Yup, just up the stairs and to the left.”

“Thanks, you really helped me out.”

“No problem, anytime.”

The man closed the door, and I climbed the stairs to the second floor. Approaching the door to apartment 203, I paused and listened. I could hear voices inside but couldn’t tell what they were saying. Still, there was no screaming, no sign of a disturbance. That was probably a good sign. I considered my options, and eventually decided to just continue my ruse. He wouldn’t recognize me, so it should work fine. I displayed the bag prominently, and rapped on the door.

A young woman with honey-blond hair answered, smile turning to confusion on the sight of the bag in my hands.

“I think you have the wrong apartment,” she began.

But I wasn’t really paying attention, my focus was on the red-haired man in the living room behind her.

“Hold this for a second, while I check the address?” I handed her the bag before she really had a chance to respond.

People were generally too polite to just drop things on the floor, so she gripped it, and I pushed past her into the room.

“Shawn?” I inquired.

The incubus was standing in the living room, talking with another woman with long, dark hair. The conversation appeared… friendly. If he was planning to kill these women, like Cramer had suggested, he hadn’t gotten around to it yet. That was something, at least. At the sound of his name, he started and turned to me.

“Do I know you?”

“I’ve delivered to you before. I know you placed this order. Are you trying to scam me? Hiding back here, sending someone else out in your stead?”

“What?” he raised an eyebrow, genuinely confused.

“You ordered 3 bags of food, and now you are just going to pretend you don’t know what I am talking about? Is this a joke?”

“Ma’am, I don’t know you and I haven’t ordered anything,” he shook his head emphatically.

“Like hell you didn’t! I can’t afford the strike on my account.”

“I’m sorry, but I don’t know what you want me to do about that. I didn’t order any food and I can’t help you. Now, I am very busy, so…”

“Ha! You think you can lie right to my face?” I accused. “I can prove you did. My phone is in the car with the other two bags of food. Step outside with me for a minute, and I will show you the order. Then, you’ll have no choice but to accept it.”

It didn’t matter that I was speaking nonsense, in fact it was somewhat beneficial. Britton was confused, but not threatened, at the moment. If I could convince him to follow me out to the parking lot, in the name of ‘sorting this out’, then Tom and I could arrest him easily. No fuss, no muss, no risk to anyone else. We could come back and help these women at our leisure, now that we knew where they were being held. If he just came with me, this would be easy.

Britton hesitated for a moment, glancing around as if he expected to see the hidden camera in a prank show at any moment, but finally he nodded.

“Alright, we’ll go sort this out and get you on your way. Monica, give the bag back to the lady. I’ll be back as soon as I have resolved this. It will only take a few minutes, I’m sure.”

I suppressed a smile as he took a step towards the door.

“Shawn, back away from her, quickly,” a voice interrupted, soft but urgent.

Shawn Britton froze, and we both looked behind him to see a third woman emerging from the kitchen.

“I thought I recognized that voice,” she continued, glancing over at me.

Fuck. I did not need this right now.

“That’s my line, isn’t it?” I asked. “It’s been a while, Jess.”

Jessica Collins stepped forward, putting a hand on Britton’s shoulder, she pushed him back further from me.

“It has. You seem to have recovered well, I’m glad to see that,” she spoke softly, refusing to meet my eyes.

Ordinarily, I would have even been happy to see her. In fact, I had been hoping to find her ever since she disappeared, but under the circumstances, it was more an inconvenience than anything. Now, I was going to have to do this the hard way.

“Kind of you to think of me,” I shook my head.

“What is going on here?” Britton demanded.

“She isn’t a delivery driver, Shawn,” Jessica explained. “This is Rayna Clay, and I suspect she is here for you.”

Britton’s eyes widened slightly at my name. Apparently, my reputation preceded me. At least Jess hadn’t forgotten about me entirely. And this confirmed something Cramer had said.

“So, you are Domini, then?” I directed my attention back to Britton.

“What?! No!” he yelped, seemingly horrified by the prospect. “Why would you think that?”

“Come on, Britton, let’s not play games. I’ve spoken to your friend Cramer. I am here to take you in. If you cooperate and give us information about any other Domini you know in the area, things will go a lot easier for you.”

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“No, wait! You don’t understand.”

I backed away from the doorway, getting space from everyone in the room, and drew my gun.

“Yeah. I am sure you can explain it all to me. Just come quietly and we can talk at my place.”

Jessica stepped forward, placing herself between us,

“Ray, this isn’t what you think.”

I sighed; this was what I had been afraid of.

“Of course not. He is a good guy, he saved you, he would never hurt anyone, you love him,” I ticked off the points on my fingers as I went. “Does that cover it, or…?”

“It isn’t like that!” Jessica protested. “Well, it is, but not in the way you think.”

“Uh huh,” I’d heard it all before. “Just step out of the way, Jess. I don’t want to hurt you.”

She shook her head,

“I know you won’t.”

“No? I can injure you without killing you. If it’s necessary, I will. You’ve done as much to me before.”

Her face flushed and she dropped her eyes to the floor,

“I didn’t… I couldn’t…”

“It’s alright, Jess,” Britton broke in. “We’ve talked about this. That wasn’t really you. You can’t keep blaming yourself for what happened back then.”

“But I…”

“It wasn’t anything you could control.”

Tears ran down her cheeks. It was enough to make me feel a bit guilty for even bringing it up. But, for the moment, I just needed her to move. I could deal with the rest later.

“I’m sorry, Ray. What I did, I just couldn’t face it. Why do you think I never contacted anyone?”

“I assume he had a lot to do with that,” I nodded at Britton.

“No! He isn’t what you think. Shawn saved me from the Domini, he protected me, helped me come to terms with everything. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for him. He encouraged me to reach out many times, but I just… I wasn’t ready, yet.”

“Of course. Why wouldn’t he want you to reach out to all your old friends from the Organization. Makes complete sense,” I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Look, Jess, whoever this guy told you he was, it was a lie. He is Domini and he traded for these other women with a Rogue named Andrew Cramer. They are abduction victims, being kept here, away from their families, against their will. Do you understand?”

Reasoning with her might be pointless, but seeing as the only alternative was to shoot her, I would try this first.

“No, you don’t understand,” Jessica protested. “He lied to Drew, so that he would trust him, so that he would send women to him. Shawn is helping them get away, the way he is helped me. He is… rehabilitating them. So that they can go back to their families.”

“Yeah, that doesn’t make sense. If he wasn’t on Cramer’s side, why wouldn’t he have turned him in? Why leave him free to keep abducting others? When I found Cramer, there were three women chained in his basement, one was near death,” I turned to Britton. “If you aren’t like him, how could you just let that continue?”

I pinned him with a searching look. Britton bit his lip.

“What Drew was doing was disgusting, and I hate that I couldn’t do more to stop it, but I figured helping some people, at least, was better than none. I couldn’t bring in anyone else because I wasn’t sure who was safe. The Organization is gone, after all.”

“You could have at least gone to the Council.”

“Who in the Council could I trust? You don’t think they were infiltrated by the Domini?” he shook his head. “No. There was no one I could turn to. I just tried to save as many as I could, alone. I lied to others and told them I was Domini, so that they would trust me. I asked them for their thralls, said it was for my personal use, but I have been helping them, and letting them go. Jess has been assisting me. You can ask her.”

“I would, but I can’t really trust anything she says, can I?”

“You can! You have to, please!” Jess begged.

“I can confirm that it is the truth,” the woman with the dark hair stepped forward. “When I came here, all I could think of was returning to Drew. I only stayed, because Drew had told me to go with him, and I couldn’t disobey. But, now… I think about him less and less. Shawn says soon I can go back to my family, right?”

“That’s right, Ashley, you are making excellent progress,” Britton smiled in an attempt to be encouraging, but I could see him sweating.

“You’re saying that you can break the hold they have over their thralls?” I asked.

“I… have been working on it. It is a slow process, that is why I can only help so many. But, I have helped several people return to their lives.”

“It’s true,” Jessica added.

It could be a lie. It was probably a lie. But… there were a few things about it that rang true. I remembered the way he had spoken to Cramer on the phone, when they hadn’t known anyone was listening. He had, truly, seemed to despise Cramer, even feel relief that he had been caught. Also, he hadn’t tried to manipulate my mind, even once. It was usually instinctive for Rogues; they almost couldn’t help themselves. Was it possible he was telling the truth?

“You, Ashley,” I looked at the dark-haired woman. “What did he say to you when he arrived at the apartment, just now. No one else speak, I only want to hear from you.”

“Well, he, uh,” she stammered briefly, before taking a deep breath and composing herself. “He said that he was in trouble, that someone knew about what he had been doing and that he needed to move us somewhere safe, and then he wouldn’t be able to see us for a while.”

I considered that. It supported his story, if he was going to dispose of them, why say anything at all? Why put them on edge? Surely, he would have just killed them, without an explanation. But this wasn’t conclusive. I was leaning towards believing him, but that wasn’t enough. If I was wrong and I let him go, every person he harmed from this moment onward would be on my head. If this was the old days, I would have arrested him, brought him back to the Organization and sorted things out there. That would be the safest and most reasonable way to handle this. But this wasn’t the old days and things weren’t that simple. I wasn’t with the Organization, now. No, the people I was with now would kill Britton, or worse, whether he was guilty or not. Which meant whatever I chose, action or inaction, I would be deciding what happened to him. I swallowed hard. Tom was going to arrive any minute. I had to do something. I had to make a choice. I could only think of one way to test the truth of their claims. It wasn’t foolproof, of course, but it was the best I could do in the time I had. I lowered my gun.

“Ok, I believe you. I’ll help you sort things out with the authorities,” I stepped forward and put a hand on Jessica’s shoulder. “And I just want to say, I’m glad you are alright, Jess. I’ve been worried about you.”

I embraced her, and I waited. If they were lying to get me to lower my guard, now was the perfect moment for anyone in this room to incapacitate me. And I knew at least Jess absolutely would. We had been here before, Jess and I. It was a risk, of course, but at least if the worst happened, Tom could handle things from here. I held my breath. I expected at any moment for someone to grab for the gun dangling loosely in my fingers, or to pull out a weapon of their own. But nothing happened. When I finally stepped back, Jess was sobbing and everyone else was watching quietly. No one had even moved, not even Britton. He actually seemed to be smiling,

“See, I told you she didn’t blame you, didn’t I Jessy?”

Jessica smiled,

“Thank you. Really, it means so much to me.”

Well, that was it. It was as much certainty as I was going to get.

“Me too, but we will have to chat about that later. For now, we only have a few minutes before someone else joins me up here, and they will not be as understanding, I can guarantee that,” decision made, I turned my mind to the next pressing matter.

“What does that mean?” Britton asked.

“It means my partner is going to kill you or arrest you, no exceptions. And make no mistake, arrest also means torture and probably death. I assume you don’t want that.”

Britton shook his head.

“Why would you be working with someone who…” Jessica began.

“Look, I have plenty of questions for you, too, but we really don’t have time to get into that right now. Later, I promise. For now, we need to come up with a plan, quickly.”

“What do you suggest?” Britton asked.

“I have an idea, but we are going to need to work together for this. Can I count on all of you?”

I looked around the room, observing as everyone nodded.

“Ok, first thing, take this,” I pressed a folded piece of paper into Britton’s hand.

“What is it?”

“Notes. The contents aren’t important right now. What matters is, when you get out of here, I need you to deliver them to someone for me. Her name and number are inside. And you are also going to tell her everything about what you have been doing here, and about all of your ‘friends’.”

“I’m not sure…”

“You don’t know who to trust. I get that. But you can trust Liz. You need to trust her, because doing this on your own is not accomplishing much. For every person you save, ubarae like Cramer will pick up two more victims. More needs to be done. Surely, you can see that?”

Britton nodded glumly.

“Also, I think you can be of help if you really are having success at… deprogramming victims. If you truly want to make a difference, that will probably be the best way. But I’ll leave that decision to you. Either way, passing the rest of this information on to Liz is the one condition I will put on helping you. Do you agree?”

Britton nodded and took the paper from my hand,

“You’re right. The ubarae who are doing these things, they need to be stopped, permanently, not just delayed or distracted. If you’re sure your friend can be trusted, I will give it a shot. It’s the least I can do.”

“Good. Alright, then. Huddle up everyone, here is what we are going to do.”