Maggie was taken down several flights of stairs to a corridor with rooms on either side. As they passed each room, Maggie noticed the various children inside. The realization of what had just transpired had yet to settle in her mind. It was as if she was living in a real-life horror film.
The two men stopped at a door, unlocked it, and shoved Maggie inside. She lost her footing and fell face-first onto the hard industrial tile floor. She rolled onto her back quickly, just as the men slammed the heavy door and threw the deadbolt.
Maggie sat up slowly, looked around the room, and her eyes landed on a little girl huddled in the corner with her knees tucked tightly to her chest and her forehead resting on them. Maggie inched her way over to the little girl until she was kneeling in front of her.
“Little girl?” Maggie whispered.
The child finally raised her head, and when she did, Maggie recognized her as the child whom she’d picked for Thelma. Stunned, Maggie fell back onto her ass. Rock had not only left Maggie there, but he hadn’t taken the little girl home with him.
“Why are you still here?” Maggie finally managed.
“’Cause that asshole you came here with left without me,” the girl hurled.
“I’m sorry,” Maggie stated mournfully. “We’re going to be all right,” she added, trying to calm the girl’s fear as much as her own. “My name is Maggie. What’s yours?”
“Joey.”
“How old are you?”
Joey thought for a moment, the memory leaving her with great despair. “Nine. My bitch mother traded me for drugs and a case of beer on my birthday.”
Oh shit, Maggie thought. Then the enormity of what had transpired pushed through her consciousness, and Maggie began to sob. Joey shifted closer to Maggie.
“Don’t cry. They don’t like it when we cry. Besides, if you’re a crybaby, they make you take pills to make you stupid. Some of the other kids have to take them all the time, and they can hardly even talk,” Joey warned.
“You’re right, Joey. Crying isn’t going to make this any better.” Maggie sniffled, forcing her emotions aside.
Maggie was struck hard by the information Joey had shared. Under John William, they didn’t force the kids to take drugs; it was a choice they could make on their own. She understood quickly that she would have to keep her wits about her to have any chance of surviving.
Maggie got to her feet and walked to the door. She peered through the window in the door and noticed a small girl looking back at her from the room across the hall. As she watched the girl, it was like looking into a mirror and seeing her past life. Why did Rock do this to me? Maggie thought. She had allowed Rock to deceive her. He had fooled all of them, and now she was back in the hands of sex traffickers.
The questions and thoughts stifled Maggie’s ability to remain calm. She told herself to breathe. Her eyelids spontaneously blinked faster, as if flicking away her horrifying reality. She realized that she had brought this situation on herself by being outsmarted—by making one wrong decision. She had been so focused on saving Seth from Thelma that she hadn’t seen Rock’s true intent. He had played her for a fool. The enormity of her situation crushed against her ribs as the pain of regret surged through her body, ripping through her nerve endings like a tornado.
Several hours later, Maggie was startled by the sound of the deadbolt on her door sliding back. A white man in his mid-twenties stood staring down at her. His head was shaved, and his beard almost touched his chest. His eyes were black, and his small mouth was too tiny for his round, pudgy face.
“Let’s go,” the hideous man commanded.
Maggie slowly rose to her feet and hesitantly walked toward the door. She stole a glance in Joey’s direction, but the young girl refused to make eye contact with her.
“Move it, slut!” the man screamed.
Maggie hurried to the door. The man snatched her up by the arm and pulled her along. Maggie didn’t have to guess where the man was taking her. She already knew what would be expected as he led her back up the stairs to the upper floor of the dilapidated warehouse.
Maggie felt a heavy shroud of sorrow wrap around her soul for making the wrong decision. Once again, the urge to go back in time and recant a horrible decision consumed her, its broad tentacles latching deep inside her psyche. How could she have been so naïve? Why did she ever trust Rock? What would happen to her now that she was back with sex traffickers? What would happen to Seth? Would she ever see Seth and Juju again?