Broken Silence

“She needs a hospital first, and pain meds. We have an emergency medical tent set up outside. The worst of the injured are being transferred to the hospital. She needs to be in that group. We have to wait on a gurney or wheelchair, so it may take a minute,” the EMT informs Flynn. The detective decides not to wait and picks me up instead. I whimper again at the pain, and he tries to comfort me as he makes his way outside. The last thing I see before the pain knocks me out, is Timmins in cuffs, being led from the warehouse.

Sophia

I'm pacing back and forth in the conference room at the station, praying with every beat of my heart that they’re successful. The agents are updating me when they can, but I have no word on Charlie yet. I'm barely holding it together. I can’t lose another person I love.

As the door bursts open, I look up at the agent.

“They’ve got her, ma’am. She’s injured, but alive,” an officer announces. I collapse into a chair, tears flowing freely as I sob in relief. My girl is alive. I tried not to think the worst, but we’ve all seen enough bad endings in the news, so it was hard. My phone starts ringing, and I see it's Flynn.

“How is she?” I can hear sirens in the background and it does nothing to calm my nerves.

“She’s in a world of pain, those bastards hurt your girl pretty bad. Prepare yourself for that, Sophia. I won't sugarcoat it. We are en route to the Starbrooke hospital now. Have an officer drive you over.” As soon as he hangs up, I’m grabbing my purse and rushing out, wanting to be there as soon as possible.

“I need a ride to the hospital, they found her. Flynn said for one of you to take me over,” I yell into the station. An officer immediately stands up and leads me out to an undercover car. Thanks to my panic, the drive feels like it takes hours, but he’s patient with me as I growl at him to step on it.

As soon as he pulls to a stop, I jump out and race through the ER, searching for Charlie. I see Flynn pacing in the hallway, and he sees me at the same time. His hands raise up to stop me from bursting into the room.

“I waited here for you, they are patching her up now,” he says as he motions me forward. I slow my pace and walk into the room, heart stopping as I gaze at my sweet girl.

Charlie looks awful and that’s a gross understatement. I hold back a sob as I take in her blood covered shirt and bruised up face and arms. My poor girl.

The nurse sees me and approaches. “Are you family, ma’am?” She steps between me and Charlie, blocking her from view.

“I’m her mom,” I say, and the nurse gives me a reassuring smile but appears worried.

“Why don’t we talk outside for a second and let them finish up?” She motions me back to the hallway, and I step out hesitantly, not wanting to leave Charlie’s side.

“Your daughter doesn’t appear to have a concussion, it’s more facial swelling from being hit with something. She has bruising on her arms and back. The team is working on getting her shirt off safely, to assess her abdomen. We think that's the worst of her injuries, but we need to take our time to make sure. The fact that it clotted to the shirt should mean the cuts aren’t very deep. I’m going to head back in and help. We will call you in when she’s done. She is in awful pain, so we gave her pain medicine and a sedative. She won’t likely wake up until mid-morning,” she explains, before giving me a reassuring pat on the arm and walking back into the room. Flynn's waiting a bit down the hall, giving us privacy. When he sees her walk away, he comes back and leads me to the waiting room.

“I’m going to grab us some coffee and check in with Agent Clark. You all right?” he asks tentatively. I shrug, and he nods in understanding before heading off. We both know we won’t be all right for a long fucking time.

Knowing I have to share the news, I pull out my phone and call Danielle to let her know Charlie is safe. Her sobs nearly break me, but I end the call quickly and I text Charlie’s friends' parents. I added them to a group chat a while back so I could keep in touch if necessary since they needed to get the kids home. I promised to call so I figure now is a good time.

Me: Charlie is safe and in the hospital. She won’t likely be awake until mid-morning due to the sedative.

I put my phone away, not caring if they respond or not. I'm too intent on waiting for the nurses to let me back in to see her. Flynn comes back a few minutes later with that beautiful, hot coffee in his hands. I reach out for mine and guzzle it down, legs bouncing and eyes trained on her door.

“I spoke to Agent Clark. They’ve got all of the victims getting checked out now in the emergency medical tent. That place was one of the worst I’ve seen, Sophia. Charlie and the others were lab rats and abused. From the looks of some others, they'd suffered through this for a long time.” He sounds beyond tired and defeated. Reaching over, I squeeze his hand and give him a reassuring smile.

“You freed them. I’m good here now if you need to go help. Charlie is sedated until tomorrow morning,” I respond quietly. I'm feeling just as exhausted now, but I won’t be going anywhere. They’ll have to throw me out before that happens.

“All right. Let me know how she is when she wakes up. I’ll come by for questions tomorrow. I don’t want to release that counselor if she aided in the kidnapping, so we’re holding her under suspicion,” he says with a sigh, getting up to leave.

I sit in the waiting room for a while longer and try not to doze off even though the exhaustion is taking over. An hour later the nurse finally comes to talk to me.

“She is sleeping comfortably now. We want to keep her on pain medicine for the night and monitor her injuries. We did some bloodwork to make sure nothing is in her system before giving them, and they show dangerously high levels of vitamins. We’re running fluids around the clock to help safely flush them, but she will need to be observed for a few days while they work their way out of her bloodstream. The cuts on her abdomen are bandaged and stitched. They weren't deep enough to cause permanent damage, but they were still deep enough she’ll likely always have scars. You can go in now, though.” Her voice is reassuring, but I don’t say anything, just rush forward and to my daughter’s bedside.

As I drag a chair close, I take in the sight of Charlie. She's wearing a hospital gown and is tucked into the bed now. Her face doesn’t look as bad without the dried blood on it, but her bruising makes my chest ache, the deep purples only turning darker as time goes on. I stroke her hair as she sleeps, mostly to reassure me that she's, in fact, right in front of me. Moments later, I drift off to sleep, leaning on her bed as I hold her hand.

Thursday

Early Morning

Cole

“Char

lie has been found. She’s in the hospital but won’t be awake until mid-morning,” Mom explains when she wakes me up. Peering at my alarm clock I see it's 2:30 in the morning, and I sigh in relief. My Charlie girl is safe.