Chapter Text
As they waited at a red light, about two vehicles behind Opal’s car, Carina dared to throw a side glance at her baby brother. His eyes were glued to the red hair of the woman they were following and he kept tapping the fingers of his right hand nervously on his knee.
“Have you talked to Papa lately?” she asked finally.
“No,” he said curtly, straightening in his seat.
“I’m worried about him.”
“So am I,” he said, letting out a long sigh. “It’s just that I don’t think I can talk to him and be okay. I need more time.”
She grasped his hand into hers.
“I’m proud of you, Andrea,” Carina told him.
“Thank you,” he whispered back, trying to convey that he wasn’t expressing his gratitude for her immediate words, but for the fact that she had never given up on him and stuck with him even if he had kept on pushing her away.
As ‘Opal’ turned into a street in one of Seattle’s suburbs, not very different from the one where Meredith had her home, Andrew watched as the red-headed lady parked in front of a large house which didn’t appear to be any different from the neighboring houses at first glance. He told Carina to take a left and they parked her car on the curb in the next street.
“Aren’t we overdoing it with this sneaking around thing a little?” his sister questioned as he yanked her by her arm and pulled her to walk down the street to the level of the house that ‘Opal” had disappeared into.
“What are we doing exactly?” she asked in Italian.
“There’s a lockdown happening if you haven’t noticed. I’m trying to find a house where there isn’t someone working from home or kids learning online.”
“And what do you intend to do once you find one?”
“Climb,” he instructed her towards the low wooden gate of a house that had no garage or cars parked in the driveway.
“What if they just don’t own a car?”
“They don’t. Or maybe they’ve got just one. And see what else they’ve got? An empty bicycle stand. Whoever lives here has taken their bikes and left.”
“Alright, Sherlock Holmes,” she grumbled as she put one of her legs over the gate after making sure that there was nobody walking their dog on the street or looking from their window.
“I still say this is the time we call the police,” Carina argued.
“No,” Andrew protested vehemently. “Not until we are completely sure we have enough proof so that they can nail her for good.”
“But what about the girl? Erin? Wouldn’t her statement be enough?”
“Maybe, maybe not. That’s if she even would choose to make one in the first place. I wouldn’t blame her if she wouldn’t. She finally got out of that situation and back to her family, I won’t tear her away from it and make her relive everything if there’s any other way of getting this bitch.”
“Va bene,” Carina agreed. “But let’s be careful, alright?” she continued as she pushed her brother into a crouching position behind a bush tree in the front yard as she heard a dog bark in the street.
The golden retriever seemed to stop right in front of their chosen house and barked several times in their direction.
“What’s up with you today, bud?” a soft male voice asked. “It’s not like Miles and his lot are at home for you to bark at them on their bikes. Come here, Lucky, let’s go home. No need to be out any more than we need to in these times.”
“Phew,” Carina breathed out after they heard the man put a leash on his dog and the sound of human feet and dog paws thrumming against the asphalt as they ran in the other direction.
The siblings made their way to ‘Opal’s house, moving closely to its walls. They were about to turn the corner when they heard the sound of steps and as Andrew popped his head to see what was happening, he saw the red-headed woman dialing a number on her phone.
“Where are you?” she growled at the recipient on the other end. “We need to move.”
They waited for a few minutes until the criminal disappeared back into her house.
“How are we getting in?” Carina wondered.
“The window?” Andrew suggested.
“No way, fratellino,” his sister protested as she dragged him towards the backdoor of the house. She tried to open the door, but it was locked. This didn’t stop the Italian doctor as she grabbed a hairpin from her pocket and started working on the lock.
“Carina, where the hell did you learn that?” the younger DeLuca asked, but as he heard his sister chuckle, he change his mind. “Wait, don’t tell me.”
“Remember Gloria?”
“Gloria as in my girlfriend from med school? You met her one time.”
“Yes, and that one time we ended up locked out from her dorm room.”
Andrew raised his arms in protest.
“Alright, I don’t need to hear any more, I know how this story ends. Why do you always do that anyway?”
“Shh, Andrea, we’ve got too much work to do right now to be worrying about your fragile male ego,” she chastised him.
“You know what? Maybe I should start sleeping with your girlfriends…and boyfriends,” he mumbled back in frustration.
At that Carina turned back to him and raised her eyebrows at him as if to say ‘really’?
The lock finally clicked and they let themselves in. On the inside the house appeared to be barren and empty like the places where detectives would set up if they wanted to tail one of the nearby houses. The air was musty as if the air had not been cleared in months. The hollowness of the home also meant that they would have to be extremely careful not to make any noise as they moved about the house. They heard footsteps on the stairs nearby and a shadow of red hair as a female figure moved upstairs. Now they only had to hope that ‘Opal’ was the only person in the house.
“What are we looking for exactly?”
“I’m not sure yet,” Andrew said. “But I suggest we start in the basement.”
They found themselves in front of yet another closed door, but this one proved more difficult to open just with Carina’s hairpin as it was secured with a thick chain. Andrew tried pulling on the chain, but there was no way he was going to be able to rip through it just with his bare hands. He tried to push the entire weight of his body against the door, but the only result was a dull sound accompanied by a sharp pain in his side.
“Hello?” a weak female voice cried from the other side.
“Yes, hi! What’s your name?” Carina asked.
“Kay. Kay Miller,” the girl mumbled.
“Alright, Kay. Don’t worry, we are here to help you.”
“Don’t let them take us away please,” the young voice stuttered out.
“Us? Is there more of you in there?” Andrew asked, but he didn’t get any answer.
“Andrea, try to have a look around and try to find something that would help us open this,” the older DeLuca instructed her sibling in Italian.
“Right,” Andrew mumbled as he realized that the girl was too terrified to speak to a man right now and he tiptoed away from the basement back into the house.
“Kay, can you hear me?” the OB/GYN asked. “He’s gone, you can talk to me now. Do you have some more friends with you?”
“Yes, there’s two more girls.”
“Can I talk to them now?”
“No. They’re asleep, they’re sick.”
“How sick?”
But before the girl could respond she heard a loud yell of ‘police! Don’t move!’ upstairs and heard her brother cry out in pain as someone slammed him against the floor. Carina took out her cell phone from her pocket and fired of a quick coded message to Maya.
“Kay, listen to me. I have to go for a bit now, but I will be right back and we will get you into safety, alright?”
“Please, don’t leave,” the girl begged, but Carina had already run up the stairs.
"There she is," Opal cried, pointing her finger towards Carina. "The crazy guy's sister. I just came to check in on my mother's old house and these two were roaming around here. I was so scared, I had to call 911 immediately."
"Don't worry, ma'am, you're safe now," one of the policeman said, putting a calming hand on 'Opal's' shoulder.
Andrew was trying to say something from his position on the ground, but his words came out muffled by his mask.
"You're making a big mistake," Carina said. "Please, just have a look at the basement. This woman is a human trafficker and she's holding three girls hostage."
One of the cops sent her a pitying look.
"Ma'am, I know what it's like to be related to someone who is a little," he made a whistling noise while pointing to his head. "But it doesn't mean that you get the right for breaking and entering because of their whims."
"No," Carina barked back. "Nobody is crazy here, okay? Andrew is right and you need to arrest this woman and you will see that you do when you check the basement."
"Please, it's about young girls lives," Andrew pleaded as he finally fought to lift up his head from the ground a little.
But the cops remained adamant as the nice of the two proceeded to cuff Carina's hands behind her back and they led the two siblings into their car. No manner of arguing with them on their ride seemed t convince them of 'Opal's' wrongdoing either.
The lock of the cell at the precinct squeaked as the guard locked it, leaving the two Italian siblings on the other side of the bars. The four policemen were already walking away presumably to return back to their office.
“Hey,” Andrew kept calling after the cops. “Hey, come back. You have to listen to me!”
“Shut your trap, man,” the warden growled.
Andrew ignored his harsh words and when none of the cops appeared to be showing any interest in coming back, he started pounding on the iron bars with his hands.
“Andrea, calmati!” Carina said, but her brother shook her hand off from his shoulder.
“I will. Once those girls are safe,” he barked back as he continued his pounding and when it was not working, he started hurling some insults at the cops’ backs. That seemed to work its charm as the captain alongside the two sergeants came back.
“Open it up, Joe,” the tallest of the policemen told the warden.
“Sure thing, cap.”
“Finally. Will you listen to me now?” DeLuca asked in relief.
But as the bars opened, the captain motioned to his bulky sergeant who stepped forward and pushed Andrew back with such a force that the doctor lost his balance and fell down on his back with a thud.
“Andrea,” Carina cried out as she staggered to help him back up.
“When my old pal Joe here asks you to shut your trap, it means you shut your trap,” the captain growled.
“Do you understand?” the sergeant asked, cracking his knuckles loudly.
“You have to listen to us. The people in that house are trafficking human beings. There are girls in danger directly in that house. And you can save them, all you have to do is listen to me and go back to check,” Andrew pleaded coming close to the captain’s face.
“Funny story, pal. Except the lady on whose property you and your sister were trespassing told us you would try to tell us something like that. Said you were crazy, I had a look into your records and turns out lady was right.”
“I’m not crazy,” the brown-haired young man huffed.
“He isn’t. He has an illness yes, but he is getting proper treatment and he’s doing well. And he’s telling you the truth,” Carina tried to argue in support of her brother.
“Or maybe you’re just his sister and can’t see his crazy,” the captain responded as he turned on his heels and tried to leave the cell.
Except Andrew grabbed him by the back of this uniform. Before Carina could react, the bulky sergeant grabbed her brother by the wrists and hit him against the wall. She could hear Andrew take in a sharp inhale of breath and his eyes darted around the place and she was sure if she was any closer to him, she would hear his heart pounding in his chest.
“Stop struggling,” the sergeant told him, but it didn’t appear that the doctor had heard him as he head-butted him with all his force.
“Son of a bitch,” the cop cursed as he touched his bleeding nose. “Dude is really freaking crazy.”
“He isn’t, he’s having a panic attack, you need to stop touching him” Carina tried to explain recalling the time that her brother had been a victim of a physical attack before, which left its psychological damage no matter how hard he had appeared to have gotten over Karev's beating quickly, but none of the policemen appeared to be listening to her and two of the three men moved to grab Andrew and pushed him against the wall.
As he kept struggling even against the doubled force, showing an almost inhuman strength in the midst of his panic attack, the sturdy cop returned to the scuffle again and pushed against Andrew, forcing him into a lying position on the bench and kneeling on his chest to prevent him from moving.
“Stop, you’re going to kill him,” Carina cried, but when she tried to approach her brother, the warden grabbed her and prevented her from moving any closer.
The next several minutes appeared to the Italian doctor as if in a haze as she kept fighting the man’s grasp on her while she watched as Andrew struggled against the weight on his chest. A stream of Italian swearwords left her mouth as she noticed how his breaths became more and more labored until he closed his eyes and became completely still.