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“No, I’m not one of them.” My brow creases some more. “Why are you hiding in the mattress?”
“Because Tilly doesn’t want them to find me. They might take me back to Daddy.” She tells me, then puts her hand over her mouth. “Oh shit, I wasn’t supposed to say that.”
“I don’t think you’re supposed to say shit,” I point out. “What do you mean the bad men will take you back to your father? Did someone take you from him?”
She sits up in the mattress cocoon, which is quite an ingenious idea, and I would never have found the little girl if she hadn’t sneezed.
“No.” She shakes her curly blond head. “My sister saved me from him.” Her eyes start to fill with tears. “Daddy is a bad man.”
My eyes widen. “Is your father one of the bad men that feed you here?”
“No.” Her head shakes again. “But he owes the bad man, and that’s why Tilly and our friends are here.”
“Why are Tilly and your friends here?”
“Because Tilly needs to pay the bad man for Daddy,” she tells me.
“Who is Tilly?”
“My sister.” She smiles proudly. “She runs the hackings.”
Ah! Now, I’m getting a clearer picture. “How old is Tilly?”
“Sixteen and...” Her little brows furrow as she counts on her finger. “Four months.”
Holy fuck! “She looks a lot older.”
“She’s tall,” the little girl says, sitting up. “I’m going to be tall like Tilly one day.”
“What’s your name?”
“Tessa.” She smiles, and her little cheeks dimple before her smile fades and her eyes narrow. “Are you a bad man?”
“Not one of the bad men after you,” I tell her honestly. “How old are you, Tessa?”
“Almost six,” she says proudly.
“How did you and Tilly end up here?”
“Mommy got very sick and she left us. Tilly says she had to go be an angel,” Tessa tells me, her big eyes filling with tears. “Daddy drank all his money and couldn’t pay the hospital bills, so the bad man paid, and now Tilly has to work for the bad man.”
“How did you end up here?”
“Tilly brought me with her,” Tessa tells me. “The nice bad man, Stan, helped her bring me here, so I wasn’t around when Daddy got angry at his booze.”
Jesus Christ! I run a hand through my hair, biting my tongue so I don’t cuss out loud. This kid’s father is a grade-A asshole using his daughter to pay off his debt.
My eyes take in the cute little angel with long blond curls. She is so adorable with porcelain skin and dimpled cheeks. Tessa is also clean, which means Tilly has been taking care of her and the three younger boys.
My conscience gives a little tug at what I’m about to do. But it might be the only way I get Tilly, the teenage she-devil, to talk to me.
Chapter 2
ANDREY
“Tessa,” I look at her thoughtfully, “I wonder if you’d help me with Tilly because she is a bit stubborn, and I really want to help you both. Get you away from the bad man, and make sure your daddy doesn’t get you.”
“How?” Tessa wipes her cheeks and looks up at me with all the innocence and trust of youth.
