"I'm not the one that put her on the bus to Sylmar, you did."
Paige blinked back tears at Mike's statement. He certainly wasn't pulling any punches, but as much as she hated to admit it, he was right. A few weeks ago, she had a choice. She could've grabbed Lina then. Figured out some other way to find the rest of the girls. Track another bus. But she needed to know where the girls went. Needed to find out where the girls went next. But then Lina disappeared, ditching the backpack and the phone she had given her.
Every lead she had turned out to be a dead end. It was as if she had looked everywhere only to turn up nothing. Just when she had a lead, her team got pulled and she decided to head out anyways with Jakes as her backup.
And she met Anika.
She convinced Anika to wear a wire while she and Jakes tailed her. But suddenly Anika was seizing and coughing up blood, because one of the heroin filled balloons ruptured in her stomach. Before she had a chance to think everything through, she found herself ingesting the remaining balloons. She had no way of knowing that Jakes had been arrested. No way of knowing that she was heading to God knows where with absolutely no backup.
It wasn't until the hours started ticking by that she realized that no one was coming for her and it was up to her to get herself out of there. But not without Lina, who was thankfully still alive - still there. She promised Lina that she wouldn't leave her behind. She probably could've made it over the fence had Lina not been with her, but she sent Lina there and she needed to get her out. Then Sulla was standing over her with a baseball bat and her escape was becoming less and less of an reality.
But the next day Mike showed up and the moment their eyes met, she knew everything would be okay. Unable to run to him. Unable to say a word without breaking either of their covers, all she could do was offer him the faintest of smiles. But what trust she had in him faded quickly once she learned there wasn't a team or even the rest of the house waiting outside to shut this place down.
Instead Mike got her out and wanted to keep this place open. Keep these scared girls locked up like cattle. Not knowing if Sulla planned to punish them or if they would be bought the next time a buyer came. Wondering if it would be better if someone bought them. If the sleezebag that was there now was better than the one that would show up tomorrow.
This was just as much her fault as it was Mike's. Page pressed her fingers into the palm of her hand, her nails indenting the soft flesh, just enough to hurt, but not enough to break the skin. Not enough as her girls were hurting. Not enough as Lina would hurt if someone bought her before they shut it down.
"Paige..."
Mike's voice jarred her back to the present and she flexed her hand, looking down at the half moon indentations in her palm for a few moments before turning back to him. She heard the apology in his voice. Regret. But not for what he did earlier. For what he said now. She didn't need his apologies. Nothing he said now would make this better unless it involved driving back there to bust up this operation and get them out now.
"Don't apologize. I've been thinking about that since the moment I put Lina on that bus. But my goal is to get my girls out of there. Yours is Solano."
"It's the same goal. The same goal."
Paige angrily shook her head, "No, it's different. We're talking about girls too helpless to fight for themselves. Girls you want to leave in there to link this to Solano. We're not talking about a shipment of heroin. We're talking about human beings!"
"You don't think I know that? If we shut it down now, then what? Then it opens up somewhere else in what, a month? Two months? We need to shut it down for good. Leaving it open longer allows us to do that."
Mike was career driven. She knew that. So was she. Cases had a tendency to consume both of them. But she was just now realizing that they were motivated by different things. Or maybe she knew it all along. It wasn't like Mike suddenly changed. "I'm not trying to be a rockstar and get one step closer to a promotion."
Mike looked at her, the hurt evident in his clear blue eyes. "If that's all you think this case is to me, then you don't know me at all. You have no idea what this case is costing me. I'm trying Paige. I want those girls safe as badly as you do. But I just don't want the girls Sulla has now safe. I want all of them safe. Including the girls that haven't gotten on a bus yet.
Mike reached for her hand and she pulled it away before he made contact, "Don't touch me."
Emotionally, she was all over the place. She was too close. This was too personal. She couldn't do what Mike was asking. It was impossible to separate her girls from the case. She couldn't compartmentalize like Mike could. She couldn't forget about the girls that were left behind and see the big picture, not after what she saw. What she experienced. Knowing what fate awaited them. She couldn't forget they were girls. Couldn't forget her anger and disgust. She was afraid if Mike touched her, she'd crumble. She'd be a crying mess in his arms and that wasn't what she wanted. There wasn't time for that. Wasn't time to process. Wasn't time for her to break or be comforted. She was out. Safe. She didn't need to be comforted. Didn't feel like she deserved it..
But she wanted him to comfort her. The past few days had been hell. She'd love to go home, take a hot shower and curl up in bed next to Mike and let him tell her everything would be okay. She wanted to believe his promises, but right now they felt like lies. Maybe whatever she and Mike were to each other wasn't strong enough to survive this and right now, she didn't really care.
"I just need a little time. I'll pull Lina out. I'll shut the whole place down. You have my word, all right?"
"Your word is shit."
