Micheal Greystone: The man who rescued me and kept me caged

Michael Greystone hit the floor before he realized his knees had given out, and by the time his mind caught up with what was happening his hands were already on her face while his gun lay forgotten somewhere behind him.

She wasn’t moving. Blood covered one side of her arm and disappeared beneath the dirt and soot covering her clothes, and for a moment Michael simply stared at her because after thirteen years of searching he had imagined this moment a thousand different ways and none of them ended with her lying unconscious beneath a collapsed section of a burning warehouse.

He pressed two fingers against her neck and waited. Then he felt it, a pulse, weak enough that he almost missed it. Relief hit him so suddenly that he lowered his head for a second before gripping her shoulders again.

“Anna.” His voice sounded rough even to himself. “Wake up.”

For thirteen years he had followed every lead connected to her disappearance, searching through cities he had never intended to visit, paying people who turned out to be liars, chasing names that led nowhere and spending years hearing the same promises from the same desperate sources who always swore they finally had something useful. Every trail eventually collapsed, every witness disappeared, every answer produced three more questions. At some point he stopped believing he would find her quickly, then stopped believing he would find her at all, but he never stopped looking. She had been ten years old when she vanished and every year that followed became another reminder that he had failed to protect her. Now she was here, alive, barely, and he refused to lose her after finally finding her.

His hand moved to her chest and a second later her body reacted, air rushing sharply into her lungs as her eyes opened, unfocused and confused, settling somewhere beyond him. The moment lasted only a few seconds before her eyes closed again, but her breathing continued and that was enough.

He slid an arm beneath her knees and another behind her back and had just started lifting her from the floor when several men appeared at the doorway and opened fire, forcing him to drop beside her again and shield her with his body while returning fire with one hand. The concrete near them shattered as more rounds struck the floor, and when another attacker appeared from the side of the room Michael dragged Anna behind a fallen beam without taking his attention off the men shooting at them. A bullet slammed into his vest hard enough to drive the air from his lungs but he stayed where he was and continued firing until one man collapsed and the others retreated behind cover.

The exchange lasted less than a minute and felt considerably longer. Michael waited a few seconds after the shooting stopped, and only when nobody else appeared did he turn his attention back to Anna.

Ryder and the others reached the room shortly after, stopping briefly when they saw Michael kneeling beside the girl while blood spread across the side of his shirt.

“Boss.” he called

Michael barely acknowledged him. His attention remained on Anna because the closer he looked at her the more convinced he became that this wasn’t another false lead. Thirteen years had changed her appearance but some things remained the same, and he could still see traces of the child he remembered beneath the dirt covering her face.

“You’re hurt,” Ryder informed him. Michael glanced down at his side and immediately dismissed it.

“Take her.” Ryder moved forward and crouched beside the girl. “Boss—”

“Take her.” Nobody argued after that.

Two men carefully lifted Anna from the floor while Michael pushed himself upright and followed them toward the exit, nobody wasting time because the fire had already spread through most of the warehouse and sections of the ceiling were beginning to fall around them. As they moved through the building Michael noticed several of his men helping the girls they had found inside the cages earlier, some walking on their own while others needed assistance, and a few refusing to let go of each other even while being escorted outside.

When they finally reached the yard, vehicles were already lined up waiting for the survivors, his men moving constantly between trucks, radios crackling from every direction, police sirens getting closer somewhere in the distance. Ryder headed toward the last SUV and opened the rear door while the others carefully placed Anna across the back seat.

Only then did Michael stop moving. He stood beside the vehicle and stared at her face again then he reached forward and brushed some soot away from her forehead before stepping back.

“Get the doctors ready,” he instructed, and the order was immediately passed along. Michael shut the door, walked around the vehicle and climbed into the seat beside her while the convoy prepared to leave the warehouse behind.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Twenty minutes later, Anna opened her eyes.