The doctor rushed the child straight into the emergency room. Claire stood there for a moment, catching her breath, then remembered she still needed to pay the hospital fees.
She barely had time to do that before the police showed up. It wasn't like they could just hand the child over to her, even though she'd been the one to expose the trafficker. What if, in some twisted way, she was actually with the traffickers? Maybe she'd turned on them just to make it easier to escape. The officers couldn't risk it.
Two of them followed her all the way inside.
"What are you doing at the hospital? Are you hurt?" someone asked.
Earlier, they'd split up because they had two bottles of hemostatic spray. Edison didn't want his niece to see all the blood and chaos around the truck, so he'd sent her to check on people in the other cars while he stayed behind. But now, realizing Claire wasn't with him, Edison felt his heart jump in his chest. Was she hurt? How would he ever explain that to Pandora?
"I'm not hurt," Claire said quickly. "There was a kid who got injured, so I brought her here."
She hesitated for a second, then added, “I think I might've stumbled onto a human trafficking ring."
She explained her suspicions to the police, saying she was pretty sure there was more than one trafficker in that van. The officers were experienced enough to pick up on what she meant. They'd already stopped the whole group and brought everyone back to the station. Until they finished questioning them, every single person was a suspect, maybe even an accomplice. There was nothing more they could tell Claire for now.
Edison hadn't expected any of this. He was worried about Claire first and foremost. "Are you sure you're okay?"
Human traffickers almost always worked in groups. As long as some of them were still out there, there was a real risk of retaliation. Edison didn't even want to think about what could happen to his niece.
People might call it selfish, but you always care most about the people close to you, even when you're trying to do the right thing.
"I'm fine, really. But that poor kid... She had glass in her face. I think the woman used her as a shield during the crash."
It was just Claire's guess, but she was almost certain she was right. There was no way a trafficker would ever treat a child like her own. The woman must have grabbed the little girl to block herself from the impact. That's why the woman was completely unharmed.
"That's disgusting," Edison muttered, frowning as Claire finished.
"I'm coming to the hospital to see you."
"You don't have to," Claire told him, trying to reassure him. "The car isn't going anywhere anyway."
But Edison wasn't about to just sit still.
"It's okay. The crashed cars are stuck, but we can turn around and take another road."
Traffic police were already working
to clear the mess. After a big accident like this, getting the roads
open again was urgent no one could afford for the whole city to grind to a halt.
"Alright,” Claire said, giving in. She knew there was no point arguing.
Edison didn't waste any time. He backed up and started heading toward the hospital Claire had- mentioned He and Valeria who'd Heaño Valeria whod taken a shared bike-ended up
arriving almost at the same time.
By then, Claire had already paid the child's hospital deposit and was sitting on a bench, waiting for news from surgery and giving her statement to the police.
"You're seriously observant," one of the officers told her. "If you hadn't noticed, nobody would have realized those two were traffickers."
"That woman really played up a sob story in the van, just in case,” he added. "Everyone else felt sorry for her."
"As for the other passengers, we haven't found anything suspicious yet, but we'll keep questioning them."