Could the drug-addicted prostitute from last night really be America’s missing sweetheart? Maybe she was part of some elaborate con job? A light-skinned prostitute could’ve faked the American accent, learned the story, and used it to bilk johns like me out of cash. How could I be certain that woman was Annie?

I clicked on the first image—the cover of People Magazine. “Vanished Without A Trace: Annie Hamilton.” Those deep hazel eyes from last night stared back at me.

Fuck.

I skimmed the first line; five years ago, just as she’d said. And by all accounts, she was still missing.

After five years, surely she was dead, right? Yet no trace of her body had ever been found. Now I remembered hearing about her disappearance, but I was deployed in Iraq at the time so I never knew all the details.

I read the first article. Annie and her boyfriend, Chris Porter, had taken a spring break cruise to the Caribbean. They’d partied until around two a.m. in the nightclub on the cruise ship and multiple guests saw them dancing together. By all accounts, they’d both been extremely intoxicated and a few guests recalled that Chris seemed to be jealous when Annie climbed up on stage to sing with the members of Divi Divi, the house band. At two thirty a.m., her boyfriend’s key card was used to enter their room, and he swore that she was with him.  Chris stated that the last time he saw her was around five a.m. sitting on the balcony of their suite the morning the cruise docked in Curaçao. He figured she just wanted to get fresh air and watch the sunset so he went back to sleep. A few other passengers claimed that they saw her at around six a.m. in the elevator with a member of the house band. Chris passed a lie detector test and had repeatedly stated his innocence. The FBI had conducted a bomb search of the ship but found nothing. Authorities believed she’d fallen overboard in a drunken stupor, committed suicide or was pushed by her boyfriend after a fight, but despite a search of the waters, no trace of her had ever been found.

I didn’t believe that she had drowned, because the ship had already been in port when she vanished.

Suicide? Doubtful. She was young, hot, in college, in love. Came from money. I guess she could’ve been depressed but I figured it was a long shot.

As for the boyfriend? I felt bad for the guy. He was a pretty-boy, wealthy surfer from La Jolla who probably never worked a day in his life. Tan, blonde, looked like one of those guys who sat on the beach smoking weed laughing at the BUD/S SEAL candidates while they were running around carrying logs over their heads during Hell Week. Came from a good family, played water polo at San Diego University. He seemed normal enough, but how did anyone really know how he treated Annie behind closed doors? Maybe he abused her. If he killed her, then he got away with the perfect crime. If he was innocent, his life was ruined from the suspicion and the guilt he must’ve felt not knowing what had happened to her.

I gazed across the ocean from my porthole. The cruise ship dock was only a mile away. If she had fallen, someone would’ve seen her, either on her ship, from the surrounding cruise ships, or in the port. It didn’t add up.

In the weeks, months, years that had followed, there’d been a few sightings of Annie on Curaçao and on other neighboring Caribbean islands, but nothing ever panned out. Her family had even supposedly once paid some con man pretending to be a former SEAL three hundred thousand dollars to find her, but he turned out to be a fraud. I fucking hated any motherfucker who lied about being a SEAL. It was easy to figure these assholes out—just ask them their SEAL training class number. Not knowing your SEAL training class number is like not knowing your last name.

But I still wasn’t convinced yet that the prostitute was who she said she was. I didn’t want to stake my career on a maybe.

I studied a few more websites. Her parents had made www.findannie.com.

There were childhood photos, lists of sightings, news articles, links to television programs.

There was a letter begging for her return posted from Chris with pictures of the happy couple.

Then a photo caught my eye.

The tattoo on her ankle.

That little cartoon alien. So that’s why she made sure I saw it. Just in case I was the man she thought I was.

The words of The Navy SEAL Code, our warrior creed, echoed in my head.

“In times of war or uncertainty there is a special breed of warrior ready to answer our Nation’s call.

A common man with uncommon desire to succeed.

Forged by adversity, he stands alongside America’s finest special operations forces to serve his country, the American people, and protect their way of life.

I am that man.”

Fuck.

The girl from last night was Annie. I was certain.

I clicked on another picture.

Yup—the scar on her shoulder. She’d shown me that also.

My heart beat rapidly in my chest, my jaw clenched.

Dammit, why did I run out of there last night instead of talking to her? Because I didn’t believe her—that’s why.

Why hadn’t anyone rescued her? She was an American for Christ’s sake! This wasn’t a fucking movie. There weren’t FBI and CIA agents on the ground in Curaçao searching for kidnapped Americans, especially since there was no proof that she had been abducted. Any sightings of her would first be passed to the local police, which were corrupt as fuck. Her parents could’ve hired one of the many contractor groups filled with former SEALs who did this shit for a living.

U.S. Navy SEALs could rescue her. I could rescue her.

There was a three hundred thousand dollar reward for her safe return. But I didn’t want any money. If I saved her, I had to remain anonymous. Any hint of an active duty Navy SEAL going rogue would ruin my career on the Teams.

I glanced back at her pictures. Man, she’d been beautiful. Could’ve been my high school sweetheart. She was half Latina, looked almost like a young Wonder Woman. Her black hair had been shiny, her hazel eyes had been bright. A soccer star, a prom queen, a little girl in pigtails. And I had treated her like she was a piece of trash.

Fucking traffickers. Most Americans were completely oblivious to the sex trade. They thought it only happened in third world countries. But girls were kidnapped off the streets in middle America, and forced to service assholes like me. I wanted her to be just another piece of ass that I could use and forget, but the pain in her eyes reminded me too much of my own hell.

What the fuck was I going to do? Tell my men? Ask my command? It wasn’t that easy. Everyone thinks that Navy SEALs are above the law—that we can do whatever we please without any consequences. Like that ridiculous story that one of our snipers shot and killed two civilian men and wasn’t even brought in for police questioning. Bullshit. There’s protocol, and busting into brothels was way out of our jurisdiction. I’d have to talk to my commanding officer. He’d send me to Captain’s Mass for going to a brothel.  Any rescue attempt would have to be cleared with the FBI and CIA. There would be an investigation to see if she was who she said she was. They might set up a sting operation. And the cops in Curaçao were crooked and could tip off her pimp. If her pimp had any inkling of what was going on, he’d probably kill her without a second thought.

And I wasn’t going to let that happen.

All those prostitutes in that whorehouse were probably trafficked from somewhere, but I couldn’t save every whore in the place. It would cause an international incident; most of them were probably from Eastern Europe or Central and South America. But I’d be damned if I let Annie, or any other American trapped there, spend one more day than they had to in that hellhole. Other men didn’t get why I hadn’t shed a tear when I found out that my fiancée had cheated on me. But the national anthem? ‘The Star Spangled Banner’ had me bawling like someone shot my dog. I watched my buddies die protecting our county’s freedoms. And I’d lay down my own life before I let some traffickers steal Annie’s life.

She was now twenty-three, two years younger than me. I thought being away from my friends and family during my deployments was bad, but at least I had volunteered to take this job. Living for five years in a foreign country as a sex slave was unimaginable.

“My loyalty to Country and Team is beyond reproach. I humbly serve as a guardian to my fellow Americans always ready to defend those who are unable to defend themselves.”

Enough men had used her and then abandoned her; I wasn’t going to be one of them.

3.

Vic made his way through the tangled maze of hung over SEALs in our sleeping quarters to talk to me. “Want to get dinner?”

If I flaked on them two nights in a row, they’d know I was up to something. “I can’t. I’m going to get a massage.”

Kyle’s head popped up in his rack. “As long as it includes a happy ending, I’m in.”

These men were my best friends—I didn’t want to lie to them. We’d saved each other’s lives more times than I cared to remember.

“No can do, I’m already late. I’ll be back in a bit and we’ll go out.” I slipped a watch on my wrist and left the ship.

I had to see Annie before they shuffled her to another brothel and I lost the opportunity forever. My goal was to assess the situation, case the building, and size up her captors, so I could plan a mission. I had to see her again—I needed to be one hundred percent sure that the girl with the hollow eyes really was Annie.

Would the pimp get suspicious if I came back two days in a row? I doubted it. If she, Annie, had survived five years, she must’ve gained their trust. They probably thought she was so strung out that she wanted dope more than she wanted her old life back. That’s how these lowlifes worked—strip these girls of their identities.

But she’d told me her name. She trusted me. And I’d walked away from her.

Some hero.

The streets seemed less bright today. I had actually looked forward to my Team’s mission in the Caribbean waters. Curaçao was a better destination than Afghanistan, as far as I was concerned. But now I’d rather be roasting in the mountains, than investigating the underbelly of this paradise.

I stopped by a tourist shop. Purchased some water, snacks, lotion, and a dress for Annie. Also bought her a small necklace, which I placed in my pocket.

The same Columbian man found me on the street. “Sailor, you had good time? Welcome back, my friend.”

I hated the way these vipers called me friend. I wondered if he even knew Annie was American. Often these girls were traded to other pimps, so he might not even know who she was, if she kept her cover. Even though he carried a rifle around his shoulders, I could take this fool in a second even without my weapon.

I followed him back into the brothel. He was about to ring the bell but I stopped him. “I want the same girl I had last night.”

“Star? Sure, sure. How about two girls? I give you a good price.”

I shook my head. “Nope, one will do. ‘Star’ did a good job.”

“What’s in the bag?”

I opened it up. “Some food, water, clothes, lotion. I wanted her to dress up for me and smell good. How much for an extra hour? I’m heading back out to sea tomorrow.”

He rummaged through the bag, and then squinted his eyes. “I give her to you for two hours free, for your watch.”

I didn’t hesitate to hand it over to him.

His face broke out into a smile. He motioned to me and led me down the hallway, to her door. Then he turned and left to lure the next jerk like me inside.

I paused before I opened the door.

One desperate plea. This wasn’t a Hollywood blockbuster or a New York Times best-selling thriller. I knew that this time there was no room for excuses, no margin for errors. I had one chance to put the cape on and be her hero.

The door squeaked. Annie was sitting on her cot, rocking back and forth, cradling her body.

Her head snapped to the side when she saw me. As her jaw dropped, I shut the door and put my index finger over my mouth, motioning for her to stay quiet. My eyes darted around the walls, scanning for a camera. Luckily, this low budget brothel was not high tech. The acidic smell of heroin made me gag. I glared at the floor and saw used needles under the bed.

She must’ve understood my disgusted expression because her chin dropped and she cowered.