The Mafia's Captive✔️

Prologe

Detective constable Brooklyn Smith finally sunk into her beloved sofa after one hard day at work. She kicked the heels off her aching feet and cracked the bones in her neck, moving to pull her legs under to give some more comfort after sitting upright on an old desk chair for hours. After closing her eyes and reveling in the silence, Brook decided to get to work. Looking to her left, she saw the digital clock flash '21:29' in red, and groaned. The fatigue was beginning to catch up to her; sleeping for a mere 4 hours at a time each night wasn't serving her well, but no matter how hard the young detective had tried each night she was unable to fall into a restless slumber. The case that was handed to her team in February, almost 7 months ago now, meant that she survived from energy drinks and surgery foods to keep her alert as Brook wouldn't rest until she had cracked it.

Looking around her apartment, Brooklyn sighed. At 23, she'd finally achieved her goal; to become a police detective. After studying a degree at University, she got a 1st bachelors, determined to reach her goal. Within 6 months of looking for police jobs after graduating, she was offered the job at a major crime unit in London. That was over 2 years ago, and Brook had only just managed to gain respect from her peers after she had spent so long proving her place in the male dominated, sexist unit. Fresh out of university in a dress and heels meant that the middle-aged men on the team saw her as one thing and one thing only; the young brunette with a big backside and ample breasts to give them something to look at while they did the hard work. She rolled her eyes at the memory, shaking her head. Brooklyn had to work twice as hard to get half of the respect that her male colleagues got, the 2 other women on the team resigning to the sexist quips and lack of invites to the pub after shifts, but not Brook. She was equal, if not better than the men on the team, and she loved to show it, normally being the first to get to the bottom of a case. However, the current case that the team had been assigned left Brooklyn stumped. It was bizarre to say the least, and a global news story.

Women from all over the world were turning up piece by piece in the River Thames. America, Russia, Italy, Spain, Brazil, Japan, England were just some of the countries where the victims originated from. Within 6 months, there had been 22 victims that had been found on the shores of the River Thames in the capital. The youngest girl was a mere 14, the oldest 39. Some were reported missing all the way back to 2001, the most recent all but 7 months ago, and each had the same branding. An individual number tattooed onto their neck. Each sexually and physically abused, everybody knew what it was, but didn't want to say it out loud. Sex Trafficking.
Which meant that it was a big organisation to take down, responsible for probably hundreds of more deaths that were scattered around the globe, yet to be discovered.
And she saw similar things happening all over the world, all to 1 organisation. The Italian Mafia.
The word on the street whispered that the head of the biggest Italian crime family in the world had made his way to the UK. She knew it was him, she could feel it. It was her coppers instinct. Yet all she had was hunches and no evidence. But Brook sure did love a challenge.

Shaking her head of the thoughts, Brooklyn picked up the large stack of case files. A new one had come that day, that she had the task of reading. 'Operation Nightingale' was printed on the front of every folder that contained the highly sensitive and gruesome details of each victims murder with photographs to accompany the documents. It took Brook 2 hours to reread the existing folders, just to familiarise herself with them to make sure that no detail was missed or forgotten. Each was opened around her, connections highlighted and colourful post-it notes stuck in places as things to remember. Although as she read, Brook knew that she didn't really need to familiarise again, as she came to memorise each victim over the 6 months. She knew the girls better than their own families did- if they had any that was, which was mostly not the case.
Finally after going through every file Brooklyn got to the new folder. She began reading, and 30 minutes in, she stopped. Her mouth dropped agape and her hands started to shake as she reread the line, over and over until her heart was almost bursting with excitement, beating even faster as she looked over at each of the post-it notes and highlighted pieces. The Italian Mafia had a connection to each of them. This was it, the moment Brook had been waiting for. This was enough evidence to look into the Mafia and everything they did.