Deadly Crossing (Tom Dugan 2) (2 page)

“What’s that all about?” Gillian asked.

Alex shrugged. “I haven’t a clue, but Thomas and Anna are coming over with Major Borgdanov and Sergeant Denosovitch. Thomas said it was urgent.”

Chapter Two

Kairouz Residence
London, UK

An hour later, Gillian sat in the comfortable and well-appointed living room of the Kairouz home, across from Dugan, Anna, and the Russians. Beside her on the sofa, Alex addressed their guests.

“Of course, we’ll do anything we can to help,” Alex said, “but I honestly don’t see much we can contribute. I’ll contact our security consultants and put them at your disposal.” He looked at Anna. “But surely Anna’s MI5 colleagues and her contacts at New Scotland Yard will be of more use.”

The Russians nodded their thanks, but Anna cut Borgdanov off before he could respond.

“Actually, Alex,” she said, “I was hoping Gillian might be able to help us.”

“But whatever can I do, Anna?” asked Gillian. “As Alex says, surely your sources are far superior to any contacts I might have.”

“Yes and no,” Anna replied. “First thing tomorrow I’ll start working those contacts, but if, as Andrei suspects, the Russian mob is involved, they’ve likely covered their tracks pretty well. I’ll start with the UK Border Agency to check on work visas and immigration records, but if the girl IS here, she may be under a fictitious name.”

Gillian looked unsure. “Well, of course I’ll do anything I can to help. But again, what can I possibly do?”

Anna hesitated, obviously searching for words. “I’m interested in any contacts you might have from… from the time before you were a nanny. Do you keep in contact with any of them?”

Beside Gillian, Alex stiffened and took her hand. He glanced at the Russians and then across at Dugan and Anna.

“It’s all right, Alex,” Dugan said. “You can trust Alexei and Ilya.”

“Well, it would seem Anna’s given us no choice,” Alex said. “And I fail to see how any of this—”

Gillian cut him off. “It’s all right, Alex. I don’t mind helping in a good cause.”

“It’s NOT all right! They’ve no right to ask you—”

Gillian reached over with her free hand and gently put her fingers to his lips. “I know you want to protect me, and I love you for it, but this really is my decision.”

Alex slumped back on the sofa and glared at Dugan and Anna as Gillian continued. “What do you want to know, Anna?”

“Tomorrow I’m going down to the Clubs and Vice Unit of the Met to see what I can find out about Russian mob operations here in London. However, most of their officers are undercover, and they aren’t likely to want to jeopardize ongoing investigations by sharing intel for a very ‘unofficial’ inquiry. That problem is compounded by the fact that I don’t have a strong relationship with anyone in that unit. I’m really clutching at straws a bit, but I thought if you still have any contacts in that world, it could help a great deal. You might be able to provide some insights that even the Vice Unit fellows don’t have.”

Gillian gave a hesitant nod. “I may know someone who can help, but it might take a day or so. I’ll get on it straightaway in the morning.”

“Thank you, Gillian,” said Anna.

The room grew silent, permeated by Alex’s brooding disapproval, until Anna rose from her chair.

“Right then,” she said, “we’d best be off. Thank you both for your help.”

Dugan and the Russians echoed Anna’s thanks, but Alex only looked at them and scowled before Gillian walked them to the door. She returned to find him standing at the sideboard, pouring himself a rather large measure of brandy.

Gillian sighed inwardly and joined him at the sideboard. “I’ll have a small one, please, dear.”

Alex nodded and reached for another snifter.

“Are you going to continue to sulk, or shall we discuss this like adults?”

Alex faced her and exploded. “They’ve no right to ask this of you. Your past is just that — past. Daisy Tatum is long dead and buried, and you’re Gillian now. My wife and Cassie’s mum. Delving into the past benefits no one, and this Russian mafia is dangerous. Who knows what they might—”

Gillian cut him off by wrapping her arms around him and pressing her cheek to his chest, hugging him tight until his anger dissipated. She turned her face up to his.

“You know I love you both beyond measure, and you’ve given me a wonderful life. I count my blessings each and every day. But you of all people should understand that I can’t refuse this request. This poor girl may be suffering as I did, and I couldn’t sleep at night knowing I might have helped her and didn’t.” She paused. “And neither could you, dear.”

He took a ragged breath. “I suppose you’re right, but I can hardly abide thinking of what you went through, and I’d spend the last breath in my body to shield you from having anything to do with that sordid world again. Were it in my power, I’d erase those horrible memories.”

She touched his cheek. “I know you would, and I love you for it. But you can’t, really, and I wouldn’t let you if you could. Daisy will always be part of me, a hidden part perhaps, but always a source of strength. As the saying goes, what doesn’t kill us makes us stronger.”

Alex returned her hug before speaking.

“So are you going to see her?”

“You needn’t say HER as if it were an epithet, dear. You know she’s always been a staunch friend.”

“That she has,” Alex agreed, “and I owe her a debt I can never repay for rescuing you and giving you a new identity. I just can’t agree with her lifestyle.”

Gillian chuckled, the tension broken.

“Gloria has larceny in her DNA, Alex. The fact that she spurned your multiple attempts to set her up in legitimate businesses shouldn’t be held against her.”

“I was rather thinking of the time she DIDN’T spurn my offer and ended up fleecing one of the fellows at my club out of ten thousand pounds.”

“It serves you right. She told me it was the only way she could think of to keep you from your incessant attempts to force her to go straight. And you made good the loss, so everything ended well,” Gillian said, barely containing her laughter. “Besides, you said yourself that Clive Falworth was, to use your words, a wanker of the first order.”

Alex sighed. “I suppose there’s no way I’m going to win this argument?”

“Not a chance.” Gillian kissed him tenderly before pulling her head back and staring up into his face.

“However, perhaps I can make it up to you. Cassie’s spending the night over at her friend Ingrid’s house. Does that suggest anything?”

Club Pyatnitsa
London, UK

Arsov sat at the end of the bar and surveyed the dim interior of Club
Pyatnitsa
, the flagship of his new London territory. It was quite a step up from his old territory in Prague, a dozen clubs and half a dozen high-end brothels in flats scattered throughout the city, owned through various front companies set up by the
Bratstvo
’s highly skilled London solicitors. Competent legal representation had been a problem initially, but the Brotherhood always sought out the best representation in each specialty. Those firms without sufficient moral flexibility to appreciate the extremely generous fees involved soon reconsidered after home visits from the more ‘persuasive’ members of the Brotherhood. Surveillance photos of solicitors’ families as they went about their daily lives, coupled with detailed descriptions of possible fatal accidents (along with graphic photos of previous ‘accidents’), never failed to do the trick. After all, the world was a dangerous place, and who could fault the attorneys for wanting to make sure their families were protected?

The solicitor arranging the real estate and business transactions had been particularly skillful. Arsov controlled his territory from a well-appointed office here at the rear of Club
Pyatnitsa
, or Club Friday, but nothing connected him to the other locations. He was a powerful spider, sitting in the middle of a web visible only to the
Bratstvo
.

His move from the
Federal’naya sluzhba bezopasnosti Rossiyskoy Federatsii
, or FSB, had been a natural one. As head of an FSB task force charged with controlling organized crime, it hadn’t taken him long to realize the hopelessness of the task. Corruption was endemic in the government, and the
Bratstvo
’s tentacles reached deeply into the very agencies charged with controlling it, and had since Tsarist times. Ever the pragmatist, Arsov had soon decided that if he couldn’t beat them, he’d join them, and quickly moved from taking the odd bribe to becoming a willing recruit.

He smiled at his new surroundings. The Brotherhood had given him more power and money than he could have ever acquired as a servant of the state (even a corrupt one), and the techniques he’d introduced in Prague had raised both the efficiency and profits of their trafficking operations tenfold. His reward had been London, and in the six weeks he’d been here, things were coming along nicely.

“That’s Katya, there,” said the man beside him, nodding to a girl clad only in a thong prancing onto a spotlit stage. The girl began a wildly erotic dance as rock music blared in the background.

Arsov watched a moment. “She looks too young.”

“I’m following your new guidelines. She’s completely legal. She turned eighteen last week, and I’ve got the documentation. I’ve sent all the younger girls out of sight to the brothels, just like you ordered.” He hesitated. “But if you ask me, it will cost us business.”

Arsov shook his head. “You have to understand the psychology of the clients, Nazarov. Men come here for a fantasy. Middle-aged men, with receding hairlines and expanding waistlines, who manage to convince themselves that a young woman who looks like a starlet cannot live until she has given them a blow job in a curtained booth. They want to feel strong, virile, desirable. But if they see a girl here that looks like their own teenage daughter, some percentage might feel guilty, maybe even call the police.”

“It was never a problem before. We have lookouts on the street to alert us to the first sign of cops. We get the young ones out of here before the cops even get to the door.”

“And how many men do you tie up standing around watching for the police? Two? Four? Now multiply that by a dozen clubs,” Arsov said. “It is a huge waste of manpower.”

Nazarov grunted noncommittally, and Arsov continued.

“It is all about knowing your customers, Nazarov. There is a different dynamic for the men who patronize the brothels; there is no illusion of romance. And a man who arrives at a brothel with a specific request to fuck children is unlikely to suddenly be stricken by a crisis of conscience.” Arsov smiled. “Besides, customers with those particular tastes will pay a lot more. Why should we let them satisfy their urges here in the back rooms at the same price a normal john pays?”

“All right, I’ll give you that, but I still don’t like the other changes. London isn’t Prague, and what we were doing before worked just fine.”

Arsov suppressed a sigh. “Fine as opposed to what? As far as I could tell, you never tried anything different. You hooked all the girls on drugs and then managed them by close confinement, withholding the drugs, and beating them from time to time for no apparent reason. You may think a glassy-eyed, bruised and drugged-out whore is sexy, but I suspect it doesn’t help sustain our clients’ fantasies particularly well, to say nothing of the cost of the drugs. We turn a much better profit by distributing those drugs instead of using them to control the girls.”

“That’s another thing since you brought up control. I don’t like this new plan at all. I think you’re giving them too much freedom.”

“On the contrary, we’re making them control themselves, AFTER they’ve earned some freedom,” Arsov said.

Nazarov looked unconvinced, and Arsov wondered if he’d have to replace the man. Some resistance was to be expected and tolerated, given that Nazarov had obviously been expecting to be promoted to head the London operation. However, Arsov had his limits.

His main concern was his new underling’s refusal to grasp the obvious — his resistance to the new control plan being a case in point. The concept Arsov had perfected in Prague was brilliant in its application of psychology and elegant in its simplicity. Breaking a girl’s spirit and perfecting her acting skills was only the first step — she still couldn’t be trusted out of direct supervision. And even then, there was always the possibility she might convince some sympathetic customer to contact the police.

Arsov’s solution was preemptive action. Though she didn’t know it, among each new girl’s first paying customers were
Bratstvo
men in disguise, alert to any attempt the girl might make at outside contact. If the girl passed that passive test, a
Bratstvo
‘john’ would then actively attempt to gain her trust and offer to make outside contact for her. If the girl accepted, the fake john would reveal himself to be one of Arsov’s men and the girl would be punished by repeated water-boarding and other torture that left no physical marks. Testing in a controlled club/brothel situation was repeated until the girl was deemed trustworthy enough to advance to the next level.

At the next level, a girl was allowed some limited freedom to run errands or perhaps go to lunch at a nearby fast-food restaurant. However, and again, all was not what it seemed. The girl was under continual close surveillance. If she attempted to escape or to contact anyone, she was immediately captured and summarily punished.

Girls who passed this challenge were tested even more stringently and given an errand that took them right by a uniformed policeman on patrol, one of Arsov’s men in disguise. The imposter would stop the girl on a pretext and engage her in conversation, giving her ample opportunity to ask for help. If she did, he would appear sympathetic, then put her in his car and deliver her back to captivity. The fake ‘policeman’ would be given a large cash payment in front of the girl, cementing the idea that the police were in Arsov’s pocket, and the girl would receive even harsher punishment, ostensibly for incurring the cost of the policeman’s bribe.

‘Graduates’ of Arsov’s program went from being unsure who to trust to being absolutely sure they could trust no one, even the police. That, along with frequent reminders of what might befall their loved ones back in Russia and of their videotaped porn sessions and interviews in which they waxed enthusiastic about their new life in the sex trade, served to destroy all resistance. The girls were free to come and go as they pleased, because there was no longer hope of rescue.