Page 108 of Lethal Torture

She lifts a shoulder. “It is what it is, I guess.” Inhaling deeply, she fixes me with her professional expression. “So—when will Paddy report back?”

“I’m due to meet him at my place this afternoon.” I hold her eyes. “Why don’t I tell you about it over dinner, at my apartment?”

Her eyes flare, and for a tense moment I think she’s going to dodge the question. “I’ve got a better idea,” she says. “Why don’t I cook for you?”

My poker face must have failed me, because a moment later she raises an indignant eyebrow at me. “What? You think I can’t cook?”

“Hey.” I lift my palms in surrender. “I absolutely never said that—”

“Because I can.” She pulls out her phone and starts ordering ingredients.

“I have absolutely no doubt.” I’m battling the urge to laugh, which does nothing to improve her indignation.

“I assume you eat steak,” she says tartly.

I incline my head, still grinning. “Absolutely.”

“Fine.” She glares at me over the screen. “Charlie is driving me. We’ll pick you up on the way home.” She flushes suddenly. “I mean—unless you want to—that is, it’s up to you, I guess. You don’t have to stay the night.”

Now I’m really struggling not to laugh.

I stand and walk over to the table, leaning down in front of her to pick up the tablet. She goes suddenly still, quivering like a deer in the forest.

I drop my hand to her leg and slowly trace the length of her bared thigh, inhaling her heady scent like the foreplay it is. “Oh, I’m definitely staying the night.” I put my mouth close to her ear. “Because what I have planned will take time, privacy, and a hell of a lot less clothing than this.”

“Your man Bogdan Kozlovis quite the piece of shit,o chara.” Paddy pulls up a stool by my kitchen counter, beer in hand.

“Somehow I’m not surprised.” I try not to look at my watch. Paddy was supposed to be here by four. It’s nearly six, and Zinaida will be here any minute. “So what did you find?”

“Minos looks clean on the surface. Big warehouses—which I’ll come back to—solid corporate structure, and, especially since they expanded into the online market a few years ago, excellent cash turnover.” He knocks off his beer and helps himself to another one from my fridge. “Problem is, Kozlov himself has fuck all to do with any of it.”

“He’s a front?”

Paddy nods. “His name is on the paperwork, but Kozlov himself is as back-end as you can get. He runs the delivery end. Gourmet hampers, catering for private parties. Runs an entire fleet of vans all over the damned city.” He throws a rather sour look at his mud-covered bike leathers, which he discarded in the corner on arrival, before he helped himself to a beer, a hot shower, and a change of clothes from my closet.

“Deliveries, huh?” I raise my eyebrows.

“Aye. Thing is, Kozlov does his deliveries after dark, and he drops off a lot more than just hampers and hors d’oeuvres.” Paddy finds a leftover pasta dish in my fridge and puts it in the microwave. “From what I can make out, Kozlov provides the fulltwisted service, from party drugs to party girls. It’s a great front. Nobody looks twice at a catering van. And no doubt the casual observer would assume that the girls carrying the platters inside are there to wait on the guests.”

I frown. “Where is he keeping the girls? Niamh’s team tracked the vans from Avonmouth as far as Reading, then lost them.”

“That’s where our man is a clever little fucker—and,” he adds, scowling, “how I got covered in bloody mud. Minos’s warehouse block in Reading has underground storage with vehicle access. He stores his entire fleet down there, and loads and off-loads undercover and out of sight. Guess who does the security for the entire block?”

“Let me guess: Lowbridge Inc.”

“Ding ding ding.” Paddy raises his beer to me. “Which means it’s as hard to get inside as your girl Charlie. Which is saying something,” he adds, grinning as he tucks into the pasta. “Christ, she’s stubborn.”

“Knowing you as I do, I’d call her smart, myself,” I say dryly. “But you did get inside the warehouse, I take it?”

He grimaces. “Not exactly. I’d need either Mak-level hacking equipment or a duffel bag full of HMX.” His eyes gleam at the mention of High Melting Explosive, his favorite toy. “The warehouses are on an isolated block surrounded by high tensile wire. I had to hole up in a nearby ditch and rely on surveillance, and even then, I got fuck all since the vans have no windows. The only reason I know there were girls inside them is because I watched the unloading process at the private houses. But even then, things are hard to track.”

“Why?”

Paddy meets my eyes, his grin fading. “Because it’s a one-way service, cock. The vans don’t come back to pick the girls up after the party is done.”

There’s a brief silence while he eats and I process what he’s just said.

“Are you telling me,” I say eventually, “that the girls never make it out of those houses?”