Page 99 of The Twins

“So we can mark Bateman down as the main Romanian contact then,” Cillian said. “With his fingers in lots of pies.”

“Yeah, I’d say so.” Andrew nodded. “And good fucking riddance if that’s the case, too.”

Mitch stepped in, shutting the door behind him. “Sorry, got caught up and lost track of time.” He sat heavily and grinned.

I frowned at him. Mitch didn’t grin. Or he hadn’t for a long time.

“You okay?” Dalton asked him, obviously thinking the same thing as me. “You seem…” He paused. “Different.”

“I’m fucking dandy.” Mitch set his phone on the table, and his smile dropped. “You?”

“Yeah, sure.” Dalton pulled a face in Grant’s direction.

“You talking about Ian Bateman?” Mitch asked. “’Cause I found out something.’

“What?” Grant asked.

“He’d visited Reg Jacks in prison five times over the four years.”

“Ah, so they stayed loyal despite Bateman not giving Jacks an alibi,” I said. Rebecca was a smart cookie; she’d said that might be the case.

“Assholes fart together.” Jamie rolled his eyes.

“And…” Mitch said, “Reg Jacks was the last person to visit Samuel Conner in Bullingdon.”

“Samuel Conner?” Jamie asked. “Who is he?”

“The guy who kicked off, threw acid at another prisoner, so his lawyer had to pay him a visit,” I said, my jaw tensing. “Said lawyer being Rebecca.OurRebecca.”

“It was a setup,” Cillian went on for me, following my chain of thought, “to get her there. They were obviously thick as thieves. Conner fixed it up so Jacks could grab her outside the prison. When she was alone, vulnerable, then took her to Bateman’s place.”

Phil grunted. “She shouldn’t have gone to the prison.”

“No, she bloody shouldn’t have.” I frowned at him. I hadn’t forgiven him for that mistake yet. Maybe never would.

“What’s Conner in for?” Andrew asked as if wanting to move on from blame.

“Pimping, drug dealing, intent to rob, theft, carrying a weapon that kind of thing.”

“Fucking asshole,” Phil muttered.

“He’s in for a while then,” Grant said.

“Yeah, don’t need to worry about him for decade or two.” Mitch rubbed his hands together.

Andrew studied the group. “The Convicts gave us the initial details about Eastern European women being trafficked, Ranson and his warehouse address came soon after, but this is getting big, guys, and luckily we’re keeping up with shit.”

“Yeah, Albania and Romania have had their gates closed, for now at least, Cillian said.

“Someone will soon fill their shoes.” Grant grunted.

“True, but we’ll be waiting,” Andrew tapped his finger on the table. “And in the meantime, we have Armenia and Kosovo to knock on the head. We don’t want any more girls coming through to be used and abused by these animals.”

“It’s coming with extras, though.” Mitch sat back and folded his arms. “Four bodies at the farm according to the first forensic report.”

“Yeah, there were four, the report is right,” I said. “All burning with the Devil now.”

Dalton turned to Jamie. “How are the Romanian girls doing? I haven’t checked in on them yet today.”