Ana sat shivering in the car. She’d been here, in the dark, for twenty minutes now. With the engine and the air-conditioning off, her warm breath had quickly fogged up the cold windows, so she’d now wound down the one next to her, making the interior of the cabin as cold as it was outside.
At least she had her thick coat on, the stolen phone hidden within.
She stared out at the block-like detached house beyond the car. She knew nothing about architecture, but the bland, grey three-storey buildings on this street, with their uniform proportions and flat roofs, looked as if they’d been designed by a bored child.
Ana had never been to this particular house before. Had never been to this downtrodden street before, though she knew exactly what she was looking at. Victor ran several properties like this in the area. Ana didn’t know the exact number – it wasn’t like she was a business partner of his – but she knew from the number of young women who passed through that Victor – along with his ‘associates’ spread through the region and beyond – had something of a mini empire.
What was Ana even doing here? All Victor had said when he came back into the warehouse, two hours after he and Alex had left, was that there was a problem. That he needed Ana to help him sort it out.
But so far she’d just been left in the car.
The unlocked car. She didn’t have the key. She couldn’t drive off. But she could step out if she wanted to.
She could run.
Why hadn’t she already?
A banging door wrenched Ana from those hopeful thoughts, and a moment later Victor came striding along the poorly lit path to the car. Ana took a large drag from her cigarette then stubbed it out and flicked the butt out of the window as Victor reached it.
‘You’re needed,’ he growled.
Ana said nothing as she stared. Felt nothing, really, which was quite surprising to her. And it wasn’t that she wasn’t shocked. She was numb.
She’d never seen so much blood. In fact she could scarcely believe it possible that a human body could contain so much.
Red splashes streaked the walls, the ceiling, the floor, which also had a large puddle growing beneath the grotty single bed.
The bed. Upon which lay the lifeless crimson-soaked body of Maria.
Even with all of the red that covered her, Ana recognised the young face. The woman – a teenager, really – had arrived in England all of twenty-four hours ago. Ana had been the one who’d basically stolen her freedom from her, and sent her on her way to this place.
Ana couldn’t explain why, but she’d looked through each and every one of the confiscated passports from yesterday. As though knowing the names and birthdays of these young women somehow brought Ana closer to them, somehow gave her more of a justification for the things she was doing. The things she was doing for Victor.
Ana jumped when he stormed back into the room, Alex in tow.
‘I don’t fucking believe this,’ he shouted. ‘One day she’s been here. All of that effort for nothing.’
Ana felt sick at that. She knew exactly what Victor was thinking. Money. He didn’t care one bit about poor Maria, what she’d been through in this room, the life that had been forever torn away from her. He only cared about himself. The hassle he’d had in bringing Maria here, which was now all to waste.
‘Ana, stop staring into space like a damn statue. Clean this place up.’
Ana nodded then picked up the rubber gloves that lay on the edge of the bucket that was filled with frothy water.
As though water and soap was going to make this scene disappear.
‘Who was he?’ Alex asked Victor.
‘A regular. Jim, is all these idiots know. They’ve told me what he looks like, but they know fuck all else.’
‘Somehow we’ll find him.’
Ana had already gleaned a little of what had happened. Jim was apparently a regular user of Victor’s girls. A not at all uncommon type, sadly. The type who couldn’t get a girlfriend through the normal means, basically because he was an obscene and violent drunk. So he resorted to paying for sex. Only he knew, just like everyone else did, that he was an obscene and violent drunk, so he was made to pay more, and was generally happy to do so. And he was made to pay more for good reason, because every now and then the women he used would end up with black eyes, or cut lips or bleeding genitalia, when he took his life’s frustrations out on them.
Extra money. Not for the victims, but for Victor, for the hassle of him having banged-up prostitutes rather than pristine ones.
‘She was only eighteen,’ Ana said, unable to take her eyes off Maria’s body.
‘Forever young,’ Alex said.
That comment got him a glower from Victor. It really should have got him a boot down his throat. Ana would have kindly put it there herself.
‘You put her here,’ Ana said. She glared at Victor, who ignored her.
‘Watch your fucking mouth,’ Alex said.
‘Or what?’ Ana said. ‘You’re going to call Jim out to get me? Beat the crap out of me? Cut me to pieces?’
‘Ana, you’re upset,’ Victor said, sounding way more calm than anyone else in the room. ‘But we will catch this guy. And we’ll make him pay.’
‘Make him pay? How much? Two hundred pounds? How much was Maria’s life worth to you?’
Victor shot over like a rocket, snarling. He grabbed Ana by the throat, took her off her feet and launched her up against the wall with a painful thud.
She grimaced in pain and gasped for breath.
‘Remember who you’re talking to,’ he said. ‘Remember where I dragged you from. You want to be back in a place like this instead? Being fucked every day by God knows who?’
Ana couldn’t have answered the question even if she’d wanted to.
‘Well, do you?’ Victor roared.
Ana shook her head, at least as best she could.
‘Now clean up this mess. I don’t want to hear another word from you.’
Victor let go and Ana clattered down into a heap on the blood-soaked floor. She glanced up to see Alex staring at her, a ghastly smile on his ghastly face.
‘I’m going to find him,’ Victor said. ‘And when I do…’
There was a knock on the front door downstairs. Ana heard chatter. Victor disappeared off to see who it was.
Ana pulled herself onto her knees.
‘Back where you belong,’ Alex said to her.
She ignored the jibe. She had nothing left to say to this man.
Moments later Victor arrived back in the room, trailed by two burly men, who Ana thought she vaguely recognised. Both were dressed in black, with thick leather boots covered in silly blue plastic covers, and leather gloves.
One of them whistled when he saw the sight, as though he was impressed with the gory scene.
Ana felt like launching herself at him and tearing a hole in his neck.
One of the men unrolled some thick plastic sheeting and he and the other grunted as they hauled Maria’s limp body off the bed. It clattered onto the sheet and the floor with a sickening thud and squelch. They rolled the body tight, casual as can be.
‘You know who did this?’ one of them asked.
‘Yeah,’ Victor said. ‘And you can be sure you’ll soon be rolling that bastard up too.’
‘If you can find him,’ Ana reminded him. She didn’t get any response.
Having finished wrapping, the two men casually hauled the plastic bundle up like it was nothing more than a rug. Like there wasn’t a young woman’s body in there.
‘Where to?’ one of them said to Victor.
‘Same place as the others,’ was Victor’s chilling reply.