Page 80 of Savage Warrior

No one does. Noses remain buried in coffee cups, and all eyes are diverted from the commotion at the counter.

Ethan kneels beside the felled café proprietor and wraps his fingers around his neck. He squeezes until the man gasps for air, then bangs his skull on the floor for good measure. “Isak Ivanov?” he repeats through clenched teeth.

The man flails and tries to speak, but the chokehold on his throat makes that difficult. Ethan relents for long enough to let him gasp out the words.

“Upstairs,” he rasps between bouts of violent coughing.

Ethan pats him on the cheek by way of a thank you, and we both head for the door at the rear of the café. Behind it, we find a narrow staircase, so we take the stairs two at a time. Anyone up there will have heard the din from downstairs and is probably already on their way out of the window.

Sure enough, we arrive in time to see a man’s smartly clad backside disappearing onto a balcony then down the fire escape.

“Tony!” Ethan barks into his phone.

We both rush at the window in time to see Tony and Aaron taking the man to the ground in the street below.

I wave to them. “We’ll be right down.”

We decide to take our captive to the deserted car park and talk there. Ivanov makes the journey in the boot of the Trabant, a fact about which he complains bitterly the entire way. By the time we drag him back into the daylight, he’s looking a lot less dapper than when he started.

“Who the fuck are you? You’ll pay for this, arseholes.” He glares at each of us. “You need to let me go. Do you know who I am?”

“You’re Isak Ivanov,” I reply. “Loan shark, fencer of stolen goods, and all-round piece of shit.”

“What of it? If you want to do business, call my office.” He struggles against the cable ties binding his wrists behind his back.

I’m minded to break his jaw, but that wouldn’t make him any more talkative, I daresay. I take another tack.

“We want to buy a girl.” We can’t know for sure, but we’re agreed that the most likely scenario is that Natalija has been taken for the flesh trade, to be sold for sex. The fact that she’s only fourteen would make her more saleable to these sick fucks.

Ivanov doesn’t express surprise. “Why did you not just say so?”

My fist clenches of its own volition. “You have women for sale?”

“Not me. I just fix things. How much are you willing to pay?”

“Fuck that. What do you have and where do I need to go to view the goods?”

“Who are you?” he asks again.

I give in to the compulsion to land my fist on his jaw. He sprawls on the concrete ground, howling. Ethan grasps him by the lapels and props him against a barrier. I grab him by the hair and jerk his head back.

“Where?” I spit.

“I..I don’t…”

I hit him again. This time, the back of his head crunches against the concrete wall. I lean in. “If you want to leave here alive, I suggest you go along with me. Where are the girls for sale?”

“Not here…”

My fist connects with his solar plexus. I wait the few moments it takes for him start breathing again.

“You need to do better. I’m losing patience.”

“Minsk,” he croaks. “They take them to Minsk, to the market…”

“Who takes them?”

“No…no names.” He wails. “They will kill me.”

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