charging bears and Roman yelled out in pain. As he clutched his face, Keith backed up nervously. The tangy vapour in the air was enough to make the girls’ eyes water.
‘Powerful stuff,’ Abby grinned, as she threw the canister inside her office. ‘Now get these little bitches out of my sight and make sure there are no customers around before you drag them into the brothel.’
A twenty-metre walk along a balcony overlooking the staircase took Keith, Roman, Anna and Lauren to an anonymous white door with an intercom mounted at its side. After being buzzed in, they passed into a reception area that smelled like cigarettes. The only phones were mobiles, the furniture was made from chipboard and the whole place gave the impression that everything could be picked up and shipped out in a matter of hours.
A sign behind the desk reassured customers that all transactions will appear on your credit card statement as North Lane Pizza & Pasta. A powerfully built bouncer scowled from a leather armchair, as Lauren tried not to stare at the goods: a half dozen girls in their late teens or very early twenties. They sat on modular sofa units, wearing silk gowns and high heels, with nothing but old magazines and a few half eaten boxes of Chinese food for entertainment.
‘You fellas don’t look so hot,’ the elderly receptionist said, as she eyed Keith’s bloody nose and Roman’s streaming eyes.
‘Sweetheart, you haven’t looked so hot since nineteen fifty-six,’ Roman snapped back. ‘So shut your yap and get me two rooms upstairs, well away from action. Don’t buzz any customers in till we’re out of sight.’
After grasping two chunky keys, Roman led the foursome up a narrow staircase and out into a corridor with five doors on each side. Just like downstairs, everything looked cheap. The rooms were nothing but plywood partitions and the doors had clasps and padlocks on them.
Lauren and Anna got shoved into rooms on opposite sides at the far end of the corridor.
‘One for the princess,’ Keith said, as he locked Anna in her room. ‘And one for my special friend.’
Lauren got shoved into a windowless space three metres square. She was surrounded on all sides by bare sheets of plywood and almost choked from the smell of air freshener. A low energy bulb dangled from the ceiling, and there was a double bed with a disposable sheet stretched over the duvet and pillows.
As Keith fastened the padlock on the outside, Lauren pulled back a thin dividing curtain. Behind it was a bathroom of sorts: a set of clean towels, a shower with mould growing on the curtain and a heavily stained, seatless, toilet. Most disturbing was a washbasin streaked with dried blood.
Lauren backed off and propped herself on the edge of the paper bedsheet. The room made her skin crawl, as she imagined teenage girls being locked up and forced to have sex with strange men: a quick shower, a squirt of air freshener and a fresh paper sheet before the next customer came in; and your head smashed open on the wash basin if you gave your boss – or rather your owner – any kind of trouble.
Horror movies had nothing on this, but Lauren knew she couldn’t let it get to her. Hopefully, John Jones and a bunch of cops would come storming in before too long, but it might take them a while to plan a complicated raid and Lauren had to consider every eventuality. She and Anna were in danger every second they were locked up, so she was determined to get out as quickly as she could.
Lauren heard steps out in the hallway, followed by the sound of a padlock springing open.
‘I’ve got a score to settle,’ Keith said, putting on a voice like he was teasing a small child. He still wore the bloody shirt, but not the jacket with the gun tucked inside.
‘Here are the rules,’ he smirked, as he pushed shut the door. ‘You do everything I say or I pop you in the mouth, like that.’ He slammed his fist into his palm. ‘Now, take your kit off.’
‘What kit?’ Lauren said, acting dumb as she reassured herself by feeling the surprise strapped to her leg.
‘Strip,’ Keith ordered, as he unbuttoned his shirt. ‘Then you can come and sit on my lap.’
‘I’ll scream,’ Lauren said.
Keith spread his arms out wide and laughed. ‘Scream all you like, honey. There ain’t nobody gonna come running to save you.’
‘Pervert,’ Lauren sneered. ‘You make me