“Would have been damn easier if that lead in Aylesbury had come to something,” I said. “Place was deserted. He must have got spooked from there at some point.”
“Win some, lose some,” Andrew said, his fists balling on the table. “But we’ll get this asshole. We’ve already stopped two pricks who thought they could bring women into the country to sell.”
“Always more filling their shoes,” Phil snarled. “But that’s why we’re here.”
I turned to Jamie. “The women are Alices, remember. And you’re the Mad Hatter who is planning a tea party.”
“And twenty thousand each, right?”
Andrew linked his hands beneath his chin. “Yeah, and feel free to drop Leo Green in the shit. If he winds up in a ditch for blabbering, all well and good.”
Jamie picked up his phone. A pen and paper sat at his side.
I folded my arms and leaned back. We’d been waiting for this moment. Direct contact with a trafficker was rare until face-to-face.
But we needed this to get face-to-face.
And get any other women as far away from him as possible.
“So this number matches one from the farm last week, the guy bringing in girls from Romania, his phone,” Jamie said. “And it was also on Leo’s phone.”
“So these human traffickers stay in touch.” Andrew nodded. “We’ve suspected that for a while.”
“Stock management,” Cillian said then wrinkled his nose. “Assholes buying women probably don’t mind a different nationality here and there. Not like they want them to talk to. I expect they help each other out if they run out.”
“I agree,” Jamie said, “and on Ranson’s phone it’s listed as Beelzebub, and on Leo’s Lucifer.”
“The Devil’s pseudonyms,” I said. “That’s what he said when I was tearing out his fingernails.”
“So it’s our best bet.” Jamie held his finger to his lips. “Show time.”
He dialed the number, setting the phone on the table. It was on speaker.
It answered after three rings. “Who the fuck is this?”
“It’s the Mad Hatter.”
Silence.
Jamie frowned.
“Mad Hatter, planning a tea party and want to buy…” Jamie added.
“How’d you get this fucking number, asshole?”
“I…I…does it matter?” Jamie was deliberately stuttering. Making himself less threatening.
“Yeah, it fucking matters, that’s why I asked. I don’t like people I don’t fucking know calling me out the fucking blue.”
“A friend, a friend who has done…business with you in the past.”
“What kind of business? I have my fingers in lots of fucking pies these days.”
“Alice in Wonderland. I mean…he bought Alice…two of them.”
“When?”
“I don’t know. A while ago. But he told me…and it’s just what I want.” Jamie paused. “What Ineedif you get my drift.”
