‘I know. But it will be worth it to me if I get it right. I have Wong’s assurance…’ he reached into his pocket for his phone, pulled it out and pressed

play.

Wong’s voice came over, muffled but it was definitely him. ‘This says that I can stay in the department.’

Ng rolled his eyes and sighed as he took his wallet out from his pocket and begrudgingly handed Shrimp a hundred-dollar bill.

Shrimp took it from him and grinned. ‘That the way the mop flops, old man—nothing personal.’ He turned to Mann and waved the bill in the air. ‘I bet on you staying, he bet you’d be kicked out. But what about the investigation into the new sex-trafficking ring, Boss? What’s going to happen to that?’

‘I don’t think these events are all random. A spate of wealthy abductions—someone’s raising funds and not just anyone—has to be someone with the clout behind them. We know CK has control of the largest trafficking ring. We know there’s a new boy in town. The other kids were kidnapped purely for money, funds. CK’s daughter’s abduction is more than that. Someone is forcing him to show his hand. Carry on the investigation this side—get out on the streets and listen to the talk. Keep tabs on Stevie Ho. We need to find out who he’s working for—is his allegiance still to CK, or is he with the new boys? According to that list you gave me, Ng, Stevie was in London before he went to the Philippines. He must have had business there. If he’s still working for CK he would have brokered the ransom. Why did they choose this child now? It isn’t by accident and they haven’t got what they wanted from CK. My hunch is that this kidnapping has something to do with Stevie increasing his trafficking routes. That means, courtesy of my new friend, Superintendent Wong, my investigation just went global.’ Mann waved and smiled at Wong through the glass. The Superintendent scowled back at him. Mann laughed. ‘I think I’m going to like this open-plan arrangement.’

Angeles, Philippines

Fields Avenue, Friendship Road, Blow Row—on the surface, Angeles, a ramshackle town a few kilometres north of San Fernando and an hour’s drive north of Manila, had just a few filthy streets with mediocre restaurants and garish bars to offer the tourist. There was not a great deal to do—there was a nearby volcano to climb but no nice beaches. There was little reason to come to Angeles except for sex. The town was created for that purpose.

Angeles was born to service the needs of the men at the nearby American naval base at Clark. When the Americans were pushed out by the do-gooders, the priests and the nationalists who no longer wanted the Americans’ help or their military bases, the whores and the whorists were left with nowhere to go. The Colonel and a few others stepped in to save those communities, and from ‘disaster’ they created ‘opportunity’—a new Angeles was born, a Disneyland just for sex—a city of fallen angels. Now it was a major destination for every whorist and paedophile in the western world.

The Colonel sat with three other men on one of the four tables outside the Bordello on Fields Avenue. He paused, beer bottle pressed against his mouth, and watched Jed, a big black guy, swagger towards him, walking the walk, talking the talk, bling hanging from around his neck in layers of gold chain and a diamond crucifix. On his arm was a tiny Filipina named Peanut. Jed glanced the Colonel’s way, nodded his head respectfully, grinned at the other men and then swaggered on past into the Bordello.

The Bordello was like all the other bars and hotels down the avenue—a facade. From across the road, face on, it looked like a mock-up of a western saloon, but from the side it looked like a cardboard cut-out supported by a scaffold and attached to a windowless concrete block. It was situated three-quarters up Fields Avenue, before the road widened, branched out and the hotels began. They weren’t proper hotels. There were no five-star accommodations on Fields Avenue. Most hotels offered their rooms at an hourly rate.

The Colonel had called a meeting for eight o’clock in the Tequila Station. He had plenty of time till then. He drank his beer and surveyed his kingdom. In the thirty years he had lived in the Philippines, Angeles was where he’d always been. Firstly as a Chief Petty Officer stationed at the nearby American naval base at Clark, and latterly as the self-styled saviour of the city of fallen angels.

Brandon sat directly to the Colonel’s right, British, shaved head, ex-Marine, his voice thick with a Portsmouth dialect, akin to a gravelly cockney. He had tattoos of Chinese script on both his arms and an eagle stretched across his upper back. He was not a man to move hastily. He had learned to sit back and observe. It had kept him alive in the Marines; it would continue to keep him alive, as long as he never forgot it. Brandon had been with the Colonel for eighteen months now. His job was to control the women, make sure that the young ones stayed scared and compliant and that the others felt the back of his hand. Brandon had not found it easy in the beginning. Hitting women was not in Brandon’s nature, but he had got used to detaching his brain from the work. That’s all it was—work. They were merchandise. The Colonel liked him, he knew that. One day he wanted to take over from him. Of course, there were obstacles to that, and that’s why Brandon had to be good at waiting and watching.

Next to him was Reese, an Australian who was stuck in the seventies—a string of love beads around his neck and flowery board shorts on his skinny legs. His surfer’s curls that were once his pride and joy were now straw, and his once beautiful face was now thin and deeply lined. He sat cross-legged, swinging his suspended leg nervously and fiddling with his cigarette packet.

The fourth man called himself the Teacher.

A few westerners sat in the Bordello at the bar enjoying a late-afternoon beer. It was their lull time. The evening unfolded in a regular pattern. The needs of the whorists were always the same—eat, sleep and fuck—but they formed their own patterns according to their age. From lunchtime onwards the younger ones emerged in packs, tired and hung over. They needed food and a good few beers and to socialise with each other. They got rid of one date, sobered up and recharged themselves ready for another evening of heat and sweat and DNA exchange. The older whorists were loners, even if they had come along with another male they didn’t feel it necessary to stay with them all day and all evening. They sat at bars on their own, picked up a girl early. They were after a companion to have dinner with and spend the night snoring next to. They preferred the calm surroundings and the melancholy country music of the Bordello. They needed to pace themselves.

A barmaid named Comfort kept the energy circulating in the bar with a big smile and a substantial push-up bra. Her laugh ricocheted around the walls as she bantered happily with the three men who had nothing else to do but sit and watch her.

Comfort looked up as Jed and Peanut came in and she moved down to the end of the bar where the signing-in book was. She leaned over the book, pen ready.

Jed didn’t acknowledge the other men in the bar. He walked in as if he were on stage. He talked loud, laughed louder. He was showing the older men that he was a young stud.

‘You got a room for an hour, baby?’

He rested his elbow on the counter and leaned over to get close to Comfort and look further down her cleavage. He grinned smugly; his gold teeth flashed in the gloom of the bar. She grinned back. Peanut stood waiting patiently for it all to be over. She was an un educated girl from the countryside, and spoke very little English. She was unattractive: dark-skinned and rough-featured. Her scrawny legs dropped down from beneath a micro denim skirt like two sticks of gnawed liquorice. But Peanut was a hit with men who liked their women to look like undernourished girls. Jed towered over her at six foot four to her four foot nine.