The Razor's Edge

by David Leadbeater

  Not long after midnight, a trio of black Cadillacs drew up outside the gated entry. One man jumped out to shake the gates and shout.

  Trent stared. “That’s actually Oleg Roth himself. I didn’t realise the man still did his own dirty work.”

  “He was a fighter,” Silk reminded him. “It’s always in the blood.”

  Silk had earned the respect of his gang through streetfighting.

  “Lockley!” the man shouted. “Get out here! Come and face me, dirty bastard!”

  The rest of the cars remained still, all doors closed.

  “They’re waiting for the gates to be opened,” Trent said.

  “And Lockley’s just that dumb,” Radford said.

  Trent nodded. “Shouldn’t take more than a few minutes. Get ready.”

  Lockley wouldn’t come down to the gates himself. He would request that Roth be brought to him in a move designed to convey power, superiority and confidence. It was also a move that left his defences wide open, though Lockley really did have no idea why Roth was here.

  “There we go.”

  The gates hummed as they parted. At the same time Roth stormed through and twelve car doors slammed open. Men boiled out, waving automatics. The gate guards were momentarily stunned. Roth ended their misery with two head shots.

  “Wait for it.” Trent readied himself on the roof. “The mayhem is about to begin.”

  Lockley’s men poured from the house. Roth’s men ran hard up the driveway and across the manicured lawn, climbing stepped feature walls and taking aim from behind clay planters. Muted gunfire erupted, the harsh sound masked by silencers. Lockley’s men leapt among the intruders, some using their entire bodies to bowl them over and go tumbling across the lawn.

  “You hit my club!” Oleg Roth shouted. “I take your home and your life! That’s how we work.”

  No alarms sounded. The gunfire was masked on both sides. Every one of these men was a criminal. None of them wanted the cops showing up too soon, but police presence was inevitable at some point.

  “Move.” Trent knew they had to move fast, strike fast and get out. Time and timing were everything now.

  Roth ran at the house, shadowed by three of his men. Trent, Silk and Radford landed in the underbrush as men started to grunt and cry out. Trent peered around a sharp-spined palm tree, searching for a straggler.

  What he saw pulled him up short.

  “Shit.”

  He watched as the Polish mob boss, Oleg Roth, rained blows upon a much bigger opponent. He watched as that man’s face grew purple, bruised and slack. He watched as Roth pounded hard fists into his body, targeting organs with precision and restrained fury. Roth used the bodyguard as a punching bag and left him for dead. Literally.

  Silk let out a long breath. “I thought he’d retired. Shit, that dude’s as serious as they come.”

  The glimmer of a new idea formed in Trent’s brain, but he pushed it aside. Now wasn’t the time. Later . . .

  “Go.”

  Silk moved like lightning, exiting the undergrowth in a flash and executing a stranglehold on Roth’s last man. With brute strength he dragged the man back into the bushes. Trent and Radford covered him with small-calibre pistols and made sure he wasn’t seen. Radford had to pop one of Roth’s men who came running forward at the last second. The Pole scraped along gravel as he hit the ground, a neat red hole in the centre of his skull.

  Trent drew a knife and held the blade against the captured Pole's cheekbone. “Talk and you live. Do you understand?”

  Hatred glinted sharper than the edge of the blade from the man’s half-closed eyes.

  As usual they had no time. Trent dug through skin until the blood welled up. “We know you guys are mob so don’t even try to deny it. Truth is, it’s your lucky day, we just want one thing and no one will ever know you told us.”

  He paused as Silk leapt out again, subduing a second Pole with Radford’s help and dragging him hard into the small clearing. Radford fell on his ass. “This is getting a little crowded.”

  “Don’t worry.” Trent dug deeper. “We’re about to get what we need.”

  The pop of weapons, the blast of mortar and bark being torn apart, the burst of shattered glass, and the sound of men screaming rippled closer for a moment as men surged through the doors of the house. Their captives struggled hard, but Trent and Silk held on tight.

  “One chance.” Trent glared at both men. “The mob is running a human trafficking ring within the US. Abduction. Where are the victims sent?”

  Trent expected denial, he expected to hear the word 'Dallas', he expected to be abused or spat upon, but what he didn’t expect was genuine bewilderment. Both men, both pairs of eyes, took on a perplexed look at the same time.

  “We do not abduct.” The first man whispered, his throat half-closed due to Silk’s arm. “We import. We do not run this human traffic ring you speak of. Try the Serbs or the Russians. They are animals.” Even with blood spilling down his face, the man gave them a feral grin.

  Trent believed him, but gave no quarter. This was their last hope. All roads led to this. If there was no trafficking ring what was left? “Don’t lie to me.”

  “I no lie!” The man tried to squirm away, but only succeeded in widening his wound. Trent knew he was telling the truth. His colleague’s identical mystification confirmed it. At that moment, the bushes around them rustled and a wide, black-suited man crashed into them. Two Poles followed him, guns popping. Trent threw his body to the side and scrambled away. The first Pole they had captured crawled after him, snarling. Trent rolled on to his back and shot down the length of his own body, between his heels, blasting the man in the face. The dying black-suited guard fell on top of the Pole. Silk slithered towards the wall of the house, upending one of their new attackers by sweeping his legs away at the knees. The second attacker turned towards the noise, leaving the way clear for Radford to stick a knife through the back of his neck.

  Trent rose quickly. Sirens split the night. Silk finished the last of the Poles. Trent moved to the picture window they had scouted earlier – one that gave them the best view of the inside of the house. He saw Roth and half a dozen of his men dragging Donny Lockley over to an unused, probably imitation, fireplace. They stuffed the man’s battered and bleeding body into the wide grate and began to douse him with a clear liquid.

  Trent turned away. “We should get out of here.”

  Flashing blue lights flickered across the wall of the house. Roth himself would have to be quick. As Trent passed the window he saw the Polish mob boss glance up, swear, and then leave Lockley where he was – the assessment most likely being that a living, terrified criminal contact would be more useful than a dead one after all. The cops would have less to pursue at least. Lockley would never rat out Roth.

  Roth bolted for the front doors.

  Trent bolted for the rear area where, at the edge of the property, they scaled a wall to enter the neighbour’s garden. As they already knew, this one was even larger than Lockley’s, backing up against the very foothills of the mountains. It was a long walk round, but they had come prepared.

  *

  With the mountains to their left, the three men started on a very long, looping walk back to Las Vegas. At some point, Radford would call Toni James to come and get them, but they didn’t want the pick-up point to be even close to Lockley’s vicinity, as much for Toni’s sake as theirs.

  Trent concentrated on putting one foot safely in front of the other, heading into the foothills first to lower the risk of being seen by eagle-eyed rich people, and then picking his way through the small rocks and hillocks. Silk and Radford kept pace, both silently. Trent unzipped his cell phone from its safe pocket inside the Kevlar vest he had been wearing. No messages. He hoped Mikey’s day out with his mom and Geoff had gone better than his own night out with Lockley and the Poles.

  He said as much to the other two.

  Silk shook his head glumly. “Those guys were serious. If the Polis
h mob doesn’t run a ring inside the US then where was Monika being taken?”

  “We got it wrong,” Radford said, equally morose. “We went too small. Should have hit Lockley.”

  “Out of the question now.” Trent nodded. “The cops will have him locked up tighter than the Venetian past masters room. Man’s lucky to be alive.”

  “I wonder if he feels that way.” Silk laughed.

  The cool mountain air caused their breath to fog. They crossed a small river and a narrow canyon, using the flashlight apps on their cell phones to navigate. Darkness held sway over the sky from horizon to horizon, the only fissure being the magnificent lights down the length of the Strip.

  “You realise we're out of leads?” Radford stated the obvious. “Short of hitting Roth or Lockley or staking out that huge building site. Which could take weeks.”

  “Lockley is a dead end,” Trent said. “He’s too small fry to know what Roth is up to.”

  “Alright,” Silk reasoned. “Well, he definitely abducts people. What does he do with them?”

  “Are we looking at this all wrong?” Trent suddenly said, thinking back to his first sighting of Roth. “We’re looking at Roth the boss, the head of the mob, one of the heads of the US criminal organisation. We’re looking at the organisation itself.”

  “Yeeess,” Radford prompted.

  “What if it’s more personal? What if we should be looking at Roth the man?”

  “Same thing,” Radford said without thinking. “Head of the Polish mob.”

  “Not quite,” Silk said. “That’s only half who Oleg Roth is.”

  20

  “Roth the man,” Trent reiterated. “Who is he?”

  Silk played the game. “A legend. A man who started with nothing and clawed his way up the bloody mob ladder all the way to the top. A man who built his future with his own hands. Literally.”

  “The fighter?” Radford cottoned on at last. “The MMA champion?”

  “I just saw him take down one huge slab of a man,” Trent told them. “No fear. No retreat. He killed the guy and never took a blow in return. That was not the action of a relaxing retiree. Roth never retired. He’s still fighting.”

  “Still . . .?” Radford’s face, lit by the half-moon, appeared stumped. “But how?”

  “He went underground,” Silk said. “Believe me, Dan, there's a huge underground circuit. The money’s better there than if you go legal, and the whole thing’s run professionally. Only problem – no rules.”

  “Cage fighting to the extreme,” Trent said. “People die in there.”

  Radford was waving. “I know this. I know some of it, at least. And not just from watching Pay-per-View with Amanda. We investigated some of these guys back at the agency. And I ain’t as slow as you guys seem to think. Really,” he added in response to Silk’s sly look. “I can accept that fighting is in Roth’s blood, it’s his passion. His obsession. I can even see that when he was outed as a mob boss he would have to take it all underground. Keep it hush hush. The underground fighting circuit would be perfect for him and his cronies.”

  “Perversely,” Silk added. “It would turn him into a better fighter.”

  “Yes, yes,” Radford said. “We’re all better when we know we’re fighting for our lives. But guys, why would he need Monika and half a dozen other abductees? Every other week? Of what use would they be to him?”

  Trent grimaced. “I can think of several.”

  Silk counted them out on his fingers. “Sport. Punching bags. Warm up. Exhibitions. First bout teasers to a bigger match. Like gladiators to bet on.”

  “You’re saying he may make them fight each other? How do you make someone do that?”

  “Seriously?” Silk said, his eyes aglow. “You’re asking me that question?”

  Radford looked down at his feet. “Yeah, man. I get it. Sorry.”

  “No need to apologise,” Silk said brightly. “We might finally be getting somewhere.”

  “The underground circuit offers big bucks, glory, and lots of kudos,” Trent went on. “But Oleg Roth was a fighting superstar and is a mob boss. He wouldn’t join a circuit—”

  “He’d run one,” Silk finished.

  “He would go big. Invite the best and pummel them. Attract big investors. Big clients. He’d turn it into a big business with him at the centre.”

  “So you think one of the attractions would be watching people like Monika fight in the ring?” Radford asked.

  “Street gangs I knew certainly used to do it,” Silk said. “It was a form of initiation. You go and beat someone to a pulp. Sometimes it’s a fair, arranged fight. Other times they pick someone for you off the street. At random.”

  “Fight or die.”

  Silk nodded, eyes far away. “Nothing personal. Just a way to keep on living.”

  By now they had walked further than they needed to, but Trent kept it going. Headway like this must never be interrupted.

  “Back to the problem,” he repeated their old adage. “Where's Monika Sobieski?”

  “She’s being held at the place where Roth stages his fights,” Silk answered immediately. “If she's still alive.”

  “First we have to confirm our theory. Then we have to get in, find and rescue her.”

  “And we can do that all in the same place.”

  Radford looked from Trent to Silk, not smiling. “Yeah, I know what you mean, guys. I know where were going. No need to look at me like that.”

  Trent stopped and studied the lightening skies. “Best give Toni a call, Dan. We should jump on this as fast as we can.”

  “Don’t let Toni hear you say that. I’d be gone for days.”

  21

  Trent hated to do it, but cancelled their reservation at the Mandalay Bay. They wouldn’t be returning there for a while. They drove away without looking back, headed for downtown Vegas, and started to think about all the items they might need.

  “Weapons. Ammo. Zip ties.” Silk thought about his areas of expertise. “Rope. Lock-picking kit. ID’s.”

  “That last one is me,” Radford said. “Plus splicing equipment. Hi-res monitors. Recording equipment. Hacking software, custom of course. Special ID’s. Modified feed detector.”

  Trent called Doug.

  “We’re heading down to Dallas,” he said. “The investigation is at a standstill. We’re left with a theory, but it’s a good one.”

  He talked the Trout through their hypothesis.

  “Well, I certainly won’t be repeating any of that to Anna if she calls.” Doug sighed. “Will you be needing the cavalry?”

  “Queue them up.” Trent pulled into the near empty lot of a Radio Shack so Radford could pick up a few parts. “If this goes all the way – we’ll be fighting for our lives and will need every one of them.”

  “All the way?”

  “It’ll be one of our best finesses ever, Doug. You’ll be proud.”

  “Just make it back in one piece. That’ll make me prouder.”

  “With Monika.”

  “Yeah, with Monika.”

  Radford came out of the Radio Shack carrying two massive bags and sporting a big grin. Silk grunted at him. “Friggin’ geek.”

  Trent wound up his call. “One more thing, Doug. Any other news?”

  “All dried up on the western front. Nothing new there, I’m afraid.”

  “Trees may need shaking.”

  “We’ll discuss it when you get back.”

  Trent felt like he was being given the brush off. “Everything okay, Doug?”

  “All good. Now stop speculating. From my end this thing runs deeper than the Mariana Trench and higher than God. Give me some freakin’ slack.”

  Trent ended the call and sat back in his chair. It was unlike Doug to let anything get under his skin. It was unlike Doug even to show negative emotion. Trent turned to the other two. “It’s ultra-important that we fly this one firmly under the radar. Now more so than ever. If mountains are starting to tumble up in Washington, our
faces plastered across CNN are the last things anyone needs to see.”

  He started the new SUV they had rented, and set off on the long trip to Texas. As they drove, Radford booted up a laptop and used a roaming modem to go online and investigate the completed half of Roth Construction’s vast building site.

  “Two potentials,” he said. “Both for rent.”

  “Can you put an offer in online?” Trent asked.

  “No. They’re recommended to be 'viewed by appointment'. Probably want to weed out the riff-raff, like Silk here.”

  “We’ll make the appointment when they open.” Trent said. “And outfit us with some solid ID’s for this one, Dan. Foolproof.”

  “Nuts. I already had Hathaway, Crowe and Butler earmarked for this one. Big job, big stars. It’s a superstitious thing. You see?”

  “They’re all movie stars?” Trent asked with suspicion. “I never heard of them.”

  “That’s because you don’t watch movies, Aaron. I’d be surprised to hear you even own a TV.”

  “Sure I own a TV.”

  Radford eyed him in the mirror. “Is it Smart? Is it 4K, Ultra HD?”

  “Sure it is.”

  “Bullshit.”

  “This whole thing Roth’s into,” Silk suddenly said. “Must be locked down tighter’n Langley. He’s under surveillance by the FBI.”

  “So was Blanka Davic,” Trent said without thought. “And look what he did to us all.”

  Silence descended. Trent drove. Nevada passed into Arizona. The sudden noise of Trent’s cell phone ringing jolted them all.

  He answered immediately, expecting Doug and not checking the caller ID. “Yes?”

  “Is this Aaron Trent?” A woman’s voice, silky but with a hard edge asked.

  Trent frowned. “Who is this?” The caller ID was blank.

  “This is Claire Collins.”

  Trent’s mouth froze in a wide 'O'. He had forgotten about the FBI nutbuster. When he caught Silk’s and Radford’s gaze in the mirror, their eyes were almost comically wide with surprise.