Blade

 

“I found the girl they were looking for,” I told Senior in the boardroom we used for meetings. I stood in front of the round table, and he sat in his leather chair across from me, leaning back.

 

He looked down his nose at me. “Good,” he said in an oddly comfortable tone. “Did you handle the situation?”

 

“I’ve started on it. I found out who set her up, and I think he’s aiming for me, or at least for Maggie,” I explained. Standing in front of Senior like this, I became very aware of the words I was using and the information I was giving him.

 

“How are you mixed up with a sex slavery ring?” Senior asked me.

 

“I’ve got eyes and ears all over the city, Senior. You know that. Occasionally, I find out about girls who have been caught up in them, and I take them to our safehouses when I find them. That’s what I did today,” I lied. Well, it wasn’t a complete lie. I did pull her out and take her to a safehouse.

 

“I better not find out that your work for Vlad involves anything like that,” he warned me.

 

“No, sir, it’s just security detail,” I explained, using an oversimplification of my job description.

 

“Now, you said you think this person is after you or Maggie. That’s the girl you brought back with you this morning, right?”

 

“Right.”

 

“And the official story is you picked her up at a club, but we both know you were working security for Vlad last night.” He cocked an eyebrow.

 

“Yeah, he went out last night, and I acted as his bodyguard while he was at the club. That’s when I saw her getting harassed by a couple of guys, so I stepped in. Come to find out, they took her purse and all, so I’m stuck with her until I can get her somewhere safe.” I shouldn’t have been lying to my president. In all the time I’d been working for Vlad, I had never had to lie about it outright. I just conveniently failed to mention exactly what I did for him.

 

“I’m still confused. How does all of this tie into the girl from earlier and the cops coming to the clubhouse to find her?”

 

“The guy causing all this trouble is Maggie’s ex. He was behind everything that happened to her last night, and I think he knows she’s with me now, so he’s trying to start shit. The girl from earlier is underage, and her brother did try to sell her into sex trafficking. She wound up with someone who has ties to Vlad. When that happened, Maggie’s ex, who happens to be Axel Walker, called the cops to tip them off that the girl was here.”

 

“Axel Walker?” Senior asked.

 

“Yeah, Axel.”

 

“He’s been gunning after us for a while.”

 

“He’s been gunning after everyone, and with this latest scheme, he could take a lot of people down.”

 

“Sounds pretty complicated. You can’t keep Maggie here if she’s going to cause this kind of trouble,” Senior reminded me.

 

“Yeah, I know. I’m thinking about dropping her off at one of the safehouses, but there’s something I need to do first,” I told him.

 

“Do what you need to do to get to the bottom of it. Let me know if you need someone to help you clean this up, Blade,” he said ominously.

 

“Will do.”

 

As I stepped out of the meeting room and pulled the door closed behind me, I couldn’t help but think he was trying to warn me. It was as if he’d been trying to tell me that there were dire consequences ahead if I didn’t go ahead and nip this situation in the bud. I felt like talking to him at all had turned out to be a mistake. Was there a chance he was onto me?

 

I slipped out the back door of the clubhouse. Standing in the lot behind the building, I fished out my phone and scrolled through my contacts. I didn’t want to call Vlad directly because I didn’t want to alarm him, but I couldn’t think of anyone else who would know what I needed to find out. I figured I’d try Alexander first. There was a chance he knew.

 

“Hello, this is Alexander,” the little man said in a Russian accent when he answered the phone.

 

“Alexander, it’s Blade. I need some information,” I told him.

 

“Oh, you,” he said, as if he’d been dreading my call.

 

“Yeah, me.”

 

“What do you want, Blade?” He spat each word out like it was poison.

 

“I picked up a girl from the auction last night. She wasn’t on any of the paperwork. We didn’t have proper information on her. You might remember her,” I suggested.

 

“Yeah, the one who was causing all that racket. What about her?” he asked.

 

“Where are her personal effects?” I asked.

 

“All of that stuff gets burned up. We can’t have that laying around, advertising that the girls were there. You know this. Why do you ask such stupid questions, Blade?”

 

“I was wondering what all she had on her. I was actually hoping to find an ID or something,” I told him.

 

“I don’t know. If we didn’t have any information on her in our papers, she probably didn’t have her ID on her,” he explained.

 

“What happens to their personal effects or the paperwork?” I asked.

 

“We’ve got a guy who incinerates it for us. He has a crematorium where he dumps our stuff and burns the shit out of it.” He started laughing. It was a hard, cool laugh. “I’ve heard him say that some of our garbage has wound up in people’s ashes. Talk about disposing of the evidence, huh?”

 

“Yeah, real funny. Can you send me his information, Alexander?”

 

“Sure. I guess it’s only been one day, so there’s a chance he hasn’t burned up everything from last night yet. What happened with the underage girl?”

 

“She’s been removed from the situation, and I’m working on tracking down the people who brought her in. Tell Vlad to watch his back. Someone is trying to set him up. You too, Alexander. I’d hate to see anything happen to you two. But don’t worry too much. I’m on it.”

 

“Excellent. I’m sending the information to you about our incinerator. Keep in touch, Blade.” Then he hung up.

 

I received a text giving me the guy’s name, the name of his funeral home, and the location of his crematorium. He was a few miles out of town, where he could work mostly unsupervised. I hurried to my bike and peeled out of the MC’s parking lot.

 

I had to find anything I could that would help me identify who brought in Maggie and Anthea. If there were any personal belongings that we still had, I wanted to get those back to the girls. I felt like they deserved it.

 

I pulled up to the funeral home about thirty minutes later. It looked like any other funeral home. The building was a cross between a church and a bank, featuring a carport that resembled the drive-thru lanes for window tellers as well as signs that resembled those that would be found outside of churches, including similar script.

 

Merrick Funerary Services and Crematorium was the name of the place, and I was looking for a William Merrick, the owner. I roared into the parking lot on my motorcycle. The place was deserted except for a four-door Volvo and a shiny white Silverado.

 

I walked in the front door and was greeted by a woman in a conservative black skirt and white blouse.

 

“Welcome to Merrick Services,” she said in that usual morbidly chipper tone that was intended to be comforting, but just came across as creepy.

 

“Yeah, I’m actually here to see Mr. Merrick,” I told her.

 

“I’m not sure if he’s available right now,” she said.

 

“Could you check, please? Tell him Alexander sent me. I’ll wait.” I took a seat in one of the office chairs in the front room while I waited on William Merrick to show. Somehow, being in a funeral home for a reason other than a funeral felt really strange to me. I felt like I shouldn’t have been there. It was not a place for the living.

 

The lady walked off in a bit of a huff. A moment later, she returned with Merrick in tow.

 

“So sorry to keep you waiting,” he said politely as he approached me with an outstretched hand.

 

“That’s fine. Hey, I’ve got some questions for you about a job,” I said.

 

“Say no more. Walk this way.” He turned and led me past the receptionist’s desk toward the back of his facility.

 

“So, how can I help you, Blade?” he asked as we reached the room where he handled cremations.

 

I tried not to show my shock at being called out. Of course, Alexander had called ahead to tell him I was visiting. “I have some questions about the paperwork and personal effects from last night’s auction,” I answered.

 

“You know, I don’t mind doing this work for Vlad. He certainly pays well. But I always hold on to everything for a couple of days after the auction for just this reason, you know. I’d hate for you guys to need something right after I burn it up. I must say, though, this is the first time anyone has come looking for anything.”

 

He kept walking while he talked until he reached a door with what looked like a storage room behind it. I could see boxes stacked on shelves through the window in the door. He grabbed the handle on the door and opened it, revealing three trash bags sitting just inside the room. Two were black, the other white.

 

“I’ve asked the organizers of the auctions to color code the bags for me. Black is for personal effects. White is for paperwork. Knock yourself out,” he said as he reached for the first bag to drag it out. “Do you need any help?” he asked me.

 

“Nope. I’m fine. If there’s anything else you need to do, I might be here for a little while,” I answered.

 

“No problem. Take your time. Just come find me when you’re finished,” he said.

 

I sat down with the three bags in front of me. I had no idea what I was looking for. I started with the paperwork, searching to see if there were any clues to the identities of the men who had turned Maggie and Anthea over. I already knew Axel was probably behind both of them. He was behind Anthea for sure, but I wasn’t so sure about Maggie. I also needed to see if there were any other loose ends in their cases.

 

When the paperwork didn’t turn up any new leads, I started into the black bags. I was looking for anything the girls could have had on them – purses, wallets, phones, anything at all. I found IDs for a few of the other girls, but there was absolutely zilch in the bags that belonged to either of my girls.

 

I essentially had two girls who could not be positively identified, who had both been dropped off at the auction pretty much at random. One had been dropped off by a man simply identifying himself as her brother. The other had absolutely no paperwork showing she’d even been there. The situation looked worse and worse the more I dug into it.

 

I groaned as I placed the bags back into the storage room and went to find Mr. Merrick again. I thanked him for his time and told him I hadn’t found anything. He apologized and told me he’d go ahead and burn the evidence. We shook hands and I walked back out to the bike.

 

It was time to move Maggie somewhere safe while I went after Axel directly.