CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Theo hung up and turned the car towards Dublin again. As he drove, information about pimps, brothels, gangland figures and tattoo parlors was downloading to his phone.
Less than an hour later he was at St. James Gate. The smell of the hops being brewed from the Guinness factory filled his nostrils and made him think of old times. Minutes later he was at St. James's hospital. He went straight to the intensive care and found that there was no-one guarding the ward. Zero police presence.
Good old Ireland, he thought, at least the recession has some advantages. No Gardai to explain myself to or get in the way of my questions.
For all his respect for the Gardai he also knew that local police were never really of any use in an international investigation. Except for logistics. Maybe. But this young detective Melinda Casey might prove an exception to the rule. Or perhaps she was not that young. He hadn't met her yet. Although his first impulse was to go to Darklow and shake the small town criminal community into information about a beautiful 19 year old girl with a foreign accent who had been forced into the local sex trade, Melinda's information somehow made him believe that he should stay on course, that all these things were related. Solve the first crime and it would lead him to the girl he was looking for. It could not be a co-incidence. He needed to find Sammy the Shark/Gino Ngata first and the only living connection he had right now were the surviving victims of last night's attack which Melinda had described to him in disturbing detail. They had survived a skin attack. This was rare.
"Excuse me." He asked a pretty nurse. "I am looking for the room where the two assault victims are recovering." He showed her his Europol ID and she smiled, a beautiful smile. When Irish girls were pretty they really were pretty. He had studied for a year in Trinity College when he was a young man and still remembered the beautiful young women he had known then. And one in particular who he had fallen for but never found a way to convince to be his. In fact, although even then he already had the easy confidence with women that made them fall for him today, still this girl had made him feel so vulnerable, so stripped bare of pretence that he had never been able to speak to her. He had always met her in company and just missed engaging, somehow, for the whole 9 months of his study term. Just once he had directly approached her, but he had crashed and burned as her pale green eyes watched him and waited to be charmed.
The nurse brought him to the intensive care unit and smiled again as he went in. She was pretty, but obviously this wasn't the time or place and it was a long time, several months now that he and Mirielle had unofficially committed to each other after years of stormy open relationship.
"Who are you?" One of the men asked him.
"You must be Peadar Crony?" Theo said. The other man, Michael Nulty had been badly sliced and peeled and was in no condition to talk, even if he hadn't been unconscious.
Peadar looked frightened.
Theo showed him his Europol badge.
"Did you get that in the pound shop?" He asked. Theo returned the badge to his pocket. "I don't have anything to say to you or to anybody else."
Theo sat down and then offered a cigarette.
"Those things aren't allowed in here you clown," Peadar said, "This is the Intensive Care Unit in case you hadn't noticed."
"Do you want one or not?" Theo held up the packet of Karelia Slims.
Peadar was a heavy smoker and desperately needed a cigarette.
"Go on then." He said.
Theo put the cigarette to his mouth and lit it for him.
"I still have nothing to say." The cigarette wobbled up and down on his lips. Theo watched for a while, allowing the hungry smoker take just a few long, grateful inhalations before stubbing the cigarette out.
"Thanks for that man."
"How are you doing?"
"How does it look like I'm doing?"
"It looks to me like you are afraid to even close your eyes.."
"So would you be bud, so would you. This shit was seriously, seriously fucked up and I'm not even joking."
"Let me introduce myself properly. My name is Theo Petrakis, and like the badge says, I am a Europol investigator."
"I don't want anything more to do with this shit. I just want to go home and forget this ever happened."
"Maybe one day you can Peadar, I really hope you can, but for the moment you have to accept that this is real and that you are in it and that you will have to do something to get yourself out. Do you even know why they did this to you and Michael?"
"Do you know why?"
"Tell me about the tattoos you lost and maybe then I can help you."
The terrified man remained stubbornly silent.
"Do you have children Peadar?"
"Boy and a girl."
"May I ask how old?"
"My young lad is 18 and the girl is 16."
"You are a lucky man."
"I know it. Even more now."
"I'm sure you do and I'm sure your family does as well. Let me tell you Peadar, I specialize in what they call the international skin-trade. Do you know what that means?"
"Prostitutes? Pimps? That kind of thing?"
"Yes. Prostitutes, pimps and that kind of thing. Sexual slavery. Child pornography. The sale of human body parts, particularly human skin. Skin that has been tattooed."
Peadar glanced down to his bandaged arms.
"That's right. And did you know that the average age of a prostitute abducted into the sex trade is 16? The same age as your daughter."
"Look, I know what you're at Theo, but Jesus Christ man, I'm just scared shitless, you know? I don't want any trouble for me and my family."
"I know it Peadar. And I'm not trying to scare you any more than you already are, but I am telling you that this is not the end of the story for you. No matter how much you want it to be."
"Look, just go away now will you? I don’t need this. Not now...." He struggled weakly with the tangled tubes that bound him to the bed.
"It can end here, but you will have to let me help you. Trust me, the people who injured you will not think twice to take your children. They liked your tattoos. Does your son have tattoos? Is he good looking? You know the sex trade isn't just for girls anymore Some clients they also are demanding boys. Sometimes they like the boy to already be marked, but not always. Sometimes they will put the mark themselves, just like your sheep farmer's here in Ireland."
"Stop. Just fucking stop it. OK?"
Theo looked to the ground. Waited. He hated to have to do this. It was one part of his job he did not enjoy. Intimidating crime victims into speaking up for themselves and for others. But in this case it was imperative. The man's family could easily be at risk. He himself could be at risk. He had seen worse cases where traders had very specific orders to fulfill and would come back for more, either from a surviving victim, which was rare, or from their genetically comparable family, much more common, if they still needed more parts. Something about Gino's story made him particularly uneasy. There was a smell of psychosis. And then there was his niece, Elissa. If Gino had information then Theo would find him, one way or the other, with or without Europol to back him up.
"But why did they attack us? Michael and me? Two old guys like us." Peadar said.
"What kind of tattoos did you have?"
"Me and Michael are mates going back years. We had all sorts of tats, especially Michael, that's why he's so messed up. Jesus, they carved him up like a piece of meat, but they wouldn't let him scream. Or me either. They stuffed our mouths, held us while they tore strips off us. This orange shit was going everywhere. I thought it was some kind of chemical but the doc said it was the fat from under our skin. I thought I was hard but Jesus I've never felt anything like this. Michael just went out after a while, but I couldn't. They took his Yants off him, mine too. Only those. We went on holidays to Thailand, just last year, to get the real things, proper Yants, done the hard way by Buddhist monks. They were painful, but worth it. At least I thought so until this happened. What are those sickos going to do with them?"
"Sell them. Maybe. Or maybe not. Maybe this was a punishment. Could that be? Or maybe your Buddhist monk, he was a good one, with a good eye. Many buyers, they like this style. Then some guys, they just hate to see good art on people they consider to be ordinary. They might think that someone like you and Michael, just two good, honest, hard-working guys haven't earned this color the way they have. Maybe they had to kill a friend in order to earn what you are wearing like an ornament. Or perhaps they have been asked to rape someone. A person they know or are related to."
"Jesus Christ. I've heard of some things, but...." Peadar Crony shivered with disgust.
"You are both still alive so I think this was a warning to you. Probably they also make some money too if the art is good. But listen to me Peadar, there is no-one going to help you here in this country except for me. Your Gardai are a brave group of men and women but they know very little about this. Skin-trade is not usual here. I am very sad to hear of this in Ireland, I love your country and I hate to see this disgusting trade spread to somewhere new. You have to tell me everything you can."
Peadar lowered his head but looked furtively at the sharply dressed Theo.
"Can I have another one of them funny cigarettes?" He said.