The Alex King Series, A BATEMAN [good books for high schoolers .TXT] 📗

the form of the proof of life. A copy of Le Monde - the leading French newspaper - with the date and front-page story of radicalised asylum seekers. The photo had been taken a week ago.

That meant she was alive, or at least, had been for a whole three weeks after she had been taken.

4

 

One week later

Biarritz, France

 

The second envelope had contained photographs of somebody else. He was a forty-year-old Russian named Pyotr Sergeyev. He was a wealthy man, yet nobody knew his net worth. His business interests ranged from construction, road haulage and nightclubs, through to people trafficking, drug dealing and murder. Sergeyev owned brothels all over Europe, where many young Muslim asylum seekers had ended up working off their passage. They would work there until they were too old for the punters, too worn and abused to appeal with their looks. And then they would simply disappear.

Pyotr Sergeyev had started out as a strong-arm for the early founder of one of the arms of the Russian mafia. His boss had been ex-KGB and when the wall had fallen, the satellite countries broken free and the Soviet Empire collapsed; KGB agents knew where the accounts were, the weapons, the disenfranchised young men with little future ahead of them. The money, contracts and opportunities were there for the taking and many men were catapulted into billionaire status, their sons free to stroll around Mayfair and buy football clubs on a whim.

When the fragile balance of power teetered, Sergeyev had been in the right place at the right time, with a gun in his hand. He had killed his boss, the man’s wife, their two young sons and the man’s closest aides. He had killed the man’s elderly father, his brother, the man’s wife and their daughter. He had thrown down a challenge to the men around him, and they had fallen in behind him. Each of them undoubtedly terrified by Sergeyev’s ruthlessness. Because when someone crossed the young Russian, their family paid the price as well.

That had been ten years ago, and Sergeyev’s power and influence had still not been successfully challenged. There had been attempts, but all had failed. The Russian mafia boss had either killed or put these would-be assassin’s families into prostitution. He spared nobody, spoke loudly of what fate these people had suffered. He had kept two of his challengers alive long enough to see the extent of his retribution.

King looked at the photograph one last time, then put it back in the envelope, along with the dossier on Sergeyev and placed the envelope in the glovebox. He checked himself in the rear-view mirror. He had scrubbed up well enough. A close shave, a brush through his damp hair with his fingers. It was good enough. He had chosen a crisp white shirt to go with the dark blue suit that he had bought in one of the town’s boutique shops, though went with the shirt left open and without a tie. It was a smart look, enough for the casino, and as smart as he had been in years.

King watched the silver Mercedes S65 saloon stop outside the casino. Sergeyev’s security had already arrived in a garishly spec’d Range Rover Sport. Both bodyguards were brick outhouses. Twenty-stone a piece and well over six foot. They saw a lot of gym time. Both struggled to look comfortable in their suits and King could see unsightly mounds above their right hips. Both men carried large handguns in holsters and were obviously right-handed.

King wasn’t armed. He thought it prudent not to test the casino’s security. Sergeyev would have already bribed the house security to allow his own security such blatant disregard of France’s firearms laws. He envisioned a great deal of money spent, both on the tables and on the bar tab, and imagined that the casino’s security would be of no consequence if the Russian decided to merely do as he pleased under their roof. He noted that any action within the casino would not be his best approach.

The security was indeed laughable, because King was both swept with an electric metal detector wand and given a quick pat-down as he entered the foyer. Sergeyev and his two bodyguards had breezed straight through and were now in the bar. One of the guards was fetching chips, the other was clicking his fingers at a waitress while Sergeyev looked bored and impatient. King noted that the waitress left a table in the middle of placing an order to take the Russian’s bar order.

The table, which was made up of two couples, looked outraged. One of the men got up and strode over, interrupting the order. He was irate and focused as much on the bodyguard as the waitress as he vented. King admired the man’s tenacity, for the bodyguard was twice the man’s width, but he stayed back and watched to see how it would play out. Inevitably, the bodyguard gave the man a shove, which was something akin to watching someone get it very wrong at the Running of the Bulls in Pamplona. The man travelled a good distance before hitting the mosaic floor with a slap that made King wince from his vantage point. He knew enough about fights to know that the man wasn’t going dancing tonight, or perhaps for the rest of his holiday.

As the man lay still on the floor, his companions getting out of their seats to assist him, there were two things that could happen now, and King watched to see which would follow. Either the maître d'hôtel would be bringing out chilled champagne and a few hundred euros in complimentary chips for the table, or the house security would be taking the two couples outside before they had time to complain and cause a scene.

It was the latter. King watched as both the women and two men were roughly handled out