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It wasn’t the way I meant it, but Wren knew that.
“Tell me, does he live up to his reputation?” she asked.
“You’d have to ask Iris.”
“There is someone who is ridiculous. Anyway, enough about her. Are we still on for dinner tonight?”
“When I heard your voice, I feared you were begging off.”
“Not a chance, Nem.”
“Bollocks,” I muttered, hearing a knock on my door. “The war god summons.”
“Thewar god? Oh, Iamlooking forward to tonight. Shall we meet at the flat so we can talk freely?”
“Let’s. Toodles,” I said before ending the call.
I stood and unlocked the door but stopped short of opening it. “Enter,” I said before returning to my seat.
“The brief you prepared belies…this.” He waved his hand over my desk before sitting down. “Are you prepared to discuss?”
Of course I was; it was my brief, for Christ’s sake. I stood to return to the conference room. Ares did not. “I’d prefer to see how you operate in your natural habitat.”
I’d reiterate my investigative approach wasn’t his concern, given my brief was proof positive I’d get the job done, but it was pointless. I’d be better served by not allowing him to get a rise out of me.
“Where would you like to begin?” I asked.
“That’s the million-dollar question, isn’t it? But let’s focus on this singular investigation for now.”
In terms of our directive from the UN, he was exactly right. The joint task force’s general mandate lacked a singular desired outcome. Eradicating human trafficking was what it amounted to. With an estimated forty million victims globally, we could throw a dart at a map of the world and begin wherever it landed.
“Tell me about Operation Purfleet.”
I shuddered inwardly. It was one subject I had no desire to speak of ever again, not that I’d be given the option.
* * *
After receivingintel suggesting at least one container of trafficked victims was en route to the port of Purfleet on the River Thames, estimated to arrive the following day, I deployed a surveillance team of five including myself. I’d advised each member to prepare for a raid in the event the information we received was accurate.
At three hundred hours, two lorries arrived at the port’s receiving dock minutes before the ship did. While it was tempting to intercept them as soon as the semitrailer trucks pulled away with the containers, we’d learn far more by tracking them to their destination.
Our wait was short-lived when they both pulled into an industrial complex forty kilometers south.
“Get a reading on the containers’ contents,” I said to Cayman, a member of my team, through the comms.
“Roger that.”
I watched as he exited another vehicle and crept to within fifteen meters of one of the lorries. From that distance, a handheld Doppler device would give us an accurate reading on how many victims were inside the containers.
“I’m not getting anything,” he said several seconds later. “I’ll get closer.” Another several moments passed. “Still nothing. However, I am picking you up.”
That answered the question I was about to ask. The device was operational; it appeared our intel was inaccurate.
“There’s something in the second box. It’s very faint, though,” said Cayman.
“Is it picking up the driver?”
“Negative. It’s in the container itself.”
