Lippmann leaned sharply forward. “That question is way outside the parameters of our arrangement, Detective.”
Maddocks inhaled deeply, allowing for another gap of silence, for pressure to build in the overly warm room. According to the two young johns being charged with Hocking’s strangulation during an erotic asphyxiation act gone awry, it had been Camus who Sabbonnier had called in to clean up and remove the body. Camus had allegedly wrapped Hocking’s naked body in a thick polyethylene tarp, the same kind of tarp Ginny had later been wrapped in. Sabbonnier had then allegedly tasked yacht carpenter and deck hand Spencer Addams to take Hocking’s body out in a boat that night, where he was to dump it at sea. Addams, however, had kept Hocking’s body for his own necrophilic uses for a week before finally throwing her out to sea. She’d washed up in the Gorge, becoming Maddocks’s first call on his new job with MVPD homicide.
Maddocks tried coming in from yet another angle. “Was Spencer Addams, the carpenter, already working aboard the Amanda Rose when you were hired in Marseilles?”
“He was hired shortly after. He worked on the yacht during the Mediterranean seasons and during the following seasons in Victoria, Vancouver, Portland, San Francisco, and the Caribbean.”
“And from where did Sabbonnier procure sex workers for all those ‘seasons’?”
“Some of the sex workers were supplied by local clubs or pimps in the cities where we docked—Sabbonnier has . . . arrangements in various cities. The women would work for the season the yacht was in port. Some would return for several seasons. Of their own volition.”
“But some of the women were held full-time on the ship against their will?”
Silence.
“Okay,” Maddocks said, “let’s get right to the barcoded girls, shall we? There were six young women found aboard the Amanda Rose where it was docked at the Uplands Marina. All of them have barcodes tattooed onto the backs of their necks. All appear underage and foreign. Where do they come from?”
“Prague.”
Maddocks locked his gaze onto Camus. “Just ‘Prague’?”
Her Adam’s apple moved. She moistened her perfectly sculpted lips. “Prague is a staging area. That’s all I know.”
Maddocks doubted it was all she knew, but he could come at it again later when they drilled down in further interrogations with both Camus and Sabbonnier, ideally leveraging one off the other with this new information.
“Is Prague where this so-called ‘merchandise’ was tattooed with barcodes?”
“From what I understand, yes.”
“What do these tattoos denote? Expiry date? Ownership?”
“Ownership. The origin and age of the merchandise. And the date a girl was first put into service. The tattoos have been scanned into a computerized database for tracking. The girls go out for a fee, generally for a period of two years. They can be returned for new ones after that period, if so desired, at additional costs. Madame Vee was testing this new line of . . . merchandise, as she calls it.”
Bile rose up the back of Maddocks’s throat. “And who owns this barcoded merchandise?”
“A Russian organization.”
“What organization?”
“I don’t know. The Russians have fully taken over the sex trade in Prague from the Albanians. They’re supplying the UK market now. And the North and South American markets. That’s all I know.”
“Right. I’m sure that’s all you know. And where did the six barcoded women found aboard the Amanda Rose enter this country?”
“Port of Vancouver. On a container ship out of Korea. Vancouver Hells Angels members and their affiliates who work as longshoremen at the port facilitated their entry.”
Maddocks’s pulse spiked. He kept his face impassive and his body still. “And then, once the ‘merchandise’ had come into port?”
“Then the barcoded girls were taken to a holding house somewhere in BC—I don’t know where. Maybe Vancouver. After that, the six came to us.”
“How long were they at this holding place?”
“I don’t know. Awhile—maybe a month.”
“Why were they held there?”
Camus hesitated. Her lawyer nodded. “They were being . . . conditioned.”
“Which means?”
Swallowing, Camus said, “Fattened up a little, maybe. Brought back to full health while buyers were sought from clubs, that kind of thing.”
“So they suffered in the shipping container. How long were they at sea?”
Lippmann moved in his chair, causing the plastic to squeak. “My client has no more knowledge of the girls’ transportation into the country than she has offered.”
Inhaling deeply, Maddocks said, “So the Vancouver Hells Angels are cooperating with a Russian organized crime ring based out of Europe?”
“She’s told all that she knows,” Lippmann repeated.
“Or all that she will?”
“I reiterate,” Lippmann said, “we have a prior legal agreement as to what shall be revealed.” He paused, dark eyes lasering Maddocks’s. “At this stage.”
Machiavellian opportunist, thought Maddocks, steadfastly returning the lawyer’s gaze. Lippmann was keeping cards to play later at the expense of six abused and terrified underage women. “What about the girls’ passports?” Maddocks said, continuing to push at the boundaries of their arrangement. “We found documents for the six barcoded girls on board the Amanda Rose—three Israeli passports, two Estonian, and one Latvian. These girls are not Israeli, Estonian, or Latvian.” In truth the MVPD had no idea what nationality the six girls were, but Maddocks was winging it. “We’ve also had these passports examined by forensic document experts—they’re forged.”
Silence.
He leaned forward. “What I’m thinking is that these young women were given passports from these countries because these particular nations—Israel, Estonia, Latvia—are among those that did not require any entry visa to Canada, until the recent changes. Now all they need is an ETA, an electronic travel authorization, which can be obtained online for a couple of dollars. Why is there no record of these passport numbers having entered this country?”
“I don’t know,” Camus said.
“Because they were for future use, weren’t they? For when you and Sabbonnier traveled with the girls aboard the Amanda Rose for all those ‘seasons’ in the ports of different countries?”
Silence.
“Where were the forgeries made?”
“Don’t know.”
“How about you try and guess?”
“Maybe they’re forged in Tel Aviv, by Russians there.”
A hot rush of adrenaline dumped through Maddocks’s blood. Slowly, quietly, he said, “So, we have Russian organized crime in Tel Aviv working in concert with Russian organized crime in Prague to traffic women internationally. And this human trafficking ring is connected to the Hells Angels on a local level?”
Silence. Lippmann was edgy now.