"Where's the red file?" Mark Morgan wants to know, but even if Robert Desmond had known where it was hidden he would not have answered the question. "I am talking to you! Answer my question damn it!" Morgan shouts annoyed. Two of Morgan's men are holding Robert between them while Morgan punches Robert in the stomach and then strike Robert in his face.
He spits in Morgan's face and the gang Leader looses his temper and rushes forward. Robert uses the two men holding his arms as anchor points and shifts his weight to them lifting both his feet from the ground and Mark Morgan runs into Robert's feet, which kicks him in the crutch.
It happens so suddenly that Robert have got time to kick Morgan who jack knives full in the face, sending him sprawling on the ground where Morgan crawls on hands and feet like a wounded animal.
In the moment of confusion, he can feel the adrenalin pumping through his body and he lifts the two thugs that are holding him from their feet and bangs their heads together with all his strength and they fall like axed tree trunks on top of Morgan who is still on the ground.
When some of the other thugs in the room rush at Robert, Peppy Da Silva shouts: "Leave him for me!" Da Silva aims Robert's Walter PPK at Robert and a bullet grazes at Robert's arm. "The next one will hit you in the head!" Da Silva shouts and Robert is forced to stop in his tracts and he turns around to face Morgan who is on his feet by now.
"I do like a man that shows some spirit," Morgan says. "I really would to have that file back." "And I would like to have my family and fiancé back," Robert growls angrily at Morgan. "I can always shoot you in the knee caps to inspire you to talk to me. Do not make me use desperate measures on you mister Desmond," the thug says with a dangerous look in his eyes.
"Morgan you have no right to abduct me. What did you do to Michelle, to make her deliver me to you?" Morgan retorts: "I will ask the questions here. Now where is the file. My patience is running out. I want a answer now."
Robert answers: "A person doesn't always get what he wants. If I had that file I would have given some copies of it to my lawyer and to some friends to protect myself of the likes of you mister Morgan." "That's just a chance that I will have to take," Morgan says and continues: "I have got a surprise for you."
While Mark Morgan walks up and down in the room puffing away at a cigar, one of his hands closes around a whip. Robert is stripped from all of his clothes, but his under pants and tied
down facing down wards on the frame of a iron bed. Morgan lashes out with the whip and soon Robert's back is a mess of blood, broken skin and blue and red marks.
At first they thought that he would sing like a bird, but after four hours of torment nothing but screams of pain came over his lips. The only thing that keeps Robert to his wits is the growing hatred that he feels towards them.
Robert entertains no hatred, fury or anger towards Michelle, but he is disappointed in her. That imploring look in her eyes and the real tears and especially the fact that she shot at Morgan’s men was enough to convince Robert that she was somehow forced to betray his whereabouts to Morgan. Along with every burning lash of the whip, in Robert's mind he again sees the pain and fear in her eyes. But why?
Mark Morgan is at his wit's end and he realizes, that he never will get an answer from Robert by force. The only reactions that he got from Robert so far were screams of pain, disgust and sarcastic laughter.
Morgan's words make no impression on Robert and it is to Morgan, as if Robert doesn't hear him and later as if Robert doesn't feel the pain anymore. The whip is thrown with anger into the corner and Morgan slams the room's door shut behind him.
An idea strikes Morgan and he orders his men to let no stone unturned in order to find Michelle. Immediately Mark Morgan notices the worry on Robert's face and suddenly Morgan knows that Robert will talk if Michelle is tormented before his very eyes.
To Mark Morgan's displeasure his men aren't able to find as much as a trace of Michelle. She has disappeared inexplicably, as if from the face of the earth.
*************************************************
It is two o'clock in the morning when Mike is woken by the insistent ringing of the telephone. The man at the other end of the receiver speaks only two words, but it is enough to prompt Mike to action.
"Michelle's missing." Mike dresses in hurry and the car that the agency has assigned to him, leaves the parkade with screaming tires. When he enters at the security checkpoint at his "agency" an operative is already waiting for him. "The boss wants to see you," he says and Mike notices that the other agent had not slept for quite some time.
The secretary that is usually at her post is nowhere to be seen and the two men enter a spacious office, where a bald headed middle aged man waits for them. "Take a seat" he invites and his blue grey eyes focuses on Mike. "You did a good job of that Erica woman, but then you always do good work." Compliments are scarce with this man and Mike waits in anticipation.
"I know that you are assigned to find the black man, but that can wait. I usually do not summon my agents when a family member needs help, but this is different and you have got the ability to distinguish between your duty and your personal life. By now you have been informed that Michelle is missing," the man, says and the light glows on top of his head.
"What happened? Why isn't her controlling agent handling the emergency?" Mike's eyes meet that of the man on the other side of the desk and then the man answers: "He can't. His dead.” It catches Mike by surprise. "What happened?" He wants to know and the worry is written all over his face. "Alexi is back. He killed the control and he may have got to Michelle as well. The Police found the body of her son in a warehouse." "Is Eric dead?" Robert asks and his eyes turn to a dangerous grey colour.
"You must have read about the Desmond's been killed in the newspapers?" The man that entered the room along with Mike wants to know. "Yes, but some local criminal must have been responsible for that."
The older man answers once more. "Alexi had been using one of the local gang networks for some time. The red roses that went along with the murders were his signatures. He always leaves roses with his victims or for some reason waits till they are in the possession of red roses. Most of the time he doesn't do the killing himself and is now using gangsters to do his dirty work."
"What does he want from the Desmond's?" Mike wants to know. "For some or other reason he is convinced that Robert Desmond is in possession of a red file which exposes the gangsters and most probably their KGB partners. Michelle was working in conjunction with the Police and the Police in turn was using Desmond to lead them to the file, but then Michelle's child disappears, she didn’t inform the police or us. She disappears and Desmond disappears and if I know Alexi he has found the file. Get him and the file."
"With whom at the Police was Michelle working?" Mike wants to know. "A Lieutenant Carr. The man knows what he is about." The younger man answers. "With which crime network is Alexis working and does anybody know where Alexi is now?" Mike asks frowning. "The Police will fill you in on the details about the criminals and as for Alexi, he is like a fox running from hiding place to hiding place."
*************************************************
Alexi enters the room and he is worried. He killed Jenkins himself and now Morgan isn't able to find the red file. "There is something odd about the number that Jenkins used to contact James Desmond with before he died." The man says to Morgan.
He has got Morgan's undivided attention. "What do you mean Alexi?" Morgan wants to know. "You and your men are not doing your work properly and now I have got to safe your skins. Jenkins had written a number on a piece of paper that I found in his hand when I made sure that he was dead, but it doesn't correspond with any of the numbers that are listed for the Desmond's. I think that they have got a house, or something somewhere else."
"You're absolutely right Alexi." Morgan remarks. He knows that the Police had searched all of the Desmond's properties in the city as well as Tracey Smith's apartment and that they did not find any leads to the red file. It doesn't take Morgan long to trace the farmstead, that Robert and Michelle now owns in the Suikerbosrand near Heidelberg.
*************************************************
By five o'clock the next morning they are on the road. Three Cressida's eat up the N3 national road from Johannesburg to Heidelberg. The leading car stops at a farm gate, which is closed with a lock, and chain and the other cars come to a halt in a cloud of dust behind it.
"Let's stretch our legs," Morgan says where he is sitting next to the driver in the front car. Robert is pulled unceremoniously out of the car and some of Morgan's thugs get out of the other cars while two of them searches for a bolt cutter in the trunk of one of the cars.
In South Africa today security plays a vital part in any business or private home. This book and the volumes to follow, will guide you step by step through the essential precautionary measures to be taken in protecting your family and valuables. From employing security guards, evacuation of your site and security measures to burglar bars and alarms in your private home.
a Book compiled by me from experience gained after 10 years in the security industry as Industrial relations officer with Nosa qualifications, 1st Aid, fire protection and also S.O.B. grade A.
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