Preface

A new year had begun for the three of us adults in the palazzo and for the thirteen beautiful young ladies who had been deported by a greedy billionaire to this remote valley in the Peruvian Andes. The huge palace, surrounded by a wonderfully landscaped garden and a protective fence that was almost insurmountable for strangers, was not particularly suitable for permanent, comfortable living, but it did offer its inhabitants security, protection, and a certain amount of luxury on the first floor. Upstairs there were more than thirty rooms for simple living and the care of small children.

Sketch of the palace and garden

Our house and the large garden were a wonderful gift to our small community and helped us to overcome many worries and hardships. We even had a swimming pool, a pond with koi and several places for sports.

After a few months and brief arguments with some villagers, we had started growing vegetables and potatoes ourselves within the secure palace garden. This meant that we were no longer directly dependent on the Indios and the supply of food, at least for a certain period of time.

Overview of the ground floor in the ‘Palace of Rus’

The ground floor was originally intended for parties and larger gatherings. The client wanted to use it for secret meetings with friends and trusted associates. The construction plan was later changed when it became clear that the planned villa for the billionaire would not be built in time. Rus was under time pressure and was wanted in several countries. As a result, he had to do without his own luxury home, and instead of the planned suites for paying guests, he had living and working quarters built into the main house. The original plans called for six soundproof rooms where well-heeled clients could indulge their criminal desires for minors. Some of the girls smuggled into the country were originally intended for this purpose.

On the upper floor, simple living quarters were set up for the girls. As Rus also wanted to produce offspring, there were six rooms for child care, each equipped with a cot and changing table.

Not only did the palace have an almost impregnable fence and a multi-secured gate, but it also had a radio station, unfortunately out of order, armouries, and lounges for the guards on the roof. His concern for persecution or attack by his enemies was evident everywhere. We even found Stinger Missiles for Air defence.

In the basement there were secret rooms with a cinema, torture rooms, and a dungeon. I hated to think what might have happened to the girls there if Rus had not been killed. We had found the chained bodies of the foreman and the architect in the dungeon. Either the secret construction plans were not supposed to leave the valley, or the investor simply wanted to avoid paying for the services of the construction experts.

The local Indios in the nearby village were the few survivors of a massive earthquake in 2011 that completely collapsed the high-yield silver mine. The mine was closed and the valley sold to ‘Rus’. Most of the families or surviving relatives of the victims had moved to other towns, but two families and twelve widows, who had lost not only their husbands but also some of their sons in the disaster, continued to use the otherwise empty huts and over the years had built up a considerable agricultural business and well-organised livestock farming for their own use.

During the construction of the Palazzo, they had greatly increased their agricultural production, supplying the construction workers with fresh fruit and vegetables, meat, eggs, potatoes, maize, and cereals. In return, the farmers received what they needed from the site management.

Valley of the Mountain Lions - front part with palace

Super-rich investor Aleksej W. Boguruskij, known as ‘Rus’, wanted to build a top-secret hideaway here in the valley. He has been wanted worldwide since 2015. Trials against him and his accomplices for extremely high levels of tax evasion and serious fraud had been in preparation in Kiev and Moscow since 2016. Whether they began after his death was unclear, but very likely. He was also under investigation for arms trafficking, child abuse, and child pornography. Criminal proceedings were being prepared in other countries, as we had learned from various documents.

Only we in the valley knew that the wanted criminal was no longer among the living. On the planned day of his transfer to the valley, he and his security guards had died as their helicopter approached the valley. We in the valley had no communication with the outside world. There was no telephone or internet connection and the only road was impassable. The bridge over the Tiso, a gentle mountain river that can become a raging torrent in the rainy season, had been blown up on the billionaire’s orders to make his hideout virtually inaccessible.