by Val McDermid
Tom gave her a considering look. ‘You know, that might not be such a bad idea.’
‘So I can count on your support when I run it past Maartens?’
He laughed. ‘You’re such a fucking politician, Marijke.’
‘I’ll take that as a yes.’ She got to her feet and retrieved the remains of her breakfast. She had just made it as far as her own desk when Hoofdinspecteur Kees Maartens barrelled through the squad-room door, his meaty hand dwarfing the can of Coke that was halfway to his mouth. He took a swig as he strode, tossing the empty can into the next wastepaper bin he passed. Recycling was for people with time on their hands, not for busy men like him, his gesture seemed to say.
‘What’s new?’ he demanded, stopping beside Tom’s desk.
‘Nothing of any significance,’ Tom said.
Maartens turned towards Marijke. ‘What about you, Marijke? Anything useful come through from forensics yet?’
She shook her head. ‘It’s all negatives. Nothing that takes us any further forward.’
Maartens rubbed a hand along his jaw. ‘I hate this case,’ he muttered. ‘It makes us look stupid.’
‘Marijke’s got a good idea,’ Tom volunteered.
Gee, thanks, she thought as Maartens turned back to her, his heavy brows lowering in an interrogative frown. ‘What’s that, Marijke?’ he asked.
‘I’ve been thinking about how meticulous de Groot’s killer was. How methodical, how organized. This wasn’t a spur of the moment thing. It was planned. What it reminds me of is the work of a serial killer. I know we’re all worried about the prospect of him killing again if we can’t catch him, but it occurred to me that he might have killed before.’
Maartens nodded, his head to one side. He crossed to her desk and dropped into a chair facing her. ‘I can’t argue with the theory,’ he said heavily. ‘But haven’t we already checked to see if there’s anything similar in the records?’
‘We can only check Dutch records, though,’ Marijke said. ‘What if his previous victims weren’t in Holland? What if he’s killed in Belgium or Germany or Luxembourg? We’d have no way of knowing.’
‘And these days, post-Schengen, we’re all citizens of Europe,’ Maartens said acidly. ‘I see what you mean, Marijke. But how does that take us any further forward?’
‘Well, I’ve noticed in the past few months that the bulletins coming out of Den Haag from Europol have been a lot more specific. They used to be fairly generic, but now they’ve taken to circulating much more detailed requests for information about particular areas of concern. I wondered if it might be worth approaching them and asking them to include a request for information about any similar cases elsewhere in the EU?’
Maartens looked deeply sceptical. ‘Don’t you think it’s a bit too near street level for them? They’re only interested in the stuff that lets them play with their fancy computer databases. They don’t want to get their hands dirty with something as vulgar as murder.’
‘But this isn’t some run-of-the-mill killing. And murder can be part of their brief. I checked it out on their website. Where there are international implications, they’ve got a responsibility to act as an intelligence clearing house for murder as well as the organized crime stuff.’
Maartens shifted in his seat. ‘They’ll think we’re too stupid to manage our own cases,’ he grunted.
‘I don’t think so, sir. I reckon they’ll respect us for sussing out that we could be looking at a serial killer. It could be a feather in our caps. We’d go down as the ones who had the brains to see the implications of what we were looking at and the courage to say, “We want input from other jurisdictions.” They’ll be able to hold us up as an example of how cross-border co-operation should work in the new Europe.’ Marijke turned on all her charm as she spoke, desperate to persuade Maartens into the course of action that suited the plans she and Petra had already made.
Maartens considered for a moment, then swung round to look at Tom. ‘And you think this is a good idea, do you?’
Tom waved a hand over the paperwork on his desk. ‘We’ve exhausted every conventional avenue and we’ve got fuck all. The way I see it, we’ve got nothing left to lose. And we might have a lot to gain.’
Maartens shrugged. ‘OK, we’ll give it a shot. Marijke, put something on paper for me, and I’ll see it gets sent off later today.’
‘I’ll have it on your desk within the hour.’
Maartens got to his feet and lumbered towards his office. ‘That doesn’t mean we stop working the case,’ he growled as he disappeared behind his door.
‘Nice one,’ Tom said. ‘Smooth as butter, you are.’
‘Yeah, well. We both know that if it works out, it’ll be down to Maartens. But if we end up looking stupid, it’ll be thanks to me.’
‘It’s good to know that in a changing world, some things always remain the same,’ Tom said with a smile.
And some things we can force to change, Marijke thought cheerfully as she booted up her computer. This was it. The big chance. And she was determined not to blow it.
Carol felt as excited as a teenager on a first date. He’d come to Berlin after all! She’d woken up after her dramatic night at the opera to an encrypted e-mail from Petra, revealing that Tony was staying in the same apartment building and drawing up a profile of the serial killer. And that he was expecting her this morning. But what more could Petra say? She had no idea of the complex matrix that was the relationship between Carol and Tony. She had no idea how much like salvation his arrival would feel to Carol.
Hastily, she towelled herself dry from the shower and pulled on fresh jeans and a loose shirt, the simplest outfit in Caroline Jackson’s wardrobe. She wanted to be as close to Carol Jordan as she could manage. She finger-combed her hair and hastily applied lipstick. No time for more.
Her heart was racing as she waited for the lift. Calm down, she told herself. He’s not here for you. But deep down, she was convinced he was. The murder investigation might be the perfect excuse, but he’d resisted coming back into the game for the past two years. All that had changed was that this was an investigation that offered a chance to bring them together.
She knocked on the door and, suddenly, there he was, his familiar face as dear to her as ever. Impulsively, Carol stepped towards him. Their arms went round each other in a hug, her head on his shoulder, his hand in her hair. ‘Thank you for coming,’ Carol whispered.
Gently, Tony moved out of their embrace and closed the door behind her. ‘I knew Margarethe Schilling,’ he blurted out.
It hit her like a glass of wine in the face, taking her breath away and making her eyes smart. ‘What?’ she said, feeling stupid.
‘Tony ran a hand through his hair. The Bremen victim. I knew her.’
‘So you came out of … what? A desire for vengeance?’ Carol asked, following him and sitting down in the single armchair, taking care to stay well away from the window. Even though she hadn’t spotted a tail, that didn’t mean there wasn’t someone dogging her every move and she didn’t want to reveal herself anywhere she wasn’t supposed to be.
With his back to her, Tony stared out of the picture window into the street below. ‘Partly. Partly because I’m big-headed enough to think I can maybe help to save more lives. And partly because …’ He paused, searching for the right words. ‘Because what happened to Margarethe made me fret about the dangers you’re exposed to.’ He turned to face her, arms folded across his chest. ‘I don’t mean to sound presumptuous. I don’t know anyone who’s better at their job than you. I don’t know anyone who’s more self-sufficient or stronger.’ He looked down at the floor. ‘But I’d never forgive myself if anything happened to you that I might have helped prevent.’ He gave a short bark of laughter. ‘I don’t even know what I mean by that, which is a very strange thing for a psychologist to have to admit. I just… I don’t know. I suppose I wanted to be around in case there was anything I could do to help you.’
His words were more
valuable to Carol than gold. Just when she’d thought he was delivering a slap in the face, he’d turned it into a caress. She’d waited years to hear this level of personal concern from him, and it had been worth every minute. The knowledge that he cared this much was almost enough in itself. It held its own guarantee for some sort of future. It promised the chance to take things at their own pace, without any necessity for her to push. ‘You have no idea how much it means to me that you’re here. Whatever the reason,’ she said. ‘I’ve been feeling so isolated on this job. Petra’s a star, but she’s not part of Carol Jordan’s life. She’s not going to see if I’m slipping away from myself, because she doesn’t really know what that self is. You do. You can be the Carol Jordan benchmark, you can be my sheet anchor. And you can help me decide how to handle Radecki.’
‘I can try. How did it go last night?’
Carol took him through her first encounter with her target. Tony sat on the sofa, chin propped on his fists, listening intently and asking the occasional question along the way. ‘It sounds to me as if you handled it well. I was afraid he’d be so suspicious of your resemblance to Katerina that he’d refuse to have anything to do with you. But you seem to have got over that hurdle.’
‘Maybe. He’s still not called, though.’
‘He will.’
‘Let’s hope so. But we shouldn’t be spending all this time on me. I don’t want to take you away from the work you have to do on your profile. That’s what you’re here for. That’s the most important thing. Because if this bastard isn’t stopped, he’s going to do it again and again. He’s got to be taken down. And if anyone can make that happen, it’s you.’
‘I hope so. I owe this bastard a death. Or at the very least, the rest of his life behind bars.’ Tony shook his head. ‘I still can’t take in the fact that Margarethe’s dead.’
‘Were you old friends?’
‘I wouldn’t really describe it as a friendship. We were colleagues with some common interests. I stayed at her house for a couple of nights once. We talked about collaborating on a paper, but we never got round to it. We e-mailed a few times a year, exchanged cards at Christmas. So, not friends, but more than mere acquaintances. I liked her. I liked her a lot. She was imaginative, intelligent. She was doing good work. And she had a son. She adored him.’ He shook his head. ‘What does that do to a kid’s head? He must be seven, eight, something like that. And he’s going to have to grow up knowing somebody treated his mother like a piece of meat.’
‘Will you let me help?’
Tony looked surprised. ‘Don’t you have enough on your plate?’
‘I’m probably going to have plenty of free time on my hands. When I’m not with Radecki or writing up my reports, I’ve got nothing else to do.’
He frowned, considering. ‘I’m working at Petra’s apartment. Obviously, you can’t come there in case you’re being watched. But if I can talk through my ideas with you, that would be a big help for me. You’re always good at coming up with the off-the-wall idea that nobody else gives house room to.’
‘Great.’ Carol smiled. ‘So when do you start?’
‘I made a start last night.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘Ideally, I should get over to Petra’s now so I can start drafting out some ideas.’
‘Do you want to get together later?’ she asked, rising to her feet.
‘We can e-mail securely, right? Let’s arrange it that way.’ He stood up and crossed to her, tentatively putting his arms round her. ‘I’m glad I’m here.’
‘Me too.’ She turned her face to his. They smiled at each other, then let go. For the first time, Carol thought, it felt as if they had all the time in the world.
23
Tadeusz Radecki was restless. Sleep had eluded him for hours after he’d returned from the opera. The encounter in his private box would have been unsettling under any circumstances, speaking as it did of someone having researched him as thoroughly as he investigated anyone he had dealings with. But beyond the natural discomfort of knowing he’d been studied, this confrontation with so close a simulacrum of what he’d so recently lost had left him feeling that the world had turned upside down.
His first sight of Caroline Jackson had made his heart skip a beat. His chest had constricted, his legs had trembled. He’d doubted the evidence of his eyes, convinced he was having some sort of psychotic episode that had produced this hallucination. But as soon as she’d spoken, he’d realized this was reality, not some pathetic projection of his deepest desire. He’d never have conjured up a Katerina who addressed him in English, that much had penetrated even his bewildered and alarmed state.
Luckily, years of guarding his face and tongue had allowed him to cover the worst of his confusion. At least, he thought it had. Whatever the truth of that view, she had shown no sign of being aware of the effect her appearance had on him. He’d been dry-mouthed and bemused, unnerved by a resemblance that stirred up the morass of memory.
And as if it wasn’t enough that he’d come face to face with a woman who could have been the twin sister of the woman he’d adored, the conversation had lurched into the most dangerous of areas almost from the beginning. This woman who made his stomach churn and his skin turn clammy knew who he really was, knew what he really did. Either she had discovered enough about his business to comprehend exactly what he needed right now, or else this was another example of the eccentric serendipity that had brought Katerina’s double to his door in the first place. Either way, it was a set of circumstances so strange it turned on its head everything he knew about how the world worked.
He had no idea how he’d managed to hold it together during their subsequent conversation, only that he’d never felt so relieved as he had when that apparently interminable first interval had drawn to a close. He’d sat through the next act oblivious to the music, completely absorbed in the private drama that had unfolded in his immediate ambit. The tension in his body had made his muscles ache, but he hadn’t been able to take his eyes off her.
He’d studied every feature in her face, comparing it to the database of images stored in his head. On closer inspection, he had become aware of discrepancies. Of course, the hair was different. The long cornsilk of his lover’s hair was far more beautiful than the short, thick blonde crop of this stranger, though it was clearly as natural a shade as Katerina’s. Their profiles were subtly distinct in ways he couldn’t quite gauge. Katerina’s eyes had been a deep hyacinth blue, but even in the dim light of the theatre, he could see that Caroline’s were grey-blue. Their mouths were different too. Katerina’s lips had been sensuous, full, beautifully shaped, appearing always to be on the point of a kiss. This Englishwoman had thinner lips, her mouth promising far less than Katerina had always delivered. But when Caroline smiled, the contrast had disappeared and the resemblance had become even more profound. Seeing that mouth pronounce the familiar ‘Tadzio’ had disconcerted him more than almost anything else.
The strangest thing about his scrutiny of her face was that although he could see clearly that she wasn’t Katerina, those small variations only served to reinforce this interloper’s effect on him. She wasn’t Katerina, which was both a disappointment and a relief. But she was a woman who had the power to move him as no one had done since Katerina’s death. That was unnerving, but also fraught with strange possibilities. The notion of working with her made him both apprehensive and excited.
But not so excited that he had forgotten the basic rules of the game. As soon as the second act had ended, he had taken the first steps to find out what he could about Caroline Jackson. He remembered a man he’d met a couple of times when he’d been setting up the deal with Colin Osborne. Nick Kramer was another Essex boy who had worked with Colin in the past. He clearly wasn’t a lieutenant in the way that Darko was, and Tadeusz reckoned the main reason Colin had brought him along was to make it look as if the teams were even. Tadeusz, always covering the bases, still had Kramer’s number stored on his mobile phone.
Krame
r had answered on the second ring. ‘Yeah?’ he grunted.
‘This is Colin’s German friend,’ Tadeusz said. ‘We met in London?’
‘Oh yeah, right, I remember you. What’s happening?’
‘I’ve come across someone who says she was a friend of Colin. I wondered if you knew her.’
‘What’s her name?’
‘Caroline Jackson. She says they were looking to do some business.’
There was a short pause. ‘I know the name. But I never met her. I’ve heard she’s in the same line of work as you and Colin. Runs an operation somewhere in East Anglia. Keeps herself to herself, by all accounts. Oh, and I heard that after Colin … died, her name came up when people was questioned. That’s all I know. Sorry I can’t be more help, mate.’
‘Do you know anyone who does know her?’
An exhalation of breath. ‘There’s this geezer out Chelmsford way. A friend of Charlie’s, if you get my meaning?’
A cocaine dealer, Tadeusz translated. ‘Do you have a number where I can contact him?’
‘Hang on a minute …’ The muffled sound of conversation. When Kramer returned, he reeled off a mobile phone number. ‘Tell him I said you were kosher.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Any time. Listen, you want to do some business – not the kind that breathes, the other kind – you gimme a call. I’m well up for it.’
‘I’ll bear that in mind.’ Tadeusz ended the call. He didn’t think he’d be dealing drugs or guns with Nick Kramer any time soon. He hadn’t taken to the man, and on the evidence of this last conversation, he lacked discretion. He keyed in the number Kramer had given him and waited to be connected.
He was on the point of giving up when the phone was answered. A cautious voice said, ‘Hello?’
Tadeusz made a quick decision. ‘My name is Darko Krasic. Nick Kramer gave me your number.’
