‘Thought we might need this,’ Smit says as he invites Jaap to sit and pours him a cup. Jaap thinks this will go down in station legend.
They take a moment – a few bites and sips, the cup almost scalding against Jaap’s hand – before getting down to it. Jaap takes Smit through what he’s got, unfolding the investigation like a complex piece of origami returning to a flat sheet of paper. Smit listens closely, asks for the odd bit of clarification. Once Jaap’s finished, Smit then takes him through the bits Jaap doesn’t know: how Roemers suspected Haanstra had rigged the drone so it could be operated remotely, then found where the signal was coming from, which led Smit right to the garage, and the confrontation which ended in Haanstra’s death and Tanya’s rescue.
No one in the police, far less Smit, had any idea what was going on, just how time-critical it had all been. They’d had no idea that Haanstra was holding Tanya, using her as a bargaining chip to get Jaap to kill.
‘We got lucky,’ Smit concludes. ‘A few minutes later and things would’ve been different.’
Jaap shakes his head. All this effort, all this energy being used for something so destructive.
‘Also we found this at the scene.’ Smit hauls out an evidence bag with a small plastic spray bottle, half-full of clear liquid.
Jaap takes it. ‘What’s this?’
‘Had the lab test it, just got the result back in. It contains scopolamine dissolved in DMSO.’
‘DMSO?’
‘Dimethyl something-or-other.’ Smit checks a bit of paper. ‘Here we go, dimethyl sulfoxide. According to the lab it’s an incredibly potent solvent; if you dissolve something in it and then put a drop on your skin the DMSO takes it right into your body. From what I’ve read, a few seconds after it hits their skin people get a garlic taste in their mouth, so this stuff works really fast. Haanstra could have got close enough to the women, sprayed a bit on their hand or neck or whatever, and within a matter of seconds the scopolamine’s taken effect. Then all he’d have to do is suggest they go somewhere, and the victim would just do it.’
They carry on, Smit confirming that the addict is now in hospital. Jaap had wrapped the cling film loose enough that she’d still been able to breathe, hoping that the drone wouldn’t be able to transmit that detail back to Haanstra.
Once they’ve been through everything, the sleep Jaap missed overnight starts creeping up on him, trying to embrace him tight. Clearly it shows, as Smit looks at him, concerned.
‘So, time off. I think you and Tanya should take a bit. Go away somewhere maybe.’
‘That an order?’
Smit looks at him, breaks into a smile. ‘If that’s what it takes, then yeah, it is.’
‘OK,’ Jaap says, getting up, everything a struggle, his limbs heavy. ‘And, uh …’
Smit puts his hand up as if to say it was nothing. ‘You’d’ve done the same. Really, there’s no need. I’m just glad as fuck I got there in time to save her.’
The air outside is on the way to steam; Jaap feels smothered by it as soon as he steps out of the station. He takes a few moments, feels how the moist air defines the boundary between him and the world. Then he starts walking back to his houseboat, thinking about what Smit had said, about taking a break, just him and Tanya.
She’s up, at least judging by the mess the kitchen table’s in when he makes it back. But he can’t see her. He calls out, a stab of sharp panic jolting through him.
Her voice answers from the bathroom, telling him she’s just got out of the shower.
He breathes and starts clearing up, allowing his heart to work back down to more healthy levels, and is nearly finished by the time she comes out.
‘How’d it go?’ she asks, clothed but still towelling her hair. He takes her in for a moment, trying to work out if she’s showing yet, if there’s any change in her shape. But he can’t make up his mind.
‘Smit was like a child gloating over a favourite toy,’ Jaap says. ‘I almost felt like saying I’d write it up after all, just to spoil his fun.’
‘I guess we both owe him on this one,’ she says, her head held sideways as she works her hair.
Jaap watches, entranced suddenly by the movement of her hands, her fingers sliding through her red hair, darkened by water, her bruised cheek like an overripe fruit.
‘You’re right,’ he finally says. ‘That’s kind of why I’m letting him run with it. And he’s the one who actually shot and killed Haanstra.’
‘So,’ she says, finishing her hair, ‘everything tie up?’
Jaap shrugs, moves to the kitchen area. He’s suddenly thirsty, desperately so. He pours himself a glass of OJ, knocks it back in one.
‘It all makes sense,’ he says, putting the glass down and wiping his mouth. ‘Sure.’
‘You sound doubtful.’
‘There’s something … not right.’
‘Hey,’ she says, stepping towards him, draping the towel on the sofa, her hair still a touch damp, hanging loose. ‘You need to let it go. Let’s go out somewhere. Somewhere we’ve never been before.’
The machete swings through the air, glinting like a flash of teeth, and takes the top off the green coconut. The man deftly inserts a straw into the hole and hands it to Tanya, repeating the performance for Jaap’s. They pay and carry on walking down Lindengracht, dodging groups of tourists wielding selfie sticks.
‘Isn’t it a bit weird?’ Jaap asks, having taken a few sips.
‘What, the coconuts?’
‘This filming obsession. I don’t get it. It’s like everyone is trying to prove to everyone else how much fun they’re always having by filming it and posting it somewhere. And this thing tastes rancid,’ he says, holding the coconut up, checking that it’s not rotten.
‘This is supposed to be fun,’ she says, elbowing him. ‘Remember?’
They carry on heading east towards the pop-up art fair they’d come to see which had a space at the end of the market. As they pass a bin, Tanya drops her coconut into it. Jaap looks at her.
‘You’re right, it didn’t taste that great.’
They amble through the stalls, stopping at some to admire the artwork, and walking quickly past the more desperate-looking artists with imploring eyes. Once they’ve seen enough they end up in a café on Brouwersgracht, a few round tables clustered on the canal’s edge.
‘OK, what’s up?’ Tanya asks once the waiter has taken their order.
Jaap shakes his head and picks up a paper tube of sugar from a glass in the middle of the table.
‘There’s something not right with the case. I just can’t see what it is.’
He’s pushing the sugar from end to end, feeling the small grains through the paper. Tanya reaches out and stops him.
‘You need to let it go,’ she says. ‘Because, really? I don’t want to be reminded of it constantly. The whole time he had me it felt like I wasn’t scared for myself, but I was for the baby. Like I was somehow failing. I don’t want to keep reliving that, OK?’
Jaap starts to feel guilty. He realizes he’s too wrapped up in the case instead of seeing what’s right in front of him, taking care of Tanya. Because that’s all that matters now, he thinks.
And yet part of him feels a tinge of resentment, as if he’s being thwarted somehow.
He reaches across the table with both hands, clasps her cheeks and leans forward to kiss her. ‘Sorry,’ he says. ‘I’m all yours now.’
Their drinks arrive and they try their best to just enjoy the moment, but Jaap feels the mood has changed. They finish up and carry on walking, Jaap trying to be present, attentive, but Tanya’s gone quiet, any joy they may have felt gone from the day.
As they’re heading back to the houseboat, crossing the bridge at Egelantiersgracht, it hits Jaap, what’s been bothering him.
‘Listen, I know we said we wouldn’t talk about this but—’
‘Jaap—’
‘Please, this is the last time, I promise. Then it’s done.’
She giv
es him a fed-up look, but then nods.
‘When you were there, in the garage, did he call anyone, anyone other than me?’
‘For fuck’s—’
‘This is important.’
‘No, he didn’t, all right?’
A passing couple turn their heads, secretly enjoying the fact that another couple are on the edge of a full-blown domestic in public.
‘He had all this computer equipment set up, but the only person I heard him talking to was you. Happy?’
She starts walking away from him, and he has to race to catch up.
‘At one point he said, “We’ll be watching you,” ’ Jaap says as he reaches her side. ‘Do you remember that?’
She doesn’t say anything, keeps on walking as if he’s a minor annoyance, some insect buzzing round her head.
‘Tanya, please, this could be really important.’
She stops dead and turns to face him. The anger’s gone. Now she just looks exhausted. ‘Kinda. Not really,’ she frowns. ‘You think there was someone else involved?’
‘Haase said Haanstra was filming the killings as a trophy, a way to get him through some past trauma. But that doesn’t make sense to me, he was too controlled. Too in control. Was he making you watch me?’
‘No. But you’re right.’ She looks out across the waters leading to Prinsengracht, as if searching for something. He watches her, and in the moment feels a kind of fear, an inevitability about what she’s going to say. ‘He called someone. He went outside so I couldn’t hear it. But he definitely spoke to someone.’
82
‘… Yeah, missed opportunity, if you hadn’t been so fucking … Yeah, all right. What’s done is done. Just means you’re going to have to sort it out yourself. He’s getting too close, it has to be done today.’
Van der Pol, phone clamped between shoulder and ear, motions Kees into the back of the car he’s sitting in.
‘Yeah, today.’ He listens for a few seconds. ‘I know he’s a cop, you fucktard. What difference does that make? We’ve killed cops before. Just get it done. And you do remember that if I go down you do as well? I’ll make sure it all comes out at trial, how do you think your cop buddies will react when they find out about you?’
He shuts down the call, takes the SIM card out of the phone and puts it in a pocket. Then he removes the battery and puts the phone in another pocket. ‘Let’s move,’ Van der Pol says to Lumberjack as soon as Kees closes the door.
Lumberjack gets them going and Van der Pol starts talking.
‘I got your message,’ he says to Kees without looking at him. ‘You sure he’s dead? I mean I’m not seeing any proof here.’
Kees finds his heart’s pounding. It’s happening so often these days that he’s starting to be able to ignore it. He’s so close to being able to walk away, he just needs to control things a bit longer. And from what he’s just heard, he needs to find out who Van der Pol was talking to, because it sounded an awful lot like Van der Pol was not only talking to a bent cop, he was ordering the death of a straight one.
For a moment part of him awakens, tells him he can’t allow that. Another tells him he’s done, out, he deserves this. It’s not his problem any more. He’s no longer a cop – Smit had told him he’s been kept off the books. And having seen the way he killed Haanstra – ‘executed’ was a word which kept floating round his head in the hours afterwards – Kees believes him.
What he doesn’t get is what Smit really wants. Kees has given him more than enough to take Van der Pol down, but he keeps him on, keeps Kees going even though with each day, each passing minute, the chances of him being found out increase. Smit’s argument has been that he needs to make the case watertight, make sure Van der Pol not only goes away, but never comes back.
But, Kees realizes, he doesn’t care about that any more. The only thing which matters is getting the money for his ID and disappearing. And key to that is getting Van der Pol to pay out.
‘He’s dead. Absolutely,’ Kees replies, trying to keep everything loose, natural.
‘I asked for a photo, didn’t I?’
The car takes a long, slow corner. Kees feels the Gs. The windows are tinted, but in any case he’s not looking out of them. Or if he is he’s not seeing what’s outside.
‘Yeah, you did,’ Kees says. ‘But as soon as I shot him I could hear the police coming. I had to get out of there. Like fast.’
Van der Pol mulls it over, all the while his eyes locked on Kees’ face.
‘I’ve been in this business a long time, y’know?’ Van der Pol says finally. ‘And I’ve done that because one—’ He raises a hand and holds up his first finger ‘—I’m careful. And two—’ He lifts his middle finger ‘—the police aren’t fucking omnipotent beings who just happen to turn up right at the precise moment when someone has to be dealt with.’
Kees shrugs. The movement dislodges a globule of sweat which has been forming in his armpit. It runs down his side with agonizing slowness.
‘I don’t get it either. I think they may have been onto him already. I was lucky and just got there first.’
Van der Pol shakes his head. ‘You sure he’s dead?’
‘He’s dead,’ Kees says. ‘So I’d like to get paid.’
The car slows down, and stops. Silence seeps into the interior as the engine dies. Kees looks out the window, sees they’re in the middle of nowhere. No one around.
‘All right,’ Van der Pol finally says, ‘I’ll get you your money.’ He gets out of the car and motions to Kees to follow him. As Kees steps out of the car Van der Pol’s already opening up the boot. Kees walks round, expecting to see it filled with a plastic sheet, like something from an old mob movie. But there’s a row of sports-kit bags, four at least. Van der Pol’s unzipping one of them, it’s black with the Nike logo picked out in reflective silver. Inside are bundles of notes. Van der Pol reaches for one, his fingers clasping it the exact same moment Kees realizes three things.
The first is that Lumberjack is behind him.
The second is that something hard is just about to obliterate the back of his head.
And the third, as the blow hits and his mind spirals down into darkness, is that he’s totally, royally fucked.
83
Roemers is at his desk, earphones in, moving to an unseen beat, his hands drumming, head nodding rhythmically. Occasionally he reaches out, smashes an imaginary hi-hat.
As he approaches, Jaap thinks of the quote on Sander’s door. He stands for a moment, trying to remember the exact wording, but it doesn’t come.
Roemers sees him, but doesn’t stop, he just swings round in his chair and continues his drumming as if Jaap’s not a human being, but a living drum kit.
‘Don’t want to interrupt anything,’ Jaap says loudly. ‘You’re obviously doing important work.’
Roemers reluctantly does a final flourish, then slips his headphones off, stowing them carefully back in their retail packaging. He’s obviously treated himself to a new pair.
‘You’re like the angel of death,’ Roemers says.
Jaap looks at him as if to say What?’
‘Here, take a look at this.’ Roemers swings round in his chair, works the keyboard and mouse. A window opens on screen. Jaap can see sky. The camera dips and he gets a bird’s-eye view of the quarry as it scans around, hunting its prey. Then it’s moving fast, homing in on the back of a figure he knows to be himself. He sees himself turning.
‘No,’ he says, reaching out and closing the window before the camera catches his face.
‘Seriously, it’s a great watch. Probably one of the scariest things I’ve seen. When you start wrapping that woman’s head up in cling film? I got the shivers. So the question is, would you have gone through with it?’
Jaap had kept the cling film loose so that she’d been able to breathe. He’d whispered his plan in her ear, told her to fight then eventually play dead. But during the night part of his mind had questioned that, questioned if it wasn’t just an
excuse he’d made to make it easier for himself.
He knows it’s going to be one of those things which is always attached to him. He could be ninety and people will still whisper as he goes past, eyes ballooning in shock. So he’s not going to dignify it ever, starting now.
‘You’ve been going through his computer, right?’ Jaap says.
Roemers points to a laptop, hooked up to his desktop with a single short lead. It looks like two computers mating, rise of the machines.
‘I’m pulling apart his hard drive now and …’ He moves the cursor around and opens up a different window with a solid string of numbers and letters. He scrolls down, the symbols blurred.
‘Seeing as you won’t know what this is, I’ll tell you,’ he says after Jaap fails to say anything. ‘This here is a key for secure communication. It’s called PGP and it allows whoever has this sequence to encrypt a message, and only someone else who’s been given the linked key can decrypt it.’
‘Can you break it?’
‘No. The key itself is 4,096 characters long. Even if I hooked up pretty much all the computers in the world and ran them constantly, we’re talking thousands of years to break this code. And I’m not exaggerating.’
Which as far as Jaap’s concerned means Haanstra was communicating with someone else, and it was something he wanted hidden. Otherwise, why go to all the trouble?
‘And there’s more, though again possibly not that helpful. He uploaded several large files over the last few days, big enough to be videos like yours.’
‘Where did he upload them to?’
‘Yeah, that’s the thing. On the darknet somewhere. Gonna be hard to trace. And when I say hard, I really mean next-to-impossible. Also, to make it worse, he deleted the files after uploading. Like proper deleted, not just whacked them in the trash can, y’know?’
‘When were the uploads?’
Roemers taps a few keys, clicks a few more windows into existence and points at a list of times.
Jaap leans in to get a better look.
He doesn’t like what he sees.
There are seven in total. But it’s the last four which draw Jaap’s attention.
Before the Dawn Page 27
