The Northern Cross (A Baltic Sea Crime Novel Book 2)

by Hendrik Falkenberg

  She had decided to seek out nature that night rather than attend New Way’s meeting. Although she appreciated all the group had done for her, she had little desire to go through another evening of condolences. She wanted to be alone, especially since it promised to be a full moon. An ancient oak stood in the middle of the clearing, with a small stream flowing nearby. Whenever she visited this spot, Antje Kramer felt she could grasp the mysteries of Celtic culture as the magic of nature invaded every fiber of her being.

  This was partly due to the spell the place cast on her and partly to the small mushrooms she brought. When the moon was high enough to illuminate the tree and the glistening stream, she got out the camping stove. She took a large cup of water from the creek, threw in a couple of vegetable bouillon cubes, and placed the mixture over the flame. Then she added the dried mushrooms. While the concoction simmered, she walked over to the mighty oak and placed her hands on the cracked bark.

  She had often addressed the Celtic mother goddess Danu in this clearing. Danu was her favorite figure in Celtic mythology, in whose honor midsummer bonfires were still lit. Her thoughts turned to her brother and tears welled in her eyes as images of their childhood flashed before her. That night she wouldn’t call upon the ancient goddess of the Celts, but instead implore Donn. According to tradition, he was the Celtic god who guided the souls of the dead to the so-called Otherworld. It was the last thing she could do for her brother.

  She returned to the small gas burner and lifted the tin pot. She sniffed the rising steam and sat down with her back against the oak’s trunk. She grimaced as she swallowed her first sip of the mushroom soup. Apparently, she hadn’t added enough bouillon, because the bitter taste of the mushrooms was stronger than ever. Bit by bit, she emptied the pot and turned her head to the side to rest her cheek on the trunk. She sat there for a while, listening to the gentle gurgle of the stream and waiting for the mushrooms to take effect.

  After twenty minutes, a feeling of warmth came over her, and her perception sharpened. She rose to fetch the small sacrificial bowl and candles. She stumbled slightly and shook her head. Had she eaten too much? The onset seemed faster and the effect stronger than usual. Breathing heavily, she steadied herself against the trunk and fought back the dizziness and nausea. After a few minutes, the symptoms subsided, and she was overcome by a relaxed, warm feeling. She breathed in relief and prepared her offering. Soon after, she thought she saw Donn standing before her, but she hadn’t anticipated that he would reach out to touch her. The process inside of her had already begun.

  CHAPTER 12

  With the start of the new week came a ferocious storm of wind and pelting rain. First responders were clearing roads, pumping flooded basements, and caring for the injured. There was a great deal of frantic activity at the police station.

  Hannes watched the raging storm through the conference-room window. He had a vague feeling that the darkness of the overcast day had dulled his senses.

  David Bach had still not been found. After the foiled attack, there was increased concern that more people were in danger. Federsen sat at the head of the conference table.

  “What’s the point of letting you train every morning if you can’t even keep up with a forklift driver?”

  “If it weren’t for that stupid cat, he wouldn’t have had a chance.”

  “At least now we know Bach has it out for New Way,” Marcel said. “It’s a good thing you went to the meeting. Even if you ended up getting that nasty cut on your cheek.”

  “We already knew from his ex that he had it out for New Way,” Federsen said.

  “But now it’s clear he’s targeting the entire group,” Isabelle said.

  “Do we know that for sure?” Clarissa asked. “Maybe he was only going to attack Ms. Köhler. And we also don’t know if he’s the one behind the graffiti and destroyed sculpture.”

  “He was hanging around there, so he’s clearly suspicious,” Federsen said.

  “We ran the getaway car’s tags,” Marcel said. “The car’s in his name, and we’ve put out an APB. Teams are posted in front of his apartment building as well as the factory where he works. He was supposed to be back working the forklift today, but he hasn’t shown up.”

  “Well, no wonder in this weather. The radio was advising people to stay at home.”

  “But he hasn’t,” Per said. Like Isabelle and Hannes, he was in his early thirties, though he had a pronounced receding hairline. “I’m sure his fellow believers have told him we’re looking for him. We’ve paid them quite a few visits already. He’s in hiding. He doesn’t care about the weather.”

  “Nor do I,” said Federsen. “And you shouldn’t care about it either, because you and Niehaus are driving over to see Antje Kramer now.”

  “True, we still need to ask her why she lied to us about the dealer.”

  “That too. But the real reason is to check on her. Mr. Beck from New Way called. He’s worried because he hasn’t seen or heard from her in days.”

  “She probably just wants to be alone and skipped the Friday meeting,” said Per.

  “The meeting, perhaps, but not her brother’s funeral,” Hannes said with some worry. “The funeral was on Saturday morning. It’s odd she didn’t show up.”

  “Especially since she was involved in the preparations,” Federsen said. “Mr. Beck last saw her in her workshop on Tuesday. They discussed how and when the funeral should take place. Since then, she hasn’t been at home or answered her phone.”

  There were many obstacles on the road. Several underpasses were blocked off due to flooding, forcing Hannes and Per to take numerous detours. Hannes strained to see through the windshield, since the wipers barely made a difference.

  “Maybe we should have called Ms. Kramer rather than put ourselves in danger,” Per said.

  “I tried. She’s not answering.”

  “Why are we heading to her workshop? There’s no way she’d drive to work in this weather.”

  “She works on the ground floor and lives in the loft above. Anyway, we’re already here.”

  He turned off the engine and looked at Per, who was not a handsome man. In the dim light, his acne scars seemed more pronounced.

  “Ready?” asked Hannes. Per nodded.

  They jumped out into the raging weather and ran through the rain. Every time their feet hit the ground, water splashed to their waists. The high winds nearly knocked them over, and within seconds they were soaked.

  “Let’s hope we don’t catch the flu again,” Per said when they finally made it under the awning.

  “Don’t tempt fate.” Hannes pounded the glass, but there was no movement inside. “She’s not down here. Let’s go around. The entrance to her apartment’s over here.”

  Unlike the door to the workshop, the door to Antje Kramer’s apartment had a bell, which Hannes repeatedly pushed. Still no response.

  “She couldn’t have gone on vacation, not before her brother’s buried,” said Hannes, his concern growing.

  “Maybe that’s why she left. Maybe she thought she was too unstable to attend. She could be staying with a friend for a while.”

  Hannes shook his head. “Of course she’s mourning the loss of her brother. But she wasn’t one to wallow. She seemed to be holding up pretty well.” He took a few steps back and looked up at a small gable window. The rain dripped into his eyes, and a shiver ran down his spine. “Look up there. There’s a light.”

  “It’s probably just a nightlight.”

  “That’s enough for me.” Hannes walked back toward the workshop. He picked up a stone and weighed it in his hand.

  “What are you doing?” Per asked. Then Hannes smashed the glass in the door.

  “There’s no way we can break down the door to her apartment. It’s massive.” Hannes slipped his arm through the window, careful to avoid the shards of broken glass, and unlocked the door from the inside. “Maybe we can access the apartment from in here.”

  “We could have called a locks
mith,” Per said.

  Hannes flicked on the light. The place looked significantly more cluttered than on his last visit. In the back, half-hidden by a large shelving rack, was a wooden door that opened easily.

  “What smells so funny in here?” Per sniffed. “Reminds me of . . . of . . .”

  “A public restroom,” Hannes said and hurried down a short hallway. He opened another door, but it led to a small kitchen. “She’s not down here. Let’s look upstairs.”

  With each step up the creaky staircase, the smell grew more and more intense—a mixture of excrement and vomit. By the time they had reached the second floor, they were only breathing through their mouths. Two doors led from the landing, and when they opened the first, the stench overwhelmed them. It was the bathroom, and it looked as foul as it smelled.

  “That’s what I call a gastrointestinal bug,” Per said.

  “I’ve had bugs too, but my bathroom never looked this bad.” Hannes opened the second door. It led into a living room where the repulsive smell was almost as strong.

  “Something’s not right here,” Hannes said and pinched his nose. There were pools of bodily fluid on the parquet floor. “It must lead to the bedroom.”

  They bounded across the living room, dodging the residue on the floor. Hannes shouted for Ms. Kramer and banged on the last remaining door. When no answer came, he pushed the door open and gasped as he looked inside.

  Ms. Kramer was by no means a sight for sore eyes.

  Meanwhile, Isabelle, Clarissa, and Marcel were dealing with Federsen. He waited until the rest of the team had taken their seats and said, “There’s been an interesting development: Matthias Böhm was arrested an hour ago.”

  “Why?” asked Isabelle.

  “Tax evasion. He’s awaiting arraignment.”

  “That’s pretty serious,” said Marcel.

  “What’s serious is that we had no idea he was under investigation. That’s some shitty communication on our part,” said Federsen. “All the text messages on Matthias Böhm’s cell phone have been deleted, but they found his wife’s phone when they executed the search warrant for his house—the phone he claimed not to have found. There were a number of texts from him on that phone. Mostly insults and threats. He also railed against Alexander Kramer.”

  “Well, this is quite the turn,” said Clarissa. “Do we have printouts of the messages?”

  “Of course,” Federsen said and waved two sheets of paper. He tossed them into the middle of the table, and everyone huddled to read them.

  Clarissa frowned. “The messages aren’t nice, but they’re not death threats either. The closest to one is this: If you go through with this abortion, you’ll pay for it in this life and the next. But he could also just mean that in religious terms.”

  “At the very least, it does seem he knew about her relationship with Kramer,” Marcel said. “Go ahead. Sleep with him for all I care. Can’t fool me anymore.”

  “Mrs. Böhm responded to almost none of these,” Isabelle said. “It’s as if she were already through with her husband.”

  “How was he evading taxes?” asked Marcel.

  “I don’t know the specifics,” Federsen said. “It seems our colleagues don’t like to share.”

  “At least we have cause for suspicion,” Marcel said. “He can only provide an alibi for the time of his wife’s murder. He was at home around the time of the crucifixion, and the only other person who could vouch for him was his wife. So it might be worthwhile if we coordinated with our colleagues.”

  Federsen said, “We’ll get more info soon. Either way, he seems to have been having a hard time financially.”

  “Now would be a convenient time to sell the horse farm,” said Isabelle. “But Mrs. Böhm would have been against that. And his financial problems would have only gotten worse if they had gotten divorced.”

  “And from his point of view, his wife wasn’t the only one to blame for the impending divorce. How soon can we interrogate Mr. Böhm?” Marcel asked, excited.

  “He’s all yours in an hour,” Federsen said and leaned back in his chair.

  Hannes looked in alarm at Per, who stared at the chaos in the small bedroom. Next to the bed was a nightstand and a rocking chair. A floor lamp lay on the ground, weakly shining. The bright wool carpet was covered in stains. Several garments were scattered on the floor. The bedspread was smeared with dirt. Antje Kramer was huddled, naked, on the formerly white bedsheets, her face turned to the wall.

  “Ms. Kramer.” Hannes approached the bed. “It’s Detective Johannes Niehaus. Are you okay?”

  No reply. He walked over to the edge of the bed and bent over the motionless woman. He tried to turn her on her back, but her body was too tense. Her expression seemed pained, her eyes closed. She felt ice cold.

  “Call an ambulance.” Per was already one step ahead, dictating the address to the dispatcher. “I think she’s dead,” Hannes whispered as he searched for a pulse. Was that a faint beat? He placed a hand over her mouth; he could feel breathing. “She’s still alive. But her pulse is barely detectable.”

  Per hung up. It was unclear what might have put Ms. Kramer in this state. Given the severity of the symptoms, a stomach bug seemed unlikely.

  Per checked her mouth for vomit. “Her mouth’s clear,” he said. “Let’s try to roll her on her back.”

  “Do you think that’s a good idea? We don’t know why she’s lying here all curled up. She seems to be in a lot of pain.”

  “She doesn’t feel the pain; she’s unconscious. But I guess it’s possible we might make things worse if we move her.”

  Hannes heard the rapidly approaching sirens. Relieved, he took a step back. It was only then that he realized how sick he felt.

  “Can you go down and get the paramedics?” he asked in a weak voice before vomiting on the carpet.

  The paramedics suspected poisoning and rushed Ms. Kramer to the emergency room. The diagnosis was acute renal failure. Judging by the look on the doctor’s face, Ms. Kramer’s chances of survival were extremely poor, and it was still unclear what had triggered the renal failure. The doctor listed a number of possible causes, but none of them stood out. On the other hand, when the physician’s assistant suggested that such symptoms could have been caused by poisoned mushrooms, Hannes perked up. He remembered Daniel Novak stating that Antje Kramer had often purchased hallucinogenic mushrooms from him.

  He and Per raced once more through the storm to Ms. Kramer’s loft, which they then tore upside down. When they searched downstairs in the workshop, they found remnants of what looked to be mushrooms. They also discovered a small tabletop convection oven in which Ms. Kramer had apparently dried her psychedelic mushrooms. Hannes placed the remnants in a plastic bag and brought them to the hospital for testing. The results were pending.

  Meanwhile, Clarissa and Marcel hauled Daniel Novak in for questioning. He was adamant that the goods he sold were pure. Since he was unwilling to name his supplier, Marcel had him locked up in an attempt to make him talk. Searching the dealer’s apartment was a disappointment. Only minor amounts of marijuana were seized; evidently, the man stored the majority of his goods elsewhere. The interrogation of Matthias Böhm was likewise unsuccessful, since he refused to talk. After a few minutes, the detectives reluctantly led him back to his holding cell.

  “What are you thinking about?” Anna asked and furrowed her brow as she smiled at Hannes. She had returned the previous weekend from her months-long trip to Southeast Asia. It was their first time seeing each other since their awkward good-bye at the airport. The kiss hello she had given him on the cheek had been relatively innocent in comparison to the kiss they had shared when she left. This only reinforced Hannes’s belief that Anna had left the country at the worst possible time. Everything was back to square one.

  “Um, I had a bad day at work. Sorry if I’m not totally with it right now. Why don’t you tell me more stories from the other side of the world? It’ll be a good distraction. So, what about t
his Hindu monastery in Gung Kavi?”

  “It’s Gunung Kawi,” Anna said and laughed. “It’s an amazing temple cut into rock. You can only reach it from this small wood-carvers’ village, which alone is worth the trip.”

  As she described how peaceful and quiet it was, Hannes gazed at her face. Though her tanned skin made them difficult to see, the Asian sun had multiplied the freckles on her cheeks. Her light-green eyes glowed. Hannes was a little jealous—the trip sounded really fun.

  His eyes lingered for a moment on the little dimple in her chin, and her engaging smile enchanted him just as it had the first time they had met. Nevertheless, he sensed some distance. He hoped he was only imagining it. His life in comparison to her stories seemed boring. After all, he had never ventured too far from Germany. Anna, on the other hand, had spent a whole year backpacking around the world before she worked at the pharmaceutical company and had seen all the continents except Antarctica. She had hundreds of amazing stories, while he didn’t have much to show for his life.

  Anna had suggested that they meet at Chameleon, the bar where they had met up for the first time a few months back. At the time, the purpose of their meeting had been completely different. Anna had worked as the assistant for a pharmaceutical-company executive whose murder Hannes had been investigating. It quickly became apparent that there was some sort of spark between them.

  “So tell me how you’ve been over the last three months,” Anna said. “You make it seem like it’s a secret. And what happened to your cheek?” She gently ran her finger along the cut. Her touch felt electric.

  “Um, I had an unfortunate run-in with a crowbar last Friday,” he said as he struggled not to blush after her touch. “I was chasing a suspect.”

  “And you claim nothing happened while I was gone.” Anna’s eyes widened. “I hope you repaid the favor?”