‘Any traffic convictions?’ asked Stoyan with his handsome Tatar grin. Everyone laughed, including Buslenko. A little laughter in the face of enemies like these couldn’t do any harm.
‘Molokov is the only member of Vitrenko’s senior management we’ve been able to identify. He has his own team within the organisation and that’s Vitrenko’s first and only weakness: Molokov’s security isn’t a patch on Vitrenko’s. It was a hasty marriage of convenience… Basically Molokov was made an offer he couldn’t refuse by Vitrenko. Molokov’s activities were encroaching on Vitrenko’s, so Vitrenko intercepted several consignments of Molokov’s and set fire to the container lorries.’
‘What was the cargo?’ asked Olga Sarapenko.
‘It was a people-smuggling operation…’
‘Fuck,’ said Belotserkovsky. ‘ That was Vitrenko? The thing on the Polish border?’
‘I thought it was an accident,’ said Olga.
‘That was the version put out for the media,’ said Buslenko. ‘A few kilometres further on and it would have been the Polish police investigating and the whole thing would have come out. It was kept quiet to buy us time to track Vitrenko.’
‘So Molokov got the message?’ asked Belotserkovsky
‘He handed control over to Vitrenko – grudgingly – but was left in charge of the people-smuggling operation. The main difference is that he has no competition any more. He works for Vitrenko and if any smaller-scale operation starts up, Vitrenko ends it.’
‘So why is this a black mission?’ asked Stoyan. ‘Ukrainian criminals, Ukrainian police and security. Ukrainian victims.’
‘It’s a black operation for two reasons. Firstly, our mission is to intercept Vitrenko with maximum prejudice. We’re not coming back with a prisoner. The second reason is, as I said at the start, that we are operating outside Ukraine.’
‘Specifically?’ asked Olga.
‘Specifically the Federal Republic of Germany.’
There was an outburst of expletives. ‘Germany?’ said Belotserkovsky. ‘I’ve never been to Germany. My grandfather went there, though. Nineteen forty-four… with the Red Army. I think I may have German cousins.’
More laughter to defuse the tension.
Buslenko went through all the intelligence they had on Vitrenko and his operation. Buslenko told his team that Vitrenko was believed to have his base in Cologne, and still controlled much of the vice in Hamburg. The scope of his operation was vast, covering everything from luxury car rings to protection to electronic fraud. Buslenko wound up the briefing by laying out a map of Cologne marked with the three properties from which they would run their operation; a second map highlighted known Vitrenko-controlled operations. He then handed each member of the team a folder containing their individual mission objectives and responsibilities.
‘By the way, Vitrenko would kill you for the information you now have in your hands. He is desperate to find out how much has leaked to us from the Molokov side of his organisation and from other sources. He is on a traitor hunt.’
‘Is this everything we have on him?’ asked Olga Sarapenko. She was sitting by the lodge’s window and the light accentuated the blue of her eyes. When Sasha had recommended that she be brought on board Buslenko had seen the value, but now he found increasingly that her beauty distracted him.
‘That’s everything we’ve been given,’ he said abruptly. ‘The Germans have more information. A lot more, probably, but they are reluctant to share it with us. Like most Westerners they believe “Ukrainian” is synonymous with “crooked”. They’re worried about leaks.’
‘You can’t entirely blame them,’ said Olga. ‘We could have nailed Vitrenko in Kiev if Peotr Samolyuk hadn’t sold us out.’
Buslenko nodded, but he still found it difficult to believe that the Spetsnaz officer had betrayed them for money.
‘Before we wind this up,’ he said, ‘there are two wild cards in the pack that you should know about. They’re not likely to be an issue, but it’s best that you’re aware of them.’ He clicked the mouse. ‘This is Senior Criminal Commissar Maria Klee of the Polizei Hamburg… and this…’ he clicked the mouse again, ‘is her boss, Principal Chief Commissar Jan Fabel, chief of the Hamburg murder squad. These two are the only people to have come close to nailing Vitrenko. The price they paid included Vitrenko using Klee as a delaying tactic, leaving her with a near-fatal wound that Fabel had to deal with. And Vitrenko left two dead cops behind him.’
‘But you don’t think they’re still after Vitrenko?’ asked Olga Sarapenko.
‘The price you pay for coming close to Vitrenko is high,’ Buslenko said, closing the lid of his laptop. ‘Jan Fabel has quit the police and Maria Klee is a basket case.’
8.
As he entered the kitchen, Benni Scholz paused to dip a spoon into one of the large pots on the huge brushed-aluminium cooker range. It was a split-pea soup that was still warm despite the hobs being switched off. A number of other pans had been knocked over, their contents splashed against the wall and across the floor where they mingled with other splashes – of blood. Scholz sipped the soup.
‘Are you deliberately trying to contaminate this crime scene, Senior Commissar?’ An attractive young woman in a forensics coverall scowled up at him from where she knelt in the centre of the kitchen floor.
‘I’ve told you many times before, Frau Schilling.’ Scholz’s dark eyes twinkled mischievously. ‘Any time you want to collect a DNA sample from me for elimination, I’d be more than pleased to supply one. But I think we should have dinner first. This place any good?’
‘I have a feeling they’ll be closed tonight,’ the forensics chief said flatly and unsmiling, turning her attention again to the mass of lacerated flesh on the floor before her. ‘In the meantime, please don’t touch anything else.’
Three other forensics technicians were working in the kitchen, each on a different area. There were also two other Criminal Police detectives from Scholz’s department: Kris, the young Criminal Police Commissar who had accompanied Scholz to the scene and Tansu, a young Turkish-German officer. The junior detectives lingered uncertainly at the doorway that led from the main salon of the restaurant to the kitchen. Both looked decidedly unwell, particularly Kris. Scholz scanned the kitchen. Everywhere there were signs of violence. The spilled pots. Blood smeared on the door frame. A stool upset. Pools of blood on the floor. The epicentre of the violence was the lump of meat that Simone Schilling now examined. It was also the cause of the nauseated look on the face of Kris Feilke.
‘What’s the story?’ Scholz asked.
‘Ukrainian,’ Kris said at last. ‘A kitchen worker. More than likely an illegal. There were three other staff in the kitchen at the time. Two Ukrainians and a Somalian. The Ukrainians won’t say a word… scared shitless. But the Somalian said that three masked men came in and started shouting at the victim. Not in German, so I’m guessing they were Ukrainian too. Specially as the two Ukrainian kitchen staff have been struck dumb. One of the masked men picked up a meat cleaver
…’ Impossibly, the young detective’s pale complexion paled further. ‘Anyway, he did that to him.’
Scholz moved over towards the body. Simone Schilling stopped his progress with another cute scowl.
‘I suppose it’s too early to ascertain a cause of death?’ Scholz grinned. It was difficult to see the features of the figure on the floor. One side of the face gaped open where the meat cleaver had sliced cleanly through skin, muscle, sinew and bone. Similarly, a straight-edged flap of flesh had separated from the upper arm, just below the cuff of his T-shirt. The cleaver’s sharp edge had made the wounds unnaturally rectilinear. Scholz reckoned there were at least a dozen slashes on the body. ‘But I’m guessing it wasn’t a gunshot.’ Scholz laughed at his witticism. Simone Schilling didn’t. She stood up.
‘You’ll get a full report from the pathologist. Herr Dr Ludeke will be carrying out the autopsy.’
‘He’s got his work cut out for him…’ said
Scholz and laughed, alone, at his joke.
Simone Schilling cast her eyes around the floor, where her team had tent-flagged various bloody smears. ‘His attackers certainly didn’t care about leaving evidence. We’ve got half a dozen bootprints in the blood. Clear patterns.’ She looked at Scholz with disdain. ‘Mind you, half of them are probably yours by now.’
Scholz looked at the body again. Four or five of the slashes on the forearms. Palm split open, exposing bone. Defensive wounds.
‘Do we have a name?’ He called to the two detectives by the door.
‘Slavko Dmytruk,’ said Kris. ‘Or that’s the name the restaurant have for him. The owners reckon he’s about twenty-three or -four.’
‘Are you okay?’ asked Scholz.
‘Never been good with this side of the job…’
‘What’s not to be good with?’ Scholz nodded to the corpse. ‘That’s not a person any more. It’s nothing but meat. Whoever Slavko Dmytruk was, whatever made him who he was, has got nothing to do with what’s left here. You’ve got to get past that. If you don’t, you’ll walk into a murder scene and find some little kiddie dead and you’ll go to pieces. It’ll be your last day on the job.’
Kris was looking at the partially dismembered corpse and did not look at all convinced.
‘Have you had anything to eat?’ asked Scholz. ‘It’s always worse if you’ve got an empty stomach.’ He turned and dipped a ladle into the still-warm soup. He held it out to the young detective. ‘Try some of this… it’s really good. Split pea…’
Kris turned suddenly and bolted out into the restaurant, in the direction of the toilets. Tansu Bakrac scowled disapprovingly at her boss. When Scholz turned back to Simone Schilling, she was staring at him in disbelief.
‘What?’ he said defensively, the ladle still extended. ‘I was trying to help him feel better…’
‘Not everyone is as insensitive to human suffering as you, Herr Scholz.’
‘Call me Benni.’
‘Okay. You can call me Frau Doctor Schilling.’ She nodded in the direction of the departed detective. ‘Shouldn’t you check that he’s okay?’
‘He’ll be fine. If not, he’s in the wrong job. Anyway, I’m not insensitive to human suffering. I feel for the victim. Horrible death. But I don’t lose my lunch every time I look at a stiff. Like I said, they’re not people any more. Just meat. No one knows that better than you.’
‘You’re right,’ said Simone Schilling. ‘A corpse isn’t a person to me. It’s a store of evidence. But it took years to become accustomed to it. Now I look at them professionally, not emotionally. But you… you’re just an insensitive pig.’
Scholz smiled. He liked it when she insulted him. ‘I’m not insensitive. Just practical.’
The young detective reappeared.
‘You okay, Kris?’ asked Scholz. He turned to Simone Schilling. ‘See? Sensitive.’
‘I’m fine,’ said Kris. But he still looked pale.
‘Right, then tell me about what happened here. Were you able to get any more out of the Somalian or the restaurant owners?’
‘Not a lot,’ said Tansu. ‘The Somalian was being very helpful but then he suddenly dried up. I reckon the two Ukrainians told him who they thought the hatchet men were. Probably Ukrainian Mafia. Anyway, the three of them have been taken into custody by Immigration. The restaurant owners aren’t too chatty either. Immigration is all over them as well.’
‘So the answer’s nothing?’ Scholz asked impatiently.
‘Not completely,’ Kris said. ‘Before the Somalian shut up, he said that there had been a woman around talking to Dmytruk. Tall, thin, expensively dressed. He got the impression she was Immigration. Or police.’
9.
Maria woke at six a.m. and listened to the sounds of the city sluggishly stirring in the dark winter Tuesday morning. She hadn’t eaten since her binge on Sunday evening and her gut ached from having been force-fed and then forcibly emptied. She still felt chilled. But something had changed.
She placed herself in another place and another time. Maria never fully understood why she did this. So much of her recent past had been devoted to trying to put what had happened behind her. But she did this regularly: lay in the dark and imagined herself back in the field that night near Cuxhaven.
Until that night they felt they had been pursuing a ghost. The team had succeeded in cornering Vitrenko and a couple of his key henchmen. Vitrenko had escaped by throwing himself through a window and into the night. Maria had been in the field with two local Cuxhaven officers. Spread out. Vitrenko had probably not even broken step as he had sliced open the first officer’s throat. Maria remembered Fabel screaming warnings to her down his radio. She had seen nothing. Heard nothing. But Vasyl Vitrenko had been brought up since boyhood to be a soldier of stealth. There had been a sound behind her and she had spun around but still had seen nothing. Then Vitrenko had suddenly loomed up from the long grass less than a metre away from her. She had swung her gun round but he had caught her hand with insolent ease and held her wrist in a crushing grip. It had been then that she felt him punch her in the solar plexus. But when she looked down she realised that he hadn’t punched her. The handle of a broad-bladed ritual knife had jutted from her body, just below her ribcage. She had looked into Vitrenko’s face. Into his cold, glittering, too-bright green eyes. He had smiled. Then he was gone.
The night had been cloudless and she had lain gazing at the stars. The pain had subsided, although she was aware of the knife as an alien object in her body. She had found she could only breathe in rapid, shallow gasps and had felt that terrible, gradual chill fill her being. It had seemed an eternity before she heard Fabel’s voice calling her name. It could only have been a couple of minutes, but to Maria it had seemed so long that she had actually begun to wonder if she was dead: if this was what death was like, your final moment stretched out infinitely. But then Fabel had been there, bending over her, touching her, talking to her. He had been her link to the living. Fabel her boss. Fabel the father of his team.
But Fabel was not here now, in Cologne. And anyway, he was giving up his career as a policeman. Maria knew that she would never go back to duty. She would resign too. Or she would die here. It was not a thought that troubled her too much. Maria knew that Vitrenko had really already killed her, three years ago in that field. All he would be doing now would be to exorcise Maria’s tortured ghost from the world. Maybe it would have been better if Fabel hadn’t found her. Death would have been better than the hell she’d endured.
And then there had been Frank. Maria knew it was as close to love as she could have come. He had helped her through the worst times. He had been gentle, loving, kind. He had been a killer.
A car passing along the street outside the hotel sounded its horn and temporarily brought her back to the present and Cologne. Maria thought of Frank and wept. Not just for him, but for herself. He had been her last chance for salvation.
Maria felt empty and aching and old. But there was something else. The idea. The idea had been there, fully formed in her mind as soon as she woke up. And with it came a strength and sense of purpose she thought she had lost for ever.
Maria showered, changed and tore the page she needed from the telephone directory. She was about to go straight out, again skipping breakfast, but she checked herself. She went into the dining room and forced herself to eat some muesli and fruit. The breakfast and the coffee she drunk seemed to fuel her instantly. And this time there would be no trip to the toilets to void her gut. She headed purposefully out of the hotel. There had been a light fall of snow during the night that had turned into a mucky grey slush. She left the car and walked into the city centre. She found the hairdresser’s first. Maria’s hair was never particularly long and she usually spent a small fortune on expensive Hamburg stylists. This salon was the standard sort of place with a limited range of styles and an even more limited range of skills. A girl who looked as if she should have still been at school shampooed
Maria’s hair and asked her what she wanted done. Maria took a photograph from her handbag.
‘That,’ she said. ‘I want to look like that.’
‘You sure?’ asked the hairdresser. ‘Your hair has a lovely natural colour. Most of my customers would kill for hair your shade of blonde. They keep asking me but I never manage it, of course.’
‘Can you manage that?’ asked Maria.
The hairdresser shrugged and handed back the photograph of Maria and her friend and colleague Anna Wolff. ‘Easy. If you’re sure that’s what you want…’
An hour and a half later, Maria was out on the street again. Despite the cold she didn’t put her hat back on. The chill air nipped at her newly exposed ears and every now and then she would stop and look at her reflection in a shop window. Her hair was now a very dark brown, not quite as dark as Anna’s and not quite as spiky-short, but it changed her appearance considerably.
The cosmetics assistant in the department store on Hohe Strasse was a little puzzled as to why her customer seemed so unsure about what went with her colouring, but a few minutes later Maria, who had always been conservative with her make-up, had a bag full of strong colours in eyeshadow, blusher and lipstick. The next store she went to, she described exactly the make-up she had just bought and claimed that she’d been wearing those shades for years and she wanted something completely different.
Before she found the next shop, she had to stop a couple of times to take the page she had torn from the telephone directory from her pocket and check the address against her street plan of Cologne. It was about lunchtime and, although her belly felt swollen to her from her unaccustomed breakfasting, she had a light lunch of soup and bread in the restaurant across the street. Maria now felt totally bloated and imagined her stomach distended, but she fought back the urge to make herself sick. It was all part of the plan.
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