After the Silence: Inspector Rykel Book 1 (Amsterdam Quartet)

by Jake Woodhouse

  ‘Right, it’s impossible.

  ‘And what about the backend, is there any way to trace who was actually uploading it, managing the whole thing?’

  ‘Look, this is professional, right? These people have covered their asses. It’ll take some time to get right back to the source, and even then that’s not going to tell me much. And I thought you’d got the men who were doing this anyway?’

  ‘Not all of them, there’s one left, maybe more.’

  ‘Sick fucks,’ said Roemers.

  Jaap’s phone rang, he saw it was Kees.

  ‘German’s just confirmed,’ said Kees once Jaap answered. ‘Korssen’s alibi is solid.’

  ‘How solid?’

  ‘Rock.’

  Jaap hung up.

  ‘Bad news?’ asked Roemers.

  ‘Kind of,’ said Jaap, getting up to go. ‘Just keep looking. If you get something let me know straight away. And call me, not Kees.’

  71

  Thursday, 5 January

  16.27

  ‘You’re sure it was him?’ asked Tanya.

  She’d grabbed a coffee in the canteen with Kees, nervous he was going to talk to her about their past. But it had turned out he didn’t really have anything to say. He’d stared at her a bit, that was all. She actually found herself wondering if he was all right; maybe all the knocks he’d had over the last couple of days had done something to his brain. After a few painful minutes of staring at cups and taking sips she downed the rest of her coffee and headed back to the phones.

  ‘Absolutely, we haven’t spoken for years, but I can still recognize his voice,’ said Haak’s brother.

  ‘And what did he say?’

  ‘As soon as I answered he said something like “I’ve got her.”’

  ‘Got who? This was Monday morning, right?’

  ‘Yeah, first thing on Monday. I said hi, then asked him what he meant?’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘Nothing, he hung up.’

  ‘And it couldn’t be someone else?’

  ‘No. I’d recognize his voice anywhere, there’s no doubt it was him.’

  ‘Have you got the number he called from?’

  ‘Uhh … yeah I should have, he called me on my mobile. In fact I remember looking at the number before answering. I didn’t recognize it and wondered who it was. Let me put you on speaker.’

  The background noise increased suddenly, and then his voice returned, reading out a number. She thanked him and killed the call. Twenty seconds later an internet search told her the number belonged to a bar and nightclub called ‘57’, the address of which was east of Centraal station, on the waterfront.

  Twenty minutes after that she was outside the nightclub. The front doors made of smoked glass and steel with the number ‘57’ in shiny chrome, one figure per sheet of glass. She stepped inside, flashing her badge at the bouncer, all neck and tiny eyes, who’d started towards her as she entered.

  It was a large, open space, helped by the huge windows looking over the bleak harbour, low chairs clustered round small tables dotted around the floor – ten of them were occupied, too early for the crowds which would turn up well into the night – and a bar which ran the entire length of one side of the room, open glass shelves glinting with strange-coloured liqueurs and magnums of champagne.

  Stairs off to her left led down to where the dance floor must be. A lone barman wearing a black shirt and rolled up sleeves, polishing glasses and keeping an eye on the closest group, a gaggle of women swaying and cackling as ethanol worked on their brains.

  She walked over to the bar and the barman – he must be what? Twenty-three, twenty-five? – looked up at her. He had blond curly hair and a pointed goatee.

  ‘Hey’ – his eyes slid up and down her body – ‘can I get you anything?’

  ‘Just the manager.’

  He raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Do you have an appointment?’

  ‘No, but –’

  ‘Then I guess you won’t be seeing him.’

  ‘I don’t need an appointment.’

  She took out her ID, slow, calm, and held it up to him, raising her eyebrow in return.

  ‘Is that you?’ the goatee laughed.

  Too late Tanya remembered she’d not managed to take the bondage woman off her ID.

  Fucking Bloem, she thought as she put away her ID and opened her jacket to show off her gun.

  ‘Just get him,’ she said.

  He shrugged, as if to say all the same to me, put down the glass he’d been working on and walked down to the far end of the bar and out to one of the groups, three men all sitting forward in their seats, hunched. His head bent down, towards the bald head of the man whose back she could see, and whispered in his ear. The bald seated man twisted round, following the barman’s arm pointing straight at her.

  The goatee walked back, told her she could go over, and picked up the glass again, giving it one more wipe and holding it up to the light to check for grease spots. Music, soft jazz, only just at audible volume. She was going to find out why Haak had been using the phone here, and a rush of hope coursed through her.

  When she got close she could see the cards on the table, cut whisky glasses refracting light. He turned as she neared, cold aggressive eyes and a face gnarled through many a street fight, and rose to meet her.

  One of the seated figures, whose face had just become visible as he moved, was looking up at her, a face she’d been staring at onscreen – her heart burst to life in her chest – the tattoo on his neck even more repulsive in real life.

  Ludo Haak.

  Sitting there playing cards and drinking whisky like he didn’t have a care in the world.

  He looked up from his hand, and read something in her eyes. She wasn’t dressed in uniform but she obviously looked like a cop because before she could react he was up out of his chair, knocking the table over.

  Glasses flew through the air. Smashed into shards on the ground. Cards fluttering down after them.

  Then she was past the bald man, shoving him roughly as she tried to gain on Haak, who was heading for the door, head down, arms pumping like he was working a punch bag. She put everything she had, directed all the power into her legs, worked them like smooth pistons.

  There were shouts in the air but they didn’t seem to make sense, she couldn’t decipher them.

  He tried to steer round the table of women, so drunk they were the only ones in the room not to have noticed that something was going on, and one of them, telling a story, flapped an excited arm out to illustrate a point. The arm hit Haak just as he flew past, causing him to swerve and crash into another table.

  Tanya was on him before he could get up, trying to cuff him, but he grabbed her wrists and flipped her over on to her back, her head whacking the floor, whiplash in her neck. He pushed his head towards her, his breath coating her face with a poisonous mist, his mouth moving, yellow teeth bared, but she couldn’t hear the words.

  And suddenly she wasn’t there on the floor of a nightclub wrestling with a criminal, she was fifteen again, on her bed, her foster father forcing himself on to her, into her, revulsion flowing through her veins.

  Tanya could hear a woman screaming, then realized it was her. Every muscle tightened and found new strength.

  Jamming her knee up into his crotch, she felt the rubbery softness, and managed to push him off as his grip lessened. Struggling to her feet she pulled her gun, fury burning in her like a nuclear reactor.

  She pointed it at him, grasping with two hands.

  Cold metal, the sounds of the room coming back to her, someone screaming – a woman – a long high-pitched whine. And this time it wasn’t her.

  Her finger twitched, then the muscle contracted as if forming a fist. The trigger resisted, then clicked just as the barman’s arms wrapped round her chest and throat, wrenching her back as the sharp crack of her gun rang out.

  For a split second it seemed as if everything was still, then one of the
vast glass sheets looking out over the harbour, turned from completely clear to a vast tapestry of tiny cracks, before dropping in a million pieces.

  More screams, there was movement, people running, and on her ear the hot breath of the barman, whispering to her.

  ‘Stupid bitch.’ She could feel his goatee tickling her skin.

  She didn’t have time to think, just react. She slammed her head back and felt cartilage crumble, and then she was free, the barman howling, cursing loudly. Her back hurt where it had caught on the bar’s edge, and she was struggling to get air down her throat, which felt bruised, constricted.

  Haak was getting up and she leapt forward, kicked him down to the floor, foot to chest. She trained her gun right at his head and stepped back.

  ‘Turn over!’ her voice strange to her, louder, fuller, more aggressive.

  Haak looked up, and then slowly did as he was told, keeping his eyes on her. She cuffed him.

  Then she pulled back her right foot and kicked him in the ribs.

  72

  Thursday, 5 January

  17.08

  ‘… and he did occasionally take Mass up here, at the Sint Nicolaaskerk, but really he was based near Maastricht at a Catholic school. And Friedman worked at a school in Heerlen.’

  Jaap had just arrived having got Tanya’s excited call. He was itching to get in there and interview Haak but he found Kees waiting for him.

  ‘That’s real close to Maastricht.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘Did Tanya get that list from Grimberg?’

  ‘I don’t know, I just saw her taking in Haak.’

  ‘I’ll ask her now. Good work.’

  He didn’t know if Andreas had been brought up a Catholic, but he was sure that Kees would find Friedman worked there, and that Andreas’ name would be on the list of pupils. He’d have to deal with that when it came up.

  Tanya was standing outside the door, leaning against the wall, apparently texting someone. She looked up at him and smiled.

  He could see marks on her neck.

  She was tough, even though she didn’t look it. He liked that.

  ‘Hey, how are you?’ Her voice slightly hoarse.

  What did he say, that he wanted to rip off her clothes, wanted to bed her, get animal, or that he was fine and they should get on with interviewing Haak, and what was wrong with him anyway? Why this surge of feelings?

  ‘You okay?’ She looked at him concerned.

  ‘Yeah, sorry, I think things are kind of getting on top of me …’ He took a breath. ‘Have you spoken to him yet?’

  ‘No, I’ve been waiting for you, I got him moved to a room on his own.’

  ‘Your neck, is it all right?’

  ‘Yeah, I think so.’ She touched the worst side gently, as if trying to hide an unsightly blemish. ‘Shall we?’ She motioned to the cell door less than ten feet away with her head.

  Her eyes were clear, hard even. He knew that look, that was the look of adrenaline spiking the system, it was the look all Inspectors had when they thought they were on the cusp of solving a case. It was the look she was probably seeing in his own eyes right now.

  ‘Did he have a phone on him?’

  ‘He had two, one of them was the third number. And he had a call from the fourth one yesterday.’

  ‘Did you get the list from Grimberg?’

  ‘No, I couldn’t get hold of him.’

  ‘He’s stalling, he just agreed in order to get rid of us. Okay, let’s do it. And don’t let him know you’re looking for a girl.’

  Ludo Haak was sitting at a metal desk, his hands cuffed and chained to the loop in the centre. The single exposed bulb, which left a line in Jaap’s eyes after he’d stupidly glanced at it, wasn’t doing anything for Haak’s complexion. His skin was yellow, dark circles round his deep-set eyes only amplified by the overhead light. He was dressed in jeans and grey hoodie, a distorted skull leered on his chest. The tattoo rippled like it was alive as he turned his head towards them.

  ‘You fucker,’ he spat out, his voice somehow choked.

  Jaap pulled up a chair opposite him, Tanya stood by the wall.

  ‘Tell me about Inspector Hansen.’

  Jaap was watching him closely, and he saw Ludo’s eyes, still trained on the metal desk in front of him, flicker.

  ‘Never heard of him.’

  Here was the guy who, he believed, had shot Andreas in the back of the head.

  In cold blood.

  Here was someone who abducted little girls and used them on porn films, who tied up and left an old couple in a burning building.

  He could feel something inside him, something hot, beginning to fizz through his veins. He slammed his fist down on the table.

  ‘Hey, fuck you!’ Haak shouted, his arms jerking involuntarily, chains scraping, harsh against the table top.

  ‘Where’s the child?’ Tanya starting in. Haak slowly twisted his shoulders and head to her, as if he’d never seen her before, as if she’d sprung up out of the floor like a wild vine.

  ‘Where’s who?’

  ‘The child, the one you took from the Van Delfts. You know, after you killed them?’

  ‘Fuck you!’

  ‘We have you on camera.’

  Silence.

  Jaap’s turn.

  ‘What about Dirk Friedman and Jan Zwartberg? You remember them? Looks like you three had quite some thing going on there. How did it work? You supply the children, and all three of you assholes took turns to star in your sick videos, is that it? Then you posted this all to some website hosted somewhere abroad and watched the money roll in, is that it?’

  No response.

  Jaap pulled out the paper with the four numbers on it, unfolded and smoothed it out on the table.

  ‘See this?’

  Haak grunted.

  ‘Who does this number belong to?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Okay, let me tell you what I think. I think this here’ – he stabbed the fourth number on the sheet – ‘is who you answer to, and he works for the Black Tulips.’

  Jaap could see he didn’t like that.

  ‘I don’t know any Black Tulips.’

  ‘Lying is an art, you ever heard that said?’ Haak just looked at him. ‘Well, it is, and I can tell you, you’re no good at it, you’re not even an amateur. So I’ll ask you again, how are the Black Tulips involved?’

  ‘I’m not telling you shit. You ain’t got nothing on me. And I want my lawyer.’

  ‘We’ll get you a lawyer, just tell me where the kid is.’

  ‘I don’t want a lawyer, shithead, I want my lawyer, and I’m not saying shit till he gets here.’

  Jaap had never beaten up a suspect, something that some of his colleagues were good at, boasted about even. He’d always prided himself on upholding the law, not stooping to the same level as the thugs they so often had to deal with. But right now? Right now he wanted to reach out and pummel the shit out of him, slam his head on to the desk, knock him back into the concrete wall until he told him what he wanted to know.

  As if sensing what was running through Jaap’s mind Tanya stepped forward.

  He noticed the movement in the corner of his eye and took a deep breath. Without saying anything else he got up to leave just as the door flew open and De Waart stormed in.

  ‘I need to talk to you, now,’ he hissed.

  Once Jaap had closed the cell door behind him he turned to De Waart.

  ‘What’s up?’

  ‘What’s up? You’ve just arrested my suspect, the guy who I think was responsible for Andreas’ death, and you’ve probably fucked with my chance of getting a conviction, didn’t you hear Smit when he said you weren’t to go after Andreas’ killer?’

  Jaap was getting sick of De Waart.

  ‘He’s a suspect in my investigation, which has nothing to do with Andreas. When I’ve finished with him I’ll hand him over to you.’

  De Waart stared at him, then turned and walked.
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  ‘We’ll see about that.’

  Jaap watched him limp out of the office. He realized he’d been clenching his fist and he released his fingers, staring at the white crescent moons in his palm.

  73

  Thursday, 5 January

  19.33

  Kees rang the bell – as far as he could tell it hadn’t actually made a sound – and was surprised when the door flew inwards a few moments later. He’d tried yesterday but there’d been no one in, and Jaap had kept him so busy today that he hadn’t been able to get back out here, to the address where Helma supposedly lived.

  It was clear the man who’d opened the door was on his way out, jacket, neck wrapped in a dirty woollen scarf, and a stained fedora, pulled low over his face. He was about sixty and had a slim parcel wrapped in old-fashioned brown paper and string cradled in his left arm.

  The man, at least a head shorter, looked up at Kees and stopped dead.

  ‘I’m s-s-sorry, can I-I help you?’ The voice was wasp-like, thin, irritating.

  ‘I’m looking for Helma?’

  His eyes narrowed.

  ‘Who’s a-asking?’

  Kees flipped out his ID and shoved it forward.

  ‘I am. Can I come in?’

  ‘Actually I was just on my way to the p-post box’ – he motioned to the parcel – ‘and I wanted to g-g –’

  ‘You can go to the post box after we’ve talked.’

  ‘B-b-but –’

  ‘Now,’ growled Kees making the old man jump, and then scurry back inside, muttering something Kees didn’t catch under his breath. He followed him through a dingy hallway filled with cardboard boxes to a room at the back of the house, where he sat down on a sagging sofa, still clutching the parcel as if it were a baby and Kees the baby-snatcher-in-chief.

  Kees glanced around. The room was dark. The air smelt as though it had been breathed many times without being refreshed, and the furniture was so old it could almost be fashionable again.

  If it hadn’t been so tatty.

  ‘So where is she?’ he asked.

  The man, who’d been staring down at the floor – eye contact was not something he seemed at ease with – flinched, but didn’t answer. A cat, entirely black apart from a white patch on a hind paw, slunk into the room, skirted Kees, and hopped on to the old man’s lap, where it turned and watched Kees warily.