A State Of Sin Amsterdam Occult Series Book Two

by Mark Hobson

  Floris sat back in his chair.

  “So yes, that’s the place. I’m certain of it.”

  “Thank you, de Kok,” Dyatlov said in his crisp and clear voice, and Pieter gave Floris a gentle pat on his shaking arm.

  Dyatlov resumed with his mission briefing.

  “So folks - Trintelhaven is our primary target. It’s highly likely that Nina Bakker is in that house, although this doesn’t guarantee that she will still be alive when we get there. Sadly she could have been dead from day one after her kidnapping, but we can’t waste too much time pondering on that. We need to hit the place soon and hit it hard and catch the bad guys hiding out there.”

  He paced back and forth across the front of the projector screen, his shadow rippling across the satellite image.

  “We need to coordinate perfectly on this. It is essential that we move in simultaneously from both ends of the dam, and also have our air-assets overhead to be our eyes and ears. Obviously, it will mean closing the road to traffic to avoid any civvies getting hurt, but if we do that too soon we risk giving the game away and the whole operation falling apart. Therefore, timing is crucial. I’d also prefer it for everybody present in this room to fully acquaint themselves with the exact layout of the area. You and your men, and me and my men, are the ones who will be going in. We can’t afford any cock-ups or wrong turns once we get there. So, I have arranged a little something for you.”

  Dyatlov used the remote control once again and Pieter and everybody else in the conference room watched as the satellite image disappeared from the projector screen, to be replaced by a dull grey wavy picture.

  At first, Pieter couldn’t make sense of what he was seeing. Yet as he watched, a little confused, he suddenly realized what was on the screen - the strange waves moving across the image gave it away.

  They were looking at an overhead shot of the grey sea, the rippling effect caused by the swell and rolling of the water. It was taken from a camera on a drone, flying above the Ijsselmeer, and broadcasting live footage back to Police HQ.

  The camera angle shifted as the drone slowly revolved in a hovering position and suddenly the long, snaking Houtribdijk Dam came into view in the near distance, the shoreline alongside the wide concrete embankment frozen with ice, and cars and lorries trundling on the road along the top.

  The drone moved forward. There was no sound to the live video, but the sense of speed was dizzying, and within a minute or so the dam seemed very close, although the camera may have been at maximum zoom. The drone operator would be under instructions not to get too near.

  Once again the drone altered direction. Now it was flying parallel with the dam, the picture focusing on the traffic. Up ahead, the now-familiar Trintelhaven dock came nearer and nearer, and then in the next instant the drone was rising up into the sky and hovering in place above their target, the concrete jetties and buildings below looking like a child’s model. The camera panned and zoomed back and forth, showing the buildings, the junkyard, the pebble beach alongside Vinke’s family home. And there, near to the front door of the house itself, Pieter saw the motorbike from last night.

  He sat there shaking his head in amazement. After all this time, they finally had them, trapped and with nowhere to go.

  The screen went dark and the lights slowly came back up.

  “Let’s rock and roll people!” Dyatlov told them.

  ◆◆◆

  On his way out Pieter caught sight of Commissaris Huijbers conferring with a group of senior officers near the door. It looked like he was giving them their final instructions, Pieter thought, or at least that was the impression he wanted to give: the man in charge, controlling things from HQ while the cavalry went to the rescue. But then he noticed Huijbers was wearing a flak jacket, and Pieter pulled up in surprise.

  The small cluster of men broke up and he dashed across to catch the police chief.

  “You’re coming with us, sir?”

  “Of course I’m coming with you Van Dijk. I just need to make a couple of phone calls, and then we move out. Did you think I’d want to miss out on the fun or something?” Huijbers snarled.

  “No, but…”

  “Besides, I intend to slap the handcuffs on that Charlotte Janssen myself.”

  Then Huijbers breezed past and was gone.

  Chapter 24

  Clawhammer

  They set out in two separate convoys.

  One would snake east past the docklands district and leave the city on the A1 motorway, and then branch off to race north on the A6 as far as the town of Lelystad, where the eastern ramp on and off Houtribdijk Dam was. This half of the Armed Response Division had the shortest distance to travel, so once in position, they would wait until their colleagues 30 kilometres away across the Ijsselmeer Sea were ready to go at their end.

  The second convoy, whose personnel included Pieter, Dyatlov and Commissaris Huijbers, would go charging through the IJ road tunnel and then head directly north along the same road that he had taken that morning, but continue onwards to Hoorn and then finally the town of Enkhuizen, where the western end of the dam was anchored.

  Once both groups were poised to strike they would be given the signal and the assault would be launched in a pincer movement, the two convoys closing in on the small dock at the centre of the dam.

  As they travelled north, the roads ahead were cleared of other vehicles and all the traffic lights were locked-off, closing all the side lanes, and flashing a continuous green to allow the police vehicles to plough straight through each junction and intersection without slowing down. But as instructed, the dam remained open until the last possible minute.

  Pieter was in the point vehicle of his convoy, as was Dyatlov. They travelled in a Lenco BearCat 4x4 Armoured Truck, a huge monster of a vehicle painted a dark grey colour. He sat in a bucket seat just behind the driver, facing towards the rear exit doors. Down either side ran a pair of plastic benches, where ten members of the assault squad sat, talking and laughing and checking their weapons.

  Pieter wore a dark blue flak jacket and a helmet, but he was otherwise dressed in his usual clothes, and was armed only with his Walther P5 for his personal protection, having refused the offer of an assault rifle. This was Dyatlov’s bread and butter, and he had no intention of interfering with the operation by being at the head of the police raid.

  Every few minutes he twisted in his seat to glance out of the front windscreen to check on their progress. He couldn’t see an awful lot for the vehicle had an anti-riot wire cage across the front, and the small slit-windows of bulletproof-glass restricted his view still further. But he did look down at the speedometer on the futuristic-looking dashboard and saw they were travelling at 140km/h, the vehicle’s maximum speed.

  From overhead, he heard a deep thrum-thrum noise that seemed to make the air wobble. He looked up. In the roof were a pair of hatches. These were pulled down, but he could see through their glass apertures, and he caught a quick glimpse of a helicopter as it flashed across the sky. One of the pair of Police AW139’s, painted with their blue livery, there to lend air-support.

  Pieter knew that just behind the lead vehicle came four huge Spartan APCs, two armoured ambulances, and finally a long Command and Video Observation truck, the mobile command centre, with Huijbers onboard.

  As the road veered through the outskirts of Hoorn and curved east, making towards the tip of the Ijsselmeer Peninsular, Dyatlov, who was sitting up front next to the driver, turned and called out.

  “Minus five! Weapons check!”

  In the back, the assault squad snapped on ammo magazines and cocked and readied their weapons, and slowly the general chatter and banter fell away as the members of the team put on their game faces.

  Pieter shared their sudden tension. His chest felt tight and his heart seemed like a slow and sluggish lump of flesh, and when he tried to swallow his spit he found his mouth to be too dry.

  Another quick glance through the front windows and he saw the large bl
ue control tower marking the ramp up onto the dam just ahead, and a long line of wind turbines stretched away to the south across the water.

  “Operation Clawhammer! Blowtorch!” Dyatlov said into his communication gear. This was the signal to launch the assault.

  Pieter felt the BearCat thunder up onto the ramp, its huge tyres singing on the frozen surface of the road, and he desperately held on to his seat as the cabin vibrated violently from side to side.

  If the road across had now been cleared of all other traffic, and if they maintained their current speed, then by Pieter’s quick estimation it would take both teams around seven or eight minutes to converge and join at the centre of the dam.

  But just as he was thinking this, the driver suddenly swerved hard to the left and swore loudly, drawing Pieter’s attention to the front once more.

  “How the fuck did they get here?” Dyatlov shouted, pointing ahead at something beyond the windscreen.

  Pieter craned his neck to see what the problem was and then saw to his dismay the pair of TV news crews parked up alongside the road’s outer rail, and the realization of what this meant struck him like a blow to the solar plexus.

  The media had been alerted to the raid, which meant all element of surprise was gone.

  He knew in an instant who had made the call, who wanted the whole world to witness his moment of glory as he personally made the arrest of Europe’s most wanted criminal.

  “Huijbers, that dumb fuck!” Dyatlov snarled, as he too reached the same conclusion.

  He struck the dashboard in fury.

  “Go around, go around!” he ordered the driver. “Push them off the fucking dam if you have to!”

  They veered around the obstacle and then lurched back to the centre of the roadway without hardly dropping their speed, and the driver straightened his course. Snapping a quick look out of the rear windows Pieter saw the vehicles behind form up two-abreast so that the convoy of police vehicles were now in a wedge-shaped formation, the BearCat at the front. With their lights flashing, and the helicopters keeping pace above them, it must have made an awesome sight as they charged over the dam.

  They passed underneath a footbridge that spanned the dam, and then the road divided in two for a short stretch with a barrier down the middle, and the convoy of vehicles smoothly separated before merging back together again. The top of the dam flattened out and was much broader from this part onwards, with a sandy beach running alongside on the left and a series of sand dunes on the right. Beyond was the frozen water.

  Pieter looked at his wristwatch and found himself counting down the minutes to when they would reach Trintelhaven. There was nothing much for the occupants to say to each other, as each of the passengers knew their precise role and had trained hard for just such situations. Instead, they listened to the low rumble of the engine and the occasional messages coming over the radio. Pieter tried to listen in, but the military-style jargon soon became too confusing to follow. But from what he could hear, the second strike-team was making good progress on the far side. The people holed up at the centre-point of the dam may well be aware that the police were coming, but it was too late to turn back now.

  Several minutes later and Dyatlov called back over his shoulder: “Vries, check the top-side.”

  Pieter watched as one of the heavily-armoured men jumped to his feet. Reaching up, he grabbed hold of a short ladder that was folded up beneath the truck’s roof and pulled it down, locking the bottom into place in two holes in the floor. Going up two rungs, he flipped open one of the hatches. A blast of cold air blew in and the roaring sound of the engine assaulted Pieter’s ears, and the smell of diesel filled the interior. The heavy-set cop climbed the rest of the way up the ladder and poked his head and shoulders through the opening.

  A moment later and he called down: “All clear. Coming up to the turning on the left.”

  His words, nearly lost in the maelstrom of sound, were relayed forward by one of his colleagues.

  “What do you see ahead? Talk to me!” Dyatlov shouted.

  “I have eyes on the other strike-team! Approx. one kilometre and approaching fast!” Vries replied.

  On some unspoken signal, every man in the back of the truck suddenly seemed to stiffen with even more apprehension. Weapons were grasped ever tighter, helmets were straightened, and those wearing infra-red goggles lowered them into position - still turned off but poised to be flicked into life once needed. Someone could be heard whispering a quiet litany.

  Vries remained upright in the roof hatch. Pieter could just about see him with his hand on the controls of the truck’s smoke-grenade launcher, waiting for the instructions to start lobbing the small tin can-shaped canisters to spread a blanket of thick, cloying smoke all around.

  Then he felt the truck swerve hard to the left as they left the main roadway, and the men on the benches tilted sideways in unison.

  Now they were bumping over the hard, frozen ruts of a small dirt track leading down towards the small dock at Trintelhaven, and Pieter felt the vibration rattle his teeth. He looked through the windscreen in time to see them whip by the branches of several fir trees, then they made a hard right and he watched open-mouthed as they crashed straight through a three-barred gate and slid to a halt in a gravel yard.

  There was a series of explosive popping sounds as the smoke grenades were fired, then a hydraulic hum as the truck’s rear hatch glided down, and the men piled out, roaring and screaming at the top of their lungs.

  Pieter followed them without thinking, his thoughts all scrambled and confused, his head ringing like a punch-drunk boxer’s, but once outside someone grabbed his shoulder and hauled him back, and then he heard Dyatlov screaming in his ear: “Wait here Van Dijk! I’ll tell you when it’s safe!”

  Then he was gone, disappearing through the smoke with his men.

  Pieter moved to one side as more vehicles roared into the yard, and then back-up squads of armed personnel poured into the house. There was a cacophony of loud shudders, and through the curtained windows he saw the bright stuttering light of flash-bang grenades going off inside. There was more shouting, doors being kicked in, and in his mind, he could visualize the men moving from room to room and detaining the occupants. But no gunshots nor signs of resistance. Which was good.

  Movement caught his eye just then and he turned to see a line of armed police snaking across the concrete jetties. This would be the other strike-team securing the perimeter.

  Then he heard the loud engine of the mobile command centre and saw as the long vehicle slid to a halt just beyond the wrecked gateway, and moments later Huijbers appeared, flanked by his bodyguards as he stomped into the yard, baseball hat on his head and a huge grin on his face.

  “Bloody awesome Van Dijk,” he shouted, his body all energized and bursting to the seams with adrenaline. “What a sight to behold. Coming across the dam, and then seeing the men go in, I tell you I had tears in my eyes.”

  Pieter stared back at him. He thought about asking who had tipped off the media, just to see what he said, but just then Dyatlov emerged from the house and waved them across. The assault was over.

  Huijbers set off at a jog, his wide girth making the ground shake, and he pushed straight past Dyatlov. “Where the hell is that woman?” he called as he disappeared through the doorway.

  Dyatlov caught Pieter’s eye, and the Russian gave a tiny shake of his head, and Pieter felt his stomach give a peculiar backflip. Oh God, he thought to himself. Nina? Had they…? Please, not now, right at the end. He went inside, feeling the blood drain from his face.

  He found himself standing in a small and dusty room filled with old furniture, the upholstery on the chairs all faded, a musty smell of age and decay in the air. The door was hanging off its hinges, as was the one leading into what looked like a kitchen. There was lots of activity in there, people moving about, and he stepped over to join them. From somewhere above he heard more footsteps.

  The kitchen was a wreck, possibly from
the assault. Smashed furniture and broken crockery and shelves and curtains and broken glass lay everywhere. A path had been cleared through the mess towards another doorway, and Pieter glimpsed a set of steps beyond, leading downwards.

  Moving over, he squeezed by members of the assault team and went down.

  Huijbers was already at the bottom, standing in the centre of the basement and looking around, hands on his hips and shaking his head.

  Pieter saw in a moment that the place was empty, just like the house at Warder, but whereas then he had felt frustration, now he felt relieved. Relieved that he wasn’t looking at the body of twelve year old Nina Bakker.

  “Fucking bastards have gone,” Huijbers said needlessly. “Taken the girl with them. They must have been holding her in there by the looks of it, but they fled just before we arrived.”

  Pieter said nothing, he just turned to look at where the police chief was pointing, seeing the small cage in the corner underneath the stairs, and a chill went through him. The front was open, the cage door swinging back on its hinges. Inside he saw a thin blanket, all crumpled up. There was a sharp smell of urine.

  He turned a full circle, his gaze taking in the small room, seeing the bed, the small table and couch, the shelf of books and DVDs, the television in the corner. There was even a bathroom with a shower and toilet.

  Huijbers stalked back up the staircase, mumbling and cursing under his breath, and after one final glance around Pieter went after him.

  Pieter followed him back outside. Up on the roadway, one of the blue helicopters was just touching down, its rotors buffeting the air. The back of his throat feeling tight from the hazy smoke drifting around the yard.