Grave Intent (16 page)

“If I knew that, we wouldn’t be sitting here and you wouldn’t have to be afraid. The murderer is obviously deranged. The good news is, he’s also arrogant and sticking to his pattern. He doesn’t just want to kill his victims, he wants to make their death a ceremony. I don’t know what’s driving him to dig those graves, but it will be his Achilles’ heel. He will return there.”

“But only with Robin’s corpse.”

“I don’t think so,” Jan countered. “I’d rather your boyfriend was here right now, but not even the police have been able to catch him. And we have far more resources than the murderer.”

“But why is he after Robin?”

“It has something to do with Dr. Valburg and Moritz Quast.”

“The first two victims.”

Jan nodded. “We can’t ask them, and Robin isn’t talking. He might know who the murderer is, possibly without even realizing it. There’s some connection between those three.”

“I wish I could help, but Robin never said a thing to me. And I guess I didn’t want to know what he was up to.”

Bergman came up to the glass from inside his office. He shook his head.

Jan sighed. Bergman must be referring to the analysis of the photo. So they hadn’t found any leads this time either.

He turned back to Friederike. “You can help us—by persuading your boyfriend to talk to us.”

“I’ve left hundreds of voice messages for Robin and I have no idea where he’s hiding.”

“He’ll get in touch eventually. He might call you or be waiting for you somewhere.” Jan handed her a card with his number. “I know he’s had trouble with the cops all his life, but ask him to call this number. We can protect him. And when we’ve uncovered the exact connection between him, Dr. Valburg and Moritz Quast, then we’ll have our man. Then your boyfriend can go home.”

Friederike took the card. “Thank you.” She raised her head and looked Jan in the eye for the first time. “If he contacts me, he’ll call you. I promise.”

After Friederike left, Jan allowed himself a stroll to his favorite kebab joint around the corner. He hadn’t had any breakfast, and his stomach was growling. The lack of sleep was wearing on him, but he saw no chance of catching up on it in the next few days.

He liked being a cop, and getting assigned to Detectives had been his dream, but investigating homicide cases came at a heavy price. He missed the things so many people got to do every day. Knowing when he’d be home at night and not having to think about work until the next day. Enjoying the weekend with all its creature comforts. Sleeping in, a nice big breakfast, partying till any hour, or just channel surfing.

Jan didn’t need a mansion, a swanky vacation, or a flashy sports car. But just to do nothing for a single day, with no responsibilities and without the knowledge that there was a maniac serial killer running around Berlin—he would give a full month’s salary for that.

For now, he hoped to have at least ten minutes to get something to eat. Enjoy a cup of tea, some banter with Alkim, the restaurant’s owner, and maybe one or two
cubes of Turkish delight. Just ten minutes before his cell phone rang, before Patrick’s team found the grave, before all the madness started closing in on him again.

“Just ten,” he muttered as if it were a mantra, folding his hands and looking up to the sky. “All I ask.”

Eight minutes was all he got. His phone rang. The Turkish delight would have to wait.

“We have the grave,” Patrick said with pride. He bounded over to the map on the wall and pointed at a green area. “It’s in a wooded cemetery in Charlottenburg.”

“That’s the big patch near Olympic Stadium?”

“Exactly. All thirty-seven acres of it.”

Jan groaned. Conducting surveillance on all that was going to be a nightmare. Lots of exits, even more paths, and countless hiding places.

“How did you guys find the grave so fast?”

“The cemetery has plenty of famous people in it. Which means extra-attentive cemetery staff and more of them.”

“We watching the spot?”

“Not yet. We have two patrols positioned nearby to observe the street, with instructions to remain inconspicuous.”

“Then send two plainclothes officers out there too. They should water some flowers, pull some weeds, but stay back from the grave.”

Patrick nodded.

“We have to stay under the radar. The murderer isn’t counting on us finding the grave so quickly. We cannot lose our advantage. Maybe he’s still in the vicinity or is checking it occasionally. Anything suspicious and he’s going to clear out for good.”

“Cameras?”

“They’re essential. We’ll mount them around the grave site. Park the surveillance van next to the grounds. On top of that I want plainclothes near all exits until dark. We’ll look for somewhere to hide near the grave beforehand. We’ll sit tight through the night. So far he’s killed his victims right around midnight and then put them in sometime before dawn.”

“I’ll see to the plainclothes officers.” Patrick went to a phone and was deep in a conversation a moment later.

Jan pulled his own phone from his pocket and pressed a number from his recent calls. “Max? Jan here.”

“I see that,” Max replied.

“Pack all you’d need for a night stakeout,” Jan continued. “Above all, those cams that don’t need any light.”

“They call them infrared.”

“Save the smart-ass quips. Move your butt and get over here. I want to be gone in twenty minutes.”

Jan put away his phone. The special team’s room was buzzing. In two hours, not even an ant would be able to pass through the cemetery without them spotting it.

They had been one step ahead of the murder the first time, and gotten behind the second time. They weren’t going to miss this chance.

An hour after their find, the wooded cemetery was under the control of the Detectives Division. Fourteen plainclothes cops were strolling around: four along the cemetery walls, six near the exits, and four within the immediate vicinity of Robin Cordes’s grave.

Jan had thrown on a cemetery-personnel jacket and was loosening up the soil of an overgrown planting bed with a hoe. After three minutes, he had the first blister on his thumb. Five minutes later, he needed a back massage. He had no idea how someone could do such work all day long without becoming totally disabled by age forty.

Since he’d been there, he’d seen no visitors. The area was off the beaten path. Surely no coincidence, Jan thought. The murderer had done his homework here too. But at the moment, the seclusion was working for Detectives. Max could set up the cams without being disturbed.

Jan looked over his shoulder at Max. The cemetery jacket was far too big for the scrawny geek. He’d had to roll up the sleeves so that at least his fingers would poke out. He was strapping a small cam to the branch of a big chestnut tree. He finished by covering the thumb-sized piece of tech with a leaf.

“That little thing’s enough for watching the whole grave?” Jan whispered into his portable radio.

“With color and sound,” Max replied. “It hardly needs any light for you to see razor-sharp images, even at night.”

“There’s no streetlights around here. Where’s the light supposed to come from?”

“It’s almost full moon. If the weather’s clear tonight, that’ll do. For safety’s sake, I placed two little candles near enough.”

“What about the paths to the grave?”

“As long as he doesn’t come bushwhacking his way through the underbrush—there’s only one path here. I installed a bigger camera in that holly. I can zoom it. When I’m done here I’ll mount more of our little spies at the entrances. Then nothing gets by us.” Max finished aligning the cam, grabbed his backpack, and went over to Jan. “You know where you’re spending the night yet?”

“About ten yards from the grave there are these big shrubs about head high; luckily they don’t have pointy leaves. A cemetery worker is cutting us out a hole in the middle and covering the rear part with bushes in pots. The hideaway is about as deep as my closet, but it will do.”

“I’ll set you up with a monitor. You can watch the grave and the path at the same time without having to get out. All that rustling could get conspicuous.”

“Okay.” Jan stood up and stretched. “I’m heading over to the briefing.”

“I’ll be at the main entrance.” Max raised a hand. “See you soon.”

Jan waved back. Still four more hours until it was dark. The trap was set.

Jan yawned as he left the conference room. He was going to have to either stock up on coffee for the night or steal some of Max’s energy drinks, if he didn’t want to fall asleep inside those shrubs. Still another hour until dusk. Robin’s death wasn’t scheduled until tomorrow, so Jan didn’t believe the murderer would show up before midnight. But he might check in on the grave. Jan didn’t want to spoil any chance of seizing him.

In a half hour, the plainclothes cops would withdraw. Visitors wandering around and caring for graves in the dark were just too conspicuous—but the cams were working and the paths weren’t too long. An officer could be at an entrance or at the grave within twenty seconds. Worst case, they could lock down the cemetery. The canine team was on standby. They could even have a chopper over the area in a few minutes.

Wasn’t more they could do. If the murderer were to enter the cemetery, he’d be leaving in handcuffs. The only unknown was Robin Cordes. Jan was hoping Robin really was as good as everyone was saying. Then at least they wouldn’t be dealing with a fresh corpse.

Jan went to the coffee machine and pressed the “Coffee Black” button for what felt like the thousandth time. He closed his eyes and considered whether to go lie down for a half hour. This was going to be a long night, and he needed every trace of concentration he could summon.

His phone jolted him from his thoughts. The screen showed an unknown number.

“Detective Tommen,” he answered.

“It’s Robin here. You wanted to talk to me?”

Jan almost dropped his coffee.

“Herr Cordes. Nice of you to call.”

Jan rushed over to the special team’s office.

“You called me by my first name before,” Robin said.

Jan pressed the door handle, closing the door with a shoulder. “Apologies. I’m normally a pretty polite guy, but with a gun in my face I forget my manners.”