Into the Night: Inspector Rykel Book 2 (Amsterdam Quartet) (24 page)

Tuesday, 11 May
08.16

Kees willed his eyes to close and his brain to turn off.

But it wasn’t working.

He’d got back from Den Haag and had been unable to sleep.

Which was a problem as tiredness seemed to make the symptoms worse, the pain flaring up with exhaustion.

And he felt like he needed a line or two, just to take the edge off.

He’d no idea why coke helped, but it unequivocally did, and had a far bigger effect than the pills he’d been prescribed. The ones he had given up taking as they didn’t do a thing but make him sick.

He was sitting on the sofa, looking out at the brickwork of the building opposite. He’d been trying to count the number of bricks, but he kept getting lost somewhere in the middle. The fog wasn’t helping.

In all the thoughts he’d had about his future – all the plans, all the fantasies which would blossom in his mind while on long boring stakeouts, the images which he’d play through in those strange moments between sleep and wakefulness – he’d never imagined that he was going to end up with difficulty moving, problems controlling his own body.

But that’s what the doctor had said would most probably happen.

A decline, the speed of which no one would be able to predict.

Reality washed over him but felt unreal. His mouth tasted weird.

Was this really happening to him? How could it? Why?

He shifted his legs, all senses now attuned to the tiniest sensation, looking for any hint that things might be getting better, that the symptoms had eased overnight, that it was going away.

But things actually felt worse.

His brain, ever looking for a way out, tried to tell him it was simply lack of sleep. Nothing at all to do with the disease. He just needed some rest, that was all.

Fuck it
, he thought.
What I really need is some coke.

After a couple of lines had hit he sat back, already feeling better. He’d laid a third one out, which he might have in a little while. And if he was concerned that it was taking more and more to have the same effect, he wasn’t thinking about it, wasn’t thinking about it at all.

His phone buzzed on the glass coffee table, vibrating towards the third line. He watched it for a few more buzzes, then snatched it up just before it broke into the slash of white powder.

He could see it was Tanya.

How did things get so complicated?
he thought.

‘Yeah?’ he said as he hit green and held it up to his ear.

‘It’s Tanya,’ she said.

‘I know. Caller ID, genius.’

‘Listen,’ she said, ignoring his jibe. ‘Something’s come up, we need to talk. Are you free? Now?’

‘Where are you?’

‘Bloedstraat, that’s where your apartment is, isn’t it?’

Kees looked down at the line of coke. Less than a second to get rid of that. He reckoned he could manage.

‘Yeah, sure,’ he said. ‘I guess you know the number?’

‘Got it from your file.’

If she’s got access to my file
, he thought as the tiny particles zoomed up into his nose,
then this is serious.

By the time he’d cleaned up she was at the door. He opened it and let her in, pointing her towards the living room, a moment of awkwardness as to what sort of greeting they should exchange.

Now that they’d fucked again.

They kept it professional, Tanya stepping through the doorway and heading to where Kees had indicated.

‘Sorry it’s so early,’ she said.

Kees felt like he should offer coffee or something, but didn’t.

‘So what’s up?’

She was standing, looking out the window, her figure an improvement on the view. He felt the familiar stirring, but the thought of what was going to happen to him killed it dead.

No one wanted to sleep with someone who couldn’t control their own limbs.

He flopped down on the sofa, springs creaking in protest. Sleeping with her had been good though. Great even, the urge coming on so strong that nothing else had existed. For the first time he’d forgotten about his disease, he’d even forgotten about what Tanya had told him, about the
abuse she’d suffered. It was only afterwards, as he drove home, that he wondered if he’d taken advantage of her, used her while she was down.

But then she’d seemed to want it, to need it, just as much as he did.

‘It’s going to come out,’ said Tanya, her back still to him.

For a moment Kees wasn’t sure what she was talking about.

‘Those calls? I asked the tech people if they could have been made to look like they came from the station but were actually from somewhere else. But they said no.’

‘And the only person who could have made them was me.’

He didn’t even frame it as a question.

‘I’ve been thinking. Maybe the best thing would be to go to Smit now. Tell him about it.’

‘Tell him I was passing on information to a drugs gang? I’m sure he’ll be thrilled.’

‘I never said he’s going to like it, but I just think it might be better coming from you,’ she said, finally turning round.

He tried to read her face, but it was too much in shadow to see clearly.

‘Meaning if I don’t tell him then you will?’

‘I have to. You know that. The information is there for anyone to see.’

A toilet flushed in the flat upstairs; something rushed through a pipe in the wall behind him. He could tell from her voice she was cut up about it, but she was right; there was nothing she could do.

‘Yeah, okay. You’re right. And just when I’d managed to kind of get in his good books again.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘That witness I was looking after, the one that escaped? I found him, took him down to Den Haag last night.’

‘Seriously?’ She stepped forward, reaching into her pocket. ‘You got him?’

‘What’s going on?’ he said, sensing the tension which had suddenly stiffened her whole body.

She pulled out her phone, and already had it to her ear, her free hand held out like a uniform stopping traffic, trying to silence his questioning. She waited, then hung up.

‘Shit,’ she said. ‘Shit, shit, shit.’

Tuesday, 11 May
09.48

Jaap stepped out of the station and took a deep breath.

Fog had formed overnight, unusual for May, and the air was like a wet cloth. It didn’t seem to contain enough oxygen.

His hands were cold, freezing cold. He tried to work out when he’d last eaten something, but he couldn’t concentrate, couldn’t remember.

In the end he’d not said anything to Smit; all he’d had to do was listen to a speech about results and then get the hell out of there. Smit had been toying with a nail file as he’d delivered the monologue.

By the end Jaap felt like grabbing it and stabbing him in the eye.

Repeatedly.

He started moving, thinking about what he needed to do.

The woman last night had said Nikolic and Teeven had been searching for an out-of-the-way building, but they’d not taken one of hers. But maybe they were just scoping the places out – who’d actually rent a place they were going to hold a kidnapped baby in for just twenty-four hours?

It would be easier if he could just get a few patrols on to this, let them do the legwork. But then he’d have to explain why, and right now he just didn’t see that as an option. Nikolic could have a contact in the police.

And there was also no way Jaap was taking the risk that he could be alerted.

Jaap cursed himself for not previously focusing on how the information on the grow sites was getting out; if he’d done that then he might now be able to hand over some of the search to patrols.

But even so, handing it over meant risking someone making a mistake, missing something crucial. Maybe even barrelling into wherever Floortje was being held and …

There was no way he was going to take the risk.

He’d start with the estate agent, the one the woman at 57 worked at, run by Doutzen de Kok. There were too many connections there to ignore; the girl who’d disappeared after giving Koopman’s keys to the first victim could have given Nikolic access to other properties.

He checked his phone for the time and saw several missed calls from Tanya. He dialled her back as he headed towards the centre, the rumble of a tram somewhere off to the left. He stepped over embedded tramlines which led into grey fog, the shiny metal beaded like a can straight from the fridge.

Floortje loved trams; she was transfixed by them. Jaap couldn’t work out if it was the sound or the motion, or something else entirely that his adult brain couldn’t appreciate.

‘Jaap, I’ve got bad news,’ Tanya said as soon as she answered.

His stomach plummeted, but his feet kept on taking him up Damrak.

‘What?’

‘That witness, at Matkovic’s trial?’

‘Yeah?’

‘Kees found him, delivered him to ICTY early last night.’

Ahead of him a traffic light turned red, softened and enlarged by the mist.

He found his feet were no longer moving. But then again his lungs weren’t either.

‘I … Shit!’ he said, his voice alien to him. His phone buzzed by his ear. ‘I’ve got another call; I’ll call you back.’

He pulled the phone away, saw it was Saskia.

She’d heard. Got a call from her boss Ronald just two minutes before.

‘But is he going to testify?’ asked Jaap once he’d listened to Saskia’s panicked voice. ‘He’s the one who absconded from witness protection.’

‘From what Ronald says Isovic’s refusing to talk.’

‘Did someone get to him, threaten him?’

‘Maybe you’d better ask Kees; he was the one with him before he disappeared.’

‘He’s refusing to talk, that mean he won’t testify as well?’

‘I don’t know, he’s literally not saying a word. But maybe he will when we get him in there and he sees Matkovic. I’ve spent hours with him; he genuinely hates Matkovic. I don’t think I read him wrong.’

Jaap’s eyes moved around but didn’t take anything in, everything internal now, scenarios running wild.

Maybe Isovic hadn’t escaped, maybe someone else had knocked Kees out.

Could it have been Nikolic, trying to get to Isovic to stop him testifying? Maybe Isovic had then got away from Nikolic and gone into hiding? And he’d not turned
himself in as the last time he was under police protection hadn’t worked out so well for him?

If so, then he needed to talk to Isovic; he might be able to help him find Nikolic.

Jaap made a quick calculation. There’d be little traffic at this time, but the fog was really thick, he didn’t want to end up with his car flipped over in a ditch. A good friend of his had wound up in a coma after the car she and her new boyfriend were in did just that. Jaap had visited her in hospital, and two days later she died.

She’d woken up just long enough to discover her boyfriend was already dead.

‘I think I’d better speak to Isovic myself. Can you get me in there?’

‘Hang on,’ she said. Jaap could hear keys being tapped quickly. ‘There’s a train leaving Centraal in fifteen minutes. I’ll meet you there.’

‘You don’t need to come. Just call them and …’

She’d hung up. He knew there was no point in calling her back to dissuade her, so he jammed his phone away and started running.

Tuesday, 11 May
9.54

If Kees had raped her pet cat right in front of her he doubted he could’ve got more of a reaction.

Thinking back, the reaction had come when he’d told her about Isovic; that’s when she’d become desperate to get hold of Jaap, constantly trying his phone, not answering the questions that Kees had thrown her way.

The main one being, ‘What’s wrong?’

She’d left, still trying Jaap’s phone, and Kees had slumped back on to the sofa exhausted, the three lines of coke not doing what they should. In fact they seemed to have crashed him out.

His eyelids closed, and he felt himself sinking down, brain slowing and speeding up at the same time, time twisting out of shape.

His phone detonated on the table in front of him.

Fuck
, he thought as he jerked upright.
Should have turned the fucking thing off.

This time it was Jaap, and he wanted to know all about Isovic.

‘What’s going on?’ said Kees. ‘When Tanya heard about Isovic she went kind of nuts …’

There was noise on the other end, a kind of rushing sound, fast-moving air. Jaap sounded out of breath.

‘What did Isovic say when you found him?’

‘Not much. He seemed kind of pissed, to be honest.’

‘Did he say anything about why he’d run away?’

‘I asked him that, he hates that guy he was going to testify against so the whole thing doesn’t make sense. But when I asked him if he wanted to see the guy brought to justice he said he did. So I asked why the fuck he’d knocked me out and run away.’

‘And?’

‘And nothing. He just clammed up and wouldn’t say anything else. Are you running?’

‘Where are you now?’

‘Home.’

‘I need some help’

‘Sure. But seriously, what the fuck is going on?’

‘I can’t really explain. Just get to Tanya.’

Jaap gave him an address not far away.

Here we go
, thought Kees as he hung up.

He reached the address twenty minutes later. The fog was getting worse, denser, and he only saw her when he was less than two metres away.

‘His daughter?’ he asked when Tanya had finished explaining.

She nodded, her lips tight.

‘Fuck,’ he said, breathing out.

Traffic was starting to increase, headlights creating a weird effect, catching the suspended water particles and refracting the light till it built up into an Impressionist on acid.

‘So what are we doing here?’ he asked.

‘Waiting for these guys to open up.’ She nodded to the shopfront they were standing outside. ‘We need to check something with them.’

Kees stared out into the fog. Tram bells clanged twice off to his left, and he could hear the crackle and fizz of electricity on the points. He turned to Tanya.

‘Look, about what we were discussing earlier—’

‘There’s nothing I can do, you know that.’

‘I know. All I’m asking for is a bit of time; I think I can straighten things out.’

‘Straighten things out? How are you going to do that? The woman’s dead—’

‘I don’t know anything about that. You know that.’

‘Thing is, the time she was killed you were doing what?’

‘This was what, Saturday morning? I was with that fuck of a witness Isovic.’

‘The one who escaped.’

‘Yeah, but—’

‘So unless he’s willing to back you up about the timings then … Look, I’m just working the worst-case scenario. Because you know that’s exactly what Smit’s going to do.’

Kees shook his head. He was beginning to wonder if any of it mattered.

‘I’ve got one lead to follow up on, and after that I’m going to have to report back,’ she said, staring out into the nothingness.

‘What’s the lead?’

She looked at him, held his gaze for a few moments before breathing out and looking around as if checking for something.

He could hear footsteps approaching.

‘I’m going to regret this,’ she said.

‘Regret what?’

She handed him a folded bit of paper.

‘You didn’t get this from me.’

Kees was about to unfold it when a figure appeared out of the fog and stopped right by them, a look of surprise on her face. Kees thought he recognized her, but couldn’t place it.

‘Desperate to buy a house?’ she asked, looking between them while she got her keys out. ‘Let me guess. You’ve just got married, you’re now looking to start a family, and you need a house to get started in?’

‘You know,’ said Tanya, ‘it’s uncanny just how wrong you are. But we still need to talk. I’m assuming you’re Doutzen de Kok?’

The woman nodded and started unlocking the door.

Inside, once de Kok had flicked the lights on, she invited them to sit at the chairs in front of her desk. The company was one of those who thought having funky designer furniture in bright colours made it look less like an estate agent’s.

Kees settled into the lime-green chair shaped like a cupped hand while Tanya took the hot-pink chair which was a pair of gaping, plump lips.

‘So you’re the cops who found my employee at the nightclub last night?’ she asked, sitting opposite them. She was wearing a suit, but the material was a bit shiny for Kees’ taste, and had very thin white vertical lines running through the dark-blue fabric.

White lines.

He hated the fact that his mind was so predictable.

Then he placed her. He’d met a prostitute on a case last year who, although younger and more glamorous, bore a strong resemblance to the woman in front of him.

And her surname had been de Kok as well. He wondered if Doutzen knew what her sister did for a living.

‘Yes,’ said Tanya. ‘And I want to know if any of these men have been in here.’

The woman took the photos Tanya offered and studied them. She shook her head and handed them back.

‘I haven’t seen them, but if you can leave these, I’ll show them to everyone else when they get in.’

‘I believe they were shown some properties. They were looking for farm buildings, industrial units, basically anything out of the way, non-residential. I’ll need a list of what they saw.’

De Kok turned to her computer, tapped away and then reached under her desk, where a printer was whirring.

‘Here’s what we’ve got,’ she said. ‘It’s not really our kind of thing, but there are a few. Most of these have been listed for over a year.’

Kees leaned over and looked at the sheets as Tanya held them. There were thirteen, all outside Amsterdam.

‘Thanks,’ said Tanya, getting up to leave. ‘And these are all still available; no one’s taken them?’

‘All free as of yesterday evening. And frankly, there’s not much chance of any of them flying at the moment.’

Kees and Tanya stepped outside, closing the door behind them.

‘So what now, we have to check these places out?’ said Kees.

‘Let me call Jaap first,’ she said. She pulled her phone out, but her arm stopped midway between her pocket and her head. Kees looked at her; she was staring at the estate
agent’s window. Then she put her phone away, and stepped back towards the door.

‘Hey,’ said Kees.

She ignored him.