Beyond The Window: A Fast Paced Crime Thriller (Private Detective Heinrich Muller Crime Thriller Book 2)

by Robert Brown

  The train pulled into the station and the trio disembarked with a small crowd of tourists and locals. Britt went her own way, while Heinrich pulled up a list of hash bars on his phone.

  “Let’s get started,” he said.

  They headed down one of the main streets downtown, where a couple of the bigger cafés selling weed were located. A policeman walked by, heading in the other direction. He looked like a completely different species from the average New York cop—a big young guy with a shaved head and a round, jovial face plastered with a contented smile. He reminded Heinrich of a dumb, good-natured jock at his high school, one who got along with everyone and never picked on the nerds. Heinrich wondered how you said “galoot” in Dutch.

  “It’s outrageous that we can’t call on the police for help,” David fumed. “How can this trash be legal?”

  “No idea. Britt says a politician is trying to get it reviewed in parliament.”

  “Good. That doesn’t come soon enough to help us, though.”

  Heinrich stopped short, almost causing a collision with the woman walking behind him. She glared at him over her shoulder as she walked past.

  He paid her no attention. His mind raced with questions he couldn’t answer.

  If what these movie producers were doing was legal, why kill Wanda back in New York? Why try to kill him?

  What were they hiding?

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Three hours later, they had hit all the hash bars. No Casey. After Heinrich and David checked on the last one, they walked through a park, hoping to spot Arizona.

  They got a call from Britt. Heinrich put it on speaker phone so the preacher could be part of the conversation. They moved well away from any passersby.

  “She wasn’t at the screen test. Just some creepy guy who thought he’d be the top rather than me,” Britt told them. “They asked me something interesting, though. They asked if I was willing to do Cut and Paste.”

  Heinrich heard the strain in her voice. He paused a moment, then asked, “Did you say yes?”

  “Yeah.” Britt sighed. “Yeah, I did. They want me to start in two days.”

  “I’m not sure we have two days. Anders and his crew might decide to silence Casey and come looking for her. Plus there’s that murder rap. They can’t hide the body forever. They’re going to have to decide whether to dump it somewhere or call the cops on me.”

  “I don’t think they’ll do that,” David said. “They wouldn’t want the police involved. They’ll probably hide the body somewhere, along with the halberd. That way they can blackmail you if you come after them.”

  “Yeah.” Heinrich sighed. “I think you have a point there.”

  David nodded, his face sober. “In my line of work, I’ve gotten to know many criminals, reformed or otherwise. I’ve learned how they think.”

  Heinrich told Britt to meet them, then hung up.

  After they met, they had lunch and planned their strategy. There seemed to be nothing to do except continue searching the city and hoping they’d bump into Casey and Arizona. Heinrich could tell that David was growing impatient. He felt for the guy. Arizona could be getting exploited right that minute and here they were in a café, sipping coffee and eating sandwiches.

  Then Britt got a call that changed everything.

  She talked in Dutch for a minute, agreeing to something while giving the two men significant looks. Once she hung up, she glanced at the next table, where a pair of tourists was scrolling through their photos. She leaned forward.

  “Satyr Studios has invited me to a party tonight,” she whispered. “They want me to meet the cast and crew. They said I can bring a friend.”

  “Perfect.” David slapped his hand on the table. “We’ll go in there, grab my granddaughter, and leave this decadent country.”

  “Hold on a minute,” Heinrich said. “We have to think this through. If you go in there, Casey will recognize you. She’ll recognize me, too, for that matter.”

  “Not if we put you in a mask,” Britt said.

  Heinrich cocked an eyebrow. “What, like those gimps in the club?”

  “It’s the only way I can think of,” Britt said.

  Heinrich put his head in his hands. “I’m not paid enough for this shit.”

  “If it’s a matter of money Mr. Müller…” David began.

  Heinrich sat up straight. “It’s not. We have to save the kid and if this is what I have to do, I’ll do it.”

  “I’ll do it too,” David said after a slight pause.

  “There’s no BDSM shop here. I’ll have to go back to Amsterdam,” Britt said.

  “We don’t have time!” David objected.

  “The party isn’t until ten. It’s barely two now. I can get there, do the shopping, and get back before six.”

  “Thank God for small countries,” the minister said. He reached into his wallet. “How much do you need?”

  Heinrich caught a note of hesitation in his voice, like he didn’t entirely trust Britt to come back. Nevertheless, he was desperate enough to hand over four hundred euros when she asked for it.

  Britt pulled out her phone and went to the website of a bondage shop on Warmoesstraat. The two men watched as she scrolled down the headgear section.

  “These all cover your face. Which one would you like?” Britt asked.

  “That one with the spiked collar for me,” Heinrich said. “That way, they can’t strangle me. What about you, Mr. Murphy?”

  The minister looked pale. “What depravity! You’re not getting me in one of those!”

  “If you don’t, you won’t be able to come to the party. Casey will recognize you in an instant. You’ll need a full outfit, too. Britt, I’ll give you my room key so you can fetch mine.”

  David Murphy slowly shook his head. “I can’t. Lord forgive me, but I just can’t. I’ll guard the entrance and look out for trouble.”

  Heinrich let out a slow breath of relief. He hadn’t wanted David along anyway. The minister probably would have blown their disguise by freaking out the instant he saw Casey.

  “That’s a good idea, Mr. Murphy. We’ll need some backup. Were you ever in the Army or do you have any sort of combat training?”

  “No.”

  “Are you willing to use violence?”

  After a slight pause, he nodded.

  “All right,” Heinrich said. “I’ll get you something you can use. Britt, you better get going.”

  Once Britt had left, Heinrich went shopping. Pepper spray was illegal in The Netherlands, so he had to go primitive. He bought a pair of durable hiking socks, then went to a hardware store and bought a large number of ball bearings. He filled up the toe of each sock, twisted the ankle portion, and tied it off. Now they each had a crude sap.

  Heinrich found an isolated part of the river walk and they practiced hitting trees.

  “I feel like a juvenile delinquent,” David complained.

  “You’re hitting that tree something fierce.”

  “I’m imagining the faces of those perverts,” the minister said, his sap thudding into the tree again.

  “You’re getting the idea.”

  David glanced at Heinrich between hits. “So, this is how you make your living?”

  “Some cases are easier than others. In Poland, I got into a gun fight.”

  David stopped hitting the tree and stared at Heinrich. “What a terrible world you live in.”

  Heinrich shrugged. “We all live in the same world. It’s just that some people see the ugly parts clearly while others pretend they aren’t there. I’d rather see them and try to do something about them than stick my head in the sand.”

  “I agree, but I try to do it a different way,” David said, winding up for another hit at the tree.

  “I know. I’ve read about you. I’ve never had much use for religion. Too many hypocrites and people out for their own gain, just like in everything else. You’re the real thing, though.”

  “That’s very kind of you to say.”
The minister put the sap into his pocket, making it look like he had a giant erection.

  “Don’t mention it.”

  “I try to follow Christ’s teachings and he’s blessed me with a measure of success. But here I am with trouble in my own house.”

  “We can’t pick our family, Mr. Murphy.”

  David gave him a sympathetic look. “Like your grandfather?”

  “You do your homework, Mr. Murphy,” Heinrich whispered, giving the tree a hard strike.

  When Heinrich was a teenager, his grandfather, whom he’d never known, had sprung him from juvenile detention. His parents hadn’t given a damn. Grandpa Otto had treated him well, taught him his native language of German, and gave him a decent home. He’d turned Heinrich around. And then he’d been exposed as a Nazi war criminal. The publicity had killed him, and had left Heinrich embittered for a long time. Anyone who did a little digging online could find the connection between him and Grandpa Otto. Hell, there was even a Wikipedia page on the case.

  “Your grandfather’s crimes aren’t your fault, Mr. Müller. In the course of his research, my personal assistant didn’t find evidence of any other living family. Perhaps you keep that hidden. Considering the people you have to deal with, I’d hardly be surprised. Are you married?”

  “I prefer my own company. Come on, let’s search the hash bars again.”

  They walked along the river. The sunlight glittered on the rippled surface in the wake of a canal boat.

  “So, no family at all? No steady girlfriend? I think it might balance you out, if you don’t mind my saying.”

  “I do mind you saying, as a matter of fact,” Heinrich snapped.

  He was sorry as soon as the words left his mouth, not only for the rudeness, but for what it revealed about him.

  “Sorry,” Heinrich said. “My lifestyle doesn’t encourage long-term relationships. I mentor a kid, though. He’s as screwed up as I was. I don’t think I’d be anyone’s first or even fifth choice as a mentor for a teenager, but he doesn’t have anyone else.”

  “The Lord was wise to bring the two of you together. He’ll probably do you as much good as you’ll do him.”

  Heinrich didn’t know what to say to that, so he said nothing.

  They searched all afternoon, scouring the hash cafés and parks but finding nothing. David looked exhausted. No doubt he’d had a sleepless flight over, and the long day of walking and stress had visibly worn him out. Heinrich tried to get him to take a nap on a park bench or even check into a hotel so he could lie in bed for a couple of hours, but the minister would hear none of it. Instead, he got a strong coffee in one of the hash bars, looking wildly out of place amid all the local twenty-somethings and tourists smoking weed.

  While David drank his coffee, Heinrich wondered about Anders and his crew. There had to be more to them than what he was seeing— something that would make them kill.

  He remembered a similar case in the Ukraine a few years back. A film studio had made a series of nudist films featuring children. Considering how poor the Ukraine was, the producers had easily found parents willing to let their children prance in front of a camera naked if it meant food on the table. The films didn’t include adults and didn’t involve sexual situations, so they were legal and the authorities could do nothing. The film studio distributed all around the world, making money hand over fist until the Ukrainian cops had found an excuse to search the computers of the company president. When they did, they found a small amount of child porn. That was enough to throw him in jail and shut down the company. Significantly, he was never punished for the films he had made, only for the porn on his computer.

  There had been no violence in that case, not even any coercion, so why had Anders ordered a hitman to kill Wanda? That hitman had been an amateur—a ruthless amateur but an amateur nonetheless. Probably some local thug who had killed before and was willing to do so again for enough money. That meant they didn’t have the sort of connections to hire a professional.

  Whatever prompted them to kill, it was something they hadn’t expected. They’d been making legal movies and somehow gotten thrown into trouble that made them paranoid. Johan’s assertions that the company was completely above board were just bluster.

  Heinrich brought up Google Maps and checked the address of that night’s party. It was a little way outside the city. Like a lot of smaller European towns, Delft ended abruptly. There was a bit of sprawl along the main highway, but in other directions the city simply stopped, going from rows of houses and shops to open farm fields in the distance of a city block. The party was being held at a large farmhouse on a country road in the middle of a field, though only a mile from the last bus stop on the urban line. A canal ran less than a hundred meters from the farmhouse. Trees lined either side of it. Good; that would give them some cover. David could hide there and keep watch while Heinrich and Britt went inside.

  Inside to what?

  Heinrich had no idea.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  The quiet of the rural road was punctuated only by the whoosh of the occasional car speeding by, briefly illuminating the three figures walking along the shoulder. Delft lit the night sky to the west, the illuminated stone spires of its twin churches poking above the smaller buildings. To the east, the direction in which they headed, all was dark. The stars were out and the air was cool after a warm day.

  Heinrich felt on edge, and he knew the others did, too. His phone’s GPS told them they were almost there, that the farmhouse would soon be visible up ahead.

  “Time to change, I guess,” he said quietly.

  He stopped and pulled the fetish gear from the duffel bag he was carrying.

  “You’re going to change right here, by the side of the road?” David asked.

  “There’s no cover around here,” Heinrich replied, indicating the flat, open fields all around them.

  “At least walk away from the road a bit, newbie,” Britt said, nudging him.

  “Yeah, you’re right,” Heinrich said with a wry smile. “I’ve been hanging around the fetish community too long. It’s desensitizing me.”

  They walked a little way into a field, their shoes pressing into the soft earth.

  Heinrich changed quickly, then stuffed the sap down the front of his leather pants.

  “You’re big enough. You don’t have to compensate,” Britt joked.

  “Good Lord!” David muttered, turning his back.

  “How the hell do you know how big I am?” Heinrich asked her.

  “I peeked in the locker room.”

  Heinrich grinned. “Stare rape, eh? Just because you identify as a man doesn’t mean you have to take on the worst aspects of patriarchy.”

  As soon as he said it, he worried that he’d gone too far, that he’d made fun of her belief system. Britt didn’t get mad, though. She only laughed and slugged him on the shoulder.

  “Damn, you really are one of the guys,” he said. “You should meet the owner of my boxing gym. You two would get on like a house on fire.”

  “Quit fooling around. Let’s get going,” David grumbled, his back still turned.

  Heinrich donned the mask Britt had bought him. It was leather and fit snugly around his head. There were holes for his nose and mouth, and for his eyes, of course, but it still felt suffocating. Within a minute, sweat was beading on his face.

  Britt pulled out a length of chain and clipped the end to a loop on Heinrich’s collar. She led him down the country lane like a dog. David walked well ahead of them, as much to avoid seeing the scene as to make it look like he wasn’t with them.

  After a couple of minutes, the canal angled into view, cutting diagonally across a field to their right before paralleling the road on which they walked. David cut across the road and disappeared into the shadows of the trees.

  The farmhouse appeared ahead. Several cars and a van were parked in an open lot in front. A few lights shone through the curtained windows.

  A car sped past, illuminating th
em in its headlights. Heinrich felt a sudden spike of embarrassment at being led down the side of the road at the end of a chain. A man’s voice shouted something as the car moved away.

  “What did he say?” Heinrich asked.

  “He called you a pervert and a bitch.”

  “I’m learning more Dutch every day.”

  They walked up the gravel driveway. A muscular man stood outside the front door. He was smoking a cigarette but obviously standing guard. Britt addressed him in Dutch.

  “Hey. Remember me from the screen test? I brought my bitch.”

  Wonderful. I get to use that word already, Heinrich thought. I hope this damn case is over soon.

  “Yeah, I remember you.” The man’s smile had no warmth. “Go on in.” He opened the door and they passed through a short hallway into a large living room. The building looked at least a century old, with stone walls and thick roof beams. Rustic furniture and a large oak coffee table took up much of the room. Several people lounged there, mostly young and many in fetish gear. Two more stood by a wet bar at the far end of the room.

  Britt stopped short. A second later, Heinrich realized why.

  They were all men.

  The room was silent as they all turned to look at Britt and Heinrich. Those holding glasses set them down. Quite clearly, Heinrich heard the front door open and close, and then a bolt slide shut.

  The entire room exploded into action.

  As everyone leaped to their feet, Heinrich picked up a heavy glass ashtray on a nearby table and threw it with all his strength at the nearest man. It hit him in the temple and he fell back on the sofa.

  Heinrich didn’t have time to see if the man was down for good because he had to dodge a beer bottle thrown at his head. Britt let go of his leash and uncoiled the bullwhip from around her waist. Before she could finish, she had to slug a guy rushing her. He dropped to the floor.

  Heinrich unclipped the chain leash from his collar and swung it at two men coming at him. He missed, but they both backed up. A glance one gave over Heinrich’s shoulder warned him of danger. He ducked and swung at the same time. A knife whipped through the air an inch above his scalp, and his chain wrapped around the leg of his new assailant.