Out of nowhere, another man appeared. Ben gave him no chance to raise his pistol. Instinctively, he threw the knife at his neck and then shot him right between the eyes. While the man fell to the ground, Ben hid behind a tree in a flash and crouched down. As he had expected, two men came running and screaming. While they stood over the bodies of their dead comrades, still wondering what had happened, Ben came out from behind the tree and shot both of them in the head at close range.
He took a breath and looked around, listening. The only sounds he heard came from some distance away. As he bent down to the bodies and searched their pockets for magazines, he kept an eye out and his ears open for more enemies. But there was no one left.
Ben knew Sonnenallee. When they were younger, this was the neighborhood that had once been considered the better one. This is where people wanted to live, to raise their children in a quiet neighborhood. Here everything was clean, tidy, perfect. So perfect that some people made fun of it. Secretly, however, one wanted to live here only too gladly, where one could step out in the evening without problems before the door. Here, the neighbors invited each other to barbecue parties and didn’t try to set your car on fire.
Mo and his family hadn’t exactly lived in the worst neighborhood, but they hadn’t lived in Sonnenallee either. Ben hadn’t cared about that. He had never expected to ever be taken into such a home as Mo’s family home. For him it had been paradise and Sonnenallee had been aspirational only because he wished it better for his adopted family, or whatever they were. No, wished for the best. They deserved the best.
Instead, Mo’s father died as a result of injuries inflicted on him by a couple of teenage half-breeds because he tried to stop them from beating a boy to death. And Mo was now dead, too. Murdered by some gangsters who apparently wanted to prevent Mo from bringing to light what Ahrend was involved in. And of course, Mo was right when he assumed that Anna was also in danger.
Ben had not been able to save Mo because he had hesitated too long. But he would save Anna. Come what may.
No retreat. No giving up. No mercy.
He watched the house and let his eyes glide over the area. Every car, every tree, every house was scrutinized by him before he moved on. He took advantage of every cover he could find without pausing in his movement. Instinctively, he took advantage of the conditions of the environment. His senses were all heightened.
You have to be invisible. The less they see of you, the less they can judge you. The days of open combat are over. Warriors operate in the shadows.
Although he couldn’t spot anyone, Ben crept around to the back of the building to the basement entrance that led to the garden. There were plenty of hiding places here that offered potential attackers protection from being discovered by him. Ben, however, could not discover anything.
Silently, he reached the cellar door, which was of course locked. He took out one of the knives, which was a military-style simple double-edged blade. Without thinking about what he had to do, Ben slid the blade between the door frame and the door. With a soft click, it opened and he slipped inside.
He looked for something to put in front of the door since he couldn’t close it. He pushed a small shelf, on which old paint cans and cachepots were stowed, in front of it and placed some buckets and brooms crosswise, which served him as an alarm system. Should anyone use the same entrance, this would not go unnoticed by him.
Use your environment. Everything can be useful. Every object is a weapon.
Ben put the knife away again and gripped the handle of his pistol, which was equipped with a silencer. He would have preferred another weapon, but here he had to be ready to react quickly to take out several enemies as effectively as possible.
As he entered the stairwell, the lights immediately came on. Motion detectors. Ben pressed himself against the wall, but nothing happened.
The stairwell was simply white. Everything was clean. The floor was not slippery and one could see from the basement to the top floor. Hiding would be so difficult, for him, but also for his opponents.
When he passed the front door, he did so with extreme caution. There was no indication that anyone had tampered with it, nor that anyone was nearby.
He crept up to the second floor, where there were only two apartment doors. The sign on the doorbell was small and made of brass, the letters barely legible, but Ben recognized the name.
He considered ringing the bell or breaking in, but then decided to push the button. The sound wasn’t loud, but to Ben’s ears, any noise was one too many. He had no choice, however, and had to take a chance.
If he had broken down the door, there was a chance that Anna might have mistaken him for a burglar or even a hired thug. The way Mo had explained Anna’s situation, Ben assumed that the young woman was expecting an unwelcome visitor. If she had any idea who Ahrend had gotten involved with, she knew that these people weren’t exactly subtle.
He rang the doorbell again and stood clearly visible in front of the peephole. He had only met Anna once before, but he hoped that Mo had written him down so that Anna wouldn’t call the police if she saw him standing in front of her door.
Ben listened and heard footsteps. Only softly, but clearly audible to him. He resisted the impulse to push the door open as soon as Anna opened it even a crack. It would certainly have been easy for him to simply kick it in, since most of them had only a simple curtain lock, which would be useless in opposing a direct use of force.
Anna opened the door and Ben immediately recognized that it had considerably more than just a padlock. Around here, that could only mean that she was either paranoid or had realized what kind of guys she might be dealing with. Most likely, her windows were similarly secured. Good for her. But tonight that wouldn’t be enough, since the men who were surely hunting her were more than just common burglars. Even a few more locks and the thickest security glass would not stop them.
Ben eyed Anna for a moment. She was wearing a gray tank top with a sports bra underneath along with red and black plaid pajama pants and white socks. Her hair was tied in a simple braid and her eyes looked as if she had slept through the night so far rather than really slept. It was probably not the first time this had happened today.
“Yes?” she asked hesitantly. “Ben? Am I right? Ben Becker? What are you doing here? Is something going on with Mo?”
Yes. It was something with Mo, but how could he explain it to her so directly here and now?
Yes, it’s something with Mo. He’s dead. But the blood on my hands and clothes is not his. And yes, he was shot, but it wasn’t me, even though I have a gun.
That wouldn’t sound very credible.
“You look terrible,” Anna observed, and to Ben’s great surprise, she opened the door. “What the hell happened to you?”
Ben considered lying. But that would damage the relationship of trust before it even existed.
“Mo was murdered,” he said.
Anna looked at him, stunned. “What?!”
Then she slapped her hands over her mouth and her eyes wandered back and forth. Tears were forming and Ben could tell she was on the verge of a breakdown.
“May I come in, please?”
When Anna did not respond, he pushed his way into the apartment and closed the door.
Anna looked at him again, searching for answers in his face. “Why?”
Ben took a breath. He knew they didn’t have much time, but he had to somehow get Anna to trust him and go with him. They weren’t safe here.
He noticed Anna looking startled at his bloody hands, as well as the knife in his belt. He had tucked the gun into the back of his waistband.
“Is the blood his?” Anna asked in a trembling voice.
“Not all of it. But probably some.”
Anna swallowed. “Did you...?”
Ben shook his head hastily. “No. He came back already badly hurt. I tried to stop the bleeding.”
Anna nodded as if in a trance. “And the other blood?”
“Came from whoever was chasing him.”
Anna swallowed. “What...? Why...? What were they chasing him for?”
Ben was silent for a moment. “He was at your computer in the branch because he thought he could find clues there about what Ahrend was blackmailing you with and what machinations he was involved in.”
Anna was aghast. “At the branch office? But why?”
“Because he wanted to protect you. He believed Ahrend was taking advantage of you and...”
“... that he was harassing me,” she added weakly. “Of course. That makes sense. I’m sure he believed that.”
Ben pulled out the piece of paper and handed it to Anna. “Here, he wrote this down.”
Carefully, Anna unfolded the note. The contents confused her even more. “This doesn’t make any sense. It’s just letters and numbers.”
Ben nodded. “A code. It’s how he used to encode notes he thought were important. With the right key, we can read it.”
Anna frowned but slowly understood. “Do you have the key?”
Ben nodded. “Yes. But that doesn’t matter right now. What matters is that he was worried about you when he died. He thought the men might be after you, too, and do something to you.”
Anna looked at him in panic. “Me? But...” She nodded. “Because I know too much. Ahrend wants to kill me because I might know too much.”
Ben nodded. “That’s what it looks like. And his men are probably on their way here right now.”
Anna looked around and began to pace apathetically up and down her small hallway. Suddenly she paused and seemed to think hard. “But Ahrend doesn’t have any men. He’s a banker.”
“They were, as far as I could tell, Russians.”
Anna seemed to realize. Then she nodded. “Russev.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Russev. Ahrend has connections to Russev. He’s like the resident Russian mob boss here. I don’t know if that’s true. But it would fit. An unscrupulous businessman, involved in all kinds of illegal mafias, is probably a better description. But he actually keeps a low profile.”
Ben took a breath. “Not today.” Anna nodded, then looked around again in near panic.
“They’ll come. I’m sure Ahrend told Russev to kill me.” She slapped her hands in front of her face and looked back at Ben. “But why did Mo send you? Why didn’t he call the police right away?”
Ben was silent for a moment. “He didn’t believe the police could protect you. His father was a policeman and he always had a very definite opinion about what the police could do in a case like this. Besides, Mo probably believed you might be involved in everything. That Ahrend had something on you and the police might then discover it.”
Anna leaned against the wall. All this was apparently too much for her. “But why you?”
Ben paused again for a moment. “He trusts me.”
Anna snorted. “To be able to protect me? From the Russian mafia? You’re a banker, for crying out loud!”
Ben couldn’t help a brief smile. “That’s what I told him.”
“And yet he sends you.”
Ben nodded. “Listen. We’ve got to get out of here. I’m your only chance to go underground right now. Put on something for moving well and, most importantly, running fast. And do it quickly. We’ve wasted way too much time already, but it’s important that you believe me.”
Anna smiled mirthlessly. “So I have no choice?”
Ben looked at her piercingly. “If you want to survive, no.”
Anna nodded.
“Please give me back the note.”
Anna looked at the paper and smiled sheepishly. “Excuse me.”
She handed the note back to Ben and then disappeared into one of the rooms.
Ben looked around. The back of his neck prickled, and he had the feeling that someone would come storming through the apartment door or window any minute now. In addition, he somehow still felt the need to follow Anna. But she would surely have little understanding if he entered the room where she was changing. So he confined himself to listening carefully for any suspicious noises.
Carefully, he approached one of the large windows, which during the day in summer certainly let in a lot of light and made the pastel-colored apartment seem even brighter. He liked the apartment. There were not many objects, but a lot of empty space between the furniture. Everything was new, most of the white simple but tasteful. There were no photos, but paintings of beautiful landscapes.
Of course, all this was irrelevant, because all that mattered to him was that he discovered potential hiding places for attackers or for himself, weak points and objects that could be used as weapons. All this happened automatically, without Ben having to think about it for long, instinctively.
When he stepped up to the window and looked out, he didn’t see how beautiful the location was either, only the strategic features. A large meadow the size of two soccer fields. A playground in the middle. Scattered trees at the edges. Behind it, the parking lot.
From here, it would be difficult to sneak up on them unnoticed. But if they had to get out, they would have an equally hard time. Then this played into the hands of possible attackers.
“Can you see anyone?” Anna wanted to know. She had put on athletic pants, sneakers, and a long-sleeve fleece jacket, over which she shouldered a small backpack, all dark. She tied a simple braid and appeared calmer than she had been a moment before.
Ben shook his head. “No. But that doesn’t have to mean anything. Do you have any weapons?”
Anna looked at him indignantly. “I’m a bank clerk. My weapon is a laptop!”
Ben smiled wryly. “Any combat experience?”
“Zumba?”
Ben shrugged. “Might even be useful. But I meant something else.”
Anna showed a pinched face. “Self-defense class for women. Had stopped once, but now started again.”
“Better than nothing.”
Anna was irritated. “Better than nothing? I thought it was good.”
“How many men were in the classes?”
“Well, none. It was a self-defense course for women, after all.”
“And you trained with them.”
“Of course. I always signed up when asked to fight.”
“With protective gear.”
“What are you getting at?”
“Are you often attacked by women in protective gear who want to rape you?”
Anna was silent.
Ben looked at her penetratingly. “The men who come after you are not women in protective clothing. And once they meet you, you’ll know what I’m getting at.”
With that, he looked out again and fixed on a point in the distance.
Anna folded her arms. “What about you? What experience do you have? Have you ever been in a real fight?”
Ben smiled. “I’ve had the odd altercation in the past.”
“I see, because you look like a milk boy.”
Ben’s tired smile widened. “Rule number one: never underestimate anyone.”
“It’s just because you’re supposed to be the one protecting me. And I don’t quite get why.”
Ben looked at her. “Did you trust Mo?”
Anna bit her lip at the mention of the name. “Yes. Of course.”
Ben nodded. “And he trusted me.”
Then his eyes fell on a small shelf lined with books lined up neatly. One caught his eye directly. He walked over and pulled it out. Yes, it was the book Fool on the Hill.
“This was a gift from Mo,” she said. “He said I should definitely read it.”
“Did you?”
Anna screwed up her face. “The story was nice. But I’m more into series.”
Ben nodded, then looked out the window. “They’re here!”
“What?!” Anna tried to step to the window, but Ben pushed her aside. Then he pointed outside. Cautiously, she looked in the indicated direction.
At first she could see nothing. Then, howe
ver, she made out some figures approaching the house and behaving conspicuously inconspicuous. Everything about them just screamed that they did not belong here.
“It’s going to look similar out front,” Ben observed.
“So where do we go now?”
“To the roof.”
Anna looked at him. “To the roof? Then that’s where we’ll be trapped, isn’t it? There’s nowhere to go from there!”
“Yes, there is. On the other roof.”
Anna’s eyes grew wide. “You’re kidding!”
Ben’s eyes were emotionless. “Mo’s dead. I’m not joking. You’re not going to die.”
Anna just nodded and her eyes filled with tears, which she wiped away. “Okay.”
“Ready?”
She laughed wanly. “Do I have a choice?”
“No.”
She shrugged her shoulders. “Then I’m ready.”
Ben nodded. “Good, then let’s go.”
With that, he pulled out a knife and held it in Anna’s direction, who raised her hands dismissively.
“What do you want me to do with this?”
“Use it. Aim for the soft areas of the body. Belly. Neck. Eyes. Genitals.”
Anna took it hesitantly and Ben turned, carefully opening the apartment door. Listening for any sound, he entered the hallway. Immediately the motion detector lights came on.
He ran to the stairs and did not turn around. He could hear Anna following close behind him. She might be afraid, but she also wanted to live. He certainly hadn’t convinced her completely, but he was her only option. She realized that she was really in danger now, more than ever before.
The stairs ended in a hallway that had several doors and one that officially led outside. Ben headed for it, but Anna held him back.
“It’s locked. Wait, I have the key.” With that, she took out a small bunch of keys, with five keys hanging from it. After a short search, she found the right one and opened the door.
Once they slipped through, Anna locked the door and looked back at Ben.
“Now what?”
They were on what appeared to be a rooftop terrace of sorts, used by several people. There was a Hollywood swing, various tables and garden chairs. There were also numerous plants that made everything look like a rooftop garden.
Ultimate Rage - Ragnarok (Thriller) Page 7