Life Slowly Faded

by Kieran Double

  “Not long. The longer he leaves it, the more we will be able to protect Susie. He knows that. I’d say a day, maybe two at most. They’ll need guns, and transport. That’ll take time to gather.”

  “He’s on a suicide mission. We’ll get him,” said Muller.

  “Really? You’ve forgotten one thing. Merkel might be a man on a mission, but he’s a smart man on a suicide mission”

  “Jesus. You were always such a pessimist, weren’t you?”

  “What can I say? Someone has to keep your mania in check. Been doing alright with Walker here, though.”

  “‘Course, he has, Phillips. You know me, always calm,” said Walker, smiling for the first time since Sylvie Merkel had been killed. He looked at me. “Phillips, why do you have so many guns on you? Isn’t one enough?”

  “No, it’s not,” I said, smiling. “I have three on me. My Glock, my Colt Python, and a Ruger down my sock. Not to mention the Winchester Model 70 in the trunk of the Jag. Not loaded, of course. I’m told it if was, it’d be illegal. And we’d never want that, would we?”

  Schlaukopf walked up to our desks. “Come into my office. We need to talk.”

  “CSI has nearly finished with the Merkels’ apartment. We haven’t found much. There wasn’t a laptop. The iCloud was empty. Everything deleted. But… we did find a folder in the Merkels’ wardrobe. Its contents were…. Interesting.”

  “Well, what was in the folder?”

  “Pictures. And a handwritten letter.”

  “What pictures? Damn it! Schlaukopf, tell me!” I demanded angrily.

  Schlaukopf didn’t say a word, just let a few of the pictures fall onto the desk. They all showed the same thing, from different angles. The image of that thing had haunted my dreams for the last two years. Annie. My Annie, all covered in blood, red-black blood that spread in a puddle of gore, droplets spreading between the kitchen tiles. I wretched, as always when I saw it, though nothing left my gullet. But this time, I did cry with sorrow, but with joy.

  “We’ve got a lead!” I shouted, after all this time. “Is it enough to convict?”

  “Probably, but you don’t want to convict him, do you? I’m deputizing you, Mr. Phillips.”

  “I don’t want to be deputized, Schlaukopf.” Why I bothered, I’m not entirely sure. The look in my eyes must have contracted anything I said. Police corruption… at least I was on the right side this time.

  “Tough luck, you don’t have a choice,” said Schlaukopf, standing up. He walked around his desk. “I’m doing this to protect you, Marty. And you’ll just have to understand that. The path you’re taking… Annie wouldn’t want it, but now that you’ve chosen it, I’ll do everything in my power to protect you”

  “You make it sound like I’m doing something stupid,” I said, trying to arrange my face in such a way that this might seem plausible. My voice seemed strangely high.

  “Not yet. But I recognize that look. You’re rabid. Killing Merkel won’t bring her back.”

  “Nothing will, Schlaukopf. I get that. Trust me, I do. But that bastard deserves to die for what he’s done; to the women in the book, to his wife, to Susie, and to Annie. There is nothing some stupid judge and jury can do to change that. Merkel is guilty, of everything. There is no excuse for his crime. No money earned. No one protected, no vengeance taken. It causes only pain. And it’s about time he realizes what that feels like” I said, then my tone hardened, attempting to go back to normal. But it was cracked. “The letter?”

  “Written by Mrs. Merkel.”

  ‘Dear Mr. Phillips,

  If you’re reading this, I’m dead. I’m sorry about your wife. Michael told me about it at the time. I thought it was funny, laughed even. He told me everything. I’m sorry. I’ve changed now. Look after my little Susie, Mr Phillips.

  Yours Sincerely

  Sylvia Wolfermann’

  “Oh, that’s cute. I’m going, Captain. See ya around,” I said, walking out of the room.

  I sat in the Den for a few hours that night. The barman, Schlaukopf’s cousin, was a Fuchsmann too. I should have known. The Fox’s Den. Jesus Christ, they had a sense of humor. Walker came in, sometime around nine. He sat beside me. “Beer please.”

  “I’m sorry for the way I acted yesterday, Phillips. I didn’t know…it was her anniversary” he said, sipping his beer. “Wil told me last night.”

  “Yeah, well, life’s tough, Andrew,” I muttered, taking a sip of my bourbon. “You of all people know that.”

  Walker raised his eyebrows.

  “Wil told me there was trouble at home, after a bit of squeezing. No details. He’s very loyal to you, after only two years,” I said, trying not to sound sore. “We were together seven years, me a rookie at the start. And he wasn’t far out of the blocks either, two years. His old partner had just died, heart attack. Funny, he helps keep us both together, and yet dishes the dirt on us to the other. He’s one of the strangest men I know. The best too, but that’s beside the point.”

  “‘Suppose it is,” said Walker, taking another sip of his Bud. “You remember when we had that bust up. Oh, god, it must have been four years ago. Annie comes in – Wil called her – and she marches over to me and slaps me straight across the face. I laughed. There’s something about you, Phillips. Something funny. That whole thing was a joke anyway. Just some fooling around. Sometimes I wonder whether we’d be a good team.”

  “Most of the time, I’d say we would be. Just when times are tough, we’d butt heads too often. With Muller in the middle, I wouldn’t worry too much. He’ll make us work.”

  “I’m not so sure about that.”

  “Really? I mean Muller manages to somehow stay detached from everyone, as if he’s trying to stay attached to everyone. He seems so shut off and distant from the whole thing.”

  “He looked close enough to your sister. Last time I saw him, there wasn’t an inch between them.”

  “You peeping at Ashley kissing your partner? No wonder the wife’s being a bitch.”

  “That’s the worst part; I’m not even sure she is. I love her, and the children. But this job…”

  “You can’t let go, even when you go home. Because if you did, then you wouldn’t be doing your job properly. There is no time off. They don’t get that. You know, that’s the only thing we ever used to fight about; work. She was a middle-school teacher. They weren’t her kids, as much as she loved them. She could forget about it when she got home. All of it. I couldn’t. I’d always see the bodies. Now it’s just the same one, over and over again. Work and love combined. And it’s just as shit as when they were separated.”

  “If it comes to it,” said Walker, standing up. “I’ll leave Merkel for you. He’s yours. And I won’t stop until you can put a bullet in his head.”

  Walker left. I stayed for a few more minutes, before leaving myself.

  I sat up reading the report again. Annie wouldn’t like what I was doing, but since when had I cared what other people wanted? Even people I loved. I thought about the day I found her dead, murdered in her own home. Savagely beaten, more like a slab of tenderized meat than a thirty-year-old woman. The wife of a police officer. A good person. And there had been nothing I could do, nothing to bring her back or fill the hole she left in my heart.

  Even now, I remember my confusion as I called out her name. “Annie! Annie! Where are you? Don’t play tricks on me” The front door was locked. That was odd. I put my key in, turned it. Still no Annie. For a second, I thought she’d run out on me, like she’d promised. But I dismissed that notion. She wouldn’t have done it like this. Not my Annie. I saw the blood spreading between the tiles, congealing. Her clothes had been thrown all over the place. There she was. My wife was lying there, in nothing but a pool of her own blood. But she was still alive, fighting.

  “Marty,” she croaked. “I’m dying.”

  “Sush! Be quiet!” I said, holding her bloody hand. “You’re going to be alright, sweetie.”

  “I thought you were th
e…” she began.

  “…pessimist…”

  I held her hand, as the life slowly faded from her. The end was near. I knew it. Just didn’t want to admit it to myself. I picked up the phone. “Muller! It’s Annie! She, ah… someone hurt her. Get here as soon as you can. Call an ambulance!”

  They arrived soon afterward, pronounced her dead on the sidewalk. I cried shamelessly and they gave my useless looks of pity. Pity! What did pity ever do for anyone? Did pity complete souls? No, it rips them open. No one ever understands that, not until a darkness falls over them. What was the point living without her? She was everything. Why I got up in the morning, why I went to bed at night. And now she was gone. Just like that. With a click of the fingers.

  I could have lived without her. She could have left me for another man or a woman and I would not have cared, even if I never saw her again. The knowledge that she was gone and that no one would hear her laugh again… that knowledge was unbearable. I pulled the Glock from my belt, placing it against my temple. What was the point living if she was gone from the world? How could someone so strong be gone? I was weak. I did not deserve to live.

  “Marty, no!” Ashley shouted, but I’d popped the magazine out already.

  I remember the look the investigating officers gave me. Walker and Edwards. A feisty twenty-something and a near-retirement old-timer. They were suspicious. Why not? Cops are human. And the husband’s always the first suspect. I was a drunk even then. I’ve always drunk too much, but after my father died, a year before Annie, it got worse. Perhaps I’d had a little too much to drink. Killed my wife and tore her to shreds with a knife, like some wild animal. Now I was vaguely remembering it.

  Or maybe seven years staring at crime scene pictures had gotten to me. Maybe I had decided to try something out on my own wife. But as much as I, and they, to a certain extent, wanted me to be guilty, it just didn’t add up. I’d been at The Fox’s Den for the last three hours. Annie had only got home two and a half hours before. I couldn’t have done it.

  It was then, in that moment, that I picked up my cell and dialed Schlaukopf. There was something I could do and I was going to do it. Damn the consequences. I had to something now. “Hey, Captain. Look, about Susie. I was thinking… do you think Susie can come over here? To stay…”

  8

  Children

  Then she took it, and went to her mother’s grave and planted it there; and cried so much that it was watered with her tears; and there it grew and became a fine tree.

  (Ashputtel/Cinderella)

  I was still reading the damn report when Susie came in. Trying to expel the pictures from my mind, I said, “Susie! Good to see you.”

  “You too, Marty,” she said, hugging me. She put down her little travel bag and collapsed on the couch next to me.

  “I think it’s time that we go to bed, Susie. You’ve got school in the morning, and I need to find your father.”

  Susie just nodded, then looked at the picture of Annie and I. “She was your wife?”

  “Yeah,” I said stiffly.

  “I’m sorry for you. She was murdered?”

  “She was,” I said, gulping dryly. “We think your father killed her, as revenge for my sister hunting his friends.”

  Susie looked at the ground. “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t punish the child for the sins of the father and all that. Your mother left a note and some pictures. It should be enough to get a conviction, but I don’t care. He did it, and I know he did.”

  Susie nodded, going into my room. She called out, “Do you have another bedroom?”

  “No.” Shit. I hadn’t thought of that. It seemed such as small detail in the grand scheme of things. “I’ll sleep on the couch. You take the bed.”

  “But Marty…”

  “No. We’re not arguing about this. You take the bed. End of story.”

  She didn’t protest any further.

  “Marty! Get up will you!”

  I moaned, half rolling over on the couch. “It’s six o’clock in the morning, Susie.”

  “I’m serious,” she continued, as I felt her jumping on top of me. “Get up!” she said, punching me.

  “Alright. Alright. I’m getting up,” I said, falling off the couch.

  After I scrambled to get dressed, I ran around the kitchen looking for the cornflakes. Then I realized that Susie had already made me breakfast; black pudding, white pudding, bacon, fried egg, sausages, pancakes, toast and coffee. “How many people are you planning to feed?”

  “Just the two of us,” she said giggling, sitting down. “I thought I might treat you, after how nice you were to me.”

  “Thanks, Susie. It means a lot.” I hadn’t eaten a proper breakfast since Annie had died and even then she had had to force it down my throat half the time.

  “You’re clean shaven,” muttered Muller, when he saw me.

  “I am?” I said, feeling my jaw. “Apparently I have, must have been reflex. I dunno. Where’s Walker?”

  “He’s taking some time off. Sort out the marriage. We’ll be working this alone.”

  “Shame. When we’re not butting heads, Walker’s actually a good detective.”

  “Really? There must be something wrong with you,” Muller said, laughing.

  “There are many things wrong with me, Muller,” I muttered, perhaps inaudibly.

  “Sure you don’t want to go in the E-Type,” I said, admiring her. It was a beautiful car, red, with a convertible roof.

  “Marty,” sighed Muller. “According to protocol, I’m supposed to be in a Department vehicle while working.”

  “Screw protocol, Wil,” I said, revving the Jag’s engine. “Hop in.”

  He relented, hopped in next to me. I laughed. Just like old times. Wil and I on the road. Minus Annie. And that still left a huge hole.

  We visited Sylvie Merkel’s parole officer, a plump aging woman. I led. “When did you first meet Mrs. Merkel?”

  “A few months ago,” answered the parole officer. “She was released from prison back in July, for assault. She’d served six months.”

  “Did she violate her parole at any stage?”

  “Not that I know of. She was trying to change herself, or at least that’s the impression I got,” Merkel’s parole officer continued. “For her daughter, Susie, she said. To be honest, I had more trouble with the husband than I did her.”

  Muller raised his eyebrows. “Mr. Merkel was here? How many times did he come? What did he say?”

  “Yes, he was here. About three times, I think. He threatened to kill me, said I was giving her funny ideas.”

  “That fits, I suppose. Thank you for your time,” I said, standing up and putting my notepad away.

  “We’ll call you if we need anything else,” added Muller.

  On the way back, Muller’s cell rang. “We’re heading there right away, Sir,” Muller said into the phone.

  “Going where?”

  “5th Avenue,” answered Muller “Someone matching Merkel’s description stole a van.”

  “Right in our backyard. Jesus, he’s really trying to piss us off.” I’d been heading back to Headquarters anyway, but I pushed the Jag harder.

  “Wolfvolk are cocky bastards, Marty. You better get used to it.”

  “Actually, on that, how do you kill them? Susie said just shoot them a lot or in the head.” I’d been thinking about that for a while.

  “That’d work, but the best way, the traditional way, is to cut their heads off. Same thing with limbs. They might be able to heal ridiculously fast, but they can’t regenerate lost limbs. Still, it’s hard to get near enough to do that and suspicious when the authorities find the body. Wolfvolk can have twice the strength of an average man, and they love running once they’ve changed. Not to mention, they stay in packs. A deer slug to the head should do it. But, yes, little Susie was largely right; when it comes to Wolfvolk, keep shooting till you run out of bullets. It’s the only way to make sure they stay down.”


  “They stay in packs? Susie mentioned something about the other day. She said there were some Lowenvolk and Reise in her father’s pack.”

  “She did?”

  “Yeah. Is that bad?” I had heard something in Muller’s voice that only rarely appeared; fear.

  “It is. Lowenvolk are more organized that Wolfvolk, and Reise… they’re nearly impossible to kill. 20 gauge shotgun might do it, but practically nothing else.”

  “Oh, brilliant…”

  The scene that greeted us on 5th Avenue was frantic. The news vans had arrived before we did. Reporters badgered me especially, as I walked towards the crime scene. I suppose I had been something of a minor celebrity back in the days before Annie’s death. Muller and I had always gotten the big nasty cases for some reason, and it wasn’t skill. Perhaps it was just my friendship with Captain Schlaukopf. Publicity after Annie had contributed too.

  “What happened?” I asked a nearby uniformed officer.

  “A man matching your suspect’s description stole a black van, about half an hour ago,” answered the uniformed officer. “It was caught on CCTV. He held up a sign, and said, and I quote, ‘I’m getting my daughter back, Phillips.”

  “Merkel’s idea of sending a message,” said Muller.

  “Received loud and well,” I muttered darkly. “Show us the footage.”

  “That’s definitely him,” I said, pointing at the screen. Merkel had hotwired the van, then held up the sign. “What you think he’s doing? Preparing for a raid?”

  “Yeah. This doesn’t look good. If he comes for Susie, I’m afraid there’s not much we can do. Merkel’s men are professional and experienced men. We’ll have to get protection for her. There’s no way we can just leave you to protect her alone.”

  “Is that supposed to be an insult?”

  “No, Marty. Look, I know you think you can take on the world. But think about this clearly, about Susie’s safety. You could probably take Merkel, but ten of them, no way. Don’t do that to her.”

  “Fine, but those unis won’t be that much use. You know what they’re like. Nervous, jumpy.”