For seven agonising minutes, they squatted behind an out-of-control leylandii hedge, screening the front garden of a neighbour. Checking they had their passports – faked ID from dearly departed Danny, in the Deenens’ case. Double-checking the flights.
Then, just as a beat-up Toyota Previa drew up with its Asian driver full of apology and M25 traffic information, the regal bulk of the 7 Series turned into the road, slowly gliding towards them.
CHAPTER 47
Amsterdam, above The Cracked Pot Coffee Shop, much later, then Sloterdijkermeer allotments, then, even later, Van den Bergen’s apartment
It was already dark outside. There was an eerie pink glow in the sky, where the dense, low-hanging clouds seemed to reflect the red lights of neighbours, plying their wares in the windows of the surrounding houses.
‘I ain’t staying here,’ Letitia said, wrinkling her nose at the shabby room with its gabled ceiling.
‘Just be thankful we’re all still alive,’ George said, deliberately keeping quiet about the second coming of the BMW 7 series, just as they had been clambering into the taxi. A miraculous coincidence of biblical proportions, where an identical car had been the wheels of a local dealer, rather than Bloom’s black-clad hitman-for-hire. ‘It’s just for a couple of nights until we sort something better out. Think of it as a holiday.’
‘They all on the game, then?’ Tinesha asked, peering out of the window at the scene on the other side of the canal.
Patrice giggled beside her. ‘Look at her!’ He pointed to a statuesque blonde, coquettishly pouting down at a group of young men who were standing by the canal’s edge. She beckoned them to her, naming her price using her fingers. The men sized her up, as though she were erotic meat hanging in a butcher’s window; deciding if her flesh by the pound represented good value for money.
‘Yep,’ George said. ‘Every time you see closed curtains round here, chances are someone’s screwing behind them. Same shit goes on here as any other big city in the world, except the Dutch don’t try to dress it up. A turd rolled in glitter might be shiny, but it’s still a turd.’
‘Patrice!’ Aunty Sharon said. ‘Cover your ears, bwoy!’ She bit her lip uncertainly, eyes roving over the scratched old furniture: the sagging double bed; the chaise longue that had been patched up badly; the thin, office carpet covered in stains. ‘You lived here? Serious? You?’
George nodded and smiled wistfully. Bed springs squeaking in Inneke’s room below. The battered table where she had sat and written essays for her politics course at the university. That glorified bedsit above The Cracked Pot Coffee Shop held both good memories and bad. ‘Nobody will come looking for you here. Not after all this time. And Jan’s a good guy. He promised me the bedding has all been done on a hot wash. Sit tight. Smoke some weed downstairs. I’ll be back in the morning.’
Eyeing Piet Deenen’s scabbed, florid face beneath the street light, Van den Bergen touched his own skin, wondering if the bacteria that were clearly eating this man alive were airborne. Could he become contaminated? Gabi started to cough, a rumbling, painful-sounding affliction. As though this were some strange mating ritual between rough sleepers, Piet started to cough too, then spat something almost solid onto the thinning layer of snow that covered one of the Sloterdijkermeer allotments.
‘Sweet Jesus,’ he said, glaring at the offending body fluid. ‘Cover your mouths! And don’t dare spit on my bloody plot. You could have tuberculosis.’
‘I haven’t got tuberculosis,’ Piet said, shivering.
‘How the hell do you know? You could contaminate my soil.’
‘I’m on antibiotics!’ Piet looked back at Van den Bergen, took a packet of tablets from his pocket, and waved it around like a white flag.
‘Just keep walking, will you? My cabin’s next on the left. And I’ve got a doctor friend of mine coming to look you both over in the morning. You’re a mess! I don’t know what you were thinking.’
Gabi stopped dead in her tracks on the pathway and scowled at the Chief Inspector. ‘We were looking for our children, or had you forgotten?’
Van den Bergen sighed and ushered her onwards. The public thoroughfare through the allotments was not the place for an argument, even if it was currently deserted. And besides, Gabi looked like she was only days away from starving to death. He didn’t have the heart to curry confrontation with a woman who had given up everything and lost so much more.
Unlocking his cabin, he checked over his shoulder to reassure himself that their clandestine retreat had gone unnoticed. But it was near midnight – outside the official opening times for the complex. If there was ever a place where two fugitives could slip into hiding unnoticed, it was Sloterdijkermeer by night, when the ground was still covered with snow. He herded the couple inside the freezing box.
On the potting table were bundles.
‘I put together some camping gear. It should keep you comfortable enough,’ he said, unfurling one of the sleeping bags: Tamara’s, from a time when she was still young enough to go camping with her old dad and actually enjoy it. ‘There’s a fan heater, but it’s old. Make sure you switch it off for a bit when it starts to smell.’ He fished out a bright orange heater from under the table, plugged it in, ignoring the disconcerting stink of an impending electrical fire that immediately permeated the cabin.
Gabi wrinkled her nose. ‘Are you trying to kill us?’
Van den Bergen smirked. ‘You could spend the next few weeks in the cells, if you like. I’m sure Kamphuis and Hasselblad will be pleased to know you’ve come back from the dead. Especially if Hasselblad is, as you say, in cahoots with this Gordon Bloom.’
From inside his backpack, Van den Bergen pulled out his large Thermos flask, which George had bought him. A bulky tinfoil parcel.
‘Something hot to drink and some sandwiches to keep you going. You have to stay put. Don’t go wandering off, will you?’
‘What choice do we have?’ Piet asked.
‘You’ve murdered four men,’ Van den Bergen said, a wrenching sensation in his ageing viscera. He was torn between feeling he should arrest these takers of lives, and the agreement he had reached with George that he should keep them under wraps until they knew more. ‘I’m locking you in. Try anything funny and you’re behind bars at the mercy of my superiors.’
‘What if we need to get out in an emergency?’ Piet asked.
‘What if there’s a fire?’ Gabi’s shrunken face crumpled with concern.
Glancing at his unreliable fan heater, Van den Bergen merely shrugged. ‘Saves you the job of burning in hell, doesn’t it?’
Driving through the silent streets of Amsterdam’s outskirts, from the allotments to his apartment, Van den Bergen revelled in the thrill of anticipation. George would be waiting for him. Danger had brought his young lover back into town, ahead of schedule. Tonight, his cold, cold bed would be warmed by her body. Didn’t the sun stream through the French doors of his patio a little brighter when she was there?
For a moment, with the car’s engine purring, the Smashing Pumpkins buzzing on his stereo and the moon shining onto the glittering overnight frost that had settled on the bonnets of parked cars lining the sides of the road, he imagined he had it all. Piet Deenen under lock and key. An intelligent, beautiful woman who loved him. A grandchild, growing healthy and strong inside his daughter’s belly. The possibility that he could vanquish his professional enemies once and for all. Then, he realised how ridiculous that sounded. The Deenens would escape and it would be his fault. He and George would inevitably argue because he was the king of self-sabotage. Tamara might lose the child or it would be born looking exactly like Numbnuts, complete with a ridiculous, overgrown beard. Hasselblad and Kamphuis would take him down, if not out entirely.
His hip began to ache. His abdominal scar throbbed. His throat stung as stomach acid barged its way up his gullet. Business as usual.
With the aching legs of the unfit and the heavy heart of the middle-aged, he climbed the stairs. A pinpoint of light emitt
ed through the spyhole in his front door revived his spirits. George would be sitting on the sofa in the living room, legs tucked beneath her, playing with one of her corkscrew curls, a bottle of wine already open. Yes, this was going to be a good night after all.
Key in the lock, he walked inside and smelled cabbage and sickly perfume. Out-of-place aromas. Had George been trying to cook?
Kicking off his shoes, he made his way down the hall to the source of both light and smell. There, on his sofa, lay a woman reminiscent of George, though it was not George. A large, older woman he had glimpsed only briefly two years ago. Sitting at a table in a cheap chain pub, clutching a wine glass, wearing a fun fur that had made her look like a mountain lion with an extreme manicure.
‘This is a fucking uncomfy set-up, man,’ Letitia said, wiggling her toes at him. ‘Thought you was senior. Don’t they pay you enough to get proper fucking furniture?’ Cheap floral perfume wafted towards him as she arranged herself the length of the sofa.
But the smell of cabbage came from his left, near the windows. There, seated primly in an armchair ,was Marie, laptop on her knee, files spread all over the floor.
‘Hi, boss. I’ve already accessed the system of one of Bloom’s companies,’ Marie said, hooking her lank hair behind her ear. Fingers a blur, as she tap-tapped her way deeper into the ether. ‘Fashionista Limited. Buys and sells clothing from the Far East to supermarkets across Europe.’
George emerged from Van den Bergen’s kitchen, clutching a cafetiere of coffee and four cups, wan with fatigue, or perhaps anxiety. Who knew? No kiss hello. No hug on offer. No smile to warm the place, though by the feel, she, or more likely her ghastly mother, had cranked his heat up to tropical. Top button of George’s jeans undone. A telltale empty bag of Croky chips on the coffee table said she had had dinner without him.
‘Grab a seat,’ she said, though every seat in his living room had been taken. ‘You’re not going to believe what we’ve already found!’
CHAPTER 48
Amsterdam, Van den Bergen’s apartment, later still
‘See these claims for business expenses?’ Marie said, turning the laptop towards Van den Bergen. She turned the screen away again before he had even had chance to put his glasses on. ‘There’s a company car, expensive dinners in high-end restaurants. All Amsterdam. A golf-club membership.’
Perching uncomfortably on the arm of George’s chair, Van den Bergen shot surreptitious glances in Letitia’s direction. Nobody had yet explained why she was there. Hadn’t George said she would install her family at The Cracked Pot for a couple of days until a secure hotel had been sorted out?
‘Are you listening, Paul?’ George said.
Flick, flicking through the channels with clickety-click nails prodding the buttons of the remote control, Letitia tutted loudly. ‘Your telly is shit. Anyone ever tell you that?’ She flung the remote onto the coffee table. ‘You got anything drink? I could go a rum. Brandy, if you ain’t got that.’ She clasped her fat neck. ‘I’m so thirsty. It’s like a desert in here, now I put the heating on. And flying dehydrates you, you know.’ She slapped her stomach, which made a hollow noise. ‘How about we order a pizza?’ She jerked her thumb at George. ‘She gave me a shitty handful of crisps, but I’m still fucking starving.’ Examining her nails, the one on her index finger shorter than the rest, she exclaimed, ‘Shit. I broke a fucking nail drying my hands on that piece of cardboard you call a towel, hanging in your bathroom. Seriously, man. You call this police protection? Cos you ain’t protecting my best interests. Know what I mean?’
‘Can it, Letitia,’ George said, eyes narrowing as her irritation clearly mounted. ‘By rights you should be on the other side of town with Aunty Sharon. This is police work.’
Hands in the air, Letitia’s eyebrows disappeared into her hairline. ‘I weren’t sharing no bed with that fat cow. She farts in her sleep. Always did when we was kids. Stank like a box of rotten eggs. They used to call her Shaz the Spaz at school, cos Dorothea Caines reckoned she had a spastic colon.’ She laughed heartily, her ample bosom heaving.
‘You’re so unpleasant. Did you get lessons when you were a kid?’ George asked, diverting her attention from Marie’s laptop to glower fiercely at her mother. No response beyond a curled lip. ‘And you’re well mean to Aunty Sharon. I don’t even know why you’ve been staying at hers anyway. Perched on the sofa like a fucking vulture. Eating her out of house and—’
‘Enough!’ Van den Bergen stood abruptly, resenting being made to feel an interloper in his own place. He could tell that Letitia was a woman used to dominating proceedings, manipulating people until their choices suited her agenda. But he would not bend to this woman’s will. He had met her kind before. He had been married to her kind, hadn’t he? ‘Letitia. You can stay here for tonight but I’ll have a car take you back over to the coffee shop tomorrow morning.’
‘Nah. I don’t fucking think so, lanky lover boy,’ she replied, looking him up and down with a disparaging grin, as though he were a tragi-comic side show in a human circus.
‘The spare bedroom is through here,’ he said, conceding no ground, using the same firm voice he reserved for angry relatives visiting their incarcerated drunk and disorderly loved ones. ‘I’ll show you. This way, please.’
Letitia rolled onto her side and grabbed her cigarettes from her handbag, which was lying next to her on the floor. ‘Sofa suits me better. I can watch telly and listen to yous, innit? I didn’t give up my life to come to Amsterdam to get bored to death, did I?’
Feeling George’s eyes on him, Van den Bergen chose his words with care.
‘George, Marie and I are discussing a live case, where the people involved pose an immediate threat to your safety. You may not listen to us. We are not here for your entertainment, Ms Williams-May.’ He saw with some satisfaction that this puffed-up armchair-despot was visibly deflating. ‘This is my apartment. I didn’t invite you here. I doubt George brought you along for the ride willingly.’
George shook her head, closing her eyes to emphasize her innocence.
‘I can only assume you invited yourself,’ he continued. ‘So, you will leave first thing tomorrow and await my instructions at The Cracked Pot Coffee Shop. Follow me to the bedroom. Now, please. And I forbid smoking in my place. If you want to smoke, you can spend the night on the patio. It’s only going to be around minus one tonight.’
With Letitia out of earshot, Van den Bergen perused the Fashionista accounting software Marie had hacked into. Other records listed with Companies House in the UK showed the same name cropping up on the Board of Directors no fewer than six times – six separate businesses that operated as subsidiary concerns in the Bloom Group, showing six lots of business expense claims by the same person over a period of some ten years.
‘Mieke Hasselblad,’ Marie said, looking to George and Van den Bergen for a reaction with bloodshot, blue eyes.
‘Hasselblad’s wife,’ Van den Bergen said, allowing a wry smile to flick the corners of his mouth upwards. ‘Jesus. Bloom was telling the truth. He is in bed with the Chief of Police.’
‘What are we going to do?’ George asked, rubbing his forearm. ‘I mean, Bloom’s a rich businessman and involved in politics. A toff and a backbencher. He’s got legitimate business interests over here, as well as in London. Maybe Hasselblad doesn’t have a clue that Bloom runs an organized criminal empire as some kind of macabre hobby.’ She chewed her lip. ‘I mean, is that likely?’
Van den Bergen shook his head, thumbing the iron filings of his stubble. The clock on the wall in the kitchen said 2.30 a.m. His stomach was growling noisily, but that could wait.
‘This is a mess.’ He ran his hands through his thick white hair, considering his options, the jeopardy George was in, what to do with Jack and Mrs Frost, ensconced in his allotment cabin, their children still missing … ‘George, you speak to as many convicted sex offenders as you can.’
‘I’ll cross check the Dutch sex offenders list with the names
on Dobkin’s database,’ she said, making notes on her phone. ‘See if there’s any matches.’
‘Good,’ he said. Trying to calculate how much time they might have before it got out that they were conducting a separate investigation into the top brass, in addition to harbouring a serial murderer. A week, at best. He’d have to take the wrap entirely if they were caught out, of course. ‘I’ll give Elvis a list of informants to make contact with. Marie, you keep trawling through Bloom Group’s business records and see what comes up. Start digging into Hasselblad’s finances. See if his wife’s being used to launder money, somehow.’ Stinging, exhausted eyes on the two of them. ‘But we have to keep this between us. Nobody outside my team can know. Got it?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Yep.’
‘That include me, big boy?’ Letitia asked, leaning on the architrave of the living room door, brandishing a takeout pizza menu in one hand and a packet of cigarettes in the other.
CHAPTER 49
Amsterdam, Bijlmerbajes prison complex, then, Marie’s apartment, then, Sloterdijkermeer allotments, 20 March
‘Son of the Eagle,’ George said, pointing to a photo of Rufus Lazami, a promotional shot, taken from the Bloom Group plc website, which depicted him in a sharp, dark suit. His wide smile said he was an approachable and well-liked boss, hiding his true identity beneath a veneer of respectability. ‘You know him?’
The man sitting opposite her in the interview room scratched at the tattoo on his neck. ‘That the Son of the Eagle?’ he said in a strong Rotterdam accent, a sing-song voice marking him as an affable guy, rather than the convicted child abuser that his prison record revealed him to be. ‘I know the name, but I never actually met him.’
George noticed the inmate’s gaze drop to her chest. She clasped the collar of her shirt closed, wishing she had done up the top button, not that fabric and buttons were a barrier to a determined imagination. ‘Eyes up here, please,’ she told him, pointing to her face. ‘I’m too old to be your type, anyway.’
The Girl Who Walked in the Shadows Page 28