Transgression. Breaking the rules. Absence of empathy. No remorse.
The killer
is not mad.
Bad news gets around fast. Vicente Lapuerta is taking me to court for police violence and manipulating evidence against him. His lawyer has just lodged a formal complaint against me with the public prosecutor and every police officer in the city knows it. It won't be long before the journos find out, either. I'll be suspended at the very least. Compulsory holiday. Sent away as far as possible to lick my wounds. Taken off the Ripper case. Relieved of my duties. I don't even know how to take the news.
A moment after I find out, Martin tells me to come and help him question a woman sitting in his office. No quiere ponerme en antecedentes.
- 'Come and hear what she said to me,' he says pleadingly.
She's middle-aged, around fifty. With a swollen purple lip and eyes red from crying. An ordinary face you'd expect to see at the market every day. Heavyset, she wears black trousers and a flesh-coloured blouse under a woollen jacket. Her hands are folded in her lap.
- 'Adela, please tell the Commissioner what you've just told me.'
She looks up at me slowly. I try to arrange my face into an expression of moral rectitude, an upstanding defender of the law who can be trusted, but it obviously doesn't work, because her eyes flicker back to Martin and she says:
- 'I came in to see Lopez.'
- 'He's not in today,' says Martin.
- 'If you like, we can phone him and he'll tell you you can trust us,' I say.
She takes a deep breath and sighs.
- 'Come on, Adela, it's all right,' says Martin encouragingly.
- 'I reported my husband because he beat me. I want him out of my house.'
- 'That's taken care of,' says Martin.
- 'But... what if he comes back?'
- 'He's not coming back,' says Martin, and looks at me deliberately, so she'll see him do it.
I nodly firmly.
- 'I guarantee he will not be bothering you,' I say.
I realise as though through a haze that it's the first time in months I've been able to guarantee anyone's safety. But I know Martin will make sure she is safe. And he'll do what he has to do.
- 'Javier... the man who was killed... was his cousin.'
- 'Go on.'
- 'The one who got killed, Damian, he was at the house, with Javier.'
We let her tell it at her own pace. Another deep breath. A shiver runs through me.
- 'I didn't know Damian was wanted by the police.'
- 'He wasn't wanted by the police. I wanted him.'
She looks at me quizzically.
- 'Javier gave him money,' she goes on. 'Damian said he had to go into hiding for a few days. He didn't want to be found, but he'd had the money soon. Tons of money. And he'd give some of it to Javier.'
- 'What else, Adela?'
- 'When Damian.. when his body was found, Javier got very scared and angry, too. That's why he was drinking last night and...'
She lets out a sob and Martin places a reassuring hand on her shoulder.
- 'Did Robot... did Damian say how he was getting the money?'
She shrugs.
- 'I don't know. They were whispering, like it was a secret. But later, after he hit me, Javier said sorry and wanted to make me feel better. He told me a man was going to give Damian a ton of money and we'd get our share.'
- 'Did he tell him why?'
- 'No, but he said Damian knew a lot about a lot of people.'
- 'Did Damian give anything to Javier? Anything, photos, a notebook...'
- 'Not that I saw.'
I'm bursting with questions and fear she won't be able to answer them.
- 'Where did Javier hide Damian?'
- 'They went off in the car, but I don't know where.'
- 'Before this time at your house, do you know if they had met up before?'
Adela's face twists with something like pain.
- 'About three months ago, in summer, Damian came round and they fought because Damian asked him for money. Javier gave in in the end and gave him some.'
- 'Do you know what Damian wanted the money for?'
- 'To pay one of the whores they used to go off with.'
She says it so violently, spit flies onto Martin's desk. Then she looks up at with rage and resentment in her eyes, as if she were looking at her husband.
- 'What whore?' I say evenly, knowing the answer before she can say it.
- 'The one that got killed.'
Martin and I look at each other.
- 'Which one?'
- 'The bloody Romanian. They were mad about her. She did what she wanted and they gave her whatever she asked for. Money, money, more money...'
She falls silent then, saying that's all she knows. She begs us to get rid of her husband, not to let him go back to the house.
Martin will drive her home. I phone Malasana.
As it's ringing, I flip through my notes and find Adela's husband's name. Javier Macías Albor. We questioned him next to El Pestucia's bar the day after Cristiana Stoicescu was killed. The sleazy-looking guy. I was rude to him and Malasana said he made him uneasy.
In under an hour, Martin, Malasana and I are at Macias's office. Martin dropped off Adela and drove straight out there to meet us. It's an industrial unit built out in the middle of the countryside, next to a service road, far from any industrial estate. It boasts a metal fence standing ten feet high, concrete buildings surrounding the plot of land and a central, circular building with exposed stone walls like a castle in a cartoon.
We honk and the tall metal gates grind open. Aparcamos entre maquinaria expuesta a la vista de todo el que pase por la autovía: toros, grúas, motores, dúmpers, carretillas, hormigoneras, andamios, furgonetas. A sign proclaiming EL PENCAS MACHINERY juts out from the castle, blinking so brightly you can see it a mile off.
A stray dog slinks about, too scared to come and sniff us out. A Romanian in overalls walks past, looking somber. He looks at us warily and then disappears behind the building, walking through a set of metal doors into the warehouse. He can smell we're pigs and would rather keep his distance, just like the dog.
We go up a flight of stone stairs next to a would-be pond, dirty water trickling into a muddy pool.
- 'Javier Macías Albor?
- 'Inside.' The woman jerks her head at a door. It's a long time since her hair saw a shower. She's no spring chicken, either.
Despite her total lack of interest in us, she looks up and peers at us with crusted eyes, her face hard and harassed, a testament to what she must put up with every day.
- 'Come in,' shouts a man on a mobile phone, looking out of the window.
He's not so welcoming when he turns around and recognises us. He freezes for a moment, then hangs up without saying goodbye to whoever he's been talking to.
- 'Wha...'
Malasana punches him square in the solar plexus.
He doesn't even have time to whimper. He hunches in on himself, slowly, in complete silence. His face grows puce as he tries to catch his breath. Malasana walks him over to a chair. His grey-skinned face drips with sweat. Finally he lets out a long, rasping sigh and air enters his lungs. He coughs raggedly.
- 'Tell your secretary she's done for the day,' I order.
He lifts a hand, asking for a truce. Then takes out his phone, pushes a button and tells her to go home. She protests, so he shouts. Not a minute later the car is zooming out of the lot.
- 'The Romanian downstairs. Get him out.'
He nods. Malasana's tamped down any urges he had to argue.
He shouts and a moment later the Romanian walks out of the compound.
We look around the office: stacks of papers, rubbish in the drawers, stained invoices and dispatch notes. Print-outs of machinery for sale. Martin browses through his computer. Machinery sales web
sites. Business emails.
- 'You're coming with us,' I say.
- 'Am I under arrest?'
- 'You wish.'
We laugh and he starts to panic.
- 'It was just once. I didn't hit her hard,' he says pathetically. 'You don't know how much of a pain she can be. Always annoying everyone...'
- 'What about your cousin?'
Macias looks at me with such stupefaction and sadness on his face that for a split second I almost feel sorry for him. I smile, knowing every time I do I'm twisting the knife.
- 'If I'm not under arrest you can't make me go with you,' he protests. 'I know you've already been reported for police violence...' A futile attempt to take the high road.
The three of us laugh maniacally, disconcerting him even further.
- 'Let's go for a walk. Then... we'll see the state you come back in. That depends on you. Maybe you won't be able to speak.'
- 'Oi. You can't do that. I've not done anything...'
Martin and Malasana each grab him firmly by the arm and Javier Macias follows us like a prisoner being led to the execution field.
Half an hour later we park outside an old farmhouse, the front door hanging off its hinges. This place has witnessed several of these encounters. Empty, silent fields stretch out on every side. The door creaks ominously as Martin pushes it open. It smells of dust and damp. We hear scrabbling, squeaking sounds and know the rats are running back into the walls. Macias hears it too.
- 'What is this?'
- 'The Germans had concentration camps, Javier. We've got this farmhouse. And you'll see they're not so different.'
- 'You can't! You can't!'
We stick him in an empty room, a lone 40-watt bulb dangling over a chair like something out of a horror film. It's cold in this old ruin.
- 'Sit down,' says Martin coldly.
I take his coatoff roughly, leaving him in shirtsleeves. Macias hunches over, sitting docilely. I roll up his sleeves and tie his hands and feet to the grimy chair. He begs.
No one says a word for a few minutes. Malasana works slowly and methodically. Macias doesn't take his eyes off him, his eyes full of tears. Malasana delicately cuts and sharpens a couple of wires, then touches them together, sparks flying. I open a doctor's dag to reveal a few instruments that would strike fear into the breast of anyone at the dentist's.
- 'What's - what's that for?' His voice is shaking.
Drool, sweat and tears mingling on his face. Malasana walks slowly and deliberately up to him, the wires in his hand.
- 'Let's go easy to start with. Warm up before the heavy lifting. Then I can get to work with our toolkit here and the drugs. You say when to stop, Javier.'
- 'No!' he screams, but Martin lands a punch square in his mouth and blood spurts out, silencing him.
He cries fat, terrified tears and says he'll give us whatever we want.
- 'Then start by swearing you'll never lay a finger on your wife again.'
- 'I swear! I swear! I swear!'
- 'Or set foot in her house.'
- 'I swear!'
- 'Or go anywhere near her.'
- 'I swear!'
We all believe him.
- 'Look at the big man now,' laughs Martin. 'Not scared of hitting a woman though, are you? Just look at you now.'
Macias's face is smeared with snot and tears.
- 'Look at that, Javi. We haven't even got started yet and we've already got the first thing we wanted out of you.'
- 'I swear!' he says compulsively, over and over.
- 'Onto our next concern. Your cousin. Tell us about your cousin.'
- 'I'll give you whatever you want! Whatever you want!'
Malasana places the wires on his body, but they're not live yet.
- 'From the start, Javier.'
Macias tells us that Damian was his first cousin. They were almost the same age and grew up together, but then Damian went off to Barcelona and got into drugs. He's never touched drugs, he's scared of that whole scene. 'Lots of weirdoes, nutjobs. They'd kill you for a fiver.' For years, they'd get a drink together whenever Damian was in town, Damian would ask Javier for some money and that was that. But more recently, Damian had moved back to Baria, into the prefab house we saw. He wouldn't be around at the weekends - he'd be working at a brothel in Murcia or Alicante, selling a bit of coke to get by. Until he was fired from the club for hitting one of the girls.
- 'He's always liked beating women up, hasn't he?'
He nods.
- 'Three months ago, in July or thereabouts, he came to see me. He needed money because he'd beaten this girl and the pimp wanted compensation. I didn't have the kind of money he was asking for. I gave him a grand and told him that was it. But he said they were gonna kill him if he didn't pay up, so a week later I gave him another thousand. That was all I gave him. He was pissed off with me and I didn't see him til this week.'
- 'Who was the girl he hit?'
He looks down. He knos what he's going to say next could cost him a blow.
- 'The Romanian girl who got killed.'
Malasana punches him in the side with his tiny, iron fist. It takes Macias several minutes to get his breath back. But this time he doesn't protest. He knew it was coming.
In the meantime, we light up. I put a lit cigarette in his mouth.
- 'Smoke.'
I untie one of his hands so he can hold the fag. He thanks me, grateful as all prisoners are when their tormentor shows them some small kindness.
- 'I should have told you when you asked me about her. But how was I to know what was gonna happen? And Damian was totally obsessed with her. Like we all were. We all wanted her. What a woman! It's a bloody shame.'
- 'Did he kill her?'
- 'No! Why would he? Her pimp was the one extortng him, so if he'd killed her he would have had to pay even more. And even Damian was scared of that pimp.'
- 'Who's the pimp?' I ask, checking he's not bullshitting.
- 'The one who beat Damian up was Bogdan. But he's not the big boss. They say he's much worse.'
- 'They've both been put away now.'
Macias nods, smoking slowly and listlessly.
- 'Like I said, I didn't see him for a while. When he came to see me the other day after he got out of hospital, he was in a good mood. He said he'd paid off his debts and he wasn't worried about the Romanians any more, he had something good in the pipeline, just had to hide for a few days so no one would find him and then he was going to leave the country. He was going to get a lot of money and I'd get a cut if I helped him hide.'
We let him pause.
- 'I hid him in the office for a couple of days, over the weekend. But I told him he had to leave on the Monday before the workies came in. And he did.'
- 'Do you know where he hid next?'
- 'No. He went off by himself.'
- 'Did he tell you how he was going to get the money?'
- 'He said he had info no one else had. And if this one guy didn't pay up, he'd tell a different guy.'
- 'A reporter?'
- 'No.'
- 'How do you know?'
- 'Cos I asked him.'
- 'What kind of guy then?'
- 'I don't know.' He shrugs. 'He wouldn't tell me who it was.'
I would. I understand now that this guy is there as if doing nothing.
- Would not it be the same guy?
- 'What? Oh - nah. He mentioned two guys. The one who was gonna pay him the most money was the one who had the most to lose if Robot blabbed. The other guy was the fallback, in case the first one fell through, and he said although it wouldn't be as much he could still get a nice stack out of him.'
- 'What else?'
- 'Dunno. I gave him some money. He was my cousin, for Christ's sake. We went through a lot together.'
- 'Do you know where he used to meet up with these guys? Did he s
ay anything we could use to identify them?'
- 'He said they were very similar. Two mean bastards. He said one had paid off his debt to the Romanians and was gonna be treating him like a king for a very long time. But I don't know anything about the other guy. He didn't say anything about him.'
- 'Did he give you any notebooks, notepads?'
- 'No.'
- 'A phone number?'
- 'I've got his number in my contacts. But he changed it. He threw away his old phone so he couldn't be traced. I wrote his number number down.'
- 'What did he want from you? Why did he need you?'
- 'He said I would have to go and get the money.'
- 'When? Where?'
- 'I was supposed to wait for him to phone me. But he never did. Next thing I know... he was the way you found him out by the quarry.'
- 'Your cousin knew who was killing those women, didn't he?'
Macias shakes his head, a terrified look on his face.
- 'No! I think it's that creep in the tapes. He was blackmailing the guys who took part in the orgies. He didn't know anything about the murders...'
- 'You're lying!'
- 'I swear I'm not! He didn't tell me anything. Just that he was going to get a lot of money. And if they were giving him money it couldn't have been good. He was involved with the whole tape thing... That's what he said. Baria's finest fucking whore who knows where... That's all I know.'
I let him sit there with his lies, sensing it's better to let him believe he's getting away with it.
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