Denial (Sam Keddie Thriller Book 2)

by Paddy Magrane

  Extreme weather and the prospect of being confined inside a narrow space were perfect conditions for an attack of his claustrophobia, which asserted itself whenever he was under stress. But his body had felt charged, as if a fierce electric current were running through him.

  His success reaching Amsterdam against all odds should have been cause for celebration, but as the plane taxied, he felt his resolve take a dive. He had a clue, that was all, and a city to search. And what if Zahra had decided at the last minute not to make the journey? Or maybe she had tried, but been apprehended. He shuddered at the thought of her being sent back to Creech Hill.

  Outside the terminal, in a wind that was brutally cold and unforgiving, Sam joined the queue at a taxi rank, his head buried deep in the collar of his coat. The cab that eventually took him into the city, its interior a warm, damp fug, travelled slowly along an untreated motorway, sliding occasionally in a grey cocktail of ice and snow.

  He asked to be dropped just off Dam Square and walked a short distance down Spuistraat – his toes numbing in his shoes – to a hotel he remembered from a previous stay, when he was attending a psychotherapy conference.

  The doors were locked and Sam had to press a bell three times before a woman wearing a sweat top, leggings and flip-flops trudged to the entrance to let him in. She looked unimpressed, her face as severe as the weather outside.

  The foyer was as he remembered it – a large bland place of plastic plants and leather seats. The woman checked him in quickly, clearly keen to get back to sleep.

  In the hotel room, he dropped his bags on the floor. It was nearly 6am. There was nothing he could do right now. He flopped down on to the bed.

  His sleep was disturbed by dreams of him chasing Eleanor and Zahra through a foggy cityscape – the women visible for brief tantalising moments, before they vanished.

  He woke in the afternoon, feeling groggy and disoriented. He peeled open his curtains and saw that it was going dark already. Ideal. He was fairly certain the place where he planned to start his search didn’t really come alive until this time of day. He showered and headed down to the hotel restaurant, where he ate a greasy burger and chips. Outside, a high-pitched whine of brakes announced a slowing tram, which stopped outside the nearest window to disgorge passengers before moving off, sparks from overhead cables illuminating the wintry gloom. Across from the hotel, in a tapas bar with bare brick walls, a man was hanging a leg of ham on a hook. He paused to look out the window and seemed to fix his stare on Sam’s face. Sam turned away.

  Just before 5pm, he drained a coffee and went to reception. He picked up a map of the city and sat briefly to work out his route. He’d done some exploring during his previous visit and had a sense of the city’s layout – the horseshoe-shaped pattern of canals rippling out from the centre – but he’d never visited this evening’s destination. Satisfied, he folded the map in his coat pocket, and left the hotel.

  As his foot hit the pavement there was a ping of a bell and a cyclist swerved round him. Sam felt his pulse quicken, the anxiety lying close to the surface. He moved at a pace, hoping the energy would generate some heat. He crossed a main road then headed east down a narrow alley, passing an antique shop and the tempting, candle-lit interior of a bar.

  This was the city centre, a tourist-friendly area of well-lit streets, with windows giving on to restaurants, hotel lounges and department stores, yet Sam couldn’t escape the feeling that he was being watched. Twice he turned to look round and both times he saw nothing. There were people about, but they were heading in the opposite direction, emerging from buildings or walking arm in arm with partners. No one seemed interested in him.

  About ten minutes later, he emerged from an alleyway on to a canal. It was, at first glance, a classic wintry view of Amsterdam. A canalside fringed with leafless trees; tall, handsome houses with gables like upturned boats; bikes chained to the railings of the bridges. But the inky water of the canal amplified the subtle difference in this area – its surface shimmering with reflections of red lights and neon.

  Sam turned north, past a sex shop, its windows crammed with skimpy plastic uniforms, whips, handcuffs and so many dildos he felt his eyes water. Then a theatre with a big neon sign that flashed with the promise of live sex. A poster of a black man wearing little more than a thong, a blonde in thread-like underwear bent double at his waist, gave a taste of the show inside.

  Bar the odd couple and a handful of solitary men, punters were thin on the ground. Perhaps it was still too early. Perhaps it was too cold.

  Sam moved on, then, passing a narrow alley, doubled back on himself. This, he realised, was as good a place as any to start.

  He began down the walkway, aware of eyes watching him from a full-length window to his left. He looked briefly at the girl, trying to take in her features with the eyes of a detective, not a leering punter. She was Asian, her white bra and panties luminous thanks to fluorescent lighting, and she was pressing both hands against the glass and locking on to Sam with glazed eyes. The next booth was empty but the one after contained a blonde girl in pink underwear and furry Moonboots. She sat on a shiny plastic chair, legs parted, beckoning slowly with her forefinger.

  Sam heard jeering and laughing. Ahead, a group of six men were walking in his direction. The noise and the way they swayed suggested they’d been on a bender. Here was the next stage of the day’s entertainment.

  As they reached Sam one of them spoke up: ‘Any recommendations, mate?’

  Sam smiled and shook his head, moving on. There were two more occupied windows, an older woman in a long, tight t-shirt stretched over large breasts, and a stick-thin, pale girl with red hair, who might have been a teenager.

  Sam turned back on himself, prompting a rapping on the glass from the Asian girl as he passed her booth, then returned to the canal. He tried three more alleyways and was beginning to lose hope when he passed the entrance to another show. According to a sandwich board that sat in a pile of snow, the theatre promised a ‘United Nations Sex Show’. The poster on the board featured a group of pouting women. There were about ten of them in all, all clichéd sexual fantasies from around the world. Among them was a tall, too-perfect Scandinavian-looking blonde, a petite Thai girl in hot pants, and a rangy black woman with an afro.

  The black woman shared the same fine, almost Arabic features, as Zahra. Sam felt himself flood with hope, an emotion that was as quickly doused in despair. The woman might, just might, be from Eritrea or Ethiopia or Somalia. And she might, just might, know of the community of women Zahra had once lived with. But it was tenuous stuff, not least because he was in the Red Light District on a hunch, no more.

  That Amsterdam was the last place Zahra had felt safe, Sam was certain. Her life since had been defined by a terrifying cross-Channel journey, and then the fear, frustration and uncertainty of life inside Creech Hill. But about the sex worker angle, Sam was on less solid ground. He remembered Zahra describing two women – a nurse and a teacher back home in East Africa – who were now doing what she called ‘other work’. Uttering that phrase, her eyes had filled with sadness. Did that mean they worked here? He couldn’t be sure. But all he had to do was think of the man who’d put Eleanor in a coma and Fitzgerald in the freezing canal, and his mind was made up.

  He stepped inside. The cold was immediately replaced with a thick warm wall of perfumed air-conditioning. Sam dreaded to think what the smell was covering up. There was a ticket booth from which a woman, all low-cut top and dyed blonde hair greying at the roots, looked up at him with dead eyes.

  ‘I need to talk to one of the girls.’

  The woman blinked slowly, then spoke in a thick Dutch accent: ‘No one speaks to the girls. No one touches the girls.’

  ‘Just five minutes. I’m looking for a friend who’s gone missing. She may be in danger.’

  ‘I told you –’

  ‘I’m not looking for sex. I’m looking for a friend.’

  Behind the woman, a door opened and a s
hort, wiry man emerged. He looked North African, and had bulging eyes and oily skin.

  He muttered something in Dutch to the woman and she grunted a response.

  ‘You don’t talk to the girls,’ he said.

  ‘I don’t want to cause trouble,’ Sam said. ‘I want to find a friend.’

  He slipped his hand in his coat pocket, pulled out his wallet, flashing it in the man’s face. ‘I have cash.’

  The man looked him hard in the face with his bug eyes. ‘Fuck off.’

  Sam felt the blood rush to his face. ‘Listen! A friend of mine’s in danger. All I want is a few minutes with the African girl on that poster –’

  He was still holding the wallet aloft when he felt his arm yanked behind his back and pushed upwards. A shot of pain coursed up his arm and the wallet slipped from his grasp. He caught a glimpse of a large man behind him, a black face, before he was being marched to the entrance. He was pitched forward, his upper body over-reaching and legs scrambling on the icy wet cobbles for purchase. He lost his footing and fell forward, his arms breaking the fall.

  ‘Fuck!’ Sam cried out. He was lying on his front on the cobbles, the pain in his arm now eclipsed by a burning sensation in his right hand. With his left, he pushed himself up into a kneeling position. He then gingerly lifted his right hand from the ground. It must have caught the rough edge of a cobble. It was bleeding from a large cut to the fleshy part of his thumb.

  He turned to shout some abuse at the man who’d flung him to the ground but he’d already disappeared and the woman in the booth was now serving a customer.

  ‘You OK?’ said a woman’s voice behind him.

  Sam, still on his knees, turned to see a tall figure wrapped in fake fur, a bobble hat pulled low over her head.

  ‘I’m fine.’

  He felt an arm cup his elbow and he was being pulled, as if he weighed no more than a bag of shopping, to his feet.

  ‘I think this is yours,’ she said, handing Sam his wallet.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said, stuffing it in a pocket.

  ‘You don’t want to mess with those fuckers.’

  Sam realised her face looked familiar. His eyes darted to the sandwich board, then back to his Samaritan. Though shorn of make-up, she was definitely the Scandinavian blonde on the poster.

  The woman was moving away when Sam spoke. ‘Do you work in there?’

  She turned, giving him a weary look, as if already regretting her good deed.

  ‘I’m looking for a friend. She may be in danger.’

  The woman sighed.

  ‘She’s Eritrean. That girl on the poster might be able to help.’

  ‘I doubt it. She’s from Sudan.’

  Sam’s hand pulsed with pain. He winced.

  ‘You need to get that seen to,’ said the woman. Her face softened. ‘Listen, there’s a café in Rembrandtplein. The Schiller. We go there after the show. Just after eleven. My Sudanese friend might be there.’

  Chapter 20

  Amsterdam

  The Café Schiller had a discreet frontage among the tourist traps of Rembrandtplein, but opened up inside into a large brasserie, with wood panelling and subdued lighting.

  Sam visited the toilet to wash his injured hand then applied a dressing he’d bought at a pharmacy en route. He then settled into a booth in a far corner of the room, ordering a coffee. The café was half-full, people having dinner or playing board games while nursing hot drinks or Amstels.

  It was 7pm. Four hours to kill.

  He should have felt calmer. He had a lead, of sorts, but that episode at the theatre had left him trembling with anger and frustration. He signalled to a waiter for another coffee.

  *

  Sam glanced at the clock hanging on the wall above the bar. It was 11.15pm. He was on his third coffee and feeling edgy, the caffeine coursing through his system.

  The bar’s patrons had thinned to about ten people. Another couple were just leaving, the open door bringing bitter air into the café.

  The barman, a young, handsome guy, was leaning against the polished mahogany of the bar, playing with his phone.

  Another blast of cold air invaded the room, this time accompanied by a group of people, obscured by thick coats and hats. The barman looked up and smiled. He called out a greeting in Dutch.

  Sam recognised the Scandinavian woman, who was first to the bar. Then, tensing in his seat, he caught a glimpse of the figure by her side, the large black bouncer who’d flung him to the pavement.

  The others in the group had disappeared to the toilet. The Scandinavian blonde was chatting to the barman and then glanced round, seeing Sam. She elbowed the large black man and gestured in Sam’s direction.

  Sam readied himself to move fast. Although there was a lot of floor to cover, he reckoned he had speed on his side if he went now. But it was too late. The bouncer was already moving towards him, a lumbering mass who seemed to get bigger with every inch he covered.

  Soon he was looming over the table, his face impassive.

  ‘Hey,’ he said, his voice containing some trace of West Africa, ‘sorry, man.’

  Sam just stared, overwhelmed with relief.

  ‘Just doing my job.’

  To Sam’s huge surprise, the bouncer then sat next to him on the banquette, the leather sighing as the man eased down. He turned to Sam and grinned like a child.

  Next to join them was the blonde, who held two steaming mugs of hot chocolate in her hands. She placed them on the table then peeled off her coat and hat.

  ‘It’s the crazy fucker,’ she said. ‘How’s the hand?’

  Sam held up the bandaged hand for her inspection. ‘Fine.’

  Up close, even in the soft light, her face was far removed from the sexualised fantasy of the poster outside the theatre. Cleared of make-up, it was lined and tired, her lips chapped and the skin around her nostrils pink and raw.

  The others were coming to join them. As they discarded their coats, scarves and hats, Sam made out the Sudanese girl. Like the blonde, she was markedly different to the promised woman of the poster. There was no afro, just cropped peroxide hair and an angular, hardened face. Behind her was an almost skeletal man with long black hair, the Thai girl, and a short, dumpy woman. Sam found himself hemmed in on the banquette, an instant member of the gang.

  ‘You’re lucky,’ said the blonde. ‘Leyla’s gonna talk to you.’

  Leyla tipped her head to one side and frowned at Sam. She then muttered something in Dutch to the blonde.

  ‘She wants to know who you’re looking for.’

  ‘An Eritrean woman, Zahra Idris.’

  The blonde translated. Leyla started to laugh, then spoke.

  The blonde translated again. ‘She says, “You must think we’re all one big family, us African girls”.’

  Sam protested. ‘That’s not what I meant. Zahra said she lived with a community of women – some Europeans as well as Africans. They looked after her. I think some of them may have worked in the Red Light District.’

  Even as it was escaping his lips, he realised how pathetically tenuous it all was. But there was no chuckle this time. Leyla was speaking in more hushed tones now, her face deadly earnest. The blonde muttered back. She then spoke to Sam.

  ‘She thinks she knows the group you mean,’ said the blonde. ‘But where they live is not a place for someone like you.’

  ‘Why’s that?’

  Leyla emitted a short, mirthless laugh.

  It was the skinny man’s turn to speak, his voice deep and Italian sounding. ‘The commune you’re talking about is in Bijlmer.’

  ‘Right.’

  The skinny guy exchanged glances with the others. ‘It used to be a total shithole, a place where they dumped everyone they didn’t wanna see in the pretty streets round here. Junkies, blacks. Then a plane crashed into one of the tower blocks.’

  Sam had a vague recollection of the disaster. Some time in the 90s. An image of a tower block sliced in two surfaced in his mind.
/>
  ‘It was a 747, wasn’t it?’

  The skinny guy raised his eyebrows, as if impressed. ‘You got it. An El Al flight. That 747 took out a whole section of one of the tower blocks. Killed fifty people.’ He paused, laughing. ‘But at least the demolition had started.’

  ‘They started to tear the other high-rises down. Build more expensive, low-rise stuff. Pull in the yuppies.’

  The word ‘yuppies’ seemed to tickle everyone in the booth, whatever their grasp of English. A chuckle rippled around the table.

  ‘The yuppies came to see Justin Timberlake and Beyoncé at the arena,’ continued the skinny guy, ‘but they never moved in.’ He scratched one of his hollow cheeks. ‘The place is better. I mean, you’re not gonna get mugged in daylight. And kids play in the park and shit. But there are still corners I wouldn’t visit.’

  ‘Like the one we’re talking about,’ interjected the blonde. ‘It’s right by the crash site. Got a bad vibe.’

  ‘I need to go there,’ said Sam. ‘I’ve got to find her.’

  The skinny guy rotated a finger at his temple.

  ‘What’s so special about this woman?’ asked the blonde.

  Sam looked round the table, at faces he barely knew. He didn’t have the energy for an abridged, safe version. ‘My girlfriend was attacked,’ he said. He could feel a stab of emotion behind his eyes, sadness and anger balled into one. ‘Whoever did it is after me too. Zahra may know why.’

  There was an audible intake of breath, as if the group were reassessing the stranger in their midst.

  ‘Catch the Metro to Bijlmer Arena,’ said the blonde quickly, as if she now wanted rid of Sam. She muttered something to Leyla, who pulled a biro from her bag and began drawing on a napkin.