The Last Temptation

by Val McDermid

Krasic nodded. “I’ll chase them up, boss.”

  “Do that. And remind them that whoever pays the piper calls the tune. I want the man who killed Katerina. I don’t give a fuck about the legal process. I want to make him pay in a way he’ll remember for the rest of his life. So tell those bastards to stop fucking around and produce some results.”

  Krasic sighed inwardly. He had a feeling this was one investigation that was going to hit a brick wall sooner or later. He didn’t relish the moment when he would have to report that fact to Tadzio. For the time being, he’d just have to keep going through the motions. “I’ll talk to someone tonight,” he promised.

  “Good. I’m tired of problems. I could use some solutions. Whatever it takes.” He leaned back against the soft leather and closed his eyes, signalling that the conversation was over. Playing the bully didn’t come naturally to him, but he’d found himself slipping into the role depressingly often since Katerina had died. He couldn’t bear the thought that the rest of his life was going to be like this, a constant succession of crises and problems. It felt as if her death had taken all the ease from his life, and he wondered if he would ever again feel relaxed and comfortable in his own shoes. Perhaps vengeance would help.

  It was the only thing he could think of that might.

  It was Petra Becker’s first visit to Den Haag, and she was surprised by its lack of flamboyance compared to Amsterdam. The canal houses were models of understated classical demureness, with few of the ornate flourishes that gave a walk in central Amsterdam so much visual richness. This was an expense account city, with none of the bohemian colour that provided Amsterdam with its variety. Here, there was an air of sedate prosperity, speaking of a prim propriety that made Petra’s Berliner soul feel stifled. She’d been here less than a day and already she was craving the disreputable.

  She wasn’t sure how she felt about the day that lay ahead of her. She was due to meet the British cop at eleven. Carol Jordan, a Detective Chief Inspector, whatever that meant. Petra was supposed to tell her everything she knew about Tadeusz Radecki, and it stuck in her throat. It didn’t seem fair that she should hand over such hard-won gains to someone who hadn’t earned her stripes in the battle. When Hanna Plesch had told her that her new role was to act as liaison for someone else’s undercover, she’d felt cheated. Of course, she was too familiar a face in Berlin to go undercover herself, but it pissed her off that her bosses had rolled over and handed the whole affair to the Brits. What did they know about German organized crime? Who did they think they were, muscling in on her territory? And how dare they think they could succeed where her department had failed?

  Plesch had read her reaction in her face, in spite of her best efforts to keep it under wraps. She’d told Petra that she only had two choices. She could work with Jordan, or she could walk away from the whole Radecki investigation. Reluctantly, Petra had accepted the assignment. It didn’t mean she had to feel happy about it.

  She consoled herself with the knowledge that the take-down would have to be carried out by German cops. The Brits wouldn’t be prosecuting this one. At the end of the operation, when they put Radecki away, Carol Jordan would be long gone. Petra Becker, on the other hand, would still be here, and she’d be the one who would be remembered as being instrumental in the final dismemberment of Radecki’s rackets.

  She found a café, bought coffee and a couple of warm rolls and took them over to a table by the window. She pulled a slim file out of her battered leather briefcase and began to read.

  Detective Chief Inspector Carol Jordan had graduated from Manchester University and gone straight into the Metropolitan Police. She’d been fast-tracked for promotion and had reached the rank of Detective Sergeant in the shortest possible time. She’d worked in general CID and also done a stint in the specialized major-incident team that dealt with murders and other serious crimes. When she’d passed her inspector’s examination, she’d left the Met and moved north to the industrial city of Bradfield. That seemed to be when her career had really taken off.

  DI Jordan acted as liaison officer with Dr. Tony Hill, a Home Office approved offender profiler, on a series of murders in Bradfield. Her work was instrumental both in uncovering the identity of the perpetrator and also in saving the life of Dr. Hill. Petra read the dry words and made a mental note to check out the case on the internet when she had the opportunity. Serial killers always made it big on the world wide web.

  She continued reading. Jordan then moved to East Yorkshire Police, where she was promoted to Detective Chief Inspector and took charge of the CID in the North Sea port of Seaford. While she was stationed at Seaford, she renewed her professional relationship with Dr. Hill, taking the lead role in an investigation which led to the eventual capture of the serial killer Jacko Vance. DCI Jordan’s work was central in obtaining the conviction of Vance, who is believed to have killed at least eight young girls. Another serial killer investigation, Petra noted. She’d take a look at the background to this one too. Maybe Carol Jordan could do her career another favour, aside from Radecki. There weren’t that many officers around who had experience of tracking serial killers. Perhaps Petra could pick Jordan’s brains and come up with a strategy for nailing the killer she believed had already struck in Leiden and Heidelberg. If Jordan was as good a cop as she appeared to be on paper, it was worth considering.

  Petra returned to the file. Two years ago, DCI Jordan returned to the Metropolitan Police, where in addition to operational duties with the serious crimes unit, she has undertaken extensive training in intelligence gathering and analysis. For the purposes of this undercover, she has been temporarily assigned to the National Crime Squad.

  That was the end of the brief. There was nothing in the file to suggest that Jordan had any undercover experience. Maybe they just hadn’t gone into details. Petra couldn’t believe they would put anyone into an operation this dangerous unless she really knew what she was doing. Radecki was way too smart to take anybody at face value. He’d be deeply suspicious of anyone who turned up with so convenient a proposal for solving his current problems. Jordan would have to be a superb operator to stay alive, let alone get under his guard and uncover anything worth knowing.

  There was one more sheet of paper in the file. Petra flipped it over, seeing it was a photocopy of a photograph. She couldn’t stifle a gasp of astonishment. If the caption hadn’t told her this was Carol Jordan, she would have been convinced that she was looking at a photograph of Tadeusz Radecki’s late girlfriend.

  What was going on here? The resemblance was so spooky it made the hairs on the back of Petra’s neck stand up. Where the hell had they found this cop? With looks like this, no matter what Carol Jordan’s background, she’d have been drafted in for this assignment. She could imagine the guys thinking that if anyone was going to make Radecki drop his guard it was this particular British cop. And she supposed they had a point, though it was the kind of coincidence that would freak her out if they’d pulled a stunt like this on her. It would certainly make Radecki’s sidekicks suspicious, but the man himself probably wouldn’t be able to resist Katerina’s doppelgänger. She gazed down at the picture and a slow smile spread across her face. For the first time since Plesch had briefed her, she was looking forward to this.

  Back at her hotel, with time to spare, Petra decided to check her e-mail. There was nothing particularly interesting or urgent, so she turned to her favourite news site on the web to see what had happened in Germany since she’d left. She browsed the index of the day’s stories till something buried far down the list caught her eye. LECTURER BRUTALLY MURDERED IN BREMEN, she read with a sinking feeling.

  Hastily she clicked on the link that would bring her the full story.

  A psychology lecturer was found brutally murdered in her home on the outskirts of Bremen last night. The victim’s boyfriend, who disturbed the killer, was also attacked and left for dead.

  Johann Weiss, 46, an architect, was battered unconscious by his assailant when he arri
ved at the home of Dr. Margarethe Schilling, 43. He alerted police when he regained consciousness and discovered the murdered body of his partner.

  Dr. Schilling was a lecturer in experimental psychology at the University of Bremen and the mother of an eight-year-old son from a previous marriage. The boy lives with his father near Worpswede.

  Police are refusing to release details of the crime, but a source close to the investigation revealed that

  Dr. Schilling’s body was bound and naked. Her body had been mutilated in a ritualistic manner.

  A police spokesman said, “Investigations are continuing into the death of Dr. Schilling. We are pursuing various lines of inquiry. This was a particularly brutal and callous murder and we are determined to bring Dr. Schilling’s killer to justice. We would like to appeal for any witnesses who saw anyone in the vicinity of Dr. Schilling’s home yesterday evening to contact the police immediately. We are particularly keen to speak to the driver of a dark-coloured Volkswagen Golf.”

  Petra gazed at the screen, appalled and excited in equal measure. It looked as if the killer had struck again, and on German soil. And this time, there might just be a lead to pursue.

  Carol followed Larry Gandle, the British Europol Liaison Officer who had picked her up at the airport, through the corridors of Europol headquarters on the Raamweg. With his sharp suit and his cropped, thinning hair, he looked more like a financial services salesman than a police officer. But there was something indefinable that marked him out as English, something beyond his nasal Black Country accent.

  He led her to a small conference room on the third floor of the main building. The only window looked out on to a central courtyard, allowing no possibility of being seen from the outside world. As Carol settled herself at one corner of the long bleached wood table, the door opened and a tall, rangy dark-haired woman walked in. She had the loose-limbed stride of an athlete at home in her body. Dressed casually in black jeans, a charcoal sweater and a creased leather jacket, a black satchel promoting the Berlin Film Festival slung over her shoulder, she looked more like a TV producer than a cop. Her hair was cut short and fashionably tousled with wax. She had a triangular face, broad across the forehead and narrowing to a pointed chin beneath a thin-lipped mouth. She looked unnervingly severe until she smiled a greeting, her blue eyes crinkling at the corners and promising compromises her expression in repose flatly denied. “Hi,” she said. “I’m Petra Becker.” She crossed the room, ignoring Gandle and making straight for Carol. “You must be Carol Jordan.” She spoke English with a transatlantic hint overlaying her slight German accent.

  Petra held out a hand to Carol, who stood up and shook it. “Pleased to meet you. This is Larry Gandle, one of the British ELOs.”

  Petra nodded acknowledgement and pulled out the chair nearest Carol, so they were sitting at ninety degrees to each other. Gandle was immediately shut out of their communion, though he didn’t realize it. He sat down opposite Carol, a large expanse of table separating them. “Nice to meet you, Petra,” Gandle said with an air of condescension. “I’m here purely to facilitate this meeting, to answer any questions that might come up that fall into our remit. But essentially, this is a joint operation between the British and the Germans, and it’s up to you two to run it in a way that works best for you.”

  “Thanks, Larry,” Carol said, not quite dismissing him, but clearly focused now on Petra, the woman who would be her link back into her real life from the chilly wastes of deep cover. Petra would be her first line of defence, but, paradoxically, she would also be the person who could most put her at risk. For Carol, it was vital to establish a bridgehead of respect at the very least. Liking would be a bonus. “I appreciate you coming up here so we can thrash things out off the territory,” she said. “I’m sure you’re just as busy in Berlin as I used to be in London. It’s never easy to get away from the day-to-day case-load.”

  Petra raised one corner of her mouth in a crooked smile. “Tadeusz Radecki has been the most significant element of my case-load for a long time now. This doesn’t feel like an escape, believe me.”

  “No, I can see that. It’s a big weight off my mind that they’ve assigned me a liaison officer who knows so much about the background to the case. I’ve come into it cold, and I’m going to need all the help I can get. What I wanted to do, if this is OK with you, is to hammer out the practicalities of how we work this, while Larry’s still here to keep us straight on what’s possible and what isn’t. Then I thought the two of us could go back to the hotel and brainstorm all I need to know about Radecki and his operation. How does that sound to you?”

  Gandle looked as if he was about to protest, but Petra caught his movement out of the corner of her eye and cut across him. “Perfect. These official meeting places are so stifling to the soul, no?”

  “Exactly. And I need to understand Radecki with my heart as well as my head. So I’m relying on you to open him up for me.”

  Petra raised her eyebrows. “I’ll do my best.” She paused and cocked her head to one side, studying Carol’s face. “You know, they told me you looked like Basler, and it’s true, your photograph does resemble her. But in the flesh, it’s uncanny. You could be her twin sister. You are going to blow Radecki away. I swear to God, he is going to be freaked out when he sees you.”

  “Let’s hope it’s in a good way,” Carol said, feeling self-conscious under the other woman’s appraising gaze.

  “Oh, I think so. I don’t see how he could resist.” Petra smiled. “I think this is going to work.”

  “It’ll work,” Gandle said confidently. “DCI Jordan is one hell of an operator.”

  Petra ignored him and continued to focus on Carol. “So, we need to establish where you are going to be staying in Berlin, how we feed you into Tadzio’s world, and then how you and I maintain contact.”

  “For starters, yes.”

  Petra opened her satchel and took out a stylish ring-bound notebook, its pages edged in a rainbow of colours, its black plastic covers embossed with a chain-link design. She flipped it open at the green section and tore out a page. “I think a hotel is not a good idea for you. Too many people have access to the room, and it’s too easy for Radecki’s people to bribe a chambermaid to let them in. Radecki himself may be bowled over by your resemblance to Katerina, but I think the people around him—especially his lieutenant, Krasic—will be suspicious of you. Krasic will want to check you out as far as he possibly can. What I think is better is this: there is a building on a quiet street between the Ku’damm and Olivaerplatz that used to be a hotel and has been turned into service apartments. They are mostly used by business people, like you are supposed to be. Each has a living room, a bedroom, a bathroom and a small kitchen. You rent them by the week and a maid comes in twice a week to change the linen and to clean the place. It will be more secure, but also you will feel more at home there. It will be more relaxing, no?”

  Carol nodded. “Sounds good to me.”

  Petra passed her the sheet of paper, which contained an address and phone number. “I checked this morning that they have vacancies. I pretended to be a business associate of yours and asked them to hold one for you. They’re expecting you to call. You do have credit cards in your alias?”

  “I’ve got everything. Passport, driving licence, credit cards, a couple of old utility bills and bank statements. I don’t have any Carol Jordan ID on me at all—I handed it all over to Larry for safekeeping.” She smiled across at him. “Just don’t sell my warrant card on the black market, Larry.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “Don’t tempt me.”

  “Next is how we stay in contact,” Petra continued.

  “Now, I’ve got something that will help here,” Gandle butted in. “Carol, you’re going to have a laptop with you, right?”

  “That’s right. The London boys set it up. It’s all Caroline Jackson stuff. A shedload of old e-mails, various business-related files and letters. Plenty of stuff to back up my cover story and nothing t
hat shouldn’t be there.”

  Gandle placed his showy aluminium briefcase on the table and snapped open the locks. He produced a flat black rectangle with a cable protruding from one end. “This is an auxiliary hard drive that you can plug straight into your laptop. It’s preloaded with all the access codes you need to get into TECS.”

  “TECS?” Petra asked.

  “The Europol dedicated computer system. It incorporates an analysis system like the one you’ve trained on, Carol, together with an index system. And we’ve just got the information system up and running, so you can access all we hold on Radecki and his known associates. Everything Petra and her colleagues have passed on to us is in there, at the touch of a key. There’s also an encryption system that will allow you to send secure e-mail to anyone who has the key. Petra, we’re also going to make that available to you, so Carol can communicate securely with you via e-mail, which will be much safer than phone calls.

  “And to keep it out of sight…” His hand went back into the briefcase and came out with a blue rubber box with a stubby antenna coming out of one corner. “The coolest radio in town,” he said. “You can buy them in all the smartest shops. Only, this one’s different. The techies stripped out the guts of it and inserted a miniature radio. It works just like the original, but when you open it up—he pushed a metal slider on the base of the radio and it fell neatly in half—“there’s a hiding place for your spare hard drive.”

  Carol and Petra exchanged a look and burst out laughing. “Boys and their toys,” Carol spluttered.

  Gandle looked offended. “It does work, you know. Nobody’s going to give it a second look.”

  “Sorry, Larry, it’s very clever,” Carol said, not wanting to alienate her British back-up. “And you’re right, it’s entirely unsuspicious.” She reached for the radio and slotted the hard drive into place then closed it up. She pressed a small blue rubber button and static crackled out of the speaker. “Very good. It’s exactly what I need, even if it does make me feel a bit like James Bond.”