‘So, you see,’ the Ukrainian said, ‘you’re now officially working outside the law. As are we.’
‘Who are you?’ Maria took the glass of water offered by the woman.
‘We are your new partners.’
‘Ukrainian intelligence?’
‘No. We’re not SBU. Technically, we’re police officers. I am Captain Taras Buslenko of the Sokil. It means “Falcon”… we are an anti-organised-crime Spetsnaz. And this is Captain Olga Sarapenko of the Kiev city militia, similar to your Schutzpolizei. Captain Sarapenko is part of the Kiev police’s anti-mafia unit.’
‘You’re after Vitrenko?’ asked Maria.
‘Yes. And he’s after us. What you see here are the remains of a seven-strong special unit put together to come here and… deal with Vitrenko.’
‘You’re planning to carry out an illegal assassination on German soil?’
‘Isn’t that exactly what you had planned to do yourself, if you got the chance?’
Maria ignored the question. ‘You said there were seven of you. Where are the others?’
‘Three dead. There were two traitors in the group. We met at an isolated hunting lodge in Ukraine. No one knew about it. By the time we worked out it was two of our own and not an attacking force, we were already exposed. Only three of us made it out of the woods, then Belotserkovsky took it in the back.’
‘My fault…’ The pain showed on Olga Sarapenko’s face. ‘I was injured and he was helping to get me out.’
‘I was supposed to be providing cover,’ said Buslenko. A silence fell between them and Maria could see that they were somewhere and sometime else. She knew what it was like to live and relive an experience like that.
‘So why didn’t you re-form a complete unit?’ she asked.
‘No time and no point,’ said Buslenko. ‘Time’s on Vitrenko’s side. We have to get to him before he gets to us. Hopefully, Vitrenko will have assumed that we have aborted the mission… that Captain Sarapenko and I are running scared. We couldn’t be sure that if we did rebuild a unit that we wouldn’t have infiltrators again. But we know we can trust each other. There’s only one other person we can rely on…’
‘Who?’
‘You,’ Buslenko said, handing Maria back her handgun.
6.
The crowd went wild. Andrea stood before them, her body dark and sleek with fake tan and body oil, her hatred and anger hidden behind a searchlight-white smile that beamed across the expanse of the hall. The music Andrea had chosen thudded hard and harsh in the hall and all the time she thought about the stupid, soft little tart she had once been. This, now, for all to see, was the real Andrea Sandow. Andrea the Amazon. Each pose drew a roar of appreciation from the crowd. She improvised a final optional pose at the end of her routine: Overhead Victory. Her biceps, which were bigger than those of any of the other competitors, bunched high with a rippling topography of vein and sinew. The crowd cheered and many rose to their feet. She stood down to Relaxed Front and bowed low to the audience. She turned sideways with a bounce and moved quickly to the side of the stage where the other competitors waited. Maxine smiled a broad smile and nodded respectfully through her applause. And with that Andrea knew she had won. All the pain, all the anguish and sacrifice had led to this point. What no one in the auditorium knew was that it wasn’t just her competitors she had defeated.
Maxine hugged her warmly and genuinely as soon as the judges announced their decision. Andrea felt like crying but, of course, the tears wouldn’t come. The other contestants congratulated her, but she could see that only Maxine was genuinely pleased for her. Andrea felt bad, knowing that if things had been the other way around she would not have been so generous.
‘We’ll get pissed tonight,’ Maxine said in English. ‘Competition’s over… a week of indulgence before getting back to the grind?’
‘The champagne is definitely on me,’ said Andrea and they entered the dressing room. Three people waited for them, one of whom she recognised as Herr Waldheim, a member of the competition’s organising committee.
‘This is Herr Dr Gabriel and his nurse, Frau Bosbach.’ Waldheim introduced the other two. ‘They are here on behalf of the bodybuilding association to do a random blood test, if you have no objections.’
‘Of course not,’ Andrea said and felt her jaws ache from the effort of keeping her smile in place.
7.
At Fabel’s suggestion they left the car parked and he and Scholz walked to St Ursula’s. The church sat in a small square, hemmed in by neighbouring buildings. There was a bar-restaurant at one end of the square and a parochial house jammed against the flank of the church.
‘Where was Sabine Jordanski found?’ Fabel asked.
‘Over there, behind the church.’
Fabel and the others followed Scholz round the side of the church. As with the scene of Melissa Schenker’s murder, it was concealed from view. Another hidden death trap.
‘Where did she live?’
‘Her apartment was around the corner and over on Gereonswall.’ Scholz indicated the street that swept away from them.
‘Something doesn’t make sense…’ Fabel looked back in the direction of the city.
‘What?’ asked Scholz.
‘I’m convinced that the killer lies in wait for his victims. But the church is on the wrong side. She wouldn’t have passed by here.’
Scholz smiled grimly and shook his head. ‘She was with friends when she came home. They split up here and headed off. Even if she had come this way, the killer couldn’t have grabbed her. She was with witnesses.’
‘Then he must have either persuaded or forced her to come up here.’
‘Must have.’
‘That could mean that this specific church does have a significance. There was no sign of sexual contact?’ Fabel asked although he knew the answer.
‘None,’ answered Tansu. ‘No semen, no evidence of sexual assault.’
The four detectives stood looking at the ghost of a murder scene. The second they’d examined that day. Fabel was beginning to understand the dynamic of this small team: Scholz acted as if he wasn’t the boss, Kris and Tansu called him Benni and never Chef, but the truth was that he steered his team probably more strictly than Fabel did his. Kris was the apprentice: quietly gathering the gems of wisdom from Scholz’s feet. Tansu was strong-willed and intelligent, but still unsure of her feet and unwilling to challenge Scholz. It was clear that he had closed his mind to Tansu’s theory about the rape victim in ’ninety-nine. Fabel, on the other hand, could see her reasoning.
‘There’s something you’ve got to see.’ Scholz hunched up his shoulders against the cold and led Fabel towards the vast dark doors of St Ursula’s. Fabel followed him into the church, gazing up at the vaulted ceilings and the stained glass that burned dully against the winter light beyond.
‘Very nice.’
‘That’s not what I wanted to show you.’ Scholz guided Fabel to a vast reinforced door immediately to the right of the main entrance.
‘We’ll stay here,’ said Tansu. ‘It gives me the creeps down there.’
Fabel and Scholz went down stone steps into the crypt of the church.
‘This is open to the public during the day, but it’s monitored constantly by CCTV. And that massive door you saw is shut tight and time-locked at night.’
Fabel stopped in his tracks. The vaulted ceiling was whitewashed, with gilded details. Apart from that, it was as if the whole space had been lined with gold. But it was what the gold covered that fascinated Fabel.
‘The Golden Chamber…’ explained Scholz. ‘St Ursula’s is the second-oldest Romanesque church in Cologne. As you saw, the city has kind of encroached on its space, but there used to be an extensive graveyard outside dating back to Roman times.’
Fabel stared all around the chamber. The details on the walls were of bones and skulls. Real bones and skulls, pressed into the mortar of the walls and arranged in geometric patterns. Hundreds of them. Thousands. All gilded. The art of death. There were small alcoves pressed into the walls of the vault. Each contained a plaster bust.