Reckoning Point, стр. 40
“Yes, it’s a rather nasty affair,” replies Bram as he locates a vein.
“The last thing we need in the resort at the height of summer too. News like this spreads, before you know it Amsterdam and everywhere will be suffering. They rely on that particular trade and the girls must be so scared.”
Bram pauses and looks down at her. “Maybe it will help the resort, weed out the bad and the good will come. It’s economics, really.”
She blanches at his harsh words and wonders if he cares at all for his patients. But before she can think of a retort he’s speaking again.
“I had your young man here about it the other day.”
She blinks in surprise. “Erik?”
“How many other young men do you have?” His words are tinged with a smile but she cringes inwardly.
“Is he heading the investigation?” she asks, and then. “I’ve not been home yet, that’s my next stop.”
Bram wipes her arm and puts a small round plaster over the area from which he has drawn the blood. He hands her a pot and points towards the toilet.
She’s sitting in the loo when she hears him speaking.
“It looks like he’s in charge of this one. Let’s hope they catch the killer soon, or it won’t look good on your Erik now, will it?”
Sitting on the cold seat in the toilet she stares into the mirror in front of her. Erik has risen through the ranks at the station but, like her, he’s determined and focussed and he’s heading straight for the top. This case could make him, but it could also break him.
She closes her eyes and heaves a sigh. At least when she gets home he’ll be distracted through his work. And knowing that fact now, she knows she won’t be confessing anything to him about her own misdeeds. If these tests are all okay, she can just forget that anything ever happened and Erik will never need to know.
38
ERIK FONS & ALEX HARVEY
WALDOPSTRAAT
9.7.15 Afternoon
They’ve been at the murder scene for hours and Alex has somehow found himself no longer the nuisance interloper, but more of an assistant.
When they had got out of the car Erik was off and running, leaving Alex no choice but to follow him down the narrow alleyway that stank of urine and which was littered with old food wrappers and discarded bottles. A police guard stood at the open doorway, arms crossed over his burley chest, and he had nodded a greeting to the Inspectuer.
“Has anyone else been in?” Erik asked.
“No sir, not since the reporting officer.”
“Who found her and who was the attending officer?” Erik asked as he snapped on two pairs of gloves and handed some to Alex.
Alex wondered if it was deliberate or if Erik was just distracted. Whatever it was, he wasn’t going to argue or draw attention to the fact that he shouldn’t be there, so he put on the gloves and stayed quiet.
“I was attending, sir,” interrupted a female officer as she stepped forward. “Sergeant Coby Klerk.”
As they began to speak rapidly in Dutch the heavy on the door had joined in and Alex took the chance to look through the open door into the flat.
It was dark and dim inside; the only window in the kitchen area being directly opposite the alley wall, so Alex imagined that was in a state of almost constant darkness.
“Feet!” Erik had suddenly barked at Alex, breaking off from his conversation and throwing a couple of plastic shoe covers over to him.
Smiling to himself, Alex carefully backed out of the door and slipped the coverings on over his shoes, confident that he was now a part of the team.
Erik isn’t sure how Alex came to be an integral part of his murder investigation. The man didn’t take no for an answer, though if Erik is honest with himself, he likes Alex’s way of thinking, and, if he’s very honest, he needs all the help he could get. And Erik is so conscious of this case and the affect it could have on his career that he is proceeding slower than he ever has before, in order not to miss anything vital.
Now the two of them stand over the dead body of a woman who has been identified as Amber Bente. She’s on her back, naked, the only marks on her a dark smudge on her face and bruising around her neck.
Erik leans closer, peers at her face, identifies the mark as mascara. He looks at her face, her eyes are open and cloudy. Amber’s body is covered in Livor Mortis, and with the tip of his gloved finger he presses the point between her ribs and her spine. The blue tinged skin doesn’t change colour, which tells him she’s been dead for at least ten hours.
“She’s been strangled, right?”
Erik straightens up and looks at Alex. He’d almost forgotten he was there. Now, his new acquaintance joins him at the bedside and together they stare down at the girl.
“It looks like it,” agrees Erik as they study the yellowing marks at her neck.
“And did the other ones die of asphyxiation?”
“Yes, but–” Erik breaks off and walks around the bed, leaning in to the dead girl as close as he can without touching her.
“But what?”
“There was another wound on the other two girls, on both of them, like a patch of skin had been removed. Unless it’s underneath her I can’t see it here.”
“Do you mean it was removed as in taken as a keepsake, like a trophy?” Alex asks.
Erik shrugs. “Maybe.”
“So what now?”
Erik walks to the bedroom door and calls to the heavy on the door. He barks some orders at him before turning his attention back to Alex. “Now we