Craig Russell - The Valkyrie Song

‘This bitch isn’t going to be scared into a panicked flight,’ said Fabel. ‘My guess is she’s dumped the car very close and stolen another. I want the control room at the Presidium to alert us to any stolen cars in a five-kilometre radius. Or a damaged Polo being abandoned. In the meantime, get every mobile unit to check alleyways, side streets, disused sites — anywhere she might have dumped it. But I’m pretty sure we’ll find it close by. And have every woman walking alone stopped and questioned. Minimum two officers. And extreme caution.’

‘There’s something else,’ said Dietz. ‘I’m pretty sure I hit her. There’s some blood on the road further up where she ran. I think I got her in the leg.’

‘She’ll have tried to find somewhere to get fixed up. She’s still here, Werner. We’ve got to find her.’

Poseldorf was one of Hamburg’s trendiest addresses. The property was expensive and the shops and restaurants exclusive. But Poseldorf had started off as Hamburg’s poor quarter and the layout was a tangle of cobbled streets.

Anke used as many alleys and access lanes as possible, even clambering over walls to avoid using the main streets. She found herself on Hallerstrasse, near the TV studio and the Rotherbaum tennis stadium. The street was lined with cars, but most were expensive newer models with complicated immobiliser and alarm systems. She walked on. She would have to walk back to where she had left her own car. She needed to get it out of the area before it was treated as an abandoned vehicle, giving the police a positive ID and address for her. But she had parked far enough away from the Alsterpark to feel relatively secure. It was a decision that she regretted now with every step she took. Her calf throbbed and her entire leg began to ache, a result of the sudden and severe muscular contraction after the bullet had hit. It would not have been too long a walk if she had been able to continue straight along Mittelweg, but she knew that the police would, by now, be stopping almost every woman walking alone, so she was forced to take the most circuitous route, more than tripling the distance she had to cover.

Anke felt an enormous relief when she turned the corner and saw her Lexus saloon parked where she had left it. She sank into the leather seat and stretched her injured leg out straight, allowing herself a moment to rest. She eased her hand up the back of her boot and felt the wet leather. When she got back to the apartment she was going to have to stitch the wound, which, given its position, would not be easy.

Leaning her head back against the seat, Anke closed her eyes for a moment. She turned suddenly when she heard someone knocking on the side window.

Anke smiled and slid the window open. She assessed the situation: young policewoman — very young — alone, foot patrol, inexperienced. Every one else hunting the killer from the Alsterpark.

‘Is this your vehicle?’

‘Yes, it is. Is there a problem?’

‘You’ve been parked here too long. I’ll have to give you a ticket. What’s your name, please?’

You’re checking my name against the database, thought Anke. You’ve already radioed in the index number. It’ll be flagged up later. Her identity, her address, all compromised.

‘Jana Eigen.’ She gave the name she’d been living under for the last ten years. A name that had become as real to her as Anke Wollner. Now it was lost.

‘May I see your ID card and driver’s licence?’ The young policewoman was trying hard to project authority. Anke estimated she was no older than twenty-three; pretty, with dark hair under the police cap. Her blue police jacket was a size too big for her, giving her an almost childlike appearance.

‘Sure,’ said Anke, reaching into the shoulder bag sitting next to her on the passenger seat. ‘Here it is.’

Anke’s first shot hit the policewoman in the throat. She dropped beside the car. Anke swung the door open but it jammed against the policewoman’s body and she had to squeeze out, hurting her leg as she did so. The young policewoman was face down, the oversized blue waterproof jacket bunched up like a turtle’s carapace with the word POLIZEI emblazoned on it in white. A sickeningly wet gurgling sound issued from her and she was trying to crawl away. Anke fired a second round into the back of the policewoman’s head and she lay still. There were screams from onlookers and Anke knew that she’d have to move fast. The policewoman’s body obstructed the car so Anke had to drag it out into the road. Then she jumped back in the car and sped off.

She would have to dump the car. She would have to find a safe place.

It was pretty much what Fabel had expected. Van Heiden had not been angry, nor had he lectured Fabel, but he had communicated, more by silences than words, that things could not be worse and, if the axe fell, then it would fall squarely on Fabel’s neck.

What hadn’t helped had been the media attention. Accounts of the shootings on Harvestehuder Weg were repeated on every news bulletin, on every channel, and not just in Hamburg. The Presidium was like a medieval castle under siege, with satellite-dish-topped vans parked outside and TV crews pointing their cameras at the building. Fabel even got a message that Sylvie Achtenhagen had been trying to get in touch with him.

‘She said it’s very urgent,’ the cop at reception had told him.

‘I bet she did,’ said Fabel, scrunching up the note, leaning over the reception desk and dropping it into the wastebasket.

After leaving van Heiden, Fabel phoned Werner at the hospital.

‘How’s Anna?’

‘Still in theatre,’ said Werner. ‘I’ll phone as soon as she comes out and I hear anything. Try not to worry, Jan. She’s tougher than either of us.’

After Fabel hung up, there was a knock on the door and Dirk Hechtner came in.

‘You okay, Chef? I mean-’

‘I know what you mean. I’m okay. Thanks for asking. What have you got?’

‘The gun recovered from Margarethe Paulus’s apartment — we’ve traced it. It used to be owned by a Zlatko Ljubi i c, a Croatian. And listen to this: Ljubi i c was arrested during the same sting as Goran Vuja i c. He was Vuja i c ’s bodyguard.’

‘Where is he now?’

‘I’m chasing that up,’ said Hechtner. ‘The Danish police had to let him go: it’s not illegal to be a gangster’s bodyguard unless you can be nailed for doing something illegal yourself. He worked in Copenhagen as a security guard for a while. After that, I don’t know yet. But it’s a hell of a coincidence that there’s a Vuja i c connection after all.’

‘Anything else?’

‘Yeah — I checked out Svend Langstrup, Gina Bronsted’s head of security; no form. But he’s a former officer in the J?gerkorpset, that’s the Danish special forces. He has dual nationality: Danish and German. Langstrup ran his own security company for a while — and yes, I’m way ahead of you, I’m checking with the Danish police to see if it was his company that Zlatko Ljubi i c worked with. From what I can see he’s on a huge salary. He lives out in Blankenese.’

‘Okay, keep on it. I’m heading down to the Ops Room.’

The Operations Room was more crowded than usual and Fabel’s heart sank when he saw both van Heiden and Police President Steinbach amongst the other officers. For Fabel, having his superiors present when he was trying to run an inquiry was like having a teacher peer over your shoulder while you did your homework.

But he could tell by van Heiden’s face that his bad-news day had just got worse.

‘We’ve lost another one,’ said van Heiden. ‘The bitch has killed another police officer.’

‘Who?’