Eagle ascending, p.9
Eagle Ascending, page 9
“That’s not all,” O’Brian continued. “A movie mogul from LA financed the gallery, an Israeli citizen, which has got Hawtrey thinking this is an anti-Semitic thing.”
Krueger cursed.
“What’s up, Joey?” O’Brian asked. “You sound almost as tired as me.”
“You remember I asked for information on cryogenic freezing?” Krueger asked, answering his partner’s question with a question of his own.
“Sure do,” O’Brian said, “but with this latest attack, you’ll forgive me if I put your newfound hobby on the back burner.”
“Sam,” Krueger said, “I don’t think this is a hobby no more. You need to know what I found out… and what I did… last night.”
DAWN WAS BREAKING warm over New York by the time Krueger has finished his story. “I’m screwed, aren’t I?” he asked his partner.
“Most likely,” O’Brian confessed, grimacing as he took a swig of the coffee that had grown cold while Krueger was speaking. “You need to get on a plane back here, buddy. Those GSG-9 are bad hombres. Get back to New York and lawyer up. You’ll most likely be extradited, but at least you’ll have Uncle Sam on your side.”
“I’ll be out the country by the end of the day,” Krueger said. “In the meantime, I need whatever you can find about cryogenic freezing. Is it… is at all possible that my grandfather could be walking the streets?”
“I’ll see what I can find out, partner,” O’Brian said. “I’ll show you what I dig up when I see you tonight. That means you call me the second you land, capiche? I’ll take you for a beer, then I’ll take you to a lawyer. He’s an expensive SOB, but he’ll work day and night to make sure you never spend a day in German cell.”
Cheered by his partner’s promise of aid, Krueger hung up with a smile a face. For the first time in twenty-four hours, he felt hope that he’d get through this nightmare without losing his mind. He even allowed himself a bite of the cured meats Brandt has offered him for breakfast.
But no sooner had he swallowed the first mouthful than Brandt returned to the lounge, wearing an expression that told Krueger his good cheer was about to be banished.
“You ready for the second bad headline of the day?” she asked.
“Nope,” Krueger answered, before taking Brandt’s cell phone. The homepage of a local Berlin newspaper was up on the screen. It was a tabloid, judging by the lurid way they reported the deaths of Sergeant Thomas Webber, hero of GSG-9, and Herr Gunther Frick, Vice-President of Gummi Pro.
The article was in German, and with his tired eyes and numbed brain, Krueger was in no mood to translate. He handed the phone back to his host.
“We knew they’d find them sooner or later,” he said, shrugging on his black shearling jacket.
“No!” Brandt said, “it’s worse.” She pulled up the article and began reading. “Both victims were found at dawn in the Neukölln district, close to the notorious derelict factories used as a meeting point by drug dealers and gangs. Early reports suggest that they were found stripped naked and hanging from a nearby tree, though police have refused to provide details on the deaths.”
Krueger shivered despite his coat. He was well acquainted with death; he knew how quickly it could come, and how it showed no respect for youth, age, money, or power. He’d faced killers in foreign war zones and on the drug-clogged streets of New York and had grown wearily indifferent to their rage. But mutilating the dead, disturbing bodies without motive: these were not the signs of a simple killer, but of a madman.
The conspiracy Krueger was facing, if conspiracy it was, was far blacker than he thought.
“What do you make of it?” he asked Brandt, finishing the last drop of a glass of water he did not remember picking up. Krueger’s mood was dark, but it grew darker still when Brandt began talking in what sounded like riddles:
“When someone is convicted of a crime punishable by death and is executed, you hang him on a tree, but his corpse must not remain all night upon the tree; you shall bury him that same day, for anyone hung on a tree and abandoned is under God’s curse.”
“Where did you dig up that nice little limerick?” Krueger asked.
“The book of Deuteronomy,” Brandt replied, “in the Bible.” The weight of that mighty one-syllable word seemed to bear down on Krueger, and his shoulders crumpled. He sat back on the couch, as if trying to escape its portent.
“So our two boys were discovered last night,” he said. “Their pals found them, realized their failure and grew mad, and because they are zealots, they decided to hang them—”
“So they would forever be under God’s curse,” Brandt said, finishing Krueger’s sentence. “What sort of people would do this?” she asked.
“The kind that are about to feel the long arm of American justice,” Krueger said. Clenching his jaw, he rose to his feet and strode out of the room and into the hallway. “These guys are mixed up with the attacks back home,” he said, “and they are mixed up with my goddamned family too!”
Krueger hands became fists, and he slammed his right paw into the wall. His face, already massive, looked like it had been carved in marble by angry, slashing hands and was terrifying to behold.
“And by God they will pay!” Krueger bundled his papers into his coat pockets. His first flush of despair had been burned away by a rage that was now roaring heartily in his chest. “Tessa,” he said, “I’m heading home. Once I land, I’m getting my boys in NYPD to help clear this up. Soon there’ll be American agents all over this city like a rash. Till then, you sit tight; don’t go exploring that Volcker rat hole no more!”
Brandt, impressed by the older cop’s passion, blushed. Her eyes grew wide in surprise and admiration, and she opened the door of her apartment. Krueger took a step into the hallway, but as he turned he caught site of two tall officers approaching, clad in the green and white uniforms of the Berlin Landespolizei.
Their eyes fell upon his, and the officers broke into a sprint. Krueger cursed and retreated into the apartment, locking the door behind him. “Goddammit Sam! I told you not to tell anyone!”
The footfalls outside came to sudden stop, replaced by loud banging on the door.
“Cops!” Krueger said to Brandt. “Either Sam’s blabbed to someone or Hawtrey found me. Either way, we’re screwed.”
“But your partner didn’t know you were staying in my apartment!” Brandt cried over the din behind the door. She lived in a smart apartment building near the Tiergarten, and already her neighbors were spilling into the hallway sharing worried glances as the police continued to batter the door.
“You’re thinking these guys could be friends of Weber?” Krueger asked.
Brandt nodded her head and grabbed a large silver sculpture atop the hallway table. It looked like a sham Remington, depicting a cowboy riding a horse.
“Slow down,” Krueger said, but events were moving too fast now. If the men behind the door were Weber’s confederates, perhaps even the men who had hung his naked body, then he and Brandt needed to escape. But if they were here on the orders of Hawtrey, or had somehow linked them to the murders, then his career, and his liberty, depended on playing nice.
Krueger leaned his head against the door, watching his sweat drip onto the floor below. He felt like he was back in the Middle East, not knowing friend from foe. Everyone, it seemed, was hiding their names and intentions beneath a veil of lies. It was enough to drive even reasonable men to black despair.
“What do you want?” Krueger cried.
“You are wanted for questioning,” the officer replied in English, “in connection to the murders last night in Neukölln district.”
Krueger sighed. In times like this, it was all too easy to reach for a gun, and sure enough, Krueger patted his back to make sure the Dostovei was still tucked into his pants. It was empty, but no one knew that except him.
Looking at Brandt, Krueger shrugged and opened the door.
The two men leapt into the hallway and slammed the door behind them. Batons raised, they swiftly disarmed Brandt, who had not expected Krueger to let them in, and they slammed her against the wall. A picture hanging from a dusty alcove fell to the floor, spraying the carpet with glass.
Too violent, Krueger thought, backing away from the other officer who was approaching him. Gaunt and wiry, he wore a feral smile and a mud-stained jacket that was too big for him.
“Hey Neumann,” Krueger yelled, reading the name tag on the front of the jacket. But the officer did not flinch. His lupine smile did not waver.
Krueger yelled the name again, but once more the man did not respond.
These aren’t cops, Krueger slowly realized, as his meager breakfast turned summersaults in his belly. These were the men who had hung Weber and Frick from the tree. As if to confirm his suspicion, the man stepped into the light streaming from the lounge door, and Krueger saw that the stain on his jacket, which he had mistaken for mud, was something far worse.
It was blood.
Krueger roared, a sound guttural and fierce, and the phony cop took a step back in fright. His smile vanished completely when Krueger presented his gun, and he dropped the baton.
“Get back Fritz!” Krueger said, and the man did as he was told.
Seeing Krueger menace the man closest to him, Brandt raised her leg and struck the guy behind her in the crotch. He stumbled, but not as much as Brandt had hoped, and when she tried to seize the sculpture, his fist was there to stop her. The man grabbed Brandt’s hair and yanked her violently, before using both his hands to hold the baton against her throat. He pulled hard, and as Brandt began to choke, her attacker turned to Krueger and grinned triumphantly.
“Get back!” He said in English, “or her neck is broken.”
Krueger paused. The man holding Brandt had a tattoo on his neck, and the violet bags under his eyes suggested a drug addiction. Depending on what garbage was coursing through his veins, he could kill the doctor before Krueger took another step further.
“Let her go,” Krueger said as the second phony cop, the one who had dropped his baton, recovered his courage and stood next to his friend. He looked like a man who had won a prize but was not sure how.
“Not a chance,” the man replied. “Put down the gun. Now.” The threat lingered in the air as the man pulled the baton, crushing Brandt’s throat. Brandt’s lips began to turn blue.
Krueger sized up his two opponents. Both smaller than he, but with the zeal of maniacs, they could easily overpower him.
But he did have Brandt. And her gaudy plastic trophies proved she was not as helpless as these two men believed.
Krueger nodded, a lightning-fast glance that gave Brandt a split-second’s warning of what was to come. She saw it through tear-stained eyes and nodded. Then Krueger raised his empty gun and threw it at the nearest man. It missed, barely striking his shoulder, but it provided Krueger the time he needed to reach down and grab the baton the phony cop had dropped earlier. So armed, the New York cop fell upon his foe, swinging the club, not caring where the blows landed, so long as they hurt.
Brandt’s attacker took a defensive step back, and in so doing, lessened his grip. It was the one shot she needed. Simultaneously she stomped on his left shoe and drove her elbow savagely into his gut, enjoying the sucking sounds that came out of his mouth, knowing she’d left him winded. She spun and raked her nails across his face, drawing blood, and as he raised his hands defensively, she finally grabbed the sculpture and brought the rearing horse down upon his head. It left a red welt at the top of his skull, and he collapsed to the floor, conscious, but with no fight left in him.
Krueger, panting, dropped the blood-stained baton in disgust. His foe was bleeding from his nose, his lips were busted, and the remains of three teeth littered the floor.
“So how do you know self-defense?” Krueger asked, amazed at Brandt’s swift and confident attack.
“I have a reputation with a few of the Neo-Nazi gangs,” she said. Krueger noticed Brandt was still breathing calmly, suggesting she was fitter and tougher than most college faculty. “It pays to know how to take care of yourself, especially when amateurs like this are clogging up the gutters of Berlin.”
Brandt shook her head dismissively, enraged that the men had violated her home and so casually assumed that she was easy prey. She had the look of someone who had often been underestimated in her life, and was left bitter as a consequence.
“Not quite,” Krueger said, accurately assessing the situation. “They stripped and hung dead men from a tree, they found where you lived, and they either stole, or have friends who could provide, genuine police uniforms. Not bad for what appear to be addicts.” Krueger totted up all these points like an accountant, and the grim balance suggested only one course of action. “We’ve got to leave,” Krueger said, picking up his gun and wiping the blood from the baton. “More may be coming.”
“But this is my home!” Brandt protested.
“And it will be again,” Krueger said, “but right now, we have to get out of here.”
Brandt stood with her hands on her hips in defiance. But suddenly her green eyes, which had narrowed to slits, opened wide. “I know where we can go,” she said.
“It needs to be someplace secluded, someplace quiet,” Krueger said. “I need to call Sam, and most likely Hawtrey too.” Brandt was pacing around the apartment, tossing clothing and other items into a blue canvas bag. “What do you have in mind?” Krueger asked.
“Airport,” Brandt replied.
“Did you just hear a damned word I said?” Krueger cried, but Brandt didn’t reply. She pushed open her door, pushed passed the worried neighbors with her nose in the air, and rushed to the lobby with Krueger, bewildered, following behind. “Trust me,” she said, “this place is one of the most secure in the world.”
Tessa Brandt gunned the car and sped out of her parking lot just as the sound of police sirens rose in the air. The real cops had arrived.
IT TOOK SIX LONG, drab hours to reach Frankfurt, but the journey had at least given Krueger time to rest. He slept well, and his dreams had been untroubled by the chaos of the last few days. He awoke to find a jagged grey skyline beneath a milky sunlight.
Not even Brandt’s many conversations had woken him. She’d spent most of the trip on her cellphone speaking hurriedly in German, and though Krueger didn’t know who she was talking to, the long wrenching laughs suggested it was a close friend or friends.
She’s tough, Krueger thought. A home assault would have broken most people’s confidence and sapped their self-esteem. But this teacher? Yucking it up just hours later.
“I should have used that time to make a few calls myself,” Krueger confessed as he opened his eyes to find Brandt charging her cell phone. Outside, the sky was a vast grey smear.
The young German scholar smiled and flicked the turn signal; she was taking her green little Volvo off the Autobahn. “You needed to sleep,” she said.
“Sam needs to know. So does Hawtrey…and Hassler.”
“They’ll all be told when we get you out of the country,” Brandt said. “And there’s too much heat on you in Berlin.”
“On us,” Krueger corrected her. Brandt grimaced, remembering the crazed savagery which had nearly ended her life. “So where are you taking me?” Krueger asked.
“Greystone Investment International,” Brandt answered, before adding the words “private equity group” when she saw Krueger’s vacant expression.
Krueger frowned as the Volvo drove over the Love Lock Bridge toward downtown. Vast skyscrapers, gleaming confections of steel and glass, rose up to meet them.
“You don’t seem like a girl who parties with bankers,” Krueger said.
“I’m not,” Brandt replied, “but Barnaby Grimm isn’t a banker.”
Forty minutes later, Krueger and Brandt stood on a windswept helipad overlooking Frankfurt. Glum-eyed guards stood alert around them. Greystone, founded by Lord Anthony Leslie Grimm, had continental headquarters on the top floor of the Silberturm, a fantastical skyscraper that seemed to shine even in the dun afternoon light. Standing atop that tower, Krueger and Brandt could barely be heard over the din of the gusting wind.
But soon a sound louder still emerged: the throaty growl of a helicopter engine. Lights cut through the low-hanging cloud, and a sleek black chopper finally emerged, gracefully landing just a few dozen feet away from where Krueger stood.
The sole passenger gamboled out of the door before the rotor had come to a complete stop. His dark complexion and brown eyes contrasted with the light grey tweed suit he was wearing. His black hair was swept back, and a golden pocket watch twinkled from his vest.
“Tessa!” he cried in a deep baritone. “Welcome back!” Tessa smiled seductively and embraced him.
“Good to see you, Grimm,” she said, before leading him to Krueger.
“Detective, this is Dr. Barnaby Grimm, formerly on the faculty at St. Andrews University. An expert on the antiquities and archeology of the Middle East, and a good friend.”
“Please to meet you, pal,” Krueger said, and was amazed to discover that Grimm greeted him without once staring at his chin. It was a welcome change from the minute winces and furtive stares he normally received.
“Pleased to make your acquaintance,” Grimm said in an accent that suggested an expensive education. “May I press you to some afternoon tea?” Grimm asked, ushering Brandt and Krueger to the stairwell.
But Brandt grabbed his hand and came between him and the exit. “Actually, we are rather rushed, Barnaby. A swift departure would be most appreciated.”
Grimm flashed a warm smile that lingered on his lips even as he returned to the helicopter. “As you wish,” he said.
“Why are we hooking up with his guy?” Krueger asked Brandt as the rotor blades coughed back into life.
“Three reasons,” Brandt answered, leading him to the open door of the helicopter. “First, he knows early Christian history like you Americans know baseball. He might shed some light on Krueger’s quest for the Cross. Second, his dad is the third wealthiest man in Europe, which means he has ways to get us out of Germany without any entanglements with the police.”
