Beyond The Window: A Fast Paced Crime Thriller (Private Detective Heinrich Muller Crime Thriller Book 2) Read online

  He crept to the pillar and froze a step before he made it. He had heard a sound, the faintest scuff, beyond the pillar and the screen, a little to the left. Red Bandanna creeping for the back exit?

  Heinrich whipped around the pillar in a crouch, his gun leveled. Beyond lay a rectangular area about ten feet long and six feet wide, cordoned off by black velvet on two sides and the concrete wall at the end. What looked like a surgeon’s table stood in the center, all gleaming chrome and clean grey padding. An opening on the far right led somewhere he couldn’t see.

  A glance down the main axis of the room showed several such partitions and openings.

  Shit, this really is a maze.

  Another muffled grunt. This time Heinrich didn’t answer.

  Instead of moving to the opening at the far corner, where Red Bandanna had obviously gone, Heinrich peeked around the partition and saw another area cordoned off by velvet screens. In this one, a strange wooden X about eight feet tall was bolted to the floor. Chains on each end of the two beams sparked Heinrich’s imagination about what its purpose was. A side table with an array of whips and riding crops told him he didn’t need his imagination.

  Heinrich had always been a meat-and-potatoes man. This sort of stuff, while not offending him, left him baffled and somewhat amused.

  It also distracted him for a crucial second.

  A movement behind him. He spun and dodged just in time to avoid the sap hitting his head. Instead, the heavy leather pouch, filled with what felt like BBs, struck his forearm.

  Just a glancing blow, but enough to send his gun flying. It clattered on the floor and slid under the nearest partition.

  Heinrich’s boxing reactions kicked in. He threw a weak left jab intended more to back off the attacker than to hurt him. Then he backed off himself.

  This worked on both counts. They ended up two paces apart.

  Heinrich’s blow hadn’t even landed.

  Red Bandanna still wore the cloth over his face, Wild-West-style. He wore a black wool cap over his hair, black jeans, and a black shirt. Medium height, athletic build, brown eyes.

  “I guess you’re not one of Wanda’s customers, huh?” Heinrich said.

  The man raised the sap over his head and lunged forward.

  Heinrich feinted to the right, then dove to the left. Red Bandanna was fooled just long enough to hesitate, then swing at Heinrich and miss.

  Heinrich grabbed the first thing he could on the table, then used his free hand to fling the table at his opponent, who dodged nimbly out of the way.

  They circled. Heinrich discovered he had grabbed a riding crop.

  “You may not be a customer,” he said, “but I’ll give you a good whipping if you don’t give up right now.”

  Red Bandanna had no intention of giving up. He’d gotten more careful, though. Heinrich’s riding crop looked flimsy compared to the heavy leather sap, but Heinrich had the reach on him.

  Heinrich proved it by springing forward, smacking Red Bandanna across the face, and darting back before the guy could counterattack.

  Red Bandanna looked more pissed than hurt. He let out a roar and rushed Heinrich, who scurried behind the wooden X.

  But it was a trick. As soon as Heinrich was out of reach, Red Bandanna turned on his heel and bolted for the front of the room.

  Shit. Heinrich followed.

  And fell into another trick. With impressive speed, Red Bandanna had made it to the front door. By the time Heinrich rounded the corner, the guy had picked up the heavy ceramic pot of a ficus plant by the door and heaved it at him.

  Heinrich barely had time to dodge out of the way. As it was, a few leaves slapped him. At least the pot hadn’t busted his head open. That would have been an embarrassing death.

  Red Bandanna bolted out the door. Heinrich went after him.

  The intruder was in full flight mode now. No more tricks, just escape. He ran down the stairs as fast as he could, Heinrich half a flight behind him, still wielding the riding crop.

  “I’m going to give you a good whipping, you motherfucker!” Heinrich said this as he rounded the corner onto the next landing and nearly bowled over a little old lady, her blue hair in curlers.

  “I told you freaks to get out of this damn building!” she shrieked. “This time I’m calling the cops!”

  “Please do,” Heinrich called over his shoulder as he ran down the next flight of stairs.

  The sound of the front door opening told him that Red Bandanna was a good runner and had gained distance on him. Heinrich picked up speed, risking his neck by taking the stairs three at a time.

  He got to the front hall just as Red Bandanna slammed the front door shut behind him.

  Heinrich hurried over, took a second to use the peephole to make sure the guy wasn’t planning a nasty surprise, and wrenched the door open.

  Too late. His caution with the peephole had given Red Bandanna even more of a lead. He was across the street and about to round the corner.

  Heinrich cursed. The guy was faster than he was. No point in pursuit.

  Strange that he had run, though. That sap would beat a riding crop any day. Maybe the guy got spooked by Henrich’s bluff about the cops coming?

  Heinrich got the impression that his opponent didn’t get spooked by much.

  So no, it wasn’t the thing about the cops.

  Maybe he fled because he had already finished the job.

  Oh, crap.

  Heinrich rushed back up the stairs, giving the old lady a nod as she took the opportunity to screech at him again. This time she held a phone in her hand.

  When he got back to the dominatrix studio, the first thing he did was retrieve his gun from where it had slid under the partition.

  The muffled grunt continued, more persistent this time.

  Heinrich followed the noise through a couple more of the little partitioned rooms until he stopped short. On the bare concrete floor knelt a naked man. He was bound hand and foot, his hands tied behind his back and his forehead pressed against the floor. Several leather straps wound around him kept him totally immobile. A complex arrangement of straps around his head obviously had some sort of gag attached, because all he could do was grunt. He was blindfolded. His bald head and bare butt made for a bizarre symmetry.

  Heinrich would have laughed but another sight killed any humor in this scene. A female leg poked out from behind a large bureau stocked with various whips and restraining devices.

  Sighing, he went around the bureau to find what he expected—a dead body.

  Wanda the Whip wore a black corset, fishnet stockings, and stiletto heels. The stilettos had fallen off in the struggle. Her feet were unusually small, giving her a girlish look. Livid marks around her neck showed that she had been strangled. Her face wore an expression of surprise.

  Heinrich felt for a pulse on her still-warm wrist and found none.

  CHAPTER THREE

  “Wait! You can’t go in there!”

  Heinrich ignored the front desk attendant as he burst through the inner doors of Firestarter Systems, Inc., his client’s Internet startup. He stalked through a medium-sized room with long tables and beanbag chairs where kids who looked fresh out of college tapped away on their laptops. Most didn’t even notice him. A couple looked away from their screens long enough to give him a confused and disapproving stare. He was the oldest person in the room by at least fifteen years.

  A glass-enclosed meeting room with half a dozen people around a table, looking at a PowerPoint presentation, showed him where to go. Brixton Murphy stood at the front, gesturing at something on the screen.

  Heinrich opened the door. “Meeting over, kids. Get out,” he ordered the group. Then he jabbed a finger at Brixton. “You and I need to talk.”

  Some idiot with dreadlocks sitting by Brixton spoke up. “Look, man, you can’t just—”

  “Kiss your boss’s ass later. Or are you going to try to kick me out, beta male?”

  Mr. Dreadlocks curled his lip but didn�
��t reply.

  Brixton raised his hands. “It’s all right, everyone. Sorry for the interruption. This is important. If you could all—”

  “Get your asses moving,” Heinrich said.

  Everyone filed out. Mr. Dreadlocks actually flinched as he passed Heinrich.

  Kids these days, Heinrich thought, shaking his head.

  The last one out closed the door behind her.

  Heinrich rounded on his client.

  “What the hell did you lead me into? Did you know that mug was going to be waiting there for me?”

  Brixton wore a clueless expression on his face. Heinrich spelled it out for him.

  “Wanda’s dead. I showed up half an hour before I was supposed to, but a minute too late to save her. The murderer was either going to take off or wait for me and give me the same treatment. So tell me, you piece of shit, just what the fuck is going on?”

  Brixton’s shocked sputtering told Heinrich that the idiot really didn’t know the answer. “W-what do we do?”

  “It’s out of our hands. Homicide is over at the studio now. I just spent an hour debriefing Detective Fowler of the NYPD about your case.”

  Brixton buried his face in his hands. “Oh, God. It’s going to be all over the papers. What will happen to my business? And Dad’s ministry?”

  Heinrich shook his head in disgust. A woman was dead and all this hipster could think about was his reputation? The rich were all the same, no matter what the generation.

  Oh, and Daddy was a preacher. Wonderful.

  “Look, you threw me into this with the impression that I was doing a typical fetch-the-runaway-wife job. Routine stuff. But now I got a body on my hands and a killer who knows my face. So tell me everything, and I do mean everything.”

  Brixton slumped in his chair. Out of the corner of his eye, Heinrich could see Brixton’s employees staring at them over the tops of their computers.

  When Brixton spoke, he whispered, though the glass was soundproof.

  “Going to Amsterdam wasn’t actually Casey’s idea. Zhe was contacted by a production company in The Netherlands called 666 Entertainment.”

  “Sounds lovely.”

  “They do photo spreads and movies with a satanic theme, mostly with a BDSM slant. There’s a huge underground market for niche stuff like that. They offered zir good money. Plus zhe could have zir own work in the Red Light District during off hours.”

  “Why take the kid?”

  Brixton shrugged, his head hung low. “I don’t know.”

  Heinrich paused. “They don’t make … other kinds of niche stuff, do they?” Heinrich’s gut knotted as he said the words.

  Brixton’s head snapped up. “No! Casey would never agree to that. Zhe’s a good mother!”

  “Good enough to rob her husband blind and abandon her infant.”

  Brixton’s eyes widened. “Serenity! What if they go after her?” He pulled out his phone and called the daycare center. After a minute he got off, obviously relieved. “I need to pick her up just to be on the safe side,” he said.

  “And check into a hotel. Detective Fowler will be calling you once he’s done with the crime scene. I gave him your phone number.”

  “All right.” Brixton got up to leave.

  “We’re not done yet!” Heinrich snapped.

  Brixton sat back down like a punished schoolchild.

  “So, tell me more about this production studio.”

  “I don’t know much. I’d only heard the name. Casey led me to believe zhe hadn’t made up zir mind yet. Guess zhe had. Wanda got in touch because Casey wanted her to come with. That’s how she knew where Casey went. I got the impression that Wanda was spooked by the whole thing. Something about it scared her, and it’s hard to scare Wanda.”

  “Whatever it was, now we don’t get to know. Tell Fowler all this. I’ll send you a bill for the one day I was on the job.”

  “Wait! You can’t quit.”

  “A woman has been murdered. It’s a police affair now.”

  “No, you need to go get Casey and Arizona! The cops will be too slow. A warrant, talking to the cops in Amsterdam, extradition … that will take days, and they might not have days. Book the next flight out there. I don’t care how much it costs.”

  Heinrich considered. The guy was right; the cops would take too long. Fowler was a good man, but the red tape would slow him down. With Heinrich being a private investigator, he was facing a legal gray area when a police investigation was underway, but Fowler would let it slide. He was good people.

  “All right, I’ll go. Anything else you gotta tell me?”

  After the briefest of hesitations, Brixton shook his head.

  Heinrich glared at him. “Anything?”

  “No!”

  Bullshit, but you’re not going to spill, are you?

  “An extra two grand if I bring your kid back unharmed.”

  “Of course. Anything. And two grand for Casey.”

  “Deal.”

  Your wife ain’t worth shit, buddy, but I’ll take the money. And as for getting your little girl back unharmed, it might be too late for that.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Heinrich booked a red-eye flight leaving JFK at eleven that night. It would get him into Amsterdam the next day at one in the afternoon. It was the best he could do. He bought a first-class ticket so he could catch some Zs on the way over. He had a feeling he wouldn’t get much once he was in the Netherlands.

  In the meantime, Brixton sent him a long email with details about his missing wife and kid. He also sent a picture. Mother and daughter together in some park. Both had flaming red hair. The kid had a big gap-toothed grin while her mom looked more serious. Casey’s hair was cut in a severe pattern, bangs way too short, with the sides shaved and the back in a weird rectangle hanging straight down to the small of her back.

  “I bet she walked all over poor little Brixton.” Heinrich murmured. “That beta male probably loved it, too. What a chump.”

  He forwarded the information to Biniam, a computer hacker who specialized in hunting down secrets online. Later that day, Biniam invited him over. Heinrich was surprised. The refugee valued his privacy and generally kept to himself.

  Biniam lived in a one-bedroom apartment in Alphabet City, one of the last bastions of true New York. When Heinrich had been growing up in the Eighties, it had been a no-go area even for a juvenile delinquent like him. It had cleaned itself up a lot since then, although it had managed to resist gentrification to a large degree. Walking the streets, Heinrich heard a dozen languages and saw people from every continent. This was how all of New York had been before it was whitewashed into generic sameness.

  Biniam, for example, was from Eritrea, the region that had first discovered coffee, but he’d have looked out of place among all the hipsters in Starbucks.

  “Selam, Biniam,” Heinrich said as he entered through the door. “Kemey ‘aleka?”

  “Kemey Wu’elka, Heinrich,” Biniam replied. He was a slight man in his late twenties, with Semitic features and coffee-colored skin.

  The friendly hello took Heinrich to the end of his Tigrinya. He’d never had a reason to learn more of it. He did, however, speak those words perfectly.

  Biniam gave him the traditional handshake of the Horn of Africa, clasping Heinrich’s hand down low and then bumping his shoulder against his. The shoulder bump was a habit from the old country that Biniam had kept, much to the amusement of his small circle of friends. Clapping to get a waiter’s attention was something they’d had to make him stop.

  Biniam’s apartment looked like the complete opposite of what Heinrich imagined a typical computer hacker’s place would be. It was scrupulously clean, with no pizza boxes or Chinese takeaway on the table. Biniam preferred to make his national cuisine, something he got to eat damn too little of back in Eritrea. Half that country was starving. On the walls hung photos of Eritrea—blue waters, rugged mountains, and the Italian retro cafés of the capital, Asmara. There were no posters of
science fiction movies and no comic books anywhere. Only the high-powered Mac with two large screens hinted at Biniam’s occupation.

  “I’ll put on some coffee,” Biniam said.

  “Music to my ears.” Biniam’s coffee was the best Heinrich had ever tasted.

  He followed the hacker into the kitchen, where Biniam began grinding the coffee beans.

  “I found some wonderful details about your dominatrix,” Biniam said with a giggle. “You’re going to have fun on this case.”

  “What did you find?”

  “Just like her husband suspected, she has moved to Amsterdam and rented a room in the Red Light District. I don’t have her home address yet, just her workspace. Basically, it’s a little closet where the woman stands by a glass door so she can be seen from the street. When a man is interested, they go in back, where there is a bedroom.”

  Biniam put the grounds into a small brass pot and set it on the open gas range. He chuckled.

  “I must say, in the West you really make things efficient. Back home, the girls just lounge around the bars. In Amsterdam, you don’t even have to buy a beer.”

  “But in Eritrea, how do you tell the difference between the working girls and the girls who are just at the bar for a drink?” Heinrich asked.

  Biniam laughed. “Decent women don’t go to bars!”

  “Um, OK. What else have you found out?”

  “Some ads she has put up on various online adult sites. A few of the Dutch bars and clubs she hangs out in, or at least that she’s reviewed online. I think she’s doing it to drum up business. She uses her working name, the same as in her Red Light District room. Intersex Dom666.”

  “Lovely.”

  “Oh, and I looked up Brixton Murphy for you. I was curious why someone so boring would marry such a crazy woman. It turns out he’s quite the little rebel.”

  “Really? How so?”

  Biniam didn’t answer immediately. The coffee had come to a boil, a black froth bubbling at the top of the pot. A rich aroma pervaded the room. Biniam put a cloth over the pot to filter out the grounds, then poured it into two tiny cups. Taking them, the two men moved to the living room and sat. Heinrich didn’t try to sip the scalding liquid at first. Instead, he held it close to his nose so that he could savor the smell.