Forty Hours: A breath-taking thriller Read online

  “Hello, Faris.”

  At least, she wasn’t yelling at him right off the bat. Her gaze scanned his face for a few moments before registering the bandage on his forehead and his split lip. Concern swept across her face, but it was quickly replaced by chilly reserve. She finally tore her eyes from him and looked down at the child. “Lilly, say hello to Faris.”

  The name sliced through him like a knife.

  “Hello!” the child chirped. She looked uncertain – obviously she sensed the tension that ran between her mother and the strange, dark-haired man.

  Faris nodded at the girl. “Hello, Lilly.” He held back all the other words that wanted to come because he didn’t want to sound bitter. What could he have said anyway? You’ve settled down nicely in your new life. How could you name the child Lilly?

  Come back to me!

  He flinched. Had he said that last sentence out loud? Obviously not, since Laura was now smiling. That smile looked timid, but not angry. “What are you doing here?” she asked.

  He gazed at Lilly and pressed his lips together to keep from telling Laura about the explosion in the subway. One of the reasons she had left him was because she could no longer stand the constant fear she felt for him.

  “Nothing. I just happened to be in the area.”

  Her pale blue eyes searched his. Yeah, right! he read in them, but to his relief, he didn’t say anything.

  Her t-shirt really did match her eyes perfectly.

  “We’re doing alright, Faris,” she murmured after a few moments, and he understood that she had held back two critical words.

  Without you.

  He nodded. Started to beat his retreat. “Of course. I didn’t mean to bother you.”

  She smiled at him again, and this time, Faris’s knees felt weak.

  “You’re not.” Her eyes shifted to his wrist. “You’re still wearing that bracelet,” she said.

  Faris plunged his hands into his back jeans pockets. “I think I should go.”

  Laura just nodded.

  Faris climbed awkwardly back onto the motorcycle seat. He was aware that the child was gazing at him just as intently as Laura was. With a grin, he nodded at Lilly. “Take care!”

  Laura didn’t say a word.

  Faris started the machine.

  *

  Richard Westphal threw an irritated glance at his watch. It was already four-thirty! Once again, the meeting had lasted longer than he had thought it would, and now he had to hurry. He strode quickly around the corner onto Ku’damm in order to reach the closest subway station. The next moment, he ran into a group of men and women, all of whom were wearing the colorful scarves associated with the church conference. They were singing some stupid hymn. He barely managed to avoid running into one of the men.

  “God almighty!” he cursed.

  The man turned toward him. He was around fifty, and his beard had more gray in it than brown.

  “Sing with us!” he urged Westphal cheerfully.

  Westphal could hardly believe his ears. “Get out of my way, sir!” he demanded.

  The bearded man simply raised his eyebrows quizzically. The eyes of the rest of the group members were now on Westphal, but despite the curiosity that was reflected in their gazes, they stubbornly continued to sing. Westphal swallowed back another expletive. He took a step to the side, but that didn’t help. The group was blocking the entire sidewalk.

  “For shit’s sake!” he exclaimed.

  One of the women stopped singing. “You aren’t doing yourself any good, running around all the time,” she declared.

  Westphal stared at her suburban perm. “That’s none of your business now, is it?” He tightened his grip on his briefcase, shifted one shoulder to the front, and simply forged his way through the crowd. To the right and left of him, the singing gradually tapered off among the rest of the conference attendees. “Well, I never!” Westphal heard someone murmur indignantly.

  Refusing to let that stop him, he lifted his chin and forged on. His mood worsened appreciably when the moronic singing undauntedly resumed behind his back.

  If it had been up to him, this dumb church conference would have taken place somewhere on the moon. No, better yet – on Mars! That would have been even a little farther away. But instead, the singing, praying suckers were clogging up Berlin’s streets and had been annoying him for days. This morning, one of them even handed him one of those glow sticks. Unbelievable!

  As he walked along, Westphal pulled the stick-like object out of his suit pocket. He stared at it grumpily. The moto and logo for the conference were printed in bright letters on the white plastic.

  Speaking the Word of God Boldly.

  What sentimental nonsense!

  Westphal glanced around. He had almost reached the subway station at Adenauerplatz, and just a few meters away from him, a trash can was hanging from a light pole. Naturally, it was spilling over with empty food containers and other garbage from the various fast-food places around the intersection. Typical! The city agreed to host an event like this church conference, and it wasn’t even capable of making sure that all the trash these people generated was neatly disposed of!

  The glow stick still in hand, Westphal paused beside the overflowing trash can. Several wasps buzzed around his head, but he didn’t pay attention to them. He briefly considered snapping the finger-thick plastic rod to see in which color it would glow, and before he could convince himself to abandon this childish impulse, he did it. Nothing happened.

  The stupid thing was broken!

  Westphal angrily stuffed the glow stick into the trash can, then continued on his way. He had a client waiting for him!

  *

  Bobby watched the man in the suit shove something into the overflowing trash can. His interest was immediately aroused. Those snobby types often threw away things that he – Bobby – could use to make a little money. With difficulty, he stood up from his blanket close to the subway station entrance, skirted the bicycles that were chained up there, and shuffled over to the trash can.

  He peered curiously between the cardboard boxes and the half-eaten burgers. With his pointer finger, he pushed aside a crumpled newspaper. A wasp grew angry, and buzzing aggressively, it dove at his face. Bobby swatted it away at the same moment his eyes fell on the object the Suit had thrown away.

  It was one of those church conference glow sticks, one that had already been kinked. That was obvious from the milky line running across the white plastic surface.

  Disappointment spread through Bobby, since he had been hoping for something of value. Nonetheless, he picked up the thin white object with the rainbow-colored band and examined it from all sides. A little catsup was smeared on it, but he cleaned that off with the hem of his shirt. He then hung the stick around his neck. Now, he almost felt like one of the conference visitors! He chuckled softly.

  A group of teenagers wrapped in colorful scarves walked past him. Bobby liked the conference-goers. Most of them were generous, and maybe they would be willing to give him more money if they could clearly see that he was one of them. With an eager smile, he returned to his spot and counted up his gains. Almost ten euros. He grinned inwardly. Yes, he was definitely a fan of the conference!

  Bobby spontaneously decided that he had worked enough for today. He carefully rolled up his blanket before stowing it in the Aldi bag that served as his suitcase. He would find a spot to unwind in Preußenpark and just enjoy life a little.

  Several minutes later, he stretched out in the middle of a circular grassy area. The sun shone down warmly on him, and he gladly held his face up to it. Ten euros in less than two hours! He usually didn’t receive that much over the course of an entire day. He played with the glow stick, as he dozed a little. Somewhere, a church bell tolled the top of the hour, but he didn’t count the strokes.

  He was just about to stand up when the glow stick made a strange sound. It was like a small bang, fairly quiet, but Bobby had good ears. In bewilderment, he gazed down at
the white stick.

  A second later, he was engulfed by a fireball.

  *

  Faris hadn’t even crossed two streets when his phone went off in his pocket. He pulled over on the side of the road, hastily fished out the device, and answered it on its sixth ring. “Yes?”

  “Faris?” Paul’s voice.

  Faris only needed to hear his name, the cadence with which Paul spoke it, to know that something had happened. “What is it?” he exclaimed.

  “The caller,” Paul said. “He contacted us. And was pretty mad that he hadn’t reached you. I tried to calm him down, Faris, but …”

  The hairs on Faris’s neck started to rise. “But what?” he said, hearing his voice grow rougher.

  Paul didn’t answer immediately, though Faris could hear him breathing.

  “He set off another bomb, Faris. Just now. In Preußenpark. Close to Ku’damm.”

  Faris closed his eyes. “Shit!”

  “Where are you now?” Paul asked.

  “In Zehlendorf.” Faris checked his rearview mirror. For a moment, he thought he saw Laura turn the corner, but when he looked closer, he realized it was a woman he didn’t know.

  “You need to get back here as quickly as possible,” Paul said. “Effective immediately, you’re back on the team.”

  Chapter 15

  After the second bombing within the space of a few hours, chaos reigned on Keithstraße. In order to enter the building, Faris had to fight his way through a ring of reporters, waving away microphone after microphone that was held up in his face. “No comment,” he said at least a dozen times. Right before the heavy door swung shut behind him, he saw the journalists dash over to two patrol cars that were just rolling up to park on the other side of the street. Niklas Hesse was nowhere in sight, but that wasn’t surprising, since Faris had his motorcycle.

  The interior of the building was no less frenzied. The telephones behind the reception desk rang incessantly. Faris saw that two members of the support staff had been allocated to the porter on duty, to help manage the flood of incoming calls. None of the three glanced up when Faris strode past them toward the staircase. He tried to imagine what the situation must be like in the emergency center. Presumably the staff there were whizzing around at the speed of light.

  Things were somewhat calmer on the upper floors, but even here, the tension was palpable everywhere you looked. Faris passed by colleagues in uniform who were accompanying witnesses down the hallway, or who were tending to those who had come in to make their statements. He gazed into tired, stressed faces as he hurried up the last stretch of stairs to reach the War Room.

  The room was hardly recognizable from the last time he had been in here. Ben seemed to have transferred half of the FCI team in and the case table was just as jammed full of computers and technical gear as Hesse’s heavy oak table at Tempelhof. A pale, wiry guy was in the process of connecting black and gray boxes with a length of cable, the purpose of which was a mystery to Faris.

  Somebody had brought in two televisions: an old-fashioned, boxy device on wheels with birchwood veneer, and a contemporary flatscreen TV. The older one was running channel N24, the newer one showed one of the new capital city stations. Someone had activated the split-screen, and in the lower right corner, a different station was showing in a little window. Like both of the others, this station was running content about the second explosion in Preußenpark.

  In thick red letters, a countdown had been written at the top of the case wall.

  31 hours.

  The number had obviously been wiped off and adjusted several times already. The previously clean white surface underneath it was now a reddish smear.

  Deep in conversation, Tromsdorff, Gitta and Marc Sommer were standing in front of Gitta’s glass office. Ben was busy doing something on his computer, and evidently whatever it was wasn’t making him happy, since he threw his arms up in despair. Shannon was nowhere in sight, probably in an interdepartmental meeting.

  An officer Faris didn’t know was standing at the whiteboard, on which the notes, drawings and, above all, question marks had multiplied significantly. The stranger looked close to retirement age. Faris guessed over sixty, since his hair was gray. He was spinning a thick blue marker in his fingers, but his thoughts seemed to be far away, since his gaze was fixed absently on something out the dormer window.

  Paul was on the phone, and based on what he was saying into it, was speaking with Marvin Andersen. His back was to the door, so the first person to see Faris was Tromsdorff. He nodded at the newcomer, but before he could say anything, Ben called out. “Shit!”

  All eyes turned toward him. He pointed at the flatscreen on which the coverage of the bombing in the park had been replaced by a different report. “Someone turn it up!” he called as he pushed his keyboard aside.

  Gitta took care of the volume, and a reporter’s voice filled the War Room.

  “... I’m standing here at the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church, where the first clashes have occurred in the aftermath of the bombings.”

  The camera panned over to a group of forty or fifty people who had gathered at the foot of the church, which had been destroyed during World War II. They were holding up placards, on which a devil figure was holding up a communion chalice.

  Paul ended his call. “The hard-core Catholics are gathering,” he commented drily.

  Faris recognized the image on the posters because, even before the church conference began, there had been isolated demonstrations by conservative Catholics who condemned the joint Eucharist with their Protestant brethren. However, this rally was different in character from the earlier peaceful gatherings that had been exemplified by hymns and prayers. This time, the demonstrators seemed angry and belligerent.

  Once more, the camera swept across the enraged crowd, before it zoomed in on a man in a priest’s black robes, carrying a microphone. “We are now seeing what happens when we hand Satan the chalice!” he thundered. “Our holy Catholic Church is at risk of going under in a sea of flames, and we …”

  Faris was distracted from the diatribe by the opening of the conference room door. Dr. Geiger walked in. The first person she greeted was the older officer whom Faris didn’t know.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” she said loudly, turning toward the rest of the team. “I see that you are informed about the latest developments in the city. We …” Her gaze fell on Faris, and she stopped mid-sentence. “Mr. Iskander.” It was obvious that his presence didn’t fit her agenda, but she clenched her jaw and continued reluctantly, “It’s good that you’re here! The bomber made it very clear to us that he wants us to have you on the team.”

  Faris held back a sarcastic reply.

  “Do you have any idea why that might be?” Geiger asked.

  Faris shrugged. “Have there been any new victims?” he inquired instead of answering her.

  “A homeless man,” the older officer supplied.

  “Faris, this is Friedrich Gerlach,” Tromsdorff said as introduction. “He is our contact with Andersen and his people.”

  Gerlach nodded mutely at Faris. Except for these three words, he hadn’t said anything else, and he seemed to want to keep it that way.

  Geiger sank down on one of the chairs. She looked worn-out – exhausted and also slightly shaken.

  Faris recalled his own guilty feelings after the bombing at the museum. “You didn’t press the button,” he said quietly, without even thinking about it.

  From where he was sitting, Paul sent him a long, meaningful look. Faris acted as if he didn’t notice anything.

  Dr. Geiger stared at him. “Of course not,” she said archly. “Why would you even think that?”

  Faris swallowed his answer and glanced over at Paul. His partner shrugged.

  “Alright, good.” Tromsdorff held up his arms, drawing everyone’s attention to himself. “The caller called back. Shortly before five. He demanded to speak with you, Faris, and was quite annoyed when we told him that you were no
longer on the team.” He shot Geiger an emphatic look, but her face was impassive. Given how impenetrable and cool she always seemed, she would have made a good politician. “We tried to calm him down,” Tromsdorff continued, “but that didn’t work. The only thing he said was that Arabic phrase.”

  “As-samu alaikum,” Faris interjected.

  Tromsdorff nodded. “Exactly. And then he set off the second bomb. It was pure luck that there were no other victims.”

  Faris rubbed the back of his neck. It felt as if someone had massaged the muscles there with icy cold fingers.

  The door of the War Room swung open again, and Shannon stepped inside. With a nod at Faris, she took her seat without saying a word and reached, as usual, for her tennis ball.

  Now Paul stood up from his seat. “He called one more time after that to tell us that he wouldn’t have any problem delivering us more bodies.”

  Faris saw his partner shiver. “Did he tell you what he wants?”

  “Just that we needed to get you back on the team.” Paul glanced over at Dr. Geiger. “That was it. No demands, no ultimatum. Nothing.” Frustration and consternation were written across his face. “He wants you to suffer, Faris. The question is why? You must’ve done something to make him want revenge like this.”

  “I think you should listen to the conversation that Paul had with him,” Shannon suggested. “We have analyzed it thoroughly, but perhaps you’ll pick up on something we missed.” She stretched her neck and looked over at Ben. “Ben, could you play for us the recording of the last call?”

  “Sievers,” Faris heard Paul say.

  For a moment, the caller seemed to be startled. You could hear him gasp. “Where is Faris?” he finally asked.

  “He isn’t here. I’m …”

  “You can’t be serious!” Despite the distortion, you could still hear how upset the man on the other end of the line was.

  As he listened to his own voice on the recording, Paul rubbed his forehead with his thumb and forefinger. From underneath his hand, he caught Faris’s eyes. Faris knew that his partner was blaming himself for having been unable to prevent the second bombing.