Whisper For The Reaper, Jack Gatland [good books for high schoolers txt] 📗

Daddy also disappeared during the fall of the wall. Their mum died a few years back, so it was just the two of them. She used to be a PA in a pharmaceutical company, but lost her job and Rolfe hired her to be his assistant, mainly I think to monitor her.’

‘Are they close?’ De’Geer asked.

‘No,’ Billy shook his head. ‘There’s some kind of issue with either Ilse or Rolfe being an affair child? I couldn’t probe any deeper, but there was definitely some kind of half-sibling issue. And I couldn’t really go ‘I know a great DNA person, and we could find out for you’, you know.’

‘You could,’ Doctor Marcos muttered. ‘You totally could.’

‘So brother and sister don’t get along,’ Declan mused. ‘We might be able to use that. Did she say why they’re here?’

‘Yeah,’ Billy looked back to his notes. ‘They’re hunting a war criminal.’

‘That’s what they also told me,’ Declan replied. ‘Any particular one?’

Billy shook his head.

‘She didn’t say, but I felt there was some kind of familial thing going on.’

‘How do you mean?’ Doctor Marcos asked. Billy turned to her as he spoke.

‘I got the impression, and it could be because of poor translations, that Rolfe is ashamed of something this guy did, they’ve been looking for him for a while and it’s more than just a standard case.’

‘Maybe they’re hunting Müller senior?’ Anjli suggested. ‘Or, it’s your mechanic friend.’

‘They’ve been here two weeks though,’ Declan frowned. ‘They’re literally drinking in the same bar that he does. If they’re hunting him, they’re doing a piss-poor job of it.’

‘Unless they’re waiting for something,’ Jess suggested. ‘Maybe it’s like you have with arrests, you need to see the crime being performed before you can arrest?’

‘I think you’ve been watching too much TV there, lassie, but I get your point,’ Monroe nodded. ‘They want Karl, or maybe their daddy, or maybe someone else to expose themselves somehow. But how?’

‘Maybe by being the Red Reaper,’ Declan walked to the sideboard and poured himself a sparkling water as he thought. ‘We said there was possibly a missing murder, and we know that the first one we know of is in Berlin. Maybe there’s something here we don’t know about?’

‘I’m going to have to become besties with Ilse, aren’t I?’ Billy moaned. Declan smiled.

‘Your undercover days are not over yet, William,’ he replied. ‘And while you’re on it, see if she knows anything about the break in at my house a couple of weeks back.’

Billy pulled out a folded piece of notepaper from his pocket. ‘She gave me her number and email address, told me to contact her at any time,’ he explained. ‘I was going to throw it away…’

‘But now you’re going to email her back and arrange another meeting, lonely IT technician that you are,’ Monroe grinned. Billy sighed, tossing the note to the table where it landed next to the laptop.

‘I hate undercover,’ he muttered. ‘And I hate Billy Myers, IT Support.’

‘You think they might have done it?’ Anjli was surprised at this. She’d been there with Declan when he’d arrived at the house to find the back window broken and the iMac removed. ‘Why?’

‘I have a list of suspects who could have stolen my dad’s computer, and one by one they’re being struck off,’ Declan shrugged. ‘About time I put some more people on it.’

He looked around the table.

‘We’ve had a good day today, and we’ve gained some positive leads. But we’ve also gained more questions than answers.’ He looked to Monroe. ‘What would you suggest we do next?’

The DCI thought about this for a moment.

‘Interview anyone else we know connected to the previous murders,’ he suggested. ‘Dotty Brunel had a husband, I believe? He might still be in town. We also need to look into Berlin and see why Rolfe is even here—‘

‘I can answer that,’ a voice said from the door, and Declan turned around to see Tom Marlowe standing in the doorway.

I hadn’t even seen the door open, he thought to himself. That guy’s good.

‘Guys, meet Tom Marlowe,’ Declan said. ‘Likely not his actual name, so don’t bother remembering it. He works for Emilia Wintergreen.’

‘I’ve got news from London,’ Tom said. ‘We cracked the USB cypher and opened up Patrick Walsh’s file.’

Monroe rose at this.

‘Spook,’ he almost spat the word in disgust.

Tom grinned.

‘Hello, Uncle Alex,’ he replied.

13

Family Feuds

With Marlowe’s arrival, the afternoon’s plans were scrapped, as Billy worked through the files that the probable spy had brought with him. Many of them were doubles of the files that Jess had found and collated from Patrick Walsh’s secret filing cabinet, but there were some German files, and more than a few redacted CIA numbers that had caused a buzz of interest.

‘It looks like there was another murder,’ Billy announced as he flicked quickly through the files. ‘Or something similar.’

‘What do you mean?’ Monroe asked, walking over to Billy to read the screen. Marlowe, now sitting in a chair by the coffee machine, stretched.

‘In 1988, two years before the fall of the wall, there was an attempted murder,’ he replied. ‘I read the files. Sorry if I wasn’t supposed to.’

‘Define attempted,’ Declan asked. Marlowe shrugged.

‘One that didn’t happen,’ he replied. ‘Basically, there was an eighteen-year-old woman named Eva Mencken who claimed that a border guard had attacked her and tried to force her to commit suicide after she’d helped two East Berliners escape to the West. Apparently she didn’t play along, and then a week later her parents were brutally murdered in a knife attack. She refused to speak to the police after that, and a month later she disappeared.’

‘She wasn’t killed though,’ Billy added as he read from the screen. ‘She went into hiding and only appeared when the wall fell.’ He leaned back. ‘Died of cancer though about fifteen years ago. Apparently raised a complaint about Wilhelm Müller in 1996, but they quashed it.’

‘Why would it be quashed?’ Declan asked.

‘Because someone high up wanted it stopped,’ Marlowe replied. ‘Müller had very