Three Detective Novels In A Package July 2023 E-Book

Alfred Bekker

• Herausgeber: Alfredbooks
• Kategorie: Abenteuer, Thriller, Horror
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 393

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Beschreibung

This volume contains the following mystery novels: Murder Mail (Henry Rohmer) Trevellian And The Cop Killer (Neal Chadwick) Marquanteur And The Contract Killer (Alfred Bekker) The former policeman Gerard Larôche is murdered. It quickly becomes clear that the killer was a contract killer. Who is behind it? Larôche had made many enemies, and at least one of them continues to rule his clan even from prison. But then there are more murders, and the trail leads in another direction. Commissaire Marquanteur and his colleagues from Marseille pick up the trail. Alfred Bekker is a well-known author of fantasy novels, thrillers and books for young people. In addition to his major book successes, he has written numerous novels for suspense series such as Ren Dhark, Jerry Cotton, Cotton Reloaded, Kommissar X, John Sinclair, and Jessica Bannister. He has also published under the names Neal Chadwick, Jack Raymond, Jonas Herlin, Dave Branford, Chris Heller, Henry Rohmer, Conny Walden, and Janet Farell.

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Alfred Bekker, Henry Rohmer, Neal Chadwick

Three Detective Novels In A Package July 2023

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Inhaltsverzeichnis

Three Detective Novels In A Package July 2023

​Copyright

Murder Mail: Thriller

Trevellian And The Cop Killer: Thriller

Marquanteur And The Contract Killer

Three Detective Novels In A Package July 2023

Alfred Bekker, Henry Rohmer, Neal Chadwick

This volume contains the following mystery novels:

Murder Mail (Henry Rohmer)

Trevellian And The Cop Killer (Neal Chadwick)

Marquanteur And The Contract Killer (Alfred Bekker)

The former policeman Gerard Larôche is murdered. It quickly becomes clear that the killer was a contract killer. Who is behind it? Larôche had made many enemies, and at least one of them continues to rule his clan even from prison. But then there are more murders, and the trail leads in another direction.

Commissaire Marquanteur and his colleagues from Marseille pick up the trail.

Alfred Bekker is a well-known author of fantasy novels, thrillers and books for young people. In addition to his major book successes, he has written numerous novels for suspense series such as Ren Dhark, Jerry Cotton, Cotton Reloaded, Kommissar X, John Sinclair, and Jessica Bannister. He has also published under the names Neal Chadwick, Jack Raymond, Jonas Herlin, Dave Branford, Chris Heller, Henry Rohmer, Conny Walden, and Janet Farell.

​Copyright

A CassiopeiaPress book: CASSIOPEIAPRESS, UKSAK E-Books, Alfred Bekker, Alfred Bekker presents, Casssiopeia-XXX-press, Alfredbooks, Uksak Special Edition, Cassiopeiapress Extra Edition, Cassiopeiapress/AlfredBooks and BEKKERpublishing are imprints of

Alfred Bekker

© Roman by Author

© of this issue 2023 by AlfredBekker/CassiopeiaPress, Lengerich/Westphalia

The invented persons have nothing to do with actual living persons. Similarities in names are coincidental and not intended.

All rights reserved.

www.AlfredBekker.de

[email protected]

Follow on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/alfred.bekker.758/

Follow on Twitter:

https://twitter.com/BekkerAlfred

Get the latest news here:

https://alfred-bekker-autor.business.site/

To the publisher's blog!

Be informed about new releases and backgrounds!

https://cassiopeia.press

Everything about fiction!

Murder Mail: Thriller

Henry Rohmer

Copyright

A CassiopeiaPress book: CASSIOPEIAPRESS, UKSAK E-Books, Alfred Bekker, Alfred Bekker presents, Casssiopeia-XXX-press, Alfredbooks, Uksak Special Edition, Cassiopeiapress Extra Edition, Cassiopeiapress/AlfredBooks and BEKKERpublishing are imprints of

Alfred Bekker

© Roman by Author

© of this issue 2023 by AlfredBekker/CassiopeiaPress, Lengerich/Westphalia

The invented persons have nothing to do with actual living persons. Similarities in names are coincidental and not intended.

All rights reserved.

www.AlfredBekker.de

[email protected]

Follow on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/alfred.bekker.758/

Follow on Twitter:

https://twitter.com/BekkerAlfred

Get the latest news here:

https://alfred-bekker-autor.business.site/

To the publisher's blog!

Be informed about new releases and backgrounds!

https://cassiopeia.press

Everything about fiction!

Murder Mail: Thriller

Thriller by Henry Rohmer

The size of this ebook is equivalent to 140 paperback pages.

Attacks with explosive letters spread fear and terror. The victims are exclusively members of the New York Police Department. For the investigators, this is a tricky case. They encounter a wall of silence and violence. Are the syndicates waging a private war against unpopular cops? Or is someone seeking revenge for alleged or actual police injustice?

A gripping action thriller by Henry Rohmer (Alfred Bekker).

Henry Rohmer is the pseudonym of an author who, under the name Alfred Bekker, became known primarily as the author of fantasy novels and books for young people, as well as writing historical novels. In addition, he wrote novels for suspense series such as Jerry Cotton, Cotton Reloaded, Kommisar X, John Sinclair and Ren Dhark.

1

"Go!" said Milo.

With a mighty kick I let the door of the apartment burst open. I held the handle of my weapon in both hands and let my gaze wander around the room in a matter of seconds.

Nothing.

A dresser with a phone on it, a coat rack with two jackets on it, and a stained carpet where someone must have spilled half a bottle of red wine at some point.

A door led into an adjoining room.

It was half open.

"Careful," murmured my friend and colleague, Special Agent Milo Tucker. He, too, held his gun at the ready.

With one leap I was next to the door and pressed myself against the wall. At the same time, a shot barked in my direction.

It was the tremendous firepower of a magnum revolver. The shooter simply fired through the door of the neighboring room. The projectile tore a fist-sized hole in the door before sending a mirror on the other side of the room flying to pieces.

With wide sentences Milo crossed the room and pulled open the door to the bathroom.

He looked in my direction and shook his head.

"It's the FBI!", meanwhile, I shouted loudly. "Nunez, we know you're in there! Give yourself up! The house is surrounded! You're not getting out of here!"

No answer.

On the other side of the shot-up door, there didn't seem to be any movement, and the silence that reigned there seemed unreal.

I took a deep breath.

Milo stood on the other side of the door.

We exchanged a quick glance.

Our opponent was trapped - and he knew it. He didn't stand a chance of leaving this house in any other way than in handcuffs.

Anyone else would probably have given up under the circumstances, preferring to rely on the art of lawyers rather than their own shooting skills.

But Nunez was a very special case....

The man we were dealing with was a living fighting machine. A man who was perfectly trained to kill and had chosen murder as his profession.

In Chicago, he had killed a man with a rolled-up magazine with which he had crushed his opponent's Adam's apple. Nunez was a man to be wary of - just like those who had secured his services....

No one knew how many people had been killed by this guy, who had once been born under the name Gabriel Nunez and had since lived under dozens of identities. Most recently, he had held a position as a bartender.

A cover, both for himself and for the man whose dirty work Nunez had presumably done most recently: a certain Ray Tarantino.

Nunez was a kind of mixture of chameleon and bloodhound. He behaved as a chameleon towards us - he played the bloodhound for his clients.

It was a fact that even a multiple murderer could sit in the electric chair only once.

Nunez had nothing to lose.

And that made him unpredictable.

He would literally walk over dead bodies. In Pittsburgh two years ago, he had shot his way out of the way of four G-men who wanted to arrest him. He knew no consideration neither against himself nor against others.

I gripped my gun tighter when I heard a noise from the other side of the door. Something was being pushed...

Then I heard footsteps...

I looked at Milo.

My friend nodded.

"Now," I hissed.

A kick opened the door. I rushed forward. Seconds between life and death, in which anything could happen.

A figure climbed through the window.

Wide-open, determined eyes looked at me. His hair fell low on his forehead. He bared two rows of flawless teeth like a predator.

And in his right hand he held the massive Magnum revolver, whose .45 caliber could blow half your head off.

Nunez was already halfway out the window. He was still hanging on the windowsill with the back of his right leg.

His muscles and tendons tensed. He probably wanted to escape via the fire escape.

"Put the gun down, Nunez!", I yelled.

For fractions of a second, everything hung in the balance.

But Nunez was a professional in every respect.

He knew he wouldn't be able to yank his gun up and fire it before I put a fatal bullet in his torso.

He knew it and that's why the tension in his arm muscles relaxed a little. His face twisted into an ugly grin.

And then Nunez actually dropped his gun. It hit the parquet floor with a hard sound.

"Satisfied, G-man?" he growled.

His facial expression looked wolfish. It was not the features of a man who had just given up and was coming to terms with the idea that he would soon have to answer to a jury.

"Come back in very slowly!", I demanded.

Milo was next to me and took the walkie-talkie out of his coat pocket.

"This is Agent Tucker. We've got him."

I took a step forward and said, "You are under arrest, Nunez. You have the right to remain silent. If you waive that right, anything you say from now on can go to court..."

"Save the litany, G-man!" he grunted.

Something is wrong, it went through my head. I racked my brains in those seconds about what it might have been.... My instinct was sounding the alarm and I had always done well by listening to it. I let my eyes wander for a moment.

The furnishings were nothing special. Nunez had probably taken over the room furnished. Department store furniture that you had to assemble yourself. Imitation pine wood. The armchairs already looked quite worn and almost a bit worn out. On a low glass table lay some magazines whose covers mostly showed naked women with huge breasts.

Restlessness filled me.

I looked back at Nunez.

He moves too slowly!, it ran through me. But I didn't know how to interpret that. And then there was this sound...

A tick.

"Damn it!" exclaimed Milo.

In the same second, I understood.

With a deafening bang, everything seemed to explode. Glass shattered. The seating area flew apart in shreds.

A veritable inferno broke out.

I felt the murderous heat and the shock wave. I hit the ground hard. Through the chaos I heard Milo's hoarse scream.

Nunez had tricked us!

2

I rolled around on the floor. I struggled for breath.

Acrid smoke made me retch. I struggled to my feet and jerked the gun in the direction of the window.

There was nothing more to be seen of Nunez.

He had dumped us stone cold.

The small explosive charge with a timer had been quite powerful. Nunez had apparently simply placed it in an armchair. No wonder he had hesitated to come back into the room. He had known that the inferno would only be seconds away....

One step further and I would have been torn to shreds.

I looked at Milo.

He sat on the floor with his back against the wall.

Blood ran in streams down his forehead. It dripped onto his jacket and onto the floor. He groaned.

He looked at me.

"It's nothing!" he yelled. "Some damn splinter!"

He pressed the sleeve of his jacket on the wound to stop the bleeding.

I heard footsteps and whirled around.

Two colleagues came in with their guns drawn. They were Special Agent Medina and his partner Clive Caravaggio.

Milo stood up.

"He's gone," he explained.

With two steps I was at the window. The smoke bit into my eyes and made them water. This guy had known exactly what he was doing. Everything on one card. It was just like Gabriel Nunez. A killer without mercy.

I looked out.

Nunez had apparently reached the balcony of the neighboring apartment via the window ledge. Breakneck!, I thought.

And from there he had reached the fire escape.

I heard his clattering footsteps on the metal grates, saw him stumble down as if in panic.

Nunez raised his head.

He fired without aiming. I ducked.

The bullet shredded the window frame close to me.

Apparently, Nunez had a second weapon with him.

With someone like him, I wasn't surprised. Judging by the bullet hole in the window frame, it was a smaller caliber iron.

A .22, perhaps. But these projectiles were also deadly.

I fired back. My bullet got caught somewhere between the metal grates of the fire escape and caused a spark there.

Nunez continued to run.

I climbed onto the windowsill.

"Jesse, what are you up to? Are you insane?"

That was Agent Medina. He looked at me quite astonished.

Meanwhile, I climbed out the window and began balancing myself along the ledge.

I looked down.

The fire escape led to a backyard. A passageway connected this to the main street. In this case, it was Rivington Street on the Lower East Side of Manhattan.

Our people had cordoned off the block. Nunez would not get far.

I hoped.

I jumped from the window ledge onto the balcony of the neighboring apartment. Then, in one more leap, I was on the fire escape. I rushed down, two three steps at a time. Nunez fired an untargeted shot in my direction. The shot went into the void, scratched somewhere on the already not quite dewy plaster.

And then a squad car roared down the passageway from Rivington Street and into the yard. A second one followed.

Officers with submachine guns jumped out and got into position. They wore the FBI's blue tactical jackets and bulletproof vests.

"Freeze, Nunez!", I shouted. "Or you're a sieve."

The killer hesitated.

One more flight of stairs and he would have been downstairs.

But he knew that this no longer made sense. However, he didn't think about giving up either. Not in his dreams.

A quick movement, a jump...

He made a dash for the nearest window. The glass shattered. He protected his head with his arm. I knew what he was up to. He was hoping to find a hostage in one of the other apartments on the block. That was it.

His last chance. And he was unscrupulous enough to seize it.

I followed suit, stumbling down the steps. The task forces that had taken up positions in the courtyard were now also moving.

But I had reached the window through which Nunez had disappeared more quickly. I climbed through it. The apartment seemed to be deserted. There was no furniture in the room I entered. The floorboards creaked in a way that could be deadly in this situation. I looked at the door. It was standing open. The hallway beyond was in semi-darkness, from which it suddenly flashed.

A shot cracked.

I threw myself to the side and fired back. Then I picked myself up. I sprinted off and pressed myself against the wall next to the door.

I listened.

Nothing was heard.

Then it clicked.

The cock a gun was cocked.

I looked up and saw the barrel of a revolver. Nunez was pointing it at me. He had come through the door in a flash.

He put all his eggs in one basket. This apartment was uninhabited. So I was the only hostage he could take here.

He grinned wolfishly.

"Stupid what G-man!"

"Give it up, Nunez!"

"To get to the chair and be roasted alive? I can do without that!"

"It's over!"

He put the barrel of his gun to my head.

"Drop it!" he hissed.

I lowered the gun.

Meanwhile, our people had reached the shattered window. They froze.

"I've got your man!" shouted Nunez. "If one of you moves, he won't have a head."

The barrel of his revolver pressed hard against my temple.

Nunez grabbed me by the shoulder and pulled me with him behind the door into the semi-darkness.

We were out of the FBI people's field of fire.

"Not a good choice to take a G-man hostage," I growled.

"I couldn't be too picky." He chuckled like crazy. "Strange isn't it? Actually, you should have just bitten the dust by now.... If you'd just taken one more step forward..."

A noise made him wince. It came from the other side of the apartment, where there was probably a hallway. Probably some of our people were working their way from there to the scene. I hoped.

"Give up!", I hissed.

He was sweating. Fear flickered in his eyes. He looked like a cornered wild animal.

"Take your handcuffs off your belt! But slowly."

I obeyed.

"Give it to me!"

I gave it to him. He took it with his left.

"What's your name?" he asks.

"Trevellian. Jesse Trevellian."

"I think I've heard of you!"

"It's possible."

"Can you do something for me, G-man?"

"A deal?"

He nodded. "Yes."

"It's plenty late for that, Nunez. But ultimately, that's up to the prosecutor."

"What if I put a really big one on your knife?"

"Let's hear it!"

"Ray Tarantino. That's one of the big shots you're all after. You're just too stupid to really pin anything on him..."

"Like this?"

Chatter, I thought. Nothing but chatter.

He was really afraid. He saw the noose tightening. And I wanted to buy time. My own handcuffs he now put around my right wrist with his left. "Now the other arm!" he demanded.

In that second, I let my left hand fly out. With a well-aimed, well-placed blow, I knocked his weapon aside. The right that followed hit him square in the face and sent him crashing to the boards. He staggered backwards and crashed into the bare wall from which the plaster was peeling. Mold ate into the stone.

Nunez wanted to yank the gun up immediately, but I was quick enough to get to him. My hand clamped around his gun arm and pushed him to the side. I slammed my hand against the wall and the gun fell away from him. The next moment I received a terrible and quite unexpected blow in the pit of my stomach. My eyes went black. I staggered backwards and could only barely avoid the next blow.

Nunez rushed to the gun lying on the ground.

He grabbed her, yanked her around.

His finger tightened around the trigger.

He aimed at my eyes.

And pulled the trigger.

I looked directly into the muzzle flash, which in this semi-darkness seemed like a sudden flash.

3

A jolt went through Nunez's body. The barrel of his gun slid upward, his eyes were fixed. The fabric of his shirt turned blood red. Nunez stopped moving. It was a clean shot to the heart that had caught him. I turned around.

One of our people stood in the doorway and lowered his gun.

It was Special Agent Mike Sutter, a broad-shouldered man around fifty with short hair and a very angular face.

I knew him well. He used to be with the City Police. He had worked his way up there. For a while he was in narcotics, and later he was recommended by his superiors for FBI training.

He looked at me.

"Are you okay, Jesse?"

I nodded.

"Yes, with me it is," I murmured.

Sutter took a deep breath. Then he put the gun back in its holster and walked toward the dead killer. "I had no choice," he said.

"I know," I replied. "You saved my life, Mike!"

4

"You have nothing to reproach yourself for, Agent Sutter," Jonathan D. McKee, the chief of the FBI's New York District, said later as we sat in his office.

Sutter shrugged his shoulders.

Milo was also there. A wound dressing adorned his forehead.

But it looked much worse than it was. A piece of glass had touched him. The wound had been disinfected and stitched. At best, he would be left with a barely visible scar. He had been lucky. The thing could literally have gone in his eye.

"You shot Gabriel Nunez in a self-defense situation," Mister McKee clarified. "He left you no other choice..."

"I know," Sutter said. "And yet..."

McKee looked at him and nodded in understanding.

"I think I know what you mean."

"Anyway, the last time I did it, it took me quite a while to get over it."

"You've shot someone before, Mike?", I asked.

He turned around to me. Before he spoke, he brought the cup of steaming coffee to his mouth. Mandy had made it, Mister McKee's secretary. Her coffee was not world-famous, but those who were on duty at the FBI District headquarters on Federal Plaza and had ever tasted this dark brew were delighted.

Sutter's eyes narrowed.

His eyes flickered uneasily.

"It's been a long time, Jesse," he said then. "And I don't really feel like talking about it, either."

I raised my hands.

"I didn't mean it that way."

Sutter nodded.

He looked very serious. Not only since this incident. He had always been like that as long as I knew him. He was someone who had worked his way up from the bottom. He had started as an NYPD patrol officer, taking classes, training. His superiors had always recommended him for promotions and additional training.

Sutter seemed to be one of those men who had devoted his life entirely to fighting crime. A straight-A cop. We were glad to have him with us. Personally, I hadn't had that much to do with him.

But Medina and Caravaggio worked with him more often.

"You want a day off?" asked McKee.

Sutter shrugged. "Might not be bad"

"But don't brood too much, Mike."

"Don't worry." He grinned. "Janice will stop that from happening."

"Well, then..."

I sipped my coffee.

He was still pretty hot.

"Strange," I then said thoughtfully.

McKee looked at me intently and took a step toward me. I was sitting in one of the armchairs in Mister McKee's office with my legs crossed.

"What are you thinking about, Jesse?" he asked.

I looked up.

"About this Nunez trying to talk to me just before he died..."

"Talk?" That what Sutter. He suddenly seemed very attentive.

I nodded.

"Yes, he wanted a deal. And he wanted me to go for it."

"Well, it's been established that Gabriel Nunez murdered for the big boys," Mister McKee stated. "However, he was always very discreet about who he worked for."

"They probably appreciated that side of him in particular," Milo Tucker interjected.

"He was talking about Ray Tarantino," I said.

"What?" McKee raised his eyebrows.

I nodded.

"Yes, he was going to deliver him to the knife, as he said.... Shortly before, he had noticed that apparently our people were also stalking from the other side of the apartment. He must have sensed that even for an ice-cold shark like him, the skins were now swimming away..."

We had been after Tarantino for a long time. He owned some posh discos and nightclubs, which we suspected were in fact transshipment points for designer drugs. However, various raids by our colleagues from the DEA and various special units for drug tracing, which the individual police stations maintained, had led to no results.

Caravaggio, a blond-haired Italian-American, placed his empty paper cup on the table.

"Wouldn't surprise me if this Nunez guy had something to do with the Gordon case, too."

Harry Gordon had been a general manager at a Tarantino nightclub until he was shot in his car a week ago.

"So far, no one can prove it," Sutter said.

Caravaggio raised his hand. "But that may change once our colleagues from the Scientific Research Division have taken a closer look at the weapons that were in Nunez's apartment..."

While Clive Caravaggio talked, I watched Sutter.

His eyes were still flickering restlessly. I wondered what was going on inside him.

He stood up.

He stroked his face with his hand. When he noticed my glance, a tense smile crossed his face. Something made him embarrassed and I wondered what it was.

"Tough day today, huh, Jesse?"

"Indeed!"

"At least this living fighting machine won't be able to kill anyone now..."

"Yes."

But this fighting machine called Nunez was just a tool, I added in my mind. A weapon in the hands of completely different people, who acted in the background...

Still.

5

When Mike Sutter reached next to him the next morning, the other half of the bed was empty. Vague and somewhat hazy memories of a hot night surfaced in him, during which he had slept rather little. Janice had been insatiable. And it had helped him forget and clear his head.

Sutter flipped the covers aside and stood up. He put on a robe and walked out of the bedroom, yawning.

The living room was furnished ultra-modern. Everything was in black and white. Table, sitting area, cupboards. Janice had chosen the things.

"Hello, darling," she said in her crooning, siren-like voice.

She stood there, completely naked. Her smile was seductive. Sutter thought about the previous night.

"Hello," he said.

"You're still worried," she said as she studied his face.

"I don't."

She laughed. "You're lying, Mike. And you know it's completely pointless!"

"Oh, yeah?"

"Because I can read minds. At least yours!"

Mike Sutter's smile was thin. Janice came toward him. Her heavy breasts bobbed up and down provocatively as she did so. She stopped in front of him, braced her slender arm on her curved hip. Then she threw back the thick, dark hair.

"This guy wasn't worth it!"

"I know."

"But..."

"It's been that way with me ever since, Janice. You know?"

She came a little closer. She wrapped her arms around his neck. Her breasts pressed against him. She kissed him with passion and finally he pulled her to him.

Breathless, she broke away from him.

There was a challenging flash in her eyes. She stroked his shoulder with her fingertips, then said. "I'm going to take a shower. Are you coming?"

Sutter nodded. "Yes."

With catlike movements she walked towards the door of the bathroom.

At that moment, the doorbell rang.

"Just a moment," Sutter murmured, addressing Janice. But she was no longer in the room.

Sutter walked down a hallway to the door.

He opened the door. The letter carrier was standing in front of the apartment door. A small, somewhat squat man with a pointed chin.

"Good afternoon, sir. I need a signature for a registered letter."

Sutter signed and then picked up his mail.

A few letters, a magazine, a larger envelope.

He recognized the electricity bill by the envelope.

"Have a great day, sir!"

"Thank you, you too," Sutter replied.

The door clanged shut. He went back into the living room and put the mail on the low table made of pitch-black imitation wood.

And then he noticed the letter without a return address.

"Will it be much longer, Mike?" he heard Janice's voice.

"No," he growled between his teeth. Sutter was G-man. He had the special instinct that comes with many years of service, whether with the police or the FBI.

A deep furrow formed on Sutter's forehead.

With a quick movement, he then tore open the envelope.

At that very moment, the inferno broke loose. There was a deafening bang.

"Mike!" shrilled Janice's voice between them. She came out of the bathroom. Her hair stuck damply to her head. Her eyes were fixed with horror. She saw Mike Sutter lying motionless on the floor. His hands were torn to shreds.

And he no longer had a face.

The repulsive smell of burnt human flesh hung heavy in the air.

Blood was everywhere and even one of the armchairs had only broken parts left. The feathers of the upholstery sailed around and slowly floated to the ground.

Janice let out a hysterical scream.

She was out of her mind.

A breeze from the bedroom stirred up a few charred scraps of paper....

Remains of a letter that had brought death.

6

Mike Sutter's apartment was on 45th Road in the borough of Queens, New York's bedroom community.

Visiting a crime scene is always a sad thing. In this case, that was especially true.

I averted my eyes from Mike Sutter's body and saw Milo's face. It was pale.

Colleagues from the Scientific Research Division, the central recognition service of the New York Police Department, which could be requested by us as well as by all precincts of the New York Police Department, were already at work.

A medical examiner named Cochrane has also been there.

"When I get the guys who are responsible for this!", I heard Agent Clive Caravaggio press out angrily. He had his hands clenched into fists. His face had turned dark red, and he was looking toward the window.

I let my eyes wander a bit through the apartment.

There were hardly any of Mike's personal things on the shelves. Somehow that amazed me. As if he had been here for a visit. Slowly I crossed the living room. I tried not to make the job of the forensic experts any more difficult than it already was.

I took a look into the bedroom.

A woman was sitting on the bed.

"Miss Janice Morgan?", I asked.

She looked at me. Then she nodded. I showed her my identification. "I'm special agent Trevellian. Call me Jesse."

"Mike told me about you, Jesse," she said.

"And he to me from you, Janice."

A faint smile slid across her devastated face. Her eyes were red. She rose. She crossed her arms in front of her chest and moved toward me. She wore a skimpy sweatshirt and jeans. Her face was pale.

The terror was clearly visible in her features.

"I know it's hard for you to talk about what happened now," I began.

She swallowed.

"It was awful..." she whispered. With an erratic gesture she wiped her hair from her face.

"Describe what happened.... Every detail can be important. And the sooner we get on the trail of whoever sent Mike that letter bomb, the better chance we have of getting him, too."

"Of course."

Janice had to visibly pull herself together.

She took a deep breath.

I touched her lightly on the shoulder and raised my eyebrows.

"I was in the bathroom," she said. "The doorbell rang. Mike answered the door. I heard him talking to someone."

"With whom?"

"I assume it was the mailman. But I couldn't understand what was being said because I had already turned on the shower. And then... "She let out a sob. "A bang. It was so..." She faltered. "Horrible," she then whispered.

"How long had you and Mike been living together?"

"For three years."

"Did he talk to them about official business?"

"No, never."

"Do you know of any enemies who wanted him dead?"

She looked at me in amazement. "You're asking me that, Jesse? A G-man doesn't make himself popular everywhere..."

I nodded.

"That's true, of course. But there doesn't necessarily have to be a motive for this act that comes from the line of duty."

She sighed. "I understand," she said. "First, you need to investigate in all directions."

"You said it, Janice."

She stepped closer to me. The tone in which she then spoke to me was dark and very quiet. It sounded almost confidential. "You promise me you'll get this guy, right, Jesse?"

"Yes," I said. "Mike saved my life. I owe him."

Every murder was a terrible crime.

But when it hit a colleague, it was especially close.

7

It would take some time for Janice to get over the horrible experience that was behind her. After I finished questioning her, Milo took me aside.

He seemed very concerned that Janice not overhear what he had to say to me.

"What's going on?", I asked.

"Here, this was in Mike's desk," he said, holding a binder of bank statements under my nose. I took the binder and leafed through it a bit.

"He had an enviably high bank balance," I noted. "Except for rent, electricity and the like, almost nothing seems to have been debited..."

Milo nodded.

"That could mean one of two things," he murmured. "Either Mike was very frugal or..."

"You mean he made his living from a source other than his FBI salary?"

"You said that now," Milo indicated.

We exchanged a glance.

We were both uncomfortable even expressing such a thought. Janice came out of the bedroom. She glanced over at us briefly and visibly avoided turning her head toward Mike's body.

I took a deep breath and handed Milo back the binder with the extracts.

Suspicion was quickly sown. Even against a G-man. My first thought was to ask Janice about the account balance.

But then I let it go. Not today, I thought. Later, if the suspicion should be confirmed. We simply knew too little yet. Besides, I couldn't imagine that a flagship G-man like Mike Sutter might be collecting fees from the other side. Of course, there were also corrupt officials in all areas of the police. But they were the absolute exception.

And with Mike, I just couldn't believe that it would be the case with him as well.

"It's only circumstantial," Milo indicated. "But one we should keep an eye on."

"Yes," I muttered.

Janice walked toward me. I stepped toward her.

"Do you still need me?"

"Not at the moment... Do you have someone who could take care of you a little?"

"I have a sister who lives on Staten Island. I think that's where I'm going to move for a few days..."

"That's not a bad idea. Tell me the address so I can reach you."

"Of course," she breathed.

At that moment a voice sounded from a tape recorder. It was the answering machine that stood on a dresser. Clive Caravaggio had turned it on. Only one call had been stored. A man's voice answered without giving the name.

"Well, how do you feel now, super cop!" The voice sounded rough and throaty. And very angry. "Have you read the paper yet? Today you convicted Ed... My son's life is ruined now, Mike. And so is mine. All because you couldn't jump over your shadow. I hope you feel good about that!" A pause followed. Then a heavy breathing. "You piss me off, Mike..." Then a crackle on the line. The caller had hung up.

I noticed Janice's tension.

"Who was that?", I asked.

"Barry Mancini," she provided. "About a year ago, his son Ed beat to death a man he owed a gambling debt to. It was Mike's case. He was the one who convicted Ed. Barry required Mike to turn a blind eye and suppress evidence. That could have been done at the time. Mike should have just steered the investigation in a different direction until some grass grew over the matter. After all, this wouldn't have been the first unsolved death in New York..."

"Where did that Mancini guy get the idea that Mike would do something like that?"

"Because they had been comrades in Vietnam. In the same unit. That's why. Barry always felt Mike owed him. But Mike was doing his job."

"And when did this call originate?"

She shrugged. "Must have been yesterday. I don't think either of us checked the answering machine anymore."

"This is the first time you've heard this?"

"Yes," she nodded. "Besides - yesterday was the sentencing hearing against Ed Mancini. I read it in the paper."

Clive Caravaggio, who had been listening to us the whole time, now took a step toward Janice. He held a key in his hand.

"Do you know what this one goes with?" he asked.

Janice shook her head.

"I don't know."

"Looks like a locker," I commented.

Janice became very monosyllabic. A slight blush crossed her face. "If Mike possessed something like that, he didn't tell me about it. This is the first time I've seen the key! Where did you get it?"

Clive raised his eyebrows.

"It was hidden behind the molding of the door frame!"

8

I couldn't shake the thought that Mike Sutter might have received money from the other side. I hoped that it did not turn out to be true. Although one can never completely rule out such a thing. In all, there were about 80,000 cops on duty in the New York metropolitan area, if you combined all the units of the FBI District, the City Police, the DEA, the Secret Service, and the Port Authority Police. A number of people equivalent to a medium-sized city. It would have bordered on a miracle if there hadn't been someone among them who couldn't resist temptation now and then.

Only - none of us would have thought of Mike Sutter in this context.

Maybe the contents of the safe deposit box would provide some kind of information. Clive and Medina were doing their best to find out which bank it was in. And somehow my instinct told me that Janice Morgan was lying about that. I believed that she knew exactly what the box was and where it was located.

Maybe even what was inside. But no one has yet been able to prove to Janice that she was lying.

Milo and I meanwhile took on the other lead we had in the case.

Barry Mancini, who apparently couldn't forgive Mike for not forgetting the law for the son of an old Vietnam comrade.

The case had been an FBI case because the guy Ed Mancini had beaten to death had been a citizen of the state of New Jersey, but the crime had taken place on New York soil.

We tried to find out more about Barry Mancini by remote data transmission. And indeed we found what we were looking for.

After his time in Vietnam, Mancini had been in the New York City Police Department for several years. Five years ago, he had retired with the rank of sergeant. Today he worked for a company that manufactured and installed alarm systems.

But one thing was really interesting.

In Vietnam, he had most recently been with an explosives task force.

"Maybe this really is our man," I said.

Finding out his current address was a small matter.

9

Barry Mancini lived in an apartment building in the East Village. It was on Avenue A, just north of Tompkins Square Park.

His wife opened the apartment door for us.

We showed her our badges, and she led us into the living room. Barry Mancini, a tall, dark-haired man whose hair was now interwoven with gray, sat slumped in one of the deep armchairs.

The bushy mustache reinforced the impression left by the downturned corners of his mouth.

He looked up.

"FBI?" he asked after we held out our IDs to him as well. "What do you want?"

"Can we talk to you alone, Mr. Mancini?"

"I have no secrets from my wife."

"As you wish..."

"Out with it, what is it about?" Instead of offering us a seat, he stood up. He squeezed his hands into the tight pockets of his jeans.

"One of our colleagues died today in an assassination attempt," Milo began. "Mike Sutter. You know who that is?"

"Yes, I know that..."

I had a cassette recorder with me. I set it down on the low table and played the tape. A moment later, the voice that Mike's answering machine had recorded was heard.

"That was you, wasn't it?", I said.

Mancini took a deep breath.

"I guess there's no point in denying it!"

"Indeed."

Now Mancini's wife interfered. "Wouldn't you have done anything to keep your son out of jail?" she cried. "I can guess what's going through your head now, sir! But you are mistaken! My husband did not kill that Sutter man."

"Mike Sutter died from a letter bomb. This narrows the circle of suspects in so far as it must be someone who knows explosives..."

"Ah, that's where the wind is blowing from. They dug up that I was in a special unit.... Look around here! Search everything! You won't find an ounce of explosives!"

"We'll get back to you on that," Milo said coolly. "In case you change your mind in the meantime, I've already got a search warrant here..."

Barry Mancini turned pale.

And I said, "When did you call Mike Sutter?"

"This morning. About 10 o'clock. I was still under the impression of the verdict.... I called by cell phone from the courthouse, and the cell phone company itemizes every call on the bill."

He grinned wryly. "But I'm sure you would have thought of that yourself..."

Ten o'clock, I thought.

By then, Mike Sutter was dead.

10

"That doesn't make sense," Milo said as we drove back "Why would he still call Mike if he wasn't even alive. Obviously he didn't know about the murder."

"Or he wanted to appear to be doing just that," I returned.

"And in doing so, first raise suspicion?"

"Why not? It had to be obvious to him - as an ex-cop - that the matter with his son would come to light. So maybe he went on the offensive."

"I don't believe it," said Milo. "And we didn't find anything in the apartment that could confirm a suspicion..."

"One to zero for you," I said. "On the other hand, Mancini had a motive, he had the opportunity and, above all, he had the ability to send such a letter bomb on its way..."

"I know," Milo said. "But it might be hard to prove it to him. There were hardly any traces at the crime scene..."

11

Later, in the office, Milo and I once again studied in detail the data stored about Mike in our computer. A flawless career for which one could only take one's hat off in admiration.

Clive Caravaggio had come over to us from the room he shared with Agent Medina.

At the moment, that wasn't the only reason we were hanging in the air a bit.

The forensics report was not yet on the table.

We all hoped that a clue awaited us in it.

After all, there certainly weren't too many people who could craft a letter bomb of the kind Mike Sutter had shredded.

At least the search for the locker had turned up something.

Clive and Orry had found what they were looking for at a branch of First National Bank in SoHo. The key had fit.

A close examination of Mike Sutter's bank statements had put them on the trail. The locker fees had been debited annually by standing order.

The contents of the tray were on the table in front of us.

Forty thousand dollars in cash.

They were carefully wrapped in plastic. They still had a forensic examination ahead of them....

So it was true: Mike had had a side income.

Presumably from black money.

"So it's true," Milo said at one point," as if he had another source of income besides his salary."

Clive frowned and nodded.

I could literally read his thoughts.

He was shocked, as we all were. This was especially true for Clive, who had been friends with Mike.

"He saved your life, Jesse," he then indicated. At that, he pointed the index finger of his left hand at me. "Don't forget that before you suspect him!"

"Now don't tell me you really think this is Mike's life savings, Clive," I commented.

Clive clenched his hands into fists.

"Damn..." he whispered.

"I can't imagine that any more than you can, Clive. But his bank statements speak for themselves..."

"And this Mancini?" asked Clive.

"Maybe a dead end," Milo agreed. "But of course we'll keep an eye on that one..."

Over at Medina's, the phone went off at that moment.

A minute later he came in through the half-open door. He made a rather perplexed face.

"George Kalman called..."

I looked up in amazement.

"And what did he want?" Kalman worked as a bartender in one of Ray Tarantino's stores. And on the side, he was our snitch. So far, however, with only moderate success. We had not yet been able to prove that the great Ray Tarantino was a major dealer of designer drugs and also collected protection money from several discotheque owners. And then there was the unsolved murder of Harry Gordon, the ex-manager of Tarantino's high-class discotheque Magic...

"Kalman wants to meet with us," Medina said. "He would have found out something. About Mike!"

Milo whistled through his teeth.

"So word has already gotten out then!"

"Did he say anything else?"

"No. He seemed pretty frantic. The meeting place is Pier 62, tonight at ten. He can't drop off earlier..."

12

It was already dark when we reached Pier 62 via Eleventh Avenue. In the immediate vicinity of the pier, which jutted about two hundred feet into the Hudson, were several warehouses of a recently bankrupt import/export company. Now these warehouses did not even have gates. Literally everything that was not nailed down had been removed and auctioned off with the bankruptcy estate.

At the moment, the site was an industrial wasteland.

I turned off my sports car. Milo and I got out.

A moment later, Medina and Clive arrived. Milo had a flashlight with him, but left it turned off.

Then we went to the pier.

On the other side of the Hudson, the silhouette of Hoboken could be seen. A sea of lights in the night.

"I hope this Kalman guy actually has something to show for it," Clive commented.

"I think so," Medina said.

"And why is that?" asked Clive.

Medina shrugged.

"Instinct," he opined.

I checked the fit of my weapon. Safe was safe.

A lonely meeting place, it went through my mind. But for someone like George Kalman, it could be vital not to be seen with us.

We entered the pier.

A cool wind swept across the Hudson River from the west. It blew from the west, from New Jersey. A brightly lit ship crept along the river toward the mouth.

A figure stood out darkly at the end of the pier. The collar of his coat was turned up, his hands buried in his pockets.

He came up to us.

"Kalman!" shouted Medina, who had obviously recognized him.

He stopped and eyed us. The most striking thing about his face was his bushy mustache. His eyes seemed restless.

"I'm glad you're here..." murmured Kalman. He turned his head nervously to the side as he did so. He was afraid.

"You wanted to tell us something about our colleague Mike Sutter," I noted. I wanted us to get straight to the point.

I carefully studied the face of the informer. And at the same time I wondered how to assess him. He had been unsuccessful for a long time and had been unable to offer us anything of interest. He simply hadn't been able to get hold of the decisive information. Or he was afraid of the risk. Whatever the case.

"He's a mole," Kalman noted. "I watched myself as he came into the Magic to pick up a pack of dollars at the bar.... He disappeared into an adjoining room with Tarantino. The door was open a crack and so I could see the money..." He took a deep breath.

"I had met Sutter a few times before. He even interviewed me. After all, Sutter was also involved in the Harry Gordon murder investigation."

"Yes, that's right," I confirmed.

"Sutter apparently misappropriated evidence."

"What evidence?" I asked. I wanted something more concrete. Everything he had said so far sounded pretty vague to my ears.

"You've got some work to do, too, G-men," Kalman replied, somewhat angrily. "I just got a call from the boss..."

"You mean Ray Tarantino!"

"Yeah, that one! So, that's who talked to Clayton and Jimenez about Sutter wanting more money."

"Who are Clayton and Jimenez?", I wanted to know.

"They run a lot of the business for him. How to describe their function?" He shrugged. "Girl for everything, I'd say." He screwed up his face.

"Now no one needs to wonder why Tarantino was always well informed when something was being prepared against him..."

"Indeed!" growled Medina.

And Clive said, "I don't believe you, Kalman! You're just trying to make yourself interesting. The best thing we can do is cross you off our list..."

"Listen..."

"You're lying through your teeth just to make yourself important!" Clive took a deep breath.

"Clive!", I admonished him. I could understand him. Mike had been his friend, and he just couldn't believe what was beginning to look more and more like fact. After all, it wasn't just this snitch's testimony.

Clive took a few more steps. He stroked his hair back.

Kalman looked at me.

I could not believe my eyes.

"Watch out!", I shouted.

In the middle of his chest was a small red dot.

A laser beam!

Someone aimed a special rifle at Kalman that had a laser sight. It was possible to hit with pinpoint accuracy even over long distances.

A fraction of a second - that's all I had left to act.

I pulled the stunned Kalman aside.

We both staggered to the ground. The others were confused.

At the same moment the shot cracked through the night.

I rolled around on the floor.

My hand let my coat and jacket slide to the side as if automatically. I grabbed the handle of my gun and yanked it out.

The other G-men, meanwhile, had also gone down, their hands on the hilts of their weapons.

I looked across the basin between Pier 62 and 61.

This basin was about a hundred meters wide and two hundred meters long.

Almost to the top, Pier 61 was built with industrial facilities. Warehouses, large cranes and so on. These facilities stood out against the darkness as dark outlines.

And then I saw the figures at the end of the pier.

There were at least two.

Something flashed.

Another shot barked out.

Clive Caravaggio fired back twice, although that was more or less pointless. At this range, our weapons were hopelessly outgunned.

From the other side of the harbor basin, a few more shots came our way. And they were also very well aimed. The projectiles whirred densely over our heads.

I looked to the side.

George Kalman looked at me with staring, broken eyes.

Blood seeped through the fabric of his jacket onto the cold concrete of the pier.

Inwardly, I cursed. I had not been fast enough.

"Let's get them!", I heard Milo grimly blurt out.

He had picked himself up and was now walking along the pier in a crouched position - back towards our car.

We were still being shot at. I fired back twice. Less in the hope of actually hitting us than with the intention of intimidating the mysterious snipers a bit.

I got to my feet and followed Milo in an equally crouched position.

The fire died down on Pier 61.

Vaguely, a movement was discernible in the darkness.

"They want to run away!" I shouted to Caravaggio and Medina. Medina, meanwhile, had picked up the radio.

"This is Agent Medina. Reporting a shooting at Pier 62, perps are trying to escape. Urgently need backup to cordon off the area..."

13

At the sports car, I caught up with Milo. Almost simultaneously, we pulled open the doors. Seconds later, I started the car and we roared off. The ride lasted only moments. Then we had reached Pier 61. The large cranes rose steeply into the sky, most of them quite rust-eaten.

We got out, guns at the ready. I had switched off the lights of the sports car so that it could no longer be seen in the darkness.

We looked around.

"They must still be here," Milo murmured to me. "We would have noticed a car driving away."

"What if they came across the Hudson on a boat?", I returned.

Milo shrugged his shoulders.

"Then I can only hope that Orry remembered to alert the harbor police..."

I took a deep breath.

Probably Milo was right and the killers were still here, on this obscure terrain. I hoped so. Because if we could confront them, maybe they would be able to answer some questions for us. Questions that we would otherwise have to ask Ray Tarantino directly.

And he would play the clueless one, as we had come to know him so far.

We worked our way slowly, covering each other as we went. Milo left the flashlight in his jacket pocket.

It was too dangerous to turn them on. Who knew where one of those killer snipers was lurking in this confusing harbor area.

He would not let such an opportunity pass him by.

I just hoped that our people arrived quickly. FBI, City Police, Port Authority Police. The whole club. If the net wasn't tight enough, the killers would slip through our fingers....

Cautiously it went ahead.

And then...

A red dot out of nowhere!

Right at my upper arm. With a jerk, he moved sideways....

To where my heart was.

"Get down, Jesse!" That was Milo. But if I had reacted only then. it would have been too late - just like with Kalman.

I ducked and threw myself to the ground. I hit the concrete hard. A shot barked out. The bullet whizzed through the night and missed me by a hair's breadth.

Milo fired back.