‘Yes …’ He started to pull at her blouse. He saw the swell of her breast. Full, warm flesh.

‘Not yet,’ she said firmly and pushed him away. ‘Tell me about them …’

‘I hurt them.’ Oliver felt the rage surge in him. ‘I really fucking hurt them and now I’m going to hurt you, you fucking slut!’ he screamed at her. ‘You’re just a tease and a whore, but now I’m going to teach you a real lesson. I’m going to bite you and fuck you and if you’re not quiet I’ll kick the shit out of you.’ He lunged at her, swinging his fist into the side of her face.

The blow didn’t connect. There was a sharp pain on the inside of his forearm where she had blocked the blow, followed by an agonising explosion in his groin as her knee slammed into it. The rage changed to confusion and then to fear as he realised that she had twisted his arm round behind him and slammed him against the wall. He couldn’t move. He couldn’t see much either, with his cheek pushed hard into the wall. There were other noises. Crashes. Shouting. The room filled with dark figures. They had guns. There were other hands on him now. Handcuffs. Suzi spun him around. She pushed the thick copper coils of hair from her face.

‘Now, Hans … now I’ll tell you my real name. Just like I promised. It’s Tansu Bakrac. Criminal Commissar Tansu Bakrac. And you, you perverted piece of shit, are under arrest.’

As they led him out of the flat, Oliver noticed that the doors off the hall were now open. Empty rooms. No furniture. That was where all the other police had been waiting; that was why she had led him directly into the bedroom: it was all a masquerade. They had probably recorded every word he had exchanged with ‘Suzi’ since they met in the hotel.

There were two other plain-clothes police officers waiting in the hall. Of course, Oliver knew the shorter dark-haired one who now looked at him in shock. ‘Suzi’ turned to the taller, blond-haired officer whom Oliver had not seen before and grinned.

‘That was some favour you asked …’

5.

‘What’s up with you, Benni?’ Fabel asked as the uniformed officers led ‘Hans’ out to the waiting police cars. ‘You look like you’ve seen a ghost.’

‘Shit …’ said Scholz, his expression still one of shock. ‘Bloody hell …’

‘What’s up?’ Tansu’s triumphant grin gave way to a frown.

‘Don’t you know who that is? You’ve just arrested Herr Dr Oliver Lüdeke.’

‘The forensic pathologist?’

‘One and the same. Now the crap is really going to hit the fan.’

‘A forensic pathologist …’ said Fabel. ‘Someone who would be an expert at excising an exact quantity of human flesh.’