Grave Intent Read Free

who’d lost his mother. He balled his fists and cursed at length—in his native Kinyarwandan, for safety’s sake. He was among cops, after all.
    He made his way back to the lobby and was scanning a directory sign when a young woman came up next to him. She was three heads shorter and wore a tight green T-shirt that accentuated her athletic body. But her serious expression and her dark hair pulled back in a neat ponytail made her seem forbidding and severe. Of course, the pistol and pepper spray only added to his impression. Women with weapons spooked him.
    “You look a little lost,” she said in a kind voice. “Are you new here?”
    Chandu considered making a sarcastic remark but then realized how he must appear to this woman. He was wearing biker boots, torn jeans, and a dark leather jacket. Add the tribal tattoos on his forehead, and he must seem as foreign to this female cop as she was to him.
    “I am.” He smiled widely. “Thanks for asking. Could you tell me where Jan Tommen conducts his meetings?”
    “Aha, you must be that Chandu fellow.”
    “Yep, I am that Chandu fellow.” He wondered if there was a poster with his image and name on it somewhere in the station.
    “I heard about you.”
    “You’re not the only one.” Chandu had no idea what Jan had been saying about him, but it didn’t exactly help his line of work when every cop in Berlin knew who he was.
    The woman was eyeing him up and down. “Hmm,” she muttered. She seemed to like what she saw.
    “The conference room?” Chandu said, unnerved by her thorough inspection of his body.
    The woman flinched and went back to being all business. “Uh, go down that hallway all the way to the end. Take a right; second door on the left.”
    Chandu walked past the woman. He could feel her watching him until he was all the way around the corner.
    Max was waiting for him in the meeting room. Seeing a trusted face put him immediately at ease. “Hey there, Max.” He gave the young computer freak and sometime hacker a friendly pat on the shoulder.
    Max’s long hair stuck out in all directions. His pants were too short for his skinny legs, and those green sneakers he never took off were probably part of his feet by now. The only aspect of his appearance that had changed in the weeks since Chandu had last seen him was his T-shirt, which was bright red with the word Bazinga in large black letters.
    Max looked up, grinned, and then turned back to his keyboard. “Be done in a sec. Just have to finish connecting to Forensics.”
    “Don’t let me disturb you,” Chandu said and went over to a bulletin board near the door. On one side hung photos of a large home. The stark rooms were shot from various perspectives. Next to them were images of a cemetery. The body of a man lay facedown in a rectangular open grave that looked freshly dug. Next to the grave stood a simple wooden cross on which was painted a name, date of birth, and date of death.
    Jan had left comments on the photos with little Post-its. On the living room, one note read C RIME S CENE? Jan had noted M URDER W EAPON N OT D ETERMINED on a grisly close-up of the back of a completely shattered head.
    Chandu was looking over a map of the cemetery when Jan strode in.
    “Good morning, old buddy!”
    “Morning.” Chandu gave Jan a big hug with his massive arms. Then he stepped back and took a good look at his friend. Jan had surely been up all night. His thatch of brown hair hadn’t been combed, and his shirt was wrinkled, but that mischievous grin of his—like that of some teenager who’d pranked his schoolteacher—outshone his weariness.
    Jan was an experienced investigator, but in his last case he’d come under suspicion of murder himself. He had gone into hiding at Chandu’s place, and the whole episode had been incredibly rough on Jan. Chandu wasn’t sure if he was ever going to be the same “good old Jan” again.
    “How does it feel to be working for Homicide?” Jan asked.
    “Don’t