“After you finish, there’s a rental-insurance repayment request form for you to fill out. As a treat,” said Beate.
Bureaucracy was Austria’s national pastime, and Andreas saw it as a game. If you selected the correct forms, ticked the right boxes, and memorized a few million codes, you could beat the system. Most people preferred solving crosswords on their coffee breaks, and most people found him to be a bit strange. Not Beate.
“Is it a repayment request or a request for reimbursement of payment?” he asked.
She answered with a blank stare.
He returned to his reading, muttering, “Send me the invoice, I’ll handle it after lunch. Should be easy, assuming the boyfriend got the invoice stamped and signed.”
She searched for a copy of it on her personal tablet. “It’s got a signature but no stamp. Will that be an issue?”
Yes, yes, it would.Oida.This guy wasn’t worth the shine on hiscuff links. He couldn’t even validate an invoice. How had he survived to reach adulthood in Austria?
Andreas finished speed-reading the manual, more refreshing than his coffee. He slapped his knees and announced the start of the workday by saying, of course, “So.”
He rose from the bench, taking pride in how his legs ached from his morning run, which had been more of a morning slide, given the icy roads. He usually began each shift by mixing an organic protein shake, but they were two steps inside the station when the chief inspector summoned them to his office. Andreas had a hunch that whatever orders they were about to receive would postpone his morning routine. He was right. Two bodies had been found at seven a.m.—at the Hotel Orient.
— 10 —Zehn
The Orient had a reputation for protecting reputations, so investigating there meant stepping on powerful toes. The Hotel was within walking distance, so the detectives opted for the stroll rather than risk getting stuck in a Viennese traffic jam. Sirens prove useless if you’re caught behind a horse-drawn carriage.
Vienna had twenty-three districts, the first of which was the Innere Stadt, the Inner City, which stood in the center of the map with its nose held high. The rest of the universe extended from it, curling clockwise in relative numerical order like a reverse Fibonacci spiral.
Andreas came from the Twenty-First District, Floridsdorf, a large neighborhood on the outskirts where the local dialect was as strong as their disdain for police, whom they lovingly nicknamed theKieberer. His mother should have been proud when he became detective, in the First District, no less, but she wasn’t. Why he had to work something as demanding as homicide, she didn’t understand. He’d bungled his first case by making the rookie mistake of actually solving it and arresting a renowned philharmonic conductor who’dmurdered his third wife in hopes of running off with his second violin. Since then, Andreas’s career had stalled like a taxi stuck behind a stubborn horse.
He couldn’t risk complaining, lest it give Mama ammunition to remind him how, if he’d just taken a waste-management job with Magistrate 48, sorting refuse like his father and cousins, he’d have more time to come around for dinner. More time to find a nice woman to bring home with him too. She had a point, at least people in the Twenty-First District respected the 48ers.
The walk to the Hotel Orient was far from leisurely. The wind had something wicked in mind, as did the relentless swells of tourists crowding the city-center cobblestones. The route to the den of sin led the officers past four churches. They started at the station, which stood in the cold gray shadow of gilded St. Stephen’s Cathedral. Historically, houses of worship were the only buildings granted the privilege of sparkling more than the palace.
They took a shortcut, veering through the realm of current royals: the Golden Quarter, which was littered with luxury shops, designer detritus, and restaurants frequented by city elite. They passed Zum Schwarzen Kameel, a restaurant where even in winter people dined alfresco to be seen. The photographers behind the rope in front were occupied by a well-loved footballer and a well-resented city minister eating breakfast at neighboring tables. They paid no attention to the detectives walking by. Which meant the news of a death at the Orient hadn’t escaped. Yet.
This case had the potential to become a nightmare. Andreas and Beate walked in silence, between murmurs of awestruck tourists and clacking of horse hooves on pavement, with the question hanging between them. She bit first.
“Have you ever seen the inside of the Orient?” she asked.
“Seen the inside? As far as I know, it’s only open to guests.”
“Maybe you took one of your little Tinder dates there, assuming you actually managed to meet one,” she said, shooting him a scolding look.
He grumbled. “No, I’ve never been, and I’m not interested in the sort of woman who would go. That place is for affairs, not first dates.”
“What makes you so sure any woman would accept your invitation to the Orient? And on a first date, no less.”
“You know what I meant. Haveyoubeen?”
“You think I’d admit if I had? But it’s not just for cheaters. I’ve heard it’s romantic.”
“You’veheard, eh?”
He stopped short. She matched him.
He looked her up and down, pinching his chin. “Nope.”
“Nope what?” she asked.
“I don’t think you’ve ever visited the Orient.”
Beate smiled. Andreas held a finger to his lips in mock contemplation, then pointed at her. “ButI think you’d go if you were invited. Maybe the boyfriend will take you.”
