He stood before her as if he’d shot up out of the ground, just as she had turned around again to take a last look at Tobias and this blond bitch driving that luxury ride.
“Jeez, Thies!” Amelie gasped in shock, surreptitiously wiping the tears from her cheek. “Do you have to scare me like that, damn it?”
Sometimes it was really spooky the way Thies could just appear and vanish without making a sound. Only now did she notice that he looked sick. His eyes were sunk deep in their sockets and had a feverish gleam to them. He was trembling all over, with his arms wrapped tight around his upper body. The thought shot through her mind that he really looked like a crazy person. Then she felt ashamed for thinking such a thing.
“What’s wrong? Don’t you feel good?” she asked.
He didn’t react, just looked around nervously. His breathing was fast and irregular, as if he’d been running. Suddenly he uncrossed his arms and grabbed Amelie’s hand, much to her surprise. He had never done that before. She knew that he didn’t like being touched.
“I couldn’t protect Snow White,” he said in a hoarse, tense voice. “But I’ll take better care of you.”
His eyes shifted restlessly, and he kept looking toward the edge of the woods as if he expected some sort of danger to emerge from that direction. Amelie shuddered. All at once the pieces of the puzzle fell into place.
“You saw what happened, didn’t you?” she whispered. Thies turned abruptly and pulled her along with him, holding her hand tight. Amelie stumbled after him through a muddy ditch and thick undergrowth. When they reached the protection of the woods, Thies slowed down a bit, but he was still walking too fast for Amelie, who smoked too much and never exercised. He held her hand in an iron grip; when she stumbled and fell he would immediately pull her to her feet. They were climbing a hill. Dry branches crackled under their feet, magpies scolded from the tops of the fir trees. Without warning he stopped. Amelie looked around, panting and through the trees she spied the bright-red roof tiles of the Terlinden villa a little ways down the slope. Sweat ran down her face and she coughed. Why had Thies taken her around the entire perimeter of the property? The road through the park would have been far less trouble. He let go of her hand and began fiddling with a rusty, narrow gate, which opened with a reluctant screech. Amelie followed him through the gate and saw that she was now right behind the orangerie. Thies wanted to grab her hand again, but she pulled away.
“Why are you running all over the place like a madman?” She tried to quell the uneasiness that suddenly filled her, but there was something definitely wrong with Thies. The almost lethargic calm that he usually displayed had vanished, and when he looked at her now, straight in the eye and without averting his gaze, his expression scared her.
“If you promise not to tell anybody,” he said softly, “I’ll show you my secret. Come on!”
He opened the door to the orangerie with the key that was under the doormat. She deliberated briefly whether to simply walk away. But Thies was her friend, he trusted her. So she decided to trust him too, and followed him into the room that she knew so well. He closed the door softly and looked around.
“Could you please tell me what’s going on?” Amelie asked. “Has something happened?”
Thies didn’t answer. At the back of the large room he moved a big potted palm aside and picked up the board on which it had stood, propping it against the wall. Amelie stepped forward with curiosity and looked in amazement at a trap door set into the floor. Thies opened the hatch and turned to her. “Come on,” he urged her.
Amelie stepped onto the steep, rusty iron stairs that led down into the darkness. Thies closed the trap door above them, and a second later a faint lightbulb went on. He squeezed past her and opened a massive iron door. A flood of warm dry air rushed toward them, and Amelie was flabbergasted when she entered a large cellar room. A bright carpet, walls painted a happy orange. A shelf full of books on one side, a comfortable-looking sofa on the other. The back half of the room was separated off with a folding screen. Amelie’s heart was in her throat. Thies had never given any indication that he wanted anything from her, and even now she didn’t think he would pounce on her and try to rape her. Anyway, in an emergency it was only a few steps to the stairs and then out into the park.
“Come on,” Thies said again. He pushed the screen aside, and Amelie saw an old-fashioned bed with a high wooden headboard. On the wall photographs were hung neatly in rows and columns, as was Thies’s habit.
“Come over here. I’ve told Snow White so much about you.”
She moved closer, and suddenly she couldn’t breathe. With a mixture of horror and fascination she looked into the face of a mummy.
* * *
“What is it?” Nadia squatted down in front of him, putting her hand gently on his thigh, but he pushed her away impatiently and stood up. He hobbled forward a few yards and then stopped. What he was thinking was monstrous!
“Laura’s body lay in an underground tank on the grounds of the old military airfield in Eschborn,” said Tobias in a hoarse voice. “You must remember how we used to have parties out there. Because J?rg’s father had the key to the gate.”
“What do you mean?” Nadia came after him and looked at him blankly.
“It wasn’t me who threw Laura in that tank,” Tobias replied vehemently, grinding his teeth. “Damn it, damn it, damn it.” He balled up his hands into fists. “I want to know what really happened! My parents were ruined, I sat in prison for ten years, and then Laura’s father pushes my mother off a bridge! I can’t stand it anymore!” he yelled, as Nadia stood mutely in front of him.
“Come stay with me, Tobi. Please.”
“No!” he snapped. “Don’t you get it? That’s exactly what they wanted to achieve, those assholes!”
“Yesterday all they did was beat you up. What if they come back and they’re serious this time?”
“Kill me, you mean?” Tobias looked at Nadia. Her lower lip was trembling slightly, her big green eyes were swimming in tears. Nadia didn’t deserve to be yelled at. She was the only one who had stood by him all this time. She would have even visited him in prison, but he hadn’t wanted her to. Suddenly his fury subsided and he felt only guilt.
“Please forgive me,” he said softly, reaching out his arms. “I didn’t mean to shout at you. Come here.”
She leaned against him, snuggling her face against his chest, and he wrapped his arms around her.
“Maybe you’re right,” he whispered into her hair. “We can’t turn back time.”
She raised her head and looked at him. There was deep anxiety in her eyes. “I’m afraid for you, Tobi.” Her voice quavered a little. “I don’t want to lose you again, now that I finally have you back.”
Tobias grimaced. He closed his eyes and put his cheek on hers. If he only knew whether things could ever work out for them. He didn’t want to be disappointed, not again. He’d rather live the rest of his life alone.
* * *
Manfred Wagner looked like a heap of misery as he sat at the table in the interview room. With an effort he raised his head when Kirchhoff and Bodenstein came in. He stared at them with the red-rimmed, watery eyes of an alcoholic.
“You have been charged with multiple felony counts,” Bodenstein began sternly after he had turned on the tape recorder and stated the requisite formalities for the transcript. “Grievous bodily harm, dangerous disruption of traffic, and—depending on what the district attorney decides—negligent manslaughter or even homicide.”
Manfred Wagner turned another shade paler. His gaze shifted to Kirchhoff and back to Bodenstein. He swallowed.
“But … but … Rita is still alive,” he stammered.
“That’s true,” said Bodenstein. “But the man whose windshield she fell onto suffered a heart attack at the scene of the accident. Not to mention the property damage to the other vehicles that were involved in the pileup. This matter will have serious consequences for you, and it doesn’t help that you didn’t turn yourself in to the police.”
“I was meaning to,” Wagner protested in a whiny voice. “But … but they all advised me not to.”
“Who do you mean by ‘they’?” Kirchhoff asked. Any sympathy she’d had for this man was gone. He had suffered a terrible loss, but that didn’t justify his assault on Tobias’s mother.
Wagner shrugged but didn’t look at her.
“All of them,” he repeated, as vague as Hartmut Sartorius had been a few hours earlier, when Kirchhoff asked him who was behind the anonymous threatening letters and the attack on his son.
“I see. Do you always do what ‘all of them’ say?” It came out sharper than she intended, but had an effect.
“You have no idea!” Wagner flared up. “My Laura was someone really special. She could have amounted to something. And she was so beautiful. Sometimes I could hardly believe that she was really my daughter. And then she had to die. Just tossed aside like a piece of garbage. We were a happy family. We’d just built a house out in the new industrial park, and my cabinet shop was doing well. There was a good sense of community in the village, everyone was friends with everyone else. And then … Laura and her girlfriend disappeared. Tobias murdered them, that ice-cold bastard! I begged him to tell me why he killed them and what he did with her body. But he never said a word.”
He doubled up and sobbed without restraint. Bodenstein wanted to turn off the tape recorder, but Kirchhoff stopped him. Was Wagner really crying out of sorrow for his lost daughter or because he was feeling sorry for himself?
“Cut out the playacting,” she said.
Wagner’s head flew up and he stared at her as dumbfounded as if she’d kicked him in the ass. “I lost my child,” he began in a quivering voice.
“I know that,” Kirchhoff cut him off. “And for that you have my complete sympathy. But you still have two children and a wife who need you. Didn’t you think at all about what it would mean for your family if you did something to hurt Rita Cramer?”
Wagner fell silent, but suddenly his face contorted with fury.
“You have no idea what I’ve been through for the past eleven years!” he cried.
“But I do know what your wife has been through,” Kirchhoff replied coolly. “She has not only lost a child, but also a husband, who goes out every night drinking out of sheer self-pity, leaving her in the lurch. Your wife is fighting to survive. What are you doing?”
Wagner’s eyes began to flash in anger. Kirchhoff had obviously hit a sore spot.
“What the hell business is that of yours?”
“Who advised you not to turn yourself in to the police?”
“My friends.”
“Probably the same friends who stand idly by as you get tanked up at the Black Horse every night and take your life in your hands. Am I right?”
Wagner opened his mouth to reply but changed his mind. His hostile expression turned unsure, and he looked at Bodenstein.
“I’m not going to let you get to me.” His voice shook. “I’m not saying another word without a lawyer present.”
He crossed his arms and lowered his chin to his chest like a recalcitrant child. Kirchhoff looked at her boss and raised her eyebrows. Bodenstein pressed the STOP button on the tape recorder.
“You’d better go home,” he said.
“You mean I’m … I’m not … under arrest?” Wagner croaked in astonishment.
“No.” Bodenstein stood up. “We know where to find you. The DA will bring an indictment against you. So you are going to need a lawyer.”
He opened the door. Wagner staggered past him, accompanied by the uniformed officer who had been present in the room. Bodenstein watched him go.
“The guy’s so pitiful that I almost feel sorry for him,” Pia said next to him. “But only almost.”
“Why did you come down on him so hard?” Oliver wanted to know.
“Because I have a hunch that there’s a lot more hidden behind all of this than we can see at the moment,” Pia said. “There’s something going on in that dump of a village. And it’s been going on for the past eleven years. I’m absolutely sure of it.”