Bad Wolf (50 page)

She propped her hand on her hip and regarded Wolfgang with feigned indignation. “Does Mama know about this?”

All color had drained from Wolfgang’s face and now he was deathly pale.

“Please, Meike.” He raised his hands beseechingly, and his Adam’s apple bobbed up and down. Sweat glistened on his brow. “Get out of here and just forget you ever saw us.…”

He stopped when the ponytail guy appeared in the kitchen doorway behind him.

“Well, well,” said the man, “what do we have here?”

“Do you like your coffee?” Meike asked sharply.

“It’s all right,” said the bearded, muscular man, whose suntan indicated that he spent a lot of time outdoors. His eyes flashed mockingly. “In my opinion, the Saeco makes a better cup of coffee, but this is acceptable.”

Meike gave him a dirty look. The gall of this guy. Who was he anyway? And what was Wolfgang doing on a Friday morning in her mother’s house? She walked down the last two steps.

“Please, Meike!” Wolfgang stepped between her and the man. “Just go. You didn’t see us here.…”

“It’s too late for that now,” said the other man, shoving him aside. “Go check the mail, Wolfi.”

Meike suspiciously looked back and forth between him and Wolfgang, but Wolfgang avoided her eyes and turned away. Incredible! He just left her standing there.

“Wolfgang, why did—”

The punch came out of nowhere, hitting her right in the face. She staggered back and barely managed to catch hold of the banister. She touched her face and looked down in disbelief at the blood on her hand. A wave of heat pulsed through her body.

“Are you crazy, you asshole?” she screamed. She didn’t know what made her madder: this outrageous jerk who had really hurt her, or Wolfgang, who had turned away like a coward as he took out his cell and left her to her fate. Hatred, disappointment, and adrenaline boiled over, and instead of running to the front door and yelling for help, she pounced on the bearded man with a furious shriek.

“Oh yeah? Your mama didn’t fight back like this. She was really boring compared to you.” He had his hands full fending her off, but in the end, Meike didn’t have a chance. He was a full-grown man and she only half his size. Still, he grunted with the effort as he toppled her to the floor and then jammed his knee into her spine and brutally tied her wrists together behind her back.

“You’re a regular little wildcat, aren’t you?” he hissed.

“And you’re a shit-eating jerk-off!” Meike gasped between clenched teeth as she tried to kick him.

“Get up. Let’s go.” The bearded guy pulled her to her feet and dragged her down the basement stairs.

“Wolfgang!” she shrieked. “Shit, do something!
Wolfgang!
”

“Shut your trap,” the man panted, slapping her a couple of times. Meike spit in his face and kicked at him, striking a particularly sensitive spot. That made him blow his top. He shoved her into the furnace room, then began beating her until she dropped to the floor.

Finally, he seemed to think it was enough. He straightened up, breathing hard, and wiped his brow with his forearm. His ponytail had come undone and his hair fell in his face. Meike was doubled up, coughing, on the bare concrete floor.

Upstairs, the doorbell rang.

“The mailman is here,” said the man. “Don’t go away. You’ve still got a date.”

“With you, or what?” Meike croaked. He leaned over her, grabbed her by the hair, and forced her to look at him.

“No, baby. Not with me.” His grin was diabolical. “You’ve got a date with the Grim Reaper.”

*   *   *

The witness shook his head.

“Nope,” he said firmly. “It’s not any of these guys.”

“Really?” Bodenstein asked to make sure. “Take your time.”

“No.” Andreas Hasselbach was quite sure. “I saw him only briefly, but it wasn’t any of these men.”

Five men were standing on the other side of the one-way mirror, each holding a sign with a number on it. Prinzler was number three, but the witness didn’t look at him any longer or more intently than at the other four. Pia saw the disappointment on her boss’s face, but she knew at once that the man wasn’t there, because all of them except for Prinzler were police colleagues.

“What about this guy?” She handed Hasselbach the printout of the artist’s sketch that was done with the assistance of the eyewitness from Höchst. All it took was one glance.

“That’s the guy!” he shouted, excited and without hesitation.

“Thank you,” Pia said with a nod. “You’ve been very helpful.”

Now all she had to do was find this man. Maybe the public could help them again. Her colleagues returned to their desks, the witness was ushered out, and Prinzler was taken to the nearby interview room. Bodenstein and Pia sat down across from him, while Cem leaned against the wall.

“Why are you keeping me here?” Prinzler was pissed off. “There are no charges against me. This is sheer police brutality. I want to call my wife.”

“Just talk to us first,” Bodenstein suggested. “Tell us how you knew Leonie Verges and Hanna Herzmann and why you visited them. Then you can call your wife and leave.”

Prinzler gave Bodenstein an appraising look.

“I’m not saying a thing without my lawyer present. You’ll just use anything I say against me.”

Bodenstein bombarded the man with the same questions that Pia and Kröger had already asked him yesterday, and received the same answers.

“I want to call my wife,” Prinzler replied to each question. It seemed really important to him, even when he tried to act calm. He seemed extremely worried about his wife. But why?

Pia glanced at her watch. In an hour, she had to be in Falkenstein. Then she wasn’t coming back here today. She shoved the artist’s drawing in front of Prinzler.

“Who is this man?”

“Is that the guy you’re looking for? That’s why you had the lineup?”

“Right. Do you know him?”

“Yeah. That’s Helmut Grasser,” he replied brusquely. “If you’d asked me in the beginning, I could have saved you this whole song and dance.”

Fury rose up inside Pia, like blood oozing out of a cut on the skin. Time was running out, and this guy, who might hold the key to solving their cases, was holding things up. And she couldn’t find anywhere to insert a crowbar. Bernd Prinzler was like a concrete wall with no cracks or crevices, an impregnable wall of stubborn determination.

“Where do you know him from? Where can we find him?”

He shrugged.

Pia felt her blood really start to boil. Was she going to have to physically drag every scrap of information out of this guy?

Cem left the room.

“Take a look at this.” Pia put in front of Prinzler a printout of the e-mail she’d received that morning. “Someone was taking pictures of me and my partner’s granddaughter yesterday.”

He didn’t even look at it.

“I don’t have my reading glasses with me,” he said.

“Then I’ll read it to you.” Pia snatched the page. “‘Little girls keep disappearing and are never found again. It would be a shame if that happened to this sweet little thing just because her mama keeps sticking her nose into things that are none of her business.’”

“I have nothing to do with that.” Prinzler kept his gaze fixed on Pia’s face. “I’ve been in jail since Wednesday, remember?”

“But you know what this is about!” She had to control herself to keep from yelling at the man. “Who writes e-mails like this? And why? What was Hanna Herzmann researching? Why did Leonie Verges have to die? Who else has to die before you finally open your mouth? Your wife? Should we bring her down here? Maybe she’ll talk to us if you won’t.”

Prinzler rubbed his chin in thought.

“Let’s make a deal. You let me phone her,” he replied at last. “And once I know that she’s okay, then I’ll tell you everything I know.”

It was no deal; it was extortion. But it was a tiny breach in the impenetrable defensive wall that Prinzler had built around himself. A chance. Pia glanced over at Bodenstein. He nodded. Pia took out her cell and laid it on the table in front of Prinzler.

“Okay, go ahead,” she told him. “Call her up.”

*   *   *

The car slowed down and swerved to the left. Kilian noticed someone leaning over him, and then the door opened. He felt the wind rushing past and the centrifugal force pulling him sideways. Shocked, he braced his knees against the front seat, trying instinctively to hold on somehow, but his hands were bound behind his back. A violent shove, and he tipped sideways and fell. A flash of fear as he felt momentarily weightless before his brain grasped what had happened. Damn, they’d shoved him out of the moving car! He slammed to the ground, landing on his right shoulder, and his collarbone cracked with a loud snap. The pain took his breath away. Tires screeched and skidded over the asphalt, brakes squealed, and the horn of a truck blasted right next to him. Kilian desperately tried to roll off the road, hitting his head on the sharp edge of a guardrail. Was he safe now? Where was the road? Gravel scratched his cheek and he smelled grass.

A car door slammed and quick footsteps approached. Kilian pulled up his legs and squirmed farther toward the grass.

“Hey! Hello!” Somebody touched his arm and the pain exploded like white-hot fire in his brain.

Excited voices all began talking at once.

“Call an ambulance!”

“… just fell right out of the car.”

“Is he still alive?”

“I almost ran him over!”

Hands on his head. The pressure of the blindfold loosened. Kilian blinked at the bright light, saw a man with a mustache in a checked shirt. He looked shocked.

“How are you feeling, man? Can you move? Are you in pain?”

Kilian stared at him and nodded slowly.

“My shoulder,” he whispered with an effort. “I think something’s broken.”

“The ambulance will be here soon,” the man assured him. “Oh man, what the hell happened?”

Kilian’s field of vision broadened. He raised his head and saw that he was lying under a guardrail at the edge of a two-lane highway. A big truck with its blinkers on was half on, half off the oncoming lane, another directly behind it.

“They just tossed him out of the car!” exclaimed the man, who was probably the truck driver. His face was as white as chalk. “I just missed running over you by a hair.”

“Where am I?” Kilian licked his dry lips and tried to sit up.

“On the L56, right near Selfkant.”

“In Germany?”

“Yeah. What happened?”

Another man came over holding a cell phone in his hand.

“No reception,” he said, and he, too, bent over Kilian in concern. “Hey, man, what’s going on? What happened to you?”

“I have to get to Frankfurt. And I have to make a call.” Kilian could only imagine how he looked. “Please call an ambulance or the police.”

“Hey, you look half-dead,” said the younger of the two men. Kilian could think only of Chiara. He had to reach her before something happened to her. The two men helped him sit up and then propped him against the guardrail so they could free him from his bonds. With their help, he managed to get to his feet.

“Could you give me a ride?” he asked. “I really have to get to Frankfurt urgently.”

The two truck drivers weren’t too crazy about getting in trouble with their shipping contractors for stopping and giving statements to the police. They asked no questions, just gave him a bottle of water and a rag to wipe the dried blood off his face and hands.

“I’m heading for Mönchengladbach,” said the one with the mustache. “Maybe I can find another trucker on the radio who can take you from there to Frankfurt.”

“Thank you.” Kilian nodded. He barely managed to climb into the cab of the truck. He felt consumed with pain, and the skin was stretched taut on his face. From the side mirror, a swollen, grotesque face stared back at him. It bore no resemblance to him whatsoever.

The guy with the mustache started the engine of the huge semi and maneuvered it back onto the right side of the road. Kilian shuddered. The tires of the big thirty-ton truck would have crushed his bones like a walnut. That’s probably just what his abductors were hoping.

*   *   *

The garden was full of guests dressed in their summer best. Everyone was in a festive mood. The jazz band played and waiters squeezed through the throng with trays of champagne glasses and finger food. Emma was looking for her in-laws. From the invitations, she knew every single name on the guest list, but personally she knew hardly anyone. Louisa was holding on to her hand and staying close, acting as shy as if she were a stranger at the party. It had taken all of Emma’s skill to conjure up an acceptable short hairdo for Louisa after she had hacked off her curls. Wearing jeans and a white long-sleeved shirt, she looked like a little boy.

“Ah, there are Grandma and Grandpa,” said Emma. Her in-laws were standing on the big terrace, Josef in a light-colored linen suit, Renate in an apricot-colored dress that went wonderfully with her tanned skin and white hair. They were greeting the guests as they arrived. Renate’s face was radiant, and she seemed happy and relaxed.

Emma congratulated her father-in-law on his birthday.

“So, where’s my little princess?” Josef bent down to Louisa, but she hid behind her mother. “Don’t you want to give your grandpa a little kiss on his birthday?”

“No!” Louisa shook her head vigorously. The people standing nearby laughed in amusement.

“What happened to Louisa’s beautiful hair?” Renate asked in consternation. “And where’s the pretty pink dress?”

“We like the short hairdo better,” Emma hastened to say. “Don’t we, Louisa? It makes washing hair a lot quicker.”

“But what…” Renate began, but Emma silenced her with a pleading look.

“Papa!” Louisa shouted at that moment. She tore out of Emma’s grasp and ran over to Florian. Emma’s heart skipped a beat at the sight of her husband. Like his father, Florian wore a light-colored suit and looked simply fantastic. He picked up Louisa and held her high. Then she flung her little arms around his neck and pressed her cheek to his.

“Hello,” Florian said to Emma. He didn’t comment on Louisa’s new hairdo or the jeans. “How are you doing?”

“Hello,” Emma replied coolly. “Fine. You?”