Snow White Must Die (Bodenstein & Kirchhoff, #4)(121)
“Nonsense!” The indifferent smile had vanished from Nadia’s face. Her eyes suddenly sparked with anger. Pia recalled J?rg Richter’s comment that even as a young girl Nadia had been able to terrify other people. He’d called her ruthless.
“You were jealous.” Pia remembered what Amelie’s diary said. “Maybe Tobias told you that Amelie visited him now and then. I think you were afraid that something was brewing between Tobias and Amelie. To be honest, Ms. von Bredow, Amelie looks a lot like Stefanie Schneeberger. And Stefanie was the love of his life.”
Nadia von Bredow leaned forward a little.
“What do you know about true love?” she whispered in a dramatically lowered voice and wide-open eyes, as if she’d received a director’s instructions. “I’ve loved Tobias ever since we were kids. Ten long years I waited for him. He needed my help and my love to get back on his feet after being in prison.”
“Then you’re probably fooling yourself. Your love obviously isn’t reciprocated,” Pia jabbed, and saw with satisfaction that her words had hit home. “Especially if you couldn’t even trust him for twenty-four hours.”
Nadia von Bredow pressed her lips together. Her beautiful face contorted for a fraction of a second.
“The relationship that Tobias and I have is none of your business!” she replied vehemently. “What’s the point of this shitty questioning about Saturday night? I wasn’t there, and I don’t know where the girl is. Period.”
“So where is your great love then?” Pia kept needling her.
“No idea.” Blazing green eyes looked into hers without blinking. “I do love him, but I’m not his nursemaid. So, may I go now?”
Pia was starting to feel disappointed. She couldn’t prove that Nadia von Bredow had anything to do with Amelie’s disappearance.
“You posed as a police officer and went to see Mrs. Fr?hlich,” Bodenstein said from the background. “That’s called unauthorized assumption of authority. You stole the paintings that Thies gave to Amelie. And later you set fire to the orangerie to make sure that there would be no more pictures.”
Nadia von Bredow didn’t look around at Bodenstein.
“I admit that I did use the police badge and a wig from the prop department to find the paintings in Amelie’s room. But I did not set the fire.”
“What did you do with the pictures?”
“I cut them into little pieces and fed them through the shredder.”
“Makes sense. Because the pictures would have exposed you as a murderer.” Pia took the photocopies of the paintings out of the file and placed them on the table.
“Quite the opposite, actually.” Nadia von Bredow leaned back with a cold smile. “The pictures prove my innocence. Thies is really an amazing observer. Unlike you detectives.”
“How so?”
“For you, green equals green. And short-haired means short-haired. Take a closer look at the person who killed Stefanie Schneeberger. Compare her with the person who watched while Laura was raped.” She leaned over, briefly looked at the pictures, and tapped on one of the figures. “Here, look at this. The person next to Stefanie clearly has dark hair, and if you look at this picture with Laura—the hair is much lighter and curly. I can tell you that on that evening in Altenhain almost everybody was wearing a green T-shirt from the Fair Association. There was some sort of text printed on the front, if I remember correctly.”
Bodenstein compared the two pictures.
“You’re right,” he conceded. “So who is the second person?”
“Lauterbach,” said Nadia von Bredow, confirming what Bodenstein already suspected. “I was waiting for Stefanie in the yard behind the barn, because I wanted to talk to her about the Snow White role. She didn’t really care about playing the part, she only took it so she could officially spend more time with Lauterbach.”
“Just a moment,” Bodenstein interrupted. “Mr. Lauterbach told us that he’d only had sex with Stefanie once. On that evening.”
“Then he was lying.” Nadia snorted. “The two of them were having an affair all summer long, even though everybody thought she was with Tobi. Lauterbach was completely crazy about her, and she thought that was cool. So I was standing by the barn when Stefanie came out of Sartorius’s house. Just as I was about to go over and talk to her, Lauterbach showed up. I hid in the barn and couldn’t believe my eyes when they came in and got it on together in the hay, only a yard away from where I was hiding. I had no chance to escape, and had to watch them go at it for half an hour. And listen to them both tearing me down.”
“And then you were so furious that you killed Stefanie,” Bodenstein concluded.
“Oh no. I didn’t say a word. Suddenly Lauterbach realized that he’d lost his key ring while they were screwing. He crawled around on all fours, practically hysterical, almost howling. Stefanie couldn’t stop laughing at him. Then he got mad as hell.” Nadia von Bredow laughed spitefully. “He was in a gigantic panic because of his wife, who was the one with the money; even the house belonged to her. He was nothing but a pathetic little horny teacher who liked to play the big man to his pupils. At home he had nothing to say!”
Bodenstein had to swallow. It sounded all too familiar to him. Cosima had the money and he had nothing to say. And this morning, when she confirmed she was having an affair, he’d felt like killing himself.