Snow White Must Die (Bodenstein & Kirchhoff, #4)(66)

“Tobi!” Nadia put away her phone and hurried to him with a horrified expression. “What are you doing out here in the cold?”

“Amelie is missing,” he said. “The police have already been to my house.”

With effort he stood up. His legs felt like ice and his back hurt.

“Why?”

He rubbed his hands and blew on them.

“Once a killer of girls, always a killer of girls, you know. Besides, I have no alibi for the time when Amelie disappeared.”

Nadia stared at him. “Let’s go inside.” She pulled out her key and opened the street door. He followed her, walking stiffly.

“Where were you?” he asked as they rode up to the penthouse in the glass elevator. “I’ve been waiting a couple of hours outside.”

“I was in Hamburg. You know that.” She shook her head and laid her hand on his, concerned. “You really ought to get yourself a cell phone.”

He finally remembered that Nadia had flown to Hamburg on Saturday for a film shoot. She helped him out of his jacket and shoved him toward the kitchen.

“Sit down,” she said. “First I’ll make you some coffee to warm up with. My goodness!”

She tossed her coat over the back of a chair. Her cell rang with a polyphonic ringtone, but she ignored it and kept on fiddling with the espresso machine.

“I’m really worried about Amelie,” Tobias said. “I have no idea what she really found out about the old case or who she may have talked to about it. If anything has happened to her, it will be all my fault.”

“You didn’t force her to sniff around in the past,” Nadia replied. She set two cups of coffee on the table, got some milk from the fridge, and sat down facing him. Without makeup, the violet shadows under her eyes made her look exhausted.

“Come on now.” She put her hand on his. “Drink your coffee. And then you’re getting in the bath to thaw out.”

Why didn’t she understand what was going on inside him? He didn’t want to drink any shitty coffee or take a shitty bath! He wanted to hear from her lips that she believed he was innocent, and then get her help to figure out what could have happened to Amelie. Instead she was talking about coffee and warming him up, as if it made any difference.

Nadia’s cell rang again, then a little later, the landline. With a sigh she got up and took the call. Tobias stared into space. Although the detective had obviously not believed him, he was more worried about Amelie than about himself. Nadia came back, stepped behind him, and flung her arms around his neck. She kissed his ear and his unshaven cheek. Tobias had to stop himself from trying to pull free. He was in no mood for affection. Couldn’t she tell? He got goose bumps when she ran her finger along the mark on his throat that the clothesline had left. To make her stop, he grabbed her wrist, shoved his chair back, and pulled her onto his lap.

“On Saturday night I was with J?rg and Felix and a couple of other guys at J?rg’s uncle’s garage,” he whispered urgently. “First we drank some beer, then this Red Bull stuff with vodka in it. That really knocked me for a loop. When I woke up Sunday morning, I had a gigantic hangover and couldn’t remember a thing.”

Her eyes were very close to his, and she gazed at him intently.

“Hmm,” was all she said. He thought he knew what she was thinking.

“You don’t believe me,” he reproached her and shoved her off his lap. “You think that I … killed Amelie, like I did Laura and Stefanie back then! Am I right?”

“No! No, I don’t!” Nadia protested. “Why would you want to hurt Amelie? She wanted to help you.”

“That’s right. She did. I don’t understand it either.” He got up, leaned against the fridge, and ran his hand through his hair. “The fact is, I don’t remember anything between nine thirty in the evening and four o’clock Sunday afternoon. In theory I could have done it, and that’s what the cops think too. Plus, Amelie tried to call me umpteen times. And my father says I was brought home at one thirty in the morning by Dr. Lauterbach. She found me drunk at the bus stop in front of the church.”

“Shit,” said Nadia and sat down.

“You said it.” Tobias relaxed a little, reached for the cigarettes on the table, and lit one for himself. “The cops told me to stay available.”

“But why?”

“Because I’m a suspect, pure and simple.”

“But … but they can’t do that,” Nadia began.

“They can,” Tobias interrupted her. “They’ve done it before. And it cost me ten years of my life.”

He inhaled the smoke of the cigarette, staring past Nadia into the dim gray fog outside. The brief period of good weather was over, and November was showing its most unpleasant side. Heavy rain was pouring down the windowpanes from low-hanging black clouds. The Friedensbrücke spanning the Main river could only be seen as a silhouette.

“There must be somebody who knows the truth,” Tobias ruminated, reaching for his coffee cup.

“What are you talking about?” Nadia asked.

Tobias looked up. It irritated him that she seemed so calm and collected. “About Amelie,” he repeated, noticing that she briefly raised her eyebrows. “I’m sure that she found out something dangerous. Thies must have given her some pictures, but she didn’t tell me what they showed. I think somebody felt threatened by her.”