Snow White Must Die (Bodenstein & Kirchhoff, #4)(72)

“Well, Thies is very sensitive. Even small changes in his surroundings can sometimes throw him into a tailspin.”

It sounded like a response she had committed to memory. The lack of any empathy in her words was remarkable. Obviously Mrs. Terlinden had little interest in what had happened to the neighbor girl. She hadn’t even asked about her out of politeness. That was odd. Pia remembered the conjectures of the women in the grocery store who considered it entirely possible that Thies might have done something to the girl when he was prowling through the streets at night.

“What does your son do all day?” Pia asked. “Does he have a job?”

“No. Strangers expect too much of him,” said Christine Terlinden. “He takes care of our garden and those of a few neighbors. He’s a very good gardener.”

Involuntarily Pia thought of an old mystery novel cliché: The murderer is always the gardener. Was it that simple? Did the Terlindens know more? Were they hiding their handicapped son in order to protect him?

* * *



The rain had finally turned to snow. A fine white layer had formed on the asphalt of the street, and Pia took great pains to bring the heavy BMW with its summer-tread tires to a gentle stop at the main entrance to the grounds of the Terlinden company.

“You should have your tires changed,” she told her boss. “Winter tires from O to E.”

“What?” Oliver frowned in annoyance. He was lost in thought, but clearly it had nothing to do with their work. His cell buzzed.

“Hello, Dr. Engel,” he answered after glancing at the display.

“October to Easter,” Pia murmured. She rolled down the window and showed the gate guard her ID. “Mr. Terlinden is expecting us.”

That wasn’t exactly true, but the man merely nodded, hurried back into his warm hut, and raised the barrier. Pia accelerated slowly so as not to skid and steered the car across empty parking spaces near the glass fa?ade of the main building. Right in front stood a black Mercedes S-Class. Pia stopped behind it and climbed out. Why couldn’t Oliver cut short his conversation with Engel? Her feet were blocks of ice because the short drive through Altenhain was barely enough to get the car heater going. The snow was coming down faster. How was she going to drive the BMW all the way back to Hofheim in the snow later on without ending up in a ditch? Her gaze fell on an ugly dent on the left rear fender of the black Mercedes, and she took a closer look. The damage couldn’t be very old or rust would have formed.

She heard a car door slam behind her and turned around. Bodenstein held the front door open for her, and they entered the lobby. Behind a counter of polished walnut sat a young man; on the white wall behind him was only the name TERLINDEN in gold letters. Simple yet imposing. Pia told him their business, and after a brief phone call he accompanied them to an elevator in the rear of the lobby. They rode in silence to the fifth floor, where a stylish middle-aged woman awaited them. She was apparently on her way out the door since she was wearing a coat and scarf, with her bag over her shoulder, but she dutifully escorted them to her boss’s office.

After everything Pia had heard about Claudius Terlinden, she’d expected a jovial patriarch and was at first a bit disappointed when she saw the rather average-looking man in suit and tie sitting behind a completely overloaded desk. He got up when they entered, buttoned his jacket, and came forward to greet them.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Terlinden.” Bodenstein had woken up from his daze. “Please excuse us for bothering you so late in the day, but we’ve been trying to reach you for hours.”

“Good afternoon,” said Claudius Terlinden with a smile. “My secretary gave me your message. I was planning to call you early tomorrow morning.”

He was somewhere in his mid- to late fifties, and his thick dark hair was graying at the temples. Seen close up he looked anything but average, Pia ascertained. Claudius Terlinden was not a handsome man: his nose was too big, his chin too angular, his lips a bit too full for a man, and yet he radiated a presence that fascinated her.

“Good Lord, your hands are freezing!” he said with concern when he offered his warm dry hand, and put his other hand on hers briefly. Pia gave a start; it felt like he’d given her an electric shock. A fleeting expression of astonishment flitted across Terlinden’s face.

“Shall I get you some coffee or hot chocolate so you can thaw out a bit?”

“No, no, we’re fine,” said Pia, disconcerted by the intensity of his gaze, which had made her blush. They looked at each other a bit longer than necessary. What had just happened here? Was it a simple case of static electricity explainable by physics or something altogether different?

Before she or Bodenstein could ask their first question, Terlinden asked about Amelie.

“I’m extremely worried,” he said gravely. “Amelie is the daughter of my legal advisor. I know her well.”

Pia dimly recalled that her plan had been to go after him hard and insinuate that he was hot for the girl. But this plan had suddenly been quashed.

“Unfortunately we have no new information,” said Bodenstein. Then he got straight to the point. “We’ve been told that you visited Tobias Sartorius several times in prison. What was your reason for doing so? And why did you pay off his parents’ debts?”

Pia shoved her hands in her vest pockets and tried to remember what she’d been intending to ask Terlinden so urgently. But her mind was suddenly as blank as a freshly formatted computer hard drive.