Secret Honor (Honor Bound 3)

“Nunzio. Alfredo Nunzio.”

“And would you say, Inge, that Señor Alfredo Nunzio and your husband are lovers?”

“I think so,” she said.

“Do you think that, as lovers are wont to do, Werner may have shared secrets with his beloved Alfredo?”

“I don’t think so,” Inge said.

“Why not?”

“Werner is too smart for that,” Inge said.

“Because he is aware of the consequences?”

“Yes.”

“Inge, what I’m wondering now is what you thought when Werner was ordered to Berlin.”

“I was frightened,” she said.

“For yourself? For your husband?”

“For myself,” Inge said.

“Good girl, Inge! I’m actually starting to think that you understand the importance of telling me the truth, not what you think I want to hear.”

“I am.”

“Now tell me about your friends,” von Deitzberg said. “Anyone special?”

“No.”

“You said that so quickly, I’m tempted not to believe you.”

“There is no one special,” she said. “I understand the necessity for discretion.”

“This is not Berlin, Inge. There is no Hotel Adlon, no Hotel am Zoo. So where do you find your lovers?”

“I…sometimes meet people at social events, diplomatic receptions, that sort of thing.”

“And where do you go with these people you meet?”

“Usually here,” she said. “They take a room here in the Casino.”

“These people include diplomats?”

“Two or three times.”

“Is that discreet? For the wife of a senior German official?”

“I’m very careful.”

“Have you become friendly with any German officer?”

There was a just-perceptible hesitation. “Just once.”

“And who was he?”