Midnight Hunter

I launch myself at him, my scream shattering the peace of the evening. “They were all I had left of my life! That coat was all I had left of him. It was my father’s coat. They were my clothes. You had no right.” I batter his chest and shoulders but his body easily absorbs the blows. He holds onto my elbows but doesn’t move—he doesn’t even seem surprised. When I reach up to claw at his face with my newly manicured nails he grabs my wrists, turns me around and crushes me against his chest. My arms are trapped beneath his and I shriek, thrashing about, trying to twist free, trying to bite, but I’m held as if in a vice.

“Let me go.” The memory of his hard, hungry eyes fills my vision. Are his hands going to move down over my body now, taking what I won’t give? I’ll scream so loudly the neighbors will think someone’s being murdered. I’ll bite him until he bleeds and scratch his eyes out.

“No. I will not let you go.” His mouth is close to my ear and he doesn’t need to speak above a harsh, sinister whisper. “You don’t need reminders of your old life as you are never going back. Do you understand? This is your life now. You’re mine.”

Hearing him lay it out so coldly and brutally takes my breath away. I wish his housekeeper and secretary could see him now. They haven’t felt him ruthlessly hunt them down, catch them, possess them. Take sadistic pleasure in trapping them, body and soul. “You can’t make me forget who I am. I’ll always remember, and I’ll always hate you for what you’ve done.”

“Oh?” There’s so much scorn and amusement in that one brief question. His breath is warm against my ear and I feel him looking down at me, enjoying that he has me his mercy. He plants a slow, tender kiss on the side of my neck and I feel my pulse thundering beneath his lips. It’s a kiss that belies the cold cruelty of his words and the steel of his embrace. It’s the kiss of a lover, soft and sensuous, and something clenches low in my belly in response.

I expected cruelty, and armed myself against brutality, but I wasn’t prepared for this. I wasn’t prepared for him to be gentle and I don’t know how to fight it. He shifts his arms, one hand moving to caress my throat and I draw in a soft breath of surprise and need. He feels it, and his lips move up to my jaw, trailing burning kisses.

No, please, I don’t want this. He can’t strip me of my will to resist him along with everything else. I will garb myself in hatred for him. I will steep my body in antipathy and rage. Even so, it takes every ounce of strength I have to speak. “I’ll never be yours.”

But it comes out as a breathy whisper, not the defiant shout I wanted it to be.

His lips curve into a smile against my throat. “Oh, Liebling. Yes, you will. I have not even begun to try and you are already giving in.”

My eyes fill with tears. He’s wrong. He’s wrong. But my body has betrayed me because I’m not even fighting anymore. How can this be happening, after all he’s done? I remember my father and Ana and I feel so ashamed. “I hate you.” But my voice is filled with anguish, not defiance.

Volker releases me so suddenly that I stagger, and drag breath into my lungs as if I’ve been drowning. When I turn to face him that hard, emotionless look is back in his eyes. He straightens his uniform jacket and cuffs as if he can’t bear to be in even the slightest disarray. “Go to bed. You’re overwrought.” And without another word he turns and walks into the dining room.

I stand shaking where I am. What gives him the right to do the things that he does? Is it this system which grants him so much power without restraint? Yesterday I would have said that I distrust how East Germany is organized, with its spies and secret police, but now I detest it. On unsteady feet I make my way to my bedroom, tears brimming on my lashes. I feel sick of crying before I remember that I haven’t actually cried, not properly. No longer able to swallow down my tears they break like a storm, and I throw myself down on my

bed and muffle my sobs in a pillow.

My mind keeps circling back to one thing, and it’s the most ridiculous, insignificant part of this whole mess: that was the first time a man’s ever kissed me. It was my neck he kissed, but it doesn’t matter. That was being kissed. There was passion in it, and desire. Possession. I felt it, responded to it, and for that I’m so ashamed. I’m a traitor of a different sort now—to Ana and my father.

There’s a knock on my door and my whole body clenches in fear. But a moment later I hear Frau Fischer’s voice, not Volker’s. “Evony, can I come in?”

I sit up wiping my face, and my fingers come away black: the mascara. It’s everywhere, and gumming my eyelashes together. Frau Fischer opens the door, bearing a tray of something steaming and sets it down on the bedside table. “Herr Oberstleutnant called to say you are unwell. But what’s the matter? Have you been crying?”

There are black smudge marks on the white pillowcase as well. “Called?” I ask thickly.

“Ja, I live just down the street, the top apartment in the blue and white building.”

“Oh.” I know the one she means. It’s just a few doors down, and even though she’s loyal to Volker it’s comforting to know that she’s nearby.

“Have you got a stomach ache or are you homesick? I’ve brought some soup for you. Herr Oberstleutnant said you haven’t eaten yet.” She makes me get into bed and puts the tray over my lap, and I let her because it’s nice to have someone fussing over me in this motherly fashion. All my life it was just me and Dad and I looked after him for as long as I can remember.

Frau Fischer sits on the bed and tells me about herself while I eat a little of the soup. It’s very good, a clear broth with sliced sausage and mushroom. I think I taste lemon and thyme, too. It’s miles better than the food I make though I’m sure I could have bought the same ingredients. There’s a piece of rye bread, very dark and cut thickly.

She has three grown daughters and the eldest lives with her along with a baby grandson, whose name is Thom, and her granddaughter called Lea. “Their mother is working at the television station right now.”

I look up in surprise. “But who is watching the baby?”

“Lea is watching Thom. She’s eleven, and a very good girl, though how she does complain when she has to babysit.”

“You should go back to them. I’m sorry you were called away.”

She shakes her head. “In a minute, when you’re finished your supper.”

I’m grateful for her kindness, but I’m also curious. She’s more familiar with Volker than anyone else is as she knows his private habits. Hoping that I won’t somehow get her into trouble, I ask, “What do you think about Oberstleutnant Volker? As a man, I mean?”

She looks baffled by my question, as though it’s never occurred to her to have an opinion about her employer. “He’s a very good man. A fair man.”

Oh, what rot. She can’t really believe that, can she? I wonder if she’ll think I’m spying on her if I ask too many questions, but I can’t help myself. “I won’t tell him what you tell me, I promise. I’m just trying to understand him better.” I want to be able to predict his behavior. If I can predict him, I can outwit him.

She gives me a curious look. “But you must know him quite well yourself? Though I don’t hold with people knowing everything about each other before they are married. Some things should come later. Like living together.” She looks around the room. “But you’re in here, so that’s something in this day and age. Young women have so much more freedom since the war and I can’t think that it’s good for them.”