Private Berlin (Private 5)

“My son fancies himself an anarchist and an artist,” she said. “He despises my husband for his money.” She smiled sourly. “But he doesn’t refuse the ten thousand euros Hermann deposits in his account every month.”

She laughed caustically and then looked at Mattie. “You have children?”

“One,” Mattie said. “A son.”

“Rudy is an only child as well,” she began. She hesitated and then said, “But he’s not why you are here.”

“No,” Katharina said. “We’re here because Chris Schneider is dead.”

That shocked the billionaire’s wife. “Dead? How? He was such a young man!”

Katharina gave her the bare bones of the circumstances. Mattie listened to her report as if it were arriving from outer space, incomprehensible even to her.

“In a slaughterhouse?” the billionaire’s wife said. “Why?”

“We don’t know,” Mattie replied. “We’re hoping you might help.”

“Where has Hermann been the last few weeks?” Katharina asked.

Agnes Krüger fidgeted in her chair. “He was here in Berlin for the most part, I believe. Ask his secretary.”

“I did,” Katharina said. “She said he’s off on business.”

“Or tending to his mistresses.”

“Doesn’t he live here with you?” Mattie asked.

Her face flickered painfully. “Hermann has a bed here. He uses it from time to time. Comes and goes as he pleases. Doesn’t give a damn if I’m in it or not.” Agnes Krüger looked closely at Mattie, who’d somehow won her trust. “You know, he wasn’t always like this. At least I don’t think so. This belief that anything goes came with the money.”

“Where did you meet?” Mattie asked.

“Here in Berlin shortly after the wall fell. He was making his first fortune bringing textiles into the newly liberated east as fast as he could. I worked for him as his secretary. Rudy was just a baby. My first husband had deserted me, and, well, Hermann is a good talker.”

“Who knows how to make money,” Katharina said.

“He came to capitalism naturally. It suited him.”

“I don’t understand,” Mattie said.

“He grew up in East Berlin, but as soon as the wall fell he was in motion.”

“Same thing with Chris.”

She studied Mattie again. “He was more than a colleague to you.”

For the second time in twenty-four hours, Mattie wondered if she was that transparent, but she said, “My ex-fiancé.”

“Oh, dear,” the billionaire’s wife said, her hand traveling to her lips. “I’m so sorry for you, Frau Engel.”

Mattie nodded, swallowing hard at the loss pulsing in her.

There was a pause and another painful flicker in her skin before Agnes Krüger said, “And you think my husband might have been involved in his death?”

“What do you think?” Katharina asked. “Is he capable of it? Would he have reason? Would Chris’s knowing about all the women, and being ready to reveal them to you, drive him to murder?”

The billionaire’s wife was still for several moments, and then she turned, disgusted. “On this my son is correct: Hermann’s soul is black.” She hardened. “You should know that there have been rumors about Hermann.”

“What kind of rumors?” Mattie asked.