Mother Dear

by Nova Lee Maier

  He started the car and drove out of the parking lot. Shivering, he reached for the heat and turned it up. The cold had seeped into his bones.

  17

  “I think it’s been stolen.”

  Werner raised an eyebrow. “How come?”

  “The zipper on my bag was open.”

  “When did you realize?”

  “Just now, right here in the car. Shit, it’s definitely gone.” Helen zipped up her bag and put it on the floor by her feet. Her sunny image of Brighton had just been severely dimmed. “I want the kids to be able to get ahold of me.”

  “They still can.” Werner dug his iPhone out of his pocket and held it in the air. “Just give yourself a quick call, to make sure.”

  Helen selected her own number and listened intently. “Voice mail,” she said. “It isn’t even ringing. That’s weird, isn’t it?”

  “It must be switched off. That means it’s been stolen.” Werner took the phone back from her.

  “Should we report it?”

  He shook his head. “Waste of time. They probably won’t be able to do anything more about it than the police in the Netherlands would.” He glanced at her briefly before looking back at the road. “I’ll tell you what: when we get to the hotel, I’ll ask them to call that café. Maybe your phone fell out of your bag there, or you left it on the table, and a waitress found it. It happens all the time at the Horn of Plenty.”

  She nodded, but she wasn’t optimistic. A waitress wouldn’t turn off a phone she had just found. A thief would.

  He put his hand on her thigh and gave it a friendly squeeze. “It happened, honey. We can’t do anything about it now. But I refuse to let it ruin my vacation, and nor should you.”

  Helen mumbled a reply and looked outside. They were driving past a bright-blue-painted building that was home to a fishing tackle shop. Immediately next to it was a little church with a small cemetery full of lichen-covered headstones. It looked as though the last resident of the village had been buried there at least two centuries ago. Southern England was one big fairy tale, but she couldn’t enjoy it right now.

  Werner rubbed her leg. “Don’t worry. I’m sure I can put a smile on your face this evening.”

  18

  Ralf parked his car directly opposite number 23. Werner’s Mercedes wasn’t there. On the driveway next to Helen’s light-blue hatchback stood a gray BMW 5 Series. He recognized the car: the grandparents were here.

  He crossed the street with the envelope in his hand. Just now, he had been on the verge of shoving it through the mailbox at the police station—but then he had stopped to reflect. What would the police do with these notes? Investigate them, of course. And Helen was still alive, but Brian had disappeared. So, if they managed to figure it out, they would end up back at his door—and he didn’t know if he would be able to keep his cool when they did. Too much had happened for that.

  Ralf rang the bell. Brian, Mikey, the police, Sara—they’d all underestimated him. Mikey had already learned his lesson. And now Sara was about to meet a whole other Ralf.

  She opened the door herself. Behind her in the hallway stood a dignified, gray-haired man who looked him up and down.

  “Hey, Ralf.” Sara smiled, then peered ostentatiously over his shoulder. “Where’s Naomi?”

  “I’m on my own.”

  “Oh?”

  “I need to talk to you.”

  She gave him a questioning look, but said nothing and opened the door wider.

  The gray-haired man hadn’t moved from his spot. Ralf greeted him with a forced smile. The man gave a brief nod.

  “This is a friend of mine,” said Sara to her grandpa, before turning back to Ralf. “Come on upstairs.”

  19

  “I’m sorry.” The receptionist put down the phone and looked at Helen apologetically. “I wish I had better news for you. But they said they’d keep an eye out for your phone.”

  “Thank you.” Helen wasn’t particularly disappointed; she hadn’t expected any other outcome.

  Werner walked up to her. “Nothing?” He had been standing at the other end of the lobby, calling her provider to have her number blocked.

  “No. I’m so upset about this.”

  “Me too.” He gave her a kiss on the forehead. “But we can always replace it.”

  “There were photos and videos of the kids on it too.” More than a thousand, she thought. Unique moments she would never get back. For a long time, she had been meaning to transfer them to her computer—it’d only take a moment—but she had never gotten around to it. And now everything was gone.

  “We’ll buy a new one when we get back.”

  She just nodded. Werner was still focused on the device, not the sentimental value. It was irrelevant to him; he never looked at photos of himself or the children.

  “Now it’s time for a good old English tradition,” he said.

  “What’s that?”

  He put his arm around her and led her away from the lobby. “We’re going to stuff ourselves with tea and super-sugary cakes.”

  20

  “Why did you want your mother dead?”

  Ralf almost vomited the words out. He had spent the entire journey here thinking about it—his opening question. That was the most important one. It was the sole way of taking Sara by surprise. She would give him an honest answer only if he could shock her into it.

  Her reaction was disappointing. She looked at him uncomprehendingly. “I’m sorry?”

  “I was here on that Friday,” he said. “I was standing right there, watching.” His voice shook as he pointed toward the embankment through the wall of Sara’s bedroom.

  “What do you mean, Friday? What are you talking about?”

  Ralf launched forward and grabbed her by the arm. Pushed the envelope into her face. “I’m talking about this, bitch. The sick plan you and Brian came up with to kill your mother. What the fuck made you do it? And where’s Brian?”

  She shoved him back. “Get a grip, man. Are you crazy? Killing my mother—that’s insane.”

  “Brian came in here; I watched him. Your father was in the kitchen, and your mother—” He stumbled over his words. “I saw her come home. Three shots, Sara. Then nothing. Brian didn’t come back out.” He was panting, his mouth half-open. “It was supposed to be your mother, but it was Brian.”

  Sara stared at him as if he had suddenly sprouted tentacles out of his ears. Then her face hardened. “When?”

  “As if you don’t know. The Friday before last, in the evening.”

  “That’s when I play tennis.”

  Ralf had to restrain himself from wrapping his hands around her throat. “Stop it, Sara. You make me want to puke.” He waved the envelope. “Of course you were at tennis. It says so here. Along with who goes where and when, what time everyone gets home. And where you put the gun.” He narrowed his eyes, then added in a quieter but more menacing tone, “You came up with it all, and you wrote it all down, together with your sick boyfriend, Brian.”

  “Brian isn’t my boyfriend. He never has been, and he never will be. And I never wrote anything down with him. This conversation is over.” She pushed him on the chest. “Now, get the hell out of here, idiot.”

  He leaned forward and whispered, “Do you know what I’ve been wondering all this time? Did you choose Brian especially for this? Did you think, Hey, look, a bad boy, exactly what I need? Had you already made up your mind to use him when you let him bang you at the Horn of Plenty?”

  She lifted her hands to her mouth. Froze.

  “I’ll take that as a yes,” crowed Ralf. He took a step back and folded his arms.

  “That piece of shit.”

  Until now, Ralf had been wondering if she had taken acting lessons or if she was just a natural liar, but from the way she was looking at him now, he could detect nothing but shame. It confused him.

  “He promised he wouldn’t tell anybody,” she said quietly.

  “Well,” he sneered, “you p
robably could have guessed in advance that he wasn’t very trustworthy, couldn’t you?” He was fed up with this whole charade, so he pulled the notes out of the envelope. Held them in front of her nose. “Recognize these?”

  She ducked backward and started to read them. Her eyes flitted from left to right. Ralf watched her expression change—her eyes growing wider and wider. “Oh my God. Do you know whose handwriting that is?” She tried to snatch the paper from his hand, but he pulled it back and held it out of her reach.

  “Whose?”

  Her shocked expression had given way to complete bewilderment. “But that can’t be right,” she whispered. “It can’t be.”

  “Whose?” he repeated.

  “Let me see the rest.” She grabbed the envelope from his other hand and pulled out the rest of the notes. Fell back onto the bed and examined the photos. “Am I going crazy?” she whispered.

  21

  “This will be the death of me,” laughed Helen.

  The waiter had already brought them some tea, and he now returned with a stand laden with sweet treats. He cleared a space for it on the round table between Werner and Helen, put it down, and disappeared with a bow.

  Helen could smell how sweet they were. “These cakes must be six hundred calories each.”

  “No way,” replied Werner.

  “How much, then? Seven hundred?”

  “Wait; let me check.” Werner picked up a cake from the bottom of the stand and took a bite. “At least a thousand,” he said with his mouth full.

  “Jeez. And we’re going to dinner after this.”

  “Don’t think about it.” He passed Helen a petit four.

  It tasted divine. Cream, caramel. A little salt too. Sweet, rich, and gooey. “Goodness,” she said once she’d finished. She had an immediate hankering for a second.

  Werner also took another. There was a dab of cream on it, and gold-colored pearls. Miniature masterpieces, made with great care.

  A British couple sitting opposite Helen had already polished off at least six. The woman was slim and chic. Her husband had a slight paunch, but none of the guests in the lounge had the sort of figure you would expect to see on somebody who regularly overindulged in these calorie bombs.

  Werner followed her gaze. “Once they’ve finished their afternoon tea, I’m sure they’ll both spend hours running around the ninety-three acres of garden and parkland, looking for flowers for their room.”

  The woman heard Werner’s overly affected English pronunciation and shot him an irritated look.

  “You’re being told off.” Helen kept her head still, but pointed the woman out with her eyes.

  Werner raised his hand and winked at the guest, who turned away. “That must be because I don’t know what ‘the done thing’ is. Nouveaux riches, madame—my apologies.”

  Helen almost choked on a mouthful of cake and held her hand over her nose and mouth, coughing.

  Werner grinned at her over the rim of his china cup. There he was again, thought Helen: Werner as she used to know him, the boy she had fallen in love with. He was still there, then, hidden under his pragmatic and irritable exterior. She leaned forward to take his hand, but he pulled his phone out of his pocket.

  “The light in here is really nice.” Werner stood up. “Come on. Let’s take a photo for the folks at home.”

  22

  “Why would your father want to murder your mother?” asked Ralf. “Because of the alimony?”

  Sara had leapt up from her bed and was standing in the middle of her lavishly furnished room, staring at the wall. “Alimony?”

  Ralf tried to imagine how he would feel if somebody told him that one of his ex-girlfriends had conspired with his father to murder his mother. He couldn’t—he didn’t know where to start. It was totally insane.

  Sara’s phone buzzed. Just once, discreetly. She paid it no attention. “Alimony?” she repeated. Her eyes were moist.

  Ralf wanted to tell her what he had seen. Compared to what Sara had just learned about her father, the news that he also had a girlfriend on the side didn’t seem particularly shocking. It was like telling someone who’d severed an artery that they’d also grazed their knee. But when he saw how hurt Sara already was—how disillusioned and deeply betrayed—he decided to keep it to himself for the time being. “Yeah, I don’t know. Obviously he wants to get rid of her. He must be afraid that he’d have to pay her too much money if they got a divorce.”

  “The business doesn’t belong to my father.”

  He hadn’t seen that one coming. “What do you mean?”

  “When Grandmother died, she left her money to Mom. She used it to buy our house. At the time, my father was still working as a manager at the Horn of Plenty, and the inheritance meant he could take over the company. Or rather, my mom could. Everything is in her name.”

  “When was that?”

  “Seven years ago. I was ten.”

  “So your mother is rich?”

  She nodded.

  “Why does she still work, then?”

  “Because she likes her job.”

  Ralf scratched his neck. Thought carefully. “So, if your father wanted to get a divorce—”

  “Then he’d lose his restaurants,” Sara said, finishing his thought.

  Ralf recalled hearing about rich celebrities who’d had to pay out millions to their exes. “Wouldn’t he be entitled to half of everything?”

  Sara shook her head decisively. She seemed to be growing calmer. “I don’t think Grandmother liked my father very much. At any rate, she arranged things so he wouldn’t get any of the money if they ever divorced. My parents had a few fights about that at first.” She frowned. “They thought I couldn’t hear them. Dad was really angry about it.”

  Ralf tried again. “But would he be able to get his hands on the money if your mother died?”

  “Yeah—in that case, he would. Because then he’d have to look after us, I guess.”

  “How do you know all this?”

  “Dad told me. We often talk about finances.” She said it casually, as if it were the most normal thing in the world.

  Nobody ever talked about money at Ralf’s house. He had no idea what his parents earned, except that it couldn’t be much. And he knew nothing at all about their financial arrangements.

  “There’s still one thing I don’t understand,” he said.

  “What?”

  “If your father wanted to murder your mother, and he asked Brian to do it for him, then why did he kill Brian?”

  “Did he do that?”

  “Yeah,” Ralf said softly.

  “Did you see him do it?”

  He shook his head. “I heard the shots. Three. I mean—”

  “Heard.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Not saw.”

  He stared at her in silence.

  “So how do you know it was my father?”

  I don’t, he thought.

  He had simply assumed.

  It hadn’t occurred to him for a second that a mother would be capable of something like that.

  He let it sink in for a moment, then asked, “Your parents are on vacation?”

  She nodded. “In England. They left early this morning.”

  “London?”

  “No, southern England. Sussex, I think it’s called. On the coast. My parents went there on their first vacation, back when they met.” Her eyes glazed over, and her voice sounded dull. “It was Dad’s idea. A present. Mom sent us photos of the hotel this morning. Super fancy. Wait . . .” She pushed a strand of hair from her face and took out her phone. “He just sent me a message.” She read it out loud. “‘Your mother has lost her phone. If you need us, use this number.’”

  “Lost her phone,” repeated Ralf.

  Sara leapt up from the bed. “We need to go to the police.”

  “And then what?”

  “I don’t know. If all this is true, they need to stop my father.”

  “What will you tell th
em? That your mother shot somebody? That I helped Brian with a robbery that turned out to be a contract killing?” He had raised his voice. “And anyway, do you really think they’ll jump into a helicopter and fly over to England? No way. First they’ll do some paperwork, open an investigation, in their own good time. Get in touch with their colleagues—”

  “That would lose us a few days.”

  “Everything OK up there?” The male voice calling from downstairs had an unmistakable German accent.

  Sara put her finger to her lips and walked over to the door. Opened it a crack. “Yes, Grandpa,” she called. She sounded like butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth. “Ralf is just about to head home.”

  She closed the door and turned to face him. “We have to do something, don’t we?” she whispered. “If this is true—” She shook her head in disbelief. “Please tell me I’m dreaming this, Ralf.”

  He looked at her with a strained expression. “I’m afraid—”

  Sara’s phone started to buzz. She started so violently that she almost dropped it. Looked at the screen. “My parents.”

  Ralf looked over her shoulder at the photo that Werner had sent. Helen Möhring was sitting in a dark-red leather armchair and smiling as she lifted up a cup of tea. Next to her stood a stand laden with tiny cakes.

  This is your mother. Dad and I are putting on weight! Tonight we’re eating at a fancy restaurant that belongs to the hotel Everything OK at home? Love, Mom

  “I want to warn her,” she said.

  “You can’t. This is from your father’s phone. He’ll see it.”

  “Yeah, but—”

  “Send something like ‘Sounds great, have fun.’ Something normal.”

  She shook her head. “I could just call?”

  “But then—”

  “I’ll tell my dad it’s about women’s problems or something, and that I want to speak to my mom in private.”

  “Sara, I don’t think that’s a good idea. Maybe—” He swallowed. “Maybe it would be better to call the police after all?”