Deep Pain

by Marcus Hünnebeck

  The main attraction was about to begin.

  He looked at his cell phone. No missed calls. No new messages. He was on his own. Till entered the hall and sat down in the back row. A movie trailer was playing on screen. From his seat Till watched the audience. He counted a total of six people in his row. Two fathers, one mother, three children. He kept looking around. In order to see the visitors in front of him better, he rose silently and advanced two rows of seats.

  His heart stopped when he checked the middle rows. In one of them he discovered an older woman sitting next to a boy. Directly behind them, a single person.

  Spannberg?

  Till sank deep into a nearby seat and pulled the cell phone out of his pocket.

  I’m afraid Spannberg is sitting here at the movies, he texted. Where are you?

  He sent the message. What now? If that was truly Spannberg sitting behind the boy, she could easily kill him with a long knife or pistol. Taylor’s life hung by a thread.

  The movie trailer ended. Shortly afterward the main movie started. Till had to decide. He stood up and walked forward, bent over.

  No one else sat in the row behind Taylor. Just the one woman, who still wore her thick jacket. Both details seemed unusual. At the moment she was looking at the screen. But when Till approached her, she looked up and they instantly recognized each other. It was her. He could see that now.

  Spannberg thrust her hand into her jacket pocket.

  “Police!” Till shouted.

  A few moviegoers laughed. Till threw himself on the seat next to Spannberg, and another woman cried out. Now people around them started to react. Till grabbed Spannberg’s arm and held it tightly.

  “Taylor! Mrs. Dickrich! Run!”

  The older woman turned around while Till wrestled with Spannberg.

  “It’s Spannberg—Franka Spannberg!” he said. “She’s after Taylor because of his father.”

  Spannberg roared and grabbed Till’s face with her free hand. Panic broke out in the theater. Visitors rose from their seats, but no one fled yet, still confused.

  Till clenched his fist and struck uncontrollably. He hit Spannberg in the neck. She flinched back and her claw tore away from his face.

  “Everyone out!” yelled Till.

  The grandmother took her grandson by the hand and pulled him down the aisle. Spannberg screamed in frustration. She pulled a pistol out of her jacket. Till slapped her wrist with full force, and the pistol fell to the ground.

  “Gun!” he yelled.

  Now finally all the moviegoers rose and poured out of the theater. Till jumped up and kicked the gun, which slid across the carpet out of reach. He grabbed the killer’s right arm and twisted it behind her back, then ripped her out of her seat.

  “You’re coming with me!” he said. “That’s it.”

  “Help!” Spannberg yelled. “It’s my ex! He’s stalking me.”

  Was she hoping for some naive do-gooder to save her?

  “This is Franka Spannberg, the wanted murderer,” cried Till. “Everyone leave! The police will be here soon.”

  He pushed her to the exit. Spannberg defended herself, but Till was stronger.

  “I could have killed you on the trip to Berlin,” she said.

  “I’m glad you didn’t.”

  She turned her head and spat, but the saliva landed on her own jacket.

  Till reached the double doors. In the hallway in front of the movie theater, parents seemed to hold out with their children. Some of the children cried and clung to their parents. Why weren’t they running away? Had no one informed the staff?

  With Spannberg in a police grip, Till pushed his way into the crowd. He stopped when someone blocked his path.

  Although she had cut her blond hair short and had dyed it black, Till recognized the woman immediately. Those blue eyes. Not that long ago, she had used his services to go into hiding from her ex, the late Chief Inspector Ludger Krumm.

  “Hello, Mr. Buchinger,” said Sandra Borke. She wore a thick jacket and, beneath it, an explosive vest. “Or may I call you Till?”

  Spannberg stumbled forward, but Till pulled her back.

  “Sandra? What are you doing here?”

  “Giving you a choice.”

  “What choice?”

  “You have the lives of all these people in your hands. If you make the wrong decision, I’ll set off the bomb. Look how many innocent children would die.”

  Now, finally, the closest moviegoers tried to move backwards, away from the bomb.

  “Stop, everybody!” Borke yelled. “Stop, or you’ll die!”

  “What do you want?” Till said.

  “We’re going to get into Franka’s car and we’re going to leave together. If anyone tries to stop us, I will detonate the bomb. I’m finished with my life. What about you?”

  Once again Spannberg tried to break free. This time Till allowed it, and the murderer went to stand by Krumm’s ex.

  “Why?” Till asked.

  Spannberg laughed. “Can’t you guess?” She turned to Borke. “I have to kill Taylor. Did you bring a gun? I lost mine.”

  “No.”

  “Shit!”

  Out of the corner of her eye Till saw the grandmother standing protectively in front of her boy.

  “That can’t be changed,” said Borke. “Come on! The cops will be here any minute. From now on everything will be different anyway.”

  Spannberg grabbed Till by the wrist.

  “Shitty feeling, right?” Now she was the one who twisted his arm behind his back. She reached into his pocket. Seconds later, his cell phone flew away in a high arc.

  But despite the danger they were all in, Till was not disheartened. At least he had saved Taylor’s life. The hateful look Spannberg shot the boy gave Till all the satisfaction he needed.

  The three of them went to the exit.

  “What’s going on here?” asked a brawny-looking employee, who held a radio in his hand.

  “Get out of here,” Borke said. “Or I’ll blow us all up.”

  She lifted her jacket, and the man stalled in his tracks.

  “Chief Inspector Dorfer!” cried Till. “Get a hold of—”

  Spannberg buried a fist in Till’s side.

  “Shut up,” she said.

  Till stumbled forward. Since Spannberg was not armed, he could overpower them in a duel. But he was powerless against the explosive vest. He gave in to fate. At least for the moment.

  On the way out, employees repeatedly approached the theater with worried looks. When they noticed the explosive vest, they ran. Undisturbed, Spannberg and Borke escorted Till from the building.

  “You know where I’m parked?” Spannberg asked.

  “Of course,” Borke said.

  They approached the parking lot at a run. Spannberg’s vice grip loosened several times for a fraction of a second, but Till did nothing. He hoped for a better chance. Finally she gave up whatever she was doing and resumed her tight grip.

  “Will you get my keys?” she asked. “They’re in my right pocket.”

  She stopped, clasped her free hand in Till’s hair, and pushed his head down. Borke approached them. Before Till could react, she had slapped a handcuff around his wrist. Seconds later, both hands were clasped behind his back. Spannberg pushed him forward. Till cursed himself. In his hope for a chance to escape, he had fallen for their diversion. Cuffed, he was at their mercy.

  They approached a mid-size car. Borke reached into her partner’s pocket and pulled out the ignition key. The turn signals lit up twice as she unlocked the doors.

  Borke opened the back passenger side, and Spannberg pushed Till inside. He couldn’t support himself. He fell and banged his head on the opposite door.

  Spannberg laughed. “Don’t get your hopes up, by the way. You won’t get the doors open at the next red light. The car has child locks.”

  Borke got in on the passenger side, and Spannberg
took a seat behind the wheel. As soon as the two of them sat down, they leaned toward each other and kissed.

  “The look on his face!” Borke laughed. “Bourgeois!”

  “It’s not that you kissed,” Till said.

  “Well then, why the look?” she asked.

  “Because. I didn’t have the slightest suspicion you were faking anything in my office. I can’t believe it.”

  Spannberg started the engine. “Where shall we go?”

  “To our hiding place. We have to end it all today.”

  “You really think so?”

  Borke nodded. She put on her seatbelt and adjusted the rearview mirror so that she could watch Till. “Does that offend your professional honor? That I tricked you?”

  Spannberg backed out of the parking spot and headed for the exit, then pulled into traffic.

  Would Till succeed in eliciting information from these women? He had to gain time. It probably wouldn’t take long before Dorfer heard about the incident at the theater. And he knew that people like Borke and Spannberg, or at least people like Spannberg, loved to talk about themselves.

  “I have a question for you, Ms. Borke,” Till said. “When you came to me for help, why pretend?”

  “Ms. Borke?” She grinned. “I think it’s sweet that you never forget your good manners. You never fall into the trap of familiarity.”

  “Only if you insist.”

  “He builds up distance through this,” Spannberg explained. “I noticed it on the trip to Berlin.”

  “It’s better to say Mr. Asshole than just asshole,” Till said.

  Borke clapped her hands in amusement. “Thanks, asshole. Oops. See? Just asshole isn’t so bad, is it?”

  “How did you two meet?” Till asked.

  “None of your business,” Borke said.

  Till looked out the window, feeling shot down. In the Friday evening traffic they didn’t move fast. Unfortunately, no police cars with flashing blue lights raced toward them to thwart their escape.

  “I learned about Sandra thanks to an inmate,” Spannberg said abruptly.

  “Franka!”

  “He can’t tell anyone anyway.”

  Borke sighed.

  “Karsten Hansen,” Spannberg said. “He told me about it during a therapy session and even mentioned Sandra’s full name. He was so of it proud, too, to have gotten away with it.”

  “He raped me,” Borke explained. “Years ago. I didn’t report him. Out of shame, I guess. It was at a party, and unfortunately I have to admit I was flirting with him. We ended up in his apartment, and when I wanted to end things there, well, he wouldn’t have it. Fortunately, he was so drunk that it was over quickly.”

  “I found Sandra in the phone book and contacted her,” Spannberg said. “She was interested in telling me her story, so… we met in a pub and…”

  “… immediately felt attracted to each other,” Borke said. She seemed to like this part of the story, seemed more forthcoming. “When I was a teenager, I realized that I was bisexual, always looking for the right partner. In Franka I finally found my soulmate.” She stroked Spannberg’s thigh.

  “Unlike Sandra, I already knew who I was sexually,” Spannberg said. “After my first boyfriend, I knew men weren’t capable of giving me what I needed to be happy.”

  “We had a wonderful year,” Borke said.

  “Eleven months,” Spannberg corrected. “Then the riot broke out and…” She didn’t complete the sentence. “I had always kept my homosexuality hidden. No one knew about Sandra. Besides, she was not in Hamburg when it happened.”

  “Two weeks hiking in the Pyrenees. Without internet, without television. I only found out about it after I got back.”

  “During recovery, she took care of me at home,” Spannberg said. At this point, they were talking more to each other than to Till. Basking in their own romance, the story of how they met. “But the pigs had done much more to me than just hurt me externally.”

  “I was especially upset to hear that Hansen had gotten to her,” Borke said. “I kept asking myself, would things have turned out differently if I’d reported him? If I’d had the courage? Maybe he wouldn’t have committed murder years later. Because he would have been in prison already. Maybe he even got his appetite from me. And then he took it out on Franka.”

  “I tried to show her it wasn’t her fault,” Spannberg said. “So we concentrated on something else. The rapists. They had to pay. But of course we knew we couldn’t get to them inside the prison walls.”

  “So we made a plan to get revenge on their loved ones,” Borke said.

  Spannberg put on the blinker and stopped in front of a red light. “They had mentioned so many names during their sessions. It was easy to make a hit list. The pigs were supposed to rot in jail and suffer, knowing there was nothing they could do to stop me.”

  “So you’re an accomplice,” Till said. He had already surmised this, but he needed to keep the conversation going.

  “Yes,” said Borke, sharing a loving glance with Spannberg. “We spied on the potential victims together. Then Franka struck for the first time. I was her back-up. I stayed nearby to help her escape if necessary. And then Ludger Krumm and his partner took over the investigation. I secretly watched Ludger for a while. He was single. It was my idea to start a relationship with him to get information firsthand.”

  “At first I was against it, but she wouldn’t give up,” Spannberg said. The traffic light changed. Slowly she drove off.

  “After a few weeks I noticed Krumm’s destructive character. He was possessive, jealous, a threat.”

  “I begged her to kill him.”

  “But you don’t just kill a cop. Especially if you’re in a relationship with him. Then I had an idea.”

  “That’s how I came in,” Till concluded.

  Borke beamed. “We learned so much from you. By the way, you are much more conscientious than Albrecht. No one would have tracked Franka down if she’d turned to you.”

  Till shook his head. “Jonathan was a good man. My mentor. Everything I know, I learned from him.”

  “How sweet of you,” said Borke. “Nevertheless, it’s not true. I’m convinced that Ludger has tried to track me down with the help of police resources. He did not succeed.”

  “That’s only because you followed my advice,” Till said. “Maybe your partner wasn’t quite as careful.”

  Spannberg didn’t comment on the accusation. They silently covered the next few hundred meters. Then the murderer took a small remote control in her hand and pressed the only button on it. She reduced her speed. Till looked through the window and saw a garage door slowly swinging open.

  He analyzed what the women had just told him. If Borke had helped her partner, it was not surprising that Spannberg had managed to stay below the police radar for so long.

  Spannberg steered the car into the garage and clicked the remote control again. “Welcome to our little secret cave.”

  They waited until the garage door closed, then both women got out. Spannberg pulled Till out of the car and led him through a door into a large, barren basement. She directed him to an old-fashioned radiator.

  “Sit down!”

  She pushed him to the floor. Borke opened one of the handcuffs and locked it around the heating pipe. As a test, she shook the cuffs. “No one can hear you here. Best save your strength.”

  The women left the room and switched off the ceiling light. Till sat in the dark. The lack of light didn’t frighten him. On the contrary. He could focus his thoughts better that way.

  The result of his considerations depressed him, though. If they murdered him on the spot, he would have no chance. His only hope was that they still needed him.

  39

  In the kitchen Spannberg took two bottles of beer from the refrigerator while Borke shucked the explosive vest and laid it on the kitchen table.

  “To us,” said Spannberg.

 
They bumped bottles. The women had made it to their hiding place despite difficult circumstances. That alone was reason to celebrate. Nevertheless they had to think about their next steps.

  “We have to go into hiding forever. Set ourselves off abroad. It’s over, Franka. Now it’s just a matter of not ending up in prison.”

  Spannberg took a big sip and slammed the bottle down on the table. “Why didn’t you stop him before he entered the theater? I should at least have killed Fischer’s bastard. If Buchinger hadn’t gotten in my way—”

  “You had plenty of opportunity to kill Buchinger yourself,” Borke said. “I just followed him and had to improvise. He overpowered you, remember?”

  Spannberg stared down at her empty bottle. “You’re right. I’m sorry.”

  The women embraced each other in silence. When they separated, Spannberg shook her head. “I can’t do this.”

  “Can’t what?”

  “Live underground,” Spannberg said. “Submerge. Even if with Buchinger out of the way, there are plenty of others who can track us down. Should we flinch every time there’s a knock at the door?”

  “He taught us all the tricks,” Borke said. “Krumm couldn’t track me down. We can do this. We have a lot of good years ahead of us if we don’t play dumb.”

  “But I don’t want that.”

  “What do you want then, Franka?”

  Spannberg nudged the bomb vest with her bottle. “Why don’t we go out with a bang?” She looked up at her partner then, hoping to see commitment, but sad to see distress instead. Was Sandra afraid of death? Why did she want to continue this cursed life? Spannberg lacked the strength. “There’s a second vest,” she continued, slowly twirling her bottle on the table. “Enough explosives to go down in history. Just like we talked about.”

  Sandra’s facial expression changed then as something dawned on her. The doubt disappeared. Tenderly, she put her hand on Spannberg’s cheek. “You don’t feel like it anymore.”

  “No,” Spannberg said. She truly didn’t. She was done with running. Done with waking up from nightmares every night, sweating and screaming.