Safe as Houses Read online

  She puts the braising pan on the stove and adds a chunk of butter. When it has turned brown, she lays in the strips of beef. The meat singes with a hiss. A few cloves, a couple of bay leaves and chopped onion. A delicious smell drifts through the kitchen, the smell of the past, of her home. An overwhelming feeling of homesickness comes over her. She forces herself to hum along to a song on the radio, but she can’t stop her tears from adding themselves to the gravy.

  27

  Lisa spends another night in the basement with Anouk, but when Kreuger lets them out the next morning there’s a change in his attitude. He stands there almost awkwardly, but doesn’t go so far as to apologise. To Lisa’s amazement he has laid the breakfast table, and the coffee is already brewed. She sits down wondering what will happen next.

  Anouk can feel the change of atmosphere and gives her mother a questioning look. When Kreuger’s attention is elsewhere, Lisa shrugs.

  They eat without saying much, apart from a few comments about the warm weather. And then, completely out of the blue, Kreuger says, ‘If I asked you to go with me, what would you say?’

  The question falls into the room like a stone breaking through a window-pane. Lisa looks up, perplexed. The spoon she is using dangles in the air like an exclamation mark.

  ‘Go with you? Away from here, you mean?’ she asks cautiously, as though his suggestion might have other meanings.

  Kreuger takes a sip of coffee and nods. ‘Would you come?’

  Lisa’s brain works at top speed. She silences Anouk with a glance and answers as coolly as possible, ‘Who knows?’

  Kreuger adds a second spoonful of sugar to his coffee and stirs it brusquely. ‘Or would you run away as soon as you got the chance?’

  ‘I haven’t run away in the past two days.’ Lisa forces herself to take a bite of bread, to chew it calmly and to swallow before she continues. ‘This is my house, and I consider you a guest here. It’s true you forced yourself on us, but in the end we’ve got along quite well, don’t you think? You promised me that you wouldn’t harm us, and I took you at your word. Why would I run away?’

  He studies her for a long time, but she continues to drink her coffee and to return his gaze. When the silence continues, she casually asks him where he might go.

  ‘I’ve got family in Germany,’ Kreuger replies.

  Lisa nods approvingly. ‘Germany is a big country.’

  ‘Even in a small country they can’t find me,’ Kreuger says with a grin.

  Anouk looks from one of them to the other and sprinkles icing sugar on her rusk.

  ‘The police are looking for a man on his own, not a man with a woman and a child,’ Lisa says. ‘We could take my car. We’d be over the border in a jiffy.’

  She finds it difficult to hide her tension. She’d do anything to get him out of the house. Once outside, there would surely be a moment when she could try to escape. A sudden swing of the wheel and a minor traffic accident would be enough; or she could drop notes out of the car window, or shout for help at a petrol station. Enough possibilities.

  ‘Hmm, maybe it would be better just to stay here.’ Kreuger empties his coffee cup with a few large gulps. ‘But I could do with your car.’

  ‘Take it,’ Lisa offers. Hope darts through her: maybe he’s thinking of leaving very soon. Who knows, perhaps this nightmare will be over right after breakfast. ‘I’ve still got a few of Mark’s clothes. We could bleach your hair to make you unrecognisable.’

  He gives her a brooding look. She takes a small mouthful of bread to gain some time. However hard she tries to swallow, it remains a sticky ball in her mouth. Finally she washes it down with a large gulp of coffee. ‘You think I’ll tell the police.’

  ‘I don’t think it, I know it,’ Kreuger says calmly.

  ‘Maybe you’re wrong.’

  ‘But it’s not a chance I can take. You must understand that?’

  Her armpits begin to sweat and her hands feel clammy. What is he trying to tell her?

  ‘Once you’ve gone . . .’ she says, carefully formulating her thoughts, ‘they wouldn’t be able to catch you right away. If I went to the police, you could take revenge.’

  ‘That would be possible,’ Kreuger confirms.

  ‘And if they never caught you, I’d spend the rest of my life being afraid. I don’t fancy that. I just want to be able to leave the house again, to get on with my life. And I want to remember you as an unexpected guest I came to an agreement with.’ She holds his gaze. ‘The agreement that I won’t betray you.’

  The silence between them is explosive.

  ‘Hmm,’ Kreuger finally says. ‘But there’s another possibility: I could just take Anouk with me.’

  28

  ‘I’ve got more good news for you.’ Dr Reynders enters Senta’s room in high spirits. ‘I think we can release you tomorrow. You suffered a concussion when you hit your head on the steering wheel, but we don’t need to keep you in for it. I was concerned about the risks of a lung infection, but it looks like you didn’t swallow any water.’

  A broad smile travels across Senta’s face. ‘That’s certainly good news.’ Then relief is replaced by worry. ‘Has the risk of infection disappeared completely?’

  ‘I wouldn’t let you leave otherwise. But I’ll give you some antibiotics as a precaution, and paracetamol for your headache. How is that now, by the way?’

  ‘Not too bad,’ Senta quickly reassures her. She isn’t going to let a headache keep her in hospital.

  ‘Great. Just take things easy at first, that’s my recommendation.’ Dr Reynders gives Senta a warm look and carries on with her rounds.

  When she’s alone again, Senta takes a deep breath. Luckily she can go home. She is totally fed up with watching television and leafing through magazines. Which she takes as a good sign. If it’s up to her, she’ll resume normal life again as quickly as possible.

  Her new mobile, a trendy pink model, is lying on her bed, shining at her seductively, but she hasn’t yet gathered up the courage to use it. Yes, she called her father, who is in a nursing home. But she hasn’t yet dialled that one number, the one constantly running through her head.

  Senta looks at the phone in indecision.

  Does Alexander know she’s in hospital? It’s possible. Frank had told the magazine about the accident and, given that the sound recordings from the interview have been lost, one of her colleagues should have let Alexander know that the article would be delayed.

  Alexander . . . She’d like nothing better than for him to turn up and take her in his arms. But a small, barely identifiable change has taken place inside her, and it is making her hesitate before contacting him. If anything has become clear during the time she was unconscious, it is that Frank and the children form the core of her existence. Knowing this, she should put an end to her relationship with Alexander, instead of indecisively staring at her new mobile. This is a good time to start again, to stop lying and deceiving, and to leave that nagging guilty feeling behind. But then she’d also have to say goodbye to something that gives her days a little more shine, that makes her blood quicken, and removes years from her age. She might have forgotten the accident, but she has held on to the amazing feeling she had on Monday after leaving Alexander’s house and saved it in every cell of her body. She had no idea that he’d become so important to her. It’s a disturbing thought that she’s let things go too far.

  Senta hesitantly reaches out her hand and picks up her mobile. Then she makes a decision and quickly taps in the number. Her heart skips a beat when she hears Alexander’s deep, powerful voice.

  ‘It’s me,’ she says. ‘Senta.’

  There’s a short pause and then he says with surprise, ‘Senta, how nice of you to call.’

  Nice of her to call? He should be delighted. In the background she hears the rattle of a printer and automatically asks whether it’s a good time for him.

  ‘Fine, yes, not a problem. That’s to say, I was busy, but I don’t mind your calling. You k
now that. I was just surprised that I didn’t recognise the number.’

  ‘I’ve got a different phone. My old one got wet. I’m in hospital, Alex.’

  ‘In hospital? What happened?’ he asks in a concerned tone.

  ‘I drove my car into a canal.’

  Alexander inhales in shock on the other end of the line. ‘My God,’ he says once he’s recovered himself. ‘What happened?’

  ‘I can’t remember. I must have hit my head on the wheel. I’ve got bruises on my forehead and concussion. But I can’t remember how it happened, or how I got out of the car. I didn’t swallow any water, so I must have come to after the impact and held my breath. If I’d remained unconscious, I’d have got water in my lungs. I know that at a certain point I was helped out of the car. Someone jumped into the water and pulled me to the surface. The car was at the bottom by then.’

  ‘My God,’ Alexander repeats. He sounds deeply impressed. ‘Have you spoken to him or her?’

  ‘It was a man, and no, I haven’t spoken to him. But I’m going to get in touch with him.’

  ‘It’s a miracle you survived. Do you know when you can go home?’

  ‘Probably tomorrow. They’re keeping me in today just to make sure I don’t develop an infection.’

  ‘ARDS,’ Alexander says knowledgeably. ‘That is indeed something to worry about.’

  ‘Apparently the chances aren’t that great any more. So I’m allowed to go home.’

  ‘Are you allowed any visitors before then?’

  ‘Frank and the children are here as often as possible.’

  There’s a pause, then Alexander says gently, ‘If I could, I’d jump in the car right away and come to you. You know that, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes . . .’

  ‘If there’s anything I can do for you, just say.’

  ‘Think about me a lot. Cross your fingers that I don’t get an infection.’

  ‘I’d do that anyway. And I always think about you a lot. I love you.’

  Senta smiles, but then a nurse comes in and she jumps. ‘I’ve got to hang up.’

  ‘Take care. I’ll call you.’

  29

  Lisa comes within a hair’s breadth of letting her coffee cup slip through her hands. ‘No,’ she says firmly. ‘Out of the question.’

  It clearly amuses Kreuger that she thinks she’s in a position to forbid him anything. His laugh resounds through the room.

  Lisa remains resolute and continues to reason with him. ‘What would you do with a small child? She’ll only make things difficult for you. She’s ill, she’ll cry, she’ll attract attention. No, you’d be better off going on your own. I’ll give you everything you need: my car, money, clothes, food, just name it. We can even drive to the bank; I’ve got quite a lot in my account.’

  ‘That’s awfully kind of you,’ Kreuger says with a deadpan expression. ‘Really awfully kind.’

  Is he mocking her? Lisa picks uncertainly at her placemat. She might be better off shutting up now, before she comes across as too anxious. She’s made a suggestion, and every word she adds is one too many. If she could only work out what he’s thinking.

  Kreuger has laid his arms on the table and looks out of the window, sunk in thought. Lisa gets up without making a sound.

  ‘Mummy, can I play on the computer?’ Anouk asks.

  Lisa looks at Kreuger, and he nods.

  Anouk jumps up from her chair happily and waits until Lisa has started up the computer. The machine quickly buzzes to life and connects with the outside world. Everything in Lisa is tensed. She takes plates, cutlery and glasses to the kitchen and sets them on the worktop. Then she opens the dishwasher, gets out yesterday’s clean wash and puts it away. In the meantime, she listens tensely to the computer’s sounds. She knows she can’t just sit down and send an email. But Anouk knows how to open Outlook Express. Anouk could send an email; she writes to her father sometimes. Why hadn’t she thought of that sooner?

  Her head pounding, Lisa puts the breakfast things in the dishwasher. Can she risk asking her daughter to do something so dangerous? Or is he testing them?

  She calms down immediately. Of course it’s a test. Kreuger had children that age himself; he knows the computer skills that Anouk would have by now. Maybe he’s waiting for her, Lisa, to make an attempt to send an email. If he leaves them alone in a minute’s time, it will be because he wants to spy on them.

  She gets up and closes the dishwasher. With a dustpan and brush, she clears the crumbs from the kitchen floor and throws them in the bin.

  When she goes into the sitting room, Kreuger has gone. Lisa pricks up her ears and hears him pulling the toilet roll in the bathroom. He stays away for so long that she becomes sure he’s putting on a show.

  She walks to the cupboard in the hall with a stoical face, gets out the vacuum cleaner and sets to work. The temptation is enormous, but she cannot take the risk. Not now that he’s on the point of leaving.

  She is given lots of opportunities to raise the alarm throughout the day. The computer remains on, and Kreuger regularly leaves her alone downstairs. When she goes upstairs to fetch the dirty sheets, she suddenly sees her mobile lying on the bed.

  Lisa stands motionless, prey to torturous indecision. All her survival instincts scream at her to pick up the telephone and dial 112. She doesn’t have to give a detailed explanation; just a few seconds would be enough. But what if this is another test? Maybe Kreuger has put her mobile on the bed in such a way as to alert him if it’s touched. She’d have to put it back in exactly the same place. Perhaps he’s put a hair on it, or devised some other cunning trick. Or is she thinking too much?

  The phone lies on the cheerful floral duvet cover, screaming for her attention. Lisa starts to sweat. Apart from her mistrust, there’s another emotion at work: fear. It paralyses her muscles, makes her ears roar and her hands shake. She looks nervously over her shoulder. Where is Kreuger now? She left him downstairs, but he’s probably just at the bottom of the stairs. Maybe he’s removed her SIM card.

  She doesn’t do it. Her mobile is lying there too obviously, too nonchalantly. Kreuger must have put it there deliberately.

  But this does give her the opportunity to write a note to the postman.

  She hastily searches Anouk’s room for a sheet of drawing paper and scrawls her cry for help in red felt-tip pen with lots of exclamation marks.

  Please help me! The escaped criminal Mick Kreuger is holding me and my daughter hostage! This is NO joke! Please take this note to the police at once!

  Lisa Fresen

  She tears off the bottom part of the sheet, folds the written part twice and puts it in her jeans pocket. Then she gets the washing basket from the bathroom and goes downstairs, her body shaking. Her cheeks are burning when she enters the sitting room.

  Kreuger is sitting in front of the television, zapping through the 24-hour news headlines. He gives her one very brief glance. Lisa ignores him. She walks to the washing machine in the utility room and sorts through the laundry. She takes her time and gradually calms down.

  You haven’t done anything, she reassures herself. He can’t accuse you of anything. You didn’t take the risk and that was very sensible.

  The problem is that it doesn’t feel sensible. She never would have thought she’d behave so passively in a threatening situation.

  ‘You didn’t have a choice,’ she mutters. ‘It would be different without Anouk, but you simply don’t have a choice now.’

  She gets up and suddenly Kreuger is standing behind her. Lisa cries out in shock.

  ‘Don’t be afraid!’ He puts his hands on her shoulders, and Lisa knows that he can feel her shaking. ‘Hey? Are you so frightened? I just wanted to tell you something.’ He waits a while and then gently squeezes her shoulders. ‘You won’t sleep in the basement tonight,’ he says, with the expression of someone offering her a magnificent gift.

  ‘Anouk can return to her own room, and you too. With me,’ he adds.

  Ho
pe and a sense of resignation make way for a new feeling of horror. Lisa desperately tries to adopt a pose she can hide behind, but she fears he can see right through her. His sardonic laugh confirms this, and so does the hand on her buttocks.

  ‘I’ll leave at the end of the week. Sunday evening I think.’ Kreuger grabs her backside more firmly. ‘But I won’t take either of you with me. That would make things too complicated. We’ll say goodbye for good on Sunday. So we’ll just have to enjoy ourselves for the rest of the week, don’t you agree?’

  30

  Alexander phones in the evening, after visiting hours. This time he wants a detailed account of everything she can remember and what she experienced during the coma.

  ‘Were you really completely absent or did anything get through?’ he asks with interest.

  ‘You know, it was just like I was swimming around in a deep dark sea,’ Senta says pensively. ‘Unfathomable depths that pulled me down like a magnet. Sometimes I managed to get to the surface and then I heard people talking, and was aware of my surroundings. I knew I had to come out, but I just couldn’t. I kept being pulled back down into the depths. It was very frightening.’

  ‘Could you hear the doctors? What did they say exactly?’

  Senta tells the story, interrupted by Alexander’s questions from time to time. His interest does her good, and she talks ten to the dozen about everything that she remembers from those lonely hours.

  When she finally hangs up, she’s exhausted, but she still has difficulty in falling asleep. Alexander’s detailed questions have made her restless. Frank didn’t ask her nearly as much, for fear that he’d tire her out or that she’d get upset. His eyes told her again and again that he could barely believe that the catastrophe threatening them had been averted.

  Senta turns on to her side and sighs. There’s something wrong, but she doesn’t know exactly what it is. Only once she’s dozed off and has reached a state between waking and sleep does the answer come to her.