Grave Intent by Alexander Hartung Read Free Book Online Page B

bought it too, that day.”
    “You can talk to me.”
    “But you don’t understand,” Jan said. “You might well be a capable psychologist, but you don’t know a thing about everyday life as a cop. You’ve never aimed a weapon at someone, and I highly doubt that you’ve shot your lover.”
    “If I don’t know how all that feels, then why not try and explain it to me?”
    “What is there to explain? Betty had a shotgun in her hand and was about to blow my head off. If I hadn’t shot back, I’d be dead now.”
    “So you had no choice.”
    “You might have that impression, but it’s cold comfort. I live through that moment again and again and keep asking myself whether I handled it right. If I had just wounded Betty, she’d still be alive.”
    “She wasn’t the first person you’d ever killed.”
    “The other ones deserved it.”
    “You don’t think that a serial killer who tried to murder you deserved it?”
    “It might look that way when you describe it like that. But she was my girlfriend and I loved her. In my dreams I saw us as an old married couple, sitting together on a veranda, watching the sun go down.” Jan looked at the floor. “I might have acted according to protocol, and I probably had no other choice, but I still won’t ever forgive myself for killing her.”
    Kerima observed Jan a moment as if hoping he would continue. Then she paged through a folder. “Has your relationship to your colleagues changed in any way?”
    “What do you mean?”
    “To the Berlin police, you were the main suspect in the George Holoch murder case for several days. Your colleagues, one Herr Patrick Stein in particular, basically became your worst enemies overnight.”
    Jan leaned back in his chair. “It’s complicated.”
    “Try to untangle it.”
    “Patrick and I could never stand each other. I thought he was a conformist, always going by the book. He categorized me as this trigger-happy maniac who didn’t care about the rules. Not the best conditions for working together. But with this last case, it was different. Patrick was downright obsessed with catching me, ignoring all clues pointing to other suspects and focusing entirely on the evidence that incriminated me. Only after our little encounter did he finally start to have doubts.”
    “And this impressed you?”
    “To understand what I’m telling you, you’d have to know Patrick better. For him there was only the proper, by-the-book way of doing things. He ignored anything outside the box. He was obstinate and refused to learn and got stuck on the completely wrong track in pursuing George Holoch’s killer. But eventually, Patrick’s intellect won out over his obsession with getting one over on me. He was man enough to own up to his mistakes and apologize. That’s when I understood that for Patrick, it’s not about his ego but about the cause. I hadn’t thought him capable of operating like that.”
    “So you’re good friends now?”
    “That might be taking it a bit far. But we respect each other and are learning to work together. I appreciate his preoccupation with details and precision work, and he admires my unconventional methods.” Jan shrugged. “If anything good came out of the last case, that was it.”
    Kerima eyed him, then stowed the folder in her bag. “Thanks a lot for your time, Herr Tommen.”
    Jan blinked at this abrupt end to the conversation. “That was it?”
    She nodded. “I just wanted to talk with you.”
    “So what’s your evaluation? Can I go back to work?”
    “You misunderstand my role. I’m not here to make a decision about you. You should simply be sharing your thoughts and worries with someone. Even if you don’t think a psychologist is useful, I’m sure that it’ll help you feel better. And if it has a positive effect on your work, then it’s in everyone’s best interests.”
    “Am I crazy?”
    She smiled. “No. But you do have a ways to go before you’ve worked through all this.”
    “Are