Chapter 17: His Own Words

At seven the kitchen smelled of coffee that nobody drank.

Florian sat at the table with his head in his hands.

Felix stood at the window.

Vincent leaned on the counter with his arms folded and his eyes on the door.

Dominik came in last.

Vincent had unlocked the boathouse and walked him up the path. His lip was swollen and split.

A purple mark ringed his arm where Vincent had held it.

"Sit," I said.

He sat in the chair at the end of the table, the one he had carved from his grandfather's oak.

The baker's wife stood by the stove with a basket of rolls.

I had asked her to come at six. She had not asked why.

"She stays," I said. "She's a witness."

Dominik nodded.

I put my phone on the table between the coffee cups.

"I recorded last night," I said. "From the moment I heard you on the stairs."

His face went grey.

I pressed play.

The latch tore out of the wood. A man's voice said, "You said anything."

Then my own voice: "I didn't say yes."

I let it run to the end.

When I heard myself bite him, and heard him shout, Florian started to cry quietly into his hands.

The baker's wife put down her basket.

I turned off the phone.

"You swore on my porch," I said. "You said it out loud, in front of three men."

"You said you wouldn't touch me unless I said yes."

"I did," Dominik said. "I broke it."

"You did."

"I'm not going to say anything in my defense."

"Good. I'll say something in yours."

He looked up.

"On the first night," I said, "you stood at my bed and said: Move. Let me have her."

Nobody breathed.

"I've kept that sentence ever since," I said. "It's the first thing you said."

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