and the theft of the patent. Honestly, I liked it.”
Lina could understand that. Revenge was sweet, and when the
universe for once stood on the side of the poor and downtrodden . . .
“How come you and Herr Birkner hooked up again after all that?”
Lina asked.
Tanja Fischer laughed bitterly. “Philip missed the sex. It’s really
that simple.” Then she was quiet and looked to the floor. “He called me a little more than half a year after the bankruptcy. He wanted to see me. At first I was reluctant, but eventually I agreed.” She sighed and looked up. “You didn’t know him, but I swear to you, if Philip set his mind on something, he always got it. He could wrap you around his
little finger.” She sighed again. “He told me how much he missed me, how often he thought about me, dreamed about me . . . The usual,
but when he said it, it sounded unique. He gave me compliments, he
smelled good, and he took me out to dinner. He made me feel beauti-
ful and desirable, as if I were someone special.” Tanja Fischer wiped 121
Maria C. Poets
away tears. “I knew that he was mostly interested in sex. He told me that he didn’t get much with this Katja but that he wouldn’t leave her because of the child. At least not right away. He was honest, but also gave me hope—of things that probably would never happen. I went
along with it.” She took a deep breath. “So we saw each other once or twice a week. He visited me or we met somewhere and then went to
my place. His apartment was taboo, of course—as were discussions
about his relationship with Katja.” Tanja Fischer looked out the window again. “Even though Philip came mostly for sex, we occasionally
did things together. We actually liked talking with each other. But it was clear that he’d never leave Katja for me because she had something I could never offer him: money. Money and all the right connections.”
Lina had listened in silence and had not even taken notes. When
Tanja Fischer stopped talking, Lina asked, “Did you ever talk to him about the Inoware bankruptcy?”
Philip Birkner’s lover turned to her. “Once, about a month or two
ago. I had run into Frank Jensen at the market, by chance, and was
appalled at how badly things were going for him. He looked run-down
and told me he was still being investigated for industrial espionage and his wife had left him a week earlier. I told Philip about it and asked whether he really believed Frank had committed industrial espionage. If so, he must have done it on a volunteer basis since everyone could see that Frank Jensen didn’t have a dime.” Tanja Fischer smiled a tired smile. “Philip just shrugged, said he didn’t want to talk about it, and changed the subject. He simply wasn’t interested.” She shook her head. “He wasn’t interested at all in what had become of Frank.
Since that day,” she added quietly, “something changed. I changed.
I began to withdraw and stopped agreeing to meet him whenever he
felt like it.” She shrugged. “I wasn’t unhappy about the business trip to Frankfurt last weekend. Philip had invited me to a concert I didn’t feel like attending. But we hadn’t seen each other for some time and he 122
Dead Woods
became rather insistent.” With a crooked smile, she said sadly, “Just like a stubborn little boy who wants to get his way.”
Lina didn’t doubt that the woman told her the truth, but she still
asked her about details of the business trip, which she would verify later. “Why didn’t you take your cell phone along? We’ve been trying to reach you all weekend.”
Tanja Fischer blushed. “The battery was dead and I forgot to bring
the charger,” she said.
Lina suppressed a grin. Then she thought about what Tanja Fischer
had said before. “You described Philip Birkner as a stubborn boy . . .
Did he ever try to get what he wanted by force?”
Tanja Fischer raised an eyebrow. “You mean . . . No. At least not
with me. But with me he usually got what he wanted.” She swallowed.
“There was no need for him to rape me.”
“Do you think he would have been capable of such a thing?”
The woman looked out the window again. “I don’t know. With
men we know, we can never imagine they’d be capable of it, can we?”
Lina nodded slowly. She had a point. “Frau Fischer, do you know
if Herr Birkner had any other girlfriends besides you?”