The Trap by Melanie Raabe & Imogen Taylor

Author:Melanie Raabe & Imogen Taylor
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: The Text Publishing Company
Published: 2016-02-12T16:00:00+00:00

19

No, I don’t pull the trigger. I draw the gun and point it at Lenzen with trembling hands, but I don’t pull the trigger. I’d sworn to myself that I’d only use the gun as leverage. I am a woman of words, not weapons; I had a long, hard struggle making up my mind to get hold of a firearm, although I did, in the end, decide it was necessary.

And now I have been vindicated.

I don’t pull the trigger, but the mere sight of the gun has the same effect on Lenzen as if I’d already fired it. He’s as rigid as a corpse, looking at me with vacant eyes. I grip the gun more tightly; it’s heavy. I stare at Lenzen. He stares at me, and blinks. He’s understood: the table we’re sitting at has rotated a hundred and eighty degrees.

‘My God,’ says Lenzen. His voice is trembling. ‘Is’—he swallows—‘is it real?’

I don’t reply. I’m not answering any more questions. Things have reached a state of emergency. The times of neat and elegant solutions involving DNA samples or a voluntary confession are over. I do not use the word ‘emergency’ lightly. I am prepared to get my hands dirty. No more skirmishing. No games.

Lenzen is sitting before me with raised hands.

‘For heaven’s sake!’ he says. His voice sounds hoarse. ‘I don’t understand what’s…’ He falters and breaks off, struggling to retain his composure.

His forehead is beaded with sweat and I can see from his heaving chest how rapidly he’s breathing. He looks as if he’s in deep shock. Did it really not to occur to him that I might be armed? Surely he was aware of the possibility when he agreed to visit the woman whose sister he’d killed! The look of horror on Lenzen’s face disconcerts me. What if…?

I brush aside all doubt. Lenzen is going to leave this house a self-confessed murderer. There is no alternative.

I recall what I learnt from Dr Christensen: the Reid interrogation technique. Create stress. Wear down the suspect with endless questions. Punish any inconsistencies. Intersperse banal and undemanding questions with provoking and stress-inducing ones. Resort to false evidence, blackmail, force—anything goes.

Put the suspect under stress. Wear him down. Put him under stress. Wear him down. Eventually offer him confession as a way out. Put him under stress. Wear him down. And, finally, break him.

But first of all, I must find out whether he is armed.

‘Get up!’ I say. ‘At once!’

He obeys.

‘Take off your jacket and lay it on the table. Slowly.’

He does so. I pick up his jacket, without taking my eyes off him, and frisk it for weapons. But there’s nothing and I drop the jacket on the floor.

‘Empty your trouser pockets.’

He puts his lighter on the table and looks at me hesitantly.

‘Turn round!’

I can’t bring myself to frisk him, but I can see that neither in his trousers nor in his belt does he have a gun.

‘Push your bag across to me,’ I say. ‘Slowly.’

I pick the bag up and rifle through it.

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