Chapter 4
CHAPTER 4 — The Collapse of the Facade
The glass tumbler slipped from Gero Müller’s hand, crashing onto the balcony tiles and shattering into a hundred glittering shards.
Whiskey pooled across the stone, soaking into the hem of his pristine white bathrobe.
Amelie gasped, sitting up quickly on her lounger.
“Gero? What’s wrong? What happened?”
Gero didn't hear her.
His ears were ringing with a high, sharp frequency—the sound of an entire life built on control, wealth, and calculated cruelty disintegrating in a single second.
“Papa...” Gero stammered into the phone, his voice losing its polished, rhythmic charm, sounding suddenly thin and pathetic.
“Papa, listen to me. That video... it’s a misunderstanding.”
“Beate is unstable. She’s pregnant, she’s hysterical, she—”
“Shut up!” his father barked through the speaker, the retired judge’s authority flaring through his panic.
“Shut your mouth, Gero!”
“I saw the summary statement from the prosecutor.”
“The video is fifty minutes long.”
“It shows you taking a belt from your closet.”
“It shows you folding it.”
“It shows you counting.”
Gero’s breath caught in his chest.
Fifty minutes.
The nursery camera.
He had installed it three months ago. He had set the cloud storage server to overwrite every seven days.
He had personally set the encryption code.
How did she get it?
She didn't know the code. She never paid attention to technology. She was just a schoolteacher who cried when the potatoes burned!
“Papa, you can fix this,” Gero pleaded, his eyes darting frantically across the misty lake scenery.
“You know the district prosecutor! You served on the bench with her for twelve years! Tell her it’s a private marital issue! Tell her we’ll arrange a settlement!”
“She’s the one who signed the arrest warrant, Gero!” his father shouted, his voice breaking with deep, agonizing shame.
“She called me thirty minutes ago to tell me personally out of courtesy for my service.”
“She said that if I attempt to interfere, she will file judicial corruption charges against me before the sun sets.”
“Her father is involved, Gero.”
“Thomas Brand.”
“He brought two other women to the police station this morning.”
“Emilia Petersen and Jessica Wagner.”
Gero’s throat went bone dry.
The air in his lungs felt like dust.
“They... they signed statements?”
“They gave sworn affidavits under penalty of perjury,” his father said softly, the fight completely leaving his voice.
“It’s over, Gero.”
“The firm has already terminated your executive partnership.”
“The bank has frozen your corporate cards.”
“If you have any intelligence left in that arrogant head of yours, you will drive to the nearest police station in Munich and surrender before they come to find you.”
The line went dead.
Gero stood frozen on the balcony, the phone pressed against his ear, listening to the hollow dial tone.
Amelie stood up, looking at him with wide, frightened eyes.
“Gero... who was that? What were you talking about? Who is Emilia?”
Gero turned slowly to look at her.
The charming, protective, wealthy executive was gone.
In his place stood a man consumed by an ugly, frantic, predatory rage—the face he usually reserved for closed bedrooms with locked doors.
“Pack your bags,” Gero snarled, his voice dropping into a guttural command.
“We’re leaving.”
“Gero, you’re scaring me—”
“I said pack your damn bags!” he roared, stepping toward her, his fists clenching at his sides.
Amelie stumbled backward, her face turning pale as she saw, for the very first time, the monster that lived beneath the tailored suits and the charming smile.
Without another word, she grabbed her purse, backed away toward the suite’s front door, and ran out into the corridor, leaving her clothes and her luggage behind.
Gero didn't chase her.
He didn't care about Amelie.
His mind was operating on pure, primal panic now.
I need to get home, he thought, his chest heaving as he threw off the bathrobe and pulled on his street clothes with trembling hands.
I need to get back to Grunewald.
Beate is still there.
She has to be there.
I will make her withdraw the statement.
I will make her tell the police she lied.
She’s my wife. She belongs to me. She will do what I tell her to do!
Twenty minutes later, Gero’s black Audi R8 roared out of the resort’s underground garage, its high-performance engine screaming as it tore down the narrow mountain roads toward the Autobahn.
He drove like a madman, weaving through traffic at over two hundred kilometers an hour, his hands gripping the leather steering wheel so tightly his nails drew blood from his palms.
He ignored the red lights on his dashboard.
He ignored the text messages flooding his phone from his colleagues, his friends, his business partners.
He had only one thought, repeating like a mantra inside his skull:
Get home.
Fix it.
Make her pay.
He reached the outskirts of Berlin as the sun began to set behind the pine trees of the Grunewald forest, casting long, blood-red shadows across the quiet, wealthy streets.
He turned into his driveway, his tires screeching against the asphalt as he slammed the Audi into park directly before the grand entrance.
The house was completely dark.
No lights in the kitchen. No lights in the master bedroom.
Gero jumped out of the car, sprinted up the stone steps, and pulled his electronic keycard from his wallet.
He tapped it against the smart lock.
Beep.
A harsh red light flashed on the digital panel.
ACCESS DENIED.
Gero froze.
He tapped it again.
Beep.
ACCESS DENIED.
“What? What is this?!” he screamed, slamming his fist against the reinforced oak door.
He pulled his mechanical master key from his key ring and jammed it into the manual keyhole.
It wouldn't turn.
The locks had been completely replaced.
Panic, hot and blinding, boiled over inside his chest.
He ran around the side of the house toward the floor-to-ceiling glass patio doors leading into the living room.
He grabbed a heavy iron garden chair from the terrace, raised it above his head, and smashed it against the double-paned safety glass with all his strength.
The glass shattered with a deafening roar, raining heavy, crystal shards across the marble terrace.
Gero kicked through the remaining glass and stepped inside his house.
“Beate!” he screamed, his voice echoing frantically through the dark, cavernous space.
“Beate! Get down here right now!”
He reached for the light switch on the wall and flipped it.
The overhead spotlights clicked on, bathing the massive living room in bright, clinical white light.
Gero stopped breathing.
The room was completely, terrifyingly empty.
The rug was gone.
The custom artwork was gone.
Beate’s grand piano was gone.
The books, the vases, the family photographs—everything that belonged to her, everything that had given the house warmth or life—had been completely erased.
Only his furniture remained, sitting like isolated islands in a sterile, white desert.
Then, from the far corner of the dark dining room, a quiet, steady voice spoke into the silence.
“She isn't here, Gero.”
Gero spun around, his chest heaving, his eyes wide with wild, predatory rage.
Standing in the doorway of the dining room, dressed in a dark Bundeswehr service uniform adorned with thirty years of military commendations, stood Oberstleutnant Thomas Brand.
He was completely motionless.
May you like
His gray eyes were cold, clear, and unyielding as granite.
And in his right hand, resting loosely at his side, he held a heavy, folded black leather belt.
