Emma Frost Mystery Series Vol 7-9

by Willow Rose

Maya looked appalled. “And she didn’t even say goodbye?”

  “She was in a hurry.”

  That wasn’t a lie, I thought to myself.

  Maya stomped her feet on the floor with a loud groan. “Arrrgh. Why are grown-ups always so lame?”

  Then she stormed upstairs and slammed the door to her room. I shrugged and looked at Morten, who had hid his face behind the newspaper. He had a smirk on his face. “That went about as well as when I speak with my teenage daughter. You’re sure you don’t want her to know the truth?”

  I shrugged. “Maybe. I don’t know. I just can’t bear to see her heartbroken again. She just regained trust in grown-ups by spending time with the doctor. You can say what you want about her and why she was really here, but she certainly helped Maya get better. I am thankful for that, despite everything else.”

  Morten looked at the clock. “I should get home and spend some time with Jytte too. I think I’ll take her out to dinner tonight.”

  I kissed his forehead. “I think that sounds like an excellent idea. You’re always welcome to bring her here, if you like. I would like to bring our families together at some point.”

  Morten nodded, then kissed my lips. “I’ll talk to her about it. But tonight I think we’ll make it a father-daughter thing. But maybe tomorrow night?”

  I chuckled and kissed him back. That was always his answer. I knew it wasn’t his fault. Jytte just didn’t want to accept the fact that he was seeing someone, and she certainly didn’t want to meet my family. I had to accept that. At least for now.

  “See you later, gorgeous,” Morten said and left.

  Victor was playing with Brutus in the yard and I watched them for a little while, still amazed at the connection between the two of them that seemed to be out of this world.

  I sat on the couch in the living room, missing my computer. I grabbed my iPad and scrolled through today’s newspapers that all declared Lisa Rasmussen to be a racist after her blunder on stage. I couldn’t stop laughing. She was truly something, that Lisa, but part of me was happy she had a worthy opponent now, and I was definitely going to vote for Jonna Frederiksen after this. I threw a glare around the room, and my eyes stopped on the box of letters on the dresser. I hadn’t had time to read them all. I wondered about the third brother. I had asked Allan about his visit earlier today, and he had told me Per Larsen was sitting in a wheelchair, and that he was severely autistic. He was lost to the world, the staff had told him, and he was unable to understand anything. Officer Allan had told him about his brothers anyway, since he had to, but the man sat in his wheelchair, drooling on himself, and didn’t react at all. He had been living in the home his entire life. The nurse had also told Allan that the family hadn’t visited him for as long as she had worked there, and she heard stories that they never did. Only the mother came once for Per’s tenth birthday, many years ago, but she never returned.

  “It was pretty sad,” Allan said.

  I picked up the box of letters, wondering how that young boy I had heard about in previous letters as this boy filled with life and happiness, how he had ended up like that. Carefully, I opened the last letter in the pile and started reading.

  67

  January 1966

  DEAR SISTER,

  I am afraid I have some terrible news. A terrible tragedy has struck our family. I can hardly believe it. My hands are shaking as I write this to you, so you must excuse my bad handwriting. Three weeks ago, Per was hit by a car, and was admitted to the hospital in Esbjerg. We haven’t been able to visit him much there, since it is very expensive and a long trip to the mainland for us. But we went yesterday, and they told us Per’s brain was damaged when the car hit him, and he will never be the same. Oh, sister. I am heartbroken. I couldn’t believe this was the same little boy that brought me such joy over the years. He was lying in the bed at the hospital, all lifeless. They say he can hear what I say, but not understand it. They say he is retarded. The blow to his brain made him retarded and unable to take care of himself. I am crying as I write this, because this tragedy has hit our family very hard. Not only have I lost my beloved Per, who will now have to live in a home, they say, but I am losing my two other sons as well. Ulrik was driving the car that hit Per, and Peter was in it with him. So were Jonna Frederiksen and Erling Bang. The boys haven’t been the same ever since. Peter left the day after the accident. He packed his suitcase and told me he was going to live in the city. He has dropped out of school and is working as a carpenter at the local lumber company in Nordby. Ulrik is going away too, he says. He can’t stand it here anymore, he told me this morning. Claes is furious, but I sense it is no use to try and talk sense into him. Ulrik has made his decision. He’s leaving the farm, and with both of the other brothers gone, there is no one to take over the farm when Claes wants to retire. He’s heartbroken. We all are. Seeing Per in that hospital bed, unable to speak to me, was heartbreaking. At first, they thought he would get better, but they no longer believe he will. They told me to forget the boy I once knew…to pretend he has died.

  “You’ve lost your son,” Mrs. Larsen, the doctor said. “Forget about him. Try to have another child. That will make you forget about him.”

  But how can I forget about the most precious creature I have ever known? How am I supposed to forget him when I still love him? When I sense deep in my soul that he is still in there somehow? I swear, I thought he understood what I told him yesterday. I spoke to him for hours and told him everything that was going on at the farm, and I am certain he understood it. I could see it in his beautiful eyes. The doctors believe I’m just imagining it because I am mourning his loss, but the way he looked at me, I think he’s still in there. He’s still my little boy.

  But now, they’ve taken him away. They’ve moved him to a home somewhere on the island and told me to not come visit since it will only make my mourning harder on me. It’s best for everyone that I forget. Everyone seems to think so. Even Claes. He thinks we should try for another son, but I don’t know if my old body can take any more. I don’t know if I can?

  Dearest sister. I am so sorry to have to bring you all this bad news. I hope you are well in the city.

  Kind regards,

  Helle

  68

  November 2014

  I WAS CRYING AS I read the last lines of Helle Larsen’s letter to my grandmother. This was terrible. What a devastating tragedy. I put the letter on the table and looked at Victor playing in the yard. I wondered about him and his diagnosis of mild autism. I was suddenly very grateful that it wasn’t worse than that. I knew he would never have a normal life, but at least he didn’t have to spend it in a home somewhere in a wheelchair. At least he could play outside; at least he went to school along with other children. His life would be harder than most people’s, yes, but I had a feeling he would be all right somehow. There were days I worried more about him than others, but I had a feeling deep down inside that he would figure out how to deal with this. He would get by.

  I wondered about the two brothers and them being murdered like this. Why were they being killed? I couldn’t stop thinking about the fact that Erling Bang had been in the car as well. There was, after all, a connection between the three of them. They had known each other as children.

  I didn’t get to finish the thought when Sophia stormed through my front door. She looked upset.

  “Christoffer is gone!”

  “What do you mean gone?” I asked.

  “They called from school and told me he didn’t come to class today, and he’s not at the house. I’ve called all of his friends, not that he has that many, but none of them have seen him all day.”

  “When did you see him last? This morning?” I asked.

  “Yes. He ate breakfast with the other kids and they rode off to school like they always do. Josephine tells me he parked his bike close to hers and then went inside the school, but his teacher says he never showed up. I need your help to find him.”

  “Of course,” I said
. “Do you want to just drive around, or do you have any ideas where he might have gone to. Does he have like a special place he likes to go to?”

  Sophia looked confused. “I…I have to be honest and tell you I don’t know. He’s my oldest and therefore mostly takes care of himself while I’m busy with the young ones, you know? Christoffer is the one who takes care of most things himself. He’s eleven. He’s my easy child. I never have any trouble with him. He spends most of the day on the computer.”

  I called Victor and asked him to come inside.

  “Have you seen Christoffer today?” I asked, when he and Brutus came running. Victor shook his head without looking at me.

  “No.”

  “Not even at school?”

  He shook his head again. “He skips school sometimes to be on the computer,” he said.

  I looked at Sophia.

  “Really?” she said. “I didn’t know that.”

  “Only when you’re at work,” Victor said.

  “Maybe we should take a look at that computer of his,” I said. “We need to see what he’s been up to lately.”

  I took Victor and Brutus with me over to Sophia’s house across the street. All of her kids were running around the living room and jumping on the couch; the twins were playing soccer inside. My head was about to explode after just a few minutes inside her house.

  “The computer is in his room,” she said, and showed us inside and closed the door to shut out the noise from the screaming kids. “Here. My mother gave it to him a year ago. She thought he needed it to get ahead in school. He’s been on it ever since. I can’t drag him away.”

  “Minecraft?” I asked and touched the mouse so the screen turned on.

  “Yeah. All the kids play that now, right?” Sophia said, looking at Victor.

  “Not Vic,” I said. “He likes it outdoors. Don’t you, buddy?”

  Minecraft was already on. Sophia looked at me with a shrug. “I don’t know anything about this.”

  “I’m not allowed to touch a computer,” I said, thinking I didn’t want to risk anything again. Allan had been very angry at me for touching Dr. Sonnichsen’s computer. I could get in serious trouble for this. “Court’s orders.”

  Sophia exhaled. “I guess I’ll have to try then. Could you guide me?”

  “I guess there’s no harm in that. As long as I’m not touching the computer,” I said.

  Sophia was about to sit down by the computer, when Victor stepped up. “Can I try?”

  I looked at him, puzzled. He had never shown any interest in computers. “No, Victor, I don’t think…”

  Sophia moved away from the computer. “Let him. I’ll just break something.”

  “I really don’t think…” I didn’t get to finish the sentence before Victor was sitting in front of the screen, his fingers dancing across the keyboard. I dropped my jaw. I had never seen him this focused. He tapped and clicked, then wrote something. I walked up behind him and realized what he was doing was very advanced. So advanced I didn’t even know what he was up to. Numbers and letters danced across the screen. I was truly impressed.

  Victor stopped. “There,” he said. “Christoffer has been talking to the same guy inside Minecraft for the past three months. I recovered all their chats. He adopted Christoffer in August.”

  “Adopted?” Sophia asked. “What does that mean? You’re freaking me out here. What do you mean he was adopted?”

  “You can get adopted in Minecraft,” I said. “If they adopt you, you become part of their family. Maya does it all the time.”

  “This guy has adopted many others,” Victor said. “He’s very good at protecting himself, so I couldn’t find anything on him, but I found the profiles and IP-addresses on all of the kids he adopted, then found their real names and addresses.”

  “How on earth did you do that so fast?” I asked, puzzled yet slightly proud, and very impressed.

  “I used a trace route tool that I just invented. You wouldn’t understand.”

  “What?”

  “Here are their names and addresses. They all live around here,” Victor said, and left the computer. I stared at the screen. “I didn’t even know you had ever used a computer before?” I asked, looking at my son.

  “I haven’t.”

  We read through the chats with great concern. Apparently, Christoffer had been chatting with this guy about becoming one of his so-called proxies. It had started out with the man contacting him, asking if he wanted to be adopted; then, when he accepted, they started talking about his family. Word for word, we read how Christoffer felt…like no one cared about him in his family, how he felt lonely, how there was never any time for him, and this man, this guy who called himself Slender Man told him he could be his father if he liked, he could give him a family. He would care for him and could be the father he needed. He told him about the other kids he had adopted and made part of his family. There was just one thing, one little favor Christoffer needed to do in order to be one of them, to be accepted into the family.

  He had to kill someone.

  “Are you kidding me?” Sophia said, when she reached the line where he told Christoffer that he expected him to do it.

  “How…how did I not see this?” Sophia asked, with tears in her eyes. “I mean, my son…my poor son has been so lonely in this house. And I didn’t know. What kind of a mother have I been? Why haven’t I kept an eye on him on that computer? I didn’t know he could get himself in trouble like this. I had no idea. And now this? My son is no murderer. He can’t kill anyone. Do you think he would do it? For what? To become one of them? I don’t understand.”

  I exhaled deeply while looking at the other names on the list Victor had found for us. I recognized all of them. Rasmus Krohn, William Korsvig, and Tommy Malthesen. All were the teenagers that had showed up in the investigation of the killings. So, this guy had made them all kill by promising them a new family? Was it really that easy? Apparently, it was. Apparently, Christoffer had been so hungry for grown-up company, for a male-role model that he was willing to do anything. This guy was really good. He knew how to push all the right buttons to get to the boy. He told him exactly what he needed to hear. It was really creepy to read how he slowly reeled him in and persuaded him to do this, telling him to trust him and that he would understand one day. For now, all he needed was to know his loyalty was really with Slender Man. This was how he would show him. This was how he became one of them. He made Christoffer plead to be accepted. He made it something Christoffer dreamt about and longed for, something he, in the end, lived for. Something worth killing for.

  I decided I no longer cared about getting caught using a computer and sat at the keyboard. I went through Christoffer’s emails and found an online order for a Slender Man costume from an online store. This was it. That was the last proof we needed to know what he was up to.

  “We need to find him before he does anything stupid,” I said.

  “But where do we look?” Sophia asked. “It might already be too late?”

  “The name of the person he’s supposed to kill is here on the bottom. Jonna Frederiksen,” I said as I looked up at Sophia. “It doesn’t say when or where.”

  “Isn’t that the woman who is running for mayor now?” Sophia asked.

  “It is. And I have a feeling I know why this is the person supposed to go next.”

  “What do you mean?” Sophia said.

  “I’ll explain later,” I said. “Right now, we need to find Christoffer before he finds her.”

  69

  November 2014

  THEY HAD AGREED TO another debate. A late afternoon debate on the main square of town at Lisa Rasmussen’s request. She wanted to be able to explain herself properly to the public before the election, she had told the editor in chief at Fanoe Times, which was the newspaper that arranged the debates every year. At first, the editor had completely rejected her request, but Lisa Rasmussen had taken the man’s stapler and stapled him in the forehead until he ag
reed to do it. She had given him one of her election smiles, then told him if he ever wrote a bad word about her in the paper again, she would make sure her daughter Amalie never talked to his daughter Maria again. They went to the same school, and Amalie was the most popular girl there. She was the one everyone wanted to be friends with. Amalie had the power to make his daughter’s life a living hell, Lisa told him.

  Now, she was standing behind the heavy curtain on the scene where, in about half an hour, the debate with Jonna Frederiksen would once again take place. But this time, it would be different. Lisa had a little something up her sleeve that was going to make sure she won this time.

  If only Merethe did her part, then nothing could go wrong. But where was she? Why hadn’t she arrived with Lisa’s package yet? It had been quite an unusual request. Lisa knew that it was a lot to ask of her campaign manager, but she didn’t think it was too much. After all, the dear campaign manager hadn’t exactly delivered the results Lisa was paying her for, had she? No, Lisa didn’t think it was too much to ask, but she had still made sure to make Merethe understand that she meant business. She had taken a picture of Merethe’s son standing in front of his preschool, then told her that she would poke his eyes out with a needle if she didn’t do as Lisa told her to.

  Sometimes it was just too easy.

  A few people had already gathered in front of the stage. Lisa had a feeling a lot more would come this time around. She had asked Merethe to stand in front of the local supermarket and hand out fliers announcing the debate before she went to get Lisa’s package. Lisa looked into her purse and saw the gun. She had bought it many years ago from someone selling it out of his truck. It wasn’t registered anywhere, and no one knew it belonged to her. She knew it would come in handy one day. She had just never known it would be like this.

  “I’m back!” Merethe was panting. Her face was so pale, her teeth dirty, Lisa thought, and cleaned her own with her tongue to make sure none of this morning’s romaine lettuce and kale smoothie was stuck between her teeth.