by Sara Blaedel
“That’s his car, parked right there!” Louise pointed at a Bordeaux-red station wagon. The car her colleagues from North Zealand had seen in Sørensen’s garage had to be Christine’s.
Eik shut down the siren and blue lights as she slowed. Louise reached for the police radio to call for backup.
“Wait,” Eik said. “Just a minute. Give me a chance to see if she’s in there.”
“Like hell I will. Sørensen is inside the house.” She’d already called for more patrol cars.
Their feet crunched gravel as they ran up the driveway. Louise rang the doorbell, with Eik already hurrying down the steps to run around the house. Immediately the door was opened by a blond woman with a page cut and pale cheeks, in a black turtleneck sweater and elegant dark pants—it had to be Vivian Hald Sørensen.
Louise was about to show her badge when the woman grabbed her and held on. She began sobbing. “They’re out back, he has a gun,” she stammered. “He shot the girl.”
They felt a draft when they entered the moist, cold living room; the terrace door was open a crack. Eik stood in the broad doorway between the dining room and day room. Someone had bled on the floor.
“Go in the kitchen and stay there,” he said. Vivian Hald Sørensen sat down on the floor with her arms hugging her knees. She was in shock.
“What happened?” Louise asked. Pistol in hand, she rushed around to turn off the lights in the living room and kitchen.
Sørensen’s ex-wife didn’t even seem surprised they knew about the young girl. She pointed at the tripod that had been tipped over in the living room. “He forced me to record his statement, he wanted it to be like the ones made by that group that kills people. And then suddenly the girl was standing behind him. I don’t know how she got in.”
“Where are they now?” Eik was at the terrace door. An open gym bag containing a box of rifle ammo lay on the floor between the two rooms, but there was no sign of the rifle.
The sobbing woman whispered, “I think she’s been hit, he shot at her. But then he ran off, and she chased him.”
The sound Eik made as he wrenched the terrace door open and ran toward the forest spurred Louise to drop any idea of waiting for backup. She sprinted after him before he’d reached the backyard’s open gate, and they rushed down a small path that led to the forest road.
The January darkness was deepening between the trees, the road was wet and slippery from melting patches of snow. Eik stopped at a fork and looked around. “Stephanie!” he yelled, so loudly that her name echoed among the trees. A gray fog hung in the forest, making it difficult to see clearly.
Louise ran toward a thicket. She noticed black, soggy leaves that had been tramped down, a narrow path leading between bare beech trunks. She heard Eik, still on the forest road, as she fought her way along the path to a large, oval hollow. Fifty meters in diameter at least, she estimated, then she looked around and immediately noticed the black figure curled up at the bottom of the hollow.
“Eik!” Louise screamed, and she kept screaming his name as she ran down the slope.
They reached the figure at the same time, but Louise stepped back when Eik kneeled beside Steph and carefully swept her hair off her face.
She lay on her side, her arms stretched out, her legs pulled up underneath her. Eik could only see the profile of her face, but Louise was struck by the resemblance between father and daughter.
He sat still for a moment, studying the unconscious girl. Then he lay a hand on her forehead and ran a finger down over her cheek, a gesture so gentle and filled with affection that tears welled behind Louise’s eyes.
He felt for a pulse with two fingers against her throat, then he carefully checked the bloody wound over her right temple before slowly turning her and pulling her black leather jacket to the side.
“She’s been hit,” he said. “One side, under her breast.”
“Shit! Stay here and call for an ambulance. Pull her over behind the bushes there, I’ll look for him.”
Louise’s heart pounded; Sørensen had to be close by. Slowly she maneuvered forward while covering Eik and Steph as he carried her behind the bushes. She spotted him after only a few meters. “Call for another ambulance,” she yelled. “He’s over here on the ground!” She heard Eik calling behind her as she began running.
Vivian Hald Sørensen appeared on the forest road. She walked stiffly toward her ex-husband and kneeled beside him; a dispassionate professionalism seemed to have kicked in, pushing her shock aside. “He’s bleeding. He’s been shot in the heart.”
The well-dressed doctor lay motionless on the ground, his eyes closed and his shirt soaked with blood. His rifle lay a meter away.
His ex-wife took his hand and stroked it as she spoke comfortingly to him.
“Stay with him,” Louise said. Through the trees she heard the backup arriving. “We’ve called for another ambulance.”
The woman shook her head and spoke quietly. “You shouldn’t have. He didn’t want to be on this Earth any longer. I’m sure he planned to end his life after making his statement and taking the blame for what he did. It’s his choice. He’s going now, his pulse is weak. Let him find peace.”
Louise ran back to the house and out onto the street, to the officers who had arrived. Soon the forest was filled with flashlights and people, working effectively and with few words to secure the area. The ambulance personnel broke through the thicket and down to the hollow where Steph lay. Eik stood up to give them room.
Louise returned to Vivian. She still held her ex-husband’s hand.
“He’s let go, he’s leaving this world. When you have nothing more to live for, you should be allowed to die.”
31
Louise could barely drag herself up the stairs to her Frederiksberg apartment that evening. She was hungry, her eyes watery from exhaustion.
They had watched the recording of Erik Hald Sørensen’s testimony several times. Toft had brought Else Corneliussen in for more questioning and had filled her in on what had happened.
“I’m shocked, very shocked,” she said quietly, after they offered her a glass of water. “He was popular, a dedicated man. Everyone liked him.”
Louise was certain that Sørensen had fooled everyone completely; nothing during Else Corneliussen’s questioning had set off any alarm bells.
He hadn’t performed an assisted suicide. He had been present, but Else Corneliussen had administered the medicine. They had planned to share the duties starting next month, according to her.
Louise couldn’t get Sørensen’s confession out of her head, and in a way she wished she could have spoken to him after what she’d heard him say. Not that he hadn’t cleared everything up for the police. It was just that his explanation had made a strong impression on her.
The door to Melvin’s fourth-floor apartment was open a crack. Two suitcases and a large shopping bag stood out on the stairway, and she heard voices inside.
When Melvin was released from the hospital, Grete Milling had offered to move in so he wouldn’t be alone to start with. And a few hours earlier, when Louise called to hear if it was good to be back home, Melvin had said he’d never thought he could be this happy again, that he was thankful he hadn’t died out there on the stairway. “Now it looks like I’m going to be waking up beside somebody in the morning again,” he’d said.
“Hello,” Louise said, sticking her head inside to see if Jonas was there.
“Come in,” someone shouted. Mrs. Milling appeared in the hallway. She had on a striped apron, and her sleeves were rolled up. “Jonas and Melvin are in the living room, but we saved some food for you.” Louise felt as if something soft and warm had been wrapped around her.
“There’re still a few things we haven’t carried in,” Grete said, “but I think I’ll wait to unpack more until tomorrow. We have to get everything settled, too.” She stood in the kitchen, piling several heaping sandwiches on a plate. She handed it to Louise. “Wouldn’t you like a beer?”
Louise nodded. “Would I ever.” She opened a cabinet and took out a glass.
Melvin sat on the sofa. He still looked pale and was clearly tired, but he paid attention while Jonas gave him a detailed summary of a series he’d seen on Netflix. When Louise walked in, her son stood up and gave her a hug.
“It’s freaky that Eik has a daughter,” he said. “Is she okay?”
Louise hadn’t had time to tell him much. After Eik had gone with Steph to the hospital, she’d gotten only a single text from him. Eik, who never texted. But apparently a lot had changed. He wrote that Steph’s condition was still unstable.
“She’s wounded seriously, but he’s with her. I don’t know if she’s conscious.”
“But we’re going to meet her, aren’t we?”
“I hope so,” Louise said, and left it at that.
“I’m sure he’ll be a super good dad.”
Louise attacked the roast beef. After she finished chewing, she said, “Yes, I’m sure he will.”
She pointed at Melvin and smiled. Their neighbor had fallen asleep with his hands folded on his lap.
* * *
The next morning, when Louise showed up at Homicide for a debriefing with the rest of the team, Suhr took her aside and asked her to come into his office.
The head of Homicide closed the door and pulled out a chair for her. “Have you heard how the young lady is doing?” He sounded worried.
“Steph is still in intensive care, but this morning her condition stabilized, and they’re moving her to a general ward.” Late the previous evening, the girl had been wheeled into an operating room; the doctors were afraid her inner organs had been damaged. “Eik is with her, and I’ll join them when we’re done with the debriefing.”
Suhr leaned forward and folded his hands on the desk, his expression serious. “Michael Stig isn’t coming back to the department. We received his resignation yesterday, after you left.”
Louise had trouble concentrating on what he was saying. Her thoughts were with Eik and Steph at the National Hospital.
“I don’t think the dream of heading up a department always jibes with the pressure involved,” Suhr continued. Louise tried to focus; his penetrating stare made her uneasy. “Stig definitely made a wise decision.”
Her thoughts wandered again. To Vivian. She had been with Sørensen when he died, had gone along in the ambulance.
“But his resignation won’t affect my decision to leave at the end of the month, that’s already been announced. We’re going to be understaffed.”
Louise tried to grasp what he was saying.
“Might you be interested?” he asked, his expression serious again. “Let’s be honest here, there’s a lot of pressure with the job…”
He kept looking at her while waiting for an answer.
“I’m sorry, could you repeat what you said?”
His eyes softened, and he looked at her indulgently. “I’d like to recommend you for head of Homicide. The leadership is backing me up on this. It might mean you’ll have to take some supplemental courses in leadership. And the only thing left for me to say is, sometimes the pressure is heavy. But there’s no doubt in my mind that you can handle it, and I hope, I really do, that you’ll say yes.”
Louise was disoriented after the debriefing, after packing her things and telling Rønholt she was leaving for the day. She walked down and took a bus to the National Hospital.
Steph had left her weekend bag behind at Police Headquarters when she’d tried to find Erik Hald Sørensen, and now Louise brought it along. That morning Louise had thought about packing extra toiletries and a sweater she might like, but had decided against it; Steph might feel she was interfering, and she didn’t want to push.
Instead, she bought a bouquet of tulips and some pastries at the hospital gift shop before taking the elevator up.
When she walked into the room, Steph was sitting up in bed with a breakfast tray in front of her. Louise was startled by how different the girl looked, wearing a hospital gown and with all the black makeup scraped off. She was trying to press a straw down into a small carton of juice. Eik sat in a blue chair with armrests, a cup of coffee in his hands, his feet up on the iron frame of the hospital bed. But when Louise came in he set his cup down and walked over and kissed her. Her body felt heavy and loose when his arms closed around her. She hugged him back.
“She’s the one who’s your girlfriend?” Steph asked.
Eik let go of Louise and smiled at his daughter. “Yes. In fact she’s going to be my wife. She just doesn’t know it yet!”
Louise’s jaw dropped, and she was about to protest. She heard Steph laughing and Eik saying something else, but she was too stunned to pick up on what he said. Fortunately the door opened behind her. Rønholt peeked in and asked if it was too early for him to pay a visit.
“No, come on in,” Louise blurted. She stepped back out of the way in the small private room.
Rønholt didn’t know what to do with the flowers he’d brought along. Louise looked past him and caught Eik’s eye. He smiled and held her eyes, as if he wanted to show her that he meant what he’d just said.
“I’ve been looking forward so much to meeting you,” she heard Rønholt say. He held his hand out to Eik’s daughter.
“Nice to meet you, too,” Steph said. “My father just told me about you.”
Eik walked over to Louise and put his arm around her. Rønholt turned to Eik. “That leave of absence you asked about, I think it can be arranged.”
“Glad to hear it. It’s sort of like paternity leave.” He grinned at Steph. “So we can keep dreaming.”
“Leave of absence?” Louise looked up at him in confusion. Hadn’t he just proposed to her, and now he was taking a leave of absence? He hadn’t mentioned this before.
“Steph wants to travel and see the world, and I want to go with her.” He explained that he’d been looking into seeking parental custody, now that her mother was dead. “Of course it’s completely up to Steph, if she wants to put up with me,” he added.
“And she already said she wants to,” his daughter said, as she buttered a roll.
“So, are you talking about traveling for a week?” Louise asked. “Two weeks?”
“More like six months,” Eik said. “But we have to get this young lady on her feet before we plan anything.”
Steph broke in. “You two have to come, too. You and your son. We can go places together. Or maybe you’ve already done that?”
Suddenly she looked shy, as if she were a bit ashamed about getting so carried away with her dreams, and with people she barely knew.
“We haven’t, actually,” Louise said. “I’ve never traveled with Jonas.” They’d never even talked about it, she thought. “But unfortunately I can’t just take off for half a year, and anyway, Jonas is in school.”
Louise paused a second before looking at Rønholt. “And by the way, I was just asked to be the new head of Homicide.”
Rønholt smiled at her. “I was wondering if you’d mention that. I take it that you’re considering the offer. I’m happy for you, but even more for them.”
“You know about it?” Louise said.
He nodded and explained that Suhr had called him yesterday evening. “I think he was just putting a feeler out. Of course I said I wasn’t happy about you leaving, our special unit is off to such a good start. But on the other hand, it’s a lot better than the job announcements I’ve been showing you.”
Louise nodded. Eik looked startled, and suddenly it was all too much for her. She felt dazed, and she had to leave the room to get a grip. After apologizing she walked out to take the elevator down; she needed a place to sit by herself for a while.
As far as she was concerned, Eik could go wherever he wanted with his daughter. That wasn’t what rattled her. It was more that he made it sound so natural, so uncomplicated, that she and Jonas would be part of his and Steph’s life.
On her way to the ground floor cafeteria, someone b
ehind her suddenly called out, “Where are you going?” Camilla, she thought. She turned and watched her friend trot up to her, clasping flowers, magazines, and bags of candy against her chest.
“How’s she doing up there?” Camilla asked. “I’ve called several times to hear, but they wouldn’t tell me, even though I explained I was a friend of the family.”
“She seems to be doing okay. She and Eik are already talking about her moving in to live with him. And that was Sofie’s plan, wasn’t it? But they need to get to know each other, of course.”
“That sounds smart. It must be a lot for them to handle all of a sudden, too. Do they get along?”
Louise nodded. “They actually act like they’ve known each other a long time. I’m sure they’ll figure it out.”
Louise pulled her arm back when her friend suddenly punched her shoulder and said, “Hey, damn! Congratulations on the job! I saw your message, this is big for you!”
Camilla followed along to the coffee line.
“Yes, it’s really big,” Louise said. “It’s going to take some getting used to.” She explained that Eik and his daughter had begun talking about going on an extended trip. “They’ve decided they want to travel and do things together while learning about each other. Maybe that’s a good thing, a very good thing, that way I can concentrate on my job. If I decide to take it.”
“Yeah, because you’ll have to prove to everybody you’re not the type who buckles under from stress just from sitting in the boss’s chair,” Camilla teased, smiling at her.
Louise nodded. “Something like that. I have to be a good leader, anyway. One who makes everyone want to work with them.”
They found an empty table by the wall. Now, sitting across from each other, Louise got a good look at her friend and was startled by what she saw. Camilla, who always put on makeup and arranged her hair before going anywhere, looked run-down, like she’d just fallen out of bed. Louise had been so preoccupied that she hadn’t noticed, and it worried her. She reached across the table. “What’s going on with you?”