by Viveca Sten
Then they would spend a few days with Elin on Harö, just as they had planned before the phone rang on December 26.
The thought made him feel better. It gave him the strength to reach out, turn the key, and start the engine.
“I’ll be home soon,” he told Pernilla.
CHAPTER 107
Wednesday
Nora pulled on her boots and thick jacket. Jonas was due to arrive on the ferry at ten fifteen. Suddenly she longed to see him; she could hardly wait.
He was staying until Sunday, which meant they would have five days together. Time to talk, time to tell him about everything that had happened at the bank. Strangely enough, she was no longer so upset. Once she’d made her decision, a sense of calm had come over her. She would get by somehow; she would find a new job, support herself and the boys.
“Are you going down to meet Jonas?”
Simon came out of the kitchen, looking miserable. She knew he was disappointed because Henrik had gone back to town last night.
“I am, honey—do you want to come with me?”
He stared at the floor, his hair falling over his face.
“Would you have preferred for us to celebrate New Year’s with Dad?”
He nodded. “Like Christmas Eve. That was so cool.”
Nora crouched down in front of her son. “You know I like Dad a lot, but I really like Jonas, too.”
How could she possibly explain the situation to a nine-year-old? There was nothing he wanted more than for Nora and Henrik to get back together, but she couldn’t just conjure up those feelings once again. The love had gone.
Yesterday evening Henrik had asked if he could stay for New Year’s. They’d been sitting in the kitchen over a cup of coffee. Nora’s temperature was back to normal.
“I’m still fond of you,” she’d said quietly. “We have two wonderful sons, and we had a lot of good years together.”
He could see it in her eyes; she didn’t need to go on.
“You’re in love with Jonas.”
Nora looked down at the table. “Yes. I’m sorry.”
She was so pleased that she and Henrik were able to spend time with each other, that they’d celebrated Christmas as a family, without the tensions of the past couple of years.
But she just didn’t love him anymore.
It was Jonas she yearned for.
After a brief silence, Henrik reached out and stroked her cheek.
“I only have myself to blame. Don’t think I don’t know that. I’ve behaved like a complete asshole for way too long.”
Henrik was more subdued than she’d ever seen him.
“Marie left me, by the way.”
Nora knew how hard it had been for him to say those words.
“Maybe that’s what it took to make me think,” he went on after a while. “Realize what I’d done.”
They had parted as friends—at least that was how it felt.
Nora put her arm around Simon’s shoulders.
“Sweetheart, your dad and I still care about each other, but that doesn’t mean we can live together. You’ll understand when you get older, I promise.”
A gloomy expression was the only response.
“Listen, Thomas and Pernilla are coming over tonight, along with baby Elin—that’ll be fun, won’t it?”
“Are they staying over?”
“Absolutely! They can’t go back to Harö in the middle of the night.”
She straightened up and fastened her jacket.
“I’m off to meet Jonas now. It wouldn’t surprise me if he has a belated Christmas present for you . . .”
It was good to get outside, even though it was cold. She had felt a little unwell when she woke up, but the air was fresh and made her feel much better. For the first time in several days, a bright winter sun was shining down. It was going to be a perfect evening for fireworks; the Sailors Hotel usually put on an impressive display on the last night of the year.
When she reached the harbor, she saw that the Vaxholm ferry was already making its way through the Sound. She hurried along to the jetty. By the time she got there, the ferry was only about thirty feet from the quayside. Nora craned her neck, desperate to see if she could spot Jonas.
He was right at the front, and he also seemed to be looking for someone. For her.
As soon as he saw Nora, he began to wave so eagerly that the sailor standing beside him couldn’t help smiling.
Nora felt a wave of happiness spreading right through her body.
It was going to be a wonderful New Year’s.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This is my sixth book—a dizzying thought! The time has passed so quickly, and it’s still so much fun to tell a new story!
This entire narrative is my invention, but I won’t hide the fact that I find the anti-foreigner movements that have grown in Sweden since 2010 deeply worrying.
As usual, however, all the characters spring from my imagination, and any resemblance to living persons is entirely coincidental.
The tale of the poisonous beans is actually true, although I have moved it to a year earlier: the scandal occurred in Cornwall in 2009, when it was discovered that thousands of bracelets made of paternoster beans had been sold at the Eden Project. The so-called Chocolate Murders in Malmö took place in the early nineties.
With regard to the Swedish title: I farans riktning (In Harm’s Way) is a legal concept relating to the law on compensation. Liability for compensation depends partly on the causality between an action and an injury, and partly on the fact that the injury is a foreseeable consequence of that action. For example, if you drive the wrong way up the freeway, you are putting yourself in harm’s way, and will almost certainly collide with another vehicle at some point.
One correction: I have opened the Sailors Hotel over Christmas, when in fact it normally takes guests only over New Year’s. I take full responsibility for any errors which may have arisen.
I am grateful to many kind people for their assistance during the writing of this book.
Special thanks to my friend Enlil Odisho, who so generously shared her experiences of what it’s like to arrive in Sweden as an Assyrian refugee from Iraq.
Detective Inspector Rolf Hansson from the Nacka police has been a great help on many aspects of police work. Thank you, as always!
I would also like to thank Dr. Petra Råsten Almqvist, an expert in forensic medicine; senior counsel Helena Nelson; CFO Göran Casserlöv; criminologist Mikael Rying; Councillor Cecilia Klerbro; and Anders Rying of the Sailors Hotel, all of whom have assisted me in my research.
Thanks also to family and friends who have read the manuscript and offered their opinions along the way: Lisbeth Bergstedt, Anette Brifalk Björklund, Helen Duphorn, Gunilla Pettersson, and, not least, my beloved husband Lennart.
Once again my heartfelt thanks to my publisher, Karin Linge Nordh, and my editor John Häggblom. You make me a much better writer, and I hope you realize how much I appreciate your input! It’s a privilege to work with you.
Warm thanks also to Sara Lindegren and everyone else at Forum. At Nordin Agency, my thanks go to Joakim Hansson, Anna Frankl, Anna Österholm, and everyone else who works so hard to promote my books in Sweden and all over the world. What a team we are!
Thanks to Lilia and Assefa Communications, who help me with PR.
To my wonderful children, Camilla, Alexander, and Leo: thank you for putting up with a mother who disappears into another world from time to time.
Lennart, you are my rock, as always.
And finally—this book is dedicated to my maternal grandmother, who came to Sweden from Vilnius during World War I, at the age of four. Grandma, I miss you so much.
Sandhamn, April 2, 2013
Viveca Sten
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Photo © 2016
Since 2008, Swedish writer Viveca Sten has sold more than 4.5 million copies of her Sandhamn Murders series, which includes Still Waters, Closed Circles, Guiltless
, Tonight You’re Dead, The Price of Power, In the Heat of the Moment, and In Harm’s Way. They have cemented her place as one of the country’s most popular authors, whose crime novels continue to top bestseller charts. Set on the tiny Swedish island of Sandhamn, the series has also been made into a Swedish-language TV miniseries seen by seventy million viewers around the world. Sten lives in Stockholm with her husband and three children, yet she prefers spending her time on Sandhamn Island, where she writes and vacations with her family. Follow her at www.vivecasten.com.
ABOUT THE TRANSLATOR
Marlaine Delargy lives in Shropshire in the United Kingdom. She studied Swedish and German at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth, and taught German for almost twenty years. She has translated novels by many authors, including Åsa Larsson, Kristina Ohlsson, Helene Tursten, John Ajvide Lindqvist, Therese Bohman, Ninni Holmqvist, and Johan Theorin, with whom she won the Crime Writers’ Association International Dagger for The Darkest Room in 2010.