Invisible Murder (Nina Borg #2) (12 page)

“No,” he lied. “Why should I?”

“Remember you promised to get me the slug bait.”

“I’ll do that after we eat. The garden center is open until seven. If it can’t wait until tomorrow, that is.”

“I can’t,” she said, flipping the next rissole. “We need to finish them off before they have a chance to reproduce.”

INA WAS GONE
.

The teachers had known about it since that morning, but Nina only found out about it when she came to spend her lunch break with Rina, a habit she had fallen into since the trial.

“She ate breakfast and grabbed her schoolbag, like all the other kids,” Rikke said defensively. “But she never showed up in the classroom. The teachers have been out looking for her most of the day.”

Nina looked at her watch. It was 1:45 P.M., and there was a chilly wind blowing over the Coal-House Camp. It took a certain amount of determination for a seven-year-old to stay out so long on her own, but that was still what she chose to believe for the time being—that Rina had left the camp alone and of her own free will. It was not completely unthinkable that Natasha’s former fiancé had taken her, but Nina couldn’t quite believe it. She pictured Michael Anders Vestergaard as he had appeared in court. Freshly ironed shirt, expensive cologne, and a broad, self-satisfied grin. He was a sadistic bastard, no doubt about that, but he went in for risk-free crimes. Women on the margins of society and possibly also their children; victims he could control without winding up behind bars with all those nasty Hells Angels thugs. For the moment, Rina was too big a risk for him now.

“We contacted the police,” said Rikke, the carer. “They asked if there were any family members she might be with.”

“They know damn well her mother’s in jail,” Nina said, pulling out her car keys. “Rina doesn’t have anyone else.”

“Well, you know how it is. They don’t have unlimited resources.”

Yes, Nina knew that quite well. Children ran away from asylum centers every single week, and it was true that some of them turned up with
family members somewhere or other in the constantly migrating population that flowed back and forth across Europe’s borders. But Rina wasn’t that kind of child.

“She’ll probably come back on her own,” Rikke said, giving her best stab at a smile.

Nina couldn’t even muster a response. Rina had been gone for almost six hours, and in Nina’s opinion contacting the police now was too little, too late. Rina was seven. The world was a dangerous place for kids like her. This wasn’t something that could wait until some duty officer could be persuaded to find the resources.

Magnus had apparently had the same thought, because when she returned to the clinic he was already ready to go, jacket and phone in his hand.

“I’ll search the shrubbery behind the school grounds. Are you taking the car?”

Nina nodded, hastily typing a text message to Ida.
Delayed. Take 300 kroner from the kitchen envelope and call a cab. I’ll be there as soon as I can
. It was roller hockey Wednesday.

“I took her to see Natasha last week,” Nina said. “I think she made a note of the route. I’ll try driving in that direction, anyway.”

“It’s is a long way for a seven-year-old,” Magnus said. The district prison where Natasha was serving her sentence was on the other side of the city, nearly thirty kilometers away.

“Yes,” said Nina. “But if you were Rina, where else would you go?”

T
HE GIRLS WERE
almost half an hour into their match by the time Nina found her way to the asphalt rink in one of the southern suburbs. They were playing outdoors today and had been lucky with the weather. The rink was dry and clean, and the air was cool. Nina settled next to the coach on the spectator side of the graffiti-covered boards, and looked around for her daughter. She caught sight of Ida’s helmet, black and decorated with pink skulls. Ida had been playing on the Pink Ladies team for almost two years now and was small and lightning-fast and impressive to watch, out there in the thick of the action. Most of the girls Ida’s age were taller and heavier, but that did not appear to bother her. Not even if it cost her bruises and countless scrapes.

Ida was playing the attack now. She crossed in front of a player from
the other team and stole the ball with a couple of rapid jerks of her stick, then raced toward the goal at full speed, cannoning the ball into the net with an explosive and totally clean shot. She only just managed to evade the goal’s metal bars and slammed into the boards with a hollow thud instead.

Nina had seen that kind of move before and knew it was part of the game, but it still seemed to her that Ida was playing even more offensively than she usually did. She glanced over at the coach, who nodded briefly at her and then turned back to look at the rink again.

Ida was on her way back to her half of the rink with her stick raised in a short victory celebration. Her hair shone wetly under the edge of her helmet; her face was clenched in concentration. Nina followed her with her eyes and felt a joyous tug in her chest at the sight of Ida surrounded by all the others.

Another face-off.

Ida was ready at the front of her own field, and as soon as the ball was in play, she hammered her stick between the legs of the other team’s forwards. The sticks scraped and struck the asphalt until Ida finally got the ball free and continued, running amok in a new attack on their goal. She almost seemed to be alone on the court. The other players set out after her in a halfhearted job until she again hammered the ball in behind the goalie. This time she didn’t manage to slow down properly; she stumbled, took a couple of quick tap-dancing steps in her rollerblades, and smashed onto the asphalt with her stomach, chest, and hands in a brutal smack. She lay there doubled over in front of the goal without making a sound, and the coach swore and hastily leapt over the sideboards.

“Goddamn it! No one was even on her.”

Nina followed. She tried to ignore that distinctive jolt it caused because it was
Ida
. Of course nothing serious had happened to her. Of course not. She squatted down next to Ida in front of the goal. She probably just got the wind knocked out of her, Nina thought, her wrists and hands ought to be pretty well protected by her equipment. She cautiously touched her daughter’s shoulder.

“Try to stretch out a little,” she said. “It’ll help.”

Ida glared at her angrily.

“You keep out of this,” she said, rolling away from Nina with a stubborn groan. “What the hell are you even doing here?”

The other Pink Ladies were there now. Anna and the new one, Josefine. They helped Ida to her feet, shooting awkward glances at Nina.

“We thought you couldn’t make it,” Anna said in a tone that Nina couldn’t quite interpret. “It took forever to find a cab. And with all our equipment.…”

“Look, I’m really sorry, but.…”

With a jerk, Ida turned her back and skated slowly back toward her team’s goal. Nina was left to deliver her apology to Anna and the empty space where Ida had been.

T
HEY HADN’T FOUND
Rina until 3:45 P.M. The owner of an allotment garden in Gladsaxe called after seeing the girl sitting for more than twenty minutes, curled up next to the fence along the highway, her school bag still on her back. That was how far she had been sure of which way to go, Nina thought. At the Ring 3 overpass, she must have become discouraged. Rina cried when Nina came to get her, but apart from being generally exhausted from a day without food or water, there was nothing wrong with her. Nothing more than usual, as Magnus flatly remarked. He had volunteered to watch Rina for the rest of the afternoon, and Nina had driven off to the hockey rink as if her life depended on it, or at least as fast as rush-hour traffic would permit on the congested roads. Shit, shit, shit.

The girls won by a landslide, but Ida painstakingly avoided meeting her eyes as she rolled off the rink and started taking off her gear. Nina wasn’t even permitted to pack it up for her.

“My mom will be here soon,” Anna said, talking to Ida. “We don’t really have time for a shower.”

Ida was still struggling with her shin guards, but Nina didn’t need any help interpreting what was going on. Ida had arranged for another ride home.

“But it would be easier for you to ride with me since I’m here,” Nina said.

Ida turned her head and looked at her.

“No thanks,” she said and at first attempted an icy, arrogant stare. Then the corners of her mouth began to wobble and she looked away quickly.

“We were late for the match. Do you have any idea how embarrassing that was? For all three of us? They almost didn’t let us play.”

Nina quickly glanced at Anna. She wished that Anna would give them
a little space, but Anna stayed where she was. She was obviously uncomfortable, but she stayed put.

“Come on now.” Nina hoisted up Ida’s equipment and jacket. “I need to have a look at those bruises anyway, once we get home.”

“No.”

Ida yanked her jacket out of Nina’s hands.

“You’re a shitty mother. You know that? Just a shitty mother. I’m spending the night at Anna’s.”

N
INA WATCHED THEM
go with annoyance.

Ida was bent over a little as she walked, as if she were still in pain, with Anna and Josefine attending her like silent, slightly awkward squires. Anna’s mom turned and gave a single wave before they drove out of the parking lot.

Nina hoisted Ida’s equipment bag and tossed it into the backseat. She had heard from certain optimistic and bubbly colleagues that there was a life beyond the teenage years. She would, in other words, survive this. And so would Ida.

OU WANT A
drink?”

Søren gave the young man waiting for him at the café table a surprised look. Khalid had suggested the their meeting place, Café Offside, himself—a little sports bar awash with nicotine, crammed in next to Nørrebro Station, and clearly one of Copenhagen’s few remaining smokers’ sanctuaries. Also sufficiently Khalid Hosseini’s home turf that he was the one to order the drinks. Søren decided to ignore this slightly provocative act and nodded briefly.

“Yes, please. A club soda.”

Khalid, who had occupied the innermost corner of the booth, deftly got up and zigzagged his way through the busy café’s crowd of standing patrons, laid a bill on the bar counter, and returned shortly afterward with a club soda in one hand. He slipped back into his seat and smiled at Søren with his eyebrows raised. A perfect saint, Søren thought sarcastically, wondering for a moment whether he should have turned up unannounced at Khalid’s home address instead, just to catch him off balance. These young men were never quite so cocky when they had their gloomy father sitting next to them on the sofa. On the other hand, the family could also have been an extremely disruptive element, and Khalid had three younger siblings and a mother, who would presumably either lament reproachfully or dart back and forth with tea and sticky cakes that were far too sweet. Søren leaned back in the flimsy café chair and tried to maintain eye contact with his young host.

He was nineteen. Long-limbed, skinny, and smooth-shaven if you ignored a pair of neatly trimmed sideburns. He was wearing a tight, orange shirt that appeared to be fairly expensive. The same was true of the dark, high-end jeans and white sneakers.

It took a while, but finally he met Søren’s eyes.

“What was it you wanted to talk to me about?”

Søren didn’t answer. He waited, slowly pouring his club soda into the glass and watched out of the corner of his eye as the young man’s façade began to crumble. Young people weren’t used to lulls in a conversation, and certainly not to long periods of silence. Khalid’s eyes darted away from Søren’s club soda before moving back to the cola he had sitting in front of himself on the table. He took a swig and was then inspired to fish his cigarettes from his black backpack under the table. His fingers trembled slightly as he pulled the cigarette out of the packet, then he half-heartedly held out the pack to Søren, but stopped midway through the gesture and let it drop down onto the table between them instead, in a sort of clumsy invitation.