Lene Kaaberbol - Invisible Murder

The angle changed. Now the photographer was standing over Ida, speaking once more.

“Say hi to Mommy.

Smile.”

Ida’s eyes flitted toward the camera, then she looked directly at the man holding the phone and angrily jutted out her chin. “Smile.”

Ida shook her head, took two steps farther back, and bumped into the purple wall. The phone was right up against her face now. A finger slid slowly over her chin, pushed its way tentatively between her lips, and made its way over to the corner of her mouth. Pulled it upward into a grotesque, crooked grin.

“Smile for Mommy.”

The picture went black, and Nina felt the man slowly ease up on the pressure on her mouth. He pulled his hand away completely. She turned her head, and it was only now that she could really see the man next to her bed. He wasn’t that much taller than her, she thought, and skinny under that loose T-shirt. He was wearing a pair of very light-blue Levis that were cinched in at the waist with a wide, studded leather belt, its oversized belt buckle featuring a shiny, pale skull. His hair was shoulder-length, dark blond, and looked freshly washed. The rest of him was worn and scruffy and cigarette-ravaged, even though he could hardly be older than thirty. His nose was swollen and bruised on one side, his eyes wide and feverish. Probably snorted a line of crystal meth a few hours ago, Nina thought hostilely, and felt a glint of satisfaction at the thought of how short and miserable this man’s life would be. How his body would be covered with oozing sores from the crank bugs, how he would scream and call for mercy, and how he would die alone and in pain. She would kill him herself right now if she had the slightest opportunity. For what he had done to Ida. She lashed out at him, but there was no strength in her blow, and it only grazed his throat before he grabbed her hand and held it securely.

“Easy, girl.” He spoke to her in accented English.

His voice was quiet and arrogant, as if he were talking to a child, and then he let go of her entirely and let her sit halfway up in bed. He pulled a clear plastic bag out of a duffel bag that was on the floor next to the bed and set it on the covers.

“Put them on,” he said, still in English.

Nina peeled the crackling plastic aside with two fingers and glanced quickly at the contents. It looked like some sort of tracksuit. The price tag was still on, fluttering from the waist of the dark-blue pants.

“Where is she?”

The man looked at her and smiled.

“Really cute daughter you’ve got. She looks like you. Just a little firmer in the flesh. Delicious young cunt. Totally soft to touch.”

His accent might be thick, as if he had a mouth full of gravel, but his vocabulary was convincing.

Nina felt defeated. His words were so harsh. So evil. She could feel her defenses washing away. A floodgate had been opened. The fear that had started to seep into her body at the sight of the first picture of Ida on the phone roared through her now, full strength. It slid into every single thought, formed unwelcome images, and little film clips that churned and rattled and played over and over again in endless loops. Ida in the apartment in front of her three attackers without her clothes on. Ida naked in some basement. Ida in the rearview mirror, a thin, black silhouette on a bicycle in the dark on her way up Fejøgade. That was the last time she had seen her.

Nina tried to inhale again. Tried to think. Should she try to stall for time? Pull the cord to call the nurse? He wouldn’t be able to stop her. All she needed to do was to reach up.

They heard footsteps out in the hall, and the man sat down on the chair next to her bed. He quickly pulled a small, tired-looking bouquet of tulips out of his bag on the floor and placed it on the covers. Water seeped out of the plastic wrap surrounding the green stems, making a big, wet stain on the white bedding. He wasn’t nervous, Nina thought. Everything he did was so calm and effortless. As if this were a totally normal day in his life.

A nurse came into view in the little window in the door just as the man leaned over the bed and placed his free hand over hers. His smiling face had moved in very close to hers, and he had even managed to adopt something that resembled a concerned smiled. A couple of long, bright-red lines stretched from his ear down over his cheek and Nina couldn’t help thinking of Ida’s black-painted fingernails.

“My poor baby,” he said, and behind him Nina could see the nurse’s face disappearing again. Her white clogs clicked quickly on down the hall, and Nina knew that the woman was probably already reporting the latest gossip on the odd patient in the isolation room. By now everyone had probably read about her marital problems in Ekstra Bladet . The news of a man in her room with flowers would add some excitement to the staff’s lunch break.

Nina looked at the man and knew that she wouldn’t put up any resistance. She didn’t dare. He had Ida.

He stood up, pulled Nina’s covers aside, and threw the tracksuit at her with an impatient grunt.

“Put it on. Now!”

Nina pulled the clothes on over her hospital gown without protest and without looking at the man. A feeling of disgust crawled across her skin when she thought of him holding Ida down, touching her. Whatever plans he had for her were immaterial compared to what he planned to do to Ida. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see that he had opened the cupboard next to her bed and was rummaging around in the white hospital linens on the shelves. He swore quietly.

“Where the fuck are your shoes?”

Nina leaned against the bed, exhaustion from the effort of putting on the clothes making the room swim around her.

“They threw them away,” she said. “Because of the radiation.”

He swore again, pulled some long, white socks out of the cupboard, and threw them at her.

“Put these on and don’t try anything clever.”

Nina obediently pulled on the socks and found herself standing there in white socks and a pair of dark-blue tracksuit bottoms that were slightly too big. He moved over behind her. She could feel his sharp, warm breath against her ear.

“And now, we go. Pretend you’re healthy and have shoes on,” he said. “And pretend you’re not you.”

ØREN RINSED THEcoffee cup in the sink in the men’s restroom, filled it with cold water, and drank. Tomorrow, or next week, or whenever this goddamn case was over and he had time to catch his breath again, he would take the time to find that article he vaguely remembered about bacteria in water coolers and send it out over the intranet. He knew his little act of protest against the tyranny of water coolers was a waste of energy, but surely a man his age was allowed to mount his moth-eaten warhorse and attack a windmill now and then.

He was holding the cup under the tap one more time when it slipped through his fingers. He grabbed for it with both hands and managed to stop it from crashing to the terrazzo floor, but water splashed onto his shirt and trousers, leaving a trail of drip marks near his fly that was not very flattering.

Oh, crap. It wasn’t so much the accident—the water would dry quickly—it was what it told him. That he was tired. That he ought to go home, or at least down to the basement to crash in one of the bunks for a few hours. He had only slept three hours the night before and had been working for more than eleven hours since then. And, well, he wasn’t eighteen anymore. But his young Hungarian colleague would be landing at Copenhagen Airport in an hour, the results from the Opel registration list would be back soon, and he really wanted to talk to Malee himself and see if he could get anything out of her that Birgitte and her colleagues in the NEC hadn’t been able to. A video wasn’t enough.