Next of Kin (31 page)

The light in the flat was on when Rose came back from the hospital. Katrine, she thought, and pushed open the door, completely unprepared for the confrontation.

‘Where have you been? What have you been doing?'

Aziz stood in front of her with a straight back. His question sent a myriad of thoughts through her head. Was it over now? Was he going to leave her? Call her immoral or something worse, which she felt she was? She wanted to ask if he could forgive her and if he could live with it, with her. But that wasn't what came out of her mouth.

‘How did you get in?'

She hadn't given him a key. Not because she didn't want to; there had just never been a need.

He shrugged. ‘It wasn't difficult.'

She was tempted to ask if it was an old habit from his younger days in Gellerup, but one look at his pained face stopped her. They stood like this, facing each other, and their eyes met. All the unspoken emotions hung somewhere above their heads before they descended over them like a white gauze curtain. But even through that she saw love, and even through that she saw it was his skin, his eyes and his body calling out for her. She took a step forward and held out a hand.

‘Rose. My Rose.'

Any thought of consequences was brushed aside. They would have to learn to live with them, Rose said to herself. Live with them, coexist with them and accept them as though a third party was present, trying to come between them.

‘I went to the hospital,' she whispered. ‘I warned Mustapha that PET had something on him.'

‘Shh. Don't say any more. Not right now.'

Her tears came as relief, and she hid in his arms and his caresses.

‘We need to talk about it,' she sobbed into his chest, but he led her to the living room and they settled on the sofa; she crept up close and nestled against him, wanting to disappear inside him. The exhaustion and tension of the day loosened something inside her.

‘You shouldn't be here. You've got college. Why did you come?' Nothing could be allowed to destroy his future, because his future was hers, too, no matter how things panned out.

‘I came because I knew you needed me. I knew something was going on, I just didn't know exactly what.'

She told him even though he didn't want to hear it. She told him because she didn't want there to be any more curses over them; to be anything between them. ‘I couldn't help myself. Perhaps I've let a terrorist loose in the world, but I wasn't strong enough to hold back.'

He stroked her hair and kissed her. ‘Mustapha's an idiot. But I don't believe the bit about terror. He's not capable of that.'

She let the words sink in and clung to them, adopting them as her own truth. After all, Aziz would know his childhood friend best. Surely he had to know.

He cupped her face between his hands. ‘I'm glad you did what you did. I would have done the same. Somehow …' he said, caressing her face and gently parting her lips with his finger. ‘… Somehow he's still my brother.'

The Special Unit moved in the pitch dark like black-clad soldiers in a computer game, their weapons raised for action. Wagner could barely hear the sound of their heavy boots as they filed expertly past the row of fire engines in the garages and took up their places around the exercise area.

The smell of soot from the blackened ruins of the houses was acrid and forced its way down his lungs. It was like playing guerrilla in a war zone, hiding behind low walls and beneath fallen roof frames, resting your gun barrel on window sills where there were now only gaping holes. A burnt-out bus without glass stood like a ghost, blackened by the countless flames that had licked through its windows and up to its roof. Beside it lay mountains of exploded bricks, and off to the left you could see the shape of three gigantic vats full of water. Oil was used to set fire to the water and divers would have to jump through the flames and pretend to save lives.

As they picked out their positions he wondered whether there was a life here to save. He hoped so. He also hoped they would find tracks leading to wherever Kirsten Husum was. Not here, he guessed, but he couldn't be sure. She might be down in the pipe with her victim, sabre ready to strike as the deadline approached. They'd have to take that into account when they discussed how they would enter. She might also be carrying a gun. There were a great many options and risks.

‘The shelter's under that mound,' Ivar K said, pointing. ‘That's the emergency exit.'

Wagner nodded at what resembled an ancient passage grave beneath a grass roof. ‘Twenty metres, didn't he say?' he asked. ‘From the entrance to the exit.'

Ivar K nodded. He had been briefed by the training centre manager and had given instructions to the unit. ‘The room is a long cement pipe with a diameter of two metres. Should anyone start bombing, it's a stronger construction than a square room.'

Wagner nodded again. Perhaps it would be easier than they anticipated. Kirsten Husum was unlikely to be there. It was more likely that she'd set triplines in the area around the bunker, maybe even booby-trapped it. The specialists would have to check the terrain before the unit could move into the shelter.

They waited at a distance as the men in black and their unit leader carried out their part of the job. When it was safe to move, men were posted at each end of the shelter before they went down.

Ivar K moved next to him, but Wagner placed a hand on his arm and held him back. ‘Wait.'

They heard the faint sound of the hatch being opened. Then a warning was shouted. ‘This is the police. We are coming in.'

No answer. In the shaft under the hatch a metal plate was pushed to the side. From a distance they watched the men swarming in with their weapons at the ready and their shields held in front of them. Wagner held his breath and sent up a prayer. This could be a death trap and they knew it. There was only one entrance being used—who knew what awaited them down there?

As in a nightmare, he expected to hear an exchange of shots and perhaps someone blowing themselves and everyone else to smithereens. But the silence buffeted against them for many long, drawn out seconds. No shots were fired, no voices heard shouting.

At last, after what seemed like an eternity, they got the signal that the room had been made safe.

‘He's here,' the leader of the unit said. ‘We've rung for an ambulance, but he looks more or less okay.'

Wagner and Ivar K went down the steps.

‘Mind your heads,' he said.

They ducked into the long bunker where time seemed to have ceased to exist. A clammy, musty smell of earth hit them as well as the pungent stench of human waste. Despite the naked bulbs that cast a pale light into the room, Wagner still had to wait before his eyes adjusted to the scene in the shelter. There were primitive wooden benches all the way down to the emergency exit, which had been bolted from the outside. The floor was also made of wood and that camouflaged the fact that the room was one long pipe, as Ivar K had said. The walls curved on both sides and the light cast eerie shadows.

Then his eyes focused on the figure sitting on the bench in the middle of the room. No cushions, no blankets. Only a man squinting at them through pinched eyes with an expression of mild bewilderment. He was unshaven and sat bent double as though suffering from terrible pains. Neither his hands nor his feet were tied—it wouldn't have been necessary, thought Wagner. A board wedged under the heavy duty door handle would have made it impossible for anyone to get out. The acoustics were dry, and the walls were thick, designed to withstand aerial bombing. No one would have heard his cries for help.

‘Anders Nikolajsen?' Wagner asked in a friendly voice.

The man looked at him, confused, and nodded slowly.

‘We're here to help you. The ambulance will be here very soon.'

He didn't react this time. Wagner turned to Ivar K who was bent over with a handkerchief pressed against his mouth and nose. Only now did he notice the relentless sound of dripping water.

‘Let's get out of here,' he said, making his way up into the fresh air.

Dicte drove through the peaceful countryside. Left at the crossing in Kasted and on to Brendstrup.

Her mobile phone had rung several times at the bottom of her bag, but she hadn't picked it up. She didn't know quite why, except that she had to be free to do this. She had to concentrate on bringing the whole business to an end.

Ole Nyborg Madsen had talked about his daughter who had died in a meaningless accident. She could sympathise with his reactions: his thirst for revenge, his frustration and his urge to slay evil. When Rose had been attacked she had felt the same. She hadn't gone as far down the road as he had, but the motivation had been there for her to jettison all common sense and moral scruples. The instinct to take justice into her own hands was strong. However, she wasn't quite sure whether this was what was driving her now. It could also be the other business, which was lying in wait, gnawing away at her.

She turned off and headed towards the ‘Marielyst' housing estate, as Ole had instructed. He'd described how he'd followed Kirsten Husum after he had caught her using his computer. How she'd roared off in her white van, so agitated that she hadn't noticed that he was tailing her.

She drove deeper into the quarter where the houses were in lines, each with its own character: garden gnomes, birdbaths, crazy paving, sun dials, the occasional miniature mill. She came to a kind of square where post boxes had been attached to wooden stakes hammered into the ground like totem poles. She leaned forward to see better.

‘To the right,' she mouthed, repeating Madsen's instructions. ‘Down to the end and turn left.'

And there she was. She pulled in and switched off the ignition in front of a white wooden house with peeling paint. The trees and bushes were bedraggled, the hedge untended. The curtains were drawn, but there was a light on inside. A white van was parked in the drive.

She didn't know what she'd expected, but it certainly wasn't this.

The aroma was the first thing. It struck her as soon as Kirsten Husum had opened the door to a crack and scanned the neighbourhood to see whether Dicte had come alone. A sticky-sweet aroma, like rotting plants in a greenhouse, followed in her wake as if adhered to her body and clothes.

The next was the sight of the flowers. They were everywhere in the little house. In vases, jam jars, pots and bottles. Every square centimetre was taken up with the blooms: roses, carnations, ox-eye daisies, freesia, lily-of-the-valley in various degrees of decay. Candles also cluttered the rooms in small coloured glass candleholders along with Middle-Eastern-looking ornaments with gold edges and filigrees.

‘I knew you'd find me,' she said. Then she nodded at the vases. ‘I like to have beauty around me. The flowers keep me alive in an ugly world.'

The strange woman had led the way into the house. She wasn't overweight, but large. There was a suspicion of muscles bulging beneath the long-sleeved T-shirt while tight jeans enclosed a broad, firm backside which was perfectly in proportion with the rest of her body. She moved in a feminine, almost graceful manner as she took a seat, motioning for Dicte to do the same.

‘Would you like something to drink?' Kirsten asked, the perfect hostess.

Dicte's throat was rough and dry. She sat down slowly and perched on the edge of a soft chair. ‘We've met before,' she said, ignoring the invitation. ‘Many years ago. Was that why you chose me?'

‘I was four years old.'

‘And I was sixteen. I was just a child myself.'

It sounded defensive and Dicte was annoyed with herself. She could have done with a glass of something to hold onto, after all. She thought of Ole Madsen and understood. Habits helped in unfamiliar situations, and this situation was truly unfamiliar, if not surreal.

‘You saw me. We saw each other,' Kirsten said. ‘You saw the fear in a small child, and you did nothing. You must also have heard the screams and cries for help. You must have heard something.'

Dicte listened to the accusation. Against her will, memories came flooding back. It was so brief. The glimpse of a small, mute girl at the top of the steps leading down to the cellar. The sensation that something was utterly wrong as someone took the girl's hand and led her down. The little face turning to her with a silent prayer for help; the expression that was ignorant of what was awaiting her. The mixture of trust for the person holding her hand and deep, deep anxiety fighting for supremacy in the four-year-old's eyes.

‘I didn't realise who you were or what you were doing in the commune,' Dicte said truthfully. ‘I wasn't interested in you, to tell the truth. I couldn't have cared less about the commune or those in it. I was in love and that was all I thought about.'

Kirsten Husum closed her eyes for a brief second and slumped back in the chair. ‘I remember you. Your face. My memory of the rest was blotted out but I have never forgotten you. You were my one hope. You could have saved me.'

Dicte drooped; her tongue seemed to fill her mouth. She had been engrossed in herself. She had seen, but hadn't wanted to see; she had heard, but hadn't wanted to hear. She had known—nothing concrete, but her instincts were strong—and hadn't wanted to know.

‘The crying. There were noises,' she confessed. ‘Sometimes they penetrated the music, but Morten turned up the volume and they were lost in the background.'

Kirsten Husum's face contorted. ‘That was the boiler. Whenever I refused to do what he wanted, he held my head under the water in the boiler until the pressure built up in my ears and eyes and it felt as though my head would explode. I remembered the boiler when the water came.'

‘The tsunami?'

The voice was a monotone, as though Kirsten had been practising a monologue for the theatre. ‘I thought it was the Day of Judgement. I thought the end of the world had come. I had never heard of a tsunami. We became separated in the sea and I saw Yousef and my little son disappear.'

She picked imaginary fluff off her jeans. She was well dressed and her hair, apparently just washed, cascaded down to her shoulders in blonde waves. Nevertheless, there was something dirty about the whole place, Dicte noticed. The kind of dirt that can never be washed, maybe.

‘I was dragged beneath the water too, but managed to grab hold of a branch and hung onto it. Some people saved me even though I didn't want to be saved. I begged them to leave me be, to take others. But they dragged me up onto the hotel roof. And that was when I remembered. In all the water, as the pressure built up and my head was about to explode, I remembered all that had happened. I remembered it had been my own brother.'

She seemed to shrink. Dicte couldn't meet her eyes and studied the flowers instead, all the beauty that was decaying in stale water.

‘I met him at the hospital.'

‘Your brother?' puzzled, Dicte asked.

Kirsten shook her head.

‘No, someone else. He understood everything. He said there were others; there were many of us. He talked about justice and about how we had been denied it. He talked about changing the world into a better, a more just place.'

She reached out her hand and picked the limp leaves off a yellow rose that stood alone and bowed in a beer bottle. ‘It was supposed to be a new beginning. All over the world. Al Qaeda's methods, but not really religious. A quest for justice. For victims to be taken seriously.'

She looked at Dicte again. ‘The world is full of victims. The world is full of people who have suffered but never, ever, receive redress. It's full of evil, which hovers on the surface and knows how to survive. There is no one to save the damned.'

Not religious. Dicte could hear the idiom of religion and was whisked back to her childhood. The bitterness at the fanaticism she had struggled against, hated with such fury, returned. She still hated it; she could feel the heat of it rise with this woman's simmering fervour, the stench of decay and the imagined smell of the bloodbath of the Last Day. She recognised it as soon as she'd spoken of saving the damned. Doing something for others and imagining you had a solution. But there was no solution to evil, she knew. You couldn't fight it with its own weapons. You could lose everything, even your closest family; especially them, perhaps. You could have everything taken from you, but you couldn't take. If you did, you'd lose something else, something even more fundamental.

‘What's his name? Who is he?'

Kirsten Husum shrugged. ‘We were never given his name. He called himself Uomo. Man.'

‘Nationality?'

Another shrug. ‘He was Asian, that much I do know. But we didn't talk about nations.'

‘Who's we?'

She stared across the room, perhaps through the thin curtain. ‘I don't know. I met only one other person. A Pakistani woman. There have been many, I'm sure of that, but the idea is to build individual cells so that we don't know each other's identities. It's simple and effective. As I said: a copy of Al Qaeda's methods. Strange, really, that no one has thought of it before. Using their ideas and methods but for a different purpose.'

‘But what's the difference?' Dicte asked. ‘It's all about imposing what is considered a higher justice.'

Kirsten Husum snorted and her contempt joined the nauseous smell of flowers and candle wax. ‘Religion is nonsense. Especially that religion.'

‘Islam? Why? Because Yousef's family didn't accept you? Because they wanted you to wear a scarf and convert?'

It was a shot in the dark, but it seemed to have hit something. She could see that in Husum's angry look. Dicte went on. ‘Because they shunned you, isolated you, left you without family? Was that why you dressed as you did and chose the sabre as your weapon?'

Kirsten Husum shrugged, but Dicte could see in her eyes that the emotions she felt were far from indifferent.

‘That was my way of mocking them. My way of shaking them up.'

‘Muslims in general, or only Yousef's family?'

The question was ignored. Kirsten Husum got up and went to the window. ‘Have you come on your own?'

‘Yes.'

‘Aren't you afraid?' She turned away from the window.

Dicte could see the hatred now, so clearly. Perhaps she should feel fear. But all she felt was a blend of sympathy and anger. ‘I'm not afraid,' she said. ‘I've come to take you in. Because you have to stand to account for your actions, even though you have also suffered. Otherwise it will never end.'

Kirsten went to a small desk, sat down and pulled open a drawer.

Something glinted in her hand hidden behind a bunch of red roses. Dicte registered the gun. Its muzzle carelessly pointing in all directions.

‘I think you should put that away,' she ventured in a voice she didn't recognise. ‘No good will come of this. Ole Nyborg Madsen also knows your secret. If you kill me, you'll also have to kill him.'

A smile flitted across Kirsten's face. She must have been pretty once, Dicte thought. A destroyed, pretty child.

‘I never fitted in,' she said, as if reading Dicte's mind. ‘I didn't know how to make friends. Everything seemed to slip from my grasp. I didn't seem to understand the rules of the game. Went at it too hard. I wanted to make people love me. It was only when I met Yousef that I knew what love was.'

‘And when he died you no longer cared?'

‘Yes. When he and our son were gone, I was left to chase a mirage. Justice is a slippery phenomenon. When you think you have it in your hand it slips out and assumes other forms.'

‘You can't take your revenge out on a tidal wave,' Dicte said.

‘You can't take your revenge out on God,' Kirsten Husum said. ‘But you can try and you can feel alive in the time you have.'

She turned the gun in her hand and gave the shiny muzzle an almost affectionate look.

The gun approached her moving lips, as though it were a game. Then it jerked away and Dicte found herself staring down the barrel.

‘You could have made a difference. You could have saved a life, but you chose not to.'

The hole was so small. It was hard to imagine the forces it could unleash. Perhaps that was why she didn't feel any fear.

‘And next time? Morten? Kaspar? Dion?' Dicte took a quick look around the room. There wasn't anything she could use as a weapon apart from the flowers, the vases. Kirsten was a big woman. Dicte wouldn't be able to overpower her. But would she really shoot to kill?

‘Kaspar had a guilty conscience. He tried to compensate by letting me live with him. Morten and Dion. They deserve to die, no question.'

Hatred and loathing distorted her face. Dicte knew she had pressed a button. She had named the enemies, the adversaries that would be fought with every means at Kirsten's disposal. But hatred was absorbing all her attention and for a fraction of a second her eyes lost their intensity as she drifted off into the agonies of her past.

She didn't know why she did it or what she hoped to achieve. It was instinct more than anything else. She grabbed a vase of carnations and hurled them at the wall behind Kirsten. The hand holding the gun wavered in the air and swung in all directions. A shot went off and a pane shattered as the bang echoed in Dicte's ears.

At almost the same moment she launched herself with all the power a run-up can provide. She slid over the desk, knocking over the vase of roses, and landed on top of Kirsten in a pile on the floor, body on body. She groped for the hand with the gun. Another shot went off. This time it hit a picture on the wall.

She grappled with a person of huge strength. Kirsten was a large fighting machine with arms and legs working like a mechanical toy. But Dicte had the advantage of surprise and finally she managed to grab the hand holding the gun. Kirsten's fingers around it were strong and firm and didn't budge. Dicte had to grasp the weapon instead and use all her weight to try and lever it away. Then another shot went off and something sticky seeped between the steel and her skin. She was aware it was blood, but for a second she didn't know whether it was hers or Kirsten's. Then the other woman sank back. A red blotch spread across the thigh of her tight jeans. Her hand let go of the gun and a ragged moan issued from her lips, her chest heaving with exertion.