Call Me Princess (35 page)

“It seems illogical,” Lars said, puzzled.

“Yeah,” Louise nodded in agreement. Then a wave of guilt washed over her. “I just promised him one thing after another,” she said. “Everything you can think of.”

Lars didn’t even glance over at her, just nodded and said, “Of course you did.”

“We’re all prostitutes before the Lord,” she whispered to herself, tilting her seat back and leaning her body back into a position that helped her tensed muscles relax. “I would have promised him anything to get him to walk out of there.”

“That’s part of the job, and you did great,” he said, giving her knee a squeeze. Then he admitted that Suhr had been tenser than usual while she’d been inside.

“But of course he was exceptionally pleased when Susanne came out,” Lars hurried to add when he heard Louise sigh. “And I’m guessing there won’t be a dry eye left when the papers print the pictures of him leading her away from the scene as her savior.” Lars laughed a little before becoming serious again. “I’ve never seen him so quiet and desperate. He looked like he was holding his breath the whole time you were in there.”

She didn’t know what to think. It would certainly be understandable if he was angry that she’d acted without consulting him and deprived him of the opportunity to lead the charge.

“Should I take you straight home?” Lars asked.

She really wanted to take him up on the offer, but somewhere in the back of her head she could hear Jakobsen lecturing about how it was important for people to properly wrap up experiences like these so they didn’t ossify.

“Camilla’s dating his brother,” Louise suddenly blurted out. She closed her eyes so she wouldn’t have to see her partner’s reaction, but she heard his outburst.

“What did you say?” he spluttered.

What a stupid thing to say, Louise thought. He’d heard her. But she could certainly understand his sentiment.

She was still squeezing her eyes shut. She described her meeting in Tivoli to Lars.

“At first I thought it was
him.
I recognized the silhouette. Turns out Henning is his older brother.”

Lars had met Henning at the party out in Holmen, so he actually knew him better than she did, she thought, her body suddenly feeling heavy. Louise couldn’t see how she’d ever be able to talk to Camilla about what had happened. Mostly she just wanted to dive down into the deep, inky darkness and not come back out until all the problems had been resolved and things were quiet up at the surface again. Right now, everything felt chaotic.

Lars was quiet for a while.

“Well, that sucks,” he finally said. “For both of them.”

L
OUISE AND
L
ARS WERE THE FIRST ONES BACK FROM
R
OSKILDE,
but the rumors had already reached the division. Willumsen came and stood in the doorway to their office, where he proceeded to stare unabashedly at Louise. She noticed him there, but couldn’t face listening to his blunt criticism about how she’d been rash and impetuous by entering the apartment. She made a point of continuing to stare straight ahead.

“We have an élite team of highly trained people who handle situations like this one in Roskilde,” Willumsen began, once the silence in the room started to grow awkward.

Louise wasn’t listening. Or pretended that she wasn’t.

“And I wasn’t planning on adding anyone else to that team,” Willumsen continued.

He was speaking directly at her, even though Lars was sitting at his desk directly across from Louise too. The mood was gloomy, and she sensed that her partner was having trouble deciding whether he ought to leave the office so he wouldn’t have to witness the imminent dressing-down, or whether he ought to stay and support her.

“I actually just said no to training any more folks from our division,” Willumsen proceeded. “But it’s dangerous to have people like you walking around, so maybe that was a mistake?”

Finally Louise turned in her chair and looked at him. Her anger was beginning to surface. She had had just about enough. Just being here at the office instead of home in her bed was demanding a huge effort.

“I did what I could,” she seethed in self-defense. “There was no time stand around outside and wait for backup. And it turned out fine.”

Willumsen actually looked a little hurt by her assertive outburst.

“Lucky for you,” he said before she managed to blitz him with her pent-up, stereotypical feelings that had been just under the surface. Then he continued, “I should have signed you up. You’re cut out for it....”

Slowly it started to dawn on her what he meant, but of course he couldn’t just say it straight out. That would have been too simple and unlike him, Louise thought, turning to face him and listening with interest.

“They’re going to be training a new team,” Willumsen said. “And as I said, we originally told them we weren’t going to send anyone, but in light of today’s events I think the situation has changed.”

Louise felt a lump in her throat and realized how seriously unhinged she was. “Thanks,” she said.

Just then, Toft and Stig came down the hallway and around the corner into her office. They ignored Willumsen and Lars and walked right up to her. Stig squatted down next to her chair while Toft sat down on her desk. They gave her looks that were so full of concern that she smiled.

“What is it?” she asked, looking from the one to the other. “I’m fine. It’s done. It went well.”

On the way back to headquarters in the car, Lars had said that Stig had offered several times to go into the apartment and get her out, but Suhr had refused, snarling that he was more than satisfied to have Rick in there.

“What was he like?” Stig asked, succumbing to his curiosity.

Louise shook her head. “He was actually really calm,” she said, surprised that she didn’t have anything more harrowing to tell him. Maybe she had a mental wall up, obscuring the fact that she had been face to face with a man who had committed a series of brutal rapes. She didn’t feel any sympathy for him, and yet she had a hard time describing him as the calculating, cynical person they had been searching for.

It struck her again that Camilla might have been sitting around regaling Jørgen with tales of his own case when they were socializing together, without any sense of how catastrophic that could have been. He could have learned something from Camilla that triggered his response. But
desperate
? Based on her experience with him in the apartment, he really hadn’t seemed desperate to her.

“He didn’t make any demands,” Louise said, “but I promised him a ton of things I’ll never be able to make good on.”

Suddenly she wished they would all just leave. She was tired, and her thoughts were whirling around in her head.

“Do you have someone who can come over and be with you when you leave here?” Willumsen asked genially.

Louise smiled. Willumsen rarely let the friendly side of his personality show, so she knew she ought to enjoy this rare glimpse.

Just then Heilmann walked in the door. “I can go with you,” she offered.

Louise shook her head firmly. “I’m fine,” she insisted. “I’d like to be alone.”

“Be sensible, would—” Heilmann stopped as the sound of heels came clicking down the hallway. Everyone in the office turned to look at the doorway, where Camilla abruptly stopped and looked around with a questioning look, wondering if it was all right to interrupt them.

“Come on in,” Heilmann said.

Toft and Stig had gotten up and moved over toward the door, as if they were afraid of being trapped in a room where things were about to get a little too intimate. Willumsen greeted Camilla briefly and then followed on Toft and Stig’s heels. Willumsen had just gotten an extension on the pretrial detention of the immigrant woman’s brother, so his group was between cases. Louise guessed he was still itching to charge the upstairs neighbor for perjuring herself during her deposition because she’d made up that story about hearing noise in the apartment at one o’clock, but no one really believed the charges would stick. All the same, most people agreed it would be fitting revenge on a person who had interfered with the police investigation so much they had been forced to let their suspect go. Of course, now he was dead—but still!

“What the fuck just happened down there in Roskilde?” Camilla asked, concerned, but unable to hide the curiosity in her voice.

She tossed her big shoulder bag into the corner and took her seat on the low bookshelf next to the door, as though she felt quite at home in Lars and Louise’s office. “I was hoping to find Lieutenant Suhr here,” she said, looking at Heilmann.

Louise was guessing Suhr had already lined up the public defender so they could start questioning Jørgen that same night.

“Did something happen with Susanne?” Camilla asked with urgency.

Louise looked at her friend and tried to deduce how much she knew about the specific details of the story, because she had no doubt that Camilla was here in a professional capacity.

“No,” Heilmann responded, “nothing too serious, but of course she is rather shaken up.”

Camilla nodded, seeming very concerned. “I was just with her. He must have arrived right after I left.” She said that last bit mostly to herself.

Lars packed up his things and got ready to head home to his wife and twins. Louise hoped for his sake that they were already in bed. He must also be more exhausted than he was letting on. She waved at him as he left and thanked him for all his help.

Camilla said, “My editor ordered me out to Roskilde when we heard about it, but I figured the whole thing would be over before I got there and that it would make more sense for me to come here.”

Smart,
Louise thought, wondering how her friend had made it through security downstairs, since she apparently didn’t have an appointment with anyone. It wasn’t that easy to sneak into police headquarters, was it?

“What happened out there?” Camilla asked, training her eyes intently on Heilmann, but Heilmann shook her head and said, “Rick is the one who knows most about it.”

Camilla looked surprised and said, “It was you? I heard the negotiating team was down there, so I assumed one of them had gotten Susanne out.”

Louise wasn’t surprised that the story was already getting out.

“He’s a major sociopath, then, huh?” Camilla continued, scandalized. “What the fuck kind of person does something like this?” She shook her head, seemingly shocked. “He could have fucking killed Susanne... or you, for that matter!”

Yes, or you,
Louise was about to add, but stopped herself. That wasn’t the way to break the truth to Camilla.

“Do you think you could go home with Rick so she doesn’t have to be alone?” Heilmann asked, giving Camilla a somber look.

“Of course, Sergeant,” Camilla answered without hesitation.

Heilmann didn’t know about Henning and the details that tied Camilla very closely to the drama in Roskilde. Heilmann will need to be filled in, Louise thought, but that would have to wait until after she’d had a chance to talk to Camilla.

“What about your editor?” Louise asked. “Are you sure you’re free to take me home?”

“Of course. Terkel will just have to find someone else—”

They were interrupted by voices and footsteps in the hallway. It sounded like an invasion, there was so much commotion erupting through the silence.

When Suhr spotted Heilmann, he and his retinue stopped outside Louise’s office.

“We’re going to take Jørgen Zachariassen out to Vestre Prison once we’re done here,” he announced.

Louise didn’t have a chance to react before she felt his eyes on her. “Prinzz” was surrounded by Toft, Stig, and his newly appointed defense attorney. Their eyes met the instant Louise glanced over in his direction. She tried to look away, but his eyes held hers.

“What the fuck is going on here?” Camilla burst out.

She was heading out into the hall when Heilmann grabbed her arm.

Jørgen reached out toward her and in an instant Stig was all over him.

Suhr waved them on so no more words or looks could be exchanged.

“How much do you know about Jørgen Zachariassen?” Suhr asked, coming in and standing in front of Camilla.

Camilla walked over and took a seat in Lars’s chair. “He’s, uh, my boyfriend’s brother. He didn’t do this—it can’t be him!”

Louise could tell that Camilla was starting to put two and two together.

“How much did he know about your set-up with Susanne?” Louise asked.

Suhr moved closer to Camilla.

Camilla said, “Nothing! Nothing at all. You listen to me. He’s a totally normal guy,” she defended him. “He’s a computer consultant, and he’s totally normal. I simply cannot believe he raped anyone at all. Besides, he lived with a woman for years. They broke up two years ago, when she left him, but he has a totally normal life.” Camilla was talking loudly and quickly. “You cannot seriously think it was him!”

“It’s hard to think anything else since he was the one holding a knife to Susanne’s throat a few hours ago. We just took a blood sample so we can run his DNA, and then we’ll know for sure.”

Camilla sat shaking her head as Suhr spoke. “What about Henning? Does he know Jørgen is here?” she asked, no longer listening to Suhr.

Suhr seized on the topic. “What was the relationship between the two of them like?” he asked, and was about to proceed when Heilmann signaled him to stop. With a brief arm gesture, Heilmann motioned toward his office.

Louise vaguely registered that Jørgen Zachariassen had been taken into Suhr’s office, and the last thing she heard was Suhr’s authoritative voice telling him, “You can take a seat there.”

Then Suhr’s door closed behind them.

Suddenly it was completely quiet. Louise looked over at Camilla, who was sitting there staring straight ahead as if in a trance. Slowly Louise summoned the energy to move. She stood up, a little wobbly, walked over, stood right next to her friend, and started stroking her hair.

Call Me Princess
is fiction. Everything could have happened, some of it did, but most of it came from my imagination, so the characters in this book do not bear any likeness to real people. The world in which the story is set has a fair amount in common with the real world, but I used authorial freedom to allow the homicide division to work throughout Copenhagen, even though they normally don’t deal with cases in Frederiksberg.
Morgenavisen
and Nightwatch.dk are purely fictional.