“I’ve never been able to understand why you’re so aggressive.” He sounded hurt.
“Who is Sara Bella?” There was no stopping her now.
“Pardon?” Jens switched the telephone to his other hand, and Anna imagined he had been lying on the sofa and was now sitting up.
“Who is Sara? I’m Sara, aren’t I? My name was Sara when I was a baby, wasn’t it? Why? What the hell is wrong with you two?!” She regretted the latter as soon as she had said it. Jens would only hear her swearing, not the message. As had happened a thousand times before. And she was right.
“Anna,” Jens said quietly. “Don’t speak to me like that. You’re stressed, I understand, but you’ve gone too far.”
“I don’t give a damn how I speak to you, Dad,” Anna said, icily. “You’ve lied. You’re still lying. There was a girl named Sara Bella, I saw a picture of her today. She’s the spitting image of Lily. On the back of the picture it read ‘Jens and Sara Bella.’ I’m her, I know I am. Why?”
“Where are you?” Jens was sounding genuinely shocked now.
“On a train between Odense and Copenhagen,” Anna sighed. Silence followed.
“Where’s Lily?”
“I abandoned her in an orphanage and made a break for it. What do you take me for? She’s asleep next to me.”
“What were you doing in Odense?” The fear in Jens’s voice was so obvious that Anna mellowed a little.
“Silly Daddy,” she said. “We went to Odense to visit Ulla Bodelsen. My health visitor. Who helped you all the times Mom was in hospital. You want to know why I’m angry? I can’t explain because I don’t know, either. But you do.” She exhaled.
“My birth certificate,” she suddenly remembered. “The date I was named is almost eleven months after the day I was born. It’s not true you named me as late as you’ve always maintained, is it? You changed my name. Why?” The latter came out as a not very quiet roar. Lily jerked, and a man wearing earphones turned and gave Anna a look.
There was total silence down the other end.
“Anna,” Jens pleaded. “We need to talk. I can explain.”
Anna held out her cell and scowled at it. Then she remembered that the World’s Most Irritating Detective had told her to control herself. She put the phone back to her ear.
“Anna,” Jens called out. “Anna?”
“I’m here,” she said tonelessly.
“Cecilie can’t know about this,” he whispered. “Promise me you won’t mention this. I can explain. It would destroy her completely.”
“Dad,” she said patiently, “if the truth will destroy her, she’ll have to be destroyed. It’s over.” She hung up. Her cell phone rang immediately. Jens’s name came up on the display. She switched the phone to silent and stared at it. He called eight times before he gave up. He left no messages. Anna leaned back and tried to look out into the dark night, but all she saw was her own reflection. She looked tired, but not angry. Not in the least. She closed her eyes. She began to fit together the pieces of what had happened almost thirty years ago, when she was born. But only the pieces. A girl who started off as Sara, then became Anna. A lie.
Slowly she calmed down. She went to the restroom, and when she returned she covered Lily with her jacket. Then she called Karen.
“I was just about to give up on you,” Karen said happily. Anna had spent the day being cross with Karen for calling Troels the night before, but she was no longer angry. Instead she said: “It took longer than I had expected. I went to Odense. It’s a long story. We’re on the train. We get in at 10:08.”
“I’ll meet you at the station,” Karen said.
“There’s really no need,” Anna said.
“I know. But I’ll be there anyway.”
Chapter 12
On Friday October 12, Søren rose at six o’clock and showered. Two hours later, he arrived at Bellahøj police station, in plenty of time for the morning meeting at nine. He stood in his office, staring out the window at the running track, while he reviewed the case. Two days after a murder, four days after a suspicious death, which was very likely also a murder, and what did he have? Not even the beginning of a theory. He should be rushing around, getting the investigation moving, pumping suspects for information and chasing every last piece of evidence.
He thought about Anna. He had never asked anyone for help. He had never been so unprofessional. And he had picked her—of all people. An unbalanced lioness with a threatened cub. A woman with something to hide.
He watched the sky above the city and was consumed by a deep urge to touch her; to kiss her and make love to her. He imagined it was New Year’s Eve, they had gone somewhere, Anna and he, to a party with lots of people, women in beautiful gowns, men in black tie. Anna stood by the window and Søren watched her from across the room. She was wearing a black dress, her yellow eyes were made up and looked dramatic, and Søren knew every man secretly desired her. Later that night, she danced. Drunk and vulgar, throwing propriety to the wind, her hair in a mess, her thighs bared where her dress had ridden up. He would find her in the darkness and put out her fire with gasoline. It would never go out. Never ever, as long as he lived.
He froze. Where had she been last Wednesday night when he had called her, twice? What could she have been up to that was so private she refused to tell him? It was odd that Henrik had said something similar. That he had been with someone and he had screwed up? Søren was suddenly convinced Henrik had visited Anna. That he had used the case as a pretext for seeing her and they had…. He checked his watch and stormed off to the morning meeting, itching to pick a fight with someone.
He briefed his team, distributed that day’s tasks, and answered a few questions. He didn’t look at Henrik directly, but watched, out of the corner of his eye, how Henrik doodled on a pad, paying absolutely no attention. It wasn’t until Søren announced he intended to visit Johannes Trøjborg’s mother, Janna Kampe, that Henrik reacted and wanted to know why. Had Søren come across something? After all, they had already spoken to Mrs. Kampe.
“I want to know whether Johannes was gay or—” Søren began.
“Of course he was.” Henrik interrupted. “If Johannes was straight, I’ll watch the next season of The Bachelor with you.”
Søren glared at Henrik. “What do you mean?”
“They like that kind of thing. They fuck each other up the ass and watch cheesy shows.” A few people tittered.
“Just like you’re some fascist pig who sits in his patrol car all day, stuffing his face with doughnuts?”
Søren expected his comeback to trigger howls of laughter, but it didn’t. Suddenly he became aware of how angry he had sounded.
Anna showed up at ten o’clock, exactly as they had agreed. He could clearly forget all about a truce. She stared daggers at him during the entire interview but never looked at Henrik once, not even when he addressed her directly, or when she replied to his barrage of questions. She was clearly making a point.