Peek A Boo I See You (Emma Frost #5) (23 page)

"Hi, Maya," my mother chirped. "You want something to eat as well?"

Maya lifted her eyes from the paper and stared at me. The look in those eyes was a horrific mixture of deep disappointment and furor.

"What's this?" she asked me.

I walked closer. "I…Maya…I…," I had no idea what to say to her. I hadn't even read the letter myself.

A tear left the corner of her eye. Then she spoke the words that I had dreaded hearing so much.

"Dad is not my real father?"

66

February 2014

"
M
AYA…
I
…"

"When were you going to tell me?" she interrupted.

"I don't know…I didn't even read the letter yet. I put it in the drawer…"

"Where I found it and saw my name on the envelope. Why would you have such a test taken without my knowledge?"

"Well, I thought there was no need for you to know about this. I mean, if it turned out Michael was your father, then you didn't need to know, right?"

"Did it ever occur to you that maybe I didn't
want
to know this? I have a dad. I don't need someone else, who I’ve never even heard of. Who is this…Erik Gundtofte? What kind of name is that even? It's stupid. Just like him."

Maya got up from her chair. My mother was looking at us with wide open eyes. "What is going on here, Emma?" she asked. "Michael isn't Maya's father?"

"This is none of your business," I said.

Maya looked at her grandmother. Then she threw herself at her. My mom hugged her and petted her head, while Maya cried her heart out.

My mother stroked her hair a couple of times. Then Maya turned towards me. "I hate you!" she yelled and grabbed her jacket before she stormed out of the house. I was about to run after her when my mother stopped me.

"Let her blow off steam. She'll probably just go to a friend's house. Don't worry. Give her some space."

I started crying. My mom hugged me. "I’ve made such a mess of things, Mom. I can't seem to do anything right!"

"There, there. It's going to be alright. Just you wait and see."

"I'm so glad you're here, Mom. I really need you now," I said.

"And I’m not going anywhere."

I sniffled and pulled away from her. I sat on a chair while she prepared food for me. Two pieces of rye bread. One with paté and the other with herrings in curry sauce. My favorite.

"Thanks," I said, while I ate. I had gotten really hungry.

"No problem," she said.

"What are you going to do about Arne?" I asked, in order to think about something else. I was worried about both Maya and Victor now. Morten had called me while I was in the car and said that the bomb wasn't a real bomb. It was a decoy, a fake. The killer hadn't wanted to blow any of us up. He wanted us to be in that situation…much like the one from the train. I was hoping that Morten and his colleagues would finally get a breakthrough in the case today while going through the crime scene at the bank, but my phone had been awfully quiet.

"Well I'll have to break the news to him, won't I?" she asked. "Do the respectable thing and tell him gently that it’s over."

"I hope he won't be too heartbroken and pee on our mail or anything," I said.

My mother laughed. "No. He won't do anything like that. He's a good man, Emma. Not that I know how to spot one even though he’s been right next to me for years, right?"

I shrugged. "Well, you see him now. And you married him in the first place, didn't you. You just got a little lost along the way. That happens."

"Could you ever see yourself getting together with Michael again?" my mom asked.

I shook my head. "That’s different. He has a new wife now and a child. He's leading an entirely new life and hardly even calls to talk to the kids anymore. He's out of the picture. "

"Well, you never know," my mom said and opened a beer for me.

"So, when are you planning on telling Arne?" I asked, as I took a sip. That hit the spot. Herrings and a beer was one of my favorite combinations. It helped me relax a little, as well.

"Well, he usually comes by around noon with the mail, right? I think I'll make him a cup of coffee."

"Give him the right stuff. Or else you'll give him a reason to get really mad," I said with a grin.

67

January 2008

S
AMUEL MANAGED TO TRASH
the entire living room before he locked himself inside of his room and finally went quiet. Alexandra and Poul stayed in their own bedroom until he was done, then snuck downstairs and looked at the damage. Alexandra clapped her hand against her mouth in distress and gasped.

"Oh my God. He’s destroyed everything, Poul."

She felt Poul's arm around her. "I know, honey. But they’re just things. We'll buy new ones. We knew he wouldn't take it well and, now that he is off his meds, there’s nothing to calm him down. He'll get over it."

"You think?"

"He's older now. It’s not like before. He just needs to remember the techniques that Ole taught him."

"I don't want to have to send him away again," Alexandra said. "Not now that it has been going so well."

"And we don't have to if he behaves. But I will not have him here if he has more of these tantrums. It's too dangerous with Olivia in the house."

"Samuel would never hurt her. He loves her. Sometimes I think she is the only one who gets him around here."

"He might not mean to, but she could get hit by something he's throwing. You know he can't control it once he takes off like he did tonight. He doesn't think."

Alexandra picked up a broken piece of an old lamp from the floor. "I loved this lamp," she said. "It used to be my grandmother's."

Poul helped her pick up the rest of the pieces and put them in the trash. Then they found a roll of garbage bags and started throwing everything out. Two hours later, they went to bed. It took Alexandra a while to calm down and she cried secretly for about an hour. She didn't want Poul to see how upset she really was, since she was afraid he would start resenting the boy again.

Finally, around midnight, she fell into a deep sleep.

A little later, she was pulled out of her sleep by a strange sound. She opened her eyes and looked at the clock. It was only two a.m. She blinked her eyes. What had woken her? She lifted her head and saw Samuel. He was standing by her bedside, staring at her with a strange look in his eyes.

"Sammy? What are you doing up? It's only two a.m. Did you have a bad dream?"

Suddenly, she was wide awake. She looked down at his PJs and his arm.

Oh my God. Oh my God! He is covered in blood! Is he holding a knife in his hand?

Alexandra sat up and looked at the boy. "Sammy, what are you doing with that knife? What have you done?"

That was when her heart stopped.

Olivia!

She stormed past Samuel into the nursery next door.

Please don't let this be true. Please don't let the blood be Olivia's! Please God! Please, NO!

Alexandra didn't even manage to finish the thought. Once she saw the blood on the crib, she knew it was too late. Samuel was behind her now; she turned and screamed into his face.

"What have you done!!!!?”

In his eyes, she saw nothing. No emotion of any kind. Just pitch blackness. No remorse, no regret, no
I'm sorry, Mom, the voices told me to do this
, no explanation. Nothing.

He opened his mouth and spoke: "You're stupid, Mom."

She barely saw what happened. She only felt the pain from the knife as it sank into her chest and made her heart stop immediately.

68

February 2014

M
ORTEN CALLED AGAIN TO
tell me it looked like they might be in luck.

"Looks like our friend have made a mistake," he said. "The security cameras were on the entire time while he placed Victor inside the bank. Well, not all of them, since he managed to shut most of them off, but one was still working; one, I'm guessing, he didn't know about. They had it installed just a week ago."

"That is wonderful news," I exclaimed.

"Yeah. Now we're going through the footage, but so far we haven't been able to see his face properly, since he's wearing a cap."

"No glasses or long hair?" I asked.

"Not this time, no. Maybe that's because we released the sketch of him. "

"But you can't see his face properly, huh?"

"No, but at least, so far, we can see him placing Victor and there is no longer any doubt about Victor’s innocence. So, you can breathe a little lighter now. It was a wild thing you did to take him home before we had him examined. Be glad you know me, since I managed to talk the officer in charge out of arresting you for destroying evidence."

"I couldn't let them touch Victor anymore. You know how he is. He can't take it. I had to get him out of there."

"I understand, but it took some talking before the officer in charge realized it was okay."

"Thanks," I said.

"No problem," Morten said.

"Now, go back to that footage," I said. "I want that bastard off the streets."

"Yes, ma'am!" Morten said and hung up.

I finished my food and the beer. I walked into the living room to check on Victor. He was sound sleep on the couch. I breathed a sigh of relief. He seemed calm now. That was good. I grabbed my phone and tried to call Maya, but she didn't answer. I sent her another text, telling her I was sorry and to come home so we could talk. I didn't like that she was out there while the killer was still on the loose.

Hopefully, Morten will catch him now.

I wondered about that Ole Knudsen character from the Inn and thought about calling him. I never really got to ask him why he left Hummelgaarden. I thought about just driving out there today to talk to him. I had a feeling he was more closely attached to this entire affair than we had thought at first. I walked back into the kitchen to my mom, who was doing the dishes. It was so nice to have her in the house. She lifted her head and looked out the window.

"There he is," she said and took off her apron. "How do I look?"

"Too good for someone who is about to crush a man's heart."

My mom shrugged. "Well I can't help it. He'll just have to mourn me, right?"

I chuckled. "Right. Good luck."

I found my laptop and placed it on the kitchen table, while listening to my mother open the front door and call for Arne to come up to the door.

"Poor guy," I mumbled. "He’ll never know what hit him."

I googled Ole Knudsen and found the Inn online. Then, I found a newspaper article dating back to 2008.

Employees Escaping Hummelgaarden
, was the title. I started reading.
Yet another of Hummelgaarden's counselors left the institution yesterday because of a disagreement with the management at City Hall.

"It is most unfortunate that Ole has chosen to leave us, but that's his choice
," a social worker named Marianne Moeller was quoted as saying.

Marianne Moeller? Wasn't that the woman who was found killed in her souvenir shop? Could hardly be a coincidence, could it? I continued, as I heard my mother talk to Arne and try to persuade him to come in for coffee, while he tried to explain that he was working and way too busy.

"I can't live with the choices that they're making at City Hall anymore,"
Ole Knudsen was quoted as saying.
"It's not human. The system is broken. They destroyed that family."

Family? What family? I kept reading and got my answer.

Earlier this week, a family tragedy occurred in a home here on Fanoe. A young boy named Samuel Holm killed his mother and younger sister with a knife in the middle of the night. Samuel was one of Ole Knudsen's patients, who he took care of in his free time by going swimming with him, since there was no room for Samuel at the institution. The city stopped Ole's treatment of Samuel, since he wasn't allowed to do it outside of work hours.

"Of course, I blame myself,"
Ole told the paper.
"I was doing a great job with the boy. I shouldn't have let City Hall stop me. I should have left this place much earlier and still seen Samuel. Maybe this tragedy wouldn't have happened."

Now, Ole Knudsen is planning on opening up an Inn in the middle of the island.

"I really can't see how this is something you can blame anyone for, tragedies happen all the time. We can't blame ourselves every time,
another social worker named Tine Solvang said.

I leaned back in my chair feeling that aha-moment. "So Ole is mad at the system. Ole decides to do something about it, to change it?"

My mom finally managed to get Arne inside the house. I heard them walk into the living room. I decided to let them have their privacy, hoping they wouldn't wake up Victor. I looked at the article again and again. A big picture of Ole Knudsen stared back at me.

Could it really be him?

"If the shoes fits…"

My mom entered the kitchen. She looked stressed out. "He'll be fine, Mom," I said. "He's a big boy."

She found two cups and poured coffee into them. "I know. I just really don't like to have to do this. What are you up to?"

"I think I might have found the identity of The Caring Killer."

"Really? That's interesting. Better tell Morten, then. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to break up with my boyfriend."

My mom left the room with a tray between her hands carrying cups and a plate of cookies. I chuckled and shook my head. Crazy old woman. Living the life of a teenager.

I decided to dig a little deeper on the story and googled
family tragedy on Fanoe Island.

Up came a lot of articles from 2008. I decided to open one and read through it, then looked at the picture. It was a nice picture of the family before the tragedy. Underneath it, the text said: