I gave him my address and staggered into the hall as he made the call. When I looked at myself in the mirror, I had to squint. I looked like come fucking help me.
On my phone was a new message from Amina.
What’s going on? Where are you???
Heading home, I wrote.
Chris followed me down to the street and hugged me. It felt stiff. I was convinced I would never see him again, and as I got into the taxi I regretted having given him my real address.
57
Michael Blomberg has a new shirt on: dolphin-blue with white buttons and rolled-up sleeves, and a sloppily folded handkerchief in his breast pocket. He leans way over the table with an oversized smile.
“I really want you to see your mother. We need to talk, the three of us.”
“I can’t,” I say.
The very thought scares the shit out of me.
“What do you want me to tell her, then?” Blomberg asks. “That you don’t want to see your own mother?”
Of course I want to see her. There’s nothing I want more. But Blomberg would never understand.
“Tell the truth. I can’t deal with it.”
He sighs heavily.
“Or else lie,” I suggest. “I’m sure you’re competent enough to come up with a good lie.”
The big lawyer shakes his head.
“I’ve known Ulrika for many years…”
“I know. You know Mom pretty well, right?”
Blomberg stiffens. This isn’t the first time I’ve made such an insinuation, and it won’t be the last. I’m happy to let him wonder. Ignorance is power.
“Do you know Margaretha Olsen too?” I ask.
“I don’t exactly know her. She’s a—”
“Professor.”
He is startled and makes an annoyed grimace.
“Lund is a small…”
“Pond.”
“City,” he says. “Lund is a small city.”
“Does she think I’m guilty too?”
“Who? What?”
“Margaretha Olsen. Does she?”
“I have no idea about that whatsoever,” Blomberg says, scratching behind his ear. “What does it matter? Who cares what people think? The important thing is for us to demonstrate reasonable doubt in court.”
“Is that really the important thing? Then why does it feel like everyone has already made up their minds about what happened?”
“What ‘everyone’ are you talking about?”
“The police, the prosecutor, like, the whole world.”
Blomberg squirms, but sounds as certain as always.
“That’s called confirmation bias. When you have a theory and ignore everything that contradicts it. It’s extremely common. Doesn’t have to be conscious at all. And likely isn’t.”
“But isn’t an investigation supposed to be objective?”
He shrugs.
“We’re talking about human beings here. We’re only human, all of us.”
Then he fingers the black beads of his necklace and seems to brace himself before dropping his little bomb.
“Linda Lokind.”
He waits me out with his gaze.
“What about her?” I ask.
“Do you know her?”
“Not know, exactly. Lund is a small…”
“Pond.”
Blomberg leans back and winks.
“Now tell me, Stella. You have had contact with Linda Lokind, haven’t you?”
“Had contact?” It sounds so formal. “I mean, I know who she is.”
“You do?”
Blomberg nods slowly. The question is, how much does he know?
“I met her once or twice. That’s it.”
“But you know she and Christopher Olsen were together for a few years? They lived together.”
I try to act surprised, but Blomberg hardly seems convinced.
“I’m planning to present Linda Lokind as an alternative perpetrator.”
“What? To the police?”
He nods.
“You can’t do that!”
I feel dizzy and hot. My mind is spinning.
“But it could mean your freedom,” Blomberg says.
Does he believe Linda is the one who killed Chris? I reach for a glass of water and accidentally splash some on the table when I go to pour. Blomberg follows my every movement with interest.
“Linda Lokind filed a police report on Christopher Olsen after they broke up last spring. According to her, Olsen was a real tyrant. But there was no proof, so the investigation was closed pretty quickly. A reasonable motive for revenge, right? And it doesn’t matter whether it was true or not. In Lokind’s mind, Olsen was a violent man who assaulted her in the most horrific ways.”