by Viveca Sten
“Not for the past few days.”
“How about texting her?” Ulrika glanced at her watch, less than ten minutes to go. She needed to end this call and go inside.
“You’re my lawyer,” Kovač said. “It’s your job to fix this. She can’t just take Lukas and disappear—he’s my son, too.”
Ulrika paused on the top step. “I’ve got an idea—I just need to check on a couple of things. Come by my office at four thirty this afternoon.”
CHAPTER 44
Nora was immediately struck by the idyllic charm of Körsbärsvägen. Every house seemed to have a perfectly manicured lawn and apple trees. In a month or so the gardens would begin to bloom.
“Look at that,” Leila said, pointing to the front door of number twenty-three. The frosted glass was broken, and someone had stuck a piece of cardboard on the inside. There were shards of glass on the ground. “I wonder what happened here?” She moved closer. “That’s a thick pane of glass—it took some breaking.”
Nora pushed the shards aside with her foot.
“How about this for a theory?” Leila went on. “Andreis Kovač turned up and threatened Mina’s parents. Her mother had a heart attack, and when Mina found out, she changed her mind about talking to us.”
“That would certainly explain a great deal.”
“Let’s hope her father is more talkative than Mina,” Leila said as she rang the doorbell. They heard the sound echoing through the house, but no one came.
Leila had contacted the hospital on the way over, and had been told that Stefan had gone home to rest for a few hours. He ought to be here. She rang the bell again, and eventually Stefan appeared.
He looked haggard. His hair was all over the place, his chin covered in gray-white stubble. The last time they saw him he’d been a different man.
“What are you doing here?”
“We wondered if you could spare us a few minutes? It’s about your son-in-law.”
The flash of fear in Stefan’s eyes confirmed their suspicions. Kovač had definitely been to the house and threatened them. “It’s not very convenient,” he mumbled.
“It won’t take long,” Nora countered.
“No one needs to know about this,” Leila added. “But it would be best if you let us in.” She made a sweeping gesture with her hand. “In case anyone wonders why we’re standing on your doorstep.”
Stefan rubbed his forehead, then stepped aside. There was glass on the floor of the hallway, too. A white dustpan and brush stood in one corner.
“Coffee?” Stefan offered, leading the way into the neat and tidy kitchen. The house was beautifully kept, with typical Swedish furniture in pale wood. Nora recognized the beige corner sofa from the IKEA catalog; it was one of their most popular models.
A safe, secure, middle-class home.
Stefan switched on the coffee machine and placed two blue mugs on the table. He was clearly taking his time in order to avoid answering their questions.
“So how are you?” Nora asked.
Stefan continued to busy himself over by the counter. His shoulders were hunched, his movements jerky, as if he couldn’t quite remember which parts of his body served which purpose. “Do you have children?” he said over his shoulder.
“Two sons and a daughter. The boys are twenty and sixteen, and Julia’s almost seven.”
Stefan turned around. “Mina’s our only child. You think you’re going to be able to protect them from all the bad stuff, make sure no one ever hurts them . . .” His voice died away. “We were wrong.”
The last of the coffee dripped down into the pot.
“What happened to the front door?” Nora asked.
“It was an accident.”
“What kind of an accident?”
Stefan searched for the right words. “Some kids throwing stones. I need to call a glazier, but I haven’t had time.” He poured their coffee.
“How’s your wife? We heard she was in the hospital.”
His pale face lost even more color. “How do you know that?”
“We saw Mina this morning.”
“Mina?” He sank down onto a chair. “Did she tell you? She wasn’t supposed to—” He broke off.
“What were you going to say?” Leila encouraged him gently.
He hid his face in his hands.
“We’d really like to hear it from you, too, in your own words—if you feel up to it,” Leila added.
“If Katrin dies, it’s his fault,” Stefan mumbled between his fingers. “He’s a monster.”
“Start at the beginning,” Nora said.
Stefan lowered his hands and gazed in the direction of the front door. He clenched his fists, the thin blue veins standing out. “I think I ought to speak to Mina first,” he said, getting to his feet as if he’d already said too much. “I really need to get back to the hospital. Maybe we could discuss this some other time?”
He almost threw them out; they hadn’t even touched their coffee. Back on the pavement, Leila sighed. “Someone else who’s terrified of Andreis Kovač.”
Nora clutched her car key. “We’re not scared,” she said. “We’re going to make sure we put him away.”
Bosnia, February 1993
Selma was sitting on the sofa in the living room with an old magazine. She hadn’t turned the page for a long time; she was simply staring at the pictures and listening to the erratic rhythm of her heartbeat.
Fear had become such a normal state of mind that she no longer remembered how she had felt before all this. The helplessness was the worst, knowing that she couldn’t do anything, that her fate was determined by factors beyond her control.
The phone rang.
Selma knew it was her sister. She called at this time most days to try to persuade them to leave, to come to her in Croatia until everything calmed down. Their parents were still trapped in Sarajevo. It was months since they’d heard anything.
Maybe they were already dead.
She couldn’t cope with watching the news reports anymore, the starvation and desperation in the city. The population of Sarajevo had been under siege and bombardment for almost ten months. Her father was almost seventy, her mother sixty and diabetic. Selma knew in her heart that their chance of survival was very small, but she tried to push the thought away.
The village where Aunt Jasmina and Uncle Adnan lived had also been attacked, just as she’d feared. It was impossible to contact them; she’d tried to call many times, but she couldn’t get through. The small amount of information that had trickled out was so horrific that she couldn’t bring herself to believe the whispers.
Selma shivered and rubbed her hands together, but it didn’t help much. Andreis was sitting by the window, staring out at the snow-covered garden.
The only good thing about the snow was that it made the days lighter. The electricity came and went. Sometimes rockets illuminated the sky, but then she hid in the pantry with the children and hoped the attack would soon be over.
Last night Andreis had crawled into bed beside her once again. Emir was already there; it was too cold to leave him in the crib. The three of them had lain there, close together. Her beautiful little boy was scared of the dark now. He was too frightened to be alone at night, and refused to hide in the cramped cellar beneath the kitchen, even though it was the safest place in the house. He suffered from nightmares and had sudden, inexplicable outbursts of rage.
Zlatko was often missing at night, but Selma didn’t dare ask where he went. He was rarely sober when he got home, and he was always in a bad mood.
They’d stopped talking to each other.
The more he sensed her silent reproach, the more aggressive he became. Sometimes she wished he didn’t have a bad leg so that he would have been called up, like most other men. It would have been easier if he’d been at the front. Then she could have worried about his safety instead of dreading him coming home drunk and spoiling for a fight.
She saw Andreis blow on his fingertips. She knew he
was cold in spite of the two sweaters he was wearing, plus long johns under his jeans. She hoped he wasn’t hungry, too; the little food they had was earmarked for dinner.
There was a knock on the door.
Blanka brought the cold into the house. She was wearing a coat that was far too big. Her cheeks were red, eyes wide.
“Have you heard what’s happened in Gornji Vakuf?” she said before she’d even taken off her scarf.
Selma put down the magazine. “I don’t want to hear any more bad news. Please tell me something that will cheer me up instead!” She could see from Blanka’s face that wasn’t going to happen. Her friend was on the verge of tears.
“Croatia has attacked the Bosnian army!” she sobbed. “Now we’re at war with them, too!”
“That’s impossible.” Selma felt sick. Was that why her sister had tried to call not long ago? To pass on the unthinkable? “They’re our allies,” she whispered. “We’re fighting the Serbs together.”
Blanka sank down on the sofa and pressed her hand to her mouth, struggling to stay in control. “Everyone’s fighting everyone now,” she said quietly.
Selma’s cheeks were already wet. Blanka reached out and placed a hand on hers.
“There’s no hope for our country now. We’re all going to die before this war is over.”
CHAPTER 45
Nora yawned; it was definitely time to go home. She gathered up the documents she’d been studying for the past hour and put them in the filing cabinet behind the desk.
It was a relatively simple case, but she’d found it difficult to concentrate on the details. Mina kept coming into her mind, which was frustrating; she’d already spent far too many hours on Andreis Kovač over the past few days. Jonathan wouldn’t be impressed if she neglected the rest of her commitments. Each individual prosecutor’s statistics were meticulously analyzed, especially after the latest media outcry over the length of time it took the Economic Crimes Authority to deal with its cases. The Authority had been heavily criticized for the fact that preliminary investigations seemed to take forever before charges were even filed.
Her office phone rang; she didn’t recognize the number.
“This is Herman Wibom,” a polite voice informed her. “Am I disturbing you?”
“Absolutely not.” Nora leaned back on her chair. They were both on the same side, after all, and she needed Wibom to help her persuade Mina to testify against her husband.
“I’ve just spoken to Ulrika Grönstedt—she’s Andreis Kovač’s attorney.”
“Yes, I’ve met her.”
“She’s been informed that I’m representing Mina.”
“Oh yes?” Nora was doing her best not to hurry him along. She wanted to say get to the point, but that probably wouldn’t help. He was like some long-winded old relic from the eighteenth century.
“I’m afraid she’s delivered an ultimatum.”
Nora sat up straight. “Sorry?”
“She claims that Mina has removed her client’s child without permission, and has therefore committed a criminal act.” He sighed. “If Mina doesn’t return the boy to her client, Ulrika Grönstedt is going to file a complaint with the police.”
It couldn’t be true. “Seriously? Her client has beaten his wife black and blue! Are you telling me he wants her reported to the police because she’s too scared to stay at home?”
Wibom sounded deeply unhappy as he went on: “She is unilaterally preventing the other parent from having contact with his child.”
“You’ve got to be joking!”
So Grönstedt was intending to use the Penal Code in order to force Mina to return to that appalling man. Nora grabbed the blue book and quickly turned to chapter 7, which dealt with family law. There was no ambiguity in section 4:
A person who without authorization separates a child under fifteen years of age from the person who has the custody of the child, shall, unless the crime is one against personal liberty, be sentenced for arbitrary conduct concerning a child to a fine or imprisonment for at most one year. The same applies if a person having joint custody with another of a child under fifteen years of age without good reason arbitrarily carries off the child or if the person who is to have the custody of the child without authorization takes possession of the child and thereby takes the law into his or her own hands.
She quickly skimmed through the rest. Her attention was caught by the final sentence:
If the crime against the provisions of the first or second paragraph is gross, the accused shall be sentenced to imprisonment for at least six months and at most four years.
“Grönstedt repeated several times that the mother had taken Lukas without his father’s agreement,” Wibom said. “He’s determined to fight for his rights.”
“She can’t be serious! Mina certainly has good reason in the eyes of the law to take the child—surely there can’t be any doubt about that?”
“The parents have joint custody, as I understand it. Andreis Kovač is adamant that Mina had no right to remove the boy from his home. Grönstedt stressed that he’s begged her to come back many times, but Mina has refused to accede to his demands.” He still sounded like a legal textbook. “As far as I’m aware, there is currently no proof that Mina’s husband assaulted her, and Mina denies that any such assault was perpetrated. Therefore, the court cannot take such an allegation into account.”
Theoretically, Wibom was right. Mina had never formally altered her original statement, in which she’d said that she’d tripped and fallen. As long as she refused to testify, she couldn’t cite Andreis’s violence as a reason for leaving him and taking Lukas with her.
The idea that this could be exploited in order to force her to give up her son was totally unacceptable. If Mina had been terrified of standing up in court before, that was nothing compared to the situation in which she found herself now.
Admittedly Ulrika Grönstedt’s job was to represent her client, but this was one of the worst things Nora had ever experienced. Did the woman have no integrity? Was she really prepared to go to any lengths to help Kovač force his wife and son to come home?
She must know her client; she must realize what a total shit he was.
“That’s absolutely ridiculous,” Nora said, slamming the Penal Code shut.
What precedents were there in this kind of case? Nora had no idea; she’d never dealt with family law or custody issues. Before moving to the Economic Crimes Authority, she’d been employed as a legal adviser with a bank for fifteen years.
A couple of colleagues passed her door, and the sound of their lively conversation penetrated into Nora’s office.
Herman Wibom sounded very unhappy. “Ulrika Grönstedt stressed that there’s going to be a custody battle over the boy, and that things don’t look good for the mother. Even if her actions aren’t deemed punishable by law, she could lose custody on a temporary basis if social services carry out their own assessment.” He cleared his throat. “I thought you ought to be made aware of the situation, given what you said to me this morning about persuading Mina to testify.”
Nora thought it was unlikely that Grönstedt’s new tactic would make Mina more inclined to stand up in court. “Have you spoken to Mina about this?”
“I think it’s better if I do it face to face. It’s too late today; I’ll go over there tomorrow.”
Nora pushed the Penal Code away. She wanted to hit someone or something but didn’t quite know who or what. “Did Grönstedt have anything else to say?”
“She’s demanding that Mina hand Lukas back to his father within three days—so on Thursday at the latest.”
“And if Mina refuses?”
“Then she’ll go ahead and report Mina to the police, and at the same time she’ll contact social services and request that the father is granted sole custody.”
“Sole custody.”
“‘Because the mother is unstable, and isn’t prepared to cooperate with the child’s father.’ I’m sorry, but that’s exactly
what she said.”
CHAPTER 46
Leila opened the door of the interview room at the Economic Crimes Authority. Dino Herco was already there. She’d deliberately made him wait for a few minutes; there was no harm in marking her territory.
Interestingly, he’d arrived without a lawyer. Presumably he wanted as few people as possible to know he’d been asked to come in, or he was hoping that this was the end of it, and that they’d get tired of him if he repeated his lies often enough.
Whichever it might be, Leila had every intention of exploiting the situation.
She shook hands and sat down at the table; someone had scratched the surface with a sharp object.
She read out the obligatory details for the tape, then opened her file as she considered the best way to begin. She should have brought a colleague along, but no one was available. It would be fine; she didn’t want to postpone the interview until tomorrow.
Dino Herco couldn’t sit still; he kept changing position. His nails were bitten to the quick, and there were little sores around his cuticles. Leila hadn’t noticed this when she was in his apartment; she was sure she would have if his fingertips had been in such a state.
This was a good sign—she was determined to do her best to increase the pressure on him.
“We’ve checked out the information you gave us the last time we saw you. There’s no doubt that the call to emergency services came from your cell phone.”
“I told you—it was stolen.”
“There’s no record of the offense.”
“I didn’t get around to reporting it.”
“And there’s no insurance claim.”
“I didn’t get around to that either.”
Leila decided to take a risk. “Where were you last Saturday night?”
“Sorry?”
“Someone went to the home of Mina Kovač’s parents and threatened them at about ten o’clock in the evening. The window in the front door was smashed; there was glass everywhere. The police were called.”
