by Susan Lewis
Love you, A xxx
(PS – Will focus on the guys next.)
Making a mental note to forward this to Leo when she landed, Andee refused a second coffee and croissant from the steward and closed her eyes. Although none of this confirmed Tim’s theory, it wasn’t ruling it out either; in fact it was making her increasingly uneasy. But organ-trafficking? Really?
Feeling faintly queasy, she turned to gaze at the clouds. Nothing was making sense to her, from Alayna’s social media report, to Martyna’s comments about Penny, to John Victor Jr’s – Jonathan’s? – need for help.
After an easy pass through immigration Andee wheeled her new overnight bag through to Arrivals, where a portly, well-groomed woman of around fifty was displaying a board with her name on it. Going to her, Andee found herself responding to the warmth of the woman’s smile with some enthusiasm of her own.
‘I’m guessing you’re Selma,’ Andee said, as they shook hands.
‘Indeed I am,’ Selma replied, her gentle voice confirming her as the woman Andee had spoken to on the phone. She was also the ‘assistant’ who’d sent the email containing flight details. ‘I am very happy to meet you. Please come this way. The car is not far.’
With the pleasing anticipation of being in a country she’d never visited before mixing with some apprehension, Andee took in her surroundings as she walked alongside Selma to a large black Mercedes, where a chauffeur was already holding open a rear door.
‘Is this your first visit to Stockholm?’ Selma asked, as they merged with the traffic heading towards the city.
‘It is,’ Andee confirmed. ‘I read something recently about Sweden being in the top ten best places to live.’
Selma’s smile was full of pride. ‘It is a beautiful country, and Stockholm, as you will see, is a very special city. Maybe you already know that it is made up of many islands which are linked by, I think, forty-two bridges. This is why we call ourselves the Venice of the North. Our waterways are much wider, and very blue at this time of year. Plus, we have many quaintly cobbled streets, historic buildings and a magnificent palace in Gamla Stan, which is the old town. Of course there are also many boats and cafe´s on the waterfronts, and also some of the best restaurants in Scandinavia, possibly the world. And then there is the coffee.’
Andee’s eyes twinkled.
‘I am reading your mind,’ Selma told her mischievously, ‘which is why our first stop will be at a very special place which is not far from your hotel.’
Interested to hear that she would be in a hotel, Andee said, ‘When will I meet with Sven?’
Selma grimaced an apology and glanced at her watch. ‘I am afraid it cannot be today. I will explain over coffee, meantime, if you will forgive me there are some urgent calls I must make.’
Deciding now wasn’t the time to object to being kept waiting, Andee simply gazed out of the window, having no more success in reading the passing signs than in understanding whatever Selma was saying on the phone. She truly was in a foreign country, excluded by the language and possibly even the culture; however, she wasn’t feeling too anxious yet, only curious and even vaguely excited.
Checking her own phone as it rang, she saw it was Graeme and gladly clicked on. ‘Hi, how are you?’ she asked quietly.
‘I’m fine. Where are you? That wasn’t a British ringtone.’
‘I’m in Stockholm.’
‘Stockholm? Why?’
‘It’s a long story. I’ll tell you later. Have you ever been here?’
‘Yes, a few times. I used to go with a client to buy art at the Auktionsverket. How long are you going to be there?’
‘I’m not sure yet.’
‘I’m guessing it’s something to do with Penny?’
‘It is.’
‘Are you alone?’
‘Yes and no. I was invited by Sven Sylvander, who I haven’t met yet. He’s someone Penny’s son wants me to be in touch with.’ If Selma was listening she showed no sign of it.
‘Is Penny going to be at this meeting?’
‘I’ve no idea, but I don’t think so. Are you managing to get things back on track at your end?’
With a sigh he said, ‘Don’t get me started.’
‘Oh dear. How’s Nadia behaving?’
‘The way she usually behaves, passionately.’
Not sure she liked the answer, Andee said, ‘Is she with you?’
‘Yes. I mean, not at this moment, but she’s at the villa every day now and I really wish she’d go back to Spain for a while.’
Liking that answer much more, Andee fell silent for a moment, not sure what else she wanted to say, but not wanting to ring off either.
‘I miss you,’ he said softly.
Swamped by feeling, she said, ‘I miss you too.’
‘I’d like to be the one to show you Stockholm. It’s one of my favourite cities.’
‘If you can get here …’
‘If I could I’d be on the next flight.’
Forty minutes later, having journeyed along a motorway surrounded by more glorious pine forests than she’d ever seen in her life, to be greeted in the city by the most entrancing baroque architecture on just about every street corner, Andee was sitting outside a famous café in the Gamla Stan being invited to name her bean type, grind size and froth style.
The coffee shop was on a quaint, cobbled street adjacent to a waterfront with towering and colourful old houses soaring skywards, and a tantalising glimpse of the royal palace glistening in the bright midday sun.
When eventually their bespoke brews arrived Selma raised her cup and said, proudly, ‘Valkommen till Stockholm.’
‘Tack,’ Andee smiled, using the only Swedish word she’d managed to pick up from watching every episode of The Bridge.
‘When we are finished I will take you to your hotel,’ Selma told her. ‘It is not so far from here, in the area known as Ostermalm, which is like your Kensington or Knightsbridge in London. You will probably enjoy to freshen up a little before we begin our tour.’
Andee blinked. Tour? ‘Oh no, I really don’t want to put you to any trouble,’ she protested. ‘I’m quite …’
‘It is no trouble. I am happy to do it,’ Selma assured her, ‘and Sven insists that you should see something of our beautiful city before you leave. I’m afraid it isn’t possible for him to see you today, because he is very sick. He has – how do you say leukemi …?’
‘Leukaemia?’ Andee ventured, hoping she was wrong. Who’d wish it on anyone?
‘This is correct,’ Selma confirmed. ‘Yesterday he was receiving chemotherapy. He insisted he would be strong enough to see you today, but of course it is not true. He needs another day to regain some strength.’
‘Oh, goodness,’ Andee murmured. ‘I’m so sorry.’
‘We are all sorry, because we love him very much and sadly he is not going to recover. The doctors are keeping him with us for as long as they can, but not so long that his life becomes unbearable.’
Andee couldn’t think what to say as Selma sipped her coffee and waved to someone she knew. In the end she said, ‘Have you worked for Sven for long?’
Selma smiled. ‘Since I was twenty. He is a very good man to work for, which is why he is so much loved.’
Andee weighed up her next question, and decided simply to go for it. ‘Do you know my sister?’ she asked.
‘Oh yes, very well,’ Selma replied, clearly unfazed. ‘We call her Kate, which is what she prefers. Others know her as Michelle, and of course to you she is Penny.’
Andee had got stuck at Kate – the evil Kate Trask from East of Eden? – until the mention of Penny. ‘So you know who she really is?’ she asked incredulously.
Selma simply added more sugar to her coffee.
‘Is she here?’ Andee wanted to know.
‘No, we have not seen her since Jonathan disappeared.’
‘Jonathan? Her son?’
‘That’s right. He has been in touch with you?’
&nbs
p; ‘With my mother. He wanted me to contact Sven. Penny calls him John. John Victor.’
Selma’s eyebrows rose.
Hoping for more of a response, Andee waited, but none was forthcoming. ‘What did you mean when you said he’s disappeared?’ she asked.
‘He is not in contact with Kate or Sven.’
‘Why?’
‘It is Sven who must answer this question. I am here to keep you company for today and make sure that you have everything you need.’
Realising that Selma would have her instructions and that nothing she, Andee, could say would make her sway from them, Andee decided to resign herself to the wait and simply enjoy her tour.
By seven that evening she had crossed so many bridges, admired so much stunning architecture and gasped at such an abundance of picture-postcard views, many from Heaven, a rooftop bar in the Sodermalm district, that she couldn’t imagine why she’d never been here before. The city was far more fascinating – and friendly – than she’d expected, and she couldn’t help wishing Graeme was with her so she could enjoy his stories of previous visits.
Since she was eager to talk to him, she waited no longer than it took to get to her hotel room and pour herself a large glass of wine before connecting to his number. To her frustration she went through to voicemail, so after leaving a message for him to call as soon as he could, she sank into a plush armchair and opened her emails.
No more from Alayna, nor from Leo; however there was a curt note from Penny that immediately infuriated her.
For all these years I’ve left you alone, never digging into your life or trying to interfere with what you’re doing. It would be to your credit if you would afford me the same courtesy.
‘I can’t believe the nerve of her,’ she exploded to her mother when she got through. ‘It’s like she’s completely forgotten that she got in touch with us. And how dare she say she’s never dug into my life when she’s so blatantly been having me watched. I don’t suppose you’ve seen the boy again?’
‘I’d have told you if I had. I keep thinking about him though, and wondering why he said time was running out. What on earth do you think he means?’
‘I’ve no idea, Mum, but hopefully by this time tomorrow I’ll be able to give you an answer.’
The following morning Andee was already waiting in the hotel lobby when Selma and the chauffeur arrived to take her to meet Sven. Having consulted a guidebook she was aware that the area they were travelling through – Ostermalm – was home to some of Stockholm’s wealthiest residents, and this was very evident. The baroque and Renaissance buildings, immaculate in their upkeep and made glorious by ornate turrets, spires and onion domes, were as opulent and elegant as anything she’d seen in Paris or London, maybe even more so. She tried to imagine Penny moving around the area, speaking the language, meeting friends, shopping in the stylish boutiques, enjoying the history and charm. It wasn’t easy, but given how little she knew of her sister’s life that was hardly surprising.
Eventually they turned off a wide, busy boulevard with a tree-lined walkway down the centre of it into a quiet, triangular construct of exclusive mansion blocks. They came to a stop outside an ivory-coloured building with black wrought-iron balconies rising up over several floors, and a set of heavy black doors to mark the entrance.
‘Sven also has a home at Djursholm, overlooking the sea,’ Selma informed her as she put in a security code to enter the block. ‘It is where he prefers to be, but his treatment means he must spend most of his time in town.’
Concerned for how sick he actually was, Andee said, ‘Are you sure he’s up to seeing me today?’
‘Oh yes, he is looking forward to it.’ Selma nodded her thanks to a security guard who was showing them into an elevator.
At the fifth floor the doors opened and they were greeted by a slightly bent old man with a complexion like tree bark and an expression that appeared half happy, half tragic, the result, Andee suspected, of a stroke. ‘Thank you, Erik,’ Selma said gently. ‘You can tell Freja that we are here and will take coffee in the lilla salongen when she has it ready.’
‘Of course. It will be my pleasure,’ Erik responded with an awkward little bow.
Moved by the politeness of them speaking English, presumably for her benefit, Andee looked around the extraordinary circular entrance hall with its elaborate mid-European decor and wide marble staircase that curved up to the next level. There were statues and paintings everywhere, fresh flowers in large oriental urns and a rack filled with so many styles of walking cane that Sven – or someone in the household – must surely be a collector.
‘Through here,’ Selma invited, pushing open a large oak door with iron-studded hinges and, incongruously, but sweetly, a child’s drawing of a house pinned to the front. Underneath the drawing were the words Pappa’s Den.
‘We found it the other day while going through some things,’ Selma explained, ‘and we decided to put it up again.’
The lilla salongen turned out to be a cosy, oak-panelled room with tall sash windows along one wall offering views over dense green treetops, a black and gold marble fireplace with a gilt-framed mirror over the chimney breast, and three matching sofas in mahogany leather forming an intimate square around a circular glass table.
‘Sven will be with us shortly,’ Selma told her. ‘He favours this room above the others. It is less formal, he says.’
Andee was by now so riveted by the photographs on just about every surface that she was barely listening. Penny was in so many of them, staring out with watchful, almost solemn eyes, or seemingly trying to avoid the lens altogether. In some she was smiling, but only a few, and in others she was much slimmer and younger than she was now. Andee presumed the older man who often featured alongside her was Sven, and the young boy was surely John – Jonathan – at various ages. Selma also appeared, but the woman who really caught Andee’s attention, apart from Penny, was a truly striking beauty. There was so much gaiety radiating from her in just about every shot that Andee felt a strong desire to meet her.
‘Sven’s wife, Ana,’ Selma said softly, seeing Andee transfixed by the woman’s appearance.
Before Andee could respond, a door beside the fireplace opened and the man from the photographs came to life. For a bizarre moment Andee felt thrown, for as strikingly similar as he was to his captured images, there was also an enormous change. The shock of white hair had gone, as had the swarthy complexion. His age-spotted head was completely bald, and the skin on his face was waxen and crusted. He was painfully thin and stooped, but his eyes, behind their frameless spectacles, were such a deep and arresting blue it felt almost as hard to look at them as it was to look away.
‘Andee? May I call you Andee?’ he asked, holding out an unsteady hand to shake. This was the voice she’d heard on the phone, low and gravelly and slightly hypnotic.
‘Yes, of course,’ she replied, feeling the knotted bones of his fingers as her own closed around them.
‘Thank you for coming to Stockholm,’ he said, holding her gaze in a way that felt authoritative yet reassuring. ‘I am sure Selma has explained why it is not possible – or let us say it is not easy – for me to travel these days.’
‘Yes, she has,’ Andee replied, ‘and I’m very sorry to hear what you’re going through.’
He dismissed it with a wave of his hand, which he turned into a gesture for her to sit down. ‘Ah, here is Freja with our refreshments. I hope you’ll forgive me for not taking anything myself – doctor’s orders – but please enjoy the coffee, and Freja makes the most excellent kladdkaka, which I expect you know is a Swedish version of chocolate cake.’
Andee hadn’t known it, but she was happy to try it, along with the coffee, which turned out to be excellent. As for the patisserie … She wondered how she was going to limit herself to only one slice.
‘Selma will stay with us,’ Sven informed her, as Freja set a bottle of mineral water and a glass on the table next to him. ‘I don’t think I’m going to
collapse or die in the next hour or so, but just in case, it would be awkward for you to deal with it alone.’
The merriment in his eyes was so infectious that Andee had to smile.
‘Now, I think we should come straight to the point of why you’re here, don’t you?’ he said. ‘Jonathan gave you my number, yes? Have you seen him?’
Startled by the suddenness of the question, Andee said, ‘No, but my mother has. He gave her your number to pass to me.’ She wondered whether to bring up the issue of the name, but decided to leave it for now. ‘Why doesn’t he approach me himself?’ she asked.
Batting the air, as though there might be a fly near him, he said, ‘Because he suspects his mother is having you watched, and I am sure he is correct about that.’
Andee’s eyes widened. Apparently he didn’t find anything inappropriate about this, or if he did he wasn’t showing it. ‘But there is always email, and the phone,’ she pointed out.
‘He believes his mother to be capable of monitoring all things.’
Andee held his gaze, an unspoken request for him to expand. When he didn’t, she said, ‘Is she?’
He smiled. ‘I really have no idea, but I can tell you that she is very resourceful.’
‘So what is going on? Why am I here?’
‘To answer that I must tell you that I have not spoken to Jonathan in several weeks, but I imagine he has put us in touch because he wants me to ask you to help him.’
Andee’s eyebrows rose. ‘Why does he need help?’
Sven shifted uncomfortably, but waved Selma back to her chair as she made to get up. After sipping some water, he said, ‘He has got himself into a situation that does not please his mother. It could end up causing her some … difficulties and she is very keen to avoid that. I’m afraid he can be as stubborn as she is.’
Realising she needed to back up slightly, Andee said, ‘How did he even know about me?’
‘Ah, yes. This is a good question. He knows because I told him, and once his mother realised I had done this she guessed he would go to you if things should go wrong between them. I confess this was my intention, although the current circumstances – I refer to the reason for his disappearance – were not in existence at the time I told him he had another family. I did it as a form of insurance. Once my cancer was diagnosed I needed to be sure someone would be there for him should things ever become … complicated, as they are apt to do with his mother.’ He paused as Selma refilled his glass and passed it to him. ‘He has come to you now,’ he said, after taking a sip, ‘because he feels that his situation is … It is becoming urgent. He should let me help, but he won’t because of my health, and to be frank, I’m not sure he fully trusts me. This makes me sad, of course, but I understand it.’
