The Woman in the Hotel Read online

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Copyright © 2018 by Sara Blaedel

  Translated by Søren Markers

  Cover copyright © 2018 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  Hachette Book Group supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright. The purpose of copyright is to encourage writers and artists to produce the creative works that enrich our culture.

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book without permission is a theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like permission to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), please contact [email protected]. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

  Grand Central Publishing

  Hachette Book Group

  1290 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10104

  grandcentralpublishing.com

  twitter.com/grandcentralpub

  First Edition: December 2018

  Grand Central Publishing is a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc. The Grand Central Publishing name and logo is a trademark of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.

  The Hachette Speakers Bureau provides a wide range of authors for speaking events. To find out more, go to www.hachettespeakersbureau.com or call (866) 376-6591.

  ISBN: 978-1-5387-3290-8

  E3-20181015-DANF

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  Also by Sara Blaedel

  About the Author

  Discover More Sara Blaedel

  1

  The blow landed with such violent force that he was slammed against the wall and momentarily lost his balance.

  John Lind had been heading toward the printer to get his article. He had noticed that the door to the editorial office was open, but he had not heard any footsteps.

  The club hit him again, and this time he felt his own blood dripping as pain exploded in the right side of his head. He instinctually attempted to protect himself with his hands, but they were knocked out of the way by the next blows.

  Is it money you…

  He didn’t have time to finish the question before he was kicked hard from behind, knocking him down. Then a barrage of punches and kicks hailed down on him, until his consciousness withdrew in a fog.

  He made one last attempt to get up before the club came down on him again, connecting with his skull with a crunching sound. Then, the light faded.

  * * *

  As the smoke twisted lazily toward the ceiling, Camilla Lind let her gaze follow it while she emptied her beer. The Friday bar at the Danish daily Morgenavisen had evolved into an actual party when the sub-editor put out more beer and wine and the youngest intern in the newsroom connected a pair of loudspeakers to his computer, turning up the volume of the music.

  Camilla glanced at her wristwatch and noted that it was almost nine o’clock. The alcohol had drawn out little beads of sweat on her upper lip, and by now it was several hours since she and a couple of the other “mid-forties journalists” from the culture section had decided to stop going to the yard every time they wanted a smoke. That had provoked some tart comments—mostly from some of the younger female journalists, who still exchanged glances every time a lighter was drawn.

  Taking in the position of the hands of her watch, she realized that she’d lost track of time. She had said she would be home an hour ago, but one beer had led to another, and suddenly she’d forgotten all about David, who was back in the apartment with her son, Markus. Her boyfriend had even offered to go shopping and have dinner ready when she got home.

  Camilla heaved a sigh while rummaging through her bag for her cell phone, thinking about a plausible excuse.

  The others were discussing Bruce Springsteen and his upcoming performance as the main attraction at the Roskilde Festival.

  “There’s a bottle of cognac in it for you, if you assign me to it,” Balder tried, draining his beer while straining to focus on the editor of the culture section.

  “I’d rather spend an extended weekend with a mummy than forty-five minutes with the Boss,” the younger colleague assigned to cover the concert quipped.

  * * *

  “Shut up, kiddo,” Camilla interrupted. She was about to defend her old idol when she spotted the eight missed calls from David on her phone. And another four from Markus. She couldn’t deal with calling them and explaining. Instead, she sent a couple of short text messages and was about to turn off the phone when it rang in her palm.

  She nodded when her colleagues asked if she wanted another beer and was fumbling around to reject the call when she noticed the area code on the screen. It wasn’t like her stepmom to call this late on a Friday night, so Camilla answered it, pushing past the others who were packed around the oblong editorial table.

  “It’s your dad,” Eva Lind said as Camilla came out into the hallway. “He’s been assaulted. It’s very serious; it happened down at the paper.”

  The words hurtled along without pause. Camilla’s parents had divorced when she was eight years old, but she’d been mature enough to decide that she wanted to live with her dad and stay in Skagen. The last time she’d seen him had been four months ago, when she was home and visiting him and the stepfamily. During her childhood years, they’d grown to feel almost like her own mom and siblings.

  “He’s just been scanned at the hospital in Frederikshavn, and now they’re moving him to the neurosurgical ward in Aalborg. It’s his skull. They don’t know if he’ll survive.”

  While Eva talked, Camilla let herself slide onto the floor. It hadn’t been more than a couple of hours since she’d spoken to her dad, and now she visualized him. John Lind, editor-in-chief, and owner of the small independent weekly SkagensPosten and, furthermore, proprietor of a reputable printing house specializing in exclusive art books.

  “He was unconscious when the ambulance arrived,” Camilla heard her stepmom say. The beer was beginning to surge up her throat. She leaned her head against the wall in an attempt to regain some measure of control over herself.

  “They think he was hit with a club or a bat. There was blood; a lot of blood. Michael is down there now.”

  Michael Eskildsen had been the love of Camilla’s youth; they’d gone to school together. Now he was a detective at the small police station in Skagen. It was a long time since she had seen him. Visits to her childhood home were few and far between.

  “You’d better come home. Michael has already booked a ticket for you on the late flight. He’ll make sure you’re picked up in Aalborg.”

  * * *

  The flight was scheduled to depart at 10:50 p.m. She asked the cab to wait while she hurried up to her apartment to pack a bag.

  Markus had fallen asleep on the couch, and David was waiting for her in the hallway with the door open and a worried look on his face. Camilla had called him on the way from the paper. For a minute, she’d been relieved to have such a dramatic excuse to trump all of his reproaches and accusations. But none came. Instead, he helped her pack and watched as she went into the living room and kissed Markus on the cheek and pulled her fingers through his hair.

  “I can move in here for a couple of days,” David suggested as they went down the stairs.

  Camilla gratefully accepted the offer. She ha
dn’t even thought about what she was going to do with her son, and there was no one else to take care of him. After the cabdriver had taken her bag, she and David hastily kissed good-bye.

  “Promise to call?” David wanted to hold her hand, but she withdrew it and got into the cab. She saw him wave but leaned her head back against the headrest. Right now, she couldn’t cope with anything but getting to Aalborg in a hell of a hurry. Before it was too late.

  As she sat in the plane, more flashes of memory emerged. The last time she’d seen her dad, he had been full of energy. On Easter Saturday, he had arranged a special exhibition at Klitgaarden; he’d rounded up numerous Skagen paintings that were privately owned and had therefore never before been accessible to the public. It was typical of her dad to get access to things like that, Camilla thought. When he put his mind to something, there was no holding him back. She drank a cup of coffee on the plane and thought about the latest story that had attracted her father’s attention. It was about Danish straw men who bought up houses in Skagen for rich Norwegians, who then rented them out, making a killing.

  Camilla had helped him confirm it, and she had several Norwegian sources who’d candidly admitted to owning houses in Skagen, even though it was illegal for foreigners to own and rent out property. Her dad had enough exposing articles to run a whole series and had carefully planned to run it now, at the verge of peak season. The first one had just been printed and outraged letters to the editor were pouring in, but maybe the whole thing would quiet down if the rest of the series didn’t see print.

  It was half past midnight when she arrived at the hospital. The ambience in the deserted hallways felt heavy with the night and the muted lighting. They were all there: her stepmother and her two stepsiblings. Tina was the first to get up when Camilla came through the revolving doors to the neurosurgical ward, and without words, the two embraced. Just then, a doctor and a nurse emerged from the bay where John Lind lay.

  “He’s sustained a serious skull fracture. During the brain scan, hemorrhage in the cerebral cortex was localized. We’ll put him on a respirator while we determine if he’ll need surgery. Tomorrow we’ll be able to tell you a bit more.”

  Tomorrow, Camilla thought. So the doctor assumes that he’ll still be alive then.

  “If he makes it through the night, that is,” the doctor said with a worried expression on his face before allowing them to enter the bay one at a time.

  “You go first,” Eva said, giving Camilla a gentle push in the back.

  She saw her dad lying there with his eyes closed. His face was grotesquely swollen and was a blackish-violet color from the blows. The left side of his head was covered by a big gauze bandage.

  She gingerly sat down at the edge of the bed and took his hand.

  “Bloody fucking hell,” she mumbled, while stifled sobs made her throat constrict. Then she felt a small squeeze in her hand. He still had both his eyes closed when she squeezed back.

  She sat for a while, stroking his hand and gazing at its back, where the veins protruded. Then she leaned forward.

  “I’m going down to the paper tomorrow to sort out the readers’ letters and make sure the best ones are picked for printing, and then I’ll publish the next straw man article, to keep the readers’ attention.”

  She paused briefly.

  “But you have to promise not to go dying on me during the night. Or tomorrow, for that matter. Deal?”

  She stopped and reflected that maybe this was not the time for their usual tones of voice. On the other hand, neither of them would be better off if she broke down sobbing. It would only serve to make her father even more aware that this might be the last time they were together. If indeed he were conscious enough to perceive that. Camilla felt another squeeze in her hand and assumed that the deal was done. She bent down and kissed his palm; she didn’t dare get close to his battered face.

  “See you tomorrow,” she said, getting up. She lingered briefly before she left the bay.

  * * *

  That night, Eva made a bed for Camilla in the living room. Now she lay on the couch with a cigarette in one hand and her cell phone in the other. She was speaking to her boss at Morgenavisen and repeating, somewhat annoyed, that he didn’t have to transfer somebody else to her assignments.

  “I’ll be back Monday morning,” she said, reaching for the ashtray a second before the ashes fell onto the carpet. “I’ll fly home Sunday. I’ll have enough time to iron my shirts before I go,” she added, promising that she would be well prepared and presentable for the ceremony, when Denmark turned over the EU Presidency to Cyprus. Actually, it was mostly the prospect of a couple of days in the sun that had made her push for the assignment, but now she regretted it.

  She squashed out the cigarette and thought intensely with her eyes closed. Maybe she was away from Markus too much? But she hadn’t planned to go to Skagen when she’d made the deal about going to Cyprus.

  Camilla had been raising him alone since he was a year-and-a -half, and now David was struggling to take on the role of Markus’s dad. She was torn from her quiet thoughts when the kitchen door was ripped open and she heard her childhood boyfriend, Detective Michael Eskildsen, shout:

  “There’s a fire down at the editorial office. Camilla, you’d better come with me.”

  2

  Three fire trucks were parked in front and the flames were licking up the walls and eating through the roof as dense smoke wafted toward the sky.

  Michael parked right outside of SkagensPosten. Camilla got out of the car, shaken, and trailed him as he went over to talk to the inspector.

  “It was started deliberately, no doubt about that,” an elderly fire chief said, nodding gravely toward a shattered window. “Looks like there was gasoline in the bottles that were thrown through the windows.”

  “Was anybody in there?” Camilla asked, stepping closer. “What about H.C.?”

  Hans Christian was SkagensPosten’s only full-time journalist, and he had worked at the paper for as long as Camilla could remember.

  The inspector shook his head. “Nobody was there. We’re trying to get the fire under control before it spreads further.”

  The soot had blackened the white wall and the water formed small pools, but the fire was still too violent for Camilla to get close enough to view the extent of the damages.

  “What in the world is going on?” Camilla exclaimed, and she put her hands in front of her face to shield it from the heat of the flames. She shook her head uncomprehendingly as Michael began pulling her away from the fire. “It must be the same people who beat up my dad.”

  She glanced once more at the flames before turning her back to the fire trucks and the men who still struggled to get the fire under control. Her chest buzzing with impotence and disquiet, she slowly started walking while Michael told her that the police had found no traces of the perpetrators of the assault, except for a married couple who thought they had seen two people leaving the paper’s small parking lot on a moped.

  Camilla crossed the street and began walking home.

  * * *

  It was almost a week since John Lind had been put on a respirator in the neurosurgical ward. According to the doctors, it was a small miracle that he survived, but it was hard for Camilla to reconcile herself with the hospital’s latest announcement.

  “His speech center is damaged and there’s a high risk of partial paralysis,” the consultant had said that morning. “Sadly, it’s likely that he’ll have trouble moving around and reduced strength in the entire right side of his body.”

  Aphasia was the next word that got through to her.

  “He’s suffering from aphasia, has lost his language skills, and will have trouble expressing himself,” the doctor continued, then tried to soothe Camilla by saying that John might be able to express himself in writing. Before they left the hospital, he had been taken off the respirator, so his body could begin to heal on its own.

  Her thoughts were blocking each other. Assau
lt and then fire. Everything was whirling around in her head. Brakes screeched, and a horn was pressed with a vengeance when she absentmindedly stepped off the curb to cross Sct. Laurentii Street.

  “Bitch!” a man shouted after her, and she flipped him off while trying to focus her thoughts on Cyprus and her assignment. But in the middle of her personal chaos, it was hard to muster the appropriate enthusiasm about the turning over of the EU Presidency and the official celebratory ceremony that would follow. Camilla gave up, as her thoughts kept returning to SkagensPosten anyway.

  On her way back from the hospital earlier in the day, she had stopped by the paper. H.C. had been sitting at his monitor with a grim look on his face, and she guessed that he had already been informed of the grievous prospects for his longtime boss and friend.

  After the assault, he took over the daily management of the paper, and when Camilla had said that she would continue her dad’s series of articles about the Danish straw men acquiring properties for wealthy Norwegians, he had initially turned her down and promised that he would run it himself. She had insisted until he’d accepted, admitting that he could probably use the extra manpower. The second article in the series had just been published.

  * * *

  It was almost half past ten when Camilla awoke the next morning. She missed Markus down to the bone, and David, too, at least a little bit, and she needed a cigarette and a strong cup of coffee. She felt like she had been dragged from one nightmarish dream to the next during the night.

  She was completely worn out and a little dizzy when she sat up. She was already fed up with sleeping on a makeshift bed in her old room.

  She put on a pair of sweatpants and pulled the T-shirt from the day before over her head before she began the descent down the narrow stairway, but she stopped abruptly and listened when she heard men’s voices coming from the kitchen.

  “We’re terribly sorry to hear what happened to your husband, and it’s entirely understandable if our call is a bit inconvenient.”