Sara Blaedel - Call Me Princess

PEGASUS CRIME

NEW YORK

For my brother, Jeppe.

T HE PAIN CUT INTO HER WRISTS, AND SHE COULDNT REACT BECAUSE her hands were tied so tightly behind her back. Terrified, she turned her face toward him. The blow struck so hard that it hammered her head down into the bedding, rebounding back up for the next blow. She opened her mouth to scream; but before the sound could come out, her mouth was blocked by something hard. The duct tape he stuck over her mouth made her feel like she was wearing a mask.

The candles were still lit in the living room. The bottle of wine and the glasses were sitting on the coffee table. Blood trickled down along her nose as she stared at the glow from the candlelight, her head turned to the side, and she thought about the restaurant and their three-course meal just a few hours before.

He had ordered calvados to go with their coffee, without asking her if she liked it, so she hadnt needed to admit that she didnt know what it was. They held hands over the table.

Pain shot through her as he cinched her ankles together tightly. Something hard chewed into the flesh right above her ankle bone.

Later they had danced in the living room. Very close. He had held her face in both his hands and kissed her.

Dear God in heaven, help me!

The blood kept flowing, and she struggled to get the air in through her nose. She concentrated on her aim as she lifted her bound legs and tried to kick him off the edge of the bed. He was sitting with his back to her but managed to turn around and parry her feet. Another blow from his fist bruised her cheek and temple.

Lie still now and nothing will happen.

He held on to her firmly and angrily shoved her bound legs to the side.

His clothes were on the chair next to the wardrobe. Her own lay in a messy heap on the floor by the end of the bed. Piece by piece, he had asked her to undress slowly.

The left side of her face throbbed. The quiet music played on in the living room. Her fear felt like an iron grip around her gut.

She cried from pain and shame. Buried her face and body down into the soft comforter and wished it would swallow her up. Her tears mixed with the blood as he pulled her out over the edge of the bed so that only her upper body was resting on the mattress. The world and reality exploded as he shoved himself into her with a violent thrust.

The tightly adhering tape held her scream back. She fought to keep her nose free of the bed and struggled to inhale calmly, but she kept getting thrown out of rhythm by the pain, which threatened to destroy her. Her body began to relax, as a fog slowly shrouded the pain and she lost consciousness.

T HERE WAS A SLIGHT CLICK AS SHE PRESSED THE SWITCH, AND A second later the glass door to the emergency ward swung open. She walked quickly, her eyes trained on the floor. Out of the corner of one eye she noticed family members sitting and talking softly together. A lab technician wheeled a phlebotomy cart out of one of the exam rooms, and she only barely avoided crashing into him.

She said Sorry in passing and hurried past the glass windows surrounding the nurses station, over to the reception desk.

Assistant Detective Louise Rick, Copenhagen P.D., Unit A, she said, introducing herself. Whom should I be talking to?

A young nurse stood up and smiled at her. Just a secondIll page the doctor. Why dont you take a seat for a minute. She pointed toward the white oval table covered in coffee-cup stains and crumbs from peoples afternoon snacks.

Louise removed her sunglasses from where theyd been perched atop her dark hair and set them on the table, and watched the nurse page the doctor. Louise clasped her hands behind her head and exhaled heavily. She had grouchily struggled her way through rush-hour traffic along Kalvebod Wharf and Folehaven, swatting the steering wheel a number of times in frustration when traffic ground to a standstill. It had taken an unusually long time to drive just six miles from the Copenhagen police headquarters out to Hvidovre Hospital.

IT HAD BEEN NEARLY FIVE OCLOCK WHEN THE HEAD OF THE HOMICIDE division, Lieutenant Hans Suhr, came into her office. She was writing out her list of things she needed to buy at the store on the way home; but when she saw the look in Suhrs eyes, she pushed her notepad aside and prepared to call Peter and ask him to pick up the groceries instead. Peter had suggested as much himself that morning as he drove her to work, but she had optimistically dismissed the idea, saying it would be no problem, she could run the errands for once.

Theres been a rape, and a brutal one at that. I want you to go check it out, Suhr said, sitting down on the hard wooden chair next to her desk.

Before he could continue, Louise pulled her notepad over again and tore off her shopping list. Lieutenant Suhr often called her in on rape cases; as it usually went over better to have a woman to take the victims statement, and as there werent that many of them in the division, the cases generally landed on her desk.

The victims been taken to Hvidovre, hed said after she had her ballpoint pen ready. Shes a thirty-two-year-old woman from Valby. Her mother, who lives in the apartment upstairs, came down to her daughters place at dinnertime and found her in the bedroom, gagged, with her hands tied behind her back. There was blood on the bed, and the daughter was nearly unconscious from the ordeal.

The lieutenant seemed to be considering whether or not there was anything else he ought to add. Then he said, The mother took the duct tape off her mouth before calling the ambulance.

Louise studied him as he spoke, trying to prepare herself for how ugly it would be, whatever she was going to see. The fact that the victim had been hogtied and gagged was enough for the downtown precinct to have contacted Unit A, and the victims condition automatically classified the rape as aggravated battery.

Susanne Hansson lives alone; and when the police arrived at the scene, the mother said that her daughter did not have a boyfriend or any friends she would have been sleeping with voluntarily.

Louise furrowed her brow. What does the rape victim herself say? she asked.

Suhr shrugged his shoulders. Nothing. The precinct detectives tried when they got to Hvidovre, but they didnt get anything out of her. One of the female doctors has spoken with her a little since then, but I dont know how much she found out. Other than that the victim wants to report the rape. Youll have to talk to her, and then shell have to go to National Hospital and be examined.

Louise nodded, satisfied that she would have a chance to build up some rapport with the woman before they arrived at the Center for Victims of Sexual Assault downtown. Her experiences with previous aggravated rape cases told her that if Susanne had been roughed up as much as Suhr suggested, it would probably just traumatize her more to have to undergo the coroners exam that same night. It would be good if they had an opportunity to establish a rapport before that, so the woman had a chance to feel at least a tiny bit secure again.

Whats her current condition?

Go find out, Suhr said. Im sending Jrgensen out to the womans apartment on Lyshj All. The crime-scene investigators are already there. Call once you have a rundown on what happened. He slapped his hand on her desk in closure, then got up and left her office.