Girl Who Kicked the Hornets Nest, The - Stieg Larsson [266]
“I can.”
“And if you start playing up, I stop being your lawyer. Understood?”
Salander nodded.
“One more thing. I don’t want to get involved in a big drama between you and my brother. If you have a problem with him, you’ll have to work it out. But, for the record, he’s not your enemy.”
“I know. I’ll deal with it. But I need some time.”
“What do you plan to do now?”
“I don’t know. You can reach me on email. I promise to reply as soon as I can, but I might not be checking it every day—”
“You won’t become a slave just because you have a lawyer. O.K., that’s enough for the time being. Out you get. I’m dead tired and I want to go home and sleep.”
Salander opened the door and got out. She paused as she was about to close the car door. She looked as though she wanted to say something but could not find the words. For a moment she appeared to Giannini almost vulnerable.
“That’s alright, Lisbeth,” Giannini said. “Go and get some sleep. And stay out of trouble for a while.”
Salander stood at the curb and watched Giannini drive away until her tail lights disappeared around the corner.
“Thanks,” she said at last.
CHAPTER 29
Saturday, 16.vii – Friday, 7.x
Salander found her Palm Tungsten T3 on the hall table. Next to it were her car keys and the shoulder bag she had lost when Lundin attacked her outside the door to her apartment building on Lundagatan. She also found both opened and unopened post that had been collected from her P.O. Box on Hornsgatan. Mikael Blomkvist.
She took a slow tour through the furnished part of her apartment. She found traces of him everywhere. He had slept in her bed and worked at her desk. He had used her printer, and in the wastepaper basket she found drafts of the manuscript of The Section along with discarded notes.
He had bought a litre of milk, bread, cheese, caviar and a jumbo pack of Billy’s Pan Pizza and put them in the fridge.
On the kitchen table she found a small white envelope with her name on it. It was a note from him. The message was brief. His mobile number. That was all.
She knew that the ball was in her court. He was not going to get in touch with her. He had finished the story, given back the keys to her apartment, and he would not call her. If she wanted something then she could call him. Bloody pig-headed bastard.
She put on a pot of coffee, made four open sandwiches, and went to sit in her window seat to look out towards Djurgården. She lit a cigarette and brooded.
It was all over, and yet now her life felt more claustrophobic than ever.
Miriam Wu had gone to France. It was my fault that you almost died. She had shuddered at the thought of having to see Mimmi, but had decided that that would be her first stop when she was released. But she had gone to France.
All of a sudden she was in debt to people.
Palmgren. Armansky. She ought to contact them to say thank you. Paolo Roberto. And Plague and Trinity. Even those damned police officers, Bublanski and Modig, who had so obviously been in her corner. She did not like feeling beholden to anyone. She felt like a chess piece in a game she could not control.
Kalle Bloody Blomkvist. And maybe even Erika Bloody Berger with the dimples and the expensive clothes and all that self-assurance.
But it was over, Giannini had said as they left police headquarters. Right. The trial was over. It was over for Giannini. And it was over for Blomkvist. He had published his book and would end up on T. V. and probably win some bloody prize too.
But it was not over for Lisbeth Salander. This was only the first day of the rest of her life.
At 4.00 in the morning she stopped thinking. She discarded her punk outfit on the floor of her bedroom and went to the bathroom