Red Wolf_ A Novel - Liza Marklund [123]
Little darlings, I shall always be with you, nothing bad will get to you.
She walked along newly woken streets towards the Arlanda Express, and took a packed train out to the airport.
There were still two hours before the plane took off. She tried drinking coffee and reading yesterday’s evening papers, but restlessness tore at her stomach until the words and the caffeine felt like they were suffocating her. She gave up and watched the wings being de-iced. She’d made up her mind not to think about the Federation of County Council middle-managers planning the day’s work, and preparing to deal with a rapidly developing crisis involving one of their employees.
As the plane moved away from the ground, her sense of being lost gradually faded. It wasn’t quite full; she had an empty seat next to her, and picked up a copy of the Norrland News that had been left by a previous passenger.
She watched the ground glistening, frozen and rock-hard beneath them, further away with every passing second.
She turned her attention to the paper and forced herself to look through it.
The inhabitants of Karlsvik were demanding more evening buses. A missing three-year-old had been found in the forest outside Risvik with the help of a helicopter with thermal imaging equipment, and everyone was happy and grateful and the police had done a wonderful job. There was the threat of a taxi strike at Kallax Airport. Luleå Hockey had lost at home in the Dolphin Stadium, 2–5 against Djurgården, served them right.
She lowered the paper and leaned her head back, shutting her eyes.
She must have dozed off, because the next moment the wheels were hitting the ice and tarmac at the Arctic Circle. She looked at her watch, almost eleven, and stretched her back, looking out of the plane window. Pale dawn was hanging over the frozen heath landscape.
As she walked through the Arrivals hall she felt empty and naked. It took a few seconds before she realized what was missing: the horde of chattering taxi-drivers by the exit.
She went over to the hire-car counter and picked up her keys.
‘The engine warmer and inside heater are plugged in,’ the young man said, smiling flirtatiously. ‘Take the cable with you. You’ll need it.’
She looked down at the floor and muttered her thanks.
The cold outside was dry as dust and utterly paralysing. It hit her like a fist. Shocked, she gasped for breath and tried to defend herself against the sharp little knives she was breathing in. The illuminated figures above the door said it was minus twenty-eight degrees.
The car was a silver-grey Volvo, anchored to an electricity post with a thick cable. Without electric engine-warmers no car would ever start in this sort of cold.
She took off her polar jacket and threw it in the back seat.
Inside the car it was stuffy and warm thanks to the heater on the passenger side. She started to sweat immediately in all her thermals. The engine started the first time, but the power-steering and wheels were sluggish and hesitant.
She passed the fighter-plane that loomed over the entrance to the airport, and took the left exit from the roundabout instead of the right, towards Piteå instead of Luleå. She peered through the windscreen to see if she recognized anything. She had taken a taxi from the airport with Anne Snapphane ten years ago.
The heathland disappeared behind her and she drove into what must have been fertile agricultural land. Large farms perched on the edge of the forest, oblong timber buildings, exuding wealth and influence. To her surprise she emerged onto a wide motorway, she didn’t remember that at all. Her surprise only grew as the motorway went on and on without her seeing a single other vehicle on the road. The feeling of surreal desolation took a stranglehold on her neck; she had to struggle to breathe normally. Was this some sort of joke? Had reality slid away from her? Was this the road to