Chapter 88
Their lips are almost touching when Hanna’s phone rings in her back pocket.
She is so surprised by the sound that she bangs her forehead on Henry’s chin. The blow makes him cry out; he bounces back against the sofa cushion, and his hand flies to his face. As Hanna mumbles an apology, she takes out her phone and answers.
“It’s Emily,” says a young, agitated voice.
Hanna is confused—who’s Emily? She searches her memory and realizes this must be Filip’s girlfriend—she was with him on Tuesday.
“Hi, Emily.” Back to reality.
It is almost midnight, way too late to call unless something is wrong.
“Filip is gone!” Emily almost shouts.
Hanna makes an effort to pull herself together.
“What do you mean Filip is gone?” She sits up straight and meets Henry’s worried gaze.
“We had dinner at Supper.” Emily’s voice is shrill with anxiety.
“Filip went outside for a smoke, but he didn’t come back.
I waited at the restaurant for nearly an hour; then I went back to ?reg?rden to see if he was in our hotel room, but he wasn’t there.
” She is crying now. “I don’t know where he is, and I can’t get a hold of Henry. I’ve been trying and trying!”
Hanna glances at Henry; he must have switched his phone to silent.
“Have you tried calling Filip?”
“Of course I have! I’ve texted and called at least a dozen times, but there’s no answer, not on Snapchat either. You don’t understand—he’s gone!”
Henry is listening closely. He can tell from Hanna’s questions that something isn’t right, and mouths Speaker so that he can hear what Emily is saying.
Hanna ignores him. She doesn’t want anyone to know that she is with Henry at this time of night.
“Listen to me, Emily. Are you sure he hasn’t just gone for a long walk around the village?”
Emily is still crying.
“Emily?”
“He’s been gone for such a long time. He would never do this without telling me.”
Hanna swears silently over the situation in which she has put herself. How could she be so stupid as to sit here drinking champagne? Now she can’t drive.
“Could he have gone to see a friend?”
“He doesn’t know anyone here, apart from Henry.”
Hanna can confirm that Filip isn’t here.
“And the two of you hadn’t had a fight?”
“No! He’s disappeared!”
Hanna looks out of the window again. It is pitch black; the temperature is well below freezing. The circumstances are not ideal for a young man from Stockholm wearing sneakers to set off on a spontaneous long walk.
“Okay, so this is what we’re going to do,” Hanna says, sounding much calmer than she actually feels. “You stay in your hotel room in case Filip shows up. I will speak to my colleagues and check if anyone has seen him in the village.”
She adds a few words of consolation and makes Emily promise to let her know immediately if Filip returns. Then she ends the call.
Henry’s face has lost all its color. He takes out his phone; Hanna can see that he has several missed calls from Emily.
“Do you think the two of them might have quarreled?” Hanna asks. “You know Filip much better than I do—would he take off if he was mad at Emily?”
Henry shakes his head. “It’s not like him to disappear without a word. He cares about her way too much. I’ve met up with them a few times this week, and everything seemed fine between them.”
Hanna tries to think clearly.
Filip has been gone for only a few hours, which isn’t much at his age. Under normal circumstances it wouldn’t be a police matter until he had been missing for at least twenty-four hours. Plus he is grieving, which can have an impact on “normal” behavior.
For all they know he could be sitting by himself somewhere with his phone switched off, drowning his sorrows in booze.
But Emily sounded hysterical. And Henry is clearly worried.
A shiver runs down Hanna’s spine.
Would Charlotte’s murderer be so cruel as to go after her son too?