The Postcard Killers

    Her towel had fallen to the floor. She kicked it into the apartment and pulled him into the front hallway. The dirty duffel bag ended up under the telephone table, his jeans by the door, his shirt and T-shirt by the radiator. They made it as far as the door to the living room before they collapsed to the floor. She fell into his bright blue eyes and felt him pushing inside her. The world spun and she closed her eyes, straining her head back against the wooden floor when she came.

    “Jeezuz,” Jacob said. “I guess that means you’re happy to see me!”

    “Just you wait,” she said, nipping his earlobe with her teeth. They stumbled into the bedroom. Dessie pushed him onto the bed and began to explore every inch of his body. She used her fingers, hair, and tongue, tasting and licking and caressing.

    “Oh, god!” he panted. “What are you doing to me?”

    “I’m just happy to see you,” Dessie said. “What are you doing to me?”

    Then she sat astride him.

    She moved gently above him, deep and intense, forcing him to calm down, slow down. It gave her a chance to catch up, and when she felt the rush coming, she let go completely. He seemed to lose several seconds when he came, but she forced him to continue for another minute or so until she came as well.

    Then she fell into his arms and passed out.

Chapter 117

    DESSIE OPENED HER EYES and looked deep into his bright blue ones. They crackled with a warmth that left her breathless. And more confused than ever.

    “You’re here,” she whispered. “It wasn’t a dream. I’m so glad. I’m happy.”

    He laughed. His teeth were white, a bit crooked. His hair was sweaty, sticking out in every direction. He sank back down on the bed and pulled her to him.

    “Why did you come back?” she asked.

    He kissed her and then grew suddenly serious.

    “Several reasons,” he said. “You were the most important one.”

    She hit him playfully on the shoulder with her fist.

    “Liar,” she said.

    “How did you make out in Denmark and Norway?” he asked. She told him about the grotesque murders in the hotel in Copenhagen, about the mutilation of the bodies and the fact that the woman had probably been raped. They had found bruises and scratches on the inside of her thighs, and the semen in her vagina wasn’t her husband’s. It didn’t seem to her like the Rudolphs’ work.

    She went on to tell him about the motor home death scene at the campsite outside Oslo, how neither the bodies nor the letters had been discovered because the reporter had been on vacation, and how the bodies had been arranged to look like Munch’s The Scream.

    “How did you get on in America?” she asked.

    He gave her a summary of his investigations, telling her that the Rudolphs came from an extremely privileged background. That Sylvia had found their parents murdered when she was thirteen years old. That their guardian, Jonathan Blython, had embezzled their inheritance and been found dead with his throat cut. That Mac’s girlfriend Sandra Schulman - whom Sylvia was jealous of - had disappeared after a visit to the Rudolphs’ home. That the twins had set up an experimental art group, the Society of Limitless Art, and been expelled from UCLA because of a public act of incest.

    “A public act of incest?” Dessie said.

    “They called the work Taboo. The two of them made love in an exhibition hall.”

    “They really are mad,” Dessie said, pulling him to her once more.

Chapter 118

    AFTERWARD, THEY SAT IN bed and ate an improvised lunch. Jacob was finishing one of her microwaved vegetarian lasagnas.

    Dessie had taken her laptop back to bed and was reading Aftonposten’s report of the deal that the lawyer, Andrea Friederichs, had negotiated for the rights to Sylvia and Malcolm’s story.

    “An advance of three and a half million dollars,” she read, “plus royalties and even more money for the subsidiary sale of the book rights. And get this -

    the lawyer has decided not to charge for her services. She only represented them because it was the right thing to do, she says.”

    “Are they still at the Grand?”

    She clicked further on the site and looked at her watch.

    “According to Alexander Andersson’s blog, they checked out half an hour ago. They left through the back door to avoid the media scrum outside the main entrance.”

    Jacob threw off the covers, leapt out of bed, and disappeared into the kitchen.

    Dessie looked after him in surprise.

    “There’s nothing that links them to the murders,” she called into the kitchen. “Jacob? They’re free to come and go as they like.”

    She heard the kettle boil.

    The next minute he was standing in the doorway with a mug of coffee in each hand. His face was as dark as a thundercloud.

    “It was them,” he said. “I know it was. We can’t let them go free.”

    “But there’s still no evidence,” Dessie said glumly. “We can’t prove a damn thing.”

    He handed her a mug.

    “Their gear must be somewhere. The eyedrops, the outfit he was wearing when he emptied those accounts, the things they’ve stolen and not managed to get rid of. And the murder weapon…”