JESSICA IS SITTING on the edge of the couch, staring at the dining table. She has turned on the floor lamp next to the sofa, as right now darkness is a racetrack that sends her imagination galloping.
Jessica doesn’t remember ever experiencing anything similar. Her dreams have never felt this real.
There’s something unusual about this case she’s working on. Maybe it’s the murderer’s twisted MO. Maybe Jessica was more traumatized than she realized by coming face-to-face with him at the scene of the crime a few hours earlier. Maybe both.
Jessica straightens her knees and stands. Her joints ache; she feels a sharp stabbing at her hip. Sometimes she wonders if there’s anything else she can do about the pain, but the intensity is rarely bad enough for her to mention at the doctor’s office. Pain has followed Jessica for so long that it has become part of her. Her head dealt long ago with what happened, but she intends on giving her body as much time as it needs. She owes it that much.
Jessica passes the chair where her mother was sitting in the dream. She glances at it out of the corner of her eye and returns to the troubling nightmare for a moment, the woman at its heart who was reminiscent of her mother but wasn’t her. Look in the mirror.
The parquet creaks beneath her feet. Jessica pauses at the kitchen door and feels her stomach drop. What the . . . ?
Adrenaline surges through her body. Her black bathrobe is hanging from the backrest of a barstool, right where Jessica left it after her shower. There’s no one in the kitchen. Just the bathrobe, which, all things considered, formed a surprisingly effective optical illusion in the darkness. Jessica bunches it up and drops it to the counter. She can hear herself breathing heavily.
The electric kettle clicks on. The clock radio flashes the time. Three forty-six a.m. She needs to get a little more sleep; otherwise the upcoming day will be far too long.
Jessica shifts her gaze to the window and sees the reflection of the kitchen bathed in light, with herself in the middle of it, in sweats and a T-shirt. Her black hair has been tied back into a ponytail. It’s hard to make out her facial features.
Look in the mirror.
Maria Koponen has manifested to Jessica in her dreams, in exactly the same position and same clothes Jessica saw her in at the scene of the crime. But the face was her mother’s. Jessica has never bothered to interpret her dreams, despite being forced to occasionally discuss them in therapy. Still, she can’t help thinking that the words her mother uttered in the dream meant something.
Her stomach growls. She hasn’t eaten anything since a late lunch the day before. She grabs the bread from the basket, drops two slices into the toaster, and turns it on high because she doesn’t want to wait a second longer than necessary. The water is burbling in the kettle. The laptop is still on the counter. Jessica takes a fresh white mug from the cupboard. As she’s pouring water for her tea, she feels her phone vibrate in the pocket of her sweats, and her pulse spikes. Erne wouldn’t be calling her in the middle of the night unless it was deadly serious.
“Erne?”
“You’re awake.”
“I am.”
“Sorry. I meant what I said earlier. That you guys should get some rest . . .”
“What’s going on?”
“We have two more bodies.”
“OK.” Jessica realizes that Erne’s news, as horrible as it is, doesn’t surprise her. Something else was to be expected. Jessica forces herself to wait and let Erne choose his words. All she hears for a long time is heavy breathing.
Eventually Erne speaks: “Call Yusuf and have him pick you up.”
Jessica walks over to the kitchen window. Step by step, her reflection grows more distinct, more familiar. Jessica feels a curious relief, as if she has been afraid that window would reveal something she doesn’t want to see.
“Erne?” she finally says. “What happened?”
“Two bodies were found in the woods in Juva, near Salajärvi Lake. Sixty kilometers west of Savonlinna . . .”
“Savonlinna . . . ,” Jessica says softly. She places her fingers against the window. The glass feels cold, as if the icy wind is traveling through it and into her body.
She listens silently to Erne’s words, even though she already knows what he’s going to say. Koponen’s abandoned Audi. Chief Inspector Porkka’s mobile phone, a strange call. Then Erne sighs dramatically: “We have every reason to assume that the bodies belong to—”
“What do you mean, assume? Haven’t—”
“Jessica. The bodies aren’t easy to identify. They’ve been burned.”
“Holy sh—”
At that moment a sharp pop explodes in the kitchen, and Jessica’s heart skips a beat. The phone drops to the tile floor.
A burned smell fills the kitchen. Jessica stares at the toaster, which has just disgorged two hunks of blackened bread.