Helsinki Blood by James Thompson

Author:James Thompson [Thompson, James]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Mystery, Thriller
ISBN: 9780399158889
Amazon: 039915888X
Barnesnoble: 039915888X
Goodreads: 15815341
Publisher: Putnam Adult
Published: 2013-01-01T06:00:00+00:00

21

At nine the next morning, a gentle knocking on the bedroom door wakes me. I ignore it, want to lie here, doze, and enjoy a hangover day. Hangovers get a bad rap. The vicious ones are awful, of course, but the milder ones, if I don’t have to do anything, can be rather enjoyable. The lethargy that accompanies them forces me to relax. Pizza and Jaffa—orange soda—the combination of sugar and salt, are the best cure. Most people don’t realize that the cause of a hangover is in large part not the consumption of alcohol, but the body’s outrage at being deprived of it. Alcohol, in a sense, causes instant addiction. Hence the hair-of-the-dog cure.

Mirjami doesn’t wake. The knocking turns to pounding. Jenna shouts, “I need to come in.”

“Then come in,” I shout back. She enters and sees us in bed together. She already knew Mirjami and I were together in here last night from the shouting. Her expression is neither approving nor disapproving. She couldn’t care less, ignores me and begins shaking Mirjami awake. “You have to take me to the doctor,” Jenna says.

Mirjami looks dog-sick. “Yeah, OK. Give me a minute.”

Jenna returns with coffee for her to expedite the process.

“Why don’t you have Sweetness take you?” I ask.

“If you took one look at him this morning, you’d know. Besides, Mirjami promised.”

“Take a taxi,” I say.

She yells at me. “If I wanted a fucking taxi I would have called one, and if I want your advice I’ll squeeze your fucking head!”

I’ve been yelled at quite a bit in the past few hours, I think unjustly. I cover my head with a pillow and mind my own business. But Anu starts to cry. There will be no late-sleep-in hangover. I get up to tend to my daughter. I’m in her room and hear the door slam as I’m rocking her. Sweetness and Jenna sleep in the spare bed in her room. Sweetness doesn’t even stir at the sound of Anu’s screams. His hangover must be a killer. I told Mirjami she could use Kate’s Audi whenever she liked. They must be taking it.

From outside, I hear a whoom. It must have been loud for the noise to have penetrated the thick, bulletproof windows. I lay Anu down in her crib, grab my cane and hobble to the big window that looks out over Harjukatu. The Audi is in flames, sooty black smoke rolls off it. Jenna is on the sidewalk, not moving. Mirjami is in the road, rolling around. She wore cutoff jean shorts and a light top with straps. They’re burning and her hair is scorched off.

At the top of my lungs, I yell for Sweetness and grab my cell phone from the table beside my chair, dial 112, emergency, and explain that a car has exploded, at least two people are hurt, and request ambulances and firefighters.

Sweetness comes out of the bedroom with a hand in his underwear, scratching his balls. “What the fuck?” he asks.

I just point. He looks and tears out the door, runs to the scene in his underwear.

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