Only One Life Read Online Free PDF

the thermal carafe in the middle of the table before she grabbed a pad of paper and a ballpoint pen in case her computer hadn’t been set up yet. The coffee sloshed over the rim and down the side of the cup, burning her fingers as she walked down the corridor. Swearing, she set the plastic cup down on the desk a little too hard, causing it to slosh more. She quickly wiped her hand on her pants and went out to meet the witness.
    A tall, very pretty, very young blonde teenager was walking in slowly, uncertainty in her eyes.
    Louise approached her with an outstretched hand and a welcoming smile.
    “Hi, I’m Louise. Let’s go in here.” She pointed toward her office, which still seemed unoccupied and cluttered although her partner had already put his things away.
    “Would you like a glass of water?” she asked as they stepped in.
    The girl shook her head and sat down on the edge of the hard wooden chair that Louise had pushed toward the end of her desk.
    The bags containing her laptops were still the way she had left them, but she waited to pull the pad of paper out of one of them, hoping that a little informal chat would get the girl to relax.
    “What’s your name?” Louise began, leaning back slightly in the office chair.
    “Benedicta, Dicta for short.…” The girl cleared her throat and repeated her name a little louder. “Dicta Møller. I’m in ninth grade at Højmark School,” she continued.
    “And you’re worried that girl we found out at Hønsehalsen may be someone you know?”
    It wasn’t that uncommon for girls to worry about their female friends and contact the police if a girl was reported missing in the media.
    “There’s a girl who’s in ninth grade with me but in a different homeroom who wasn’t in school today,” Dicta began.
    Louise didn’t rush her.
    “She and I were going to get together this afternoon, and I haven’t been able to get hold of her. She’s not answering her cell, and no one answers when I call her at home.” Louise nodded and waited again without saying anything. “I’ve been calling all afternoon.”
    “Do you think she might have taken off somewhere with her parents and forgotten about your plans this afternoon? Something unexpected may have come up.”
    Dicta thought for a moment as though the possibility hadn’t occurred to her, but then she shook her head.
    “She wouldn’t have forgotten this. We were going to go through the photos,” she said, now with more strength in her voice. “She was over at my house yesterday after school, and we talked about it then. One of the photos is going to be published this weekend in the paper.”
    Louise asked her to explain what kind of photos she was talking about and what paper she was referring to.
    “I’m a model,” the girl explained. “I model for a few stores, including Boutique Aube, and the paper is supposed to run their big ad on Saturday. The photos were ready, and Samra was supposed to come to the photographer’s and take a look at them. So she wouldn’t have just taken off.”
    Tears started streaming down Dicta’s cheeks, but she continued: “She would never do that. She keeps …”
    Dicta’s emotions overwhelmed her, her words pouring out in a completely incomprehensible mess. Louise held out her hand to stop the flood of words.
    “What does your friend look like?” she asked when the girl had calmed down a little.
    Dicta straightened up and carefully dabbed the tears so they wouldn’t ruin her makeup, as though she had only now discovered that she was crying.
    “She has long, dark hair.”
    Louise sat up and grabbed her notepad.
    “And is your friend ethnically Danish?” she asked, waiting for the next crucial answer.
    “No,” the girl replied hesitantly, as though she were afraid that was the wrong answer. “She’s from Jordan.”
    “Does she have any distinguishing marks that you can think of? Or things she usually wears?”
    Dicta fell silent, picturing her friend in front of