Salander’s narrow shoulders rose and fell. “I guess. Why not, I have nothing to hide. Nothing’s ever going to be the same, is it? Can I go back to work now?”
“When do you get off shift?”
“Four—then I clean up.”
“The officers may still be there when you arrive—you are planning to come home.”
“Where else would I go? At least for now.”
“For now?”
“I don’t know if I can afford the place by myself. . . . Oh, God, this is just so nauseating— Did she suffer?”
“I don’t have the forensic details yet.”
“Who would do this?” said Salander. “What kind of twisted mind— Oh, Mr. Sturgis, I feel as if everything’s unraveling.”
Milo said, “Yeah, it’s rough.” He looked out at the traffic on Santa Monica, eyes unreadable. Then a glance at me.
I said, “Andrew, that lunch Lauren had with her mother, when she said she didn’t want to be controlled? Do you have any idea what she meant?”
“No. And even when she was upset at Mrs. A, she said she knew her mother loved her.”
“What about her father? Did he ever come up?”
“No, she never talked about him—refused to. Just clammed up the first time I brought him up, so I never did that again. It was pretty obvious she had no use for him.”
“But she never said why.”
Headshake. “There are so many reasons, though, aren’t there,” he said. “So many men who screw up fatherhood.”
“So,” I said, “you have no idea what the control issue was?”
“I just thought it was one of those family tension things, you know. I mean it’s not as if she told me about any big festering Jerry Springer thing.”
Salander rubbed the back of his head against the wall. “This is horrible, I hate this.”
“Hate what, Andy?”
“Talking about Lauren in the past tense—thinking about her suffering. Can I get back to work?”
“The show must go on?” said Milo.
Salander froze. “That was unkind, Mr. Sturgis. I cared about her, I really did. We cared for each other, loved to hang out together, but we didn’t—she didn’t confide in me. Can I help it if she didn’t confide? What I told the doctor about that lunch is all that I remember. She came back and looked miffed, didn’t want to talk about it, and I tried to get her to open up. But she really didn’t.”
“What did she say—as closely as you can remember?” I said.
“Something to the effect that she’d come this far on her own and wouldn’t be controlled—that’s it. Come to think about it, she might not have even said controlled by Mrs. A, specifically. I just assumed that’s who she was talking about, because it was Mrs. A she’d just had lunch with.” He sidestepped closer to The Cloisters’ front door.
“Let’s get back to that research job,” said Milo. “What else do you know about it?”
“Something to do with psychology—or maybe I’m assuming that, too. I’m so shook up, I don’t even know what I know.”
“When did the job start?”
Salander thought. “Soon after the quarter started—so maybe two, three months ago. Or maybe even before the quarter—I can’t swear to anything.”
“Was it a five-day-a-week job?” said Milo.
“No, it was irregular. Sometimes she’d work every day of the week, then she’d have days off. But I really wasn’t paying attention to her schedule. Half the time she was up and around, I was sleeping.”
“What else did she tell you about the job?”
“Just that she enjoyed it.”
“Nothing else?”
“Nope.”
“Did she mention who she worked for? What the project was?”
“No, just that she enjoyed it. I’m sure you can find out at the U.”
“That’s the problem, Andy,” said Milo. “We can’t seem to find any trace of her working at the U.”
Salander’s mouth dropped open. “How can that be? I’m sure it’s some mistake—she definitely told me it was on campus. That I do remember.”
“Well,” said Milo.
“Why would she make up something like that?”
“Good question, Andy.”
“My . . . You think the job had something to do with …”