Grace held out her arms and Karin plunged into them, pressing her head against her mother’s chest. Holding each other, they both began to weep. “I love you, I love you, I love you,” Grace said, over and over, as she held Karin as close as she could, feeling the soft curve of her small back, touching her hair, stroking her neck. She stopped and pushed Karin away to look her daughter in the eyes. “I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry, Karin,” she was saying. “I didn’t know he was like this. I figured it out too late.” She kissed her repeatedly on the face.
Even though Karin’s eyes were red and wet with tears, she looked all right. She looked okay. “It’s okay, Mom. It wasn’t your fault,” Karin said. “I’m okay. I’m all right. I’m not hurt. We stopped him!”
Now they were clutching each other again and crying. “I love you so much, I love you so much,” Grace was saying. “I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry. I just wish you didn’t have to go through this. It was so terrible. I should not have let you go alone. I have been trying to find you for hours…”
“I love you, Mom,” said Karin. “It was Martijn. It was Martijn. It was all him.”
There was a great deal of movement around them. The helicopter roared as it landed and sprayed sand all over the place. They covered their eyes and held each other against the wind. At the same time, they could hear the sound of an ambulance and police sirens in the distance. The cavalry was arriving. The reporters would be clambering up the hill soon.
Grace pulled Karin closer and spoke into her ear. “Did he do anything to you? Did he touch you? Did he—”
“No, he hurt Margot, but not me. He hit her on the head with a rock. He tied me to a tree and tried to get me to tell him something that Dad told me. But I didn’t know what he was talking about. He said he was looking for some photographs. I don’t know why.”
As she said this, Karin realized that the metal box was still in her jacket pocket. But where was her jacket? She needed to find it—before everyone got there and took her away. “Mom,” she said, “I need you to help me. We need to find my jacket—it has the photographs in them. It’s somewhere here, I’m sure. Somewhere right around here.”
Detective van Dijk approached and introduced himself to Karin, who immediately hugged him. “You helped my mom find me,” she said.
He nodded, with humility. “Your mom did the hard part,” he shouted above the din. “I’m going to need to talk to you shortly,” he added. “Ask you some questions. But first I need to deal with your stepfather. You’ll excuse me.”
“Karin thinks there is important evidence somewhere here,” Grace said. “We need to find it before we go anywhere. It’s in her jacket, which she says is somewhere around here.”
The detective said he would instruct some of the other officers to help them search for it. Police officers were already surrounding Martijn, lifting him to his feet and putting him into handcuffs. The helicopter had finally landed, and more vehicles were parking at the base of the hill.
Karin took her mother’s hand and they began looking through the grass to try to find the jacket. “Why did he do it, Mom? Do you know why?”
“I don’t know, Karin. I wish I knew. I don’t understand what he wanted,” she said. “It’s a puzzle with a lot of missing pieces. But I guess you know a little bit and I know a little bit, and perhaps together we can figure it out. Karin,” she added, stopping to look her daughter in the eyes. “I want you to understand that I didn’t know until yesterday that he was dangerous. Maybe I had a feeling, somehow, but I kept hoping it wasn’t true. I finally figured it out, but by then you were already in danger. I just want you to know that I never, ever, ever wanted that to happen.”
Karin began to cry. “But, Mom, he’s been hurting you,” she said. “He’s been hurting you since we moved in together. Don’t you think that hurt me?”
“Oh God,” said Grace. “I thought you didn’t know. I thought it was only me. I didn’t think…I just didn’t want it to be true. I didn’t want to admit it, even to myself. But it’s true. And it’s over now. It’s over. He won’t be able to hurt you anymore. I promise.”
“Or you.” Karin looked her mother sternly in the eyes. “Or you, Mom. I need you to be okay too.”
“Yes, of course. He’s going to be out of both of our lives. We’ll make sure that he is put away, far away. And we will start over.”
An ambulance had parked at the bottom of the hill, and now there were more people in uniform climbing up the sand dunes toward them. They’d take over from here. They’d want to ask questions. They’d want to see Karin, get her to a hospital. That was what was next.
They needed to find that jacket first.
Grace looked up to notice Detective van Dijk standing not far off from where they were, holding on to Margot, talking to her. He had a mild look of satisfaction on his face, just barely recognizable, and Grace felt again a pang of gratitude toward this man who had helped her get her daughter back.
Karin pulled away—not far, but it suddenly sent Grace’s heart racing again—and she pointed to a spot in the grass. “I see it,” she said. “My jacket is right over there.” She ran to it, picked it up and dusted the sand off, and then slipped her hand into the pocket.
