Page 118 of Playing the Game

“Okay,” Heidi said, switching focus back to Jonas. “If the story is bullshit, what’s really going on?”

“I don’t know. Adam came over yesterday.”

Heidi sat up. “What did he say?”

“It wasn’t what he did say, it’s what he didn’t. He told me I need to trust him for a short while. Then all will be revealed.”

“How dramatic.”

Jonas smiled sadly. “Right? He’s definitely not with Jen.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“He promised me.”

Heidi frowned. “And you believe him?”

“I think I do. He’s been open that there’s something he’s not telling me. Or can’t. Whatever. I’m scared he’s sick.”

“Shit. Or she might be. Closing all her socials like that. Career suicide.”

A flame of guilt burnt through him with the relief that Adam might not be the ill one. He’d spent the last few hours convincing himself of the fact.

“It would be like Adam to care for her,” he mused. “I’m pissed he doesn’t trust me enough to tell me.”

“I think you should get firm evidence that’s what is happening before you get annoyed. Besides it might not be his secret to tell.”

“True.”

They sat in silence for a while. Jonas needed to take in theprospect that the worst-case scenario he’d built since Adam left was his ridiculous paranoia at work.

“I’m lucky to have you,” Jonas said.

Heidi beamed. “And you always will have. That’s something you can count on.”

“Thank you, my darling.”

“Are you nervous about seeing Tuva?”

Truth be told, he hadn’t given it much thought.

“There will never be a day where I’m scared of her,” he replied. “I’m simply going to come out with it. I’m purposefully going to do it in front of Anna.”

“Isn’t that mean?”

“Think about it,” he continued, warming to his theme. “If Tuva says no outright, which I suspect she will on principle, Anna will grind her down for the next nine months to the point of breaking.”

The plan had come to him in the shower where most good ideas were generated.

Heidi cackled. “I like your style.”

“I’m not letting my evil stepmother beat me.”

Tuva had chosen to receive them in the formal sitting room. Everything was white. The hard couches. The walls. Even the flowers. Normally that would create a calm environment. With the Tuva touch it became stark and clinical.

“Interesting that she didn’t let us into the family room,” Jonas said.

He and Heidi sat side by side on one of the couches. The apartment in the centre of Stockholm had been a place he’d fought so hard to escape from. Now it didn’t even register as part of his life.