As Red as Blood (The Snow White Trilogy) Read online

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Text copyright © 2013 Salla Simukka

  Translation © 2014 Owen F. Witesman

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Published by Skyscape, New York

  www.apub.com

  Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Skyscape are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.

  ISBN-13: 9781477847718

  ISBN-10: 1477847715

  Book design by Katrina Damkoehler and Susan Gerber

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2013923366

  CONTENTS

  START READING

  SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 28

  1

  MONDAY, FEBRUARY 29, EARLY MORNING

  2

  MONDAY, FEBRUARY 29

  3

  4

  5

  TUESDAY, MARCH 1

  6

  7

  8

  9

  WEDNESDAY, MARCH 2

  Once upon a . . .

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  THURSDAY, MARCH 3

  15

  16

  17

  FRIDAY, MARCH 4

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  EPILOGUE

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ABOUT THE TRANSLATOR

  Once upon a time in midwinter, as flakes of snow fell like feathers from heaven, a queen sat sewing at her window, which was framed in black ebony wood.

  As she sewed, gazing out at the snow, the needle pricked her finger, bringing forth three drops of blood, which fell onto the snow. Seeing the beauty of the red upon the white, she thought within herself, “Would that I had a child as white as snow, as red as blood, and as black as the wood in this window frame.”

  Glittering white lay all around. Over the old snow, a new, clean layer of soft flakes had fallen fifteen minutes earlier. Fifteen minutes earlier, everything had still been possible. The world had looked beautiful, the future flickering somewhere in the distance: brighter, freer, more peaceful. A future worth risking everything, worth going all-in, worth trying to make a break for it.

  Fifteen minutes earlier, a light, downy snowfall had spread a thin feather blanket over the old snow. Then it had ceased, as suddenly as it had begun, followed by rays of sunshine breaking through the clouds. Hardly any days all winter had been this beautiful.

  Now, each moment saw more red encroaching on the white, spreading, gaining ground, creeping forward through the crystals, staining them as it went. Some of the red had flown farther, a shrieking, bright crimson spattering the snow.

  Natalia Smirnova stared with brown eyes at the red-flecked snow, seeing nothing. Thinking nothing. Hoping nothing. Fearing nothing.

  Ten minutes earlier, Natalia had hoped and feared more than ever before in her life. With trembling hands, she had stuffed money into her authentic Louis Vuitton handbag, anxiously listening for even the tiniest rustling from outside. She had tried to steady her nerves, assuring herself that everything was fine. She had a plan. But at the same time, she had known that no plan was ever perfect. An intricate edifice carefully constructed over months can collapse at the barest nudge.

  The purse had also contained a passport and plane ticket to Moscow. She wasn’t taking anything else. At the Moscow airport, her brother would be waiting with a rental car, ready to drive her hundreds of miles to a dacha only a few people knew about. There, her mother would be waiting with three-year-old Olga, the daughter she hadn’t seen in more than a year. Would her little girl even remember her? But no matter. A month or two hiding out in the countryside would give them time to get to know each other again. While they waited until she believed they were safe. While they waited for the world to forget about Natalia Smirnova.

  Natalia had stifled the nagging voice in her head that insisted no one would forget her at all. That they wouldn’t allow her to disappear. She had assured herself that she wasn’t so important that they couldn’t simply find someone to replace her if need be. And going to the effort of tracking her down would be too much bother anyway.

  In this line of work, people disappeared now and then, usually taking some money along with them. That was just one of the risks of doing business—an unavoidable loss like the spoiled fruit a grocery store had to throw out.

  Natalia hadn’t counted the money. She’d simply stuffed as much of it as she could into her bag. Some of the bills had gotten crumpled, but that didn’t matter. A crumpled five-hundred-euro bill was worth just as much as a crisp one. You could still buy three months of food with it, maybe four if you were really careful. You could still use it to buy a person’s silence for long enough. For lots of people, five hundred euros was the price of a secret.

  Now, Natalia Smirnova, age twenty, lay facedown, her cheek in the cold snow. Not feeling the prickling of the ice against her skin. Not feeling the frigid chill of thirteen below on her bare earlobes.

  The man had sung about a woman named Natalia to her in a gruff voice, off-key. Natalia hadn’t liked the song. The Natalia in it was from Ukraine, but she was from Russia. On the other hand, she had liked the man who sang and stroked her hair. She’d just tried not to listen to the words. Fortunately, that had been easy. She’d known some Finnish, understanding much more than she could speak, but when she stopped trying and let her mind relax, the foreign words ran together, losing their meaning and becoming nothing more than combinations of sounds falling out of the man’s mouth as he hummed sweetly against Natalia’s neck.

  Five minutes earlier, Natalia had been thinking about that man and his slightly clumsy hands. Would he miss her? Maybe a bit. Maybe just a little bit. But not enough, because he had never loved her, not really. If he had loved her, really loved her, he would have solved Natalia’s problems for her, as he’d promised to do so many times. Now Natalia had to solve her problems for herself.

  Two minutes earlier, Natalia had snapped shut her handbag, which bulged with cash. Quickly, she’d tidied up and then glanced at herself in the front hall mirror. Bleached blond hair, brown eyes, thin eyebrows, and shining red lips. She had been pale, with dark circles under her eyes from staying up too late. She had just been leaving. In her mouth, she had tasted freedom and fear, both of which had a metallic tang.

  Two minutes earlier, she had looked her reflection in the eye and raised her chin. This was her chance to make a break, and she was taking it.

  That’s when Natalia heard the key turning in the lock. She had frozen in place, straining her ears. One set of footsteps, then another, and a third. The Troika. The Troika were coming through the door.

  All she could do was run.

  One minute earlier, Natalia had charged through the kitchen toward the patio door. She’d fumbled with the lock. Her hands had been shaking too much to get the door unlatched. Then, by some miracle, it had given way, and Natalia had run across the snow-covered terrace into the garden. Her leather boots had sunk in the fresh snow, but she’d pressed on without looking back. She hadn’t heard anything. She had thought for a moment that she might make it after all, that she might escape, that she might actually win.
>
  Thirty seconds earlier, a pistol fitted with a silencer had fired with a dull snap, and a bullet had pierced the back of Natalia Smirnova’s coat and skin, barely missing her spine and ripping through her internal organs and, finally, the handle of her Louis Vuitton bag, which she had been clutching to her chest. She had fallen forward into the pure, untouched snow.

  Now the red puddle under Natalia continued to spread, consuming the snow all around. The red was still voracious and warm, but it cooled with each second that passed. One set of slow, heavy footfalls approached Natalia Smirnova as she lay in the snow. But she did not hear.

  Three people jostled at a set of big double doors, each wanting to be first inside.

  “Yo, gimme a little space so I can get this key into the hole.”

  “You can never get anything in the hole.”

  Laughter, shushing, more laughter.

  “Hold on. That’s it. Got it. And now turn it slow. Really slow. Wow. This is amazing. I mean, can you believe how you can unlock a door just by turning a key? How did anyone ever come up with a system like this? If you ask me, this is the thirteenth wonder of the world.”

  “Shut up and open the door.”

  Pushing the door wide, the three shoved each other as they piled inside. One almost tripped. Another started making little high-pitched squeals and then laughed at how they echoed in the big empty space. The third scratched his head and then punched in the code for the building alarm, one digit at a time.

  “One . . . seven . . . three . . . two. Hell yeah, I got it! And this is the fourteenth wonder of the world. That you can turn off an alarm by punching in some numbers. Hell yeah. Now I know what I’m gonna be when I grow up. I’m gonna be a locksmith. That’s a job, right? Doing stuff with locks, I mean? Or maybe I’ll be a security guard.”

  The other two weren’t listening; they were already running along the building’s long, empty hallways in the dark, shouting and giggling. The third took off after them. Laughter ricocheted off the walls, reverberating up the flights of stairs.

  “We are the champions!”

  Ampions. Mpions. Pions. Ions. Ons. Ns. S.

  “And super fucking rich!”

  Colliding on purpose, they fell to the floor, rolling around and snickering. Making angels on the wide tile floor. Then one of them remembered.

  “We’re rich, but the money is dirty.”

  “Yeah. Dirty money money money.”

  “Yo, we were supposed to go to the darkroom. That’s why we came.”

  If they could only remember what had happened. Their memories were like a mist with glimpses of individual events flashing into view at random intervals. Someone vomiting. Some others skinny-dipping in a pool. A locked door that shouldn’t have been locked. A broken crystal vase and shards that had cut someone’s foot. Blood. Music throbbing too loudly. “Oops! . . . I Did It Again.” A dead and buried single someone had put on repeat, who knows why. Someone crying inconsolably, sobbing that she didn’t want help. The floor slick with spilled rum that smelled simultaneously sharp and sweet.

  The memories refused to fit in any logical order. Who had brought the plastic bag? When had he brought it? Who had opened it, put their hand in, jerked it back out, and licked their finger? When had they realized?

  Have to take something. Fast. Now.

  “You guys got anything left? I could use another hit.”

  “I got these.”

  Three pills. One for each. Together, they placed them on their tongues and let them dissolve.

  “That’s got kick. Oh yeah. Nice kick.”

  In the darkroom. Darkness. Then one of them flipped the switch.

  “Let there be light. And there was light.”

  Plastic bag onto the table. Bag open.

  “Oh my God, that stinks.”

  “The money ain’t the thing that stinks. Money never stinks.”

  “That’s a shitload of cash.”

  “And we’re splitting it fifty-fifty, three ways.”

  “This is so sick! Nothing like this has ever happened to me. I love you guys. I love the whole goddamn world.”

  “No kissing. I’ll get all horny and lose my concentration.”

  “We could hump right here on the floor.”

  “No humping either. Now’s time for some cleaning.”

  Processing trays. Water. Cash.

  Then all they had to do was hang each bill up to dry.

  “Now this is what I call money laundering.”

  “Up and at ’em! Come on, get your butt moving, sleepyhead. Don’t even think about rolling over!”

  Shouting filled Lumikki Andersson’s ears. Unfortunately, the annoying voice was all too familiar since it was her own. She had recorded herself on her phone as an alarm because she thought that would get her out of a warm bed better than anything else. And it totally worked. Rolling over didn’t even cross her mind.

  Sitting bleary-eyed on the edge of the bed, she glanced at the Moomin cartoon calendar hanging on the wall. Monday, February 29. Leap day. The most pointless day in the world. Why couldn’t it be an international holiday? It was just a leftover day, so why should anybody have to do anything useful or productive on it?

  Lumikki shoved her feet into furry blue slippers and trudged to her kitchenette. Measuring out water and coffee, she put the moka pot on the stove to percolate. This morning, there was no way she could manage joining the land of the living without a strong cup of coffee. Outside it was still dark, far too dark to be awake. Without any light to reflect, even the tall snowdrifts didn’t help. And the gloom wasn’t going to let up for ages, holding all of Finland in its suffocating grip far into March.

  She despised this part of the winter. Snow and cold. Too much of both. Spring wasn’t just around the corner. Winter just went on and on without any hope of ending, slowing down the world while it froze out of sheer boredom. She was cold at home. She was cold outside. She was cold at school. Strangely enough, sometimes she felt like the only time she wasn’t cold was when she went swimming in the frosty hole they kept open in the ice down at the lake, but she couldn’t spend all her time there. Pulling on a big, gray wool sweater, Lumikki poured herself a cup of coffee. Then she went back into the only real room in her studio apartment, a princely hundred and eighty-two square feet, and curled up in a beat-up armchair to try to warm up. A draft came from the window even though she had added extra weather stripping in the fall.

  The coffee tasted like coffee. But she didn’t expect anything more from it. She couldn’t stand all those strange, sugary chocolate hazelnut cardamom vanilla coffees. Coffee black and strong, facts straight up, and an apartment made for living in. That was how Lumikki liked to live her life.

  Her mom was shocked the last time she visited. “Don’t you want to decorate a little? Make it look like a home?”

  No, she didn’t. Lumikki had been living in her apartment for about a year and a half. Just a thick mattress on the floor, a desk, a laptop, and a comfy old chair. For the first few months, her mom kept insisting that she was going to buy a bed frame and a bookcase, but Lumikki had tenaciously refused. Her books sat in piles on the floor. The only “decorative element” was the black-and-white Moomin calendar. Why would she even bother nesting? This wasn’t reality TV. She was just living here while she finished high school. The studio apartment wasn’t home in the sense that she was going to put down roots for any longer than she had to. Once high school was done, Lumikki would be free to go wherever she wanted without having to miss anyone or anything.

  Home wasn’t seventy miles south in Riihimäki with her parents either. These days, she felt like a stranger there. The furniture and decorations reminded her of things she’d rather forget. Things she remembered more than enough in her dreams and nightmares.

  Her parents’ reaction to her moving away from home had been full of contradictions. Sometimes it seemed like it was a relief for them. It was true that the mood at home had been tense, but it had always been like tha
t—at least as long as Lumikki could remember. She had never figured out where the tension came from, because she had never really seen Mom and Dad fighting or ever raised her own voice at them. As moving day got closer, her mother and father had given her frequent long hugs, which was strange and kind of irritating since that wasn’t how their family was.

  After the hugs, her mother would take Lumikki’s face in her hands and look at her so long that it got a little weird.

  “All we have is you. Only you.”

  Her mom kept repeating that, looking like she might burst into tears at any second. Lumikki had started feeling harassed. When she finally got her belongings moved to Tampere with her parents’ help, and closed the door for the first time after they left, she felt as if a heavy weight she didn’t even know she was carrying had fallen off her shoulders.

  “Are you really sure you’re going to be okay here?”

  Her mom always asked that. Her dad had a more practical approach.

  “Flickan blir snart myndig. Hon måste ju klara sig,” he would say, speaking Swedish to her instead of Finnish like he always did. And that was exactly what she was going to do. Daddy’s grown-up flicka was going to fend for herself. A little better every day.

  The girl who looked back at her in the bathroom mirror this morning was tired. The caffeine wasn’t working its way through her body fast enough. Washing her face with cold water, Lumikki pulled her brown hair back in a ponytail. Her parents had stuck her with a name that had no connection to reality. Her hair wasn’t black, her skin didn’t shine like freshly fallen snow, and her lips weren’t strikingly red. Seriously, who names their daughter after Snow White? It wasn’t quite as bad in Finnish—Lumikki was an actual name, even if it was also the character in the Brothers Grimm story, but still. Why couldn’t they have given her a Swedish name from Dad’s side of the family? Of course she could have tried to make the image in the mirror match the name with some hair dye and makeup, but she didn’t see any point in that. Her real reflection in the looking glass was good enough for her, and other people’s opinions were irrelevant.