Chapter 25

“I’m sorry about this,” he said.

I kissed him back. “Sorry about what? You didn’t do anything—to me, anyway.”

He nodded. “But listen, I only joined them so I could come north. I had to get away, and they approached me, asked if I would be willing to do time in a remote station up north.”

I nodded. “That’s okay. But you came with me here, okay? Just let me do the talking for the most part.”

Matt nodded and he accompanied me into the kitchen, after taking a swig of vodka—from a bottle he’d found in the storage room.

“Fortitude,” he said.

I introduced Matt to the cops, and said he had been one of the miners who had hitched a ride with me. I don’t know if they believed the story, but they didn’t challenge me openly. However, Emil did take me aside a little later.

“Look, Jens, one of the names we were given was Matt Alden. That’s him, right?”

We looked at each other in tense silence for a minute. Then I spoke.