Silver Tears(16)

“I thought so.”

She smiled at him, took a swallow of her wine, and turned to the woman. She pulled a business card out of her clutch bag and placed it on the table in front of her.

“If you want a real job—or a trip on a proper boat—get in touch.”

She turned on her heel, went back to her table, and sat down.

Patrik Ullman’s face was bright red. He muttered something to his companion, paid the bill, and stormed out of the place.

Faye waved at his back as it disappeared, drank a little more of the wine, and got ready to go up to her suite. She was longing to sink into a hot bath, wash off the TV makeup, and then slip into bed.

Her train of thought was interrupted by a throat being cleared. When she turned around she discovered David Schiller behind her. Laughter was twinkling in his eyes. She hadn’t noticed their color before. Azure blue. Like the Mediterranean. He was holding a dry martini in one hand.

“I just wanted to thank you,” he said.

“For what?” said Faye, defensively.

“For what you just did. You made me think about my two daughters. I want them to grow up with the belief that the world is at their feet, the same way I did. That young woman could have been my Stina or my Felicia in a few years’ time. So I’m glad there are people like you on their side.”



Her chest tightened in response to his words. Faye raised her glass in a toast.

“What’s the point of having a fuck-load of money if I can never tell people to fuck off?” she said.

David, whose mouth had been full of dry martini, laughed so hard that the clear liquid began to seep out of the corners of his mouth.

“My best friend Chris always said that.”

“Well, here’s to Chris,” said David.

He hadn’t noticed that she had expressed herself in the past tense and she didn’t draw attention to it. The pain was still too palpable. She hadn’t even been up to staying in touch with Johan, the fine man who Chris had married on her deathbed. He was far too much of a reminder of everything she had lost.

Faye looked at him again. She shrugged—she didn’t know what about. Her previous objections, possibly.

“Want to join me?” she said.

They ordered fresh drinks: another dry martini for David and a G&T for Faye.

“How long have you been staying at this hotel?” she asked when she had set down her glass. “Because I assume you’re staying here. If not, you have an unhealthy weakness for hanging out at the Grand.”

David grimaced.

“I’ve been staying here for two weeks.”

“That’s a long time. Is there any particular reason why? Seems pretty unnecessary when you’ve got a house in Saltis.”

He sighed.

“I’m in the middle of a divorce from the girls’ mother.”

He picked the olive out of his drink and put it in his mouth.

“Things could be worse,” he said, making a sweeping gesture around himself. “I am staying at the Grand H?tel, after all. There are homeless people sleeping on the pavement just a stone’s throw from here, because they can’t afford even the most modest accommodation. You have to see things the way they are. Johanna is a significantly better mother than I am a father, no matter how much I try. So it’s only right that she’s at home with the girls. But Jesus, I miss them.”



Faye took a sip of her G&T. She liked the way he talked about his ex-wife-to-be. It was a sign of respect—not depicting the other party as an evil monster.

David laughed. Thinking about his daughters seemed to have triggered something inside him.

“Stina and Felicia are coming here on Saturday. We’ll do the theme park at Gr?na Lund and then a Harry Potter marathon. And, tragically, I think I may be looking forward to it more than they are.”

He waved an imaginary wand in the air and Faye couldn’t help smiling.

“We’ve already established that you work in finance,” she said. “What exactly is it you do?”

Faye realized reluctantly that David sparked her interest. There was something disarming—open, even—about him that appealed to her.

“I…well, I suppose I’m what they call an angel investor. I find interesting new companies and invest in them—preferably as early on as possible.”

“And what’s your most successful investment been to date?”

David named a company in the biotech sector that Faye was very familiar with. It had been meteoric on the markets. The founders were now good for hundreds of millions of kronor and heading for even more.

“Nicely done. Congratulations. How early did you get on board?”

“Gosh, it was so early that the boys weren’t even out of school. They were still at Chalmers University of Technology and it all started as a degree project. But they got a bit of press for their innovation, I happened to read it, got interested, got in touch, and, well…the rest is history. Above all, it’s the people behind a company you invest in. It’s more about having a good feel for people than being hot on your key figures. Some people just have that certain something that means they’re going to succeed, that they won’t give up until they do. It’s vital to find those people. A lot of people who pitch to me are privileged rich kids who’ve never had to fight for anything in their lives, and who think being an entrepreneur is a piece of cake.”