We want to know what he’s up to during the hours of darkness.
‘I presume you still don’t want us to put out a call for him?’
‘No – it’s still too soon.’
Too soon?
When more people might die?
Alex ended the call with the feeling that he was standing in the middle of a storm that had no intention of abating. It was a deeply unpleasant experience.
Torbjörn Ross was driving fast. Keep going, keep going, don’t look back. He blinked several times; he was more tired than he was prepared to admit, more stressed than he’d thought. Every so often he glanced in the rear-view mirror to confirm what he already knew: he’d managed to lose the surveillance vehicle.
He was free to do whatever he wanted.
As always.
How the hell had they worked out what he was up to? He’d killed the police investigation, made it clear that no crime had been committed. That didn’t apply to Alex Recht, of course. Why did he always have to go his own way, follow his instincts? And then there was Noah, who’d emailed to tell him he’d contacted Recht. The solution to that particular problem worried Ross. He had his suspicions about who’d killed Noah, but didn’t dare investigate the matter any further. Noah’s death had certainly made things more difficult for him. He was going to have to work faster, bring his project to an end sooner than planned. He’d already given notice on the house, which had been a mistake. He should have waited until it was all over.
So that no one would start asking questions.
On the other hand, giving notice meant he had a clear deadline, which was a motivating factor. His mobile lay on the passenger seat, switched off and with the battery removed. No fucker was going to find him through modern technology. Unfortunately it meant his wife wouldn’t be able to reach him, which was a worry. She had a tendency to get herself into a state; if he was quiet for too long she’d call the police. Which would be very unfortunate for a number of reasons.
He’d left the motorway just under fifteen minutes ago. The road cut through dense forest; nobody would expect that anyone could live out here.
They can’t – they can only die here.
He would be there soon; anxiety and irritation had made him drive much too fast.
But I have to know.
He hadn’t thought it would happen so quickly. He’d run a thorough background check on the couple, knew that the man had suffered a period of severe depression a few years earlier. There was no doubt that he would break first, which was the whole point of the exercise. He had to realise that there was no way out of the hell in which he found himself, realise that he must die in order to gain redemption. And that he must take his family with him into eternity so that they could stay together.
The family. The children. Ross didn’t like thinking about them. Their deaths were a necessary evil; it wouldn’t have worked if he’d left them out of the equation. The punishment would have been disproportionate.
He peered through the windscreen, searching for the narrow track. If he met another car, one of them would have to reverse. Not that that was going to happen; who was he going to meet on a track no one even knew existed?
Two kilometres. That was the length of the umbilical cord between what he referred to as Nothing and the main road. Two kilometres of forest, wrapped around a well-kept secret. A place that could be transformed into paradise or hell, depending on how it was used.
‘I’m hoping to provide a refuge for someone,’ he’d said when he first spoke to the owners of the property.
They hadn’t asked too many questions, not after he’d explained that he wanted to keep his daughter and her family safe – a lie so entirely justified that it didn’t weigh him down any more than the air he breathed. And of course he’d provided an excellent reference from a trusted individual who could back up his story, quell any concerns. Ross didn’t want to think about what that reference might cost him.
I still have time.
He could see the house now. White wooden panelling, small windows. There was a light on.
He parked on the drive, got out of the car and closed the door. There was no need for discretion. He was alone in the forest, he was sure of it.
His pulse rate increased as he approached the house. It always did. The feeling of having total control over other people never failed to intoxicate him, as did the knowledge that he was making the bastard pay his debt in such a perfect way.
‘You’re going to suffer,’ he’d said when he took the man and his family to the house. ‘You’re going to suffer just as much as me.’
The man had protested, claimed he didn’t know who Torbjörn was and why he was doing this.
‘We don’t even know each other, for fuck’s sake!’ he’d bellowed.
Torbjörn had ignored him. He could shout as much as he wanted; Torbjörn knew what was right and wrong. It wasn’t his problem if the guy didn’t. Not any longer.
He paused at one of the windows and looked in. They were set quite high up, and he had to stand on tiptoe. The living room was empty. The television was on, but he couldn’t see either of the kids. Where the hell were they?
He took the keys out of his pocket and continued to the front door. First the entry code, then the top lock, then the bottom one. He drew his gun; he always had it in his hand when he went inside. They’d tried to ambush him once, and once only – right at the beginning before they’d realised that most of the house was monitored by CCTV cameras.
‘I’m watching you all the time!’ he’d yelled.
That wasn’t true, however. There were no cameras in the bathroom or the main bedroom. Or the hallway, which was extremely unfortunate. Torbjörn had managed to work out what they were up to only because the two adults had positioned themselves on either side of the kitchen door. In order to reach the rest of the house from the hallway it was necessary to go through the kitchen, so it hadn’t been a bad plan. If they’d stood in the hallway instead, he wouldn’t have seen them. That was why his gun had to be at the ready, his mind sharp and clear.
The reason why he’d rushed over was because there had been no sign of the family for several hours. He didn’t have time to analyse hours of film, nor to follow their movements in real time. All he knew was that however much he searched and switched between different cameras, he couldn’t find them. His only option was to come out here to check what was going on.
He flung open the door.
‘Hello?’
He took one step and almost fell over. For a moment the world turned upside down. What the fuck? Torbjörn staggered, regained his balance.
He blinked, trying to understand what he was looking at.
Red.
Blood.
Everywhere.
The man. With his eyes open, his throat slit.
Torbjörn inhaled sharply, felt the air get stuck halfway down his windpipe.
The woman and the children were sitting with their backs against the wall two metres in front of him. The woman was clutching a bloodstained knife, her hand shaking.
‘We want to go home now,’ she said.
INTERVIEW WITH ALEX RECHT
06-09-2016
Present: Interrogators one and two (I1 and I2), Detective Chief Inspector Alex Recht (Recht)
I1:
When did surveillance find Ross that evening?
Recht:
Late, very late.
I2:
But you didn’t pick him up?
Recht:
We had good reason to believe we had more to gain by leaving him at liberty but under surveillance.
I2:
But he already knew he was being followed. He’d managed to shake them off once; what made you think you’d have better luck this time?
Recht:
At that stage we didn’t realise he’d deliberately lost the tail, or that he knew we had eyes on him. We thought we’d just been careless. These things happen, I’m afraid.
I1:
We’re aware that these things happen, but this was particularly unfortunate, wouldn’t you say?
(silence)
I1:
We already know how the situation developed, but we’d like to hear your summary. Night fell, and you had eyes on Ross. Then what?
(silence)
Recht:
Then everything deteriorated. Everything and nothing. And the killing . . . wasn’t over.
I2:
How was Bergman at this point?
Recht:
Fredrika was just the same as she always was in a professional capacity – focused and brilliant.
I2:
You had no idea of what was in store for her?
(silence)
Recht:
No, and to be honest I’m not sure she had any idea either.
FRIDAY
It was gone midnight, and Fredrika was still awake. Spencer was lying motionless by her side; she could tell from his breathing that he wasn’t asleep either.
He’s watching me.
She kicked off the covers and got out of bed.
Spencer raised his head from the pillow but didn’t say a word.
Fredrika went into the kitchen, drank some water straight from the tap. She was hot and sweaty. The weather forecast had promised thundery showers during the night. A slight pressure that had started behind her frontal bone had grown into a pounding headache.
She filled a glass with water and went into the living room. Sat down on the sofa, tucked her legs beneath her. She felt insecure. Spencer had noticed the change in her mood, but hadn’t commented. That bothered her, but she was also angry.
He ran over a woman.
He left her on the road, he didn’t even know whether she was dead or alive.
And now he’s put everything right.
She felt like going back into the bedroom and putting the pillow over his face, pressing it down. Certain things shouldn’t be kept secret within a marriage – like past crimes. Particularly if they were as serious as the one Fredrika believed Spencer had committed.
Believed.
That was a difficult word to have to use in this context. She had gone over the situation in her own mind more times than she could count.
She’d read a letter in which the writer confessed to a crime.
She believed the letter had been written by Spencer.
Which could mean that he was the murderer she and Alex were looking for.
But that probably wasn’t the case. It seemed more likely that the perpetrator was Torbjörn Ross.
So why couldn’t she let go of these horrific suspicions? The answer was easy: she still had no evidence that the writer had nothing to do with the murders.
I need to talk to Spencer, she thought. I have to confront him.
Her sorrow was as overwhelming as her anger. How could he have simply let the years go by? How could he have omitted to tell her what he’d done?
Because I wouldn’t have forgiven him.
Fredrika opened up her laptop, which she’d brought home from work. She wasn’t going to get any sleep tonight, not if she was sharing a bed with Spencer, so she might as well do something useful. With a bit of luck she might doze off on the sofa, then she could blame work if Spencer wanted to know why she hadn’t come back to bed.
Because I don’t feel safe next to you.
She opened up her notes from the meeting with Solid Security. Alex had passed on the misleading information given by Peder Rydh, and it chafed like an ill-fitting shoe. Why had he said that Noah Johansson had sought help from Solid Security, when in fact it was Dan? Why had he suggested that Noah was unreliable? And why the hell had he been fired?
She refused to waste any more energy on Peder. She decided to focus on Noah and his missing brother. That was the hardest piece of the puzzle to understand. According to the initial assessment made by the police, Dan and his family were living in Australia, but according to Noah, they’d been kidnapped. Fredrika didn’t know what the investigating officer’s thought process had been, but she saw no reason to doubt Noah’s genuine concern.
So where did you hide an entire family?
And why not assume they were dead?
That was a challenging but important question: why start from the premise that the family were alive?
Maybe because a police officer had allegedly spoken to Dan on one occasion. However, he didn’t know Dan, didn’t know what he sounded like. It could have been anybody on the other end of the line.
Fredrika changed her position on the sofa. If Dan and his family had been abducted but not killed, where were they?
Ross wasn’t the kind to turn his cellar into a dungeon, besides which it would take a very long time to carry out such a project, making major alterations and soundproofing the room or rooms. According to Berlin, Ross had said that his daughter had died back in the autumn. And Dan had disappeared in May.
Forget it.
So: did it have to be so complicated? Had the person who’d taken the family really invested oceans of time in a complex building project, or did the ideal location already exist?
She shook her head, tried to get her thoughts into some kind of order.
What kind of place would it have to be? Or was the place irrelevant? Ross could have hired guards on the quiet; maybe he didn’t need a nuclear bunker.
She heard Spencer leave the bedroom and go into the bathroom.
The uncertainty about what he’d done – or not done – was driving her crazy.
After a little while he stuck his head around the living-room door:
‘Are you coming back to bed?’
She didn’t look up. ‘I have to work for a while longer.’
The clock on the wall ticked.
And yet time seemed to stand still as the man Fredrika had loved for so many years turned and walked away.
A thunderstorm raged for most of the night. One flash of lightning after another lit up the bedroom where Malin and the children had sought refuge. Malin, Hedvig and Max. There were only the three of them left now. Dan was gone, he was never coming back. The man had taken him with him when he left.
‘The rest of you are staying here!’ he’d yelled.
He had been badly shaken, shocked. As if Dan’s death hadn’t been part of his plans at all.
‘No!’ Malin had screamed. ‘No, you can’t leave us!’
The children had been so traumatised they’d stopped crying, and Malin had been unable to hold it together. She’d broken down in front of them, lost her balance on the slippery blood and ended up lying on the floor while the man dragged Dan away. Hedvig and Max had remained sitting with their backs to the wall as if they were paralysed, until Malin found the strength to get up and take control of the situation. She had to clean up the blood, calm the children. It was many hours before they fell asleep.
Now it was seven o’clock in the morning, and Malin had hardly slept. Again.
Maybe you can get used to it. Maybe you can give up sleeping.
Neither Hedvig nor Max moved when she got out of bed. She found this terrifying, and leaned over them to make sure they were breathing. They were. They were alive. So was Malin. Nothing else mattered.
Nothing else mattered.
That was how she must think from now on. As long as they stayed alive, everything else could be fixed. There were psychologists and drugs for every eventuality.
She went to the bathroom, sat down on the cold plastic toilet seat. She couldn’t get rid of the pictures in her head, Dan rushing out of the closet, Dan dying, the moment when she killed him.
It was him or me and the kids.
Madness had burned like a forest fire in his eyes. It had all happened so fast that she hadn’t had time to think, not when she hurled herself at him, grabbed the knife, pointed it at him.
‘Go on then!’ he’d shouted. ‘Do it! Otherwise we’re all going to die!’
There had been no opportunity to consider the best co
urse of action, no opportunity for reflection. He’d lurched at Malin and she’d used the knife, felt it slice into his throat – so easily, meeting almost no resistance – and watched him collapse. When he sank to the floor she felt a huge sense of relief, which sickened her. Dan was dead. And Malin was relieved. Because she and the children had survived, because they were no longer under threat from him. The feeling disappeared almost immediately, because Dan’s death didn’t actually make the situation better. On the contrary – things were worse. Now she was the only adult in the house, and their debt to the man who was holding them had not been paid.
She flushed the toilet, washed her hands and returned to the bedroom.
Only then did it occur to her that the man hadn’t brought any food. She ran through what was in the fridge: very little. In a few days it would be empty.
What happens then?
Surely he wasn’t intending to let them starve to death?
Malin got back into bed and drew her knees up to her chin.
He can’t let us starve.
He can’t let us starve.
Morning briefing was held in the Lions’ Den. For once it was pleasantly warm; the air conditioning had been repaired and order had been restored.
Or not.
Only those colleagues who were aware of the investigation into Torbjörn Ross had been invited. Alex signalled to Fredrika to close the blinds at the windows facing the corridor. He didn’t want anyone passing by to glance in and think that he or she ought to be there.
He was chairing the meeting even though Berlin was present. She wanted to keep abreast of developments; there was a fighting spirit in her that Alex hadn’t seen before. Berlin was on the attack, and it suited her.
‘Where exactly is Ross right now?’ Alex’s question was directed at the head of surveillance.
The team had had eyes on Ross since he returned home at midnight.
‘In the toilets on the third floor.’
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