MALICE IN MALMÖ

by Torquil Macleod

  ‘And would Christian Frandsen know about some of herr Möller’s movements?’

  ‘A number of the business trips, of course. And they discuss potential clients. But it’s always Mats who drums up new business and keeps existing clients happy. He’s good with them face to face,’ she said with some pride.

  ‘And what about his private life? Do you act as his confidante?’

  ‘Certainly not,’ she answered disapprovingly. ‘What he does in his own time, and with whom, is entirely Mats’ concern. Though if he wants any advice, he does turn to me.’

  ‘What sort of advice?’

  ‘Nothing of a personal nature, I assure you. It’s usually about the company. What I think of certain employees. Have they got the right attitude? Are they happy? Is Christian on top of things? He likes to know what I think of the reports he’s asked me to type up. Maybe what restaurant he should take a particular client to...’ She sounded indispensible. For a moment, Anita tried to visualize Åkesson as someone who could organize the kidnap of her boss. From a practical point of view, possibly. She was resourceful. She was the only one who knew his routines. She was a great organizer. Motive? Though her appearance was neat, she was not an extravagant person. Anita assumed that Möller paid her well. What would she do with all the ransom money? In her job, Anita got immediate instincts about people. Harriet Åkesson was just as she seemed. Dedicated, loyal, efficient – MM Data and Mats Möller were her life. And at the start of the interview, she had appeared genuinely upset that Möller had been kidnapped and that he could possibly be treated in such an appalling way. Anita could tell that she would be even more protective from now on. Despite that, she’d get Hakim to check out Harriet Åkesson’s finances.

  Åkesson could think of no one who would want to do Mats Möller any harm and do such a dreadful thing to such a nice young man. Had she been aware of anybody suspicious hanging around the building? Not to her knowledge.

  Later that same day, Möller came into the polishus and looked through the back catalogue of obvious suspects. He didn’t recognize anyone. Harriet Åkesson’s finances turned out to be in order. She was paid handsomely and had plenty of disposable income. She lived alone with two cats near Limhamn, though she had been married and divorced some thirty years before. Ex-husband was dead. She had been Möller’s second employee when he’d set up his fledgling business over a decade before. The first one had only lasted two months. He’d been checked out too, just in case there had been an acrimonious departure and he was looking to get even. He was living and working in New York and doing very well for himself. And Moberg’s further conversations with Stockholm hadn’t yielded anything useful on his Eastern European gang theory. Yes, they did operate like that on rare occasions, but reiterated that taking rival gang members was the norm. And, no, there was no intelligence of any recent activity in the Skåne area. So, as the weekend approached, they had nothing.

  Anita hadn’t even had time to get a coffee when Moberg came barging into her office.

  ‘Have you fucking seen this?’ he said, slamming a newspaper down violently on her desk. His face was beetroot red and Anita worried that his blood pressure would go off the scale.

  She stared at the creased copy of Sydsvenskan. The front page headline screamed out: BUSINESS MAESTRO MÖLLER FREED AFTER DRAMATIC KIDNAP

  ‘Ah!’ was all Anita could offer as she quickly scanned the article while Moberg breathed heavily behind her. There was a photo of Möller taken at some business conference. It was dwarfed by a bigger picture of a man grinning at the camera, sitting on a bench in Gamla Kyrkogården cemetery. It became apparent that this was Bernt Hägg, the man who had found and unbound Möller. He was enjoying his fifteen minutes of fame. The way the article read, you’d have thought that Bernt Hägg had fought off the kidnappers single-handedly and freed Möller through his own brave efforts. Needless to say, there was no comment from Möller, who appeared to have gone to ground. Anita didn’t have time to get as far as the paper’s speculation as to who had carried out the kidnap.

  ‘The commissioner’s gone apeshit. He’s shouting at everyone, including me. It’s not my bloody fault! Möller’s been on the phone in a panic and has gone into hiding. We should have sorted this Hägg halfwit out and made sure he didn’t say anything. Why didn’t you think of that?’

  ‘What?’ Anita was feeling fragile after seeing Kevin off and all the implications of that situation. This was too much. She cracked. ‘It’s nothing to do with me! You’re the bloody boss! You get paid the money; you make the bloody decisions!’ Through her fury, she knew that Moberg was only taking it out on her because the commissioner was taking it out on him. The fact was that the whole business was out of their control, though there were a couple of things she’d spotted in the article that couldn’t have come from Bernt Hägg.

  Moberg scrunched up the newspaper in his massive fist and stamped out of the room.

  After Moberg had gone and she’d calmed down, Anita picked up her office phone and punched in a short number. It was answered immediately.

  ‘Pontus. Have you been speaking to a reporter from Sydsvenskan?’

  ‘What about?’ came the cautious reply.

  ‘How did the paper know where and when Möller was snatched? Or the kind of place he was held?’

  ‘Search me, Anita,’ came the innocent reply. Now she knew Brodd had definitely blabbed.

  CHAPTER 7

  ‘Are you threatening me?’

  He was furious and he was frightened. The confident voice at the other end of the phone continued as though he hadn’t spoken. He wanted the voice to stop. How could the man know such things? He tried to interrupt, to suspend the flow...

  ‘Why can’t you leave me alone?’

  The bastard was laughing; actually laughing. He stood there, paralysed. This couldn’t be happening. He couldn’t help himself; he kept listening. The receiver was clamped to his ear. Why couldn’t he rip it away and silence his tormentor? But the man had hinted at something even darker. He had to know if he really knew.

  The man’s voiced stopped.

  ‘What do you mean you’ll be in touch?’ he yelled. Why couldn’t he just come out with it now so he would know what he was up against?

  The line went dead.

  He was sweating. The phone felt clammy in his hand. He felt nauseous, desperate. And powerless – the past was written and there was nothing he could do.

  Anita drove her car along the slip road and onto the E6. The morning of Thursday, May 4th was brightening up after the heavy overnight rain, though there were still pools of water visible at the sides of the carriageway. Anita was glad to be getting out of Malmö. The fields were emerging from their winter drabness, and yellow bands of ripening rape were beginning to dominate the vista. The optimistic early summer morning didn’t improve Anita’s mood – she was slightly dreading her trip to Helsingborg. She was skipping work on a mission that she knew she had to undertake both for her own sake and that of the team.

  April had been a difficult month. The Mats Möller kidnap investigation had hit a brick wall. Each opening had soon closed. They had found the premises that Möller had been held in, which had caused huge initial excitement. It was a unit down on the docks which had been a workshop for vehicle maintenance, belonging to a company that had closed its doors back in the 1990s. The area had yet to be redeveloped. The workshop had been given the full forensic treatment. Nothing of interest had been noted other than that the kidnappers had broken in to create their hostage base. When forensic technician Eva Thulin’s report came in – and it was thin – all she could say in conclusion was that ‘these guys are real pros’. The effect was to set Moberg off again on his Eastern European gang theory, though no one was really listening any more. The owner of the premises had been tracked down and didn’t even realize it was part of his property portfolio. It had been part of a bigger purchase some years before. No one working in the area had seen anything suspicious. CCTV had shown up a
number of green or dark coloured vans passing various points in the area over that March weekend. All except one was traced. That one had a Danish number plate. They tracked it back and discovered it had been driven into Sweden over the Öresund Bridge a week before the kidnap. But there was no record of it leaving the country either by road or ferry. The Danish authorities found that the van had been bought from a dodgy second-hand car lot outside Roskilde. Cash payment. The description of the buyer, though vague, was similar to one of the men who had approached Möller. That was a dead end, too.

  In her desperation, Anita’s thoughts returned to the tip-off that Moberg had received about the planned robbery of the electrical warehouse. Her original reasoning that it might have been a ploy to send them to the wrong location while a robbery was carried out elsewhere had proved unfounded. Yet now she couldn’t help wondering if it was all part of the kidnap plan. A significant number of police officers had been sent to the southern side of Malmö on a fruitless quest while the kidnappers were operating in the northern docks. The call had come in from a pay-as-you-go phone somewhere in central Malmö. Again, a dead end. Even checks at all the nearby surrounding fast food outlets hadn’t thrown up clues as to anyone unusual buying in the pizzas and falafels that Mats Möller said he was fed by his captors.

  The atmosphere in the office was cheerless. The Möller case hadn’t improved Moberg’s mood. The press had given the police a hard time, and the commissioner had passed the buck to his senior officer on the case. Brodd was keeping a low profile. Anita had eventually wheedled out of him that he’d been approached by an attractive female reporter who already knew about the kidnap from Bernt Hägg, and Brodd thought there wouldn’t be any harm letting slip a few extra details. Klara Wallen had enough of her own problems. Normally, she shared them with Anita in the confessional of the female toilets, but she hadn’t been very communicative recently, which Anita took as a bad sign – maybe Klara had had enough of Rolf the Sloth? (one could but hope). And then there was the tension with Hakim. Hence her trip today.

  She took the E4 off the E6 and then quickly onto the 111, which skirted round Helsingborg. On the north side, she came to Laröd and found the small estate where Liv Fogelström was living with her brother’s family. It was a modern, white, one-storey building. Anita knew that it had temporarily been fitted out to enable Liv to move in. The door was answered by Liv’s sister-in-law, who seemed pleased that Liv had a visitor. She was shown through into the small garden at the back, which was mainly patio and a small patch of grass that had a couple of deflated footballs nestling next to what was an attempt at a flower border. The footballs might explain the squashed daffodils. Liv was sitting in the sun in her wheelchair with a laptop on her knees. She, too, greeted Anita with a broad smile, which immediately made Anita feel at ease. She hadn’t seen Liv properly since she was in hospital. Hakim had hardly encouraged a visit.

  Despite her awful experience, Liv was still as bright-eyed as Anita remembered her. Her blonde hair was now cut a lot shorter, which accentuated her chubby face. And she had put on a bit more weight, understandable with her lack of exercise.

  ‘It’s so good to see you, Inspector.’

  ‘Anita, please.’ She sat down on a garden chair opposite. She didn’t really want to ask but found herself saying ‘How are you?’

  ‘I’m fine.’ Anita marvelled at how she remained so bubbly. How could someone who had had her life so dramatically changed in an instant be so upbeat? Anita knew how resentful she would be in similar circumstances and how she would rail against the unfairness of it all. Liv closed the laptop. ‘I like surfing the net; takes my mind off things. But I’m getting better all the time, though, according to the consultants, I won’t be able to use these anymore,’ she tapped a leg. ‘But what the hell do they know? Anyway, what’s happening at headquarters these days? I’m out of the loop.’

  ‘Doesn’t Hakim tell you what’s going on?’ Anita asked.

  Liv pulled a face. ‘He doesn’t like talking about work, after all this. Thinks it will upset me. He’s over-sensitive.’

  ‘He doesn’t like talking to me much these days, either.’

  ‘I’m sorry about that. I keep telling him it was my decision to be there.’

  ‘He took it all very badly. Not surprisingly, I suppose.’ Anita knew she would be just the same – she would have looked around for someone to blame for mucking up her life plans.

  ‘I know. Sometimes you’d think he was the one that got shot!’ Liv giggled. Again, Anita was taken aback by her cheerfulness. ‘He still respects you.’

  ‘Just doesn’t like me.’

  ‘He’ll come round. Our marriage plans haven’t changed. They’re just delayed.’

  Liv’s sister-in-law came out with a tray on which was the obligatory coffee thermos and cinnamon buns.

  ‘Malin looks after me so well,’ said Liv when her sister-in-law had retreated into the house. ‘My brother and her have been brilliant. And the kids are great. So funny. But I don’t want to overstay my welcome. They’ve done enough for me already.’

  ‘Are you looking around for a house?’

  ‘Hakim is. Got a couple of possibilities, though they’ll need work to get this battleship through the doors,’ she said, giving the wheelchair a pat.

  Anita took a bite out of her bun, not quite sure what to say to keep the conversation going.

  ‘Leyla’s growing,’ Liv said before Anita had time to think something up. ‘And what a smile! She’s beautiful!’

  ‘I didn’t realize you’d seen her.’

  ‘Jazmin’s been a couple of times.’ Anita was surprised that Jazmin hadn’t mentioned it, though, on reflection, it might have been in order to avoid any more trouble between her brother and her partner’s mother. ‘It’s nice to get visitors. That’s why it’s great to see you. Does Hakim know?’ Anita shook her head. ‘I won’t say anything until the time’s right.’

  ‘I would have come before, but...’

  ‘I know. It’s just I get so bored. There’s only so much TV one can watch. Or being glued to this,’ she said, glancing down at her laptop. ‘I’d like to get back to work at some stage. Even if I can’t run around anymore, I can still use the technology; I did enough computer courses before this happened.’ She sighed heavily before that infectious smile returned. ‘I know it’s impossible at the moment.’

  ‘I’m sure something will be sorted out at some stage.’ Anita was trying to be encouraging, though she wondered what kind of role, if any, Liv could now realistically play in the force. Before she ventured down that potentially awkward cul-de-sac, her phone burst into life and saved her. ‘Sorry,’ she apologized as she took it out of her pocket. ‘Anita.’

  It was Klara Wallen. ‘Where are you?’

  ‘Near Helsingborg.’

  ‘You’d better get back as quick as you can. There’s been another kidnapping!’

  CHAPTER 8

  Moberg’s face was redder than ever and he wasn’t pleased that Anita had sneaked into the meeting late; it had taken her nearly an hour to get back from Laröd. As she took her seat with an apologetic nod, she saw a photo of the victim on the board. A man in his sixties. Thin, fair hair above a confident face; the most prominent feature being the wide mouth which was creased into a pleased grin. Though the image had obviously been taken from a magazine, there was no hiding the sharp eyes. Again, the man was vaguely familiar to Anita.

  ‘This is Peter Uhlig,’ said Moberg, pointing a thick finger in the direction of the photo. ‘Sixty-three years of age. Married. Two grown-up children. Like Mats Möller, he’s a well-known businessman. Yesterday morning, Wednesday, he left his home in Limhamn at six-thirty as he does every weekday morning. He drives down to Trelleborg, where his company’s head office is on Hamngatan, just opposite the port. But yesterday he failed to turn up for work. The office rang his home to check if he was coming in – he had a meeting arranged for eleven o’clock – but there was no one at home. They thought he mus
t be ill and so cancelled the meeting. His wife, meanwhile, who had been out all day and obviously thought her husband was at work, returned, and when Uhlig didn’t appear for his evening meal – usually prompt at seven-thirty – alarm bells began to ring and it was discovered that he was nowhere to be found.’

  ‘Did fru Uhlig report it immediately?’ asked Anita.

  ‘No. But you’d have known that if you’d been here.’ The tone was reproachful. ‘As you weren’t around, I went down to Limhamn with Hakim. Fru Uhlig said she’d planned to call us when all other avenues had been explored. She didn’t want to cause unnecessary fuss. She thought he might have organized a business meeting or gone off for a golf day, as he sometimes does, without telling her. But there was no answer from his mobile. Then, around ten o’clock, she got an anonymous call to say that her husband was being held and that the kidnappers wanted a ransom. According to fru Uhlig, the voice was muffled. It was male and spoke in Swedish, though she didn’t think the accent was local.’

  ‘Not in English?’ asked Anita. ‘Möller’s kidnappers spoke English.’

  ‘I’ve noted that already,’ Moberg replied testily. ‘Probably something to do with fru Uhlig’s age. She doesn’t speak English fluently. Their threat would be fully understood in Swedish.’

  ‘That means these people have really done their homework.’

  Moberg ignored the comment. ‘Anyway, we’ve got the techies trying to trace where the call was made from. The upshot is that the kidnappers demanded four million euros by next Tuesday, the ninth – that means the Uhligs have got five days to pay up. It’s complicated because two of those days are at the weekend, when the banks don’t function.’