‘But there’s one thing I don’t understand about all of this.’ It was the first time Klippan had spoken in a while; the others turned to him as if they’d forgotten he was in the room. ‘What’s the motive?’ he continued. ‘Let’s assume it’s the same person. What’s his motive?’ He looked them all in the eyes. ‘He spies on a bunch of women in their homes. I’m with you so far. Most of them are, as far as I understand, between twenty and forty years old, and they’re all reasonably good-looking. No obese couch potatoes, but real Bettys, as my father would have put it. Nothing weird about that, either. At the same time, going by Fabian’s theory, he’s moving around in swingers’ circles where, if rumour is to be believed, women line up to have sex with him and have their privates branded. I’ve never heard of anything like it, but there’s a lot to hear in this world before your ears fall off, so let’s roll with it. But, and this is where you lose me, why would he kill Molly Wessman?’
‘Wasn’t it something about them belonging to him?’ Lilja said. ‘That’s why he brands them, right?’
Fabian nodded, even though he felt Klippan had in fact pinpointed the weakest link in the motive chain.
‘And I suppose that’s why he keeps an eye on them,’ Molander said. ‘To make sure they don’t stray.’
‘But in that case, they should all be branded, not just Wessman,’ Klippan said.
Fabian nodded. Klippan was right. No matter how you looked at it, it didn’t add up. On the other hand, logic wasn’t always the foundation of a perpetrator’s motives. In fact, the opposite was usually closer to the truth.
‘Besides,’ Klippan continued, ‘I have a hard time imagining Wessman would be the first and so far only woman who has ever stepped out on him. Especially considering how many there must be, if we assume the numbers are ordinals.’
‘Or—’ Tuvesson said, but broke off when Molander’s phone beeped and he picked it up.
‘Or what?’ Klippan said.
‘Maybe she’s just the first one we’ve come across.’
65
‘Hello? Excuse me?’
Fabian heard the distant voice but chose to keep walking across the car park outside the station. Flätan had just agreed to meet to go over a list of recently deceased women whose deaths had not been considered suspicious. Naturally, he would never admit that he himself had been incorrect or missed something. His colleague Arne Gruvesson, on the other hand, had, if Flätan was to be believed, a habit of overlooking the most obvious of cases.
‘Hello, have you a moment, please?’
Fabian, who had just opened the car door, turned around and saw a man hurrying after him across the car park.
‘I understand you’re busy. But this will just take a few minutes.’
‘I’m sorry, I don’t have jump leads, if that’s what you’re looking for,’ Fabian said before realizing he recognized the man.
‘Hi, we met yesterday. Axel Stjärnström, Eric Jacobsén’s neighbour.’
‘Yes, I remember.’ Fabian shook hands with the man who the day before had come trotting up to Jacobsén’s car in gym clothes and a baseball cap; now, he was wearing a suit. ‘What’s this about? I’m afraid I’m on my way to a meeting.’
‘I’ll try to keep it brief,’ Stjärnström said, catching his breath. ‘I obviously said some things yesterday. About Eric, I mean.’ He straightened his tie even though there was no need. ‘I’m not sure how to put this, but last night I realized I might need to modify part of what I told you.’
Fabian nodded, though he had no recollection of what the man had said.
‘As I’m sure you remember, I had nothing bad to say about him, and he really is an amazing person in many ways, full of energy.’
‘I’m sorry, what are you getting at?’
‘There’s no such thing as a free lunch, someone told me once.’ Stjärnström fixed Fabian intently. ‘I didn’t understand what they meant at the time. But now, a few years since Eric moved to our street, it couldn’t be any clearer. Nothing’s free. Right? Everything comes at a price.’
‘I’m sure that’s true, but as I said—’
‘And when it comes to Eric, I would say the price is very, very high.’
‘In what way?’
‘How can I explain it? It sneaks up on you. At first, you don’t give it a second thought. Everything’s the same as ever, just a bit better and more fun. You know, a little bit ritzier and more exciting. The only thing you find yourself pondering is why you waited so long to start enjoying life. But at that point, it’s already too late. You just haven’t realized it yet.’
Fabian had no idea where the man was going with his rambling line of thought. He wanted to interrupt, thank him for talking to him and wish him luck in life.
‘Do you know how cuckoos operate?’ Stjärnström continued, without waiting for a reply. ‘The female lays her eggs in other nests when the parents are out finding food, and she pecks holes in and eats one of the other birds’ eggs so they won’t know the difference.’
‘Yes, I’m familiar with it. But I’m not sure what all of this—’
‘That’s what Eric’s like. Just like a cuckoo chick, he makes sure he hatches a few days before the others so he’s a little bit bigger. But no one notices. Not until he’s pushed all the other baby birds out of the nest, and what’s the point then?’
Fabian nodded. ‘Okay, so that’s what you wanted to tell me?’
Stjärnström nodded.
‘All right, then. Thanks for that.’ Fabian shook the man’s hand and climbed into the driver’s seat. He was already five minutes late, and it would take him at least fifteen minutes to get to the hospital to receive his scolding from Flätan.
He put the key in the ignition, turned it and reached for the door to close it. But Stjärnström blocked him. ‘I’m sorry, if you could just move a little, so I can—’
‘For me, he crossed the line when he started flirting with my wife.’
‘Yeah, that doesn’t sound great. But you’ll have to excuse me, I’m running late.’
‘And you should know that Eric doesn’t leave it at a few stolen looks.’ Stjärnström pressed on without paying any attention to Fabian’s obvious need to leave. ‘Instead, it became increasingly open, as if I wasn’t in the same room, or his own wife for that matter. At the same time, he started hinting to me that I’d gained weight and that I never bought my beautiful wife flowers and was taking her for granted.’ He shook his head. ‘The only thing I could do was laugh it off and raise my glass to him. I mean, you don’t want to spoil the mood when you’ve been invited over for dinner and everything.’
‘No, I suppose you don’t.’ Fabian realized Stjärnström wasn’t going to move until he was good and ready, so he killed the engine.
‘The problem was, Emilie took it to heart. She ate up all that smarm of his, and in just a few months, he’d managed to make her look at him the way I’ve wished she would look at me for so many years.’
‘Have you tried to talk to him and tell him what it’s like for you? Try to make him see that his behaviour is out of line?’
Stjärnström let out a short laugh and shook his head. ‘You can’t talk to Eric that way. He slips away, feints and sidesteps and before you know it, you’re naked in his sauna with an IPA in your hand, planning a trip together.’ He fell silent as though he were summoning the strength to go on. ‘But in the end, I brought it up with Emilie, and she swore she wasn’t interested in him in the slightest. Just like me, she found him too vulgar and gauche. And I was foolish enough to believe her, talk about naïve, and then only a few months later, I discovered… It was during a dinner party at our house. It was just me, Emilie, Eric and his wife. We were discussing the killing of Osama bin Laden, when I realized his foot was between my wife’s… legs.’ He swallowed again but was overcome with emotion. ‘And she was sitting there pretending nothing was happening. Bloody hell.’
‘Maybe you should go talk to someone about this.’
&
nbsp; ‘Maybe. Yes, I suppose I should. But I honestly don’t know what good it would do. It’s not like I’ve done anything wrong.’
‘You haven’t considered moving?’
‘Every day. But Emilie won’t hear of it.’
‘I meant move as in move out, leave her.’
Stjärnström met Fabian’s eyes. ‘We might be going through a rough patch right now, but we have two children, a mortgage and a life together and I guess I’m still hoping it’s going to work itself out somehow. Anyway, I went through her phone a few nights after that incident. To my surprise, they’d only texted about the children and dinner parties I was invited to as well. I couldn’t find any emails at all.’
‘So what did you find?’
‘A picture. One that was different from all the others. At first, I didn’t understand what it was. It didn’t look like anything at all, until I realized it was a close-up of a pubic mound… Or, to be precise, Emilie’s pubic mound, which was shaved and had a tattoo.’
66
Assar Skanås opened his backpack, took out the two plastic bottles filled with water and put them next to the girl. It was her. He was sure it was her. The one the voices had told him deserved it. The one he could do whatever he wanted to.
But he was a nice man, he was, and he was going to be nice to her. At least during the act. Of course she should enjoy it too. Afterwards… Afterwards was afterwards.
Blood. He didn’t like blood. It had trickled from the wound down across her ear and dried. But not enough to make anyone react. Everyone had looked away or fiddled with their phones, assuming he was an ordinary dad carrying his tired daughter.
He hadn’t wanted to hit her. He hated fighting. But she’d clawed and screamed, she had, so loudly his ears hurt. He hadn’t meant to hit her so hard. He never did and yet that’s almost always how it turned out.
The wristwatch Igor had given him had struck her temple so hard she was still unconscious. It was the watch’s fault. Not his. He liked children and preferred to play with them when they were awake.
He took out the plastic bowl and emptied one of the water bottles into it. Then he opened the front pocket of his backpack and coaxed out the pump of the liquid soap dispenser.
Lavender, the best smell in the world. Nothing smelled better; the fragrant lather in the bowl immediately made him feel calmer as he carefully and methodically washed his hands, one finger at a time, one nail at a time. He wanted to be clean, as clean as possible. She was, after all, a virgin, and there was nothing purer than that.
He’d always thought so. But he’d never told anyone. It was his little secret. Ever since that time at the pool, he’d resisted, he’d been good. Really good, as several people had told him; he had pretended to agree with all of them about how wrong and forbidden his particular desire was. As though desire could be wrong. As though it was so much worse than the desire to eat meat or travel to the other side of the world on your holiday.
But nothing mattered any more. The voices had finally told him to stop pretending. They had told him what he’d always felt deep down inside. But they had sounded different this time; they had talked slower than usual and almost never over each other. But they’d been on his side, they had, unlike all the babbling psychologists.
She was his, they’d told him. His, his, his. The only reason she’d been born was so she could please him, and once it was done, she was spent like when the most precious flower is picked from the meadow and wilts in its vase.
He’d hurried as far from the playground as he could. Away from all the stupid people who wanted to take what was his. But the trees in the park, or maybe it was all the gravel walks, had made him confused again, and soon everything had been spinning and swapping places.
It was only when he mustered the courage to stop and raise his eyes that he’d spotted Kärnan, looming above everything else. Then he’d finally realized where he was. Oh, how he loved that old tower that made everything stop spinning.
He undid his belt, pulled down his zip, then his trousers and his underwear.
His lust hadn’t morphed into arousal yet. He couldn’t even see it for all the hair. He fumbled around with one hand, tugged on it a little to wake it up and pulled the skin back. The rank smell of uncleanliness blended with the lavender, making him feel dirty and unworthy. But he was sure it would get better as soon as he started washing and soaping it up.
He hadn’t known where to go, but just like a few days ago, everything had sorted itself out. Suddenly, he’d been walking down those stairs towards the city centre, and he’d been so tired from carrying the girl he’d almost taken a tumble. But he’d made it all the way down to the first turn.
After that, he’d carried on towards the second turn, but he’d been forced to turn back because a group of men in suits and construction helmets had blocked his way and stared. If it hadn’t been for the girl, he would have stabbed them up.
He’d almost dropped her several times on the way back up, he’d been so tired; he’d had to stop and catch his breath before the last flight of stairs. That’s when he’d noticed that one of those doors that were always closed was ajar.
Maybe it was the men in the construction helmets; he didn’t know. Either way, no one had seen him squeeze in with the girl and hide behind a pile of furniture and boxes. Shortly afterwards, he’d heard someone enter, pick something up and leave again.
He, for his part, had continued further into the building and climbed a spiral staircase to a dirty, cluttered room. But the high ceiling, the red brick walls and the window with a view of the whole city still made him feel like a king.
He picked up the bowl of water, held it between his legs and rinsed off the soap. It was exactly as delightful and exciting as he’d hoped, and once he’d air-dried, he wasn’t just clean but also hard enough to do what he’d been waiting for, for so long.
Now, he just had to prepare the girl.
67
That Eric Jacobsén might in fact be the notorious Columbus almost seemed like a bad joke. An impossibility. He had absolutely not come across as some sort of sex god who could make the women who made pilgrimage to him push beyond their sexual limits and let themselves be tattooed. But there was no doubt the tattoo his neighbour Axel Stjärnström had found on his wife was the same as Molly Wessman’s, apart from the number, 103.
He parked the car outside Jacobsén’s house in Laröd and noted that both the Lexus and the red Lamborghini were missing from the driveway. According to Molander, however, Jacobsén’s phone was in his home and in the past half hour he’d made two phone calls to Axel Stjärnström’s wife, Emilie.
During his previous visit, Fabian hadn’t had a chance to use the door knocker. It was surprisingly loud and made him back up a step and instinctively reach for the handcuffs in his jacket pocket.
But instead of Jacobsén, a blond boy of about ten opened the door. Franz Ferdinand’s ‘Take Me Out’ was roaring out from somewhere inside the house with an accompanying guitar riff that was one of the least on-key things he’d ever heard.
‘Hi, my name is Fabian Risk. What’s your name?’
‘Rutger.’
‘Your dad, he wouldn’t happen to be home, would he?’
‘No.’
‘Rutger, it’s your turn!’ someone shouted after the music finally died down.
‘Oh no? Then where is he? Your dad, I mean.’
The boy shrugged. ‘At work or out somewhere.’
‘And your mum? Maybe I could talk to her?’
‘She’s not home either.’
‘Ruuutger! Otherwise I’m going again!’
‘No, it’s my turn!’
‘You wouldn’t happen to know when one of them might be back, would you?’
‘No, but I have to get back to my friend now.’
‘I understand. Would it be okay if I came in and waited?’
Rutger was considering that, apparently unsure how to respond, when Joan Jett & The Blackhearts’ ‘I Lov
e Rock ’n’ Roll’ started up with a guitar accompaniment that completely butchered the song. ‘It was my turn!’ Rutger disappeared into the house, leaving the door open behind him.
Maybe Jacobsén was home after all. Maybe his son was just so absorbed in the video game he was playing with his friend he hadn’t noticed his father coming back. After all, his phone was here and he’d called the neighbour’s wife less than half an hour ago.
He closed the door behind him and looked around the hallway. Clothes and shoes were strewn across the floor. He took off his shoes, too, placed them neatly by the wall and continued into a living room so big it was furnished in sections.
Near the fireplace, a number of big cowhide cushions were scattered on the floor. Beyond them, by the open-plan kitchen, was a long dining table with seven lamps hanging over it in a row from the slanted ceiling.
At the other end of the room, two corner sofas formed a big U in front of the rolled-down projector screen on which an overhead projector was showing Guitar Hero while the surround sound system blasted out the Joan Jett song, which came to an abrupt end when Rutger’s friend apparently hit the wrong buttons once too often.
He’d heard about the game but hadn’t seen the fun in pressing a few plastic buttons to the beat of dated rock songs. Still, he couldn’t help walking over to get a closer look.
Rutger was considerably better than his friend; when he took over the guitar and started playing ‘Message in a Bottle’, hammering the buttons like his life depended on it, Fabian almost wanted to have a go himself. But instead, his eyes were drawn to a phone that lay discarded on the sofa among all the cords and controllers, which lit up as it received a text message.
There was nothing strange about Rutger having a phone. Nor was it any wonder it was the latest iPhone 4, which was far from cheap. No, what made Fabian react was the background picture of Jacobsén’s wife.
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