Scarred

Chapter 67

Trine can’t remember the last time she had such a good, dreamless sleep. After they had talked late into the night, she cuddled up to Pål Fredrik and didn’t wake up until her mobile started to buzz on the bedside table. She has heard people say how therapeutic it is to make a clean breast of things, to share the secrets that were eating them up, but she would never have believed that it could feel like this.

But though it helped to tell Pål Fredrik about her father and what she saw that night, she didn’t tell him everything about herself. She didn’t even come close. And she doesn’t know if she will ever manage it.

Trine gets up at the same time as Pål Fredrik though she doesn’t intend to go back to work yet. They eat breakfast together, read the newspaper, discuss the news – at least any news that isn’t about her. When Pål Fredrik goes to the office, Trine finds herself alone once again in a silence that festers around her. She feels the urge to exercise, to run away from it all, but she doesn’t; instead she reflects on how the media have wallowed in every revelation about her that has come out in the last few days.

She hasn’t read even half the stories that have been published, but the biggest headlines seem to have taken root in the public’s imagination. As an elected politician and a member of the government, she had known that her life would be subject to constant, close scrutiny. And she has yet to meet someone who has never made a single mistake. She accepted that she would always be under the microscope.

But she hasn’t deserved this.

She bloody well doesn’t deserve this.

With the benefit of hindsight, it’s easy to see that she should not have done what she did. Life would be so much simpler if we never had to deal with unintended consequences.

Talk about things being simple.

Trine realises she hasn’t allowed herself to think simple thoughts in the last few days. When she tried to identify the person who could have known what she did in Denmark, her initial conclusion was that a friend might have mentioned it to someone and thus inadvertently started the rumour. But the simplest explanation hasn’t occurred to her until now. There is one person who knows everything, who helped her, got her out of Hotel Caledonien discreetly, arranged a car and a plane ticket, booked a hotel and packed some clothes for her so she could travel incognito from Kjevik Airport. Who made the appointment that enabled Trine to deal with her little problem. It’s someone she has worked closely with during the three years she has been Justice Secretary. The person she trusted the most.

Trine picks up her mobile, which is lying next to her coffee cup, retrieves a number from her contact list and rings it.

‘Hi, Trine. How are you?’

‘Good morning. I want to hold a press conference later today. Please would you set it up?’

A short pause follows.

‘Yes, of course, but—’

‘Great. Make it two o’clock, that gives me time to prepare. But first I’d like to have a little chat with you. Let’s say my office twelve o’clock?’

Another silence.

‘Eh, okay?’

‘Great. I’ll see you at twelve noon.’

Chapter 68

Henning looks at his watch. He is early.

He doesn’t mind. Whenever he visits the Olympen café, he prefers to sit by the window. In the past he would make up stories about people walking by outside based on only a quick glance at their face, their eyes and their clothing. He regarded it as training in his quest to become a better judge of character, which in turn would make him a better journalist. And it was something to do when he was bored or waiting for someone, as he is now. It occurs to him that fear has stopped him undertaking many other activities he enjoys. Wine, friends, music. He has even stayed away from the sea. An amateur psychologist might say that he is scared of feeling anything ever again. Henning doesn’t know. He just knows that a lot is happening with him right now though he finds himself unable to take it all in.

Henning’s mobile rings. Talk of the devil, Henning thinks when he sees that the caller is Iver Gundersen. Henning immediately experiences a rush of guilt because of what nearly happened with Nora last night. Perhaps that’s why Iver is calling? Did she say anything to him?

Reluctantly, Henning puts the phone to his ear.

‘Hello?’ he says, sounding a little less confident than he had hoped.

‘Hey, man,’ Iver says in his usual cocky voice. Slowly the air escapes from Henning’s lungs. ‘How are you?’ his colleague continues. ‘Are you busy?’

‘Fairly,’ Henning replies. ‘I’m waiting for a source, but he hasn’t shown up yet.’

‘Oh, so it’s a he,’ Iver laughs conspiratorially.

‘Mm. And now you obviously know who he is.’

‘If you tell me where you are, then I can guess.’

‘Yes, I’m not going to do that, obviously.’

Iver laughs again. Henning realises that he is beginning to smile.

‘How are you?’ he asks Iver. ‘Are you coming back to work soon?’

‘I hope so. I’m going for a check-up at Ullevål Hospital in a couple of days, and then we’ll see. I’m getting cabin fever from sitting around all day doing nothing.’

Henning remembers how he felt in the weeks and months before he decided to return to work. He spent most of his time at home, staring at the wall, watching a bit of TV. The world had ground to a halt. Then he started going for a walk every day. He would sit in Dælenenga Sports Park in the evening. Gradually he got used to being around people again, though he hardly ever spoke to anyone.

‘Sorry for not stopping by last week at the hospital,’ Henning says.

‘Ah,’ Iver snorts. ‘Sod that.’

‘Only there was so much to do after the Pulli case. I didn’t have a single—’

‘Forget about it, I said. Isn’t that what you’re always telling me?’

‘What?’

‘To forget about it?’

‘Yes, I… I suppose I do.’

‘Well, then, forget about it.’

Iver laughs again. Henning smiles and gazes out at the street where a woman with three shopping bags trundles along the pavement.

‘So how are you?’ Iver says. ‘Anything happening in your life?’

‘You can say that again.’

‘So what’s going on? I mean apart from the stuff I can read in the paper myself.’

Henning would have liked to share some of his thoughts with Iver, but he hesitates before he replies. Perhaps because of Nora. Or perhaps he clams up like he did in the past when he sensed that someone was getting close to him.

Across the street he sees Bjarne Brogeland coming towards him.

‘My source is here,’ Henning says. ‘I’ve got to go.’

‘But—’

‘Sorry, Iver. I’ll tell you all about it later.’

‘Do you promise?’

Henning doesn’t reply immediately. Then he says: ‘I promise.’

In time Olympen has become Bjarne and Henning’s regular meeting place when they need to talk shop. Usually at Henning’s request, but this time it was at Bjarne’s initiative. Henning didn’t mind, not in the least; the morning had come and gone without him finding anything he could feed to his editor. Nor had he spotted any developments in the story about Trine, other than more negative publicity about her.

Henning gets up from the table and greets Bjarne with a firm handshake. They find a table further towards the back and order coffee.

‘You look tired,’ Henning says as they sit down.

‘Thanks, mate,’ Bjarne grins and runs a hand across his face. ‘I didn’t sleep very well last night. There’s something about this case that—’

He fumbles for the words before he continues.

‘We’re still in the dark, to tell you the truth,’ he says. ‘And I thought that perhaps you could, that you—’

Bjarne looks around.

‘Everyone knows you have a sharp eye for detail,’ he says.

Henning smiles quickly while he studies the police officer with mild curiosity. Bjarne looks as nervous as a teenager on his first date.

‘And your bosses have obviously given you their full support for this conversation?’

Bjarne shakes his head slowly. The aroma from their coffee cups wafts towards them.

‘No, I didn’t think so,’ Henning says. ‘So, tell me, what’s really going on here? Normally I have to play the jester to get a seat at the king’s table, and suddenly it’s the other way round? Don’t tell me you’re banging your head against a brick wall already? The guy killed himself less than twenty-four hours ago.’

Bjarne’s face hardens.

‘A fresh perspective is always useful,’ he says.

Henning takes a sip of his coffee while he looks at his old school friend. Bjarne’s dark hair appears to have gone grey at the temples during their short conversation. His cheeks are clean-shaven as always, but his skin, usually golden from a summer tan, looks pale now.

‘But you obviously can’t report any of what I’m about to tell you,’ Bjarne continues.

‘So you want me to help you, but you’re not going to give me anything in return?’

Bjarne’s brow furrows.

‘Let’s agree on the things you can report. Not all of it is sensitive.’

Henning looks at him for a while.

‘Okay,’ he says eventually and shrugs. ‘Go on then. Tell me about the pieces that don’t fit.’

Bjarne heaves a sigh, then he glances around again before he leans forward and tells Henning about Gjerløw’s past connection with the victims. He tells him about the crime scenes, the broken pictures on the walls, the photos of the victims on Gjerløw’s laptop, his visits to Grünerhjemmet, the envelope they found in his flat addressed to Tom Sverre Pedersen. The Facebook apology.

‘But nobody understands why Gjerløw did it,’ Bjarne concludes in exasperation. ‘We haven’t found any evidence that links the adult Gjerløw to any of his victims, apart from the fact that he was friends with Johanne Klingenberg on Facebook, and that he volunteered at the care home where Erna Pedersen lived. I quite simply can’t discover a motive.’

Henning, too, has moved closer to the table. It comes as a surprise to him that the murders were carried out by the same killer. It also intrigues him in a way he hasn’t felt for a long time.

‘And there are a couple of other oddities. One of Gjerløw’s two laptops was completely clean. The one with the photographs. There wasn’t a single fingerprint or a speck of dust on it. The other one, a more recent model, was covered in grime. Plus Gjerløw sent a text message to a friend shortly before he died, saying he was busy playing a computer game. “Hate the graphics, but love the sound.”’

Bjarne looks at Henning for a few seconds, then he lowers his gaze.

‘I just don’t understand,’ he says and shakes his head.

‘What did Gjerløw do for a living?’

‘He was unemployed. Or he was at the time of his death.’

‘What kind of jobs did he used to do?’

‘Casual jobs. He had worked in a nursery school, for example, mostly here in Oslo. He also did a bit of removal work, I believe. He has a lorry driver’s licence and worked for Ringnes Brewery for a couple of months, delivering beer.’

Henning rests his chin in his hand.

‘And there’s something about that little boy that sends shivers down my spine,’ Bjarne continues.

Henning tries to visualise the killer, sees him lose his temper in Erna Pedersen’s room and smash a picture of her son’s family. He sees him go berserk in Johanne Klingenberg’s flat and smash the photograph of her godson.

And he remembers the emotions that welled up in him last night when he looked at the lovely picture of Jonas. The guilty conscience that nearly choked him, how he would never, ever, be able to bear having Jonas’s eyes look out at him from the wall. That could have been the reason why Gjerløw put up that school photo he was in on Erna Pedersen’s wall. Perhaps he wanted her to remember something. Perhaps he wanted her to feel guilty.

Henning shares his thoughts with Bjarne.

‘It’s possible,’ Bjarne admits. ‘But what would cause him to smash the other photo?’

‘Maybe he wasn’t angry with the people in the pictures. Then he would have hurt them instead. And the little boy couldn’t possibly have upset anyone, that goes without saying.’

Again Henning thinks about the information Bjarne has given him.

‘If you’re right in suggesting that Gjerløw had a particular relationship to the pictures, they might have represented something to him.’

‘Such as what?’

‘I’m not sure. Perhaps he was lonely? Didn’t you say that he hadn’t managed to have a family of his own?’

‘Yes?’

‘Then he might have been jealous. Otherwise why get mad at a picture of a happy family? He didn’t know them personally, did he?’

‘No, or at least we don’t think so. But don’t forget he smashed a photo of a little boy as well. Surely he can’t have been jealous of a toddler?’

Henning doesn’t reply immediately, but he is aware of a thought, an answer somewhere deep inside him that is just out of reach.

‘What if the little boy symbolised the same thing as the happy family?’ he says eventually.

‘What do you mean?’

‘Gjerløw had no children of his own. Perhaps he longed for one?’

‘So it’s not necessarily the boy himself who is the problem,’ Bjarne says. ‘It’s what he represents?’

Henning opens up his hands.

‘Why not?’

Bjarne sits in pensive silence for several seconds. Then his mobile rings. He picks it up. Henning studies his friend’s facial expression while he listens. His pupils start to expand. His mouth drops open.

‘Okay,’ he says. ‘I’ll be there right away.’

He hangs up.

‘What was that about?’ Henning asks.

‘It wasn’t his blood,’ Bjarne says.

‘Whose blood?’

‘The blood Johanne Klingenberg found in her flat two weeks ago. It doesn’t belong to Markus Gjerløw. He’s a different blood type.’

Chapter 69

It’s about pulling yourself together. Finding a special room for grieving in your heart, but using the other rooms as well. Remembering that life must go on.

Emilie Blomvik spent the night in the freezing cold guest bedroom in the basement. She even managed to sleep for several hours. And when she was woken up by footsteps running across the parquet flooring above, the sound of her son’s pitter-patter as if he is incapable of doing anything at normal speed, she made up her mind. Enough is enough. Yes, you can feel sad, but don’t let grief eat you up.

So she went back upstairs and told Mattis that he could go to work today. He had been kind enough to take a day off to look after Sebastian and her – even though he had just been made partner. And she realised how good it felt to get back to normality. Make Sebastian’s packed lunch. Get him dressed. Sebastian, poor kid, knows nothing about what has happened; he knows nothing about death. But he knows his parents. And when one of them acts out of character, he can sense it. Of course he can.

Emilie finds him in his bedroom, subjecting Lightning McQueen to his usual brutal treatment. She smiles. Sebastian barely looks up when she says ‘hi’. There is a vroom. Then some screeching and crashing. Recently she has noticed that her son has started to close the door to his room. He wants to be alone. He opens it and he closes it. She hadn’t expected him to do that yet; after all he is only two and a half years old.

‘Right, I’m off,’ Mattis shouts out to them from the hallway.

‘Daddy is leaving now,’ she says to Sebastian. ‘Let’s go and say bye bye to him.’

Sebastian drops the car with a crash. Emilie is about to tell him not to treat his toys like that, but she stops herself. Today is not a day for rebukes. Today is all about the path of least resistance. Getting back on her feet.

They send Mattis off with hugs, kisses and waving. When the door slams shut, she asks Sebastian if he has had his breakfast yet. She gets a vigorous headshake by way of response.

‘Okay,’ she says, ‘then we’d better get you something to eat. What would you like?’

‘Cornflakes.’

‘Cornflakes it is.’

Emilie is heading to the kitchen via the living room when an object on the wall next to the stuffed reindeer head makes her stop. It’s a picture. A picture she hasn’t seen before. Two footprints in the sand, one halfway across the other, on pink photocopier paper. When did Mattis put that up? she wonders. And since when does he care about interior design? What on earth is the meaning of the two footprints in the sand? Could it be a subtle kind of marriage proposal?

There is something familiar about the image. She knows she has seen it before.

A long, long time ago.

A cold prickling begins in her neck and spreads to the rest of her body. She is about to fetch her mobile to call Mattis when her eyes are drawn to the front door.

She can hear footsteps outside.

Bjarne hurries out of Olympen and into the street where the wind takes hold of his jacket and flaps it open.

It wasn’t Gjerløw’s blood. The blood didn’t have to belong to Klingenberg’s killer, of course, but it was an obvious thought. According to the police report, Klingenberg hadn’t noticed any blood near the cat basket until the day her flat was broken into. She was adamant. And though the intruder might not be the same man who killed her, it’s likely. It’s much more than likely.

Markus Gjerløw didn’t kill Johanne Klingenberg.

And the squeaky clean laptop continues to trouble Bjarne. When they examined it they discovered that the computer’s serial number was registered to Markus Gjerløw and that he had bought it in Spaceworld twenty-six months ago. So far so good. Then they examined the second laptop, a computer of a more recent design that showed every sign of being in daily use. Why treat the two computers so differently? And why did Markus Gjerløw kill himself?

If indeed that was what he did.

Questioning his suicide seems absurd. There is nothing to suggest anything other than Markus Gjerløw chose to take his own life. But Bjarne thinks about the killer’s MO and the earlier visits he made to Erna Pedersen’s room and Johanne Klingenberg’s flat. He could have planned the murder of Markus Gjerløw as well. He could have planted the evidence that would point the police to Gjerløw so that the suspicions would be directed at a dead man. So that he himself would go free.

So that he could kill again?

Bjarne decides to ring Emilie Blomvik straightaway. While he waits for a reply, Henning catches up with him.

‘What’s going on?’ he asks.

But Bjarne doesn’t reply. His head fills with fresh thoughts while he crosses the road, still pressing the phone to his ear and navigating the traffic. He hangs up when Emilie Blomvik doesn’t answer.

Come on, he says to himself. You know what you have to do. Analyse the information quickly, accurately and effectively. Make the right call. If you hope ever to become Head of Investigation, you have to deliver in situations like this one.

If his theory is correct, the killer has to be someone close to Gjerløw. Someone who would know that Gjerløw would be at Grünerhjemmet that day.

He stops in his tracks.

Of course.

Chapter 70

Henning follows Bjarne across the street, but his police friend is deep in thought while at the same time trying to get hold of someone on the phone. At that moment, Henning’s own mobile rings; it’s a number he doesn’t recognise.

He takes the call.

‘Hello. Am I speaking to Henning Juul?’

It is an old person’s voice. Henning stuffs a finger in his ear to shut out the noise from the street.

‘You are.’

‘I’m sitting here with your business card,’ says the woman down the other end.

‘Oh, right,’ Henning says, now remembering Erna Pedersen’s old neighbour in Brinken. Borgny Ramstad, that was her name, wasn’t it?

‘I’ve been visiting my daughter in Bergen for a couple of days and I’ve only just got back. I caught the night train. And the first thing I saw when I came home was your card stuck in my front door. I hope you’re not going to try to sell me something?’

‘No, not at all,’ Henning assures her. ‘I wanted to talk to you because you knew Erna Pedersen.’

‘Indeed I did. We were neighbours for twenty-four years.’

Henning looks across to Bjarne and sees him take out his notebook and check something.

‘Mrs Ramstad, I want to ask you about something that happened quite a few years ago. It’s to do with Erna Pedersen.’

Henning tells her that Erna Pedersen has been murdered.

‘Oh, how dreadful,’ Borgny Ramstad says. ‘I haven’t been following the news recently. My grandchild has colic, you see.’

‘I understand,’ Henning says. ‘What I’m particularly interested in is the vandalism done to Erna Pedersen’s house while she was still working as a teacher. Did she ever talk to you about it?’

‘She certainly did. Erna was in such a state about it.’

‘I know she had her suspicions about who was behind it. Did she ever tell you?’

There is silence for a moment. Henning watches Bjarne press the phone to his ear again.

‘I don’t really—’

‘As far as I understand there were several culprits. But do you know if Erna was scared of any of them?’

There is another silence.

‘Well, in that case, it must have been the boy who—’

Silence again.

‘Oh, I can’t remember his name.’

‘Please try—’

‘Oh, now I remember!’ she exclaims. ‘It was the brother of the boy who died in that snow cave accident, wasn’t it?’

Bjarne remembers what Markus Gjerløw said to him on the telephone.

‘I only know Remi.’

Bjarne pulls out the list of names that Emil Hagen gave him. Sees that there is a Remi highlighted in bold.

Remi Gulliksen.

Bjarne takes out his mobile and calls Fredrik Stang.

‘Hi, it’s me,’ Bjarne says. ‘Can you check if a boy called Remi Gulliksen went to school with Markus Gjerløw?’

‘Okay, hold on.’

It has to be Remi Gulliksen, Bjarne thinks while he listens to Stang flicking through documents down the other end of the phone. Of the people who were at Grünerhjemmet on the day that Erna Pedersen was killed, Gulliksen was the only person Markus Gjerløw knew. As a friend of Gjerløw’s, Gulliksen would have been able to gain access to Gjerløw’s flat, force him to swallow the morphine capsules and then write a cryptic apology on Facebook that would make everyone think that Gjerløw was apologising for the lives he had taken.

‘No, I can’t find a Remi Gulliksen,’ Fredrik Stang says. ‘But there is another Remi in his class. A Remi Winsnes.’

Bjarne tastes the name a little. It rings no bells.

‘Okay, can you look up both Winsnes and Gulliksen for me? Try including Jessheim in your search as well and see if you get any hits.’

He hears clicking and keyboard sounds in the background. The seconds pass.

‘I’ve found a Nils Jørgen Winsnes and a Susanne Marie Gulliksen. They live in Jessheim at the same address.’

‘They must be Remi’s parents.’

‘Looks like it. He must have changed his surname as an adult.’

It has to be him, Bjarne thinks.

‘And it says here that they lost a child,’ Stang says. ‘In a snow cave accident in Jessheim in the eighties.’

Bjarne makes no reply; all he can think about is that he couldn’t get hold of Emilie Blomvik a few minutes ago. He is still very unhappy that Romerike Police decided to call off the protection Bjarne had requested for Blomvik and her family once Markus Gjerløw was found dead.

‘Call Romerike Police and ask them to go to the home of Emilie Blomvik,’ Bjarne says to Stang. ‘And tell them to hurry up.’

‘What’s going on?’

‘Just get them to check that everything is okay with her and her family.’

‘Okay.’

They end their calls. Henning comes up behind him.

‘I think I might know the name of the man you’re looking for,’ he says.

Bjarne spins around.

‘Do you now?’

‘It wouldn’t happen to be Remi, would it?’

Chapter 71

Remi can still remember it. Her birthday.

Eighteen years. The portal to adulthood. Old enough to drive and finally able to get into most bars without fake ID. Not that Emilie ever needed to. She got in everywhere, even though the doormen knew that she wasn’t old enough.

He gave her a very special present on that momentous day. A picture of two footprints, partly covering each other, on a beach. To let her know what he thought about the two of them and their future. He also gave her eighteen long-stemmed red roses, though the man in the florist told him that even numbers and flowers didn’t go all that well together.

Memories.

Memories are crap.

He wishes he had never opened the local newspaper that day when the past suddenly became the present. The years had left their marks in her cheeks, time had done something to her chin and her eyes, but he could see that she was the same girl. Just as lovely. She still had that special light in her eyes, which beamed into him and turned everything it found upside down. And it was as if the smile she sent the readers of Eidsvoll Ullensaker Blad was aimed at him. He wanted the ground to open and swallow him up.

They used to talk about what they would call their children if they ever had children together. Emilie had said Sebastian if it was a boy, and Johanne if it was a girl. Remi didn’t really mind, he just wanted Emilie to be happy. And suddenly, there she was, in the newspaper with a child on her lap. A little boy called Sebastian. He could no longer remember what the article had been about, only that the picture had been taken at the boy’s nursery.

And hey presto, they came back.

The memories.

Not only had they come back, he could physically feel them in his body, he started reliving the past, he felt the butterflies in his stomach when he walked past the places where it had happened, the place where – according to Emilie – absolutely nothing had happened. But he knew that it was all a lie.

They did it in the grove between the junction and the school playground where houses have since been built. Markus and Emilie hadn’t even been able to wait until they got home, but they were seen – at least so the rumour went. And this at a time when she was supposed to be his girlfriend, when life was meant to be good, but it became a living nightmare.

Some people are just like that; they covet what others have. If Markus saw someone with a cool jumper or jacket at school, he had to have the same – or preferably something better and more expensive. He had to have the latest thing. For some reason he had always been popular with the girls. And, to top it all, he was Erna Pedersen’s teacher’s pet.

So when Remi started going out with Emilie, Markus obviously couldn’t help himself. He had to have her, too, couldn’t bear that someone else had something so wonderful. And as for Emilie, she was out of control and just wanted to party all the time.

Emilie had pleaded innocence, of course, and blamed it all on common gossip in Jessheim. She managed to sow just enough doubt in Remi for them to get back together. And that was when it happened with the worst possible timing; she missed her period. And he remembered what it had been like, when he hoped it could have marked a fresh start for them, that everything would be different. We’ll erase the past and start over. We’ll be a family, build a life together. And we’ll call our child Sebastian.

Remi tightens his fists when he remembers the conversation they had a few days after she had told him about the pregnancy. Though she never said so outright, he realised that Johanne had been whispering in her ear and told her no, you can’t do this, Emilie. Don’t throw your life away. It’s too soon to have kids.

So what are you going to do? You’re not going to marry him, are you?

Johanne had never liked him much even though he had saved her life when she choked on that kebab outside the takeaway. He could see it in her eyes.

He finally got his proof a couple of days ago in the form of the message Johanne had sent to Emilie on Facebook.

Just as well you ended up with Mattis. It could have been much much worse ☺☺☺

A red ride-on tractor is parked on the shingle outside the garage. All Remi can think about is what it would have been like to live in this house, in its warmth. With her and Sebastian. It should have been like this. She said it would be.

The front door opens and a man comes out. A man who shouldn’t be there. He walks down the steps and smiles to himself, he looks so bloody smug, just like Erna Pedersen’s son in the picture the old hag had hanging on her wall.

Then something clouds Remi’s vision. He can’t see that he has started to move, he just feels it, he hears the shingle crunch under his feet. He doesn’t say anything, either; he can just about make out that the garage door glides open and something shiny and expensive appears behind it. He doesn’t feel his hands, his arms or his head, doesn’t feel them make contact, doesn’t hear the punch or the crack. And he doesn’t know what he has done before he realises that his knuckles are red.

Chapter 72

‘How the hell did you know that?’ Bjarne asks as he starts to run.

‘Forget it,’ Henning says, trying to keep up. ‘What’s going on?’

The distant between them grows with each step.

‘Where are you going?’

Bjarne turns his head, but increases his speed. Henning tries to follow, but his body protests.

‘Are you going to Jessheim?’ Henning calls out after him, but Bjarne just keeps on running. ‘Can I get a lift? I think I’ve earned it, don’t you?’

Henning stops outside the entrance to the police station’s underground car park and watches Bjarne disappear inside. A few seconds later a car starts up in the darkness below. Tyres squeal. A fan belt complains. Then a grey Volvo estate comes towards Henning at a furious pace and brakes abruptly right by his feet. The window is already down.

Henning looks inside and meets Bjarne’s wide-open eyes.

‘Go on then, get in!’

Emilie looks up from Mattis’s bloodied face and stares at the man who appears right behind him. With a hard push he shoves Mattis into the hallway, follows him and locks the door behind them.

‘Remi?’ she exclaims.

Remi keeps pushing Mattis towards the living room and stares at her with glazed eyes.

‘You,’ he says, pointing at her. ‘Come here.’

Emilie stands rooted to the spot.

‘But—’

‘Come here,’ Remi demands again, louder this time.

From the kitchen they hear the sound of quiet weeping. It grows and becomes increasingly desperate. Emilie sees the look Remi sends her little boy. A look that is seething with rage.

Emilie blocks the door.

‘Please,’ she says. ‘Don’t—’

But Remi interrupts her by raising his index finger, grabbing hold of her and forcing her into the living room. Mattis tries to stop him, but he has never been much of a fighter, nor is he particularly strong and Remi wards off the attack with a punch that hits him in the mouth. Mattis crashes on to the floor.

Sebastian cries even louder.

‘Please,’ Mattis stutters through split lips. ‘Take whatever you want. Only please don’t hurt us.’

Remi says nothing.

‘Just leave us alone. Please,’ Mattis implores him.

Emilie has no idea what is going on. And then there is Remi, who—

Remi’s army jacket. It’s khaki. Remi was the man with the camera outside Sebastian’s nursery the other morning. Her gaze shifts to the wall, to the framed picture. The two footprints in the sand.

Emilie clasps her mouth with both hands while her eyes well up. Remi grabs Mattis and pushes him towards the dining table. In his hands he holds a thick green rope that Emilie recognises from the garage. He orders Mattis to sit down.

Mattis does as he is told and sits on the floor next to a table leg. The sweat pours from his forehead and mingles with blood that stains his bright white shirt. A sob escapes from Emilie’s lips as she sees the madness in Remi’s eyes, a wide-eyed expression that is new to her, as if he has become someone else. She watches him tie single, double and triple knots, criss-crossing the rope and tightening it so hard that Mattis groans. Sebastian is still crying in the kitchen.

‘Get that kid to shut up,’ Remi snarls and wags an angry finger at her. ‘Make him shut up, or I will.’

Emilie sniffles, turns around and goes out into the kitchen. She kneels down to Sebastian, wipes his face, hushes him, says it’ll be all right, it’ll be all right, you just have to be very, very quiet, listen to me everything is going to be all right if you can just be very, very quiet. But it’s no use. Mattis, too, tries to call out words of reassurance to Sebastian from the living room, but to no avail. Sebastian keeps crying, his wailing rises and falls. Emilie looks around for a dummy. Finds none.

‘Where is his room?’ Remi says in a harsh voice as he comes up behind her. He grabs hold of her arm and holds her tight. Emilie tries to wriggle free, but his grip is so hard and so vicious that resistance only causes her more pain.

‘Where is his room?’ Remi says again, now louder.

‘In there,’ Emilie sobs and nods her head in the direction of the hallway.

Remi releases his hold on her.

‘Put him in there, I don’t want to listen to that bloody—’

Emilie picks up Sebastian, puts his head close to her own and strokes his back while she tries to console him. She walks down the hallway, past the door to the bathroom and into Sebastian’s room.

‘You need to be quiet now,’ she says, trying to control herself, but even she can hear that her pleading voice is close to breaking. Be strong, she tells herself, for Sebastian’s sake. It’s up to you to stop him from experiencing even more trauma than he already has.

Fortunately Sebastian seems to calm down at the sight of his things and his bed, the pale blue wallpaper, the action figures, the stuffed toys and Lightning McQueen – they all help to make him breathe more easily and he finally stops wailing and sobbing.

This in turn makes Emilie weep even harder. Her little boy. So small and vulnerable.

‘And you,’ Remi says to her when she comes back out. ‘Stop your bloody crying.’

Emilie nods, even though the tears keep flowing.

‘Close the door.’

Emilie does as she is told. Remi nods in the direction of the living room where Mattis is frantically trying to free himself. Emilie rushes over to him, she tries wiping away some of the blood on him, and doesn’t care that her hands and clothes get wet and sticky.

She turns to Remi, who has followed and stopped right in front of her.

‘What are you doing, Remi, why—’

He wags an angry finger at her.

‘I think you know if you just think about it.’

Emilie stops.

‘No,’ she says. ‘I don’t.’

‘Then you’re a stupid cow.’

Again Emilie tries to understand, but she can feel the effects of not having eaten for two days. Her brain quite simply refuses to work and the frantic thoughts make her dizzy.

‘You may be right, so why don’t you tell me? Explain it to me.’

Remi inhales and clutches his head. He massages his temples. Then he looks up at the wall, at the two footprints.

Emilie’s mobile rings. Her eyes automatically seek out the sound.

‘Is that yours?’ Remi asks.

Emilie doesn’t reply.

‘Is that yours?’ he demands to know.

Emilie nods.

Remi walks towards the sound and finds her mobile on the large, black coffee table. He takes it, checks the display and lets it ring. However, she can see that the noise troubles him. With a brusque, panicky movement he blocks the call and tosses the mobile aside.

Then he sits down on a chair. Rubs his fingertips against his temples again. Something glides across his face. An expression or an emotion, Emilie isn’t sure. But she’s quite sure that she doesn’t like what she sees.

Remi tries to think clearly.

It proves to be difficult.

He has only been inside the house once before and he hadn’t planned on doing this. He doesn’t know what he had hoped to get from Emilie. Just something. That she would say she was sorry and mean it, rather than merely say it. That she would understand.

He should have taken some more of the pills he swallowed before he went to Johanne’s flat, then he wouldn’t have been able to feel anything. But now he feels everything. The pain in his hand and in his head. It’s as if the walls are closing in on him and threatening to crush him.

So what’s he going to do now?

What next?

He lifts his head and looks around. His gaze stops on the stuffed reindeer head mounted on the wall. The eyes are dark and shiny. As if the light is still on in them.

‘Do you hunt?’ he asks, looking at Mattis.

Mattis nods reluctantly.

‘Then I guess you keep guns in the house, don’t you?’

Chapter 73

Bjarne mutters curses under his breath. Emilie Blomvik still isn’t answering her phone. And worse, she has just blocked his call.

He swears loudly and drives as fast as he can in the direction of the Trafikkmaskinen interchange roundabout to get out of Oslo. While he weaves frantically in and out of the traffic, he finds a white cable, which he plugs into his mobile. He sticks the earplugs into his ears and calls Fredrik Stang again.

‘Did you get hold of Romerike Police?’

‘Yes, they’re despatching a patrol car to the address now.’

‘Just the one car?’

‘Yes, they said that was all they had available.’

Bjarne rolls his eyes.

‘Okay, I’m on my way there now. Have you found out more information about Remi Gulliksen?’

‘Yes, a bit. He was born and grew up in Jessheim, but now lives in a small flat in Tøyen.’

‘Have we sent people over to his address?’

‘We have. Gjerstad has got everyone working on it.’

‘Great.’

‘By the way, Remi was due to be evicted from his flat today.’

‘Really?’

‘Yes, that could have been what set him off.’

‘Hm. Keep me posted.’

‘Will do.’

Some high-risk driving enables Bjarne to get out of Oslo in the rush-hour while he calls Directory Enquiries and asks to be put through to Nordby Nursery. There he learns that Sebastian Blomvik failed to show up today.

Bjarne calls Emilie again, but this time his call is cut off immediately.

‘Damn,’ he says and hits the accelerator.

Emilie Blomvik.

She was his first, his only one. Now, when he thinks about it, he doesn’t know why he loved her, only that he did. He couldn’t explain it. Perhaps it was just that she made him feel loved and valued. He believed that she admired him. That’s what she told him, she praised him, called him nice and good. No one had ever said that to him before.

But he should have known that it couldn’t last. Emilie wasn’t that kind of girl. She got bored easily and hated staying in. She liked going to parties and having fun, while he just wanted her all to himself. At first when the rumours about Markus and her started to circulate, he refused to believe them. He was in denial.

Right until that became impossible.

Emilie was his first, his only one. He could never erase her; no one would ever surpass her. It had started with Emilie and it would finish with Emilie.

The doorbell rings.

He is startled, as are Emilie and Mattis. Both of them are about to cry out, but Remi points the gun at them.

‘Hush,’ he says. ‘Not a sound.’

Chapter 74

Bjarne has barely left Oslo when his mobile rings again.

‘Yes?’

It is Ella Sandland.

‘I’ve just spoken to Remi Gulliksen’s mother,’ she says. ‘Remi visited them Tuesday evening. She says he went berserk.’

‘In what way?’

‘He beat up his father.’

An articulated lorry pulls out in front of Bjarne. He sounds the horn and flashes his headlights while he says: ‘Why?’

‘His mother wasn’t sure. It came out of the blue. Remi had knocked over a glass of water and refused to clean it up. And when his father told Remi to apologise, he went crazy.’

‘Just because he knocked over a glass of water?’

The articulated lorry refuses to get out of his way.

‘So it would seem. They don’t sound like the world’s happiest family.’

Bjarne opens the window and places a blue flashing light on the roof, though technically he should have requested permission first. It takes only a few seconds before the lorry pulls over. Bjarne accelerates and sends the driver a long hard stare before he overtakes him. The speedometer is close to 150.

‘We need to send officers over to Remi’s parents’ address,’ he says.

‘I think that’s already happening.’

‘I’m seven or eight minutes away from Jessheim.’

‘Thanks for letting me know.’

Bjarne exits the motorway at Jessheim, turns right at the first roundabout, drives past a bank and across the new roundabout left of the bridge. He continues towards the industrial estate and speeds through more roundabouts and sleeping policemen until he reaches a residential area. He follows the sat nav instructions on the screen and it doesn’t take long before he spots the patrol car from Romerike Police parked outside a red house. Bjarne parks his car alongside the local officers and looks across to Henning.

‘Stay here. And don’t even think about leaving the car—’

He pushes his index finger very close to Henning’s face.

‘Okay.’

Bjarne gets out and introduces himself.

‘It doesn’t look as if anyone is in,’ says one of the officers.

‘Have you rung the doorbell?’

‘Yes. No one came to the door.’

Bjarne checks the windows for signs of movement and listens out for sounds. The house glistens in the sunlight that has broken through the layer of clouds. The garage door is open. A stroller is parked outside. A green garden hose is stretched across the shingle.

‘There!’ Bjarne exclaims.

‘Where?’ the officer asks.

‘The curtain in the small window. It twitched. There’s someone inside.’

‘Then why doesn’t she open the door?’

Bjarne doesn’t reply.

‘I’ll try calling her again,’ he says and takes out his mobile. He lets it ring for a long time.

Finally the call is answered, but he hears only static.

‘Hello?’ Bjarne says.

There is no voice down the other end.

‘This is Detective Inspector Bjarne Brogeland from Oslo Police. Who am I speaking to?’

The silence continues.

At last a dark voice says: ‘Go away.’

Bjarne freezes.

‘Remi?’ he stutters. ‘Is that you?’

‘I want you to leave.’

Bjarne hears a chill in Remi’s voice that he doesn’t like the sound of. Bjarne says Remi’s full name, but gets no response.

‘Is Emilie there?’ Bjarne then asks.

Silence.

‘Emilie isn’t here,’ the voice replies eventually.

‘I know she’s in there, Remi. I want to talk to her.’

‘No.’

Pause.

Bjarne starts to feel hot.

‘Please could you just tell me if she’s okay?’

No reply.

Bjarne places his hand over the telephone and looks at the others for assistance, but all he gets in return are blank stares.

‘Remi,’ Bjarne begins.

‘Just drop it,’ Remi interrupts him. ‘And don’t try to come inside or I’ll shoot.’

It takes Bjarne a moment before he is able to respond.

‘What did you just say, Remi?’

‘I’ve got a gun and I’m not afraid to use it. Don’t – come – in.’

Then he hangs up.

Chapter 75

Trine Juul-Osmundsen looks at her watch and sighs. In just a few hours she will be facing the pack of wolves. She has tried writing a statement, but her fingers just hovered over the keyboard. She has heard about writer’s block and believed that it was restricted only to writers, but now she understands its true meaning. Not being able to put down a single, coherent thought. Stare at the screen and get nothing but emptiness back. It’s like living in a vacuum.

She has gone through her emails and fortunately not found any more messages from biglie0910. It confirms the conclusion she reached earlier this morning. The sender knows that there is no point in sending her emails she can’t read or reply to.

There is a knock on the door and Katarina Hatlem peeks in.

‘You wanted a word with me?’ she says and enters Trine’s office. Her long red curls are coiled around her neck.

‘Yes. Close the door behind you,’ Trine says.

Katarina does as she is asked and approaches the desk. Her steps are normally brisk. Her face is usually alert. Now it looks haggard. As if she has been crying or not slept for several days.

‘How are you?’ Hatlem asks her cautiously.

‘Sit down.’

Katarina hesitates a second before she does as she is told.

‘I’ve been doing a bit of thinking recently,’ Trine begins. ‘Or more accurately, I wasn’t able to think very much until I came home last night. It has been a little – how can I put it – difficult to focus on anything other than negative thoughts.’

‘I understand,’ Katarina says, nodding vigorously.

‘But this morning I remembered something.’

Trine drums her fingers on the desk.

‘Whoever started this smear campaign against me must have known that I wouldn’t defend myself. He or she must have known why I couldn’t tell the public what I really did on the night of 9 October last year, or rather what I did the following day. It means that this person must have known that I was in Denmark and what it would do to me if the truth came out.’

Katarina Hatlem lowers her gaze.

‘I confided in one person,’ Trine says, locking her eyes on to Katarina. ‘One person who helped me with the arrangements. And that person, Katarina dear, was you.’

Katarina makes no reply. She just stares at the floor.

‘Either you’re behind all of this or you told someone what I did.’

Trine pre-empts Katarina’s potential protest.

‘I’m going to give you one chance – just one – to explain yourself. And spare me the outrage; don’t tell me it wasn’t you, because you must have had something to do with it. Because I certainly didn’t tell anyone else.’

Katarina can’t even look her in the eye, but Trine sees the colour flare up in her cheeks. It doesn’t take long before the corners of her mouth start twitching.

‘Please believe me,’ she whimpers. ‘I never thought that it would go this far.’

‘Didn’t you?’ Trine replies tartly. ‘Few people know the media better than you, Katarina. You knew exactly how to play it.’

Katarina shakes her head frantically.

‘It wasn’t like that,’ she says. ‘It was my fault, but I promise you, Trine, I had nothing to do with this.’

‘Then I suggest that you start talking. The press conference begins in less than two hours.’

Katarina breaks down and sobs. She cries for a long time until Trine orders her to pull herself together.

‘I’m sorry,’ Katarina stutters while she closes her eyes and lets the tears run free. ‘I’m so, so sorry.’

Trine doesn’t reply, she just looks at someone who has been her closest colleague for several years. A colleague she regarded as her friend. And the tender feeling she gets inside surprises her. But she can’t make herself say that it’s okay. It’s very much not okay. The damage can never be undone.

‘I’m waiting,’ she says and juts out her chin.

Katarina Hatlem sniffs, puts a finger under each eye and lets the skin absorb some of the moisture, but to no avail. When she finally starts talking, her voice no longer trembles.

And Trine thought she knew how bad getting hurt could be. Dull pain punctured by tiny pulsating pricks, words driving splinters of pain into her heart and forcing all the air out of her lungs. She thought she knew how bad getting hurt could get.

She was wrong.

Chapter 76

As soon as Bjarne has finished the call, he rings a new number. It takes only a moment before the call is answered. He quickly explains where he is and what has happened.

‘This is a hostage situation,’ he repeats to emphasise the gravity of the situation. As he ends the call, he looks up at the house.

‘Do you have any experience with hostage situations?’ he asks.

The local police officers exchange glances.

‘I mean, apart from what they taught you at the police academy?’

‘No,’ one of them says.

‘Would it be okay with you if I take charge until the armed response unit arrives?’

‘Yes,’ they reply in unison.

‘Okay,’ Bjarne begins. ‘We need to set up an inner cordon so that the hostage taker can’t escape if he decides to leave the house. Next we set up an outer cordon that will stop outsiders entering the area. We’re lucky, only one road leads in here and it starts around the bend over there.’ Bjarne points to a grey house with tall walls. ‘There’s a footpath over there. One of you, you for example,’ he says, pointing to the man on his left, ‘go over there and stop everyone from getting through. And I mean everyone.’

The police officer nods.

‘I noticed another footpath on my way here, over by the post boxes. You go over there,’ Bjarne says, pointing to the other officer. ‘You should still be able to see inside the house, but act discreetly. We mustn’t do anything to provoke the hostage taker. Take off your jacket, there’s always a chance he won’t realise you’re a police officer. See if you can get an idea of how many people are inside. We also have to assess whether we need to evacuate any of the neighbours, certainly anyone we see outdoors. We have to get them out of here.’

The officers nod.

‘I’ll stay here in front of the house. We’ll do what we can, and wait for backup.’

The officers nod again.

‘Okay,’ Bjarne says and waves them off. The officers quickly take up their positions. Bjarne watches the house closely, sees the curtain twitch again. A head pops up and then disappears.

Bjarne has been present at two previous hostage situations. The first took place in an asylum centre. A staff member at reception called the police himself to say that he was being held against his will by a resident threatening him with a knife and a can of petrol. An ambulance and armed police officers attended immediately, and initially there were fears that the resident might burn down the whole centre. But everything was over in thirty minutes. The resident was arrested without drama.

The second time was a woman in a house out in Lørenskog and the call they got was similar to this one, that a man inside had a weapon and that he wasn’t afraid to use it. The hostage taker even stepped out on the veranda and fired a shot in the air to prove his claim. The police arrived in full force, took up positions around the house, and the hostage negotiator made contact. Again, it didn’t take long before the hostage was released. The man was arrested inside the house after a short raid.

What both hostage situations had in common was that Bjarne felt strangely disappointed afterwards. There was no action, no adrenaline rush. No messages on the police radio about an arm, a shoulder or a head in the middle of quivering crosshairs. But though Bjarne felt a little cheated then, he realises now with all of his being that he hopes this hostage situation will have the same outcome. That it will play out just as quickly, end just as undramatically and with as few injuries as possible.

Bjarne jumps when his mobile rings. He looks at the display. The call is from Emilie Blomvik’s phone. Bjarne stands frozen for several long seconds. Reluctantly, he presses the green button.

‘Hello?’

‘Didn’t you hear what I said?’ says the heavy, dark voice.

‘Yes, Remi. I heard everything you said.’

‘So why are you still there? I told you I had a gun. Do you need a demonstration?’

Bjarne closes his eyes and thinks hard.

‘No, Remi, I don’t.’

‘Then I suggest that you get out of here now.’

Bjarne rubs his forehead, his hand gets wet from sweat and he realises he has no source of advice, he is on his own. Police academy training means nothing; he can’t access the calm, the sensible advice, the gentle voice that tells the hostage taker that the negotiator is now in charge.

‘Let me help you,’ he says and immediately hears a snort down the other end.

‘The only thing I want you to do is keep your mouth shut and listen to me. I know that you’re going to call for backup now; negotiators and armed officers will turn up and everyone will want to help me, isn’t that right, everybody’s going to be ever so patient and understanding. Well, you can forget about it. I don’t want to talk to some bloody hostage negotiator.’

There is silence again. The sweat is dripping from Bjarne’s forehead.

‘Okay,’ he says. ‘So who do you want to talk to?’

The police officer’s voice echoes in Remi’s head. He looks at the TV screen where the news channel is on. A red dot is flashing as if a tsunami warning is being broadcast.

Next to the dot it says that Justice Secretary Trine Juul-Osmundsen has called a press conference later today and that she is expected to resign. But the experts Remi can hear, the reporters in the television studio, think that no one should expect her to apologise for what she has done.

So she is another one of those.

‘I want to talk to the woman on the TV,’ Remi says. ‘The Minister for Justice. I want to talk to Trine Juul-Osmundsen.’

Chapter 77

Though Henning has been told to stay in the car, he can see that something is brewing. He has already called 123news to alert them when Bjarne comes over and wrenches open the door.

‘You can’t stay here,’ he says, his voice laden with police gravity while he summons him outside with his index finger.

‘Okay,’ Henning says, getting out. ‘So where can I be?’

‘Anywhere,’ Bjarne says. ‘Just not here.’

‘What’s going on?’

‘Much too much,’ Bjarne replies, but offers no further explanation.

Henning retreats discreetly while he watches Bjarne and the two other officers. Their faces are grim, their footsteps purposeful. If you put two and two together, you usually get four. Their presence must indicate that Remi is inside Emilie Blomvik’s house. And that he has no plans to come quietly.

Henning finds a spot further away where he still has a view of the house. He takes out his mobile and rings 123news again.

The armed response unit is in place thirty minutes later. A tall, dark-haired man called Simen Krogh is in charge of the operation. He has long sideburns, a strong jaw and a thick bull’s neck.

‘Right, people, listen up,’ Krogh says, summoning the officers closer to him. He allocates some of them to a detention group tasked with catching Remi if he comes out or tries to escape. Krogh tells them that he has requested a trained hostage negotiator who will be with them in fifteen minutes.

‘We have one objective right now,’ Krogh says earnestly. ‘And that is to get the hostage taker to come out with the hostages alive. And remember, we have all the time in the world. We can drag out events to try to wear him down. Unless there’s an emergency and the hostages’ lives are in danger, then we don’t take action. We don’t storm the house unless we absolutely have to. But we’ll still prepare as if that was exactly what we were going to do.’

Krogh turns.

‘That hedge there,’ he says, pointing to one side of the house. ‘It’s dense. It’ll provide cover. There is also a veranda close to the hedge. I want two men up on that veranda, but do it quietly. I don’t want him to hear your footsteps and panic.’

The officers Krogh is pointing at nod.

‘On the other side, to the right of the garage, you can get across the fence and access the back garden. There are no windows on that side, something that will help us get closer. But the house has several windows on its long sides. So stay out of sight. See, but don’t be seen.’

Krogh then goes over to two men who are assembling rifles.

‘If you see the hostage taker aim his gun at the hostage and declare an intention to shoot, then you must await orders from me before you can take him out. No heroics. Understand?’

The marksmen nod.

The rest of the officers take up positions, both outside and inside the white picket fence.

‘Okay,’ Krogh says, walking towards Bjarne. ‘What do you make of the hostage taker’s demand?’

Bjarne shakes his head.

‘Difficult to know. Even the lunatic in there must know that you can’t just pick up the phone and, hey presto, the Justice Secretary comes running.’

‘Well, I think we should alert her,’ Krogh says. ‘So that at least she’s aware of the situation.’

‘I’ve tried getting hold of some of her aides, but it’s chaos at the Ministry right now. As far as I can understand the Minister is about to hold a press conference.’

Krogh nods.

‘The hostage taker wants to talk to her. He has a gun, which he says he’s not afraid to use. I think that a call to a Minister is a small price to pay to save someone’s life.’

Bjarne takes a deep breath.

‘I’ll get my boss to put some pressure on the Justice Secretary’s staff.’

Chapter 78

The words from Katarina’s mouth were like a punch to the stomach. Trine had never thought that the sound of a name could cause her so much pain. The years they have spent together. The plans they have made. Their dreams. The foundations underpinning everything they had done – blown away. And she understands it now; she sees how the traps were set for her and how she walked into each one without even thinking about it. Just because he told her to.

It was fiendishly clever. And now it’s too late. He has won.

Or has he?

Trine looks at the clock on the wall, gets up and rolls her shoulders. She goes to the cloakroom and looks at herself in the mirror. Tiny needles of anger prick her at the thought of what she is about to do. In the last half hour alone she has been to the lavatory three times. An hour’s run would be welcome now, she thinks, to drain the stress from her body. She is still suffering the after-effects of the liqueur she drank too much of in the cabin.

Trine removes a strand of hair from her forehead, adjusts her jacket and turns around in the full-length mirror. She looks okay, doesn’t she?

Yes, she assures herself. You look fine.

She inhales, stares into her own eyes and then closes them. She knows she is going to hate every second of this press conference. She returns to her desk, picks up the pages she printed out, though she is not sure if she really needs them. She has always been comfortable giving speeches and lectures without notes. Nevertheless it’s good to have something to look at, just in case. Something to do with her hands.

She is about to step outside when Katarina Hatlem rushes in. After she had made a clean breast of everything to Trine, Katarina said without prompting that she would obviously clear her desk immediately and not come back. Now she is waving her arm in the air and holding a mobile in her hand.

‘Trine, wait,’ she calls out.

It is as if the confrontation they had only a couple of hours ago has been wiped from her face. There is a sense of urgency to her movements that Trine has seen many times before. It means that something has happened.

Katarina stops right in front of Trine and puts her hand over the microphone on the mobile.

‘I’ve got a policeman on the line,’ she says. ‘There’s a hostage situation in Jessheim.’

Trine gives her a look of exasperation.

‘I’m just about to give a press conference, Katarina, I can’t—’

‘Two seconds,’ Katarina implores her. ‘Just listen to what he has to say for two seconds.’

Trine looks at her ex-friend for a moment before she takes the mobile and says ‘yes’. A man introduces himself as Arild Gjerstad.

Trine says nothing while she listens to his briefing. Her thoughts are racing. When Gjerstad has finished, she says: ‘Tell the hostage taker I’m on my way. Tell him that he will get to talk to me, but that I want something in return. Such as a hostage.’

Trine hands back the mobile to Katarina without ending the call.

‘I want you to go to the press room,’ Trine says as she walks past her. ‘Tell the reporters that the press conference has been postponed until further notice.’

Trine asks her secretary to inform her driver that she will be downstairs in two minutes. She doesn’t even put on a coat before she goes over to the lift and hits the down button several times. Four minutes later, after having fought her way through a throng of noisy reporters who can’t understand why she is leaving without talking to them, she is on her way to Jessheim in her ministerial car, a perk she thought she had enjoyed for the last time. The driver asks if he should request assistance from the police to get out of the capital as quickly as possible, but Trine doesn’t think that will be necessary. She regrets her decision once they get stuck in the Trafikkmaskinen interchange roundabout, but the traffic eases up as they approach the Vålerenga Tunnel. Then it slows down again near Furuset, and again at the exit to Olavsgård. Trine looks at her watch. The call came in thirty minutes ago. She hopes she won’t be too late.

The drive to Jessheim takes almost fifty minutes, but the location proves easy to find. Crowds of curious neighbours and news-hungry journalists have gathered behind the police cordons. A reporter from TV2 is holding a microphone in her hand while talking to a camera; her face is solemn as if she were about to announce a death. Then her gaze is drawn to the car in which Trine is travelling. It takes only a few seconds before the blonde reporter recognises the ministerial car and realises who has arrived.

Trine tries to find something to focus on while her driver looks for a place to park. She gets out of the car and instantly feels everyone’s eyes on her so she picks a spot above them and concentrates on that, ignores the murmur of voices and makes her way through the crowd and over to police cordons. The TV reporter calls out to her.

‘Minister, what are you doing here?’

Trine doesn’t reply, but identifies herself to the uniformed officer standing guard and is let through immediately.

Her heels make a steady clicking sound against the damp tarmac. Everyone she meets looks at her and follows her with their eyes. She finds the car marked ‘Head of Operations’ and nods to some of the uniformed officers outside.

‘Hello,’ she says. ‘Who is in charge here?’

A tall, dark-haired man turns around.

‘I am. My name is Simen Krogh,’ he says, holding out his hand.

Trine shakes it.

‘Have you had any more contact with the hostage taker?’

‘No,’ Krogh says. ‘He hasn’t called us in the last forty-five minutes, and we haven’t called him. But we’re prepared, we have people ready to go in – should it become necessary. All lines of communications are open. The Police Chief is following the situation and will decide whether or not we take action.’

‘I’ll make that decision,’ she says. ‘I’m still Justice Secretary.’

‘Er, yes, of course. That’s your right. Have you been briefed about the hostage taker?’

‘I know a little, yes,’ she says and nods. She didn’t follow the news much when she was young, but she does remember the snow cave tragedy in Jessheim. She read about it in the local paper. Remi’s brother who died under the snowdrifts. A terrible, tragic accident.

‘Okay, good,’ Krogh says. ‘Before we get started, I’d like you to talk to the hostage negotiator from Lillestrøm. Follow me.’

Krogh leads Trine through a crowd of police officers. Then he stops at a mobile incident truck, gives an order Trine doesn’t catch and a few seconds later a woman in civilian clothing gets out. She is wearing a bullet-proof vest on top of her thin, dark blue raincoat.

‘Hello, my name is Tonje Tellefsen,’ the woman says. ‘I’m the hostage negotiator for Romerike police district.’

‘Trine Juul-Osmundsen.’

They shake hands and quickly smile at each other.

‘I’ll be with you the whole time listening to every word that’s being said. Situations like these are always unique and you can never know in advance what will work. There’s one thing that is important and it might seem obvious, but you mustn’t say or do anything that could make the hostage taker even angrier than he already is. Don’t remind him why he is here. And don’t speak to him in any way he might perceive as threatening. Listen to what he says and make sure your voice sounds as gentle as possible.’

Trine nods.

Tellefsen gives her a warm smile.

‘It’s highly unusual,’ she says. ‘For a hostage taker to demand to talk to a Minister. We’re very pleased that you’ve come. It’s a brave thing to do.’

‘Thank you,’ Trine smiles and gets a warm feeling inside. ‘Which house is it?’

‘The red one over there,’ Tellefsen says and points.

Another mobile incident truck is parked outside. Trine can see that members of the armed response unit in their dark uniforms are strategically positioned around the house.

‘Okay,’ she says and starts walking towards the truck. ‘Let’s get going.’

Chapter 79

The agonies of choice. What to do.

Emilie Blomvik sits on the floor a short distance from Mattis. She is shivering even though she feels hot. Remi paces up and down in front of her, sits down, gets up again. Closes his eyes and writhes. It looks as if his head hurts. And now the police are outside.

The question is, should she do something or simply wait for them to sort it out? Can she trust them to handle it?

Yes, she decides at first. They’ve been trained for this. But then Remi started talking about the Justice Secretary. Threatened to use the gun. It made Emilie think she might have to do something as well. She can’t just sit there and wait.

Do something, yes. But what?

Fortunately Sebastian is still playing in his room, bashing away at his hammer board toy. He turns over the board and starts whacking the other side. It is a game that usually sends him to sleep. She hopes he is starting to feel sleepy now.

‘Remi,’ she says with warmth in her voice. ‘Why don’t you sit down for a moment?’

Emilie can’t gesture to him because her hands are tied behind her back. So instead she makes a come-hither movement with her head. Remi looks at her.

‘Do you remember when we used to skive off school and spend the whole day at home just watching movies?’

Emilie attempts to produce a smile she knows usually has an effect on men.

‘I can’t remember how many sweets we ate. I feel almost sick just thinking about it.’

Mattis stares at her, but Emilie ignores him. She sees that the memories start to come back to Remi. The time when they were good together. Life was fun. It was quite a wild time as well, she remembers. A lot happened.

‘We could be like that… again, you know that, don’t you?’

She has barely spoken the words before he snorts with derision.

‘What is it you want from me, Remi? What can I do to make all this go away?’

He lifts his head and looks at her.

‘I want you to say that you’re sorry,’ he says. ‘I want you to look at me and tell me you’re sorry for ruining my life.’

Emilie nods softly, before she realises what he has just said.

‘Me? I ruined your—’

‘Yes, you. You, Johanne, that vicious old—’

Remi bites his lip.

Emilie doesn’t say anything immediately, but she realises that she can’t stop herself.

‘Remi,’ she says. ‘What happened between us. It was a hundred years ago.’

Her voice is calm even though she is seething on the inside.

‘You’re not seriously telling me that you’re still upset about what happened back then?’

Remi makes no reply.

‘I was eighteen years old, Remi. Eighteen! Dear God, we were just kids. We did crazy stuff all the time.’

‘You did crazy stuff all the time.’

‘Yes, okay, but so what? We’re allowed to make mistakes when we’re young.’

‘Right and who cares if anyone gets hurt while we make our mistakes? Anything goes as long as you’re having fun?’

Emilie doesn’t respond immediately.

‘Remi, everyone has done things they regret. If I had the chance to live my life all over again there are many things I would do differently, and if that’s what you want me to say, then yes, I’m sorry for what happened between us. So here goes: I’m really sorry I hurt you. I apologise. Okay? Now can we please get on with our lives?’

‘I can tell from your voice that you don’t mean it.’

Emilie rolls her eyes, but Remi just sends her an icy glare.

‘Okay,’ Emilie says with a sigh. ‘Fine. But don’t come back later and say that I didn’t apologise.’

‘It’s too late now, anyway.’

The next moment the phone rings. Remi looks at it for a long time before he presses a button and puts it to his ear. But he says nothing. Emilie presumes it’s the police trying to talk him down.

But Emilie’s intuition tells her that talking won’t help; only action will do. And there is something in Remi’s eyes that terrifies the life out of her. There is no hope left in them. Only hatred.

You have to do something, she thinks.

Chapter 80

Trine is given a telephone and a headset, which she puts on and exhales.

‘I’m ready,’ she says and looks at the hostage negotiator who nods back in return.

‘We need to go inside the truck,’ she says. ‘You can’t stand out here and make yourself a target. This is a man who clearly wants attention, and you—’

‘I get it,’ Trine interrupts her.

They step inside the mobile incident truck. Trine is given a chair, an A4 pad and pen. The negotiator sits down next to her.

Trine has read the police contingency plan for situations like this, so she knows that every action suggested and executed will be logged. Everything she says will be subject to close scrutiny afterwards.

‘Remember, I’m with you all the way,’ the negotiator says. ‘Look at me and any notes I write down for you while you talk to him. Be calm. Self-assured. Controlled. Don’t let him know that you’re nervous.’

‘Is it that obvious?’ Trine says and laughs quickly.

‘I’m always nervous in situations like these,’ the negotiator says. ‘It usually brings out the best in me. And one more thing: use his first name, Remi. It might make him feel that you know each other. And, if you can, refer to the hostages by their first names. It’ll make it harder for him to hurt them.’

Trine nods and closes her eyes in an attempt to focus her thoughts. What if this goes belly up as well? What kind of legacy will she leave behind? She can see the demands. APOLOGISE! the front pages will clamour. Again.

Trine’s chest is pounding. Her pulse is 190. Adrenaline. A feeling she normally loves, but this is nothing like a high. She closes her eyes for a moment. Then she rings the number.

Remi looks at the phone vibrating on the worktop in the kitchen. The police have stopped ringing Emilie’s phone. And started calling his.

It means they know who he is now. They must also have discovered what he has done. But how could they? Where did he screw up?

Once more he reviews the murder of Erna Pedersen in his mind. She didn’t remember him the first time he rolled her wheelchair back from the singalong in the TV lounge, not until he showed her pictures from the year he was in and reminded her about the fractions.

Remi had never been much good at maths. One day, she ordered him up to the blackboard, told him to reduce a fraction she had written. And he stood there, staring at the confusion of numbers without understanding anything at all. Later, he suspected that had been her intention all along, make him go up there so they could all have a good laugh at his expense, the whole class. What she did afterwards, as the volume of her voice rose, certainly caused some of his fellow pupils to snicker. She ordered him to crawl under one of the desks in the front row and screamed while she hit the desk with her cane, ‘This is a fraction. And you can’t have a nothing under a fraction!’

Another time she had turned up with three large bars of chocolate and told them that if every single pupil in the class could work out an equation she had taught them, they could have the chocolate. As expected Remi failed and, surprise, surprise, she made a big point out of stressing how he had ruined it for everyone. Then there was the way she always looked at him. Her scornful laughter.

When he held up the school photo to her and pointed himself out, she showed signs of recognition, but she said nothing. And he felt the urge, right there and then, to extinguish the light in the eyes he had hated ever since his school days, but he couldn’t do it. Too many people had seen him wheel her in. Markus was waiting for him. So he left the school photo on the wall in the hope that she would remember what she had done. Perhaps she would say sorry next time.

But no. What he saw instead were traces of the same contempt she had treated him with at school. And though he had planned it, he didn’t actually understand what had happened until after he had killed her. He had also destroyed the trophy on her wall, the photograph of her son’s family displayed like a prize for successful mothering. Then he took the school photo with him and sneaked back into the TV lounge, took up position right behind Markus and sang along with ‘Thine Be the Glory, Risen Conquering Son’.

Remi hadn’t spoken to Markus since sixth form when one day they bumped into each other in the Storgata branch of Spaceworld where Remi had gone to buy a computer. They got talking and it was actually quite amusing to hear what had become of the old Romeo: absolutely nothing. No girlfriend, no children. A hefty spare tyre had formed around his waist and most of his wavy, blond hair had been replaced with a shiny, bald circle at the top of his head. Nor had he been very successful at finding work.

But as neither of them had that many friends, they started hanging out together. It was awkward to begin with. Remi wasn’t over Emilie and Markus made a point of never mentioning her name. Not voluntarily. They had to drink a whole bottle of Vargtass before Remi could ask Markus if he was still in touch with Emilie, a question that inevitably stirred up the past.

And if Remi’s father has taught him anything, it is that apologies come in many forms. It wasn’t until Markus’s body was practically anaesthetised with alcohol that he produced a feeble, miserable apology. But saying sorry means only that you sympathise, not that you take responsibility for what you did. That was the night Remi made up his mind.

Markus must be made to take responsibility.

Remi knew that Markus had dated Johanne at some point. He had also discovered that Erna Pedersen lived at Grünerhjemmet and that the Volunteer Service would visit from time to time to sing and play to the residents. And even though Markus might have lapsed over the years, he came from a family where Christian values mattered. So when Remi suggested that the two of them did something other than play computer games and get drunk, Markus was surprisingly easy to persuade.

It was well over twenty years since Erna Pedersen taught them and time had made her grey and lined. There was nothing to suggest that Markus recognised her when he saw her again. Remi knew that the police would check who had visited Grünerhjemmet on that day. If they were to discover that Johanne Klingenberg was another one of Erna Pedersen’s former’s pupils, they would start looking for a killer with a similar background. If they then tried to find out if any of Pedersen’s former pupils had been present at Grünerhjemmet on the day in question, they would finally get a hit with Markus Gjerløw. Remi Gulliksen, as he had signed himself in the visitors’ log, had never been one of Pedersen’s pupils. Remi Winsnes, however, was the name he had been known by until he turned eighteen.

The laptop arrangement was also straightforward. Markus, who always had to have the latest thing, didn’t mind selling his old laptop to Remi, a laptop Remi made sure to load with photos of Johanne and pictures taken in Erna Pedersen’s room. If the police checked if the laptop really belonged to Markus, then they would find his name registered against the computer’s serial number. All the evidence would point them to a man who, about to be exposed, had swallowed a blister pack of morphine capsules. Once again Remi saw the light extinguished in the eyes of someone he hated. And, as the perfect finish, Remi posted an apology on Markus’s Facebook profile, a status that remained unexplained.

It was perfect, wasn’t it?

So why are the police outside now?

Johanne’s murder, Remi thinks. Could Markus have had an alibi? Remi shakes his head. Halo 3 had just come out and Markus would have done nothing but play the game and play it 24/7. When Killzone 2 came out, he didn’t sleep for two days. Remi doesn’t know for sure, but he thinks it was even worse with Crysis. It was a risk, obviously, but Remi sent a text to Markus just before he went to Johanne’s flat to ask what he was doing. The reply was as he expected: Markus was playing on the computer. ‘Hate the graphics, but love the sound.’ Everything was as it should be.

So what had he got wrong?

Not that it really matters now. There are only two ways out of this situation: either with his hands above his head or staring up at the inside of a body bag.

So what do you choose?

He picks up the phone from the worktop, presses the green button and puts it to his ear. He hears white noise and senses tension. It takes a few seconds before someone says:

‘Hi.’

The voice sounds different, but he knows who it is.

‘This is Trine Juul-Osmundsen, Justice Secretary.’

It feels weird to hear the voice of a public figure he has never met in real life. But everyone in Jessheim knows who she is as she comes from Kløfta and would often be seen in Jessheim when she was young. The local newspapers have followed her political career from the start. Somehow Remi feels that he knows her and right now he doesn’t want to talk to a total stranger.

‘You wanted me to come,’ Trine says in a slightly harsh tone of voice that startles him. ‘And here I am. It’s my understanding that you haven’t met the demand I made. If you want something, Remi, then you have to give something. This means that if we’re to continue with this, talking, I mean, you and me, then you have to show good faith. You have to give me something in return.’

Remi snorts, but takes care that no sound escapes his nostrils. In view of the mess Trine Juul-Osmundsen has got herself into, he might have expected her to understand. But no. Instead, he has to give her something.

He knows what will happen if he does. The moment he opens the door, the police will storm the house and overpower him.

There is no way he will give her anything.

‘How many people are inside with you?’

Too many, Remi thinks to himself while he shakes his head.

‘I want you to release one of the hostages, Remi. No more, no less.’

Remi snorts again.

This was a mistake, he thinks. The day has been full of mistakes. And he knows what the rest of his life will be like. First he will be remanded in custody, then there will be mass vilification in the media and meetings with his lawyers in prison, and finally the trial. Even if they let him out in twenty years, everyone will know who he is and what he did. That’s no kind of life.

So what do you choose?

He looks at the gun. Then he gets up.

‘No,’ he says, picking up the gun. He looks at Emilie.

‘What did you say?’ Trine asks.

‘I won’t be releasing anyone.’

‘You have to,’ she protests.

I don’t have to do anything, Remi thinks as he squeezes the gunstock.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ he says quietly.

‘Why not?’

‘Because it’s all over now.’

‘No, Remi, it isn’t.’

‘Yes,’ he says, cocking the gun. ‘It’s over. And now I’m going to kill us all.’

Chapter 81

If anyone were to ask Trine to recount what happened next, she wouldn’t have been able to. Not in detail. She saw Simen Krogh make a thrusting movement with his hand and then she screamed. She doesn’t remember what came out of her mouth, but whatever it was, it must have worked because he stopped and looked at her. And God knows what the hostage negotiator did. But the gunshot never rang out. Nor did the hostage taker hang up.

The hissing down the other end of the phone feels like piercing, high-frequency pain. Trine blinks, tries to focus and it helps, her vision improves, but she keeps staring at a point in front of her. The hostage negotiator says something to her, but Trine ignores her.

She filters out all noises and tries to imagine Remi Gulliksen and the terrified hostages who are with him inside the house. What they must be going through. Pressing Remi to release a hostage was a mistake.

‘Remi,’ she says quietly. ‘I think I know why you wanted me to come.’

And this time she waits until he says something. It’s not much of an answer, but there is a grunt, a signal that he is interested in hearing what she has to say.

‘You and I,’ she says and waits a little longer again. ‘We’ve both done something we shouldn’t have. We’ve both been backed into a corner and we’re desperate to find a way out.’

Trine holds another pause; her forehead gets hot.

‘I think I know a little about how you feel,’ she says and leans forward on her elbows, resting them on her knees. Some hair falls in front of her eyes, but she doesn’t brush it away. She waits a little longer before she says: ‘I’ve never let anyone dictate to me. I’ve fought injustice wherever I’ve come across it. But I’ve learned something in the last few days, Remi. Or, at least, I think I have. And I understand that sometimes it’s pointless to fight the inevitable. You can stand in the sea with water up to your knees and tell yourself you’ll stay where you are, even if a giant wave comes towards you. But no matter how strong you are, that wave will knock you over.’

Trine pauses.

‘Do you understand what I mean, Remi? Do you hear what I’m saying?’

Pause. The silence gnaws at her insides. Trine holds her breath, clutches her fingers.

‘I hear you.’

‘I’ve got a suggestion,’ Trine says, warming to her subject. ‘I’ve never liked talking on the phone. I prefer being able to look people in the eye. So what I’m going to do now,’ she says and looks up for a brief moment at the protests she can read in the faces of the police officers in the mobile incident truck, ‘is to leave this truck and go and stand outside the house. I want you to walk to a window, so that—’

‘Why? So you can take me out?’

‘No,’ Trine says emphatically. ‘No one here will shoot you. I give you my word.’

She gets up and brushes off a police officer who tries to stop her.

‘If you look up now,’ she says, taking a step down on to the tarmac outside the truck, ‘then you’ll see me. I’d really like to be able to see you, too, Remi.’

There is silence.

Trine scans every window for signs of movement. She sees nothing. Hears nothing.

Then a curtain twitches.

‘Like that, yes,’ she says and feels a sense of agitation. She notices that it has started to rain, a soft, cool drizzle that lowers the temperature in her head and makes it easier to think. ‘And I’d like to see the whole of you. Do you think you can do that for me?’

Remi makes no reply. But soon she sees the face of a man with dark eyes. The raindrops settle like tiny pearls on her glasses, but she can still see him clearly.

‘Hi,’ she says and smiles. ‘Good to see you.’

No response.

‘What I wanted to tell you,’ she continues and locks eyes with Remi, ‘is that I’ve realised that I have to let it happen. There’s nothing I can do to make this… giant wave… disappear.’

Trine loses the thread for a moment. She shakes her head and a thought occurs to her. The fighter in her miraculously returns. There is no way she will accept that the winner takes all. There is no way she will be the only one who takes a beating. She will dish one out as well.

She feels all eager and excited, but then her mind returns to the situation in hand.

‘Remi, I know it’s tempting to just wait for the wave to sweep you away. God knows the thought has crossed my mind, too, more than once. I’ve raged at the people who made my life difficult and caused me pain, but at some point you have to let go of the past and start looking forwards.’

Trine tries to see through her misted-up glasses. It is becoming increasingly difficult.

‘And I think starting with an apology is a good thing. Apologies matter, Remi. It’s a—’

‘What did you say?’

‘Eh?’

‘I said what did you say?’

Remi’s voice has grown harsher.

‘I said it’s important to say you’re sorry. It’s the cornerstone of every human relationship.’

‘Don’t talk to me about apologies.’

‘Why n—’

‘You know nothing about apologies.’

Trine is temporarily wrong-footed.

‘No, perhaps I don’t,’ she says and tries to find Remi’s eyes through the beads of moisture on her glasses. ‘But I know it’s a thin line between love and hate. And I’m absolutely sure that you loved Emilie once, Remi, and that perhaps you still do. It’s easy to love and to hate. But forgiving someone might well be the hardest thing of all. And I’m not saying that you have to forgive the people who ruined your life because no one can demand to be forgiven. But nor do I think you can force someone to apologise. If you say you’re sorry, then you have to mean it. And you yourself have to recognise that you did something wrong and you must truly want to make amends. Wouldn’t you agree with me, Remi?’

There is silence again. Trine listens out for the sound of his breathing, but all she can hear is white noise. Then he moves away from the window.

‘Remi?’

No reply.

‘Remi, are you there?’

Chapter 82

Emilie looks at Remi, she listens to the short grunts he makes, but she can’t hear what is being said at the other end. She only sees him nodding from time to time, almost imperceptibly, and running his hands over his head. The words seem to have some effect on him, but it is only a few minutes ago since he threatened to kill them all. Though Remi seems to have calmed down a little, she has no idea if the rage will flare up in him again. And that could mean the end for all of them.

Emilie’s hands are bleeding. She has been rubbing them against the thick rope the whole time, but the knots haven’t loosened even a millimetre.

‘I’m listening,’ he says.

Again she wonders what they could be talking about. And who he is talking to.

The knocking in the bedroom has stopped. Sebastian must have fallen asleep. Thank God, she thinks, and hopes that it is so. Again she tries to wriggle her hands out of the rope, but it cuts into her flesh, sending shockwaves of pain through her. It’s no use. She is completely stuck.

‘How are you?’ whispers Mattis a short distance away from her.

Emilie thinks about everything that has happened in the last few days, Mattis’s new job, her negative thoughts about him that have started to surface even though she doesn’t quite know why. Looking at him now and seeing how outmanoeuvred he is, how bloodied and how battered, she realises there is very little left of the man who came up to her at the check-in counter at Gardermoen Airport and invited her to go reindeer hunting with him. And she understands that if anyone is going to stop Remi in case the police don’t, then it has to be her.

She tugs at the rope, feels the pain in her wrists again and grits her teeth. Primal strength, she tells herself. Only women know what that is. Pain is nothing. Not once you’ve given birth. But still it makes no difference. The knots refuse to budge.

From the kitchen she can hear Remi’s angry voice. He says something about apologies. Then he falls silent again.

A noise makes her glance sideways. The door handle to Sebastian’s bedroom is being pushed down.

No, she mouths silently. Don’t do it, Sebastian. Stay where you are!

But he doesn’t. The next moment the door opens and his little face peeks out. Emilie closes her eyes, desperately wishing she could shoo him away with her hands, but they are still trapped. She whispers to him to go back, but Sebastian doesn’t react, he doesn’t do as he is told, why can’t he ever do as he is told? Instead, he comes running towards her as he always does.

‘Mummy,’ he shouts. ‘I’m hungry.’

Of course he’s hungry, he hasn’t had anything to eat or drink all day.

‘I know, darling. But I don’t have anything for you right now. You’ll have to wait a little. Why don’t you go back to your room and play? I’ll come and see you very soon and I’ll bring you some food.’

Sebastian doesn’t budge. He just stares at them.

‘Hungry,’ he repeats before turning.

And then he starts walking towards the kitchen.

‘Sebastian,’ Emilie says, louder this time. ‘Don’t go in there.’

But he does.

‘Sebastian, don’t go—’

‘Sebastian,’ shouts Mattis in a voice that cuts through everything. ‘You’re not allowed to go in there. Do you hear me?’

And Sebastian stops and turns around again. He is not used to being spoken to like that. The slightest change in pitch makes him burst into tears, especially if he thinks he has done something wrong.

‘You mustn’t go in there,’ Emilie says, as gently as she can manage.

‘Why not?’ he demands to know.

‘Because—’

The next moment a figure appears right behind him.

Remi.

He looks at them. At Sebastian. Then he grabs the boy’s arm and drags him into the kitchen.

Chapter 83

Remi ignores the screaming that erupts behind him. He closes the door and sits down on one of the kitchen chairs.

The pressure on his temples has increased. He grimaces and closes his eyes, trying to ignore the pain.

When he opens his eyes again, Sebastian is standing in front of him. In his hand he holds a small, red toy car.

‘Hungry,’ he says indignantly.

Remi’s mouth opens.

‘Eh?’

‘I’m hungry,’ the boy repeats.

‘A-are you?’

Remi continues to stare at him.

‘I want some food.’

‘Okay,’ Remi says at last. ‘What do you want, then?’

‘Cornflakes.’

Cornflakes. His favourite cereal when he was little. Who is he kidding? It still is.

Sebastian, he thinks. You and me both.

‘Then I’m going to need your help,’ he says to the boy.

Sebastian goes over to the cupboard where they keep empty bottles on one shelf and finds the cereal box, then he fetches a small, blue spoon from the cutlery drawer and half runs back to Remi with both. Then he turns and races over to the fridge, opens it, tries to make himself as tall as he can, but he can’t reach the milk. Remi gets it down for him, picks him up and puts him in his high chair and pours cereal and milk. He watches Sebastian eat his cornflakes; he slurps and makes a mess.

Somewhere far away he hears a voice. It’s a woman. She says his name: ‘Remi. Are you there?’

‘Yes, I’m here. We’re here. From now on it’s just you and me, Sebastian.’

He gets up and takes the gun. He thinks about where he is going to do it. The bedroom, perhaps. It’ll be messy, no matter where he does it. Best to wait until Sebastian has finished eating. You shouldn’t travel on an empty stomach.

He goes over to the door and pushes it open. He thinks about how quiet it will be. How he will finally be able to do it, this time with Sebastian. How the two of them will stare right into the brightest of lights.

Emilie’s body is convulsing. She is crying so hard that she can’t breathe properly. When she finally calms herself down enough to take a deep breath, she resurrects the thought of primal strength and primal pain, and tells herself that pain doesn’t really exist. She contorts her hands again, more desperate now, and only one thought keeps her going, the thought of Sebastian and what Remi might be doing to him in the kitchen. Every second counts. She wiggles and twists; she feels her back getting wetter so she tears, yanks, pushes and jerks. The blood acts as a lubricant and she feels the rope begin to give; she pulls as hard as she can and hopes that if she just keeps trying, just a little bit longer, then she will be able to free herself.

Emilie grits her teeth as her back grows bloodier, but she carries on tugging at the ropes and suddenly there is no more resistance.

She brings her hands round to the front, looks at them red and sticky with blood; she doesn’t recognise them and they don’t hurt. She is free and Sebastian is still with Remi. Mattis tries to say something to her, but she hushes him in order to listen out to noises from the kitchen. Her first instinct is to rush in before it’s too late, divert Remi’s attention away from Sebastian and on to herself. But she has no way of knowing what would happen then, Remi might panic and lash out and she can’t run that risk because of Sebastian.

So now what?

Emilie looks around for a weapon, anything that can inflict injury. It’s not enough to knock Remi out even if she does get the chance. She has to make sure that he can’t get back up again.

My weights, she thinks. The dumbbells Johanne gave her for Christmas and which she keeps under the sofa in case she feels a sudden urge to exercise. Emilie rushes over to the sofa, lies down flat on the floor and spots the dumbbells in between dust bunnies, Lego bricks and an old grape that is turning into a raisin. She stretches out as far as she can, gets hold of one of the dumbbells and rolls it towards herself. Then she stands back up, raises the dumbbell to chest height and pledges that if she – and Sebastian and Mattis – get out alive, she is going to start exercising properly rather than just talk about doing it. She will take responsibility for her life. Improve herself. Try to love all of Mattis and not just the reindeer hunter in him.

Emilie hurries over to the door and braces herself.

At that moment the kitchen door handle is pushed down.

Remi doesn’t reply.

Trine turns to the hostage negotiator, to Simen Krogh, to the police officers and everyone in uniform who begin to move in almost robot-like unison. Trine knows why. A scream from a hostage means danger, that lives may be lost.

The officers from the armed response unit move closer, orders are issued, code words and warnings that make no sense to her. Everyone is standing by.

Trine closes her eyes.

Please, she says to herself. Please let this end well.

Chapter 84

Emilie raises the dumbbell over her head, ready to strike. She knows that Remi might be holding Sebastian so she hides behind the kitchen door when it opens. Remi takes a step forward. And she sees that Sebastian is right behind him, but neither of them has noticed her.

Emilie closes her eyes and lets her arm fall. She has only one thought in her head and that is to hit Remi and hit him again and again until there is nothing left to hit.

At that moment there is a bang. She has never heard such a loud bang before and when she opens her eyes, she realises at once that Mattis’s rifle has been fired, but it doesn’t stop her, she still lets the dumbbell fall and she feels that she hits something, but has no idea what.

She is about to strike again when one of the living room windows is smashed in. The floor starts to shake with the heavy footsteps of men in dark uniforms and her arm stops moving. There is a lot of shouting, but Emilie doesn’t understand a word that is being said, she just concentrates on hitting Remi, but it’s no use. Someone is restraining her.

Emilie exhales and then she sees Remi’s feet under a pile of men and Mattis’s gun trapped under a solid, black boot on the birch parquet floor. White powder scatters from the ceiling as if it has started to snow indoors. And that’s when she realises it’s all over.

The tiny, delicate crying of a toddler emerges from the pandemonium of loud, male voices and Emilie wriggles free. She rushes over to her son, who is looking up at her with wide-open, moist eyes. His cheeks are flushed. Lightning McQueen is lying next to a bowl of half-eaten cornflakes on the kitchen floor. There is mess everywhere. And Emilie doesn’t really understand what has happened, but right now she doesn’t care, either.

She puts her hand on Sebastian’s head and hugs him tightly. And she thinks that nothing in the whole world will ever make her let go.

Trine doesn’t notice that the drizzling rain has turned into heavy drops. It is as if she has a puncture. The air is escaping from her, making her heavy and empty. She feels a hand on her shoulder as someone speaks to her, but she doesn’t hear what they say and she doesn’t know who they are. It’s not until now that she realises she is shaking all over.

Slowly she becomes aware of the uproar around her; someone starts to clap, a round of applause, born out of relief, which gradually gains momentum. But Trine doesn’t join in. She just stands there panting.

It ended well. No one was hurt.

And she doesn’t know where they come from, the tears that now engulf her. She hasn’t cried for as long as she can remember. She didn’t cry when she was accused of sexual assault and life became intolerable. She didn’t cry when she lost a friend to cancer some years ago. She didn’t cry when they watched Atonement on DVD, she and Pål Fredrik, even though he did. Nor did she shed tears of joy when Petter Northug beat Axel Teichmann in the last lap of the World Championship Relay Race in Liberec, though she was a little moved.

But she is crying now.

The heavy rain disguises her tears and Trine cries as if her body needs to make up for all the tears she never shed. She doesn’t know for how long she stands there sobbing in the rain, but when she turns around and walks back to the police cordons, to the TV cameras and all the onlookers, knowing full well that she has another battle to fight before this day is over, she straightens up a little and juts out her chin.

And it strikes her that she hasn’t felt this strong for a long time.

Chapter 85

Henning cranes his neck to see what is going on. Exactly what has happened doesn’t require major analytical skills. Applause and cheers spread across the neighbourhood. The hostage situation has been resolved, clearly without the loss of life, otherwise people would not be cheering.

Henning sends a quick message to the news desk. To the extent it was possible outside the police cordons, he has kept the news desk updated and he knows that they have been feeding the readers of 123news with an account of events as they happened.

But that the story would conclude with Trine coming to Jessheim to try talking Remi Gulliksen out of Emilie Blomvik’s house, Henning would never have imagined. He should really have stayed away since conflict of interest means he can’t write anything about his sister, but she wasn’t the central character in the hostage drama.

Now she comes towards the police cordons. Her head is held high. Her stride is purposeful and her gaze is steady. She looks confident again, Henning thinks. Trine straightens her shoulders as she walks directly towards TV2’s reporter Guri Palme, adjusts her clothing and pushes out her chest slightly.

Henning makes his way to the front and earns himself a look of disapproval from the other journalists, which he decides to ignore. Trine stops in front of the TV2 camera where Palme waits until she gets a message in her ear that everything is ready. Then she asks what happened and what part Trine played in it. And Trine gives plain and simple answers without dramatising or overplaying her own role; she stresses how delighted she is that there was no loss of life.

‘But Trine Juul-Osmundsen, earlier today you were about to hold a press conference to tell your side of the sexual assault allegations. What can you tell us about that right now?’

‘What I can tell you is that I’ve offered my resignation to the Prime Minister and that he has accepted it. We’ll have to see what the King says when the Cabinet meets tomorrow.’

‘So you’re confirming that you’ll be resigning as Justice Secretary?’

‘I am,’ Trine nods.

‘Why are you resigning?’

‘I don’t think the Norwegian people need further information. Everything the media have written and said about me in the last few days should provide ample explanation.’

‘So you’re admitting that you’re guilty of the allegations?’

‘No, that’s not what I said. But recent media coverage makes it difficult for me to carry on.’

‘You need to elaborate,’ Palme demands.

‘No, I don’t.’

Palme is briefly thrown, but quickly recovers.

‘Can you tell me what the last few days have been like for you?’

Trine inhales deeply.

‘They’ve been tough; to say anything else would be wrong.’

‘Many people will view your resignation as an admission of guilt.’

‘I realise that. People will have to interpret my resignation as they see fit.’

Palme hesitates. A few seconds pass before she continues: ‘The identity of the young politician has yet to become known or confirmed. Have you spoken to him since this?’

‘No,’ Trine says.

‘Is there anything you want to say to him right now?’

‘No.’

‘Are you going to apologise to him?’

Trine looks straight into the camera.

‘I’ve got nothing to apologise for. I need to go now,’ she says and starts walking. New questions are hurled at her by Palme and the other reporters, but Trine just carries on walking and shows no sign of wanting to answer them. She aims for her ministerial car, which starts with a vroom before she reaches it. A blitz of flashlights follows them around the first bend.

Chapter 86

After Trine’s departure, Henning remains in Jessheim with the other reporters where one press interview follows another. Officials sing from the same hymn sheet. They can’t praise Trine Juul-Osmundsen enough for the part she played in saving the lives of Emilie Blomvik and her family.

Henning leaves just before seven o’clock and catches the 7.30 p.m. train back to Oslo. A good hour later he is home in Grünerløkka.

Trine’s problems in the past week remind him that he ought to look in on his mother. The last time he left her she was in bed, deep in a heavy, alcohol-induced sleep. He decides to check if her condition has changed.

The sky over Sofienberg is almost black when he lets himself into her flat. Again he is met with a disturbing silence, but the cigarette smell is back at its usual, intense level. He sees the disappointment in his mother’s eyes when he enters the kitchen.

‘Hi, Mum,’ Henning says and attempts a smile.

She never replies, she never says hi, hello or good evening. Such pleasantries simply have no place in Christine Juul’s vocabulary. As always she is sitting at the kitchen table. The ashtray in front of her is overflowing and a cigarette in it sends a steady column of thin, blue smoke up towards the ceiling. The small glass beside her is almost empty.

‘You didn’t fix the radio,’ she sulks. ‘You said you were going to fix the radio.’

‘I know, Mum. I just haven’t got round to it yet.’

‘I want to listen to the radio.’

‘I’ll fix it.’

His mother takes a drag of her cigarette and stubs it out so hard the ash spills over the edge of the ashtray.

‘And here was I hoping it was Trine coming,’ she says, knocking back the last few drops in the glass and slamming it down.

Henning looks at his mother for a long time before he closes his eyes and tells himself to just let it go as usual, that there is no point in arguing with her, there never was. But he is hurt, deeply hurt by the venom she constantly spits at him as if the very sight of him gives her a bad taste in her mouth.

‘Why do you always say that?’ he asks.

Christine Juul raises her head towards him.

‘Why do you always have to tell me that you wish it had been Trine instead of me?’

His mother’s eyes don’t move.

‘Tell me,’ he insists. ‘How often does she visit you? Do you even remember when she was here last?’

‘Yes,’ she says. ‘I do remember. I wrote it down.’

Henning splutters.

‘And why on earth did you do that?’

His mother looks up at him.

‘That’s none of your business.’

‘So you can flick through your diary and daydream about it? Is that what this is about?’

‘Hah,’ she snorts and looks away.

‘You’re a coward,’ Henning continues. ‘You sit here day in day out, mad at the whole world and me in particular – or so it seems. You smoke and drink and wallow in your own grief. Yes, I’m sure it was tough for you when Dad died, but it wasn’t my fault.’

Christine Juul stands up on trembling legs and grips the back of her chair. She tosses her head and pulls herself up to her full height. Her eyes, normally glazed and heavy with alcohol, brim with a sharpness and a rage Henning doesn’t remember seeing before.

‘Yes, it was,’ she says through clenched teeth.

Henning stares at her. His tongue swells up in his mouth and the words that finally seep out of him sound like a strangled whisper.

‘What did you say?’ he stutters.

‘You heard me,’ she barks without moving a muscle in her face. Henning can feel a red flush spread across his neck and upwards. He is only one metre away from his mother. The bitter words hang between them and her breath pricks him like needles. In the ensuing silence his legs begin to feel unsteady and it takes him a long time to compose himself.

‘And just what the hell do you mean by that?’ he asks her at last.

She is still clinging on to the chair while her gaze bores into his. She says nothing. She sits down and lights another cigarette, drinks some more liqueur. Henning demands that she explain herself, but Christine Juul has nothing more to say to him. Finally she points to the door and tells him to leave.

Henning steps out into a night that is still damp and cold. People and cars rush past him. Of course it’s not my fault that Mum’s life turned out the way it did, he thinks, and shakes his head. I was only sixteen years old when Dad died.

So why would she say that?

Chapter 87

Trine enjoys the silence and the soporific motion of the car. Her driver always handles the vehicle so smoothly and skilfully. It is especially welcome now. The excitement at Jessheim, the intensity, the resolution, the relief – all induce in her a state of deep relaxation. At last she feels calm on the inside as well. And she knows that the media will write nice things about her this time even though she doesn’t deserve them. All she did was turn up and talk. She didn’t make Remi come out voluntarily. It could so easily have gone horribly wrong. But for once the odds were in her favour. And it felt good to announce her resignation in the TV2 interview. There is no way back now. It’s over. It’s finished.

Well, not entirely.

Just as she thinks this, her mobile rings. Trine checks it and slumps slightly. She lets it ring for a long time. Finally she capitulates.

‘Hi,’ Katarina Hatlem begins. ‘I heard what happened. It was great that—’

‘What do you want?’ Trine interrupts.

Katarina sighs heavily.

‘I want to try to make it up to you.’

‘It’s a little too late, Katarina.’

‘I understand why you would say that. But even if you never want to speak to me again, I think you might be interested in hearing what I’ve been doing since you left the office.’

Trine straightens up.

‘Go on?’

Katarina starts talking. Trine doesn’t move. But her newly acquired peace of mind has evaporated.

When Katarina finishes some minutes later, Trine thanks her.

‘Don’t mention it.’

‘How did you discover all this?’

Katarina doesn’t reply straightaway.

‘I had a tip-off,’ she then says.

‘Who from?’

‘From… someone who wants to remain anonymous.’

‘Is that right,’ Trine says pensively. Katarina doesn’t elaborate.

‘And then there’s one final thing,’ she says. ‘I’m prepared to go public to support you – in case he thinks you’re bluffing.’

‘I really appreciate that, Katarina.’

‘Good luck.’

‘Thank you.’

They finish their conversation. As the petrol stations on either side of the motorway at Kløfta pass by, Trine leans forwards and says to her driver: ‘I’m afraid I have two more stops I need to make before the day is over. Is that all right?’

‘Yes, yes, of course.’

‘Great. First, we’re off to see the Prime Minister.’

Chapter 88

The rain continues to fall though it is now reduced to a drizzle. But even if it had still been tipping down there is no way Trine would have accepted Harald Ullevik’s invitation to come inside his warm, terraced house opposite Eiksmarka Tennis Club. She chooses to remain outside, looking hard at the champagne flute in his hand and the rising colour in his cheeks that indicates it is very far from the first glass of bubbly he has enjoyed that evening.

And she knows exactly why.

‘I’ve just been to see the Prime Minister,’ Trine says and looks at her friend and closest colleague in the three years she has been Justice Secretary. As always he is elegantly dressed in suit trousers and a white shirt that is without a single crease even after a long working day. He is leaning against the door frame and has loosened his tie.

‘And I suppose I ought to congratulate you now that I know the Prime Minister asked you if you would like to take over from me less than an hour ago.’

Ullevik sends her an unconvincing smile. Trine sees what lies behind it. Anxiety and apprehension because he has never seen her like this before. Out in the rain and with a look that would make a tiger flinch. Trine has to control herself very hard not to scream at him. Attack him physically.

The new Justice Secretary.

‘Yes,’ Ullevik replies reluctantly. ‘He did.’

‘You declined, I trust?’

Ullevik wrinkles up his nose and tightens his grip around the stem of the flute.

‘Eh, no. I accepted.’

Trine nods slowly.

Ullevik shifts away from the door frame, straightens up slightly and examines her with guarded eyes. Trine is tempted to slow clap him, but stops herself.

‘There’s no doubt that you should have got the job three years ago, Harald. You were better qualified; I’ll be the first to admit that. And I’m quite sure you felt that you had been overlooked, who wouldn’t have? A man with your background, and then I come along – little me, a nobody – I waltz in and go straight to the top. That must have hurt.’

Trine winks. Ullevik is about to say something, but no words come out.

‘Was that when you decided to stab me in the back?’

Again he pulls a face.

‘Did you start planning your revenge straightaway? And were you just biding your time?’

Ullevik’s face assumes a look of blank incomprehension.

‘Are you suggesting that – that I should have—’

‘I’m way past suggestions, Harald, and I know that not even your good friends at VG will want to protect you if the truth about your duplicity comes out. And if you do become the next Justice Secretary, I’ll make sure that everyone knows what you did.’

‘Trine, I really have no idea what you’re talking about.’

‘Oh yes, you do. And if you don’t call the Prime Minister the moment I leave, then he’ll be calling you. The Prime Minister knows that I went to Copenhagen during our annual conference in Kristiansand because I had an appointment the following day at a clinic that would remove the child I was carrying. Information that you found out from Katarina Hatlem one evening after the two of you had torn each other’s clothes off in room 421 at Hotel Bristol.’

Ullevik spins around and looks into the house. Then he steps outside and quickly closes the front door behind him.

‘She also told you that I hadn’t told my husband. Katarina was a good friend, one of the few people I tell most of my secrets to. Armed with this information, you convinced me to tell the press that Pål Fredrik and I had been trying for a baby for a long time. That was a smart move. It increased my popularity in the opinion polls. But it was also cynical and calculated. After that statement, I couldn’t possibly admit to having had an abortion. It would have been career suicide; me who has opened God knows how many children’s homes around Norway and signed a convention to support children’s rights across the world. Besides, there was a real risk that I would lose the man I love. And that was what you were counting on, Harald; you calculated that I wouldn’t want to risk my marriage or my career. So you fabricated an allegation of sexual assault and gave it to Norway’s biggest newspaper, a newspaper you’ve been leaking stories to for years. And I know the kind of feeding frenzy journalists engage in when they spot the chance of bringing down a member of the government. They don’t give up until they get what they want.’

‘This is completely absurd, Trine, I would never do anything like that to you.’

‘You would and you did, Harald. And cut the crap, please, I know it was you. Let me give you a piece of advice. The next time you decide to send an anonymous fax, go further away. Go to a part of Oslo or to somewhere in Norway where people don’t know you, so you can lie about who you are when you register your name and mobile number at an Internet café.’

Trine stops talking. Ullevik opens his mouth, but closes it a few seconds later. Only water dripping from a nearby gutter punctuates the silence.

Trine thinks back to the day her nightmare started, when Ullevik came to her office after the morning briefing and asked if there was anything he could do for her. ‘You’ve done a brilliant job as Justice Secretary. You’re the best one we’ve had for years.’

Lies.

All lies, the whole time.

‘Katarina has said she’s willing to do whatever she can to make amends. Do you know what she suggested to me, Harald?’

Trine continues to speak before he has time to shake his head.

‘She volunteered to take a peek at the department’s log files to find out who sent me that nice little email I got on Monday morning, just before you came strolling into my office, incidentally. What are the odds, do you think, that she’ll be able to trace that email back to your computer?’

Ullevik clears his throat.

‘She’s not allowed to do that,’ he begins.

Trine scoffs.

‘I really don’t think you’re in a position to lecture anyone on morality, Harald. And in case you’ve forgotten which department I’ve been heading the past three years – how hard do you think it would be for me to find out if you really did get a telephone call from VG that Monday morning, like you claimed, just before all hell broke loose?’

Ullevik continues to look blank.

‘That was a lie too. Just like everything else.’

He makes no reply. He just lowers his gaze.

‘Look at me, Harald.’

He does, but reluctantly.

‘Look me in the eye. Do I look like I want to lose this fight?’

‘No,’ he says and tries to straighten up. ‘But you’d never take it public.’

‘That’s where you’re wrong, Harald. As soon as I get home I’m going to tell Pål Fredrik everything. Do you know why? Because I can’t bear to go on living under the same roof as a man I’ve hurt without knowing what he feels about it. It might well be the end of our marriage, but in the long run we might have broken up all the same. My secret would have driven a wedge between us, I’m sure of it, I know all about how secrets can destroy a family. And just so you know it: I can document all my movements in Denmark. I still have the plane ticket, the hotel booking, I can even produce an invoice and a receipt for the abortion. Katarina has also stated that she’s willing to confirm that she helped me with the arrangements. And who knows – perhaps she’ll also tell the public how you came to be in possession of the information you so deviously used against me. And what about your wife?’ Trine says, pointing to the door behind Ullevik. ‘What do you think she’s going to say? What do you think your children will say?’

Trine has participated in many debates, in private as well as in public. Usually the duellers have been evenly matched. It’s rare to be able to serve your opponent a death blow of this magnitude.

‘I’ve no desire to go public with this, Harald, it wouldn’t help either of us. It would hurt our families, it would hurt the Prime Minister, and not least, it would hurt the Party. But I’ll come clean without a moment’s hesitation if you become the next Justice Secretary. Nothing will be off-limits. And that’s a promise.’

The rain has slowly gathered strength. Ullevik’s cheeks are even redder now. He looks at her for a long time before he drains his glass and gazes across to the tennis courts behind her.

Trine can’t resist the temptation to smile.

‘You’re caught between a rock and a hard place, aren’t you? You know that whatever you do, your life will be hell.’

A part of Trine can’t help wishing that Ullevik will call her bluff, so she can redeem herself in public. But something tells her he won’t take that step. His body language betrays him. His shoulders are slouching. The muscles in his cheeks have slackened. He even seems shorter than usual.

Trine is tempted to deliver a final blow to intensify the obvious pain in his eyes. But enough is enough.

So she turns her back on him and leaves.

Chapter 89

Henning crosses the street at Café 33 and walks down Seilduksgaten, which is quiet as always, even though the street is in the middle of a bustling part of Oslo. Still, the area could be filled with noise without Henning noticing; he is completely lost in a world of his own.

That is why the man who comes up behind him has to speak to him twice before Henning reacts.

‘Don’t turn around.’

Henning turns his head instinctively, but doesn’t recognise the man’s face in the brief glimpse he catches of him before he does as he is told. But he noticed that the man had his hands stuffed in his jacket pockets and that the hood over his head cast dark shadows across his face.

‘Just keep walking,’ the man says. ‘Walk straight ahead and don’t turn around.’

Henning does as the man says while his heart jumps in his chest. As he walks, he tries to remember if he has seen the man before, but the face rings no bells.

Markveien appears in front of them, dark like a river at night. There is no traffic so he crosses the street and slows down outside the entrance to his own apartment block, but the man tells him to keep moving. Henning crosses Steenstrupsgate and continues towards Fossveien. He can barely resist the temptation to turn around.

Suddenly the footsteps gain on him and before Henning has time to react, he feels two strong hands pushing him into a dark archway and slamming him hard against a wall. A face is shoved right up in his; he smells garlic breath and a furious rage.

And that’s when he realises who the man is.

Henning tries to lean back his head so he can look into the eyes of Andreas Kjær, but the concrete wall prevents him.

‘What do you think you’re doing?’ Kjær hisses. ‘Talking to my kids in my garden when my wife and I are out.’

Henning tries to stay calm, but struggles to reply because Kjær’s hand is pressing his cheek into his teeth. Kjær glances furtively out at the street to see if anyone is watching them, before his eyes return with rekindled anger. He relaxes his hold on Henning’s face and Henning tries to say something, but only gurgling sounds come out.

‘Don’t you dare come near my home again, you bastard,’ Kjær snarls.

Henning is paralysed with terror and all he can manage is a nod. This makes Kjær let go of him. Henning touches his face and neck and realises that he hurt his back when Kjær flung him against the wall, but when he looks at Kjær’s eyes, he sees not only rage.

He also sees fear.

The white cross in the garden, the dead dog on the veranda steps. Someone has tried to scare him. And they have managed to scare him so much that he doesn’t want anyone to see or hear him when he confronts Henning.

‘We’re alone,’ Henning says, surprised at how quickly he rediscovers the composure in his voice. ‘I think you know something about Tore Pulli. Is that why you decided to come looking for me?’

Kjær’s defences are still intact and his eyes continue to smoulder.

‘Is that why they killed your dog? So you won’t tell anyone what you know?’

Kjær is about to say something, but he stops and takes another look around.

‘Please,’ Henning appeals to him. ‘You’re a father yourself; you fear for your children, that’s why you’re here. You want to protect them. But I lost my son that day, Kjær. So I’m sure you can understand why I need to know what happened.’

A car drives through the puddles in the street outside. Kjær’s gaze flits.

‘I promise you, Kjær, no matter what you tell me it’ll stay between us.’

Again Kjær looks as if he is tempted to say something. His eyes search for a point on the ground.

‘It…’

He looks up, he looks down. Out into the street and back again.

Then he fixes his eyes on Henning and stands with his back to the street.

‘I don’t know who it was,’ he whispers.

‘You don’t know?’

‘Hush,’ Kjær hisses. ‘That’s all I can tell you.’

‘Come on, Kjær.’

For the second time Henning is slammed hard against the wall.

‘I don’t know,’ he says with his mouth close to Henning’s ear. ‘Okay? I don’t know. And I don’t want to know, either.’

Kjær glances around again before he lets go of Henning.

‘But they spoke funny.’

‘Funny?’

‘Yes. They spoke Swedish, but with an East European accent. That’s all I’m prepared to tell you. Now stay away from me,’ Kjær says with renewed intensity in his voice. ‘Stay away from my family. If I see or hear from you ever again, then—’

Kjær points an angry index finger at Henning’s face. It stops, quivering, in front of his eyes.

Then he turns around and disappears out of the archway.

Chapter 90

Bjarne Brogeland savours the pleasant sensation of having solved a crime, of having tightened up the loose screws. It’s like hunting for your glasses for a long, long time before finally finding them and putting them on. Suddenly the world comes into focus again.

In Markus Gjerløw’s bank account they found a transfer of 3,500 kroner from Remi Gulliksen with the reference ‘PC purchase’. The police concluded that Remi must have bought Markus’s old laptop and uploaded pictures of his victims on it before leaving it in Markus’s flat to incriminate him.

Bjarne takes out the photographs of Remi’s childhood bedroom in Jessheim. His parents haven’t changed it much over the years. The few times Remi stayed the night, he always slept in it. And the picture of his dead brother on the wall always kept him company.

Bjarne can’t even begin to imagine what it must have been like to grow up with Werner’s eyes resting on him every time Remi went to sleep. According to Remi’s mother, his father always blamed Remi for his brother’s death.

Bjarne is happy and exhausted and should be heading home, but he walks down the corridor and knocks on the door to Ella Sandland’s office. She calls out ‘enter’ and smiles at him as he does.

‘Hi,’ she says.

‘Hi. Fancy a beer?’

Bjarne can see that she is about to say ‘no’ out of habit, but she surprises him by hesitating before she replies.

‘Actually, that’s not a bad idea. Just you and me, is it, or are any of the others coming?’

‘Everyone else has gone home.’

Sandland nods.

‘Okay,’ she smiles.

And Bjarne, who has been waiting to hear her say this for as long as he has known her, smiles and completely fails to disguise the excitement in his voice:

‘Great! See you in five minutes?’

Henning is still standing in the archway, trying to calm himself down. A man glances at him as he walks past, but only for a second then he is gone.

Slowly Henning makes his way back to the street. A gust of wind whistles towards him, but he is too preoccupied to feel the touch of autumn it brings. Cars go past him at a snail’s pace looking for spaces to park, but Henning doesn’t see them. He just wanders along, pondering, while pebbles, cigarette butts and rubbish crunch under his shoes.

The people who threatened Andreas Kjær were from Eastern Europe. Now that could mean any number of countries, but it’s a beginning. Tore Pulli was going to reveal what he knew about whoever started the fire in Henning’s flat, but before he could do it, he was killed – a murder that was arranged by a man who had long been in cahoots with East European criminals.

Ørjan Mjønes.

Could he also be behind the threats against Kjær?

Chapter 91

The car brakes slowly as if the driver is trying to make the moment last.

Trine knows the perks will disappear now that she is no longer Justice Secretary. She will miss the car in particular. And the driver.

Trine finds his eyes in the rear-view mirror.

‘Thank you so much, Bjørn. It’s been great sitting here with you.’

‘You’re welcome,’ he says.

He sends her a pale smile. But instead of prolonging the agony, she steps out into an evening where drifting clouds liven up the darkening sky above her. She realises that she is already longing for tomorrow.

As she expected, several journalists have gathered outside her house, but this time she isn’t intimidated by them. She holds up her head and nods to some, refusing to let herself be distracted by the questions they call out. She just aims for the door where Pål Fredrik is waiting for her as usual.

And perhaps none of this would have happened if she had told him the truth in the first place. She would have been able to convince him, wouldn’t she?

Neither of them ever thought she would be able to get pregnant. They had tried for years without success. But then one day, she discovered she was. And she didn’t really know what happened, but suddenly she no longer wanted a child. The child became much more concrete. A new life. She didn’t know if she would be able to do it, if she would be a good mother. If Pål Fredrik had known then what he knows now about Trine’s family, perhaps that wouldn’t have been so hard to understand.

But she knew that Pål Fredrik desperately wanted to be a father and she robbed him of that chance. Without ever consulting him.

Now he takes her jacket, as he so often does, being the gentleman that he is. In a way she dislikes it, it makes her feel like a guest in her own home. And she is more than a guest. Or at least she wants to be.

He ushers her into the living room where music from hidden loudspeakers fills the room. But it is music for other, more cheerful occasions, so she switches it off and steels herself before she turns to face him.

Bjarne Brogeland and Ella Sandland arrive at Asylet. The café is always busy on Thursday evenings, but Bjarne manages to get them a table for two near the fireplace. He orders two beers and folds his hands on the table while he tries to make eye contact with Sandland. Her eyes keep slipping past him, out into the room.

‘Hey,’ Bjarne says and smiles. ‘That’s my occupational hazard.’

‘What is?’

‘Being on the lookout for villains.’

‘Ah.’

Sandland is embarrassed and laughs.

‘Always on the job?’ he asks.

‘Always.’

A waiter brings their beers.

‘Are you hungry?’ Bjarne asks her.

He realises that he wants to keep her to himself for as long as possible, but Sandland shakes her head. Bjarne nods to dismiss the waiter who disappears immediately.

Silence descends on the table. Sandland takes a sip from her glass, sends her gaze on a new voyage of discovery before she suddenly turns it on him.

‘So – who will be our new Justice Secretary, do you think?’ she asks.

Bjarne shrugs.

‘It makes no difference to me. It won’t affect how I do my job.’

‘But the way she resigned was really very odd.’

Bjarne makes a ‘whatever’ gesture with his head while he thinks about Trine Juul-Osmundsen, his teenage crush.

‘She can’t have been a particularly good boss,’ Sandland declares.

‘No, perhaps not,’ Bjarne says quietly.

‘Sexual harassment in the workplace,’ Sandland goes on and looks at him. ‘I’ve got a friend in the force who was the victim of that. It was fairly low-key, but still very upsetting. Looks, comments, whispers and gossiping behind her back.’

Bjarne suddenly feels the need to undo the top button of his shirt.

‘And she told her boss, but you think he did anything about it?’

Sandland shakes her head before Bjarne has time to answer.

‘A good manager would have done something,’ she says, without taking her eyes off him. ‘A good manager nips that kind of thing in the bud.’

And now, for the first time, it is Bjarne’s turn to look away. He seeks refuge in his beer where the foam clings to the inside of the glass. He doesn’t know what to say next so he looks across the room. An early Thursday evening. Life and laughter. Good times.

Sandland raises her glass towards him.

‘But cheers,’ she says and smiles her most dazzling smile at him. Bjarne returns her toast and empties his glass.

A word has formed in his mouth when he looks at her again.

But he can’t get it past his lips.