ELLEN

2.45 P.M.

Together, they went into the square house, which was relatively new and could still probably be called modern in real-estate terms.

Hanna pointed to the couch in the living room, and Ellen had to move some clothes to make room. ‘Are you going somewhere?’

‘No,’ she said, sitting across from Ellen in a big grey armchair.

All around them were piles of carelessly folded clothes and half-packed suitcases. Somewhere, Ellen thought she could hear a washing machine. On the coffee table in front of her lay empty biscuit packets and dirty glasses with traces of chocolate drink.

‘I can imagine that you’re shaken up after everything you’ve been through over the past few days. How are you feeling?’ she asked, crossing one leg over the other.

‘Not that great,’ Hanna replied, nervously waving an envelope in front of her face. ‘But that wasn’t what I wanted to talk about. I want to apologise.’

‘Really?’

‘Yes.’ Hanna rubbed her forehead. ‘It’s not as strange as you think. I heard that Bea and a gang of kids have threatened you. Is that true?’

‘Bea Bosängen, you mean?’

Hanna nodded. ‘Are you planning to report it to the police?’

Ellen shrugged. She wasn’t going to file a police report, even though she really ought to. But she didn’t need to tell Hanna that.

‘I want to ask you not to do that.’ She fell silent for a few seconds before she continued. ‘My son is part of that gang.’

‘I know.’

‘It’s like, Bea gets them to do sick things. And then Alice disappearing like that yesterday … Bea is the manipulative leader-figure who gets the others to be just as violent as her. They carry on with these games, or I don’t know if you can even call them games any more — recently it’s escalated.’

‘Kids are kids,’ said Ellen, without actually knowing what she meant by that.

‘Whatever. I’m going to see to it that my kids don’t disturb you again. Okay?’

‘Okay,’ said Ellen, who thought that Hanna sounded a little aggressive and knew that she couldn’t actually guarantee what she had just promised. ‘What is your relationship to Bea?’ She didn’t want to reveal what she knew; it would be better if Hanna herself had the chance to tell her how things stood.

Hanna’s eyes wandered. ‘What do you mean?’

‘How did your daughter come to have Liv’s phone?’

‘You know, I’ve just been at the police station talking to them about this. She found it in the sandbox. That’s all.’

Ellen nodded, but could see that Hanna’s lips were quivering and knew that she was lying. ‘You knew Liv Lind, right?’

Hanna avoided the question, and Ellen interpreted that as a yes.

‘What’s your relationship with your partner like?’

‘What is it you want to know?’

‘Can’t you talk to me? Maybe I can help you and your children.’

‘How?’

‘I won’t know until you tell me. But I know that your partner had a relationship with Liv Lind, and also with another woman.’

Hanna settled down in the armchair and placed her arms on the armrests. ‘There isn’t that much to tell. We’re in love with the same man and have children with him.’

‘So you’re polyamorous.’ She tried to make it sound as natural as possible.

‘Call it what you want, Alexandra’s the only one who is married to Patrik. The law doesn’t allow me to marry him, which is unbelievably old-fashioned, if you ask me. Why shouldn’t my children have the same legal rights as Alexandra’s children?’

‘Yes, you’re right. How do you live? Is it every other week?’

‘In what way is that relevant?’

Ellen’s curiosity had overcome her, and Hanna was on her guard. However Ellen tried to broach it now, it would be wrong. ‘Sorry, I’m just trying to get an understanding of the situation. Liv Lind is dead, and we know that Patrik and Liv had a relationship, so …’

‘The situation? I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, Poor woman, who accepted having to share her man. What kind of trauma must she have experienced to make her live this way? The next question you want to ask is probably about jealousy. Am I right? I know exactly what you think.’

‘I don’t think anything,’ said Ellen. ‘I’m just trying to understand.’

‘That’s the most common question: how can we manage to live like this? You know what, it suits me just fine. I’m not a victim. I’m a completely ordinary girl, who grew up in a completely ordinary family, went to the Teachers’ College in Stockholm, and fell in love with a man who happened to be married.’

Ellen raised one hand. ‘I’m not judging anyone, take it easy. Is Alexandra just as satisfied with the arrangement?’ She still couldn’t let go.

Hanna didn’t reply.

‘Do you all get together?’

‘Yes, at least once a week. We’re a family.’

‘When I met you that first time, you were carrying out baby things. Were they for Liv’s child?’

Ellen could see Hanna take hold of the armrest. ‘No.’

‘What a nice ring you have,’ she said to change the subject.

Hanna immediately drew her hand back. ‘Thanks.’

It was the same as the one Liv had had. Ellen chose not to ask any questions about the ring, Hanna was too much on her guard. She would bring it up with the police later.

‘Is everything okay, Mum?’

Ellen looked up at the stairs and started when she caught sight of the young boy. He looked so innocent with his large mouth and the blond bowl-cut hair, but when he stared at Ellen with that ice-cold expression, it felt as if they were back on the gravel road at Örelo.

‘It’s fine, honey, go back to your room,’ Hanna said, and it sounded like she was making an effort to make her voice sound calm. She waited until he had disappeared upstairs before she continued. ‘He doesn’t know that I’m apologising on his behalf. I don’t think he understood what he was doing — he was influenced by Bea.’

Ellen nodded. ‘Are you afraid of Bea?’

When she got no reply, she changed the subject again. ‘I just have to ask, because it’s so unusual, why have you chosen to live this way?’

‘Can you choose when it comes to love? Haven’t you ever been in love?’

Ellen took a deep breath. She understood exactly, and all too well, what the other woman meant.

‘Monogamy has long been the only norm for relationships in society. We’ve been indoctrinated to be in love with only one person at a time. But we’re fortunate. As I said, this lifestyle suits me. I’m the perfect housewife every other week, and when Stoffe is with Alexandra, I think it’s really nice to be alone with the kids and have time to miss him.’

‘You call him Stoffe?’

‘Yes, that was his alias on match.com, and I’ve continued to call him that. To me, he’s Stoffe. That was how we met. I didn’t know, then, that he was already married and had children.’

‘Sorry, I don’t understand. Was Alexandra aware that he was using a dating site?’

‘No. We saw each other for a while on the side. But Stoffe grew up this way, so I don’t think it came as a shock. We don’t talk about it that much. He’s in love with both of us and doesn’t want to be without either of us. Basically, it’s about friendship and trust. I don’t know why I’m telling you this. There are several journalists who’ve tried to get hold of me today, but I refused to answer. You have to promise me not to file a police report on my son and leave our family alone after this.’

‘How you’ve chosen to live is your own business, as long as it doesn’t have anything to do with the murder of Liv Lind, and that you just tell me the truth so there can’t be any misunderstanding. I work at TV4 and I’m not interested in smearing your family.’

Hanna thought for a few seconds before she continued. ‘A lot of people live the way we do. The difference is that we call ourselves polyamorous, while others keep their various partners secret from each other. Do you think that’s somehow better? There are so many prejudices against people like us. That’s why we don’t live openly with it, for the children’s sake.’ Hanna crossed one leg over the other. ‘I know what you want to ask, so I’ll help you get started. People think that it’s only about sex. That we screw like rabbits. But what it’s about is finding a relationship to feel at home in. We aren’t nymphomaniacs.’

Ellen felt a little taken aback. She thought it was sad that they couldn’t live openly, that they were forced to hide their relationship to fit in. ‘Not even the people at your work know how you live?’

She shook her head. ‘No, I don’t sit in the break room and talk about my husband’s other women. Especially not in such a little community. That’s why we live a little way from each other, so that it’s harder to connect us.’

‘To think that we haven’t come further than that by now.’ Ellen shook her head. ‘Sorry, but I just have to ask, aren’t you ever jealous of each other?’

‘No. People who ask that question usually have problems with jealousy themselves. It’s not in my nature. I know where I stand with him.’

‘But did you know that he had a relationship with Liv?’

‘Yes.’

Her tone of voice changed, and Ellen could tell she was lying, but let it go.

Hanna started flapping the envelope again. ‘I have to get on with a few things now.’ She got up out of the chair. ‘Thanks for coming and for accepting my apology for Karl’s behaviour.’

‘Kids are kids,’ Ellen said again, stealing a glance up towards the stairs and wondering if Hanna actually knew how serious the attack on her had been.

She asked her to call if there was anything else she wanted to talk about or if she was interested in appearing for an interview.

Hanna shook her head.

Ellen left the house, and as the door closed behind her, she turned around and looked at the outside of the house. If you didn’t know better, it looked like any other family lived here, and maybe that’s how it was. If it wasn’t for the fact that a murder had been committed in the vicinity, of someone who probably was a third wife, and the fact that the little girl who lived here had chosen to run away the day before.

In one of the windows on the top floor, she saw something move.

It was Alice who was looking down at her. And holding her index finger in front of her mouth.