Isabell appeared much more circumspect – at least compared to recent days – when Berg found her in the kitchen the next morning. Or was the apparent change just because of how Berg felt himself?
She was sitting on a stool at the worktop counter, two hands wrapped around a steaming coffee mug. It was gone 8 a.m. but she still wore her dressing gown, her head huddled down into the thick pink ruffles of the neck and hood.
‘Morning,’ Berg said as he moved over to make a coffee for himself. Unlike her, he was already showered and dressed. He’d be out of the door within ten minutes. Another busy day ahead, another day of fighting off the circling vultures that closed in day by day.
The story of his life.
But vultures were nothing except scavengers, feeding off scraps. Berg was a lion.
‘You look tired,’ Isabell said. Had she even looked at him?
‘Yeah,’ Berg replied.
‘You were late again last night.’
It hadn’t been that late. She’d been in bed when he’d eventually made it into the house after first being accosted by the Russians on his driveway, then left in the middle of nowhere by them. She’d been in bed, but awake.
Had she seen Sychev outside?
He’d suspected last night that perhaps she’d heard him when he’d initially arrived home, and had been at the window, looking down while he was in discussion with Sychev. That thought grew now. How would he explain it?
‘I’ll try to be earlier tonight,’ he said.
She murmured – consent? approval? – then finished her coffee and got up from the stool.
No makeup. Her hair was mussy. Had something happened with Tronstad – a lover’s tiff – the previous day? Did Berg want that to be the case? No doubt he found some satisfaction in the thought that her own scheming and cheating had caused her misery.
‘What are your plans today?’ Berg asked. He took a sip from his coffee. Too hot. Damn it. He’d wanted to drink it quickly and go. Now he risked getting stuck, trying to make small talk for several minutes while he struggled to finish it off – the last thing he needed.
‘Not much. I’ll probably be here all day.’
She gave a meek smile. Then left the room.
Berg sighed. Something about the conversation… Was that a knot in his stomach?
He swallowed another large mouthful of overly hot coffee. That’d take the feeling in his stomach away. It did. Kind of. Because, instead, his insides burned from the liquid. He grimaced. He heard her soft footsteps, padding up the stairs.
That knot again. Guilt? Remorse? Regret?
Screw this. He put his coffee down on the side, moved out into the hall, slipped on his shoes. He grabbed his car keys and his coat and headed for the door.
* * *
No Russians. No Marius. A good start to his working day.
No Nyland. A bad start. Where the hell was he? Perhaps he’d taken the opportunity to spend some time digging into Tronstad, rather than tailing Isabell, who’d given a clear indication that she was staying at home all day. But that still didn’t explain why the idiot wasn’t answering his phone, or responding to messages.
Berg grumbled and slapped his phone down on the desk.
He checked his watch. 10 a.m. already. He had to expect that Sychev would be here at some point. He’d said as much last night. Today was the day. Do or die. Well, perhaps not die, but—
A knock on his office door. As he looked up, Berg expected to see Marius’s smug face there, or – even worse – Sychev’s. No, just one of the lackeys.
Berg beckoned him in.
‘The police are here to see you. Inspector Pettersen.’
This was all he needed.
‘Of course,’ Berg said with a broad smile, as though it was the most normal thing for the police to turn up at his place of work. ‘Send her in.’
The lackey turned, and the next moment Pettersen walked in, her prompt appearance suggesting she hadn’t been ready to take no for an answer.
‘Shut the door, please,’ Berg said.
The underling did so. Pettersen was alone, it seemed. Was that a positive sign? She remained standing, coat still on, as she looked around the office with an air of disdain. What was that about?
‘What can I do for you, Inspector?’ Berg asked.
He was aware of Pettersen. Wold had talked about her, and he’d seen her around the town, but this was the first time they’d ever been face to face.
‘You’re Sigurd Berg?’ she said.
He frowned. ‘I am.’
‘My father knew your father.’
Berg’s eyes narrowed as his brain rumbled. ‘Is that right?’
‘Inspector Lode,’ Pettersen said.
Berg took a couple of moments as his memories fired. ‘Ah, yes, I remember him. He was…’ Berg really didn’t know what to say. ‘How is he?’
‘He’s dead,’ Pettersen said. ‘Has been for a long time. Just like yours.’
Berg clenched his teeth. Something about the tone of her voice that he didn’t like.
‘I remember your father, though,’ Pettersen said. ‘I was young, but people talked about him. He was the rich businessman every kid in school wanted to be. Big house, BMW, fancy clothes.’
Berg sniffed and nodded. ‘It wasn’t—’
‘You look just like him.’
It was true. He did. Berg hated that. Every time he looked in the mirror was a reminder.
She looked around the room again, turning this way and that.
‘It’s nice that you get to carry on his business. His legacy.’
He really didn’t like her tone. ‘Same for you, really. An inspector, just like him.’
‘Oh, no, Mr Berg, I’m nothing like my father. For one, he was corrupt.’ She let that hang. Berg said nothing. ‘I know that now. Small town like this, it doesn’t take much. Everyone knows each other, people are so ready to do each other favors, even if it means breaking rules, the law. I imagine that was even worse in those years. What about you?’
‘What about me?’
‘You and your father? Are you the same as he was?’
Berg paused before he answered that. The open insinuation, particularly given the mention of her father’s corruption, was that she was also accusing Berg, and his father, of the same.
‘I’m sure you’re not really here to talk about our fathers, good or bad.’
She shrugged.
‘Do you want to sit?’ Berg said, pointing to the seat right by her.
‘I’m fine,’ she said. ‘We found a body this morning.’
Berg’s stomach tightened. His immediate thought was about the barrels in the sea. Surely neither of those had come ashore. That was impossible, wasn’t it?
If not those, then… Henrik? His savior, Carl Logan?
‘Mr Berg?’
Berg shook his head to focus. ‘A body?’
‘Just north of the town, in a patch of woodland by the water. There was a car there too. The person who called it in thought it was a crash at first, but… it doesn’t seem that’s right.’
‘That’s awful,’ Berg said. ‘But… why are you here?’
And he really was confused, and worried, by that.
‘The car had Trondheim plates,’ she said. ‘And the body, a man’s, was…’
She sucked in a lungful of air as if a coping mechanism for whatever nastiness she’d seen that morning.
‘The body was very badly mutilated,’ she continued. ‘The face was unrecognizable.’
‘Perhaps an animal?’ Berg said, though immediately he felt foolish for doing so. Better to keep his mouth shut until he knew where this was going.
‘Not an animal,’ Pettersen said. ‘Not many animals use big rocks to smash skulls in.’
Berg quivered at the images forming in his mind.
‘The really strange thing, though, is that I don’t think it was the rock that killed him. Maybe the damage to the face was supposed to disguise it, but I think he was stabbed. In the neck. A post-mortem may help to clear things up.’
‘This is horrible,’ Berg said, and he really did mean that. ‘This doesn’t happen in our town.’
Pettersen pursed her lips and shook her head. ‘Unfortunately, it happens everywhere, one way or another.’
Berg said nothing to that, though his brain continued to rumble with thoughts as to what was to come next from her, as to where the conversation would go, who the dead man was. There weren’t many options, he knew, and none of them were going to be good for him.
‘It’s really strange,’ Pettersen said. ‘Because the water was right there. Anyone wanting to hide their tracks, hide what they’d done, could have easily pushed the body and the car into the water. I think we’d have still found out, but maybe not so quickly.’
‘Perhaps,’ Berg said.
‘A very amateurish move.’
‘Amateurish?’ Berg said. ‘You say it like you’d expect a killer in our town to be more accomplished.’
‘You haven’t asked me who he is yet.’
‘I thought you didn’t know?’
She frowned. ‘I never said that.’
‘No, but you said about… his face.’
‘Of course we know who he is,’ she said. ‘That’s why I’m here.’
Silence. She was testing him. But honestly, what was he supposed to say?
‘So, do you want to know?’ she asked.
‘I’m not sure I do, really,’ he said with a slightly nervous laugh.
She looked like she didn’t know how to take that. ‘His name is Jonas Nyland.’
What the hell?
‘Do you know him?’ she asked.
Of course, she already knew that he did, which was why she was there.
‘The thing is, Mr Berg, we found no wallet on him. No ID. No phone, either. But his fingerprints confirmed his identity. He’s on the system because he used to be a policeman, a few years ago in Trondheim.’
Berg kept his mouth shut.
‘Strange that he was up here, so far from home, and not to have those things on him. Almost as if the killer, who butchered the poor man’s face, who left the body and car hidden – but very poorly hidden – took those belongings from him to try to stall any investigation.’
‘Or maybe this man… Nyland, just didn’t carry a wallet, or phone with him.’
Pettersen shrugged. ‘I can’t say that’s not possible. Anyway, we found where he was staying. A rented house. I’ve already been there this morning. A busy morning. I need a break.’
She laughed. Berg didn’t.
‘Perhaps I’ll take a quick break after this.’
Berg still said nothing. He was too busy thinking. Thinking of what the hell had happened to Nyland, and exactly how much trouble he was in because of it. Was someone setting him up, or were the police just heading down the wrong path?
Or was this because of Wold? Wold was trying to hurt him.
‘Mr Berg, we found Nyland’s things. We found his phone. We found notes of his work. We found several mentions of the work he was doing for you. On his phone, we can see all of the calls and the messages from you.’
Berg shook his head in disbelief.
‘Mr Berg, did you have anything to do with Jonas Nyland’s death?’
‘What!’ Berg said, genuinely bemused by the question. Then a little more forcibly, ‘Why the fuck would I kill Jonas Nyland? He was working for me. I was paying him to spy on my wife!’
Pettersen didn’t blink an eye at his little outburst. She remained stony-faced. A cool character, that was for sure.
A knock on the door. Berg’s heart dropped. The same lackey at the window, but undoubtedly more bad news.
‘Inspector Wold,’ the lackey said before the senior policeman barged his way in. He took one look at Pettersen, then at Berg, then shook his head.
‘Karina, a word please,’ Wold said.
She looked less than impressed. Berg felt emboldened all of a sudden as Pettersen skulked off out of the office with her boss. Berg got to his feet, took a couple of steps toward the door, as if doing so would help him eavesdrop on the conversation now taking place outside.
No use. Wold appeared in the doorway once more. He strode inside, alone, and shut the door behind him. Like his colleague had, he remained standing, glaring over at Berg.
‘She’s quite a piece of work,’ Berg said.
‘She’s a brilliant inspector,’ Wold responded, almost affection in his voice. ‘But sometimes these youngsters need to learn their place before they get bitten.’
Berg relaxed a little more at that statement.
‘But just because I sent her away this time, doesn’t mean you’re off the hook.’
‘Off the hook for what?’
‘Nyland. He was working for you.’
Wold said this as though it was his outstanding detective skills that had led to the discovery of that fact.
‘I already told Pettersen that he was,’ Berg said, indicating to the door and the now departed policewoman.
Wold stared. ‘See, in a way it’s a shame I have someone on my team so keen. Anyone else and they’d have been a step or two behind. But her? She works fast. Gives me less chance to make things work. For me. If you know what I mean.’
Berg did. Wold didn’t like Pettersen because she was good at her job and honest about it. That said so much more about him than it did about her.
‘But then,’ Wold said, his face screwing up as if he was deep in thought, ‘I’m not so sure this is so simple. Perhaps Nyland wasn’t working for you but against you.’
‘What? That’s—’
‘Your wife, or perhaps someone else entirely, hired Nyland, an out-of-town investigator, to come and look into you. It’s not as though you’re without problems, without enemies now, is it, Sigurd?’
Berg decided to keep his mouth shut, whether or not Wold knew he was talking nothing but falsehoods.
‘Perhaps Nyland even spoke to you. Laid out his cards. That explains the phone calls between the two of you. Perhaps he even got funny ideas. About not just investigating you, but blackmailing you.’
Wold nodded, clearly pleased with himself.
‘I know you, Sigurd. I know you’re not the type of man who’d sit and take a threat like that. So the two of you met up. Unfortunately for Nyland, he really doesn’t know you at all. He doesn’t know what you’re prepared to do, to keep ahead.’
No. Nyland hadn’t known. Did Wold?
‘You know that’s completely untrue, don’t you?’ Berg said, trying to sound as commanding, and as calm and confident as he could.
‘Do I?’
Berg ground his teeth. Wold thought he could play games. But Pettersen… She was involved in this murder case too. She wouldn’t fall for Wold’s nonsense if he was seriously going to try to frame Berg. Perhaps her keenness really was Wold’s biggest pitfall.
‘Don’t you see what’s going on here?’ Berg said.
Wold pursed his lips and turned out his hands.
‘Someone is trying to cause problems for me,’ Berg said. ‘This has to be connected.’
Wold’s eyes pinched as he glared, but he still said nothing.
‘The boy. That Carl Logan. Nyland getting murdered. This is all connected.’
He conveniently left out mention of the Russians in that hypothesis. But actually, was them being the culprits the most simple explanation? The Russians were heaping more pressure on him.
‘What else have you found out about Carl Logan?’ Berg said, looking for any diversion he could find.
‘No one’s seen or heard from him. He’s not in town. If he was, I’d know about it.’
Wold spoke with supreme confidence as if he really believed his own words. What a joke he was.
‘But do you know anything more about who he is? Why the hell he’s in our town in the first place?’
‘No,’ Wold said.
Berg wasn’t sure he believed him. For one, it was unlike Wold to be so blunt in his answers.
Wold checked his watch. ‘Funny old world, isn’t it?’ he said. ‘I bet a few days ago you thought you were untouchable around here. How quickly a man’s position, his outlook, can change.’
Wold turned and grabbed the door handle.
‘See you soon, Sigurd.’
He walked out, leaving Berg shaking with anger, mixed in almost equal measure with worry.