‘What do you think?’ Pettersen asked as they drove away from Ingrid’s house.
‘That I feel even more sorry for Henrik now than I did before.’
‘I’m not sure you answered the question I asked.’
‘No? Still, my point stands. When I was growing up, all I ever wanted was to know my real mother and father. I never did find them, but I always imagined they would be…’
He trailed off. He didn’t know how to finish the thought. He’d never known his real parents, had bounced around from foster home to foster home, in some of them for mere weeks or months. Never settled, either physically or mentally, until he’d finally gone off on his own at sixteen – when he’d been taken under the wing of Mackie, who eventually turned him into the man he became for the JIA. But in those lost childhood years, he’d often thought about his real parents. Had imagined all sorts of things, ranging from them being the kindest, happiest people imaginable, to them being mega-rich, to them being nasty, vindictive down-and-outs. Whatever the truth, he’d never found it. But to find a woman like Ingrid, who’d seemingly happily abandoned her child and had never looked back since… It shook Ryker, and brought back a lot of angst that he thought he’d left behind as a boy.
‘But Henrik did have a loving family,’ Pettersen said. ‘The Rosteds.’
‘He did. And they died. Then he went to the Johansens. Perhaps they’re dead now too. To say he’s had it hard is an understatement. The kid is lost in life.’
Pettersen sighed. ‘This isn’t what I meant at all by my question.’
‘No?’
‘What I’m asking is why would Erling be questioning who Henrik’s father is?’
‘It’s obvious, isn’t it?’ Ryker said. ‘One way or another, all this is because of who Henrik is. Whose blood is running in his veins.’
‘You think Berg’s his father?’
Ryker thought about that for a moment. Possible, certainly, but why kidnap your own son?
‘I don’t think so,’ Ryker said.
‘Then who.’
Ryker didn’t answer. They were already approaching their destination.
‘It’s right over there,’ he said, pointing to the house along the street. ‘But don’t get too close.’ He was still abundantly aware of the fact they were driving around in a police car. He didn’t want Henrik, or any of his friends, spooked before he and Pettersen even got to the front door.
Pettersen said nothing but pulled the car over and shut the engine off.
‘So now what?’ she asked. ‘We both go over there and drag him out?’
Ryker shrugged. ‘We can ask him first.’
‘Why do we even want him to come with us? Maybe he really is safest here.’
Ryker didn’t respond to that. He got out of the car. Pettersen followed. He could tell in the way she moved, the way she flicked her gaze all over, that her nerves had ramped since they’d left Ingrid’s house. He wasn’t sure why. Both times she’d been heading into the unknown.
‘This time I’ll lead,’ Ryker said as he moved off toward the house. Pettersen didn’t say anything but he could hear her soft footsteps and her controlled breathing behind him. Ryker headed up the steps. A couple of yards from the front door he heard a noise from inside. Nowhere near as loud as the last time. Just a TV, he thought. But with a subdued silence over the top of it.
He paused at the door. Pettersen came up to his side.
‘What?’ she said.
Ryker lifted his hand to knock but his knuckles stopped a couple of inches from the wood.
‘There,’ he said, indicating the smudge on the door, just below the handle. Hard to see exactly at night, against the dark painted door, but definitely a smudge. Something wet.
Ryker uncurled his fist and reached out. He dragged the tip of his forefinger across the mark. Lifted the finger close to his face. The smell was enough.
He looked at Pettersen. He didn’t even need to say what it was. The panicked look on her face told him that she knew too.
Ryker stepped back. Lifted up his knee, then hauled the heel of his shoe into the edge of the door.
‘Ryker, no!’ Pettersen said.
Ryker didn’t listen. He did it again. On the third strike, the lock and the door finally failed. The wood splintered, metal bounced and clanked to the floor as the door swung open. The noise of the TV grew louder. No other sounds accompanied it. But the smell… and the sight…
‘No,’ was all Pettersen could muster, a hand to her mouth in shock.
‘Henrik!’ Ryker shouted out. No response.
He stepped inside. Glanced at the young woman slumped in the hallway. Blood drenched the front of her clothes and the floor around her.
Ryker moved past her. Pettersen rushed up to the woman. To check for a pulse? No point. She was dead.
Another body lay in the doorway to the lounge. A young man. Not Skinhead. A black hole where he used to have an eye. Blood streaked out of the gap, his mouth wide open as if in a perpetual last scream of pain, or begging. His blood-covered shirt was punctured with several stab wounds too. Dead, no doubt.
‘Henrik?’ Ryker said again, but quieter this time.
By now Ryker’s heart thudded in his chest like a bass drum. He couldn’t yet see fully into the lounge. Was the attacker still in there? Hiding? Waiting?
Ryker crouched a little, a more defensive pose. Hands at the ready. He had no weapon. He’d have to make do.
‘This only just happened,’ Pettersen said behind him. ‘She’s still warm.’
Ryker pushed the grim thoughts away. Stepped into the room quickly, bouncing on his toes, left, right…
No attacker. Not now. Just two more bodies. One man, one woman. The woman, laid out on the sofa, had a deep slash in her throat, her panicked eyes reaching out toward where Ryker was standing. The man was slumped, on his knees. Not much blood on him, but his neck hung at a horrific angle. No way he was alive.
‘Is that him?’ Pettersen said, the emotion – horror – in her voice clear.
Ryker didn’t think so. He cautiously moved over. Reached out for the man’s head. He went to lift up the chin to see his face, but the movement somehow caused the body to lose its balance and it rolled over onto the floor, splayed out, the head lolling.
Pettersen moaned in shock.
‘It’s not him,’ Ryker said, trying to hold back his own emotion as much as he could. The one trying to burst free, above revulsion, was rage.
‘Then where is he?’
‘They’ve got him,’ Ryker said. ‘We were too late.’
He turned and caught Pettersen’s weary gaze.
He opened his mouth to say something to her. What? Offer comfort? Swear he’d punish whoever had done this?
He didn’t say anything.
Above the grim silence, the sound of sirens drifted over.