Ryker reached the main road and turned left, his mind busy. Of course, he was taking a leap, but he was sure the red-cheeked boss at the logging site had known exactly which car Ryker was referring to, and knew exactly who it belonged to. It was already starkly apparent that in this small corner of the world, everyone knew everyone else. He also believed – certainly wanted to believe – that the Viking had pulled his phone to his ear, as Ryker left, in order to call whoever needed to know about the intrusive outsider.
Good.
The more feathers he ruffled, the sooner he’d find some answers, one way or another.
Back on the main road, he went past the next turning on the left – it was too close to the logging site. For some reason, it felt like moving a little further afield was a better bet. He took the next turning instead. Earlier in the day, on his ride from Trondheim to here, this had been the first he’d passed, when he’d been stuck behind the lorry. It was the least well laid of each of the turns. A narrow road, tarmac for the first hundred yards, heavily pounded dirt after that, with pine trees just beyond his wing mirrors each side, and needles from the trees scattered across the track. The road didn’t even appear on his satnav so he had no clue how far it’d go, or what it would connect to, if anything.
After nearly two miles he finally had an answer. A home. Of sorts. A wide, single-storey structure. A little dilapidated in its appearance with moss-covered roof tiles and grimy windows, in some places boarded up. A large area around the house was cleared of trees but it was hardly manicured. Among the dirt and pine needles lay all manner of clutter, from unused outdoor tables and chairs to a rusting trailer, quad bike, push bikes, piles of logs. A car. Not the Nissan. But was someone home?
A moped. Propped up against the side of the house. The same one Henrik had fallen from? Ryker couldn’t be sure. It was certainly the same colour. Looked like it had seen better days.
Ryker pulled the car to a stop.
He thought for only a couple of seconds before he turned back around and left.
Fifteen minutes later, his face ice cold, Ryker carefully stepped through the forest. He had some simple provisions in the backpack over his shoulders. He’d left his car in the forest, two hundred yards behind him, the vehicle twenty yards from the road that ran parallel between the logging site and the run-down home he once again headed for.
Much better to arrive inconspicuously on foot, through the trees, than on the road where his car was so obvious.
The plan?
Get close enough to the building to see who was home. Get inside if he could. If it was empty? Wait.
If he’d made a mistake, he’d be on his way soon enough.
If his hunch was right...
He moved over a rise in the forest and the house came into view below, fifty yards away. Ryker stopped and crouched down as he stared toward the building. He was approaching from the side now, and could see around the back of the house, too, where a raised deck – cleared of snow, but green and damp – wrapped around. The same car remained parked up. No signs or sounds of anyone as Ryker waited.
He moved again, more slowly, more carefully now. Step by step, tree to tree, he tried to keep the noise of his feet on the forest floor as quiet as possible. The only sounds he heard, over his steady breathing, was the gentle rustle of the trees, and the ever-so-distant hum of machinery from the logging site.
At least that’s what Ryker thought the hum was, but in the quiet, he realised the sound was slowly getting louder.
He pulled up against a thick trunk, all of twenty yards from the clearing. He saw movement between the trees off to his right. A car. He pulled as far around the tree trunk as he could. Seconds later the car came into the clearing.
A pickup truck, but not the Nissan. Shame.
Ryker spied as the vehicle came to a stop. Two figures got out of the driver’s side, facing Ryker. Another joined from the passenger side. Three people. Ryker recognised two of them. The Viking and the tattooed woman. Okay, not such a shame after all.
The third passenger – another man – Ryker didn’t know. The Viking glanced across the forest, right past where Ryker lay hidden, as the three of them talked. Ryker was too far, his Norwegian too poor for him to understand the conversation, but it wasn’t jovial.
As the other two remained standing by the pickup’s bonnet, the Viking sauntered across to the front door of the house. At least what passed as a front door. He knocked. Waited. No answer.
He turned back to the other two and mouthed off something. Not anger, but he wasn’t happy. On his instruction, Ryker assumed, the woman took her phone out and she turned to face the forest as she spoke. Her voice, her manner became more frustrated. The Viking, irate, stomped over to her, grabbed the phone from her ear and started blasting down the line. All the while he stared across the forest.
His eyes settled.
Had he seen?
He finished the conversation. Handed the phone back to the woman without taking his eyes from the spot where Ryker remained hunched. He muttered something. Then he walked forward. The other two followed. They spread out, each step slow and careful.
No, they hadn’t spotted him. If they had they would have moved more quickly. But something had spooked them. With the three edging forward, Ryker made the call to fall back, even though a large part of him wanted to stand his ground. To fight? He didn’t even know what he was fighting for yet.
He soon moved back over the rise in the forest and behind him the three were momentarily out of sight on the other side. He took the chance and quickened his pace. Pumped his arms and legs to move as quickly as he could back to his car. What he made up for in speed, he lost in stealth.
The inevitable happened. Likely as they came over the top of the hill. The angry shouting from behind told Ryker they’d spotted him. Nothing he could do about it now. He didn’t look back, but continued to take long, fast strides to his car. He reached it. Dived in. Fired the engine up. Hit reverse. The tyres skidded on the loose ground, finding just enough traction to pull the car backward, through the gaps in the trees, toward the road. Ryker had his eyes flitting between his mirrors and the three figures in front of him, closing in all the time. They were too far to worry him now he was in his car. No sign of any weapons by their sides – he was in no danger of potshots.
But they’d seen him. They’d seen his car.
He reached tarmac and swung around and sped off toward the main road. He checked his mirrors a couple of times but saw no sign of the three heading into the road.
Would they head back to their car to follow him? Try to run him out of Blodstein for good? Ryker was torn between driving slow, waiting to see if they caught up, or speeding out of there and back to the relative safety of the town.
He never quite decided which, instead driving a steady speed until he reached Blodstein, no sign of the pickup. He pulled left at the junction and into the café car park. He glanced to the windows. Spotted the same waitress as earlier in the day, dutifully seeing to a couple sitting by the window.
The engine of Ryker’s car rumbled away. He looked over to the junction as he considered his next move.
Sure enough the pickup truck pulled up to the lights. They’d given chase after all.
From a close distance Ryker could see the eyes of the driver. He looked over to Ryker. Then the pickup swung a hard left, through the red light, cutting the corner, right over the pedestrian pavement. The vehicle bobbed on its suspension as it raced over the kerb and toward Ryker’s car.
Undeterred, Ryker shut his engine down and stepped out into the cold.
Tyres screeched. The pickup came to a rocking stop a couple of yards from Ryker’s Volvo. The three jumped down onto the tarmac. Ryker held his ground as the Viking shouted over, moving into stride.
A short-lived stride.
The blip from the police car siren stopped him and his companions in their tracks. All three, Ryker too, looked over to the road, to the squad car that pulled up. Ryker had spotted it approaching already. One key reason why he’d chosen to stand and face the onrushing crew in the first place.
The driver’s window wound down. Wold. Of course. He shouted over to Viking and his chums. Viking muttered back, then turned to Ryker, and, like before at the logging site, gobbed a mouthful of phlegm onto the floor. The spit landed a couple of feet from Ryker’s shoes. Ryker didn’t react. The Viking fumed – looked seriously pissed off, as though Ryker had violated his sister or worse.
‘Nice,’ Ryker said with a mocking grin. To egg the Viking on? Maybe.
Ryker could see in the guy’s eyes that he really wanted to bound forward and smash his fist into Ryker’s face. Perhaps the only reason he didn’t was because Wold stepped from his car and moved over.
The Viking – somewhat reluctantly – backed down. He signalled to his chums and the three of them retreated to the pickup and were on their way, the Viking holding Ryker’s eye with an evil glare as long as he could until they were out of sight.
‘You can take that smile from your face,’ Wold said as he approached Ryker.
He didn’t look happy.
‘Right place, right time?’ Ryker said.
‘Is that how you see it?’
‘Is there another explanation for you being here?’
Wold didn’t answer that. He came to a stop a couple of steps from Ryker. Apparently he was on his own now. No sign of Pettersen or the other officer who’d been with him in the café earlier.
‘You know those chumps?’ Ryker asked.
‘Chumps? I don’t know what that means. Do I know those people? Yes, I do. I think I know everyone in this town.’
‘The guy with the beard–’
‘Erling.’
‘I don’t think he likes me much.’
‘I’m not sure anyone around here likes you. A lot of people are talking about you.’
‘They are? Why?’
‘Why are you still here, Carl Logan?’
‘I’m on vacation.’
‘I find that hard to believe.’
‘Because?’
Wold sighed.
‘I’m staying at the Blodstein guesthouse,’ Ryker said. ‘You can check with the guy there if you like.’
‘I already know that,’ Wold said.
Ryker would have looked surprised if he was. He wasn’t.
‘I also know you visited Erling and the others at work.’
‘The loggers?’
‘Sorry?’
‘Who runs that operation exactly?’
‘I don’t understand you.’
‘Is there a company name or something? I didn’t spot anything. Just seemed odd, all those men out there in the forest like that.’
Wold huffed, like he was getting fed up with Ryker. Well, yeah, that much was abundantly clear.
‘You went to that logging site, asking questions?’
‘Asking questions isn’t allowed around here?’
‘It’s private property.’
‘I didn’t see a sign.’
‘Then later you were seen roaming in the woods of another property.’
‘I went for a walk. Must have got lost. My mistake.’
Wold glared. ‘Road accident, and trespassing twice in the same day. Ask me, shouldn’t I arrest you by now?’
Ryker said nothing to that.
‘I looked you up.’
‘Okay?’
‘Carl Logan. Very hard to find much information.’
Ryker shrugged.
‘You have ID?’
‘I do.’
‘Can I see it?’
‘You don’t believe I am who I say I am?’
‘I don’t know yet.’
‘My ID is in the hotel.’
Wold seemed to chew on that one.
‘I’d much prefer it if you were to leave this town now,’ Wold said.
‘I figured that.’
‘I can sense that the longer you stay, the more chance there is of trouble. For you.’
Ryker once again kept his mouth shut.
‘I’d rather you leave, but I’m thinking you won’t.’
Ryker shrugged again.
‘I can only say, if you do stay, know that I’m going to be watching you very, very closely, Carl Logan.’
A silent stand-off. Neither man blinked. The clunk as the café door opened stole the attention of them both. Just the couple from the window coming out. They both looked over, a little disapprovingly, then walked away in the opposite direction.
‘So?’ Wold said, grabbing Ryker’s attention once more.
‘So I’m hungry. See you around, Inspector.’
Ryker brushed past him, and toward the café door.