Hidden in Snow (The ?re Murders, #1)(40)

?reskutan is like a second home to her.

And yet she never wanted to return.

She has managed to avoid the fells and mountains of J?mtland for fifteen years. Now she’s here, and the painful childhood memories are rising to the surface, just as she feared.

Her phone rings: Lydia. It is a relief to be interrupted, to be able to push the dark thoughts aside.

“Have you heard what’s happened?” Lydia sounds agitated, in contrast to her typically controlled demeanor.

“No.” Hanna wanders back to the table.

“It just came out, I got a news alert on my phone.”

“What just came out?”

“The dead girl in ?re.”

Hanna stiffens. “Have they found her?”

“So you know about it?”

Hanna avoids a detailed explanation about Missing People and the search. “I knew a young girl had gone missing in the area.” As she talks she brings up the home page of one of the evening papers and immediately sees the banner headline:

Dead Girl Found in ?re

A blurred photograph taken from a distance, presumably on a phone, shows a body lying on the ground below a motionless chairlift. It must be VM6—Hanna recognizes it.

Her skin crawls.

“It’s terrible!” Lydia says. “A young girl murdered in the middle of ?re.”

“Do they know that for sure?”

Lydia pauses, taken aback. “I assume so—why else would she turn up dead, without her clothes on?”

Hanna skims the article on the screen. Apparently Amanda was wearing only a bra and panties when she was found. There are details of her disappearance and the efforts that have been made over the past few days to find her.

It is beyond belief that the newspaper has already gotten hold of so many details. Hanna can imagine what the investigating officers think of that.

“I just wanted to check that you’re okay,” Lydia goes on.

“That you’re looking after yourself.”

“I am,” Hanna reassures her.

Lydia still sounds concerned. “You’ve gone through a lot over the past few days—how are you really?”

Hanna leans back on her chair and thinks.

Actually, she’s feeling a little better. It’s been almost a week, and the immediate shock of the first day or two has passed. She is still bitterly disappointed in Christian, but she doesn’t long for him in the same way, so that her whole body hurts.

However, the pain of being kicked out of the City Police is no less raw.

“I’m getting by,” she says.

“Promise?”

“Promise.”

They chat a little more and are about to end the call when Hanna remembers Zuhra.

“By the way, a girl showed up this morning to clean the house.”

“Great.”

“What’s the name of the cleaning company you use?”

Hanna asks.

“Why? Has she broken something?”

Typical of Lydia to jump to conclusions.

“No.” Hanna opts for a white lie. “She left her hat behind—I just wanted to give them a call to let them know.”

“Oh okay.” Lydia sounds relieved. “I’ll have to check. We signed a cleaning contract when the house was finished, but I don’t remember the name of the firm.”

Should Hanna mention how frightened and cowed Zuhra seemed to be? Then again, it was only a fleeting impression —she has nothing to go on. And yet she can’t shake off the feeling that something wasn’t right.

No point in bringing it up with Lydia.

“It’s not important, but if you do have the chance to check, maybe you could text me the name of the company.”

They hang up, and Hanna sits there holding her phone.

The news about Amanda’s death is dreadful. She wishes she could help.

Do the investigating officers know about the boyfriend’s background by now? Should she contact Karro, ask her to speak to her brother?

Just to be on the safe side?

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40

A quick hash with fried eggs and beetroot at Werséns restaurant on the square in ?re gives Daniel and Anton breathing room.

They need to refuel; it is only twelve thirty, but they are exhausted after the visit to the Halvorssen family. Daniel shovels down the food without really tasting it.

The atmosphere is strained when they return to the station. No one is unaffected; the death of a young girl is hard to take in.

Raffe and two CSIs who are just back from VM6 are already seated at the table when Daniel and Anton walk into the conference room. Daniel recognizes the CSIs, but can’t remember their names.

Ylva Labba, the forensic pathologist, is also there. Her dark hair is secured at the nape of her neck by a barrette, but it looks a little tousled, as if she has just pulled off her hat. It is pure luck that Ylva is here. She is normally based in Ume?, but she happened to be in ?stersund over the weekend. When the call came in, she decided to drive over to ?re.

She will soon be heading back to her hometown to carry out the autopsy on Amanda’s body, but has promised a brief preliminary report before she leaves.

Daniel sits down opposite her. They have met only via video link in the past; the kind of crime that demands her expertise on-site has been rare in ?re, at least during his tenure here.