Hidden in Snow (The ?re Murders, #1)(42)
Anton turns to look at him. “What?”
“How did the killer get Amanda on the chairlift?”
Anton puts down his coffee and takes a seat. “What’s your theory?”
“She must have been placed there during the night.”
“The lift operator said he discovered the body when he started up the machinery in the morning,” Raffe interjects.
He’d stayed and questioned the boy while Daniel and Anton went to inform Amanda’s parents.
Sebbe had struggled to pull himself together after the shock; apparently he had been in the year above Amanda at school and had recognized her immediately. As soon as he’s feeling better, they will talk to him again, but Raffe had managed to get a few details out of him.
“He said Amanda was already half-lying on the seat when the chair was on its way down.”
“In which case the killer must have put her there in the turning zone up at the top,” Daniel says.
There’s nowhere else it could have happened. Daniel has skied in that area many times. The chairlift is high above ground level. As soon as it has turned, the chairs are several feet up in the air.
“Wait a minute . . .” The image of a small building at the top of the lift comes into his mind. “SkiStar employs staff both at the embarkation and disembarkation points, don’t they? In case people can’t get off without assistance.
There’s always an attendant keeping an eye on the chairs up at the top as well, isn’t there?”
Anton nods.
“We need to get a hold of that person—as soon as possible.”
Daniel turns his attention to the large monitor used for online communications. It is time to start the meeting with the newly formed task force, convened specifically for this case. According to the manual, such a group should consist of approximately twenty-five people, but there are never that many. There is no chance of their resources stretching so far.
Birgitta Grip appears onscreen, along with two detectives from ?stersund.
“It’s already hit the press,” she begins. “With photos of the victim, the whole shebang.”
Her tone reveals irritation, even though like everyone these days she knows it is virtually impossible to stop this kind of exposure. Private individuals have no qualms about filming or uploading material to social media when tragedies happen. There are stories of road traffic accidents where passersby unashamedly filmed the chaos instead of helping dying victims.
“We cordoned off the area as quickly as we could,”
Anton protests.
“We’re holding a press conference this afternoon,”
Birgitta continues. “We’ll come back to that.”
The lack of enthusiasm is palpable. Press conferences are not a highlight of police work.
“Daniel, where are we?”
He does his best to summarize the course of events since Amanda’s body was found. He hopes that Ylva Labba and the CSIs will find something vital that will lead them to the perpetrator, but he knows better than to count on it. At least Ylva has promised to make a start on the autopsy right away; they won’t have to wait in line as was always the case in Gothenburg.
“We’re going through Amanda’s contacts before she disappeared. Her phone is still missing, but IT has her laptop and is working to gain access. Her clothes have been sent to forensics, and we’re looking for potential witnesses who were in the vicinity of VM6 during the past twenty-four hours.”
Forming a picture of Amanda’s world is a time-consuming task. It is a jigsaw puzzle made up of tiny pieces that have to be assembled as the life of the deceased is reconstructed. They also need to work out the course of events leading up to her death, understand the whole chain from her abduction to the moment her body was found.
Daniel alters his position on his chair. They don’t even have a tenable hypothesis at this point. They have no motive, no possible perpetrator. Amanda’s boyfriend, Viktor, has an alibi.
Grip looks searchingly at Daniel.
He is aware that she knows the circumstances surrounding his relocation from Gothenburg to ?re. He had to get away because his final homicide investigation brought him too close to a dangerous biker gang. The risk to his personal safety was extremely stressful; he had never been so close to burnout.
She also knows that he suffered from nightmares and had found it difficult to sleep when he joined her section, but since moving to J?mtland, he has regained his equilibrium. Something has healed over the past few years.
He has come home.
“Are you up to this?” she asks, getting straight to the heart of the matter.
Daniel wants to say yes; anything else would be a defeat. However, this isn’t only about him. The truth is that they are short on resources. Five years ago, there were fourteen staff members at ?re police station. Today there are ten, a cut of almost thirty percent. Of those ten posts, only seven are filled at present. The situation is equally dire in the Serious Crimes Unit in ?stersund, where three out of ten posts are currently vacant.
At the same time, it goes against the grain to let Birgitta Grip hand the case to another member of the team in ?stersund. Daniel moved to ?re because he wanted to live a different life, be part of the community. When it comes to the crunch, he doesn’t want to back down. He feels a sense of belonging now and understands residents’ fear.
This homicide must be solved as quickly as possible, but the workload will be brutal. He has no idea how he is going to find time for Alice and Ida over the coming days.