Hidden in Snow (The ?re Murders, #1)(52)

“Let’s look at the MO. Why was the body found on the chairlift?”

This is the strangest aspect of the case. Why did the perpetrator place Amanda’s dead body on a chairlift?

“As a warning?” Daniel suggests. He sits down, clasps his hands behind his neck, elbows sticking out.

“What do you mean?”

Daniel doesn’t know. He continues to speculate, thinking aloud. “It was too cold to bury her, and he had to put her somewhere.”

“He could have simply left her out on the mountain. She might not have been found until the spring, when the thaw sets in.”

“Maybe he was afraid we’d trace her back to the cabin where we think he kept her hidden.”

Anton shakes his head. “With a good snowmobile he could have dumped her miles away in the wrong direction.”

“He was afraid of leaving tracks?”

“That’s no good either. They’d have disappeared in hours, with the snowfall we’ve had over the past couple of days.”

The two of them continue to examine various possibilities. Daniel pushes his hands deep in his pockets and paces back and forth as they talk. When he stops he is faced with a smiling, suntanned Amanda in the photo they borrowed from her bedroom.

The contrast with the images of her frozen body is brutal.

“You know, I think the perp wanted us to find her,” he says at last. “Placing the body on the chairlift meant there was no chance she’d be missed.”

Anton nods.

“But why?” Daniel goes on. “To show off what he’d done? To demonstrate his power over Amanda, both living and dead?”

Anton spreads his hands wide. “I’m no expert in violent crimes against women. You need to have that conversation with others.”

“Like who?”

“How about this woman from Stockholm, Hanna Ahlander? It sounds as if that’s her area of expertise.”

After a brief silence, Anton says slowly, “What if he didn’t mean to kill her and wanted to return the body? Or he hoped the police operation would be scaled down when she was found?”

Is that the explanation?

Daniel resumes his pacing.

Could it be so simple, so tragic?

The key to the mystery lies with Amanda. The killer didn’t intend to take just any young girl—she was the one he was after.

OceanofPDF.com





54

The sense of being in deep waters accompanies Hanna as she makes her way to the police station in ?re.

The second she dialed Anton Lundgren’s number, she regretted it, but he answered right away. She couldn’t bring herself to end the call, so she told him her name and explained why she wanted to speak to him.

The fact that he’d asked her to come down to the station only added to her apprehension.

She waits in reception, becoming more nervous by the second.

A young man of about her own age appears. His thick blond hair is styled with gel, and his dark-blue T-shirt shows off his muscles. He looks fit and athletic, like a walking ad for a police officer in the mountains.

“Hanna?” he says.

Hanna nods, shakes the extended hand. Anton doesn’t look much like Karro, but there’s something about his open expression and warmth that the siblings have in common.

Should she mention that she’s met his sister? No, best not; it’s more professional this way. Plus of course Karro didn’t want to bring up the subject of Viktor with her brother.

“This way,” he says, using his pass to let her in through the locked door that leads into the main part of the station.

There is a staff kitchen on the left and a series of offices on the right.

“Coffee?”

Without waiting for a reply, Anton stops at a coffee machine and fills two mugs before continuing to a conference room at the end of the corridor.

Hanna walks in and stops dead.

One wall appears to be virtually covered in photographs of Amanda, everything from pictures of her smiling into the camera to close-up images of her dead body in the location where she was found.

A man in his midthirties is sitting at the table. He has symmetrical features and a neatly trimmed reddish-brown beard. His eyes are intelligent, but he looks worn out. His hair is a little untidy.

“This is Detective Inspector Daniel Lindskog from the Serious Crimes Unit in ?stersund,” Anton says. “He’s leading the investigation.”

Daniel’s handshake is firm. He looks searchingly at Hanna, as if her credibility is yet to be proven. He has considerably more gravitas than his younger colleague, and Hanna is acutely aware of her messy ponytail and lack of makeup. This morning she had just pulled on her jeans and the sweater lying on the floor by the bed.

Will they take her seriously?

“I believe you have something to tell us,” Daniel says.

Hanna clears her throat, feeling uncomfortable. She doesn’t want to repeat the mistakes that led to the catastrophic outcome in Stockholm.

“On Saturday I joined one of the search parties that Missing People organized,” she begins. “I heard something I think you ought to be aware of.”

She summarizes the information about Viktor Landahl, the teenager who beat up his ex-girlfriend when he was fifteen. Because of his age, he got away with a caution.

“Maybe you already know this, but I wanted to make sure, because that kind of caution disappears after three years if the offender is a minor. If it’s already been struck from the records, then you wouldn’t find it in an official review.”