Hidden in Snow (The ?re Murders, #1)(54)

“Go on,” Daniel says with interest.

“If the boyfriend is the killer, he might well have regretted his actions. When his girlfriend was dead, he could have felt shame, a need to atone for his sins. Giving back the body was a way of making everything right again. As right as it could be.”

She pauses to allow for any follow-up questions, but when neither speaks she goes on: “Amanda was bound to be discovered on the lift. If he’d left her out in the open, there was a risk that her body might disappear beneath the snow, and she wouldn’t be found until the spring.”

Hanna goes over to a photograph that clearly shows VM6. It is taken from the south.

“VM6 is one of the most central lifts in the entire resort.

It’s obvious that he wanted her to be found—why else would he put her there?”

She points to the heavy metal structure, the steel cables holding the chairs.

“Presumably he dumped her before they opened up in the morning. The chairs are stacked together at the embarkation station overnight, and there’s no security guard. It wouldn’t have been difficult to drive up there from the back of the mountain on a snowmobile and place her in one of the chairs—one where the back of the chair concealed the view from the valley, so nobody would be able to see what he was doing.”

Daniel looks at her sharply. “Say that again.”

Has she said something stupid? Hanna doesn’t understand why he’s reacting so strongly.

“Sorry?”

“What you just said—say it again.”

Hanna searches her memory. “The back of the chair concealed the view from the valley?”

“Exactly!”

Daniel leaps to his feet, the legs of his chair scraping on the floor.

“We’ve been speculating that the body was placed on the chair up at the top,” he explains. “The attendant at the bottom said he saw Amanda when the chair came down toward the valley station. Therefore, we assumed that the body was put there at the top of the mountain—but when we spoke to the girl who works at the top station, she hadn’t seen it.” He runs a hand through his hair. “You’re right, of course. The body must have been placed on the chair at the embarkation point, then gone round a full circuit before it came back down.”

“I guess the perp was assuming she’d be found before the lift started up,” Hanna says.

Anton gives her a thumbs-up. “Can we requisition you?”

he says with a grin. “We could definitely use someone like you.”

Is he serious? Hanna gets the feeling that he’s wondering if she’d fit in with the team.

Daniel checks his watch.

“Thanks for your time,” he says. “You’ve been very helpful.”

Hanna nods. “You’re welcome.”

“I’ll show you out,” Anton says. Daniel disappears down the corridor before Hanna can say anything else.

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55

Hanna is sitting in the car with the engine idling. She’s slightly overwhelmed after the meeting with Anton and Daniel, but also . . . happy.

At last she felt like a real cop again. Both Anton and Daniel had looked at her with respect; they’d had a proper discussion. She had made a valuable contribution, and they were interested in her views.

She has longed for that kind of affirmation. Only now does she realize how much she has missed it. How much it has hurt to know that she doesn’t count.

Something else happened after the meeting.

On the way out Anton asked whether she’d consider working in ?re, if she really wasn’t intending to go back to Stockholm. How would she feel about a temporary post up here?

?re? The idea had never crossed her mind. She has been totally preoccupied with the knowledge that Manfred Lidwall never wants to set eyes on her again. That she is no longer needed as far as the City Police are concerned.

She heard her own voice say “Yes” much too quickly.

Anton explained that the decision wasn’t up to him, but that he would have a serious talk with Daniel.

“It’s not as if I have anything else going on at the moment,” she managed to say, lightening the atmosphere.

It is still hard to take in the good news, the fact that someone might want her.

Hanna puts the car in gear and drives out of the parking lot toward the E14 and home to Sadeln.

Toward the end, her working life in Stockholm was torture. Assignments disappeared, one after another, until eventually she felt like a pariah, an unwanted outsider. She might as well have walked around with unclean written on her forehead.

A few of her colleagues offered support, but no one was really prepared to stand up for Hanna or show that they were on her side. Instead they told her to let it go, move on.

There was no point in being difficult, the bosses always came out on top anyway. The case was closed, and there were new challenges to tackle.

That made things even worse.

Hanna doesn’t want to think about it anymore. She hates the fact that Josefin’s husband, Niklas Konradsson, escaped justice, but there’s nothing she can do about that now. Her fight for Josefin has already cost her her job; there is nothing to be gained by brooding about it now.

For some reason Zuhra comes into her mind, how scared she looked when she spilled the cleaning fluid yesterday morning. The look that suggested she was afraid of being hit. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean anything. Hanna is probably damaged from all those years spent dealing with domestic violence.