Watching You(69)

‘You’ve spent a couple of years on this,’ Berger said. ‘I’ve had a few hours, and I haven’t got any further. William never wanted to talk about his dad.’

‘From William’s birth, Stina Larsson was registered as a single parent. No dad at all. No siblings.’

‘Should we assume that the father was blond?’ Berger said. ‘Now I come to think of it, his mum was more of a classic brunette.’

In the distance the harsh red walls of ?ster?ker Prison rose up, concertinaed like some crazy giant’s accordion.

‘You still don’t feel like telling me what we’re doing here?’ Berger said.

‘It’s a gamble,’ Blom said, giving him a sideways glance.

‘What are you looking for?’

‘Surveillance cameras. We’d better stop here.’

‘So I’m going to sit with the engine running just out of range and wait?’

‘Exactly,’ Blom said, and pulled up. ‘A getaway van.’

The interview room in ?ster?ker Prison was as bland every other interview room: table, security cameras, chairs, nothing else. The prisoner on the other side of the table was bland as well, in his grey prison tracksuit. He was in his early forties, and if it weren’t for the evidence time had left on his face, he would have been completely transparent.

‘I assume there’s similar evidence on the rest of your body?’ Molly Blom said.

‘The usual paedophile treatment,’ the prisoner said, touching his latest black eye.

‘Only you, Axel Jansson, aren’t just a paedophile, you’re a murderer as well.’

‘And you, Eva Lindkvist, are a cop asking seriously stale fucking questions. You’d be a really shit cop if you hadn’t read the verdict.’

‘Where you strategically confessed to all counts of sexual assault against children and consistently denied murder. To escape a murder conviction. Child-killers get extra special treatment in here, I bet.’

‘I’m not a violent person.’

‘Of course not, Axel. Sunisa Phetwiset was a Thai sex-slave, only just fifteen, owned by the Albanian mafia. No violence involved there.’

‘That wasn’t even paedophilia,’ Axel Jansson said. ‘She was legal.’

‘In the other confirmed cases the girls were eight, eleven, four and twelve. Four?’

‘It was a moment of weakness. But never violence.’

‘Of course not, Axel. Tell me about the night with Sunisa Phetwiset.’

‘You must have read the whole fucking file. The interviews are in there. What I said then hasn’t changed at all.’

‘The young Thai girl was delivered to your home by the Albanians. You had sex. She left your flat at quarter past eleven that evening.’

‘And she got a tip!’

‘The problem is the blood found in your flat, the stairwell, and in the boot of your car. The problem is the fragments of skin and blood found under your fingernails. All containing Sunisa Phetwiset’s DNA.’

‘There was no body,’ Axel Jansson said angrily. ‘They dragged every stretch of water imaginable. No body, no murder.’

‘You know it’s not as simple as that.’

‘What are you doing here, Eva Lindkvist? And who the fuck are you really?’

‘Calm down, Axel. I’m following up on a completely different case; it’s got nothing to do with you. You’re not risking anything by talking to me.’

‘Every time I talk to a cop I’m risking my life.’

Molly Blom paused, then leaned across the table and whispered: ‘So you still haven’t realised that I’m the best and most undeserved chance you’ve ever had in the whole of your pathetic life?’

Axel Jansson actually jerked back. Eventually he asked: ‘What are you saying?’

‘That there might be a different murderer. What did you leave out when you were questioned?’

‘Nothing. It really happened like I said. We fucked, I paid, she left. Nothing else. A different murderer?’

‘And the blood in the flat and under your nails?’

‘Under my nails isn’t that odd. I was a bit rougher than I admitted.’

‘And the flat?’

‘No idea. It was just scratch marks on her buttocks. But there were several decilitres of blood found throughout the flat.’

‘I’m really not doing myself any favours sitting here whispering with you, Axel. They’ll soon come in and intervene. I need more. How did the blood get into your flat? Were you there the whole time until the police arrived?’

‘No, because they didn’t show up until a couple of days later.’

Blom leaned back and felt a wave of nausea ripple through her body. She inhaled deeply and stood up. Even though she tried not to turn round, she saw the whole of Axel Jansson’s body shrink as he prepared for the next round of paedophile-bashing.

Molly Blom was led back through metal detectors and heavy gates until she regained her freedom. She stared up at the grey, metallic Roslagen sky and let the heavy raindrops hit her face. She stood like that for a while. As if the rain could wash the shit from her face.

Against her will she found herself thinking about Axel Jansson, and about the deep misfortune of having been born with such a warped inclination. Then she thought about the possibility of helping to shorten his sentence. She thought about four-year-old girls and felt that she probably needed to think it all through one more time. Then she reached the van. It was facing the other direction, ready to escape. Berger was sitting in the driver’s seat with the engine running.