Dark Secrets Read online

  They drove west on the E18. Beatrice’s directions took them past the small community of Dingtuna, then south on small roads heading toward Lake Mälaren and the inlet known as Lilla Blacken, which was where Beatrice thought they would be. Neither Vanja nor Sebastian spoke. Vanja tried calling Peter Westin, but there was still no reply. She was becoming annoyed with the psychologist’s failure to return her calls; she had left four messages by now. Sebastian closed his eyes and tried to sleep.

  “Late night?”

  Sebastian shook his head.

  “No, I just didn’t sleep very well.” He closed his eyes again to make it clear that he wasn’t interested in having a conversation, but was soon forced to open them as Vanja braked sharply.

  “What’s going on?”

  “Do we turn left or right here? You’re supposed to be navigating.”

  “Oh, please.”

  “You like making decisions. Now’s your chance.”

  Sebastian sighed, picked up the map, and studied it. He didn’t have the strength to fight back. She could have her victory this time.

  He hated Västerås.

  God, how he hated Västerås.

  He felt as if he had seen every single square foot of the town on video footage of varying quality. It had been nice to see something of the place live, so to speak, but the only time he got the opportunity to tear himself away from the tapes was when he was compiling lists of telephone calls or—Billy gave a start. His fingers flew over the keyboard. Stop. Rewind. Play. Yes, at last. Ladies and gentlemen, entering from the right: Roger Eriksson. Stop again. Billy looked at the key that had arrived with the videos. Which camera was this? 1.22. Drottninggatan. Where was that? Billy grabbed his map of Västerås, searched, found, and marked the place. The time showed in the top corner of the picture: 9:29.

  Play.

  Billy watched as Roger walked toward the camera with his head bowed, dragging his feet. After about ten yards he looked up, turned off to the right, and disappeared behind a parked car, which was in a side street and out of the picture.

  Billy sighed. His joy was short-lived. The boy was alive and had carried on walking. Which meant that Billy had to carry on as well. See more of Västerås, whether he wanted to or not. Roger was heading north. Billy looked at the key again, checked on the map. Discounted a number of cameras that were in the wrong direction and started searching again.

  He hated Västerås.

  Lilla Blacken was a popular leisure area by an inlet in Lake Mälaren. At least, it was in the summer. Today it seemed to be deserted. They had driven around on dirt tracks for a while before finding the right place.

  A Renault Mégane was parked in front of a dilapidated notice board. Sebastian got out and walked over to the empty car. Thought he recognized it from Beatrice’s house the previous day when they had seen Ulf there. A battered sign on the notice board proclaimed WELCOME TO LILLA BLACKEN—FRESH AIR AND FUN. Below the sign a number of notices had been pinned up offering items for sale or exchange, but the winter dampness had blurred most of the text. Information on fishing permits. He turned to Vanja.

  “I think this is the place.”

  They looked around. In front of them a few scattered clumps of deciduous trees were growing in an open field leading down to the water. Right down at the bottom on the shoreline stood a blue tent, flapping slightly in the wind.

  They made their way down through the damp grass to the tent. The sky was overcast, but the cold of the night had gone. As always, Vanja took the lead. Sebastian smiled. Always first, always the last word. That was Vanja. Just like him when he was young and hungry. These days he usually settled for the last word. As they approached the lake they could see two people sitting on a rickety jetty extending out into the water, not far from the camp. They seemed to be fishing. Side by side. As Sebastian and Vanja got closer they recognized Ulf and Johan. It was a real father-and-son picture, the kind of thing Sebastian had never experienced.

  Ulf and Johan were warmly dressed, well equipped with hats and green Wellingtons; beside them stood several buckets, a knife, and a box containing hooks and weights. They were each holding a fishing rod. Johan remained seated, while Ulf got up and came toward them, anxiety etched on his face.

  “Has something happened?”

  The water in Lake Mälaren was high after the spring thaw, and the underside of the jetty was dangerously close to the surface. Cold water surged up through the gaps in the planks, soaking the wood as Ulf walked toward them. Sebastian moved back a couple of paces to avoid getting wet.

  “We need to speak to Johan again. Some new information has come to light.”

  “And we thought we might be left in peace for a while. Get away from it all. This has been really tough for him.”

  “Yes, you told us that, but we need to speak to him again.”

  “It’s okay, Dad.”

  Ulf gave a resigned nod and allowed them to pass him. Johan put down the rod and slowly got to his feet. Vanja just couldn’t wait any longer.

  “Johan, was Roger selling alcohol along with Axel Johansson?”

  Johan stopped and stared at Vanja. He looked like a little boy dressed in clothes that were far too big. He paled, nodded. Ulf reacted immediately. This was obviously news to him.

  “What are you saying?” All three adults were now staring at the sixteen-year-old, who had gone even paler.

  “It was Roger’s idea from the start. He took the orders. Axel did the buying. Then they sold at a higher price and split the profits.”

  Ulf looked at his son, his expression serious.

  “Were you in on this?”

  The boy shook his head immediately. “No, I didn’t want anything to do with it.” Johan’s eyes were pleading, but his father remained stern.

  “Listen to me, Johan. I understand that you feel you have to protect Roger, but you need to tell me and these officers everything you know.” Johan had moved along the jetty to stand beside his father. “Do you understand?”

  Johan nodded without speaking. Vanja decided to continue.

  “When did it start?”

  “Sometime last autumn. Roger talked to Axel, and then it was all under way. They made good money.”

  “What went wrong? Why did Roger tell on Axel?”

  “Axel didn’t want to share the money with anyone, so he started selling on his own. He didn’t really need Roger, after all. He could take the orders himself.”

  “So Roger went to the principal?”

  “Yes.”

  “Who fired Axel Johansson.”

  “Yes, the same day.”

  “Didn’t Axel tell the principal that Roger had been in on it from the start?”

  “I don’t know. I think Roger might have told Herr Groth himself. That he’d gotten involved but changed his mind. That he didn’t want to be a part of it any longer.”

  The last questions had come from Sebastian. He could almost see Roger standing in front of the pedantic principal, playing the regretful and conscientious student. Accusing the man who had betrayed him. Roger had been more calculating than Sebastian thought. He kept revealing new sides of his character. It was intriguing.

  “Why did Roger start selling in the first place?”

  “He needed the money.”

  Ulf felt compelled to chip in, presumably because he needed to draw attention to the fact that this was something that affected his family.

  “For what?”

  “Didn’t you see what he looked like, Dad? What he was wearing when he started at the school? He had no intention of being bullied again.”

  There was a short silence, then Johan went on.

  “Don’t you understand? He just wanted to fit in. He did whatever he had to do to fit in.”

  Roger, who had been a somewhat anonymous figure at first, was beginning to take shape. The hidden aspects of his character were starting to emerge into the light and, with them, his motives. It was both sad and human. A young person who wanted to be
someone else. Something else. At any price. Vanja recognized the situation from her time in uniform. But it surprised her that this struggle could lead to violence, even murder. She took out the printed text messages from Roger’s cell that Billy had given her and passed them over to Johan.

  “Do you know who could have sent these?”

  Johan shook his head.

  “No idea.”

  “You don’t recognize the number?”

  “No.”

  “Are you sure? This could be really important.”

  Johan nodded to show that he understood, but he still didn’t know. Ulf put his arm around his son.

  “I think you and Roger had started to lose touch a little bit this term, wouldn’t you say?”

  Johan nodded.

  “Why was that?” said Vanja.

  “Oh, you know how it is, boys develop differently at that age.” Ulf shrugged as if to indicate that this was a natural law, and there was nothing anyone could do about it.

  Vanja didn’t give up. She made a point of turning to Johan this time.

  “Was there a reason you didn’t spend so much time together anymore?”

  Johan hesitated, thought about it, and then he too shrugged his shoulders.

  “He kind of changed.”

  “In what way?”

  “I don’t know… In the end he was only interested in money and sex.”

  “Sex?”

  Johan nodded.

  “He talked about it all the time. I didn’t like it.”

  Ulf hugged his son. Classic, Sebastian thought. Most parents feel compelled to protect their children as soon as sex is mentioned, mostly for the benefit of those who might be observing. To show everyone else that in this family the children are protected from the animal side of things, from everything dirty. If only Ulf knew what his wife and Sebastian had been doing last night while he was shivering in a cold tent. Then again, that would probably have ruined any chance of a constructive interview.

  They spoke to Johan for a few more minutes, trying to find more clues to Roger’s true character, but Johan didn’t appear to have any more to give. He was worn out—they could both see that—and they had gotten more from him than they had hoped for. Eventually they thanked both Ulf and Johan and headed to the car. Sebastian looked back at the father and son, standing on the shoreline watching them.

  A loving and protective father.

  His son.

  No room for anyone else.

  Perhaps it wasn’t Sebastian who had seduced Beatrice.

  Perhaps it was the other way around.

  On the way back from Lilla Blacken Vanja decided to call at Peter Westin’s house on Rotevägen. Her irritation at his failure to call her back had been replaced by a sense of unease. After all, an entire morning had elapsed. As they drew closer to the address it became clear that her anxiety was justified, as the acrid smell of smoke filled the car. Through the side window she could see a faint dark-gray column of smoke rising above the trees and houses. She slowed down and turned left into a side street, then left again into Rotevägen. It was a residential street lined with chestnut trees, but the peace and quiet had been destroyed by the large number of fire trucks blocking the road up ahead. Blue lights flashing. Firefighters walking to and fro with equipment, with no sense of urgency. Groups of curious onlookers behind a cordon. Even Sebastian woke up.

  “Is that where we were going?”

  “I think so.”

  They got out of the car and walked quickly up to the house. The closer they got, the worse it looked. Large sections of the outside wall were missing from one side of the upper floor, and inside they could see the charred remains of furniture and possessions. Black, stinking water was running down the street and into the drains. The closer they got, the more pungent the smell became. A small number of firefighters were busy damping down. On the gray fence—which was presumably the same color as the house had been before the fire—was a metal sign with the number 12 on it. It was Peter Westin’s house.

  Vanja showed her ID and after a few minutes she was able to speak to Sundstedt, the officer in charge. He was a man in his fifties with a mustache, wearing a high-visibility jacket with the words “Chief Firefighter” on the back. He was a calm man who spoke with a Norrland accent. He was surprised to see plainclothes police already on the spot. He had just called in to report that they had found a body on the upper floor. Vanja stiffened.

  “Could it be the man who lived here? Peter Westin?” she said.

  “We don’t know, but it’s highly likely; the body was found in what was left of the bedroom,” said Sundstedt, and he went on to explain that one of his team had noticed a charred foot sticking out from underneath the collapsed ceiling. They would try to remove the body as soon as they could, but since they were still damping down and the risk of further structural collapse was high, it could take several hours.

  The fire had started early in the morning, and the call to the fire service had come at 4:17 a.m. from the next-door neighbor. By the time they had arrived, large parts of the upper floor were already ablaze, and they’d had to focus on preventing the fire from spreading to neighboring properties.

  “Do you suspect arson?”

  “It’s too early to say, but the concentrated seat of the fire and the rapid spread would suggest that’s the case.”

  Vanja looked around. Sebastian had gone over to speak to some of the nosy neighbors a short distance away. Vanja took out her phone and called Ursula; she explained the situation and asked her to come as soon as she could. Then she phoned Torkel to tell him, but there was no reply. She left a message on his voice mail service.

  Sebastian was heading toward her. He nodded in the direction of the neighbors he had just been talking to.

  “Some of them saw Westin late yesterday evening, and they’re sure he was in there last night. He was nearly always at home.”

  They looked at each other.

  “It seems to me as if this is a bit too much of a coincidence,” said Sebastian. “How sure are you that Roger was one of his clients?”

  “Not sure at all. I know he went there once or twice at the beginning when he first moved to the school—Beatrice told me that—but as to whether he went to see Westin recently, I’ve no idea. All I have are those initials and the time on Wednesdays.”

  Sebastian nodded and touched her arm.

  “We have to know.” He set off toward the car. “That school is too small for anyone to be able to keep a secret like that. Trust me, I used to go there.”

  They turned the car around and drove back to Palmlövska High. This case seemed to keep taking them back there.

  The perfect school on the surface.

  With bigger and bigger cracks appearing in the facade.

  Vanja called Billy and asked him to find out everything he could about one Peter Westin, psychologist, registered address Rotevägen 12. He promised to get onto it as soon as possible. Meanwhile, Sebastian called Lena Eriksson to see if she knew what her son used to do every other Wednesday at ten o’clock. Just as Vanja had suspected, Lena knew nothing about any educational psychologist. Sebastian thanked her and ended the call. Vanja looked at him. Realized that over the past few hours she had forgotten that she had promised herself she would dislike him. He was actually a pretty good sounding board in critical situations. She couldn’t suppress a smile. Naturally Sebastian seized the opportunity to misinterpret it.

  “Are you flirting with me?”

  “What? No!”

  “Well, you’re sitting there checking me out like a lovesick teenager.”

  “Fuck off.”

  “It’s nothing to be ashamed of; that’s just the effect I have on women.” Sebastian gave her a ridiculously self-confident smile. She looked away and floored the accelerator.

  This time he had definitely had the last word.

  “Do you have a moment?” From the tone of her voice Haraldsson understood immediately that Hanser actually meant, I wan
t to speak to you. Now! Indeed. When he looked up from his work he saw her standing there with her arms folded, and her expression was grim as she nodded toward the door of her office. But she wasn’t having things that easy. Whatever was going on, Haraldsson had no intention of allowing her to play on home ground.

  “Couldn’t we do it here? I’m trying to stay off my foot as much as possible.”

  Hanser looked around the open-plan office as if to establish how many colleagues sitting closest to Haraldsson would be able to hear the conversation, then, with a sigh and a movement indicative of suppressed irritation, she pulled over a chair from a vacant workstation. She sat down opposite Haraldsson, leaned forward, and lowered her voice.

  “Were you outside Axel Johansson’s apartment building last night?”

  “No.”

  Pure reflex.

  Denial.

  No logical thought process.

  Was she asking because she already knew he’d been there? Probably. In which case a “yes” would have been better; then he could have tried to come up with a good reason for being there, if there was a problem. Presumably there was, otherwise she wouldn’t have come to speak to him, would she? Or did she just suspect he’d been there? In which case a denial would work. Perhaps she only wanted to praise his initiative? Not very likely. Haraldsson’s mind was whirling. He had a feeling this was going to be an exercise in damage control and that it would have been better to answer “yes” to the first question. Time up.

  “Are you sure it wasn’t you?”

  Too late to change his answer now, but there was no need for him either to confirm or deny what he had already said.

  “Why?”

  “I had a call from one Desiré Holmin. She lives in the same building complex as Axel Johansson. She said she saw him last night, and that somebody who was waiting in a car started to chase him when he got home.”

  “And you think that was me?”

  “Was it?”

  Haraldsson thought frantically. Holmin. Holmin… Wasn’t that the little gray lady on the same floor as Johansson? Yes, it was. She’d been so interested when he’d knocked on the door and spoken to her. He’d thought he was never going to get away. He could easily imagine she was the type who sat up keeping an eye on things. To assist the police. To bring a little excitement into her gray, monotonous retiree’s life. On the other hand, it had been dark and the old lady must have been tired and maybe a little short-sighted. Perhaps slightly senile. He could get away with this.