Áróra felt her cheeks flush. She didn’t understand what was going on inside her. It wasn’t as if she was a teenager.

  ‘Stop it,’ she said. ‘Don’t look at me like that.’

  He laughed again, and then his expression became serious.

  ‘Flosi has spent the night in a cell and he’ll be on his way to be questioned shortly, so I have to be there,’ he said apologetically.

  She nodded.

  ‘No problem,’ she said, getting to her feet. ‘I’ll see you later.’

  But Daníel took her hand.

  ‘Hey, not so fast. I’m going to finish my coffee first.’ He pulled her back to the table, and she sat down. ‘Could you explain for me properly what you were talking about last night?’ he asked, and they both smiled as their eyes met. Their conversation about Flosi’s financial affairs hadn’t been concluded when the focus of their attention had drifted elsewhere.

  ‘Flosi’s offshore account – the one he took the ransom money from – is full of money that comes in from 193 small companies, most of which are probably fronts for some kind for criminal activity. The money goes from the offshore account to other companies, two here in Iceland and one in the States. One of these, Tækjakistan ehf, is certainly a front company and I imagine the other two are as well. From Tækjakistan, and undoubtedly from the other two companies, there’s a flow of money to Garðvís ehf, which is Flosi’s big, genuine company, and those payments are covered by false invoices.’

  ‘So you reckon that Flosi is directly engaged in laundering the proceeds of crime?’

  ‘Yes,’ Áróra said. ‘It’s a typical scam arrangement. I would bet on Flosi being the bookkeeper. But that’s not in the sense that he looks after accounts; it means that he’s the individual who allows his company to be used as a conduit for the proceeds of crime. In return, he’ll get a slice of the pie, or remuneration of some sort.’

  ‘Wow.’

  ‘Exactly. You can confirm if that’s correct by checking whether Garðvís is paying unreasonably large invoices from overseas companies. That would give you evidence of money laundering.’

  ‘This sounds like a job for the district prosecutor or the Financial Supervisory Authority,’ Daníel said. ‘I have the feeling that this isn’t something that CID is equipped to deal with. But didn’t you say that there’s a Russian connection to all this?’

  ‘Tækjakistan pays rent for its office to Kuzee slf, which seems to be a small company owned by Leonid Kuznetsov. It doesn’t seem to have any activity other than to invoice for colossal rents from a few small Icelandic companies, including Tækjakistan. It can’t be right to be paying eight hundred thousand krónur a month to rent a tiny space on Smiðjuvegur.’

  ‘Leonid?’ Daníel said, his eyes suddenly sharp and engaged. ‘You said Leonid?’

  ‘That’s right,’ Áróra said. ‘He’s Russian and has Icelandic work and residence permits. If my suspicion is correct, there could well be a connection between this money laundering and Guðrún’s abduction.’

  ‘You mean that the Russian mafia might bear a grudge against Flosi?’ Daníel asked, now on his feet.

  ‘Yes,’ Áróra said. ‘That’s plausible.’

  ‘Fucking hell,’ Daníel said, stooping to kiss her on the mouth with a delightful gentleness.

  Áróra laughed, the kiss presenting a bizarre contrast to the curse that had dropped from his lips at the same moment.

  73

  They’d made little progress questioning Flosi. He sat, hunched and despondent, beside his lawyer, who at intervals whispered to him and reminded him that he was not obliged to answer the questions Helena and Kristján took turns asking. And nothing appeared on the screen of the tablet that Helena held; it was as if nobody was listening in to the interrogation, although she knew that Daníel was watching the feeds from the cameras. She imagined that he was peering at Flosi’s face with interest. The reason none of his questions were appearing on her screen must be that Daníel simply had nothing to add to what they were asking.

  ‘I don’t know how I can make it plainer than I already have: I didn’t abduct and murder Guðrún,’ Flosi said, his voice weary and his tone dull, having repeated the same thing over and again.

  Many people became angry during such interrogations, losing control of their emotions, yelling and hammering the table in frustration at being repeatedly asked the same question, but Flosi remained calm. He simply seemed tired of replying, but went through the motions for them, with neither conviction nor passion, mouthing the required words.

  ‘I didn’t do anything to Guðrún.’

  ‘You had an affair,’ Kristján said. ‘Some of us would call that doing something.’

  Flosi sighed, but he didn’t take the bait.

  ‘Certainly,’ he said. ‘And I can’t say I’m proud of it. What I mean is that I did her no harm. I didn’t hurt her physically. I would never have done that. As I have already tried to explain, I loved Guðrún and wanted nothing but the best for her, even if the passion had maybe faded from the relationship.’

  He remained calm, speaking slowly, and that came as a surprise to Helena. He had been so emotional and had come across as so unstable the first few times they had met. Now it seemed that he had drawn a veil around himself, and there was no way to read his thoughts through it. He could simply be numb with sorrow. Perhaps it was true that he had genuinely loved Guðrún and had been left in shock by her death.

  What took Helena most by surprise – and she suspected that Daníel would be wondering the same – was that he had not raised the classic point, demanding why they were not out there searching for the killer, the real murderer, instead of concentrating on him. At some point anyone innocent would ask a question like this. Understandably, as it had to be terrible to be locked up and accused of the murder of a loved one, knowing that the killer was still free.

  But Flosi said nothing of the kind. He simply continued to deny everything and looked down at the table, his expression blank.

  74

  ‘I don’t know what to think,’ Daníel said, pacing the floor in front of the whiteboard. His head was buzzing. He had two completely opposing theories he wanted to examine, and both of them looked interesting. One was that Guðrún’s death was simply linked to a money-laundering operation, and the other was focused more around Flosi’s personal affairs. Daníel had ordered the team to gather all information available concerning Leonid – who worked at Garðvís and was certainly the same Leonid that Áróra had stumbled across in her own investigation. The electronics and cybercrime division had Leonid’s computer and had promised to let Daníel know as soon as they had been able to get into it. But now it was Flosi himself who was under scrutiny, and the whole team watched and waited for Daníel, apparently confident that he had a path laid out ahead of him.

  ‘I believe him when he says he didn’t abduct or murder her, but the evidence against him is stacking up.’ The team hung on his every word, every one of them with the same look of intense concentration. ‘You all listened in when he was making his statement. What do you think?’

  Palli nodded, as did Kristján and the four officers who had been seconded to the investigation. Helena was the only one who didn’t nod in agreement. At the back of the room the commissioner stood leaning against the door frame, her eyes scanning the group.

  ‘This is a man who has definitely hidden information and never offers anything unless it’s forced out of him,’ Helena said, oddly formal, as she always was in the commissioner’s presence. ‘So maybe we shouldn’t believe what he says.’

  ‘He hasn’t lied to me directly,’ Daníel said. ‘But he certainly keeps things to himself and doesn’t share anything unnecessarily.’

  ‘He hides stuff, ducks questions and avoids fuss,’ Helena said. ‘But I have to admit that when I sat opposite him, I did believe him. At any rate, I believe that he didn’t abduct her, and there’s no evidence that he did.’

  Daníel agreed. If Flosi had been involved with the kidnapping, he would hardly have gone to the accountant to have the cash ready, and he would never have agreed to any police involvement.

  ‘Are we working on the theory that Guðrún staged the abduction to extort money from Flosi, and then he figured out she was hiding in the summer house, went there and killed her?’ the commissioner asked.

  Daníel nodded, and the whole team followed suit, their eyes flicking between him and the commissioner. He wasn’t sure whether or not to expect a rebuke for not locating the summer house earlier. It would come, as it was an unforgivable error on his part, but it wasn’t a rebuke that would be administered in front of the team. Once the case had been more or less concluded, she would call him in and between them they would go through everything that had been done, or not done, leaving no stone unturned. But now was not the moment to wonder whether these errors had cost Guðrún her life. Fear and self-reproach could wait until later. There would be a flood of both once it was all over, as there always was. Now they needed to take decisions and follow them through, without allowing the fear of possible consequences to divert them.

  ‘My suggestion is that we continue with the ransom handover and see if someone comes to collect it,’ Daníel said.

  The commissioner caught his eye and held it.

  ‘You’re assuming that the kidnappers aren’t aware that the body has been found?’ she said.

  ‘Yes,’ Daníel said. ‘It’ll do no harm to go through with it and see what happens. There has been nothing in the news so far about the discovery of the body, and it might remain that way until this evening. That gives us an opportunity. All it costs is a call-out for the Special Unit.’

  The commissioner stared thoughtfully into his eyes for a moment, and nodded quickly.

  ‘Agreed,’ she said. ‘I’ll alert them.’

  75

  Daníel waited for Áróra on the steps of the police station and took a few steps towards her as she appeared from around the corner of the building.

  ‘You missing me already?’ she asked with a teasing smile, and Daníel felt himself melt inside at the sight of her and as the memory of the night returned to him.

  ‘Yes,’ he said, and resisted the urge to wrap his arms tightly around her. That wouldn’t be a smart move, right outside the windows of police headquarters. They went side by side towards the entrance and up the steps, where he opened the door to the station with his pass card.

  ‘There are two things I need to ask you to help us with,’ he said as they took the stairs, but he didn’t have a chance to tell her more as Rannveig from the electronic and cybercrime division was waiting for them on the landing.

  ‘What news of far beyond?’ Daníel asked, and Rannveig laughed. She was a longstanding colleague and they had always got on well. They had joined the force at around the same time. He had been ambitious enough to work his way upward, while she was a systems analyst who had intended to spend just a year there before heading back to university to complete a computer science degree. But she was still here and had become one of the country’s leading experts in her field.

  ‘Everything’s just fine for those of us who do real investigations while you lot down here enjoy yourselves playing cops and robbers,’ she said, extending a hand to Áróra. Daníel introduced them.

  ‘This is my colleague Rannveig, who cracked open Leonid’s computer in five minutes flat,’ he said. ‘And this is Áróra, who is helping us interpret the data.’

  The meeting room he had intended to use was occupied, so he decided to take them to the incident room set up to investigate Guðrún’s disappearance. By now there were more keys in circulation and a much larger team at work there. Rannveig opened the computer and Áróra took a seat in front of it. She quickly found the accounting software used for Garðvís, and while she went through the figures, Daníel and Rannveig went upstairs for a coffee from the better machine.

  When they came back, Áróra had already found what she had been looking for.

  ‘That was quick,’ Rannveig said with respect in her voice.

  Áróra shook her head.

  ‘When you know what to look for, it’s not complicated,’ she said. ‘Especially when they don’t even bother to try and disguise the transactions.’ She picked up a pen and sketched a rough diagram. ‘Garðvís regularly pays large invoices from three companies in the UK. These are Babylon Gardens Ltd, Geoffrey’s Toolbox and GT Box. According to the invoices, these are for distribution services, and as it’s not easy to prove that these services have been carried out, this is an ideal route for laundering money.’

  ‘Is there anything to tell us what kind of companies these are? Whether they have legitimate activities, or are fronts for something else?’ Daníel asked.

  ‘We can check and see if Interpol has them listed,’ Rannveig said, watching Áróra’s fingers flicker across the laptop’s keyboard while she searched an overseas database.

  ‘According to a simple search, Babylon Gardens invests in property and companies in Moscow,’ Áróra said. ‘Which means that the money paid into Flosi’s offshore account makes its way to the legal economy in Russia, after stopping off at a few places around the world on the way.’

  Daníel felt his heart hammering so hard inside him that it was as if it was banging against his ribs. A cold sweat broke out down his back and his throat tightened. Could he have been so completely on the wrong track the whole time?

  76

  Áróra stood with her arms held high while the female officer clipped a transmitter to her belt and threaded the wire up inside her shirt.

  ‘We’ll hear everything you say and you’ll hear instructions from us in your ear,’ Daníel said as the officer put the earpiece in place. ‘Thank you for doing this,’ he added. ‘Flosi will have to put the ransom money in the right place so everything looks plausible, and you’re the only person who can be seen with him. And I know you’ll catch up with him easily enough if he tries something stupid.’

  The wires all in place and taped in position, Daníel led her over to a large whiteboard that was covered with a huge amount of information. He pointed to a printout of a Google Maps image of Miklatún and explained the little red crosses that had been marked on it.

  ‘You’re to drive right around the city. We’ve already loaded the route into your car’s navigation system, so you just need to go where it tells you. When you get to Miklatún, stop in the car park outside Kjarvalsstaðir, and you and Flosi are to walk along this path running along the side of the museum and then turn left. Then you’re in the right area. You walk to the middle of the park, Flosi puts down the bag on the grass and you walk back to the car the same way you came.’

  ‘OK,’ Áróra said. She was happy at the prospect of being able to help both Flosi and Daníel at the same time, and was both self-confident and aware of the knot of excitement that had formed in her belly, which was linked to what she had confirmed a little earlier from the contents of Leonid’s computer. It was as if Daníel sensed her thoughts. He pointed at the map.

  ‘In the bushes all around, by the football ground, by the museum and at the end of the playground, the Special Unit will be hidden and ready. We’ll have two drones high up over the park transmitting direct to the control room, so if anyone approaches you and Flosi, we’ll see them right away, and the Special Unit will respond. The priority is to protect you both,’ he said, and Áróra nodded. ‘They are well armed and ready for any eventuality,’ Daníel added. ‘Because considering the latest information, we don’t really know who we can expect to be collecting the money.’

  ‘You’re ready to take on the Russian mafia?’ Áróra asked.

  Daníel smiled.

  ‘I hope so,’ he said in a low voice, glanced around and grasped her hand, squeezing it in his. Áróra felt the warmth of his hand for that fleeting moment, and wanted to hold on for longer, to feel the heat of it and the soft palms feeling every inch of her. But she pulled her hand back smartly, as Helena stood up from her desk by the window, came across to them and continued to outline the route planned for her and Flosi.

  ‘When you’re back in the car, pull away immediately and drive off slowly, going to the left along Flókagata, take a right along Rauðarárstígur, then left onto Grettisgata, where you turn into the BSRB car park and wait in the car for our guys to fetch you.’ Áróra nodded. This was straightforward. Helena pointed to the map. ‘I’ll be here on Bólstaðarhlíð in an unmarked car and I’ll be listening in. I’ll have a view over most of the park and can be with you in less than a minute,’ she said. Áróra was about to reply, saying that she felt better knowing there was someone she knew close by, but before she could say anything, her eye was caught by a photograph fixed to the white board next to the map of Miklatún.

  The picture that had attracted her attention was of a panelled living room, no doubt from the summer house that Flosi had forgotten to tell the police about. The photo was starkly lit, no doubt to show the blue patch on the floor that had to be blood. But it wasn’t the blood that attracted Áróra’s attention, but the little fireplace at the end of the room.

  ‘The poker’s missing,’ Áróra said, pointing to it.

  ‘What?’ Helena asked, and both she and Daníel leaned close to peer at the picture. ‘What’s a poker?’ Helena added.

  ‘It’s a heavy metal tool that you use to shake up the fire,’ Áróra said, pleased with herself that she knew such words in Icelandic, recalling her father cursing lousy British heating as he crouched by the fire and poked at the coals.

  ‘But there are just two hooks and two tools,’ Daníel said. ‘A shovel and a little brush.’

  He continued to stare at the picture.

  ‘The poker fits into the middle of the stand,’ Áróra said. ‘There used to be a set like that in the living room when I was little, and in practically every other house in Britain.’