Camilla Lackberg - The Preacher

‘Lucas, it does no good to have this discussion. I’ve moved on since the divorce, and you should too. It’s true that I’ve met a new man, and that’s something that you’ll just have to learn to accept. The children are doing fine and I’m doing fine. Can’t we try to deal with this like adults?’

Her tone was entreating, but the silence on the other end was impenetrable. She knew that she’d crossed the line. When she heard the dial tone and realized that Lucas had simply hung up, she knew that he was going to make her pay in some way. And dearly.

The hellish ache in her head made her dig her fingers into her face. The pain of her nails tearing long gashes in her skin was almost satisfying compared with the splitting headache, and it helped her to focus.

Everything was still black, but something had made her wake from her deep, dreamless torpor. A tiny crack of light appeared above her head, and while she was squinting upwards it slowly widened. Unused to light as she was, she did not see but rather heard someone come through the crack that had widened to an opening and climb down the stairs. Someone who came closer and closer in the dark. The confusion made it hard for her to decide whether to feel fear or relief. Both feelings were there, mixed together. First one prevailed, then the other.

The last footsteps coming towards her, where she lay curled up in a foetal position, were as good as soundless. Without a word being spoken, she felt a hand stroke her over the forehead. Perhaps that gesture ought to have been soothing, but the simplicity of the movement made terror take a tight grip on her heart.

The hand continued its way along her body, and she trembled in the darkness. For a second, it occurred to her that she ought to put up some resistance against the faceless stranger. The thought vanished as rapidly as it appeared. The darkness was too overwhelming, and the strength in the hand that caressed her penetrated her skin, her nerves, her soul. Submission was her only option, she knew that with a terrifying insight.

When the hand changed from caressing to prising and twisting, pulling and tearing, she was not at all surprised. In a way she welcomed the pain. It was easier to handle the certainty of pain rather than the terror of waiting for the unknown.

The second call from Tord Pedersen had come just a couple of hours after Patrik spoke with Martin. They had a positive ID on one skeleton. Mona Thernblad, the second girl who disappeared in 1979, was one of the bodies found in the King’s Cleft.

Patrik and Martin sat together and went over the information they had gathered during the investigation. Mellberg was conspicuous by his absence, but Gösta Flygare was back on the job after an excellent performance in the golf tournament. He hadn’t won the competition, of course, but to his great surprise and joy had made a hole-in-one and was invited for champagne at the clubhouse. So far Martin and Patrik had heard in great detail about how the ball went straight into the hole with one stroke on the 16th hole. They had no doubt they would hear the story several more times before the day was over. But that didn’t matter. They didn’t begrudge Gösta his joy, and Patrik let him have an hour before they involved him in the investigative work. So for the moment Gösta was ringing round to all his golf buddies to tell them about the Big Event.

‘So it’s some devil who breaks the girls’ bones first before he murders them,’ said Martin. ‘And cuts them with a knife,’ he added.

‘I’m afraid that’s what it looks like. If I were to guess, I’d say there was certainly some sexual motive behind it. Some sadistic fuck who gets off on other people’s pain. The fact that there was semen on Tanja’s body indicates that as well.’

‘Are you going to talk to Mona’s relatives? Tell them that we found her, I mean?’

Martin looked uneasy, but Patrik calmed his fears by taking on the task himself.

‘I thought I’d drive out and see her father this afternoon. Her mother died years ago, so her father is the only one left to notify.’

‘How can you be so sure? Do you know them?’

‘No, but Erica was at the library in Fjällbacka yesterday looking up everything that was written in the press about Siv and Mona. Their disappearances have been reviewed periodically, and there was even an interview with the families a couple of years back. Only Mona’s father is still alive, and Siv only had her mother when she went missing. There was a little daughter as well, so I thought I’d talk to her too – as soon as we’ve got confirmation that Siv is the second woman.’

‘It would be a devil of a coincidence if it was someone else, don’t you think?’

‘Well, we’ll assume that the skeleton is Siv’s, but we can’t say that for certain yet. Stranger things have happened.’

Patrik rummaged through the photocopies that Erica had brought home for him and fanned some of them out in front of him on the table. He had also laid out the file that he had dug out of the archive in the cellar, intending to put together all the information they had about the disappearance of the two girls. There was a good deal in the newspaper articles that was not included in the investigative material; both sources were necessary to give them a complete picture of what was known so far.

‘Look here. Siv vanished on Midsummer’s Eve in 1979, and then Mona disappeared two weeks later.’

In order to clarify and give some order to the material, Patrik got up from his desk chair and wrote on the whiteboard on his wall.

‘Siv Lantin was last seen alive as she was bicycling home after a party with friends. The very last witness described how she turned off the main road and rode towards Bräcke. It was two in the morning, and she was seen by a driver who passed her on the road in his car. After that no one saw or heard from her again.’

‘If you disregard Gabriel Hult’s information,’ Martin added.

Patrik nodded in agreement. ‘Yes, if you ignore Gabriel Hult’s testimony, which I think we will for the time being.’ He went on: ‘Mona Thernblad went missing two weeks later. Unlike Siv, she vanished one afternoon in broad daylight. She left her house around three to go out jogging but never came home. One of her jogging shoes was found by the road along her usual route, but nothing more.’

‘Were there any similarities between the girls? Besides the fact that they were about the same age.’

Patrik couldn’t help smiling a little. ‘I can see you’ve been watching that Profiles programme. Unfortunately I have to disappoint you. If we’re dealing with a serial killer, which is what I assume you’re fishing for, there are no obvious external similarities between the girls.’ He fastened two black-and-white photographs to the whiteboard.

‘Siv was nineteen years old. Small, dark and curvaceous. She had a reputation for being rather difficult, and she created something of a scandal in Fjällbacka when she had a baby at the age of seventeen. Both she and the baby lived with her mother, but according to what the newspapers claim, Siv liked to go out partying and wasn’t very fond of staying home. Mona, on the other hand, was described as a real family girl who did well in school, had a lot of friends and was generally popular. She was tall and blonde and worked out a good deal. Eighteen years old but still living at home because her mother was sickly, and her father couldn’t take care of her by himself. Nobody seemed to have anything negative to say about her. So the only thing these girls had in common was that they disappeared without a trace from the face of the earth over twenty years ago. And now they’ve appeared as skeletons in the King’s Cleft.’