Page 22

2019

Alex realises when they get to his cabin that he hasn’t eaten since breakfast. His stomach betrays the fact to Niamh and within moments she’s on the phone to the Lodge kitchen. Minutes later, a guy arrives at the door with a foil-covered tray and a bottle of wine. Alex hadn’t even thought of room service, despite the fact there’s a thick leather-bound menu sitting on the locker beside his bed. Champagne under the Northern Lights seems to be the house specialty.

They sit in the armchairs by the fire and Alex swallows some of the creamy concoction on the plate, realising he’s even hungrier than he thought.

Niamh’s not eating, busying herself instead with uncorking the wine and pouring two large glasses.

‘Lassi,’ Alex prompts her. ‘Lassi and Vicky.’

‘There was no Lassi and Vicky,’ Niamh says. She takes a large gulp of wine. ‘But I’m sure he wishes there was.’

There’s silence for a while, as she watches him eat.

‘He has a reputation,’ she adds. ‘Not a pleasant one. We’ve all had to deal with him. Some give in but there’s a way of managing guys like him and most of us are fine.’

‘What are you saying?’ Alex says. ‘Fucking him is part of the job?’

‘God, it’s never that overt. He doesn’t force anybody. Haven’t you lived in the real world long enough, Alex? He’s rich. He’s powerful. But he’s not a beast. He plays to his strengths and some girls play that game, too. Others, well, it’s about resisting but not making a man like him feel rejected.’

‘Mind games,’ Alex says.

‘That’s what being a woman is.’ She sighs. ‘Endless fucking mind games.’

‘Did you play along or win the game?’

Niamh angrily bangs her glass down on the table. Alex jumps. He can see she’s furious with him.

‘I’m sorry,’ he says, contritely. ‘I’m not judging. Just. . . asking.’

Niamh still looks annoyed, but it slowly leaves her face.

‘Forget it,’ she says. ‘I just. . . I don’t screw around. I can manage Lassi.’

Alex holds his hands out in apology.

‘How did Vicky handle him?’

‘Not well,’ Niamh says, quieter now. ‘Vicky told him to take a run and jump. Which was neither giving in nor playing along.’

Alex can hear the words coming out of Vicky’s mouth, can picture her face as she said them.

He remembers a holiday together. Him, twenty-one, Vicky, fifteen. One of the last his parents roped him into. The ferry to France, a campsite in Brittany. Some Italian guy, good-looking, fancying his chances with Vicky.

Alex can imagine that some girls her age would have been flattered by the attention. The Italian was handsome enough to catch their mother’s eye, let alone a fifteen-year-old with raging hormones. He’d spotted the guy sidling up to Vicky on the far side of the pool, as Alex was getting a drink at the bar. All smiles and Mediterranean charm. Alex had said he’d watch Vicky while their parents enjoyed a meal on their own in the campsite restaurant.

He’d put his drink down and rounded the pool at speed, just in time to see Vicky’s big smile as she said, I’m fifteen– what are you, some kind of fucking paedophile?

Then she’d turned, dived under the water and swum to the middle of the pool. Alex had nearly fallen into the water, he’d laughed so hard.

Alex is still lost in the memory when he realises Niamh is staring at him.

‘That’s very Vicky,’ he says.

‘Lassi was annoyed but. . . also intrigued,’ Niamh continues. ‘I guess he saw her as a bit of a challenge. I’ve heard Lassi talk about horses that need to be broken in. How, once their spirit is broken, you can get a good ride on them. I’m not sure he discerns between fillies and women.’

Niamh looks nauseated and Alex feels the same way.

‘He made out to me that he barely knew her,’ he says.

Niamh looks him straight in the eyes.

‘He’s a liar,’ she says.

Alex studies her.

‘You really don’t like him,’ he says.

‘I hate men who think women are just there to be used,’ she says.

‘So, why didn’t you tell me he was harassing Vicky?’ Alex asks. ‘Why send me on a wild-goose chase after this Miika guy who, by the way, doesn’t seem to have had anything to do with her?’

Niamh doesn’t answer for a moment. He can see the firelight dancing in her green eyes as she looks at him: she’s hurt.

‘I didn’t know it was a wild-goose chase,’ she says. ‘All I know is he’s the guy all the locals have been talking about and yet, as far as I could see, the cops had no interest and hadn’t even mentioned him to you. Jesus, Alex, you’re not the only one wondering what happened to her. I’ve spent every day since they found her asking myself if I should have done things differently. If I should have reported her missing straight away. If I could have helped protect her. I’m looking at everybody, wondering who’s capable of what. All. The. Time. Even when I know these are people I’ve worked with for years; people I like.’

Alex believes her. He can see the rings under her eyes and can imagine the sleepless nights she must be having.

He takes a deep breath.

‘Except, you don’t like Lassi.’

‘No. But I’m not telling you he’s a killer, either. You asked me about his relationship with Vicky. It irritated her, the way he kept coming back. He’s like that with all of us, but he’s not here all the time. You’re only seeing him about the place now because Christmas is coming and the rates here at Christmas time. . . the tourists in the Lodge at the moment are the cream of the crop. They are people Lassi wants to return every year. He’s trying to market himself as more exclusive than the hotel on the mountain. They’re stealing his business. He has to work hard to keep it.’

‘The police haven’t even mentioned him,’ Alex says. ‘They never mentioned Miika or Lassi. The only person they’ve even considered is this Bryce guy from the States.’

‘Lassi has an alibi. Elliot, he runs the American-themed bar in town, runs a poker game. It was on that night– the night Vicky was in there with the Yanks before they all came back to the Lodge. Lassi and Elliot and a few others played poker late into the night, apparently. And then Lassi went home to his wife.’

Niamh snorts after the last word.

Alex sits back. He drinks his wine and absorbs what she’s told him.

‘If you don’t think Lassi is involved in what happened to Vicky, why did you run after me when I left the Lodge?’

Niamh narrows her eyes.

‘I ran after you because you looked upset. I was no use to Vicky. The least I can do is try to be of use to you. But if I’m not, if I’m upsetting you, just tell me to fuck off and I will.’

Alex shakes his head, softly.

‘You’re not upsetting me,’ he says.

Niamh visibly relaxes.

‘I’m sure Lassi wasn’t involved in what happened to your sister,’ she says. ‘I can’t believe anybody from here hurt her. But I also know Lassi isn’t a good man. He’s not a two-dimensional baddie. He does good things for , even I can see that. He gives a lot to charity. He seems to love his wife, despite what he gets up to. And he’s actually a generous employer, his reputation with women notwithstanding. But he can be mean. Rude. And you don’t need or deserve that shit.’

Niamh shudders. Alex wonders if perhaps she wasn’t as capable of dealing with Lassi as she wants him to believe.

‘I heard you have an alibi for the night Vicky went missing, too,’ Alex says, carefully. ‘Harry.’

She blushes, then.

‘It won’t be happening again. Harry has this thing about not sleeping with staff.’

She rolls her eyes.

‘But you like him,’ Alex says.

‘Sure. And he likes me, he’s being a dick. It’s just a pity he couldn’t have been a dick that night because if he’d said no, then I might have been out with Vicky. Maybe I’d have got with one of the Americans, too, and we’d have all gone on somewhere together.’

‘Did you do that much?’

Niamh smiles.

‘We were a good team,’ she says. ‘We weren’t sleeping around. But sometimes, we’d get drunk with a gang and end up in each other’s cabins for the night, laughing at the funny things that had happened over the evening. God, I miss those nights. I wish that had been one of those nights.’

Niamh stares into the fire. The logs crackle; Alex thinks he can smell pine but it’s probably still the smell from the Christmas tree in the bar, stuck in his nose.

‘When you were with Harry, did you fall asleep at any point or is he a really special sort of guy?’

Niamh raises her eyebrows.

‘I slept.’

‘Any chance he could have left and come back without you noticing?’

‘Jesus. No. Of course he didn’t. Harry would never do something like that.’

She’s properly angry again, Alex realises. It’s as defensive as he’s heard her and he wonders if she truly believes Harry is incapable of doing something bad or. . . if she just doesn’t want him to be.

‘What about Beatrice?’ Alex asks.

‘Beatrice?’ Niamh snorts. ‘Why would she hurt Vicky? She barely knew her.’

‘Nicolas implied she was jealous of Vicky.’

‘Bloody hell. Lots of girls were jealous of Vicky. I was jealous of her. She was stunning. Funny. Smart. I’d have fucking died for her hair, instead of my carrot top. Being jealous is not enough reason to kill somebody. Beatrice is the jealous type, but if jealousy was enough to make Beatrice kill people, she’d never have made it through secondary school.’

Alex picks up his wine glass. It’s empty. Niamh leans across and tops him up. Alex realises he’s had more than her and the alcohol’s hitting him harder. He’s tired. So bloody tired.

‘Agatha has nothing,’ he says. ‘And she’s got family stuff going on. I think she wants to find Vicky’s killer but. . . is she giving it her full attention? Do you know anything about this sister of hers? I get the impression she’s trouble. Not the trouble I’d guessed at, though. I thought Luca was the father of Agatha’s kids.’

‘The father of her kids?’ Niamh says, frowning.

Alex shrugs.

‘Single mother. I joined up the dots, but in the wrong way.’

‘She’s not a single mother, though,’ Niamh says. ‘Well, I suppose she is, but not in the way you think.’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘Those kids who live with the chief aren’t hers. They’re her sister’s.’

Alex sits forward.

‘Excuse me?’

‘Harry told me. Agatha has custody of them. I don’t know Luca, but Harry does. He says she’s a psycho.’

Alex shakes his head, confused. He hadn’t seen anything between Agatha and the kids to make him imagine they weren’t hers.

He thinks, if I haven’t noticed that, what else have I failed to notice?

Have I already missed who killed Vicky?

Niamh picks up the poker and leans across to stoke the fire.

As she stretches, Alex nods at the tennis bracelet on her arm.

‘Vicky had one like that,’ he says.

Niamh touches the bracelet. She smiles, fondly.

‘It is Vicky’s,’ she says. ‘She gave it to me for my birthday. I told her she was a tight bitch. And she reminded me that I stole a bottle of vodka from behind the bar for hers. We were always broke. Neither of us ever had a penny.’

She laughs. Then, suddenly, Niamh’s face fills with pain. She starts to unclasp the bracelet.

‘Jesus,’ she says. ‘What was I thinking? You should have it. I’m sorry– I should have realised immediately.’

Alex puts his hand gently on hers.

‘No,’ he said. ‘It’s yours. I only noticed it because I bought it for her. She never liked it. Sorry, I probably shouldn’t say that. I’m sure she meant well, giving it to you. She said at the time, what was it. . . oh, yes. You buy for me the things you think I should have, not the things I’d like to have . The bracelet was too minimalist for her.’

‘But all her stuff is gone,’ Niamh says, helplessly. ‘Please, I’m sure she did love it. It’s a beautiful bracelet. Take it. To remind you.’

Alex looks down at her fingers, resting gently on the bracelet. He can tell it means a lot to her. He can tell his sister meant a lot to her and he’s glad Vicky had somebody like this over here, so far from home.

‘I want you to keep it,’ he says. ‘You were a better friend to her than I was a brother.’

‘That’s not true.’

‘She wanted to tell me something, before she died. But she couldn’t get hold of me.’

‘What did she want to tell you?’

‘I don’t know.’ Alex frowns. ‘But she was scared.’

Niamh shrugs, helplessly.

Alex sighs. Then it hits him, what she’s just said.

‘The pair of you were always broke, you say.’

‘All the bloody time.’

‘Did you notice. . . did Vicky seem to have more money since the summer?’

Niamh scrunches up her face as she concentrates.

‘I. . . yes, now that you mention it. She bailed me out a few times and said I didn’t need to pay her back. We’d take care of each other when we could, but. . . yeah. That was weird.’

Alex mulls on this. Vicky was always broke, Niamh had said. That fits with Alex’s long experience of his sister.

But over the summer, Vicky had had money.

Where did she get it from?

Agatha tells the kids to wait in the car while she calls to Alex’s cabin. She knocks on the door and waits.

When it opens, Niamh is standing there. Agatha says nothing for a moment, taking in the bare legs under the T-shirt Niamh is wearing and the tousled hair. Within seconds, Alex appears behind her.

‘Sorry for the interruption,’ Agatha says, ‘but I’ve arranged an early meeting.’

‘Somebody of interest?’ Alex asks.

Agatha nods.

‘Give me two minutes.’

He disappears inside.

Niamh shrugs, looking a little embarrassed but not really. Agatha doesn’t blame her. She used to have a life once, too.

‘I’ll wait in the car,’ Agatha says with a tight smile. ‘You should close the door. All the heat is getting out.’

Agatha glances at Niamh’s bare legs again. Niamh smiles and closes the door.

There goes that little fantasy, Agatha thinks, remembering the feel of Alex’s legs on either side of her on the snowmobile yesterday.

Not that it could have ever come to anything, anyhow.

Agatha sighs. She really does get all the luck.

The kids are antsy in the car and Agatha hands out the rest of the salt liquorice from the glove compartment. She’d explained the plan this morning. Emilia’s not entirely happy. She wants to see her friends in the run-up to Christmas. She’d thought a trip to Rovaniemi was on the cards. Now, she’s being sent somewhere even more isolated.

Olavi and Onni are fine. They love Becki, and Becki’s mum, and news of the American family has them even more excited. Thankfully, that’s what swung it for Emilia in the end, discovering that the Americans have a teenage son.

The door to Alex’s cabin opens and he trots over to the car.

The second he’s in the car, the kids launch themselves.

‘Is that your girlfriend?’ Onni asks.

‘Who?’

‘The one who opened the door with no clothes.’

‘Onni,’ Agatha hisses.

‘She had some clothes on,’ Alex says. Agatha raises her eyebrows and Alex smiles apologetically.

‘She’s not my girlfriend,’ Alex says.

‘She’s just a hook-up, right?’ Emilia says.

‘What’s a hook-up?’ Onni asks.

‘An F-buddy,’ Emilia says.

‘Emilia,’ Agatha hisses and puts the car in drive. ‘Stop using those terms around your brothers. Stop using those terms, full stop, or a TikTok ban is coming your way.’

‘Why don’t I just curl up and die of boredom,’ Emilia drawls.

‘We’ll put that on your tombstone,’ Agatha retorts. She turns to Alex. ‘I apologise. We’re in peak teenage mode this morning.’

‘We were all teenagers once.’ Alex shrugs.

‘I don’t ever want to get old,’ Emilia says.

Agatha and Alex exchange a glance.

‘How’s your arthritis and Alzheimer’s this morning?’ Alex says.

Agatha smiles, gratefully.

‘I can’t remember,’ she says. ‘How’s your incontinence?’

‘Do I smell?’

Emilia glares at them in the rear-view mirror.

They arrive at Becki’s and Agatha asks Alex to wait in the car while she runs in with the kids and their bags. She almost does it in one trip, too, except Olavi remembers he’s left his charger in the car, then Emilia wants her AirPods from the glove compartment and there’s one almost-disaster when Onni can’t find his soft elephant, but they find it in Olavi’s bag.

Alex says nothing when she returns to the car and they get going again.

‘Sorry,’ she says, unprompted.

‘It’s no problem.’

He’s not so uptight today, she thinks, and that’s followed by, maybe he just needed to get laid to help him relax.

Don’t be a bitch, Agatha chastises herself. So what if he found solace with someone. If anybody deserved a break. . .

‘So, who are we going to see?’ Alex asks. Agatha has been so busy having a conversation with herself, she has to reset.

‘Oh. A member of the Swedish police.’

‘Why?’ Alex asks.

‘Hilda Paikkala. Something came to our attention when Janic was redoing the passport checks.’

‘Something like what?’ he says.

‘That’s why we’re going to talk to this officer. She told Janic a little on the phone but I want to speak to her in person so I’m positive we’re talking about the same Hilda.’

‘Is it a long drive?’

‘Two hours, maybe.’

‘Barely anything,’ Alex says, wryly.

Agatha smiles. He’s getting the hang of things up here.

‘Why are you bringing me?’ Alex asks.

‘Because I think you’ll be interested in what this cop has to say. I’ll let her explain it when we’re up there.’

They drive in silence for a few minutes.

‘You and Niamh,’ Agatha says. She can’t help being nosy. Even if she is turning into a dried-up old spinster.

‘It’s nothing.’

‘Charming.’

‘I don’t mean it like that. I just mean, she has a thing for somebody else.’

‘Harry.’

‘She told you?’ Alex says.

‘She’s his alibi.’

‘Why did you say it like that?’

‘Like what?’

‘She’s his alibi. They’re each other’s, surely?’

Agatha frowns. She hadn’t deliberately phrased it that way, but she can hear how it sounds.

Revealing.

‘Do you think he’s lying?’ Alex asks.

‘How could he be?’ Agatha says. ‘He has an alibi.’

She purses her lips. She can feel Alex staring at her but she says nothing more.

Does she suspect Harry? She’s known him a long time. He always struck her as a nice man. A little misguided at times, but that’s mainly because he shows such loyalty to Lassi.

Maybe, Agatha thinks, she just suspects everybody. Vicky didn’t hit herself on the head. And some of the alibis for her closest co-workers are thin. Nicolas was staying in the hotel with a friend . But the room was in the friend’s name and the guy had already left before he could be questioned. Nicolas was seen up there, that was true, but had he stayed there all night? Beatrice had gone back to a cabin with one of the American tourists. He confirmed it; he also confirmed she returned to her own bed sometime in the early hours. He’d walked her there and returned to his lodgings, but she could easily have left again. Florian was on the night desk at the Lodge. Several tourists confirmed they had dealt with him during the night but there were periods when he could have been away from his post.

If Agatha had an exact time for Vicky’s death, she could conceivably chip away at everybody’s alibi in some shape or fashion.

Halfway towards the town where they’re meeting the Swedish contact, a place just inside the Finnish border, Agatha pulls in at a service station and buys them both coffee and fat buns.

An hour later, an hour of small talk, which Agatha senses they’re both using to steer clear of more important conversation, they arrive at the meeting place. Officer Hermansson is already there. Hermansson is younger than Agatha expected, and Agatha’s half waiting for Alex to roll his eyes and comment on the average age demographic of everybody involved in his sister’s case. But he shakes the blonde female officer’s hand and offers to get more coffees. Hermansson already has one, and Agatha and Alex don’t really want any more. So they sit in front of the young officer and listen as she talks.

‘I only started as a sergeant in the Láhpo police station two years ago,’ Hermansson says. ‘If I’d been there when your girl Hilda went missing, the name would have stayed with me but, as it was, it’s just pure coincidence it meant anything to me when your colleague sent out the bulletin yesterday.’

‘So, you’re not from the passport control office?’ Alex asks.

‘No. Láhpo is the nearest border town with a police station. As a Finnish citizen, Hilda Paikkala wouldn’t have needed a passport to cross into Sweden.’

Agatha nods.

‘When Hilda went missing originally, there was a passport check at the airports,’ she says. ‘But Patric also checked land border crossings. He sent out a bulletin to border towns in Sweden. Anyhow, when I asked Janic to redo the passport checks for Hilda and Mary, he also copied Patric’s first move and went to the border town stations to recheck on Hilda. We have a lot of interaction with these stations and sometimes it’s just quicker to do this sort of thing at a local level, rather than through Interpol.’

‘Láhpo received that original bulletin,’ Officer Hermansson says. ‘And I saw in our file that Chief Koskinen checked in when she took the job three years ago, to see if there was any update. Unfortunately, our old boss passed away shortly after that, or it would have struck a chord with him when Hilda’s name eventually cropped up.’

‘I should have checked again,’ Agatha admits.

‘Well, your officer checked yesterday. And Hilda only came to my attention last year.’

‘Wait,’ Alex says. ‘You’re saying Hilda is alive?’

‘I don’t know if she’s alive right this minute,’ Hermansson says, ‘but I can tell you she was alive and in Láhpo in July 2018, four years after she went missing from Inari.’

Hermansson lets the information land with Alex, in the same way it hit Janic and then Agatha when he told her.

‘Tell him how you came across her,’ Agatha says.

‘Drugs ring,’ Hermansson says. ‘It was the big case when I started in my station, January 2018. A cross-jurisdiction investigation, spanning five years. Swedish hauliers going in and out of Russia. They were buying the drugs in Russia and then bringing them down through Sweden, across from Malmo into Denmark and on to wider Europe. I came in at the tail end but my boss made sure I was involved. One of the things he had me do was go through all the loose ends, such as the people the gang leaders used for small jobs, so when we did a big sweep, we’d pick up everybody. Sometimes, when you take the head off the snake, it leaves room for a new one. The bosses didn’t want any wannabe replacements emerging.’

Agatha nods. She knows the story of this particular gang bust. The Finnish police had kept a close eye on it. Then and now, most of the drugs that come into Finland come from the top down: Sweden and Russia.

‘Hilda Paikkala was in a relationship with one of the drivers,’ Hermansson says. ‘She was doing paperwork for the gang. I found photos of her with her boyfriend in their office, her name on fraudu-lent accounts sent to the bank, her handwriting on a lot of the tax files they kept. They were passing themselves off as a legitimate haulage company, after all.’

‘You’re absolutely positive this was her?’ Agatha says. ‘It wasn’t just a Finnish woman with the same name?’

Agatha doesn’t think that is the case: Janic had spoken to Officer Hermansson at length on the phone, but Agatha had still wanted to meet her in person, to be sure.

‘We never picked Hilda up,’ Hermansson says, cautiously. ‘Or the boyfriend. But several of our confidential informants confirmed her name and identity as Hilda Paikkalla, of Finnish nationality. It didn’t matter too much in the end. We didn’t arrest everybody and she seemed like an unlikely person to take over the gang. It would have been too big a leap, accounts manager to drug dealer. I reckon she and the boyfriend ran as far and as fast as they could. If they went through Denmark, they could be anywhere by now. But then I saw the email come in from your colleague asking about Hilda Paikkala. Just to be sure, I checked the original bulletin and the photo against the one I have from our case.’

Hermansson places a picture on the table. It shows a near middle-aged woman, attractive, her arms around a large man with a huge red beard.

‘We took this from the office when we raided it,’ Hermansson says. ‘It was pinned on the wall beside a Chinese take-out menu. It matches our surveillance photos of one of the drivers and of a woman we saw going in and out of the office.’

It’s a picture of Hilda, looking older in this photograph than the last one Agatha has of her, the last picture Hilda posed in with her friends.

‘It’s like seeing a ghost,’ Agatha says. ‘I’ve had this woman’s face on a case board since I took over as chief in .’

‘Every one of my bosses seems to have one,’ Hermansson says. ‘A person who goes missing and never turns up. Unfortunately, because Hilda wasn’t arrested, we didn’t have her name officially recorded and the bosses didn’t log her ID with Interpol. She wasn’t nearly as important as some of the others who got away and we’d have had a hell of a time proving guilt in her case, anyway. She could have claimed she was duped into signing the fraudulent accounts by the boyfriend. If we’d picked her up or registered her, you’d have seen the flag.’

‘Why didn’t you contact Finland to see if she’d returned here?’ Agatha asks. She’s trying to keep the frustration from her voice. Five years. That’s how long she and everybody else thought Hilda Paikkala was missing, presumed dead.

To think that all that time the bloody woman had been living in Sweden.

To think that all that time, she was another noose that had been hung around Miika Virtanen’s neck.

‘We did contact Finnish authorities,’ Hermansson says. ‘That is, I did. But I went straight to Helsinki. I didn’t know at the time about the bulletin from here or where she was from. I should probably have taken a leaf from your officer’s book and gone direct to you guys, or at least to Rovaniemi, but I was still new and green and I thought I should do things properly.’

Agatha’s jaw clenches.

‘When was this?’

‘August 2018.’

Agatha can feel the heat of Alex staring at her and she knows how this looks. She is suddenly deeply regretting bringing him on this little factfinder. It had sparked something in her, his interest in old cases that she’s long sought the truth about. But now she remembers what he is. The brother of a victim whose case is very current and she’s no closer to solving. And he has just witnessed her, inadvertently, solve another case. One that makes her and her force look like bumbling idiots. She can imagine that memo arriving in Helsinki and it being filed under who gives a fuck?

‘Sorry I can’t help with your Mary Rosenberg case,’ Hermansson says. ‘But, maybe it’s the same deal. Maybe she just went somewhere and hasn’t turned up yet. You might get lucky with her, too.’

Agatha smiles through gritted teeth. The only one they know for certain did turn up was Vicky Evans. Nobody is going to get lucky with that one.

‘I know how this looks,’ Agatha says to him as they drive back towards .

‘I didn’t say anything,’ Alex says.

‘You didn’t have to.’

‘I was the one who started speculating about the possibility of a serial killer. I was wrong.’

‘You weren’t the only one speculating.’ Agatha sighs.

Alex looks out the window for a while, watching as the landscape changes from the large, open snow plains to forest-lined road again. He doesn’t think he’d ever get tired of this scenery if he lived up here. He can see how some people might find it tedious– the same sort of trees, the ubiquitous white. But to his eye, it’s a winter wonderland. Funny, how a covering of snow can make anything look beautiful.

‘It doesn’t mean the theory is entirely wrong,’ Agatha says. ‘We know what happened to Hilda. We still don’t know where Mary is, or Kaya. Though, your sister’s case is obviously the most important.’

‘To me,’ Alex says.

‘I appreciate you saying that,’ Agatha says. ‘But, while I owe as much to Mary and Kaya’s families, Vicky is the only actual murder case I’m investigating and the most recent. I don’t want to go down a rabbit hole of what ifs, but you were right to ask the question about a possible link and it had crossed my mind.’

Alex shrugs. He has something on his mind. Agatha has trusted him this morning. Bringing him to this meeting with her– it showed she’s been listening to him. He needs to start trusting her.

‘I found something,’ he says.

Agatha waits for him to fill her in.

‘I figured out the password to her second email account.’

‘Ah. And you’ve looked in it?’

‘There was a draft email. I’m going to forward it to you and I was going to tell you the password today. She wanted to talk to me. She doesn’t explain in the message but. . . she says she was scared.’

Agatha’s brow furrows.

‘Read me the email,’ she says.

Alex opens his phone and reads the message, all of it.

‘You said she kept that email address just to wind you up,’ Agatha says. ‘But that email. . . she was being serious.’

‘Yes, but she didn’t follow through,’ Alex says. ‘She started to tell me something and then lost her temper. I don’t know what she means when she says I know nothing about metal. . .’

Alex trails off. Agatha has a look on her face.

‘What did she mean by metal?’ she asks him.

‘I don’t know. Maybe she meant mettle. It’s– it means ability to cope. Not metal as in iron or something.’

‘Are they spelled the same?’

‘No. She spelled actual metal. M, e, t, a, l. What do I know about metal? Well, more than most. I grew up in an area renowned for bloody steel.’

Agatha’s frown deepens. Then she purses her lips.

‘I wish you hadn’t checked her emails without me,’ Agatha says.

‘It just suddenly dawned on me, what the password would be,’ Alex lies. ‘And I only saw the message last night. . .’

That part, at least, was true.

‘What do you think she was scared of?’

‘That’s what we need to find out.’

Alex senses Agatha has more, but she doesn’t add anything.

‘It’s not like Vicky to be scared,’ he says. ‘But, according to Niamh, my sister might have had some funds. Which fits with her suggesting we spend all that money for our parents. I think she might have done something stupid to make some cash. And maybe it backfired.’

‘Like blackmail?’ Agatha says, thoughtfully.

Alex nods.

That’s what he fears.

Agatha falls quiet. He can see she’s deep in thought.

‘Thank you,’ he says. ‘I know you’re doing your best. And. . . with a lot on your plate.’

Agatha’s breath catches. Alex watches her, sees that she’s trying to keep her face placid.

‘What did Patric tell you?’ she asks. ‘I’m guessing you spoke when he drove you back to the Lodge.’

‘He didn’t tell me anything. He’s very loyal to you.’

‘Somebody told you something,’ Agatha says.

‘All I know is you’re having trouble with your sister. . .’

Alex trails off.

‘It’s not my business,’ he says. ‘I just want you to know, I appreciate you have problems, too.’

‘Thank you,’ Agatha says.

Alex doesn’t expect her to say anything more. He’s wondering how they’ll fill the remaining hour’s drive when she starts to talk.

‘We’re twins, you know,’ she says, suddenly. ‘Luca and I. And she was always the fun one. The adventurous one. A bit like you and Vicky.’

‘It comes naturally to some people,’ Alex says.

‘Yes, and sometimes you have to be more responsible to balance everything out.’

Alex nods in agreement.

‘Did you have to be more responsible?’ he asks.

‘Our parents died in our early teens. Dad had a heart attack, Mom had cancer. It was rough but we weren’t particularly close. They were older when they had us. Not really able for kids. Then, Dad was always working and Mom was quite. . . um, she was narcissistic. Luca gets a bit of that from her. We never felt we could grieve for Dad. Our mother owned that space. And then everything revolved around her illness. I’m not saying we didn’t miss them when they were both gone, but we were surrounded by aunts and neighbours and we were okay. We had each other. I took it okay, anyway. Luca, not so much. She was always a bit wild. Without any parents. . .’

Agatha turns her head to look at Alex.

‘I don’t know why I’m telling you all this.’

‘I’ve been thinking the same,’ Alex says. Then, quickly, when he sees her expression, ‘I mean, why I feel it’s easier to talk to you. I think it’s because we’re strangers and we’ve been thrown together in odd circumstances. You’ve had to deliver news to me that’s immediately made us intimate acquaintances. Plus, you know I’m going to leave and we never have to see each other again. Not to mention, we nearly died together on that snowmobile.’

Agatha laughs.

‘We were in no danger of dying,’ she says. ‘You’re right, though. It’s easier, sometimes, to be in the company of strangers. I don’t talk about this stuff. I don’t have to. Growing up here, everyone knows your business. All of it. All the time. It’s. . . it can be oppressive.’

‘I get it. My village was similar. Not as small but. . . yeah. You get into a bit of trouble, good luck to you, hoping people will forget about it.’

It’s Alex’s turn to stop talking. He’s not sure how much of this he wants to tell her; whether she’ll think less of him if she learns certain things about him.

She doesn’t press him.

‘I take it Luca was a hellraiser,’ Alex says, deciding to keep the focus on her. ‘And you were the sensible one.’

Agatha’s expression falters. Alex misses her smile immediately. When she laughs, really laughs, it transforms her entirely. She has a pleasant face, anyway, when she’s relaxed, but there are little worry lines on her forehead and around her mouth, which seems to be pinched a lot of the time in concern. But when she’s happy, she’s captivating. Even with her hair in that frizzy ponytail, her big woollen jumper and jeans, and wearing not a scrap of make-up.

He’s aware the more he’s in her company, the more he likes her. Respects her, too. He’s also aware that he’s not planning on forming any attachments while he’s here. Which is why he gently, but firmly, rebuffed Niamh last night. Niamh is not into him. She’s just looking for somebody else to help her numb the pain of losing Vicky and probably figured he’d be in the same boat.

He’s acutely conscious that, having seen Niamh in a T-shirt at his door this morning, Agatha will have assumed that Alex was with her. She won’t know and he won’t tell her that, actually, Alex conked out in the armchair sometime in the early hours and woke to find Niamh equally comatose on the end of his bed. A second bottle of wine and the hours of talking had done them both in.

‘That’s not the half of it,’ Agatha says, responding to his statement. ‘The kids, you know. . . they’re Luca’s.’

Alex isn’t able to feign surprise.

‘Somebody told you that, too,’ she says. ‘Did they tell you how they ended up living with me?’

‘No,’ he says, truthfully.

Agatha sucks in her cheeks.

‘Luca had them all with different dads,’ she says. ‘It started in our late teens. She’d drink, take drugs. I was training to be a cop and she was smoking weed and popping pills all day long. We went from being different personality types to polar opposites. People in town started to realise, too. Luca would have these huge highs then these horrible lows.

‘Usually it was only me who saw the lows. But they got worse as the years went on. She started picking fights with people. Stealing from the bar she was working in. Putting it up to Patric and the other cops. Then she got caught off her face on a nicked snow-mobile in the middle of the lake. She nearly killed somebody. And as for her boyfriends– the badder the better.’

‘Easy to attract the wrong sort of guy when danger is your stock in trade,’ Alex says.

‘Stocking trade?’

‘It’s an expression. Stock in trade. Your modus operandi. Behaving a certain way brings certain people to you. Moths to the flame.’

‘I couldn’t have put it better. She was the flame and they were throwing themselves at her. Of course, I didn’t realise what was going on with her but Patric did. To me, she was just Luca, maybe a more extreme version of herself. But Patric saw that she needed help. That she was. . . unstable. Then, suddenly, she was pregnant with Emilia. I’ve an idea who her dad is. A good-time guy, lives in Rovaniemi, comes from money. I was training there at the time, so I knew of him. He wanted nothing to do with his baby, anyway. But Luca wanted Emilia and she tried to clean up her act. Managed it, too, for a while. Then she was back to her old self, boozing, causing fights, sleeping around again. It’s honestly a miracle she didn’t get pregnant more than she did. By the time she had Olavi, Emilia was living with me. Then she tried again and had the two of them with her, but they lived close by so I could keep an eye.’

Agatha pauses. She’s delivering the story in a matter-of-fact tone, but Alex can imagine how painful those years were, watching her sister go up and down. With kids thrown in, it must have been torturous.

‘Emilia and Olavi ended up back with me just before Onni came, and then I had all three. Onni was three days old when I took him home from the hospital. She had some dickhead pretend to be a visitor and take her out clubbing while Onni was left in his cot. Then she threatened to have me arrested for stealing her kid. She assaulted a nurse in the hospital for letting me in– held a syringe to her throat.

‘Eventually, she realised she had a choice. Jail or psychological evaluation. So, she went to a doctor. And then it was the five of us, all trying, while she did her therapy. But then I found out she’d stopped going, had stopped taking her medication. She was taking drugs all right, just not the proper ones. I had to have her taken away to rehab. Forcibly. At the start, she used to send me the most poisonous letters. She was going to get out. Kill me. Kill the kids. But then she got better. Or so it seemed.’

Alex is holding his breath. The story is already horrific but he knows it’s going somewhere worse by how low Agatha’s voice has become. He can barely hear her over the car’s heating system.

‘The eldest kids had already had so much disruption in their lives. Every time they were with me, they had stability, but then they’d go back to her and it would be okay for a while but end in disaster. I can’t even bear to repeat the details. At least Onni was saved that, but he still saw her madness. She turned up once to see him when he was two, with a stolen Xbox for his birthday present, which she’d missed by months. She didn’t bring anything for the other two. Eventually, she agreed I’d adopt them. She told them, right out, she’d never wanted them. Which was a lie, but, anyhow. They were calling me Mom by then. I didn’t think I’d ever forgive her for that but at least they had me. And I explained to them that the thing about my sister was, she wasn’t bad. She just did bad things. I’m not making excuses for her but she’s never been a well person. I realised that, too late.’

‘She scares you,’ Alex says, tentatively. ‘I could see it when you opened the door the other night holding that gun. You were ready to use it. Are you afraid she’s coming back to hurt the kids?’

‘The last time she came—’ Agatha says. She trails off, takes a deep breath. ‘Are you sure you want to hear all this? It’s so goddamn depressing.’

Alex shakes his head.

‘It’s your story. And I appreciate you trusting me enough to tell it.’

Agatha sighs, heavily.

‘It’s certainly a story. The last time I saw Luca, well. . . She turned up at the house while I was working, claimed I’d agreed she could bring the kids out for a treat. Patric was busy, so I’d asked an older teenager from town to babysit because I was stuck. The girl really didn’t know better. Emilia sensed it was wrong but she didn’t know enough to say no. She didn’t realise she could. They got in the car with Luca and Luca drove them out to the lake. It was January and she said she wanted to bring them skating. At the lake, she launched into this rant and had a go at them for choosing me. The kids were terrified. They didn’t know what to do or say. And then Luca started snorting coke. She offered it to the kids.’

Agatha takes a breath.

Alex almost wants to take her hand. He can hear the horror of the memory in her voice but she’s still speaking calmly, still driving smoothly. She’s come to terms with this, he thinks, and he feels admiration for her.

‘Luca got so wasted that she passed out. The engine was off. She’d no phone. Emilia didn’t know what to do, but she knew enough to stay in the car. If they’d left the car. . .’

Alex can almost feel Agatha’s shudder.

‘It took us nine hours to find them,’ Agatha says. ‘They were all nearly frozen. They almost died. She claimed she hadn’t intended to hurt them, but I don’t know. I just don’t know.’

‘Christ,’ Alex says.

Agatha’s hands are tight on the steering wheel.

‘She’s barred from seeing them,’ Agatha says. ‘And she’s kept to it. I thought. . . I thought even she had realised she’d gone too far. But now, I think she’s trying to come back again.’

Alex shakes his head.

‘I don’t know what to say,’ he says.

‘We all have our crosses,’ Agatha says, shrugging. ‘Look at what you have to deal with right now.’

Alex considers this.

‘It’s not the same,’ he says. ‘I feel grief, and yes, I feel guilt, but even when she was driving me nuts, I loved Vicky and I know she loved me.’

Agatha smiles tightly.

‘Remember that,’ she says. ‘Because if that’s how you felt, she would have known. You always know. I loved my sister once, and Luca loved me, too. But, life changes.’

They fall quiet for a while.

‘Let me buy you a drink when we get back,’ Alex says, breaking the silence.

‘I don’t need pity,’ Agatha says, sharply. ‘That’s not why I told you about her.’

‘I know that. I’m not offering you pity. I want to say thank you for all the work you’re doing.’

‘It’s my job.’

‘I’ve a job, too, and I know the difference between doing it with my heart and doing it with my head. We didn’t get off to the best start, you and I.’

‘Because you thought I was incompetent,’ Agatha says.

‘Harsh. But on the nose. Things have changed, though.’

‘You’re still a pebble in my shoe,’ Agatha says. ‘Are you like this in your job? Relentless?’

‘That’s pretty much what my job is.’ Alex sighs.

They go to the same bar where Alex had sat a couple of nights previously. It’s busy tonight– a mixture of tourists and locals, winter sports blasting on the TV, ski gear stacked against the wall on the way in.

They make their way to a booth, order beers and chicken wings, and Alex tells Agatha some of the funnier stories from his job. He can tell she’s amazed and appalled in equal measure at the snake oil he has to sell and he’s not even telling her the half of it. He tempers it, in fact, with anecdotes about some of his nicer contracts for charitable and NGO outfits. He doesn’t tell her that this is a negligible percentage of his work and more often than not, he’s chasing lobbies that leave him needing Zopiclone to get to sleep some nights.

She surmises it, though.

‘You’re not happy,’ she says.

‘I’m very well paid to be unhappy,’ he says.

‘I can understand now why Vicky’s lifestyle irritated you so much. You hate your job, but you keep turning up.’

‘And it’s easy to be free when somebody else is picking up the tab. I loved Vicky, but she never grew up. Our parents indulged her. With me, it was different. Whatever I gave them, it never seemed enough. I earned enough to pay off their mortgage. That’s what my job did for them.’

‘Did they ask you to pay off the mortgage?’ Agatha says.

‘What do you mean?’ he asks.

‘Did it salve your conscience about your job, thinking you were putting the money you earned to good use?’

Alex doesn’t reply immediately. He’s bristling.

‘Sorry,’ Agatha says. ‘I shouldn’t have said that. It’s easy to be analytical about other people’s lives, isn’t it? I’m rarely so insightful about myself. Trust me.’

Her self-deprecation forces Alex to reflect on what she’s said, rather than react to it.

‘You’re right,’ he says. ‘My parents didn’t ask for their mortgage to be paid off. I wanted to make a point. I’ve been trying to make a point for the last sixteen years.’

‘What happened sixteen years ago?’

Alex almost smiles. It’s reflexive, something he used to do when he was embarrassed or nervous, not a sign of mirth; it’s something he’s had to work on. Smiling when somebody is having a pop at you is never a good idea. Keeping his face blank is the best way he knows not to show how he’s feeling.

‘This is starting to feel like a confessional,’ he says.

‘I’ve shown you mine, you show me yours,’ Agatha says.

Alex half smiles.

‘I was a bit of a tearaway as a teenager,’ he says. ‘Don’t know why. Maybe because Dad was so busy and I wanted his attention, or something equally pathetic and clichéd.’

Alex pauses.

‘Our area was poor enough,’ he says. ‘And I was. . . it sounds stupid, but I was too smart. And clever enough to hide it. I acted all Billy Big Balls, skipping school, being a smart mouth, so people wouldn’t figure out I was actually a nerd. I had anger issues. Sometimes. . . I still do.’

‘So, you’ve got in a few scrapes,’ Agatha says, in a tone that tells Alex she’s familiar with the tale.

‘Some worse than others,’ Alex says. He feels his chest constrict. The very memory of it makes him sweat.

‘I got in a fight with a lad one night,’ he says. ‘It was over nothing. I can’t even remember the details. We fought and I punched him so hard, when he hit the ground, he was knocked out. They thought he’d have brain damage.’

Agatha’s expression is one of calm understanding but Alex still suspects she’s judging him.

Everybody did at the time.

‘He was okay in the end. The cops. . . well, I was close to getting in real trouble, but my dad and the other lad’s dad– it just happened they were in the union together and between them, they sorted it. My headmaster stepped in as well, told everyone what a little closeted genius I was. My dad is all about class and how those on the lower rungs don’t count, but he had plenty of pull in our village. Nobody wanted a sixteen-year-old’s life ruined. But. . . it meant I had all that expectation on me, then. I’d been given a second chance. And boy, did my dad like to remind me of it.’

‘And you went and worked for the money men,’ Agatha says.

Alex snorts.

‘My bosses, they knew a good thing when they saw it. What my parents saw as a problem, TM it would put a lot of demons to rest. But Kaya is dead. I know it.’

Agatha notices a quick glance between Miika and Alex. They’ve already discussed this, she realises. Perhaps when she was searching Miika’s house and left the two of them talking. And she’d most likely have already heard about it, if she hadn’t been in such a rush to get down the mountain once she’d heard about Luca phoning the station.

‘Who do you think killed her?’ Agatha says.

Miika stares into his coffee, not looking at either of them.

‘I think Kaya was having an affair,’ he says. ‘I don’t know who it was. I never found out. She disappeared before I could confront her.’

Which of the men in this town could Kaya have been seeing, Agatha wonders? Who could have been with her and stayed quiet after?

It was what she’d suspected about Hilda after speaking to Anna in the café, that there’d been a man she hadn’t wanted anyone to know about. In Hilda’s case, she’d been right. Hilda was with a drug-dealing trucker.

A married man wouldn’t want it coming out that he’d been seeing Kaya.

And Lassi Niemenen is married.