Cold Breath (Gunnhildur Mystery Book 7)

by Quentin Bates

  ‘Four?’

  ‘Yeah, the guy the grumpy policewoman shot to start with, then they found someone they think was the dead man’s partner, drowned not far from the house where Osman was staying. On top of that, there’s been a scandal going on with some American far-right group that’s been holding meetings here over the last few days. One of the two men was murdered in his hotel, and they reckon the killer was the guy who drowned,’ Valgeir said, shaking his head. ‘Normally there’s one murder a year here, so this is like four years’ worth in one go. The police are going crazy.’

  ‘What was the fourth one? You only mentioned three.’

  ‘Oh, some lowlife drug dealer. They seem to think it’s connected to the others, but I don’t see how.’

  Ana felt the excitement inside as she flexed her fingers.

  ‘And our friend?’ she asked quietly.

  ‘He’s been moved somewhere out of the city for the moment, but Elinborg reckoned that he’ll be leaving the country very soon, probably tomorrow, she said.’

  ‘They’ve decided to get rid of him?’

  ‘Pretty much,’ Valgeir said. ‘In fact, I’m not the only one who’s leaving. Steinunn Strand, that’s the minister whose department I was working in, is going as well. She’s been bumped up to some fat UN post, so if she’s no longer in the country, then I reckon Osman’s welcome is about to expire.’

  Valgeir reached out and took her hand, clasping it in both of his as a smile spread across his face.

  ‘I’m so happy to see you,’ he said. ‘What a surprise. We’ll be travelling together, won’t we?’

  ‘Yeah, why not?’ Ana gently disengaged her hand and looked around the apartment. ‘You’ve sold this place?’

  ‘Not yet, but I have a couple of offers already. I’m holding out for a few more days to see if I get a better one.’

  ‘And you’re packed and ready to go?’

  ‘Pretty much.’

  Ana slipped out of the door and went along the hall, glancing into each room along the way.

  ‘You haven’t packed the bed yet?’

  ‘I’m not going to. A friend of mine is taking the fridge, the sofa and the bed.’

  Ana gave him a sly look that set Valgeir’s heart pumping.

  ‘In that case, we can make use of it, can’t we?’

  Osman was patient, just like a model husband, Gunna thought. He sat quietly with his hands folded in his lap as she bought what she needed, then carried the bag of new underwear, a bottle of shampoo and enough from the supermarket’s food aisle for an evening meal.

  ‘We’re not going to be able to stay here for long,’ Gunna said as they walked back to the flat.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘You didn’t notice people looking at you? They’ve seen your picture in the papers and I’d guess that you’ve been noticed. We should have just stayed indoors.’

  ‘I would go crazy if I had to stay in that tiny place for much longer.’

  ‘This is a small town. There are a lot more visitors these days, but people still notice a stranger, especially at this time of year, when it’s quiet.’

  ‘You mean you can’t hide in Iceland?’ Osman asked.

  Gunna laughed.

  ‘You can try, but it’s not easy. If you don’t want to be noticed, then you have to blend in, until people stop noticing you.’

  ‘And how long does that take?’

  ‘In Reykjavík, a few years. Where I come from, it would take at least a lifetime.’

  ‘So Iceland isn’t a place to hide?’

  ‘Not at all,’ Gunna said, pushing open the front door, which was stiff in its frame. ‘It’s pretty safe, but it’s not easy to stay out of sight. You can be sure that someone will have whispered to someone else who has a cousin who works for a newspaper, which means there’s only so long that we can sit it out here. One more night, maybe. I’m hoping Ívar Laxdal will have figured something out before then.’

  Osman went into the little living room, ran his eyes over the spines of the dozen or so books on the shelves and picked one. Gunna switched on the radio in the kitchen, then the percolator, and picked up her phone.

  Any news? she punched in and sent the message.

  Be with you at 1530, the reply came seconds later.

  She looked through to the other room and saw that Osman was sitting with the book in his hands, staring past the pages into space.

  ‘Hey.’

  ‘What?’ he asked, startled out of his thoughts.

  ‘There’s coffee in the machine,’ Gunna said. ‘Help yourself. Ívar Laxdal will be here in a couple of hours. Maybe we’ll learn something then.’

  ‘I have to brief the PM,’ Steinunn said, her voice bleak. ‘What’s the situation?’

  She had become a lonely figure behind the desk so wide that there was a chasm between her and anyone who wanted to speak to her. A few days before, the desk had been piled with reports and files in neat stacks, but the workload had already been discreetly taken away to be prepared for her successor.

  Ívar Laxdal raised an eyebrow in Birna’s direction to suggest that she could deliver the news, or lack of it.

  ‘Well . . .’ she began. ‘One of the dead men has been identified as a former mercenary. The second one—’

  ‘The drowned man?’ Steinunn broke in.

  ‘That’s him. He’s been conclusively linked to the first man, so the assumption is that the two of them were working together. There’s a third person linked to them who hasn’t been traced.’

  ‘And James Kearney? Have you identified his killer? As I said, I have to brief the PM on this, and he’s going to be climbing the walls if I don’t have anything for him, and for the Americans.’

  Birna opened her mouth and Ívar Laxdal could see her wondering how much to say.

  ‘We can be confident that these people were responsible for Kearney’s murder,’ he said. ‘We don’t have the details of who did what, but there’s enough evidence to link them to him.’

  Steinunn stared into Ívar Laxdal’s eyes.

  ‘Why?’ she demanded. ‘What on earth is their motive?’

  Ívar Laxdal stared back.

  ‘Cash,’ he said. ‘That’s what we believe, according to our opposite numbers in Europe.’

  ‘Just money?’

  ‘Exactly. These people were paid to murder James Kearney, possibly as a warning to the Children of Freedom to keep their activities to their own back yard. And your friend Osman has a price on his head. Five million dollars. That’s quite an incentive, so it’s no surprise it brings in people ready to run risks and take chances.’

  Steinunn sank into her seat and her eyes bulged. She hunched forward, elbows on her desk, the fingers of one hand nervously twisting a lock of hair.

  ‘Shit. I thought . . .’

  ‘It seems,’ Ívar Laxdal said slowly, sitting down and looking Steinunn in the eyes, ‘that your friend is a little of everything, but he managed one very unwise deal when he sold the same shipment of military hardware to two rival organizations. Neither of them got what they wanted, and now they both want Osman’s head on a plate. Hence the five million. That’s the rumour, at any rate.’

  ‘No wonder he’s a frightened man,’ Steinunn said in a hollow voice.

  ‘Frightened, yes,’ Ívar Laxdal said. ‘And with good reason. The question is, what are you going to do about it?’

  Ana strolled back through the town, enjoying window shopping and knowing that there was nothing she needed to buy, until a bookshop tempted her. After half an hour among the shelves, she emerged with a couple of novels under her arm.

  She knew where she was going, stepped out of the way of the ambling tourists, took a turn and walked uphill.

  ‘Good morning,’ the girl at the counter said.

  ‘Hi. I booked earlier. My name’s Susanna.’

  ‘You’re a little early, so take a seat, please. Someone will be with you soon. Would you like a coffee while you wait?’

  ‘
Yes. That would be lovely,’ Ana said, taking a seat in the corner and opening one of the two books. ‘Take as long as you like. I’m in no hurry.’

  For the first time, Osman looked lost and Gunna pushed a mug towards him.

  ‘You’re in the news again,’ she said. ‘Questions are being asked of the minister, and Steinunn is going. Did you know?’

  ‘What?’ He looked around in astonishment. ‘Going where?’

  Gunna scanned the pages of the copy of DV she had picked up at the supermarket.

  ‘A United Nations post,’ she said. ‘It seems it’s something pretty prestigious, although the subtext is that she’s being given a way to step down from government without having to be sacked.’

  ‘She’s going? Why hasn’t she told me?’

  There was real alarm in his voice.

  ‘Well, to start with, there was something of a panic yesterday. I reckon she had a lot on her mind, and on top of that, we whisked you away, and I don’t imagine Ívar has told her where you are.’

  ‘What now?’ Osman said, looking blankly over the top of Gunna’s head at the wall behind her.

  Gunna sat in silence and waited for him to continue or emerge from his thoughts.

  ‘I had hoped to stay here for a few weeks,’ he said eventually. ‘To think, consider my options and find some solutions.’

  ‘To what?’

  His eyes were pools of darkness in the gloom beneath the low ceiling.

  ‘To where I can be safe,’ he whispered. ‘But now I’m not sure there is any such place.’

  Steinunn’s office felt cold, and she glared at Ívar Laxdal over the expanse of desk between them as if she were defending against an invading army. She held Ívar Laxdal’s gaze. The door whispered open and Matthías came in.

  ‘You’re telling me I have to betray him, withdraw the offer to allow him to spend time here?’ she said.

  ‘That’s exactly what I’m telling you. Count the bodies,’ Ívar growled. ‘Four so far. How many more do we need?’

  Steinunn looked aside and chewed her lip.

  ‘What does my new adviser think?’ she asked, her eyes snapping into focus on Matthías.

  ‘With respect,’ he began, before Steinunn cut him off.

  ‘Less of the “with all due respect” bullshit. I didn’t come into politics yesterday, so I know what that phrase means and I’m no stranger to it.’

  Matthías clasped his hands together, fingers entwined.

  ‘With all due respect,’ he repeated, and this time without being interrupted, ‘it’s out of your hands. You’re not going to be in the country. Once you’ve taken up your new role in Madrid, it’s not as if you’re in a position to offer the gentleman in question hospitality, either personally or on behalf of the state.’

  Steinunn’s face darkened as Matthías continued.

  ‘In fact, it has never been entirely clear on whose authority he is here – yours personally, or the government’s – and there are questions that could arise about allocation of public resources. So far they haven’t, and hopefully they won’t be raised either in Parliament or in the media,’ he said in a pleasantly musical intonation. ‘However, the PM has more or less made up his mind already.’

  ‘And?’ Steinunn said.

  ‘He said, and I quote, “Get that piece of trouble out of my back yard.” He also requested an update as soon as the situation has been resolved.’

  Steinunn bowed her head.

  ‘You mean he wants confirmation as soon as Osman is out of the country?’

  ‘That’s about it. And he has to be gone before you leave for Madrid.’

  *

  Ana liked the look and admired it in the mirror as the hairdresser stepped back.

  The brown hair that had brushed her shoulders had been cut high and sharp to the tops of her ears. It was a shade darker than it had been, mahogany instead of chipboard, she decided.

  ‘That’s lovely, thank you,’ she said as she pulled on her coat.

  ‘See you again.’

  ‘Maybe,’ Ana said. ‘Next time I have a holiday in Iceland.’

  Outside she looked both ways. Food or work?

  It had to be work, so she walked back downhill the way she had come earlier, back towards the western part of town with its endless souvenir shops and bars that wouldn’t be open until later in the day.

  She made for the imposing building she had made a habit of visiting over the last few days, sat at one of the library’s computer terminals and logged in to the first of several social media accounts that she used.

  Astrid’s Facebook profile page, with its avatar of a cartoon puppy, looked back at her, and a moment later it had been deleted.

  She punched in another address and a password, and Peter Eriksen’s profile appeared, this time with an avatar of a young man with long hair that curled down to his shoulders and glasses with heavy black frames.

  Ana clicked a few like buttons, ignored a couple of friend requests, added a few non-committal comments in places to keep the profile alive before opening the messages folder. She read the two most recent messages from a sender she recognized and ignored the rest. She replied in the usual format, informing the other person that Michael had decided to go back to school – a code reporting that Michel was no longer in circulation – and that she would be in class in the next few days, so should they meet for a coffee in the usual place? That meant a debriefing was needed. She noticed that the message had been received, but no reply appeared.

  She could return later in the day and check if there was an answer that needed her attention. In the meantime she could take it easy. A sandwich and a beer in one of the cafés would suit her, and then a quiet hour in one of the galleries looking at stark Nordic art that she felt had an alien quality to it.

  She logged out, cleared the usage history and stood up, wondering as she did so if that naïve boy were dead yet. The look of surprise and dismay on his face when reality had dawned on him had made her want to laugh at the time, but now it was just saddening.

  She would have to check on him soon to make sure and remove the evidence. But lunch could come first.

  It was a shame, as she had genuinely liked him when they had met in Helsinki, and again when he had been besotted enough to meet her in Berlin. She reflected that with a little moulding and some prodding under her guidance, he could have turned from a nervous, gauche young man into a pleasantly interesting companion.

  It was too late now, though, and there were plenty more interesting men around, even if most of them had already been snapped up. She shrugged. It wasn’t as if that had ever been a problem.

  ‘I like it here,’ Osman said. He looked around the bare walls and the cupboard doors painted in pastel colours.

  ‘What do you like so much?’

  ‘Listen.’

  Gunna sat still. Around them the old building creaked almost imperceptibly and the wind whispered at the window that was open a crack.

  ‘I don’t hear anything.’

  ‘That’s just it. Not a car to be heard. No people. No noise. Not even children playing outside,’ he said. ‘Just quiet.’

  ‘It’s not always like this. It was quieter at Einholt.’

  ‘Maybe. But it was almost like being a prisoner there. A prisoner in great comfort, but still a prisoner. What we have done today – gone for a walk, had a meal – is something I have not been able to do safely for a long time.’

  ‘Because you’re a wanted man?’ Gunna said. ‘You must have upset someone pretty badly.’

  ‘That doesn’t matter now,’ he said a with a dismissive shake of his head.

  Gunna craned her neck to look at the kitchen clock high on the wall.

  ‘Well, I reckon Ívar should be here soon, and we’ll find out what the plans are. This place is fine for a few hours, I suppose, but it’s not going to be once word gets out that you’re staying here.’

  ‘You haven’t heard from Steinunn?’

  ‘Of course no
t,’ Gunna said. ‘She doesn’t communicate with people at my level. Ívar or one of the ministry staff will pass on whatever she’s decided. I don’t imagine we’ll be the first ones to find out what’s going on.’

  Skúli rang the bell, and when there was no answer he hammered on the door.

  ‘Valgeir? You there?’ he called out.

  The house seemed deserted. He peered through the grubby panes of glass in the front door and saw the narrow hallway stacked with neat lines of boxes taped shut, the walls bare of the pictures that usually hung on them.

  Valgeir had to be out somewhere.

  Skúli took a step back and took out his phone, scrolled through the numbers and hit the call button by Valgeir’s name. He listened to the phone ring, and ring some more, until the voicemail message cut in and he ended the call.

  In a meeting? Hardly, he decided. Valgeir was on gardening leave so there was nothing official to occupy him. He thumbed the redial button, and in the distance he was sure he could hear the electronic chime he recognized as Valgeir’s ringtone.

  When voicemail cut in yet again, he put his ear to the door, called again, and this time there was no mistaking the faint ringing inside the flat of the phone that never left Valgeir’s side.

  He wondered whether or not to call the police, but his experience the previous day helped him make up his mind as he tried the door handle and wasn’t surprised to find it locked.

  Could he pick the lock, he wondered? He scanned the heavy wooden door and knew there was no possibility that he could break in this way. He went up the steps and checked all of the flat’s windows, finding one that was open the crucial inch that let him get his fingers behind it. He pulled it open halfway, far enough to get a hand inside and release the mechanism holding it in place, then felt something break as he wrenched it fully open.

  It didn’t occur to him until he was halfway through that the window might not be wide enough, and it was a squeeze to get through the narrow gap, adding scratches to his knuckles to go with the grazes he had acquired the day before.

  The window was the smallest one, leading to the smallest room in the flat, and he felt for a foothold, managing to step onto the toilet and lower himself down, gasping with exertion and nerves. If anyone had seen him scrambling through a window, he could expect a knock at the door before long and someone in uniform wanting to ask a few awkward questions.