In the Heat of the Moment (Sandhamn Murders Book 5)

by Viveca Sten

  “Sachsen also thought he’d taken something else, but it’s too early to know specifics. It doesn’t have to be an illegal narcotic, of course. It could be some kind of medication.” Thomas thought for a moment. “Cocaine is expensive. If Victor’s supply ran out, maybe he went for a cheaper option?”

  “That doesn’t exactly improve the situation,” Margit pointed out.

  “No.”

  Thomas remembered a case some years earlier when a guy mixed hard alcohol with strong painkillers and then attacked his family and smashed up his house. He had been completely crazy by the time Thomas and his colleagues arrived on the scene; it took three men to subdue him. The following day, he didn’t remember a thing and couldn’t believe he’d gone berserk.

  “By the way,” Margit said, “I managed to contact the girl named Tessan, the one who was with Tobbe Hökström. Her full name is Therese Almblad, she’s fourteen years old, and she’s just finished eighth grade, as Christoffer said. I spoke to her a few minutes ago.”

  It was clear from Margit’s expression that she had useful information.

  “I’m listening,” Thomas said.

  “She says she and Tobbe parted company not long after they went over to the other boat.”

  “Is she sure?”

  “Yes. According to Therese, they arrived together at about eight and went and sat in the stern with everyone else; apparently it was pretty crowded. They’d brought a couple of bottles of vodka and started mixing drinks, but after a while, Tobbe said he was going ashore to find a toilet. According to Therese, he never came back. In the end, she got tired of waiting and hooked up with someone else.”

  “So what time did he leave?”

  “Between eight and eight thirty in the evening.”

  “So the boy was off the radar for several hours.”

  “Exactly. He doesn’t have an alibi, plus he lied to us.”

  “That’s interesting, especially in view of what Sachsen said. Victor was involved in a fight before he died.”

  Margit frowned. “Tobbe Hökström had a large bruise on his cheek.” She picked up the banana skin with two fingers and dropped it in the trash can. “There is one thing I’m wondering about.”

  “Go on?”

  “If we assume Tobbe tried to stop a fight between Victor and Felicia, surely it would have been enough for him to step in? Why would he have killed Victor, as Sachsen described the course of events? And several blows . . . it doesn’t make sense.”

  Thomas tried to picture the scene on the shore.

  Felicia, desperately calling for help. Tobbe suddenly appears—maybe she’d managed to text him to say that Victor had lost it? Tobbe arrives, hears her screaming, and comes running. He pulls at his friend’s arm, and in the struggle, Victor falls and bangs his head.

  “I’m wondering if the blow to the head had an effect on Victor,” Thomas said slowly. “Together with the booze and the drugs. Maybe he became aggressive to the point where his best friend barely recognized him. Tobbe might have simply been trying to defend himself; he picked up a stone, and . . .”

  “We need to bring Tobbe in as soon as possible,” Margit said. “And Felicia. They’ve definitely got more to tell us.”

  Thomas looked at his watch; the afternoon team meeting was due to start shortly.

  “First thing tomorrow morning,” he said.

  CHAPTER 55

  It felt as if the air was standing still. Thomas was fanning himself with his notebook, trying to cool off. It was almost eighty degrees in the room. The Old Man, at the head of the conference table, had dark sweat patches under his arms, and his forehead was shiny with perspiration.

  The whole group—apart from Erik and Kalle, who were still on Sandhamn—had gathered for an update before the end of the working day.

  “What can you tell us about the victim?” the Old Man said to Harry Anjou, who had a pile of papers in front of him.

  “Victor Ekengreen was sixteen years old, and he’d graduated from high school earlier this month with decent grades,” Anjou began. “The family lives in a large villa on Lidingö. His father is Johan, his mother is Madeleine—she’s a housewife. They’ve been married for nineteen years, and it’s the father’s second marriage. There’s an eighteen-year-old daughter, plus two half siblings who are considerably older and live overseas.”

  “No shortage of money in that family,” Margit commented.

  Maybe that’s the problem, Thomas thought, if a sixteen-year-old can afford to use cocaine on a regular basis.

  “Victor enjoyed water sports and downhill skiing,” Anjou went on. “I’ve spoken to several of his classmates, who describe him in different ways. Some saw him as a sporty guy, possibly a little shy, while others say he was pretty full of himself and not always a good friend.”

  “What do you mean by that?” Margit asked.

  Anjou looked down at his notes. “One boy in particular said that Victor Ekengreen was kind of cocky, always throwing his father’s name around, for example.” He looked around the table. “I’m assuming I don’t need to explain who Johan Ekengreen is?”

  The Old Man shook his head, and Anjou continued.

  “Everyone I spoke to said that Victor often fell out with classmates he didn’t like.”

  “You mean he made enemies?” Thomas said. “Might be worth following up?”

  Anjou shrugged. “Nobody went quite that far, but there were certainly those who didn’t like the guy. He was also described as moody and argumentative.”

  “He doesn’t sound very nice,” Karin Ek said from the other end of the table.

  “What about the girlfriend?” the Old Man said, turning to Margit. “You were going to speak to her?”

  “Her name is Felicia Grimstad. They were in the same class at high school and didn’t live far from each other. She has two siblings and is generally described as conscientious, maybe a little needy. She hooked up with Victor during the fall, and they’ve been together ever since. Her father works in recruitment, and her mother is a school librarian.”

  “She’s coming in tomorrow morning,” Thomas chimed in. “So is Tobbe Hökström.”

  The Old Man wiped his forehead with a handkerchief. The dark patches under his arms had spread, and his face was red.

  “Phone calls?” he said. “What do we know about his contacts?”

  “I’ve requested his phone records, and they’ll be here in a day or two,” Thomas replied. “We’re also going through his text messages, but we haven’t found anything useful so far.”

  “Have we heard anything from Sachsen?” the Old Man asked, tucking his handkerchief in his pocket.

  “The autopsy was done earlier today.” Thomas reported on the pathologist’s findings. He had almost finished when he was interrupted by the wail of a siren slicing through the air outside the window. He waited for the sound to fade into the distance before he concluded. “We’ll have to wait and see what the chemical analysis tells us.”

  The Old Man pondered for a moment. “So Victor was using drugs; it would be interesting to find out more about that.”

  “Absolutely,” Thomas agreed. “We’ll bring it up with Felicia and Tobbe tomorrow.”

  “He must have had a supplier,” the Old Man said. “We need to find out who it was.”

  Anjou leaned forward as if he wanted to say something.

  “Yes?” the Old Man said.

  “There were significantly more narcotics on Sandhamn this year than in the past,” Anjou said. “We ought to speak to the drug squad. They had six undercover officers working there all weekend. I think it’s the first time they’ve run such a big operation over there. The fact is, several known dealers were seen around the harbor area.” Anjou paused and cleared his throat. “Have you heard of Goran Minosevitch?” he asked. “He was there on Saturday.”

  Minosevitch was a well-known supplier in his fifties with links to various gangs; he had already served time for extensive drug-related crimes, as far as Thoma
s was aware.

  “He’s a nasty piece of work,” Anjou said. “Tall and well-built, covered in tattoos. He was on the island with his entourage, celebrating on a boat right in the middle of the harbor.”

  The Old Man turned to Thomas and Margit. “Check it out with the drug squad; it could be worth following up. But make sure you don’t lose momentum with Victor’s friends.”

  Thomas made a note. There are still plenty of theories, he thought. We need to leave every door open; this could be about something as banal as a fight over drugs.

  He pushed aside the earlier images from the shore. Every avenue must be explored without prejudice.

  Nora was standing by the kitchen window. She couldn’t help looking toward her old house, where Jonas and Wilma were. The front door was in shadow. It was usually left open, but right now it was closed.

  She’d heard nothing from Jonas all day, and the painful lump in her throat was growing. She kept on hoping he would appear on the front step so that she could pop over and say hello. Just a brief chat, that was all she needed, maybe a pat on the cheek or a quick hug.

  She wanted to touch him, feel that the physical contact between them was natural and self-evident, that nothing had changed. It would chase away all her misgivings.

  However, there was no sign of life, and she didn’t feel she could go and knock on the door without a reason.

  There were a few dead flies on the window seat. Nora tore off a piece of paper towel and gathered up the black bodies. She went to put them in the trash can and discovered that it was full to overflowing. As usual, the boys had kept on cramming in as much as possible; a couple of used tea bags and an apple core had fallen out. The last drops from an overturned milk carton had trickled onto the floor.

  With a sigh, she cleaned up the mess, then tied the bag and put in a new one. She would walk down to the dumpsters in the harbor after dinner.

  Maybe she would bump into Jonas? The prospect made her feel better.

  She put the bag in the hallway so she wouldn’t forget it, then took her cell phone out of her pocket. What if she sent a brief text asking how Wilma was? There was nothing strange about wanting to know that his daughter was OK. He couldn’t possibly object. Nora was fond of Wilma, too.

  Before she could change her mind, she brought up his number.

  How’s Wilma? Is she OK now? Love Nora

  She pressed “Send.” Fingers crossed.

  CHAPTER 56

  After the meeting, Margit accompanied Thomas to his office and sat down in the visitor’s chair. He picked up the phone and called Torbjörn Landin, the senior drug squad officer who had been in charge of the operation on Sandhamn over the weekend. With a bit of luck, he would still be around, though it was technically after hours.

  A deep voice answered, and Thomas switched to speakerphone.

  “Landin.”

  Only the last name; he didn’t need to say more.

  “Hi. I’m calling about the teenager who died on Sandhamn,” Thomas said, then went on to explain.

  “We heard that Goran Minosevitch was on the island during the Midsummer weekend,” Margit added.

  “Don’t underestimate him,” Landin said immediately.

  “What do you have on him?”

  “What do you want to know?”

  Even though Thomas knew that Landin had probably been on duty around the clock for the past few days, he suspected there was something more than lack of sleep behind his weary tone of voice. The widespread sense of frustration within the drug squad was no secret. They carried a heavy load, with far from adequate resources at their disposal.

  “We’ve got plenty on Minosevitch,” Landin went on. “He doesn’t declare an income, so he doesn’t pay taxes, like most of his associates. I think he’s taken paid medical leave on at least one occasion. He’s been in jail several times, mainly for narcotics offenses. But he’s also been involved in arms dealing, plus he has a number of debts registered with the county court.”

  “Is he violent?”

  “He’s been convicted of assault as well as threatening behavior toward officials. Most of those guys have.”

  “Where’s he from?” Margit asked.

  “The former Yugoslavia.”

  Landin didn’t need to explain. Over the past three decades, criminals from the Balkans had established themselves as major players in most illegal activities. They had been targeted by both the police and rival gangs but had more than survived.

  “Do you happen to know whether Minosevitch sells drugs to teenagers?” Thomas asked.

  “That depends on your definition of selling. If you’re asking whether he does it personally, then the answer is no. But his henchmen . . . absolutely.”

  “What are we talking about here?” Margit said.

  “Most things. Cannabis; benzos; cocaine, of course, particularly in Stockholm; and amphetamines. Ecstasy is also widespread. There’s plenty of everything available; for every new drug that’s illegal, another one comes along, and there’s very little we can do about it.”

  Thomas had felt the same sense of hopelessness on occasion, but not the cynicism behind Landin’s words.

  “I suppose teenagers are mainly using cannabis?” he said.

  “Yes. Then amphetamines and cocaine.”

  “What about multiple substance abuse—medication and alcohol?” Margit asked.

  Landin made an unintelligible sound. “It’s pretty common and extremely dangerous. The user either slows right down or becomes unnaturally lively. There are incidences of poisoning or falling into a coma. People can also become uncontrollably aggressive and violent. It’s one hell of a cocktail.”

  “But aren’t most of these drugs available only as prescription?”

  “That’s no obstacle. Painkillers like Tradolan and Citodon, or tranquilizers like Sobril, are easy to get hold of. Rohypnol or Efedrin can be found online. Unfortunately the use of this kind of medication is growing fast, especially among teenagers.”

  Thomas realized why: minors weren’t prosecuted for abuse or possession, so the situation was almost impossible to control.

  “That’s alarming,” Margit said.

  “You could say that.”

  “What’s the situation with suppliers to high school students?”

  “Street dealers?”

  “Yes.”

  Landin snorted. “We could keep an army of cops occupied full-time in Stockholm alone. New dealers are popping up all the time, with different phone numbers that are spread among the kids. Some go for booze, others heavier shit. Again, it’s something that’s increased significantly over the past few years, especially in the suburbs.”

  “I assume you had Minosevitch and his gang under surveillance on Midsummer’s Day?” Margit said.

  “Correct.”

  “We suspect the victim might have gotten into a fight with his dealer, and things spiraled out of control,” Thomas explained. “It would be helpful if we knew exactly where Minosevitch and his cronies were between certain times.”

  “In that case, I suggest we meet up first thing tomorrow morning. If you come by at eight, I’ll gather the team that was on Sandhamn.”

  Margit had been making notes during the conversation, and Thomas could see that she’d drawn thick lines under the words multiple substance abuse and aggressive.

  Victor’s friends had talked about his changeable moods. The image of two teenagers fighting came into Thomas’s mind once more.

  CHAPTER 57

  Tobbe was lying on the sofa in the living room. The television was on, but he had no idea what he was watching.

  He had to go down to the police station in Nacka in the morning. The woman on the phone had spoken in kind of clipped tones. She had sounded like his old German teacher.

  Why did they want to speak to him again so soon?

  Maybe they were mad because he and Christoffer had left Sandhamn, but that wasn’t his fault; Dad had insisted. But Arthur wasn’t around when the c
ops called, of course, and Tobbe hadn’t dared to refuse. He had promised to be there at ten.

  There was no one else in the apartment. Christoffer was with his friends, and Mom had gone shopping. Yesterday she had been waiting for them with a terrified look in her eyes, but Tobbe had walked straight past her without saying anything.

  She just didn’t get it.

  Arthur had been tight-lipped as he drove them home. “Don’t say a word to the police without talking to me first.”

  That was his final comment before he drove away. He hadn’t even mentioned the fact that Victor was dead or asked how Tobbe was feeling.

  “Fucking asshole,” Tobbe muttered. “All you care about is what other people think. You couldn’t care less about me or Christoffer, and you never have. All you’re good for is paying.”

  Money had never been a problem for Arthur. After the divorce, he had given Tobbe cash if he did well in school: five hundred for a “good” and a thousand for “excellent.” Arthur cared about that kind of crap.

  It was a lot of money, more than most of his classmates had access to. Victor had been impressed when he found out. They had been sitting on a bench in the schoolyard just after they’d been given the results of their first math test of the fall semester. Tobbe’s grade was “good.”

  “Five hundred straight into my pocket,” he had said with satisfaction.

  “Your dad must feel real fucking bad about what he did,” Victor had said, lighting a cigarette. “Talk about a guilt trip.”

  He held out the pack to Tobbe, who fished out a Marlboro and lit it. “I guess he’s paying us off,” Tobbe said with a grin.

  That had been eight months ago. It felt like a hundred years.

  Listlessly he reached for the large bottle of Coca-Cola on the coffee table; he didn’t bother with a glass. It was lukewarm, and he didn’t care. He hadn’t eaten all day, but he wasn’t hungry.

  Victor was dead. He couldn’t get his head around it.

  Tobbe swallowed, and the taste of cola was mingled with the taste of tears.

  CHAPTER 58

  It was almost time for dinner, but Jonas wasn’t really hungry. He had hardly exchanged two words with Wilma all day, even though he’d stayed home for her sake. She had slept for a long time, then she’d gotten up, taken the sandwiches he’d made for her, and gone straight back to her room.