Thin Ice: An Inspector Gunna Mystery (Gunnhildur Mystery Book 5) Read online

  ‘Yep.’ Magni grinned. ‘That’s about it.’

  ‘Well, maybe if you play your cards right you could get lucky tonight, I suppose.’

  Magni rooted through a drawer in the kitchenette in the corner of the long living room and came up with a couple of phone chargers.

  ‘Össi! Phone!’

  Össur appeared from the bathroom zipping up his trousers. He fished in his pocket and handed Magni his old-fashioned Nokia.

  ‘Looks like the one,’ Magni said, comparing the phone with the tangle of wires and plugging one in. ‘We shall see.’ He plugged the other end into the wall socket and was rewarded with a signal tone from Össur’s phone. ‘There you go. Give it a minute to start charging and then you can give it a try.’

  ‘This is the guy who can sort out passports, is it?’ Tinna Lind asked.

  Össur grunted in reply.

  ‘Do we get to know who this guy is?’

  ‘You don’t want to, believe me,’ Össur replied, and Magni could sense the fear in his voice.

  * * *

  Ívar Laxdal’s office was a fairly large one, but it still seemed crowded with Gunna, Helgi and Eiríkur grouped around his desk.

  ‘We have Alli the Cornershop and his latest boneheaded enforcer, Baldvin Ásgeirsson, in separate interview rooms, each with a uniformed officer for company. Helgi feels we have enough to hold the bonehead in custody. We’re not sure about Alli,’ Gunna said. ‘I’d like a search warrant to go through his place. I’m as certain as I can be that Baldvin started the fire, certainly on Alli’s instructions. If we can come up with the petrol can, preferably empty, then we’d have something to hold him on.’

  ‘And if you don’t?’

  ‘We let him go. But knowing the kind of business Alli is in, it seems unlikely we won’t come across something that’ll let us keep hold of him.’

  ‘Unthinkable, I’d say,’ Helgi put in, while Ívar Laxdal rubbed his chin and listened to the rasp of thumbnail on bristle.

  ‘Don’t underestimate Alli the Cornershop,’ he said finally. ‘He’s been a pain in the neck for years with dope, bootleg booze, handling stolen goods, collecting debts, supplying teenage Russian escorts, and all the rest of it. But we’ve never been able to make a serious charge stick. Don’t forget I remember the bastard of old, before any of you joined the force.’

  ‘He’s a sly old fox,’ Helgi agreed. ‘I’m wondering if we push Baldvin hard enough, will he crack and finger Alli?’

  Gunna shook her head. ‘He might crack, but I doubt he’d implicate Alli. Baldvin’s life wouldn’t be worth living if he did that, inside prison or out of it. Nobody likes a grass. Baldvin may be dim but he’s not that stupid. He wouldn’t dare unless he had a cast-iron assurance of a suspended sentence, and he’d never get off that lightly.’

  Ívar Laxdal nodded slowly. There was a grim look on his heavy face, but Gunna could see a twinkle of glee behind his dark eyes.

  ‘It won’t do any harm to push him as hard as you like, Helgi. Go ahead. Pile the pressure on him as hard as his lawyer will let you without complaining too much. Do the same with Alli, and I’ll apply for the warrant, which I don’t imagine will be a problem. Now, the other side of all this. What’s the story there?’

  ‘We don’t have a clue where three of the four missing persons are, but one of them turned up safe and sound at home last night, and was considerate enough to call and let us know this morning,’ Gunna said, and Ívar Laxdal’s eyebrows crept upwards in question. ‘Eiríkur?’

  ‘That’s right,’ Eiríkur said. Ívar Laxdal still made him nervous and he had to force himself not to gabble. ‘Erna Björg Brandsen’s husband called in this morning to say that she had returned last night. Gunna and Helgi were busy, so I went to her home and asked as many questions as I could.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Claims she crawled out of the toilet window at a filling station café in Borgarnes and ran for it. When she saw the others drive away, she went back to the café and just sat there until someone asked if she was all right and let her use the phone to call her husband, who went to collect her.’

  ‘So the others – the daughter, Össur and the unknown man – are all still on the loose? Did she tell you anything that could lead to them?’

  ‘No,’ Eiríkur said. ‘Not really. She claims she was in a daze most of the time. She didn’t know the other man’s name, didn’t notice the number of the car they are travelling in and didn’t even recognize the model, other than to say it was a grey estate. There are so many holes in what she’s saying that it’s hard to know where to start.’

  ‘Did she identify Brandur Geirsson’s killer?’

  ‘She said Össur had a gun and she saw him fire it at least once, and saw Brandur Geirsson collapse.’

  ‘Good. We have a witness,’ Ívar Laxdal said. ‘Is she stringing us along, or just being selective?’

  ‘I’d say she’s definitely not telling us everything. No question. Plus she seems oddly unconcerned about her daughter. That’s the part I can’t get my head around. If it was my child, I’d be frantic.’

  The fingers of one of Ívar Laxdal’s meaty hands drummed the table. ‘My approach would be to arrest Baldvin and let him stew in a cell, and for you to push Alli as hard as you can, Gunnhildur, and leave these two gentlemen to have a serious talk with the lady, preferably without her husband being present. Don’t be rough on her, but just go through every tiny detail until she slips up. If she hasn’t had a medical examination after a week of being held hostage, then she ought to, and a psychiatric examination may be in order, too.’ He looked up and surveyed the team sitting in front of him. ‘I’ll get your warrant as soon as I can. Take a couple of uniformed officers and I’m sure someone from narcotics will be only too happy to take a close look at Alli the Cornershop’s house.’

  ‘We’ll see. I’m not expecting a wily old operator like Alli to leave anything incriminating lying around,’ Gunna said.

  A wintry smile lit up Ívar Laxdal’s craggy face. ‘Maybe not, but we’ll see if he’s slipped up for once, or if his pal with the broken teeth has.’

  ‘If there’s anything there, we’ll find it.’ She looked at her watch and scowled. ‘And right now I have an important appointment that I’m already late for.’

  ‘My fault, Gunnhildur. Just say it’s my fault.’

  ‘I always do,’ Gunna assured him.

  Rafn was starting to feel at home in a suit. Planning officials generally found themselves at a sudden disadvantage presented with a man in a designer suit when they had been expecting a thug in leathers. But it was as well to dispose of the suit once the meetings were over and he had to mix with his own people again. In fact, the suit lived in a shallow wardrobe in the corner of what Rafn called his office, the boardroom at the Undertakers’ headquarters.

  It had once been an industrial building halfway down a sprawling trading estate, between a busy road and the shoreline that had once been a shipyard. The area was rapidly becoming urbanized as smart rows of terraced houses sprang up. The company that had previously owned the building had moved on and the Undertakers had bought the place, something that a few of them now realized had been a very shrewd move on their part, which was largely down to Rafn’s business acumen. The old workshops had come with a surprising amount of ground, according to the deeds, some of which the local authority had encroached on, and which the local government suits had belatedly admitted meant a substantial amount of money was owed in compensation.

  Things were looking good for the Undertakers, Rafn felt. He wondered how many of them had figured out that the building and the surrounding land, a strip of which was now being negotiated over with a developer as the surrounding area continued to change from semi-industrial sprawl to chic residential, actually belonged not to the association itself but to a company partly owned by the Undertakers, which was also owned by himself and two or three of the smarter members.

  He hung the suit in the shallow cupboard and
pulled on his jeans and a T-shirt. Rafn looked in the mirror and untied the band holding his long hair back, letting it fall down his back instead. He felt pleased with himself. The development plans were looking promising, with the Undertakers set for a percentage of the profits instead of a flat purchase price on the line of houses and flats that would be built on the edge of their land. With a few more careful investments, they could find themselves legitimate and still respectably profitable in a few years’ time. It would be a relief to dispose of a few of their illegal rackets, although it could be a wrench as there were undoubtedly some that would be worth keeping a discreet hold of.

  Rafn’s phone buzzed and he answered it just as Jón Egill walked into the office.

  ‘Rafn.’

  Jón Egill stood in the doorway and Rafn motioned him in to take a seat.

  ‘You see, it’s a little sensitive at the moment,’ Rafn said and winked at Jón Egill. ‘I reckon your name’s pretty toxic right now, Össi,’ he said, dropping the name and watching Jón Egill spin round from gazing out of the window.

  ‘Össi Óskars?’ he mouthed, and Rafn nodded.

  ‘It depends, Össi. It depends on your situation and what you have to negotiate with. I get your meaning and understand perfectly that you’re in a difficult position. What I don’t quite get is what you’re asking for. Are you asking us to do you a favour, purely and simply for the love of it, or do you have something to give us in return for what you’re asking?’

  Rafn managed to sound businesslike in spite of the grin on his face, which Jón Egill found himself sharing.

  ‘No problem, Össi. Always ready to talk, but business is business, you know? All right, man. Think about it and give me a call back,’ Rafn said. ‘Yeah, any time.’

  He ended the call and sat back in his chair while Jón Egill leaned against the window sill and grinned.

  ‘That was Össi Óskars, was it? He’s come out of hiding?’

  ‘It was,’ Rafn confirmed. ‘And he’s in the shit up to his neck.’

  ‘Well?’

  Magni stood in the doorway with folded arms as Össur put the phone down. ‘What did your mate have to say? It doesn’t sound like he was all that pleased to hear from you.’

  Össur’s face was even paler than usual. ‘He’s all right, is Rafn. Known him since he was a boy,’ he said with unconvincing false confidence.

  ‘And now he sells illegal passports?’

  ‘And a few other things as well. But he’s a good lad, he’ll sort us out.’

  The corners of Tinna Lind’s mouth bowed downwards in distrust. ‘So who is he?’

  ‘He’s a businessman, of sorts,’ Össur replied, a smile revealing darkened teeth. ‘He’s an Undertaker.’

  ‘One of the bikers?’

  ‘What do you think?’

  ‘All right,’ Magni broke in. ‘So what did he say? Can he come up with three passports good enough to get us out of the country?’

  ‘Yep . . .’

  ‘There’s a catch, I take it?’

  ‘It’ll cost something,’ Össur said. ‘These guys don’t do anything for nothing.’

  ‘Then you’d better find out and see if we can afford it. Go on, call him back.’

  ‘I’ll have to meet him somewhere.’

  ‘You mean we’ll have to meet him somewhere.’

  Össur’s face twisted in doubt. ‘I don’t know. It’d be best if I meet him. I know this lad.’

  ‘I don’t think so, Össi. All of us or none of us.’

  ‘You don’t trust me?’ Össur barked.

  Magni laughed. ‘Össi, would you trust you?’

  Gunna was distressed to see how tired Gísli looked. He sat at a table with a glass of water in one hand and his phone in the other. As she walked into the café his face lit up with a smile and he stood up to kiss her cheek.

  ‘Hæ, sweetheart,’ she said, sitting down. ‘I’m sorry I’m late. The Laxdal kept me talking and I couldn’t just walk out.’

  Gísli passed her his menu. ‘Law and order keeping you busy right now, is it?’

  ‘Just a bit. Have you already decided what you’re having?’

  ‘I’ll go for the burger with bacon.’

  ‘The same for me. And can you get a jug of water?’

  Gunna collected her thoughts while Gísli went to the counter. The café was a place only open from seven until around four, serving breakfasts and cheap, solid lunches for a clientele of mostly students and tradesmen. She reflected that sooner or later it would be discovered and would gradually slip upmarket and become more expensive while its original customers would, a few at a time, find somewhere else to chat or read the paper while they ate.

  ‘Five minutes,’ Gísli said, placing a jug of iced water and another glass on the table.

  ‘You know the story that’s been in the papers about the two women who disappeared?’

  ‘Yeah. I’ve seen that.’

  ‘That’s what I’m working on and it’s at the top of the priority list at the moment.’

  ‘Fair enough. In that case I’d better not ask anything. I know you’re not supposed to talk about work.’

  ‘I’m always ready to not talk about work. But it does mean I can’t hang around for long,’ Gunna said, shaking off her coat and hanging it over the back of her chair. ‘Oh, and I have to go and search someone’s house this afternoon.’

  ‘One of . . .?’

  ‘No, not one of them. But don’t ask.’

  The burgers arrived, fragrant and reassuringly solid, with a vast bowl of chips.

  ‘I thought we could share these,’ Gísli said.

  ‘I think you’d better eat all of those chips, otherwise I’ll have to be shopping for new trousers on the way home. How’s your . . .’ She hesitated as she sliced into the burger. ‘How’s Thorvaldur?’

  ‘He’s not great, Mum. He doesn’t have long to go.’ Gísli’s face twisted in discomfort. ‘You really didn’t want me to contact him, did you?’

  ‘No. Not really. He had a zero track record of wanting to be your dad, so I couldn’t figure out why you wanted to meet him.’

  ‘Curiosity, Mum. Remember that?’

  ‘Curiosity killed the cat,’ Gunna reminded him, taking a chip, dipping it in mayonnaise and pointing it at him before eating it.

  ‘That’s good, coming from a detective.’ Gísli grinned. ‘Your whole work revolves around digging into other people’s business.’

  ‘True. I get to poke my nose into all sorts and get paid for it. All right. I wasn’t happy that you wanted to see your dad,’ she said, skewering a forkful of salad as misplaced penance for the chips. ‘I can understand it, but I didn’t feel the time was right. I thought you were spreading yourself too thin. Two small children, the two girls, and then there was Naomi,’ she added and her voice tailed off. ‘So what’s troubling Thorvaldur? Has a life of excess caught up with him?’

  ‘You could say that. The woman he’d been living with for a long time died last year and it hit him hard. It was after that that he seemed ready to talk to me, as if she had been the one who didn’t want his children sniffing around.’

  ‘Thorvaldur and his many women . . .’ Gunna said, trying to keep the chagrin out of her voice.

  ‘Anyway,’ Gísli said, ‘he has bowel cancer. It was already far advanced before he got round to going to the doctor to find out what was wrong with him and he doesn’t have long.’

  ‘How long?’ Gunna asked, feeling a sudden chill and not wanting to hear the answer.

  ‘Days, probably. He could still get about until a few days ago, but he was admitted to hospital on Sunday night and the only way he’s coming out is feet first. So now I feel I did the right thing in making contact with him before it was too late.’

  ‘You’re right,’ Gunna said. ‘You were right and I was wrong.’

  Eiríkur sat with a bewildered Bogi Sveinsson in the overstuffed living room while Erna rigidly sat opposite Helgi in the television lounge of the spr
awling house, tears threatening to flow at any moment. Helgi was tired and making an effort not to be irritable, while Erna’s hands were starting to tremble.

  ‘You understand that we are doing everything we can to locate these two men and your daughter, so anything you can tell me would be a help. Even a minor detail could lead us to the person we’re looking for,’ he said, taking a deep breath and preparing to go over the same ground a second time. ‘Your daughter, Tinna Lind, I’m trying to get a handle on how she interacted with the two criminals. There was no hostility there?’

  ‘There was with Össur, not with the other man.’

  ‘You’re saying they didn’t get on badly?’

  Erna shrugged. ‘I think so.’

  ‘They got on well enough? There were no arguments with the younger man? You’ve given us a description, but it doesn’t tie in with anyone in particular in our files. Had you ever seen this man before?’

  Erna shook her head.

  ‘You were together in that hotel for almost a week, so there must have been some conversation, surely? You didn’t hear the man’s name mentioned even once?’

  ‘Össur?’

  ‘The other man, the younger one.’

  ‘Well, I suppose I did hear him called Markús or Magnús or something like that a few times.’

  ‘Did you get the feeling that Tinna Lind and this man might have known each other?’

  ‘I don’t know . . .’ Erna said. ‘They did seem quite friendly after a while.’

  ‘Friendly? How friendly?’

  ‘They did the cooking and things like that and they spent quite a lot of time together.’

  ‘In the downstairs part of the hotel, or together alone somewhere?’

  Erna looked down at the table and Helgi could see an internal battle going on.

  ‘She’s always been damned headstrong,’ Erna suddenly burst out. ‘Ever since she could walk she’s done everything her own way and never listened to a single word I’ve said to her. She could have had a decent job if she’d managed to stick at something, instead of going from here to there and running off abroad every five minutes.’