Camilla Lackberg Crime Thrillers 1-3: The Ice Princess, The Preacher, The Stonecutter

She took a long shower in scalding hot water. Everything felt like a new beginning this morning, and she wanted to meet it completely clean. After the shower and a glance at the outdoor thermometer, she dressed warmly and said a prayer that she could get the car started. She was in luck. It started on the first try.

During the drive Erica thought about how she should bring up the subject. She practised a few opening lines but each sounded lamer than the last, so she decided to ad lib. She didn’t have that much to go on, but her gut told her that she was right. For a fraction of a second she considered ringing Patrik and telling him about her suspicions, but she quickly vetoed that idea, deciding that she had to check it out herself first. There was too much at stake.

The road to her destination was short, but it felt as if it took an eternity. When she turned into the car park below the Badhotel, Dan waved happily from the boat. She had guessed that he would be here. Erica waved but didn’t smile back. She locked the car and with her hands in the pockets of her light-brown duffel coat, she sauntered over towards Dan and the boat. The day was hazy and grey, but the air smelled fresh. She took a couple of deep breaths to try and dispel the last traces of haze in her head, caused by last night’s copious wine intake.

‘Hi, Erica.’

‘Hi.’

Dan kept working on his boat but looked happy to have company. Erica glanced around a little nervously for Pernilla; she was still worried about the look Dan’s wife had given them last time. But in light of what she now knew, she suddenly understood it much better.

For the first time Erica saw how beautiful the worn old fishing boat was. Dan had taken it over after his father, and he had cared for it with real tenderness. Fishing was in his blood, and it was his great sorrow in life that this occupation could no longer feed a family. Naturally he got on well in his role as teacher at Tanum School, but fishing was his true calling in life. He couldn’t help smiling whenever he worked on the boat. The hard work didn’t bother him, and he kept the winter cold at bay by wearing layers of clothing. He hoisted a heavy roll of line onto his shoulder and turned towards Erica.

‘What the hell is this? No treats today? I hope you don’t intend to make a habit of it.’

A lock of his blond hair hung down from under the knit cap. He looked big and strong, standing in front of her like a massive pillar. He radiated strength and happiness, and it pained her that she would have to puncture that joy. But if she didn’t do it, someone else would. The police, in the worst case. She convinced herself that she was doing him a favour, but she knew she was entering an emotional grey zone. The main reason was that she personally wanted to know. She had to find out.

Dan went up to the bow with the roll of line, tossed it onto the deck and came back to Erica, who was leaning against the railing in the stern.

Erica gazed unseeing out at the horizon. ‘I purchased my love for money, for me there was naught else to have.’

Dan laughed and finished the verse: ‘Sing lovely you soft burring strings, sing lovely of my only love.’

Erica wasn’t smiling.

‘Is Fröding still your favourite poet?’

‘Always has been, always will be. The kids at school claim they’re going to puke if they read any more Fröding, but in my opinion it’s impossible to read too much of his poetry.’

‘Yes, I still have that collection of his that you gave me when we were together.’

She was speaking to his back now, because Dan had turned round to move some crates of nets that were lying against the opposite railing. She continued relentlessly.

‘Do you always give that book to your girlfriends?’

He stopped short with his chores and turned to Erica with a shocked expression.

‘What do you mean? You got one and yes, Pernilla got one, although I doubt that she ever bothered to read it.’

Erica saw an uneasy expression on his face. She gripped the railing she was leaning against a little harder with her mitten-clad hands and looked him straight in the eye.

‘And Alex? Did she get a copy too?’

Dan’s face turned the same colour as the snow on the icy bay behind him, but she also saw an expression of relief quickly slide over it.

‘What do you mean? Alex?’

He was not yet ready to capitulate.

‘I told you last time that I was in Alex’s house one evening last week. What I didn’t tell you was that someone came into the house while I was there. Someone who came straight up to the bedroom and took something away. At first I couldn’t think of what it was, but then I checked the last call that Alex made from home. It was to your mobile, and that’s when I remembered what was missing from the room. I have the exact same book at home.’

Dan didn’t say a word, so she continued. ‘It wasn’t hard to work out why someone would take the trouble to go into Alex’s house and then steal something as simple as a poetry book. There’s a dedication in it, isn’t there? A dedication that would point straight to the man who was her lover?’

‘“With all my love I surrender my passion – Dan.”’

He declaimed it in a voice full of emotion. Now it was his turn to stare vacantly at the water. He sat down abruptly on a crate on deck and tore off his cap. His hair stuck out in all directions. He pulled off his gloves and ran his hands through his hair. Then he looked straight at Erica.

‘I couldn’t let it get out. What we had together was madness. An intense and all-consuming madness. Not something that we could let collide with our real lives. We both knew that it had to end.’

‘Were you supposed to meet on the Friday she died?’

A muscle twitched in Dan’s face at the reminder. After Alex died he must have pondered countless times what would have happened if he had actually shown up. Whether she still would have been alive.

‘Yes, we were supposed to meet that Friday evening. Pernilla was going to visit her sister in Munkedal with the kids. I thought up some excuse about feeling out of sorts and preferring to stay at home.’

‘But Pernilla didn’t go, did she?’

There was a long silence.

‘Yes, Pernilla went but I stayed at home. I turned off my mobile, and I knew she’d never dare ring the phone at the house. I stayed away because I was afraid. I didn’t dare look her in the eye and tell her it was over. Even though I knew she realized that it would have to happen sooner or later, I was afraid to be the one who took that step. I thought that if I could slowly start backing away, she’d get tired of things and break it off with me. Very manly, don’t you think?’

Erica knew that the hardest part was yet to come, but she had to go on. Better that he heard it from her.

‘But Dan, she didn’t understand that it had to end. She envisaged a future with you. A future where you left your family and she left Henrik and the two of you lived happily ever after.’

He seemed to shrink with each word, and the worst was yet to come.

‘Dan, she was pregnant. With your child. Apparently, she had intended to tell you about it that Friday night. She’d prepared a feast and put champagne on ice.’

Dan couldn’t look at her. He tried to fix his gaze out in the distance, but tears began to flow, making everything run together in a mist. Grief welled up from somewhere deep inside him, and tears started running down his cheeks. He began to sob, and he kept having to wipe his nose with his gloves to stop the snot from running down. Finally, he put his head in his hands and gave up all attempts to wipe off his face.

Erica squatted down next to him and put her arms around him to console him. But Dan shook her off. She knew that he’d have to get himself out of the hell he was in on his own. So she waited him out with her arms crossed until the tears came more slowly and he seemed to be able to breathe again.

‘How do you know she was pregnant?’ The words came in a stammer.

‘I was with Birgit and Henrik at the police when they told us.’

‘Do they know it wasn’t Henrik’s child?’

‘I’m sure Henrik knows, but Birgit doesn’t; she thinks Henrik is the father.’

Dan nodded. It seemed to console him a little that her parents didn’t know.

‘How did you meet?’

Erica wanted to turn away his thoughts from his unborn child, if only for a moment, to give him a little breathing space.

He smiled bitterly. ‘Really classic. Where do people meet each other in Fjällbacka at our age? Having a beer at Galären, of course. We saw each other across the room and it was like being kicked in the stomach. I’ve never felt so attracted to a woman before.’