“Fair enough,” Gunna said. “Where’s Eiríkur?”
“On his way. Won’t be long.”
“Good,” Gunna said, sipping daintily at the coffee a tall, dark-haired young man placed wordlessly on the table. “When he gets here, start him off checking the passenger lists to see when our boy was due to travel and then get him to see if he can track down the man’s wife. If she’s still in Húsavík, he’d best get the police there to speak to her and break the bad news that she’s a widow.”
“Right, will do. And me?”
“Talk to the staff, and see what you can find by way of CCTV. We need to speak to whoever tied Jóhannes Karlsson to the bed, even though it looks like he’d probably paid whoever it was handsomely to do just that.”
“Yup. And you, chief?”
“Oh, you know. I’ll just take a walk around the shops while you and Eiríkur do the hard work.”
“Nothing unusual there, then?”
“Get away with you. I’ll start with the chambermaid who found our boy and then the duty manager, and hopefully the forensic team will have done their business by then. But first I’m going to have another cup of this rather fine coffee.”
“Are we paying for this?” Helgi asked dubiously.
“Good grief, no. It’s an integral part of the investigation.”
Haraldur sat on the bed in his underwear, breathing heavily. Hekla stood in front of him and unzipped her black dress with one hand behind her. His hands reached forward and his face was flushed.
He groaned. “God, you’re gorgeous.”
“God, you’re gorgeous …?”
“Sorry. Mistress.”
“That’s better,” Hekla warned, lifting his hands from her hips and pushing them firmly back. “You’re a bad man and now you’ll have to wait. If you’ll just get yourself in the mood, I’ll be right back.”
She let the dress fall, turned and stepped toward the bathroom, her heels clicking on the warm tiled floor, knowing that Haraldur’s eyes were glued to her buttocks, which he could just see below the hem of her shift.
She washed her face in cold water and dried it with a towel that felt as soft as fur. She could hear Haraldur’s breathing in the bedroom and the sound of him moving about on the bed. She pulled on the tight PVC one-piece suit that she had ready in the bathroom and took a deep breath, picking up a handful of scarves and a small leather strap on the way.
Hekla dimmed the lights as far as they would go and sent a slow smile toward Haraldur where he lay on the bed. She added a low chuckle and stepped toward him, standing over the naked man, hands on her hips.
“So, Haraldur, you’ve been really bad and I’m going to have to teach you a little lesson, aren’t I?” She pitched her voice deep and reached forward to tie one of his wrists to the headboard with practiced ease. He moaned as she leaned over him, her breasts encased in electric blue plastic and skimming his face as she tied the other wrist back in the same way.
The fingertips of one hand brushed his chest and down to his belly. A reasonably attractive man and in good condition for his age, she thought. Hekla walked along the side of the bed, trailing the leather strap down the length of his body and along one leg to his ankle, where she stooped and planted a kiss on his instep.
“Have you been bad, Haraldur?”
“Yes, mistress,” he responded dutifully.
“Then a little more correction might be needed.”
Another scarf was swiftly tied around the ankle and secured to the bed frame.
“Bad, bad man,” she growled in the deepest voice she could manage and the other ankle was quickly tied, leaving Haraldur spread-eagled across the king-sized bed.
Hekla sashayed back to the top of the bed and showed him the ball gag. “Since you’ve been such a bad, bad man, I’m going to show you what a bad, bad girl I can be,” she said quietly.
“Please, mistress,” Haraldur panted.
“You really want me to hurt you?”
“Yes, mistress.”
“Then watch this, Haraldur.”
Hekla pushed the ball into Haraldur’s mouth and put her hands quickly behind his neck to clip the strap shut. As she stepped back, he immediately began to breathe heavily through his nose, struggling to draw breath and splaying his cheeks to get some air around the ball.
“Now you’re going to be patient and wait right there and think about how bad you’ve been,” she said, disappearing back into the bathroom.
After what seemed an age, she reappeared. The plastic suit had gone, replaced with a hooded sweater, jeans and trainers. The makeup had been scrubbed off and the golden hair was gone, replaced with dark curls that reached her shoulders. Hekla dropped a large holdall on the floor next to the door and, as his heart sank, she went over to where his clothes had been hastily discarded, systematically going through the pockets. She switched off his phone and put it on the dresser, before opening his wallet and removing the notes, stuffing them into the pocket of her pullover without counting them. Next she extracted all of the cards and brought them over to the bed.
Hekla looked down at Haraldur, lying mute and helpless in front of her. She sat down by his head and looked into his bewildered eyes, unclipping a ballpoint pen from the neckline of her sweater.
“Are you listening carefully, Haraldur?” The only response was a limited straining of his arms and legs against the scarves holding him down and a desperate growl from behind the rubber ball.
“You know that’s not going to help, don’t you?” she told him as he went limp. “Now, listen. I’m going to go shopping for an hour or so while you ponder the error of your ways and remember how much you love your wife. All right?”
Haraldur’s eyes bulged.
“Your credit card. Tell me your pin number. Clench your right fist for the numbers. Once for one, twice for two, and so on. Four numbers. Go.”
Haraldur’s fists remained obstinately clenched and Hekla sighed. “Look. There’s an easy way and a hard way. If you give me the number and it works, after I’ve been shopping I’ll call the hotel’s reception and tell them there’s a man in room four-oh-six who is in trouble and needs some help urgently. If the number doesn’t work, then I won’t and nobody will come in here until the chambermaid comes to clean your room tomorrow morning.”
She looked at her watch.
“It’s half past four now, so that’s in about sixteen hours’ time. You might be a bit cold and thirsty by then. It’s up to you.”
Haraldur’s fist clenched and unclenched in a series of numbers.
“Two-five-two-seven. Good. Now we’re getting somewhere. And your debit card? Same number, maybe?”
Haraldur nodded furiously as she wrote the number on the back of her hand.
She held up a second debit card. “And this one?”
Another series of nods.
“Good. It’s been a pleasure doing business with you, Haraldur. Don’t worry about your cards. The bank will give you new ones easily enough. I’ll destroy them after I’ve been shopping, and I won’t sell them on to anyone else.”
She dipped into her pocket and drew out a small digital camera, pointed it at the helpless, naked Haraldur in front of her and pressed the shutter. Haraldur strained against the scarves that were holding him down and his face went a deep red as she took several pictures. She looked him up and down, screwed up her face in sympathy and spat in her palm.
“The least I can do for you under the circumstances, I suppose,” she said as she set to work. It didn’t take long. A minute later Haraldur stiffened, arched his back as far as his bonds would allow him and relaxed, while Hekla looked at him indulgently. She went to the bathroom, washed her hands and came back with a fluffy towel, which she used to wipe the man’s belly clean.
“Be careful in future, and no hard feelings, eh? Business is business,” Hekla said with a cheerful smile, looking down at the forlorn man in front of her as she swung the holdall onto her shoulder. “Goodbye, Haraldur. Someone will be up to untie you in an hour.”