“Well, I was left there with little Selma to keep me company, and the next afternoon Jónas turned up again with Sindri in tow, and Eygló coming up behind in her BMW with Baddó.”
“Bjartmar?”
“Yeah. Well Selma was kicked upstairs and the three of them put their cards on the table.”
“Three of them?”
“Yeah. Eygló went off with Selma, I suppose.”
“All right. Go on.”
Ommi frowned.
“Jónas said they had a problem. A crime had been committed that they couldn’t sweep under the carpet. He said they needed someone to take the rap for it and there would be a wage in it, plus a bonus at the ind of the stretch. Would I be interested? Well I thought they probably wanted someone to do a year or a few months or something. So I said yeah, I could do some time for the right price.”
“But it was more than a few months?”
“Hell, yeah,” Ommi said. “I could see it was Sindri. He was as nervous as hell, fiddling with his keys, biting his nails, all sorts. Your lot would’ve chewed him up for breakfast,” he said with a slim smile. “Anyway, it took me by surprise when they said it would be a murder charge, and I said hey, that’s a bit heavier than what I’d had in mind.”
Ommi kicked a stone and sent it skittering towards the fence. “But that Jónas, he’s a sly bastard. He said I’d already said yes, so now we just needed to agree a price.”
“And I take it you did?”
“Yup. Shit, yeah. Those three … Life wouldn’t have been worth living if I’d turned them down.”
“How much?”
“A couple of mill a year, plus a five mill bonus when I got out, and he swore blind it wouldn’t be more than ten years, out in six or seven, tops.”
“And you agreed to that?”
“Pushed him up to two and a half a year, plus eight, and we shook on it.”
“A done deal? What then?”
“They went back to the city; said I should stay put and wait there quietly. They left a case of vodka and a couple of beers, told me to enjoy the TV until I got a visit. So me and Selma, we made ourselves comfy. A week later you lot came calling and I just put my hands up and that was that.”
Gunna nodded to herself. Very little that Ommi had said had taken her by surprise, except that he had been so open after such a long silence. They turned again at the top of the yard and she saw that he was starting to feel the chill.
“Want to go back inside?”
“Not yet.”
“So you got a decent nest egg put away somewhere for you as long as you kept quiet and did the time. What went wrong?”
Ommi grimaced. “I’ll tell you what. I was starting to feel all right in there. Stopped smoking, worked out every day. Put an inch on my biceps. Feeling good. Then I began to hear whispers. Sindri moved abroad. OK, fair enough. Then I hear Bjartmar’s in trouble. He’d got right out of the speed and clubbing business, and went respectable, stopped being there when I called. That’s what went wrong. I couldn’t have the cash going into an account with my name on it, so I wanted it in Selma’s name. But Bjartmar said he’d invest it for me, get a good return and I’d have a big old whack waiting when I got out.”
“And did he?”
“Yeah. Put it all into the stock exchange here and there, a load into shares in banks, and lost the fucking lot when the banks went tits up.”
“That’s when you decided to walk out?”
“Yeah. I couldn’t get through to Bjartmar or Jónas. Couldn’t find Skari’s number, like he’d dropped off the surface of the earth. Selma asked a few questions for me, but her mum and Jónas had fallen out by then. I wasn’t getting any answers, so I reckoned I’d go and ask questions myself. Thought if it came to it, I’d just talk to you lot and tell you everything.”
Ommi looked directly at Gunna for the first time since they had started walking. “I thought they’d stitched me up.”
“Looks like they had.”
“Maybe. I couldn’t get to Jónas or Bjartmar. Calls stopped at their secretaries, and their offices are like this place,” he said bitterly, waving a hand at the high wire all around them as Gunna recalled the security cameras outside both Bjartmar and Jónas’s offices.
“The fire at Bjartmar’s home, was that you?”
“Addi did that. A bit of a warning.”
“And Svana? Why did you go to her?”
“To get to Bjartmar. I’d heard she was still shagging him sometimes. So I turned up at the gym one morning and waited until she came out. When she got in the car, I jumped in the passenger side and we went back to her place for a bit of a private talk.”
“When was this? Which day?”
“Morning. Don’t know what day.”
“But she couldn’t help you?”
“She said that she knew Bjartmar was away and she’d talk to him when he came back.”
“That was true enough,” Gunna said. “Bjartmar really was abroad.”
“Was it? I couldn’t be sure. Svana was sweet, but she was never that bright.”
“And Daft Diddi? That was you, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah. Look, I’m not proud of that, understand? I was getting desperate, out of cash. Eygló helped out with a few shekels and found us that place to crash in, but she’s short of cash herself after she put hers into property that won’t sell.”
At the bottom of the yard, Gunna felt her phone begin to vibrate in her pocket but ignored it. As they turned, she could see Eiríkur and the warder following them, huddled miserably deep into their coats.
“So Svana was fine when you left her?”
“Yeah. Right as rain. She’d had a lot done since I saw her last, new this, new that, looked like a million dollars. I swear it, I didn’t touch her, honestly. But if you bring the bastard who did it in here, I’ll make him wish he’d never been born.”
Gunna wanted to believe him, and for once Ommi’s voice had an earnest quality that was startlingly fresh.
“Fair enough. But Skari? What happened there?”
“Jesus. Found out why I couldn’t get hold of him. The twat had gone and moved back to Crapsville with his fat girl,” Ommi said with a shake of the head. “Me and Addi went out there to look for him, and when we did find him in Keflavík, it wasn’t the way it should have been. He just went apeshit. Said he was straight now and wanted to keep it that way.”
“So Jónas had squared all the witnesses? Skari and Svana?”
“Yeah, and the rest of them.”
“Understood. What was the upshot with Óskar? How come he’s in such a bad way?”
“He went fucking wild when I told him he’d had his payout from old Jónas for saying his piece in court that put me away, but I’d been left out in the cold. He laid right into me and I gave it all back, plus a bit more.” Ommi sighed. “I’m a lot stronger than when I was put away. I shouldn’t have done it, but fuck it. He wanted a ruck and he got a proper one.”
“And this was in Keflavík?”
“Yeah. Near where he works. Shit, I’ve told you enough, and it’s cold out here.”
WITH OMMI TAKEN away and back in his cell, Gunna remembered to check her phone for missed calls. Instead of the one that she had expected, there were fifteen, and she was scrolling through the numbers quickly, wondering which one to return first, when the phone started to buzz in her hand.
“Gunnhildur,” she barked.
“Hæ, Mum. When are you going to be home?” asked Laufey to Gunna’s relief.
“Oh, am I glad to hear you,” she said.
“Why’s that?” Laufey asked with suspicion.
“Nothing, sweetheart.” Gunna laughed. “I was just expecting a call I don’t really want to take. That’s all.”
“All right, Mum. But when will you be back?”
“I don’t know. What time is it now?”
“Two.”