Mia found a lozenge in her pocket and glanced up and down the street. Still no one there. No cars. Not even a newspaper boy. She was all alone, and she was quite sure that no one had seen Miriam and her daughter enter the flat.
A few minutes later, Munch appeared in the street. He lit a cigarette and raked a hand through his hair.
‘Sorry,’ Mia said.
‘Don’t apologize, it was my fault,’ Munch said. ‘I just wanted to – well, you know.’
‘Don’t worry about it,’ Mia said.
‘Are we alone?’
‘I think so. I haven’t seen anyone. Is everything OK up there?’
Munch took a deep drag on his cigarette and glanced up towards the third floor.
‘Everything is fine. Miriam is pissed off with me, but I understand. I hope she realizes that I’m only trying to help her.’
‘Of course she understands.’ Mia nodded. ‘It’s just all a bit too much for her right now. She’ll thank you when it’s all over.’
‘I’m not so sure about that. I had to tell her that she can’t get married.’
‘You told her to cancel her wedding?’
‘Yes, of course.’
‘That’s taking it too far,’ Mia objected.
‘A hundred people in the same church? And everyone with a connection to me? We couldn’t allow that,’ Munch said.
It was a game to the killer, nothing more. He or she was playing with them. How do you rob a bank? You blow up the building across the street. The killer knew exactly what he was doing. What she was doing. This was about more than four girls. Than ten girls. Someone had been watching Munch for years. And knew exactly how to hit him where it hurt. How to create maximum confusion. Chaos. Terror. Mia had not slept more than four hours in the last three days, and it was starting to get to her now, she could feel it. She was struggling to think straight.
‘Who’s at the office?’ Munch said when they were back in the car.
‘Ludvig, Gabriel, Curry, I think,’ Mia said.
‘Mikkelson will take me off the case,’ Munch said, lighting another cigarette without opening the window.
‘How do you know?’
‘What would you have done?’
He looked at her without expression.
‘Taken you off the case,’ Mia said.
‘Of course you would,’ Munch said, and drove towards Mariboesgate.
‘What’s your opinion?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘It’s a legitimate question. We’re investigating a major incident. The killer is coming after you personally. Will you be able to stay objective? Keep your emotions in check? I don’t think so.’
‘Remind me again whose side you’re on,’ Munch snorted.
‘Your side, obviously,’ Mia said. ‘But someone is bound to ask that question.’
‘It’s personal now,’ Munch said, and narrowed his eyes. ‘No one goes after my family and gets away with it.’
‘My point exactly.’
‘What?’
‘One comment like that in front of Mikkelson and you’re out.’
Mia ran her finger across her throat as illustration.
‘Hah,’ Munch scoffed. ‘Who else would they put in charge?’
‘Wenngård.’
‘Yes, all right.’
‘Klokkervold.’
‘For Christ sake, Mia! Whose side are you on?’
‘I’m just telling you, Holger. There are others. It is possible for you to step aside.’
Munch mulled it over before replying.
‘What would you have done? If it was a member of your family?’
‘You already know the answer to that.’
‘Exactly. So let’s say no more about it.’
‘Don’t you think you ought to get some sleep?’
‘Maybe, but it’s not going to happen.’ Munch sighed before finally opening the window. ‘Contact everyone. Office in one hour. Those who don’t show can start looking for another job. We’re going over everything again. We turn every stone until we find that bloody cockroach, even if it’s the last thing I do.’
Mia nodded and took out her mobile.
Chapter 53
‘What have we got?’ Munch said when everyone was gathered in the incident room. ‘And don’t say ìnothingî, because that’s impossible. Somebody out there must have seen something. I know that you’ve all been working round the clock, but from now on we need to work twice as hard. Who wants to start? Ludvig?’
Mia looked around the room. A sea of tired faces stared back at her; it was agony, everyone had put in a ridiculous number of hours in the last few weeks, but still they had almost nothing to show for it. Curry had grown a beard. Gabriel Mørk’s face was deathly pale and he had big bags under his eyes.
‘We have cross-referenced most of the names from Høvikveien Care Home with the Hønefoss case. So far, we haven’t found anything, but we still have a few names to check.’
‘Carry on with that. There might be something there,’ Munch said. ‘Anything else?’
‘I carried out a background check on the church you mentioned,’ Gabriel said.
Munch glanced quickly at Mia, who shrugged her shoulders and nodded back. They had let the church slip to the bottom of their list. Been too slow off the mark. They had been planning to go there when the girls’ bodies were found at Isegran Fort, and immediately after that they had discovered the threat to Marion.
‘What have you found?’
‘It’s a bit odd,’ Gabriel said. ‘They call themselves the Methuselah Church, but I found no companies or religious organizations registered under that name. They don’t have a website or anything, it seems they haven’t quite entered the digital age, or they’ve decided not to join, I don’t know.’
‘Is that all you have?’
‘No, there’s an individual whose registered address is the same as that of the church.’
Gabriel checked the information on his iPad.
‘A Lukas Walner. I did a quick search, but he didn’t show up anywhere else.’
‘OK,’ Munch said, scratching his beard. ‘I’ve visited the church myself and, as far as I remember, there were at least two people there. An elderly man with white hair and a man with short, blond hair, possibly in his mid-twenties. We have to dig deeper, and it’s important that we do it quickly. The killer caught us unawares and we need to regain the initiative. My mother attends services there, so I’ll see what I can get out of her, OK?’
‘I’ll get on it as soon as we’re finished here.’ Gabriel nodded.
‘Good,’ Munch said, scanning his team again. ‘Anything else?’
‘We’re keeping Benjamin Bache under surveillance but, so far, there’s nothing to suggest that he has anything to do with this,’ Kyrre said.
‘OK,’ Munch said. ‘We have plenty of resources, so just keep up the surveillance until we’re quite sure. Anything else?’
‘I’ve run a trace on the account margrete_08,’ Gabriel said. ‘It’s a Hotmail address created on Ö’
The young man looked at the iPad in front of him.
‘The second of March 2010. A few days before you got the first email from her, isn’t that right?’
Gabriel glanced up at Munch, who looked uncomfortable. Not only was his mother’s name mixed up in the investigation, but the killer had also been in contact with him privately. And Munch had allowed himself to be used. Mia knew him well enough to see what was going on behind his furrowed brow. He was trying to pull himself together to avoid giving the rest of the team the impression that he was letting it get to him.
‘That’s correct,’ Munch said.