Killing Moon полностью

As Harry left the bar and stepped out into the darkened corridor, he could see there was light at the end, like in a tunnel. As he drew closer, he realised that the light was coming from an open lift and could see a person standing half outside holding the doors. As though he were waiting for Harry. Or someone else — after all, he had already been standing there when Harry appeared in the corridor.

‘Just go ahead,’ Harry called out, signalling with a wave of his hand. ‘I’m taking the stairs.’ The man backed into the lift and out of the light. Harry had time to see the clerical collar but not the face before the doors slid shut.

Harry was soaked with sweat as he unlocked the door to his room. He hung up his suit and lay down on the bed. Tried to put thoughts of how Lucille was doing out of his head. He had made up his mind he was going to have a pleasant dream about Rakel tonight. One from the time they lived together and went to bed together every night. From the time he was walking over water, stepping on ice that lay thick and solid. Always listening out for cracks, always on the lookout for fissures, but also with the ability to live in the moment. They had done that. As though they had known the time they had together would run out. No, they didn’t live every day as if it were the last, but as if it were the first. As though they had discovered each other over and over again. Was he exaggerating, embellishing the memory of what they’d had? Maybe. So what? What had realism ever done for him?

He closed his eyes. Tried to picture her, her golden skin against the white sheets. But instead all he could see was her pale skin against the pool of blood on the living-room floor. And he saw Bjørn Holm in the car staring at him while the baby cried in the back seat. Harry opened his eyes. Yes, honestly, what was he supposed to do with realism?

His phone buzzed again. A message from Alexandra this time.

Will have DNA analysis ready by Monday. Spa and dinner on Saturday would be nice. Terse Acto is a good restaurant.

‘Well, it ought to be clear,’ Aune said, laying his copy of the police report on the duvet. ‘This is all textbook. It’s a sexually motivated murder carried out by a killer who will most likely do it again if he’s not stopped.’

The three people around the bed nodded, still absorbed in their own copies.

Harry finished first and looked up, squinting in the harsh light of the morning sun outside.

Then Øystein finished and let his sunglasses slide down from his forehead in front of his eyes again.

‘Come on, Berntsen,’ he said. ‘You must’ve read it before.’

Truls grunted in response and put down the printout. ‘What do we do if it’s a needle in a haystack?’ he asked. ‘Shut up shop and leave the rest to Bratt and Larsen?’

‘Not quite yet,’ Harry said. ‘This doesn’t really change anything, we assumed Bertine had been killed in a similar manner to Susanne.’

‘But we have to be honest and say it doesn’t back up your gut feeling about a rational murderer with a rational motive,’ Aune said. ‘You don’t have to decapitate the victim or steal their brain to mislead the police into believing it’s a sexually motivated murder with random victims. There are ways of mutilating which require less work and would leave pretty much the same impression of a murderer without any connection to the victims.’

‘Mm.’

‘Don’t mm me, Harry. Listen. The killer must have spent a long time at the scene of the crime, and thus have run a much higher risk than he needed to if his aim was mere misdirection. The brains are trophies, and now we see the classic sign of him learning by cutting off the entire head of the victim and taking it with him instead of sawing and sewing it back up while he’s at the crime scene. Harry, this walks, talks, smells and looks like a ritual killing with a whole range of sexual undertones and overtones, and that’s what it is.’

Harry nodded slowly. Turned to Øystein, who emitted a ‘Hey!’ as Harry snatched the sunglasses off him and put them on himself.

‘I didn’t want to say anything,’ Harry said, ‘but you nicked these from me. I left them in the office at the Jealousy Bar after that power-pop night when you refused to play R.E.M.’

‘What? We were supposed to play classic power pop. As for the shades, finders keepers.’

‘When they’re in a drawer?’

‘Children...’ Aune said.

Øystein made a grab for the sunglasses, but Harry was too quick and pulled his head back.

‘Relax, you’ll get them afterwards, Øystein. Come on, tell us that news you said you had instead.’

Øystein sighed. ‘OK. I talked to a colleague who sells cocaine—’

‘Taxi drivers are selling cocaine?’ Aune enquired with surprise.

Aune and Øystein looked at one another.

‘Is there something you haven’t told me?’ Aune said, shifting his gaze to Harry.

‘Yes,’ Harry said. ‘Go on, Øystein.’