Blackout (21 page)

Tómas and Ari Thór were on their way to Akureyri. Hlynur had to remain on duty at the police station until the end of his shift later that evening.

But why? he wondered.

The town was at its quietest and there would hardly be a call-out tonight. Maybe he’d be expected to show his face if some revellers were making a nuisance of themselves, but that was it.

He wasn’t trusted with anything more important any longer. It was no surprise to him.

He wondered now how he had ever imagined that he would be able to work as a police officer after the terrible things he had done in his younger days.

He stood up, read for the last time the latest email from the anonymous account and shut down the computer. Then he left the police station, locking the door behind him.

He had left his car at home. He made a habit of walking to work in summer – and in winter as well, if the weather allowed. So he set off on foot and was at his own door ten minutes later.

There was just one thought in his mind; the injustice of Gauti being dead while he was still living.

Now it was time to put that right.

They sat in Móna’s kitchen, as if in a black-and-white dream – or, more accurately, a monochrome nightmare.

They remained silent until Ísrún took the initiative.

‘Two nights.’

Móna nodded.

‘You said the murder had kept you awake two nights in a row, but nobody knew about it until yesterday morning,’ Ísrún said, her voice slow and serious. ‘You accidentally gave the truth away there…’

‘Yes…’ Móna sighed. Tears had begun to creep down her cheeks. ‘It’s horrible.’

She buried her face in her hands for a moment, then looked back up.

‘This secret has been dragging me down. I can’t tell you what a relief it is to talk to someone about it. It’s horrible,’ she repeated. ‘And it was all his fault.’ Rising quickly to her feet she slapped the table. ‘It was that man’s fault!’ she screeched.

Ísrún stood up and put an arm around Móna’s shoulders.

‘There … calm down. Take it easy. Sit down … please,’ she said softly.

Obediently, Móna sat down again at the table.

‘Are you talking about Elías?’ Ísrún asked, as gently as she was able.

‘Yes.’ Móna was quiet now. ‘Elías,’ she said and then was silent.

‘What did he do?’ Ísrún asked, after waiting for her to continue.

Móna stayed silent, but the tears now flowed unchecked down her face.

Ísrún decided to try another tack.

‘Did you kill him?’ she asked. She was almost certain that the answer would be no. But the lesson journalism had taught her was that nothing could be ruled out. The truth could sometimes outstrip anything fiction could offer.

‘No. They did it,’ Móna muttered.

Ísrún pricked up her ears. ‘They?’

‘My husband and Logi,’ she said and dissolved into sobs. ‘They weren’t going to kill him. They were going to give him a hiding … not … commit murder. That’s what Jökull said when they came home. But there was a nail in the plank.’

Ísrún shuddered.

Móna sat in thought before she carried on. ‘I … we had to lie to the police to give Logi an alibi. Of course he was a suspect, being one of the men who worked with Elías. Jökull didn’t know Elías that well.’

‘Why did they do it?’ Ísrún asked.

Móna took a deep breath as she marshalled her courage.

‘Elías came here the night before … the night before he died. Late. I let the bastard in. He was looking for Logi. Logi told my husband later what he said. Elías was working some scam. He said he could get paid for bringing foreign women to Europe so they could start a new life. A new life!’ she echoed, contempt colouring her voice.

‘Elías wanted Logi to be part of it. It was terrible having to see Elías that night. It was a long time since I had seen him. I went into the bedroom and howled. Jökull wanted to know what was the matter. I had promised myself after it happened that I wouldn’t say anything to Jökull about it, but I couldn’t keep it up. I don’t know why, maybe the shock of seeing Elías that night was too much for me.’

Ísrún listened, stiff with shock. She said nothing and let Móna talk on.

‘Finally I told Jökull everything,’ she said after a pause. ‘He freaked out. Jökull’s the most even-tempered man you could hope to meet,
but he went wild with rage.’ She sighed and closed her eyes before continuing. ‘He let Logi have it, as it was Logi who had brought the bastard to our house to begin with,’ she snarled. ‘When Logi understood what had happened, he was just as livid as Jökull was.
We’re not letting him get away with it,
was what Logi said. Logi’s more quick-tempered than Jökull. Before I knew it, they had gone, both of them, gone to Skagafjörður. God, how I regretted having told Jökull anything. Christ…’

Móna let out a howl of anguish. Ísrún hardly needed to ask the next question, so certain was she that she knew the answer.

‘Elías raped you?’ she said.

‘How did you know?’ Móna asked between sobs.

‘You’re not the first one he’s done this to. When did it happen?’

Móna spoke in a low voice, with long and frequent pauses. ‘Right after New Year. In the middle of the day. I’d forgotten my phone and had come home to get it. Elías was living upstairs in Logi’s place. There’s access between the two apartments. It’s just one big house, really. Logi was on a shift and Jökull was at work. I couldn’t do anything. I tried to scream and fight him off, but he was too strong for me. I could tell he’d done it before. He was just so calm and calculating.’

Ísrún felt another shudder run down her back. It was all she could do to stay seated, to stop herself running from the house.

‘I was in shock,’ Móna continued. ‘I didn’t say a word to anyone. I don’t know why. I just couldn’t talk about it. But he had the sense to move out right away.’

Ísrún hesitated before letting fly with the question that begged to be asked.

‘Is that his child?’

Móna didn’t answer right away.

‘Yes. I’m pretty sure it is,’ she finally mumbled through her tears. ‘Jökull and I had tried for a baby for so long but without any luck. And now I’m carrying a rapist’s child. I swear I was never going to say a word to Jökull, not ever! He was so pleased that it had happened
at last, that I was finally pregnant. You can imagine why they both went wild.’

‘I understand completely. The scum deserved everything he got. It couldn’t have happened too soon,’ Ísrún said, letting her own fury come to the surface.

‘He was a complete bastard. But they didn’t set out to kill him,’ Móna said.

‘Of course,’ Ísrún replied, upset on Móna’s behalf, but doing her best to remain calm.

‘It was Logi who hit him,’ Móna said at last. ‘Jökull told me about it. Elías admitted what he had done and Logi asked him simply why the hell he had done it. It was when he heard the answer that he grabbed a length of wood and lashed out.’

Móna’s words were practically indistinguishable from her sobs.

‘What was the answer Elías gave him?’ Ísrún asked, against her own better judgement, falling unconsciously back into the role of inquisitor yet again.

‘Because I could.’

Because I could.

Ísrún shivered, just as she felt the sting of her conscience. Did she also bear a level of responsibility for what had happened?

She and Móna looked at each other in silence.

‘What did you mean?’ Móna asked with a suddenness that caught Ísrún off guard.

‘What?’

‘You said just now that I wasn’t his first victim,’ Móna said, her voice gaining strength, her eyes widening

‘That’s right. He raped me as well.’

Ísrún said it without thinking. If was as if her subconscious self wanted her to say the words out loud before giving her the opportunity to think them over and change her mind.

It was a strange feeling, hearing the sound of those words now that she had finally found the courage to tell someone after all the sleepless nights, all the nightmares. A year and a half had passed since then and she was still not sure if she would ever recover. She had not been in a relationship with a man since and the thought of it made her stomach churn with revulsion.

Móna was staring at her in amazement. Ísrún’s statement had obviously come as a clear shock.

‘He did it to you as well?’ she asked, as if unable to believe her own ears. And then came the question Ísrún had been so frightened of. ‘Then why was the man free?’

‘I haven’t told anyone about it. Not until now. I felt so bad,’ she said, forcing herself to hold back the tears. Crying wasn’t her style.
‘I couldn’t bring myself to go to the police and tell them about what had happened. That was the wrong thing to do. I see that now.’

‘For fuck’s sake!’ Móna yelled, on her feet in an instant. ‘You could have spared me the same thing!’ She slumped back down into her seat, and Ísrún could see her quivering with emotion as she fought to regain control of her anger.

‘I’m sorry. If anyone ought to understand how you feel, then it should be me,’ Móna said, her voice shaking.

‘It’s a horrific experience that nobody would want to share. You’ll have to decide for yourself whether or not you tell the police about what he did to you, and if you tell them about what Jökull and Logi did. It’s not my affair and I won’t say a word,’ Ísrún said, to her own surprise.

She had fought for this assignment to find out more about Elías. She had been determined to revenge herself on him, to dig up some secret from his past and plaster it across the news. A tooth for a tooth. But she had no intention of telling anyone what she had been through.

‘Thank you,’ Móna said, although she sounded unconvinced.

‘In return, can I trust you to keep to yourself what I have just told you?’ Ísrún said hesitantly.

‘When did it happen?’

‘January last year. I was living in Akureyri and had a job there. I was out on the town one night and this man I’d never seen before wouldn’t leave me alone. He followed me out of the bar and forced me into some fucking storeroom…’ She sighed, unable to put what had happened into words. ‘I did the same as you. Didn’t say a word. Retreated into my shell. I couldn’t stay in Akureyri after that. I moved back south as soon as I could and got a job at the TV station.’

‘And then you get an assignment to do a report about him? That must have been a shock,’ Móna said, her tears gone.

‘It wasn’t quite like that,’ Ísrún said, and then fell silent. Should she tell the whole story? It wasn’t as if Móna was likely to pass it on to Ívar or María. She decided she would. It was half told already.

‘I didn’t go to the police. I didn’t even know the man’s name and didn’t try to find it out, either. I wanted to forget the whole thing as quickly as I could. But I couldn’t forget what he looked like or what he did to me. I saw his face in my nightmares every single night. Yesterday we got a report that a man had been found dead in Skagafjörður. I was on shift. Normally I don’t get to do much hard news.’ She tried to put on a smile. ‘But when his name came up, I typed it into a search engine, and there was his face looking back at me. That man. The man who raped me. You can imagine how I felt.’

Móna nodded and dried her tears.

‘There was no doubt in my mind that this was my rapist,’ Ísrún continued. ‘Elías Freysson. I just sat and stared for a while, and felt myself getting angrier and angrier. Now I knew who he was I wanted desperately to get my own back on him. But the bastard was dead, so I couldn’t kill him. What I could do was destroy what he had left: his reputation. After our encounter I had no doubt what sort of man he was and I was sure he had plenty of other things on his conscience. All I had to do was get the newsroom to let me dig into it, turn over a few stones and find what might be underneath.’ She continued earnestly now: ‘I told the desk editor that someone had called me to say that Elías had been involved in drug trafficking, and persuaded him to let me follow it up. In fact, I‘m sure he was happy to let me disappear to the country for a few days. We don’t get on, you see.’

‘And what are you going to do now?’ Móna asked quietly.

‘Nothing. I’ve no intention of dragging your family into the media circus just because of my need for revenge. You’ll have to decide for yourselves what you do.’

Móna leaned forward and stared into the distance. A new, stray tear found its way down her cheek and dropped onto the surface of the table, taking with it any vestiges of energy left in Móna’s body.

It was a wonderful feeling to have finally told someone about the rape, at long last to have talked about what she had never intended to mention to anyone. This was a first step. Now Ísrún felt she might find the strength to seek out the specialist help that could help her put this terrible experience behind her.

It was only when she was back at the guesthouse that she remembered that someone had tried to call when she was on the way to Móna’s. She sat weakly on the edge of the bed. She was tempted to turn her phone off, but at last decided to be a conscientious journalist and make the call anyway.

‘Hello?’ The voice on the other end was harsh. ‘Is that Ísrún?’

‘That’s me. You tried to call me earlier? Who is this?’

‘Hi. It’s Svavar here, over in Dalvík.’

‘Hi,’ she replied in surprise, not expecting to hear from him again. What could the man want? For a moment it occurred to her to say she was busy and end the call right there. She was exhausted, physically and emotionally, and she had little or no interest in talking to Svavar. Her part in this story was over. The mystery was solved. She had established that Elías had raped at least one other woman apart from herself, and doubtless more. But she could never bring herself to use this material, even though this had been her original aim in pursuing the story: to expose the bastard. Now she had met Móna she was reluctant to drag her into this.

‘What do you want?’ she asked abruptly.

‘I need to talk to you about something … in confidence,’ he said and she heard him hesitate. ‘You know, I’m a … a source.’

‘Fair enough,’ she replied, her interest still at a low ebb.

‘Isn’t it right that you never reveal a source’s name?’ he asked; his eagerness was unmistakeable now.

‘That’s right. Fire away. You can trust me,’ she said, her curiosity sparking a little, despite everything.

‘All right, but I’m not sure of the best way to put this.’

She could hear from his voice that he was nervous and short of breath. Maybe there could be a scoop in this after all? That would earn her a few brownie points with Ívar and María.

There was a long pause, during which all that Ísrún could make out was his erratic breathing.

‘I think Elías locked a girl up somewhere before he died. I’m starting to get concerned about her.’

Ísrún was on her feet, hardly able to believe what she was hearing.

‘What was that? He locked a girl up? Why? It’s almost two days since he died!’

‘Yeah. That’s why I’m a bit stressed out,’ Svavar mumbled.

‘Stressed out!’ she snapped. ‘You weren’t before?’

Svavar didn’t reply.

‘Are you going to help me or not?’ he demanded at last.

‘Yes, but why don’t you just call the police?’

‘I don’t want to get mixed up in all this.’

‘You’re an arsehole,’ she snarled. Then she collected herself, the thought of a young woman imprisoned somewhere slamming into her mind. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said quickly. ‘You mean you want me to pass this on to the police?’

‘Yes,’ he answered.

‘Who is this woman and where is she?’

‘I don’t know,’ Svavar replied, and quickly told the tale of Elías’s travels to Asia, how he had been paid by a group of men to fetch a girl from Nepal and bring her to Iceland. ‘This was supposed to be a trial run. If he did a good job and brought in the goods undamaged, then there would be plenty more work for him.’

‘Christ,’ Ísrún swore. She rarely brought God into anything she said, but this phone call was something outside her experience. ‘And you’ve no idea where she is?’

‘I was hoping the cops could find that out.’

His voice betrayed how tired he was.

‘All right. I’ll pass the message on and I won’t mention you, but I’ll certainly cover this in a news report. Just so you’re aware of that.’

‘Do what you like. Just keep me out of it, please,’ Svavar said, his voice desperate.

She was about to end the call when she remembered the apartment in Akureyri.

‘What about the flat?’ she asked, her heart beating faster.

‘What flat?’

‘The flat in Akureyri,’ Ísrún snapped, her patience at an end. If Svavar was telling the truth, then minutes or even seconds could count. ‘Could she be there?’

‘The flat in Akureyri? That’s Idunn’s place, Elías’s wife. I guess it’s still hers.’

‘No. Elías got it when they split up.’

‘Really?’ Svavar said, clearly taken by surprise. ‘He never mentioned that.’

‘He wasn’t short of secrets.’

Ísrún ended the call and dialled the Akureyri stringer to get a number for Helga at CID in Akureyri.

As the call connected Ísrún rushed out of the guest house, determined not to lose a second.

Helga answered after a couple of rings and Ísrún breathlessly gave her name.

‘How did you get this number? I’m in a meeting and I can’t answer questions now,’ Helga said quietly, the sharpness of her tone conveying her irritation at being disturbed.

‘This is an emergency, life or death,’ Ísrún said, making every effort to keep her satisfaction to herself.

‘What? Wait a moment, I’ll go outside.’

‘You’ll have to let my cameraman be there. Us and nobody else,’ Ísrún said, ashamed of herself for wasting precious seconds.

‘No promises,’ Helga said. ‘But I’ll do my best.’

‘I have a reliable source…’ Ísrún said, wondering how to word what she wanted to say. ‘This is someone who tells me that Elías was involved in people trafficking, and…’ she began and then paused.

‘Trafficking? Well, dammit. I was hoping we’d never see that here…’ Helga said.

This is going to be a hell of a story, Ísrún thought to herself, her commentary already half written in her mind.

‘It seems he brought a young woman to Iceland. Did you know?’

‘Yes, there was a passenger who came to Iceland on the same flight as Elías from Denmark,’ Helga said guardedly. ‘The same person had accompanied him from Nepal to Denmark. A girl. They didn’t have adjacent seats, so there was no direct connection, but we noticed it when we checked the flight lists. We haven’t been able to trace her so far. We’re only a small team who’ve been working on this, I’m afraid, but you keep that to yourself.’

‘My source is convinced that Elías has locked her away somewhere. She was supposed to be held until some contact of his collected her – and paid for her,’ Ísrún said.

‘Locked away? Where?’ Helga asked. ‘And who’s your source?’ she demanded.

‘You know I’m not going to give away a source. This person said that he didn’t know where she is. But I suspect that she’s in an apartment that Elías owned in Akureyri,’ Ísrún continued carefully.

‘He didn’t have a place here. We’d have known about it,’ Helga replied shortly.

‘He didn’t register the place in his
own
name. It’s registered to a company owned by his former wife,’ Ísrún said, and quickly spelled out the address.

‘Thanks. We’ll be right there. Anything else?’

‘No, but let me know what happens. I’m on my way,’ Ísrún said, but Helga had already ended the call.

Ísrún got into her car, and pulled away at speed, taking the road to Akureyri.

Ignoring any concerns for her own safety or rules about using phones while driving, she made a call to María.

‘Yes. Hello, Ísrún,’ María said. ‘I was trying to get hold of you earlier.’

‘I need a cameraman in Akureyri right now,’ Ísrún told her, speaking fast and hoping that nothing would be lost. ‘The police are on their way to rescue a girl Elías locked up in his apartment there. He brought her from Nepal a few days ago and was going to sell her on to a prostitution ring – here or somewhere in Europe.’

‘What?’ María yelped. ‘You’re sure?’

‘I’ve informed the police and the source is reliable. We don’t know exactly where she is, but they’ll be starting the search at Elías’s place in Akureyri any minute. We need to get our stringer there right away,’ she said, her voice strained. ‘OK to call him out?’

‘Do it.’

‘Thanks,’ Ísrún said. ‘Why were you trying to reach me?’

‘Nothing special,’ María assured her. ‘Just get yourself there.’

Ísrún didn’t need to be told twice and ignored every speed limit as she pushed the car as hard as she could.

Her next call was to Móna. Before she had left her they had exchanged numbers. Ísrún had told her to call whenever she needed any kind of support.

‘I had a thought,’ she said as soon as Móna picked up. ‘There might be a way for Logi and Jökull to admit to the murder, if that’s what it comes to, without bringing you or the baby into it. Elías was involved in people trafficking and he had brought a girl from Nepal to Iceland to sell her on. This is information that won’t be made public right away. If Logi and Jökull talk to the cops tonight and say that this was the reason behind the murder – that they were trying to save the girl – then I reckon it would sound credible.’

Móna listened in silence.

‘Thanks. That’s interesting,’ she said after a moment. ‘I’ll talk to
the boys and see what they say. But you’re right. It’s probably the only way out.’

‘You need to act quickly, though,’ Ísrún said, thinking of the desperately sad woman with the baby growing inside her. ‘I know it’s hard, but you have to do it right away if it’s going to work.’

‘Yes, yes, I know…’

Móna sounded hesitant, so Ísrún decided to press her.

‘You can tell them I told you. But, please, please my name can’t be brought into this. And no one must know what Elías did to me.’

‘Of course. I’ll make sure they know. Thank you, Ísrún. I really mean it.’

Sometimes Ísrún’s own flexible attitude to the truth was something that took her by surprise, but she decided that this time the end justified the means.