She’d had a hard time sleeping, had been worried about her little sister, Mai. Then she’d begun thinking about those brutal days in the damp boathouse and promised herself that if she ever got home, she would never go through this again. Never, never ever.

She stretched and yawned. She heard the sheet rustle under her when she shifted to her side. She lay like that for a moment, closed her eyes and tried to sleep, but her pillow suddenly felt uncomfortable. She stuck her hand under it and felt something hard. She immediately sat up and pulled the pillow away.

A passport and a stack of Swedish bills.

She quickly grabbed the passport and opened it, hugging it to her chest, hugging her passport as hard as she could.

She opened it again as if to ensure that it was real, that it was actually her passport.

A little piece of paper fell out.

Someone had written in black ink: “Thank you.”

Chapter Thirty-Two

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

IT WAS EARLY MORNING, and Henrik Levin was sitting in his office. He thought about Emma and felt powerless in a way. He couldn’t do anything, couldn’t affect anything now. The only thing he could impact was the end of the investigation he was working on. But he felt lost.

His thoughts were interrupted by Ola appearing in the doorway with a rolled-up sheaf of papers in his hand.

“I’m really sorry,” Ola began. Henrik didn’t understand. Did he know what had happened to Emma? Possibly, yes. The police station was a workplace like all others, and gossip traveled quickly through the halls. But this must be some sort of record.

“Thanks. It is what it is. There’s not much I can do about it right now, just cross my fingers and hope she feels better soon.”

“I don’t really follow you...” Ola said, looking uncomfortable.

“Emma,” Henrik answered, in a tone that hopefully signaled that it wasn’t weighing on him so much that they had to go deeper into the subject.

“What happened to her?”

“She’s...” Henrik began, but stopped.

Ola didn’t know.

“Nothing, it’s nothing, forget it. I misunderstood. What were you talking about?” he said instead.

“Kälebo,” Ola said, unrolling the papers and laying them on the desk in front of Henrik. “Overnight, a number of patrols checked every building there, but they didn’t find any Thai girls.”

Henrik sighed loudly before picking up the papers and flipping through them.

“Eleven pages of addresses, and we didn’t find anything.”

“No, and it’s really unfortunate,” Ola said. “It’s twelve pages, by the way.”

Henrik flipped through them again, counting more carefully.

“I count eleven.”

“But I printed out twelve pages, and the patrol cars got all of them. I...”

Ola grabbed the papers and counted them again.

“One list is missing,” he said, looking at Henrik in confusion.

* * *