“No.”

“Why not? Why should we have to be here if she doesn’t have to?”

“Because we were told to be here.”

“But she should be here. She was in charge of the preliminary investigation in the case, unfortunately.”

“Unfortunately?” Gunnar looked at her. “Do you want me to call her?”

“No.”

“Then be quiet.”

Carin Radler cleared her throat.

“Now that we are all here, let me introduce the commissioner of the National Crime Squad, Anders Wester.” Gesturing toward him, she continued, “He and I have had an internal conversation and I’ve called this meeting so that you will all be informed of what he has to say about the investigation that was carried out last spring.”

“Isn’t it better for us to spend our time working on new cases rather than closed ones?” said Gunnar.

Carin ignored him and sat down.

Mia smiled wryly. This was going to be interesting, she thought, her eyes drifting to Anders Wester. She examined his bald head, black-rimmed glasses and blue eyes. His lips were narrow and his face seemed relatively pale. His posture was less than impressive, with stooped shoulders and feet that pointed inward.

“Thank you,” Anders began. “As Carin said, we have already begun a discussion about the investigation you carried out last spring, and that is what I’m here to talk to you about today.”

“Get on with it then,” said Gunnar.

“It happens at times—” Anders straightened his shoulders a little “—that some districts attempt to lead federal murder investigations on their own, without the help of the National Crime Squad. Sometimes the outcome is good. Sometimes not so good. We have brought to Carin’s attention the mistakes that were made in last spring’s investigation.”

The room was quiet. Everyone exchanged glances, but no one spoke.

Then Gunnar scratched his chin and leaned forward over the table.

“Come on, you can say it! You think we did a bad job,” he said.

“Gunnar...” Carin said, holding up a hand to calm him.

“A mistake was made, yes,” Anders replied.

“A mistake?” Gunnar said. “What do you mean, a mistake?”

“It’s called a lack of cooperation. As you know, Gunnar, our purpose is to fight serious organized crime, and in order to carry out our purpose as professionally as possible, we have to cooperate on a national level. It sounds obvious, for most...”

“Listen. We did everything... There wasn’t any more we could do.”

“Except contacting us earlier. Playing special ops is not recommended. Not at the county level.”

“What should we have done, do you think?”

“You should have brought us in much earlier, as I said.”

“We let you take over.”

“Yes, but even that didn’t go according to plan.”

Gunnar chuckled.

“And whose fault was that?”

“Gunnar...” Carin gave him a look of warning.

Mia stretched her legs out in front of her.