He’d heard about the game but hadn’t seen the fun in pressing a few plastic buttons to the beat of dated rock songs. Still, he couldn’t help walking over to get a closer look.

Rutger was considerably better than his friend; when he took over the guitar and started playing ‘Message in a Bottle’, hammering the buttons like his life depended on it, Fabian almost wanted to have a go himself. But instead, his eyes were drawn to a phone that lay discarded on the sofa among all the cords and controllers, which lit up as it received a text message.

There was nothing strange about Rutger having a phone. Nor was it any wonder it was the latest iPhone 4, which was far from cheap. No, what made Fabian react was the background picture of Jacobsén’s wife.

‘Rutger, is that your phone?’

‘No, it’s Dad’s,’ Rutger said without missing a beat on the controller.

‘I thought you said he wasn’t home.’ Fabian picked up the phone and read the text.

‘He’s not.’

Could you tell Wilhelm to be home by dinnertime at the latest? Emilie.

‘All right, so it was you calling Wilhelm’s mum a while ago?’

Rutger stopped playing and turned around. ‘How did you know that? Wille, did you rat me out?’ He turned to the other boy on the sofa.

‘Don’t look at me. I didn’t say anything.’

Rutger turned back to Fabian as the Police song went down in flames behind him. ‘Did Dad send you? Okay, listen. My phone’s broken and I just had to borrow it to call Wille over.’

‘Don’t worry.’ Fabian held his hands up. ‘Your dad didn’t send me here to spy on you. As I said, I came to see him.’

‘Because I didn’t poke around in it, and I promise I’ll charge it and put it back in his office.’

‘That’s fine by me.’

Rutger breathed a sigh of relief and handed the controller to Wilhelm. ‘Your turn.’

‘But there’s one thing I don’t get,’ Wilhelm said as he adjusted the strap so the controller would be the right height. ‘If you want to see his dad, why are you here when you know he’s not home?’

‘Yeah, actually, why are you here?’ Rutger chimed in.

‘See what this is?’ Fabian handed him his police ID.

‘You’re a police officer?’

Fabian nodded.

‘Wow… Check it out.’ Rutger passed the ID to his friend. ‘So what, you’re, like, investigating a crime?’

‘Yes, I suppose you could say that.’

‘What kind of crime?’ Wilhelm said. ‘Did someone get murdered?’

‘I’m afraid that’s confidential.’

‘And what do you want with my dad?’

‘I was hoping he could help me straighten a few things out. But maybe you two could help me instead?’

Rutger lit up. ‘What do you want us to do?’