‘Do you recognize this man?’ Lilja showed him the police sketch and noted an instant reaction. His eyes stared fixedly a little too long before proceeding to scan the rest of the drawing. ‘You know who this is, don’t you?’ It was only then she realized that in her wildest dreams, she hadn’t imagined he would.

‘No, sorry. I’ve never seen him before.’

‘Are you sure? Look again.’

Landertz sighed and pretended to have another look. ‘No.’ He shook his head and handed the sketch back. ‘I’m sorry, but I have no idea who that is.’

‘Something made you react, though, didn’t it?’ If he denied it again and shook his head, she could be completely certain he was lying and then she was going to make damn sure there were headlines.

She almost didn’t notice the sound when the window behind her broke. It was only when Landertz screamed and threw himself to the floor that she realized something serious had happened. When she turned around, one of the Ikea armchairs and part of the rug and curtain were on fire.

Fuck, fuck, fuck, she had time to think as she jumped over Landertz on her way out of the office. ‘Get that fire under control,’ she called as she ran towards the door.

‘No, wait! The fire extinguisher! You have to get the fire extinguisher!’

‘And where is it?’

‘In the kitchen! Hurry, before it’s too late!’

Lilja turned back to the kitchen and immediately spotted the red fire extinguisher sitting in the middle of the room, still in its packaging. She quickly unwrapped it and hurried back to the office, where Landertz was busy trying to smother the flames by stomping on the rug and beating his suit jacket against the armchair and the wall, to which the flames had spread.

‘Step aside,’ Lilja shouted and started spraying foam at the fire, which went out in seconds, leaving behind an acrid, sooty smoke.

She put the fire extinguisher down on the floor and quickly established that there was only very limited material damage. Some new glazing, a lick of paint and a new rug and armchair and it would look just like before. And yet there was no limit to how dire the consequences might be.

The flames had died, buried under foam.

The fire, on the other hand, was likely to spread.

8

For the first time in a month, Fabian went over to his record collection at the far end of the living room and let his eyes rove across the rows of CDs. He owned more than four thousand albums, and that was after weeding out a quarter when he’d left Stockholm over two years ago.