No ordeal had been worse than watching Lena die. Nothing had torn at his heart more, weighed him down more. To experience such a loss was to become privy to a secret no normal human being wanted to get anywhere near. He had been so angry back then; sometimes he was still so angry now.

‘Why didn’t anyone say anything?’ he’d shouted during a phone call to his son one evening when things were at rock bottom. ‘Why the fuck didn’t anyone tell me?’

His voice had been thick with tears, his whole body full to bursting with fear.

‘Tell you what, Dad? I don’t understand.’

And Alex had whispered:

‘Why didn’t anyone tell me this could actually happen?’

Because that was how it felt, as if the truth had been kept from him. People could die long before they achieved the eighty years or so they’d been promised, and he was not exempt from the effects of this terrible tragedy. Dying before you got old was unnatural. That was the only conclusion he’d managed to reach – or at least the fact that it had happened to someone close to Alex was unnatural. Shit happened to other people – and as part of his job, never in his private life.

He didn’t remember how his son had answered his desperate question – with some pathetic platitude, no doubt. Nobody had known what to say when Lena died. Even Margareta Berlin, head of Human Resources back then, had come out with some meaningless nonsense, then gone behind his back and asked Fredrika to keep an eye on him. Unforgivable.

There’s something damaged about that woman, he thought. And it can’t be fixed.

He pulled himself together and made the call.

‘Noah Johansson.’

‘Alex Recht. Sorry it’s taken me so long to get back to you.’

It was gone six; the hours had just slipped by.

Noah sounded eager (much too eager) and relieved:

‘No problem, it’s fine, absolutely fine. The important thing is that you’ve called. I can’t thank . . . I was so afraid that . . . I didn’t even know if . . .’

The forced jollity and the series of unfinished sentences worried Alex. What did Noah want? He’d mentioned a missing brother.

He coughed; the air in HQ was so dry. ‘You said you wanted my help; could you be a little more specific?’ He hoped this would encourage Noah to get a grip.

Which it did.

‘Of course, of course. I don’t quite know where to start. It’s been several months . . . As I said, my brother’s disappeared.’

Alex shook his head slowly. ‘I’m very sorry, but as I explained before, you need to report him missing so that someone with more time than me can take a closer look at the situation.’

Noah’s protest was immediate.

‘I’ve already done all that. I called the police as soon as I realised something was wrong.’