The white flag . . . She remembered the ones both Linus and Hanna had waved at each other in the night.

‘It sounds idyllic,’ Bell murmured, watching the memories flit across his face like sunbeams. ‘It sounds like you were best friends.’

‘Oh, in the summer we were,’ he said, glancing at her and away again. ‘Everyone is equal out here on these little islands and skerries.’ He chewed on his lip. ‘But it’s a different matter back in the city, of course. His family owned – still own, in fact – the Grand Hotel; they had an apartment that covered the entire top two floors. Whereas we lived in a cramped duplex in Tensta.’

‘Tensta? I don’t know it.’

He gave a wry smile. ‘No, it’s a suburb in the north-west of the city.’

‘And you didn’t see each other then?’

‘He was at a boarding school in Switzerland, and his family travelled a lot. He was only really around in the summers. I used to feel like I spent all year waiting to see him.’ He gave an embarrassed smile and looked away.

‘Max, if you were such good friends, why haven’t you gone to see him?’

‘Because . . . how can I, Bell? I’m the bastard sleeping with his wife!’

And now he’s the bastard sleeping with yours, she thought, watching as he dragged a hand through his hair again. She hated that she was stuck in the middle of this and being forced to lie, but this wasn’t her secret to tell. ‘So, if you were his friend, then you were Hanna’s too, I assume?’

‘Of course. I went to their wedding.’

Bell nodded. She could see how it had played out – Hanna in a tailspin after the doctors’ prognosis; old friends consoling each other, comfort turning into refuge, into something more . . . But was it guilt, or rekindled love, that had sent her spinning back into her husband’s arms again?

‘So then Emil must understand how it would have happened between you and her, even if he doesn’t want to admit it to himself.’

He was silent for a moment, watching her. ‘. . . You’d tell me if you knew anything, wouldn’t you, Bell?’

‘Max –’

‘Please don’t tell me I’m being paranoid. I’m not a fool. When Hanna heard about the accident, she rushed out in the middle of a storm to be with him. And now she’s been there all weekend, just her and Emil and Linus, playing happy families. You got given the weekend off –’

She swallowed, wishing she had never set foot in that room that night and seen what she’d seen. Ignorance would have been bliss. ‘For the record, I asked for that time off. But they’re not alone, if that’s what you’re thinking. Måns is there too.’

‘The old guy’s still going?’

‘He’s still going – slowly, but going.’ She smiled. ‘Plus, there’s cooks, gardeners, a physio . . . . Look, she’s only there because Emil was concussed, and I think she was terrified he was going to slip back into a coma again.’