Further down the long bar, Gordon, Brynn and Kore have been joined by a newly arrived guest. Karen is startled to realise who it is. Apparently, there was more truth than Kore cared to admit to the rumour claiming a certain Los Angeles based band that had topped the charts two years previous are now working with KGB Productions. Karen has long since stopped paying attention to what’s trendy in the music business, but not even she can fail to recognise Jason Lavar. There’s no mistaking the tattoos that cover the singer’s shaved head and snake down around his eye and across half his cheek. Come to think of it, she’s not actually that surprised; in the past three or four years, more and more international artists have been seeking out Kore’s remote production company with its growing stable of chart toppers. That success is what has made it possible for Kore and Eirik to buy and refurbish one of Thingwalla’s largest houses.

She surreptitiously watches Jason Lavar and notes that although he’s considerably shorter than she imagined, his charisma is palpable.

‘Star-struck?’

The low voice and the puff of hot air against her neck makes her jump and whip around. Leo Friis holds up a bottle of IPA and clinks it against her glass with a mocking grin.

‘By you? It’s been years since you were famous, hasn’t it?’ she says with feigned surprise.

She instantly regrets the quip. The fact that Leo Friis was the frontman of The Clamp is something they never talk about. She was obviously aware of the Doggerian band’s international success, even though she had lived in London back then and had other things to think about. She couldn’t have missed The Clamp if she’d tried.

The band’s abrupt breakup, the news of the rift between its members and the speculation about Leo Friis’s sudden disappearance from the scene, on the other hand, had completely passed her by. Starting at the horrifying moment when her own life had been smashed to pieces, everything had passed her by. By the time she returned to the world of the living, the media had long since lost interest in the fate of Leo Friis. And it had taken her a long time to realise the filthy homeless person she’d come across while working on a case was the Leo Friis.