Thin Ice: An Inspector Gunna Mystery (Gunnhildur Mystery Book 5) (34 page)

‘Security? The three numbers on the back?’

‘One zero six.’

‘OK, wait a moment,’ she said, eyes on the screen. ‘It’s gone through. Congratulations, Össur, as far as the airline is concerned you’re Einar Pálmi Jakobsson and you’re on the afternoon flight to Alicante. So you need to be at the airport at three.’

Össur grinned to himself in the back seat. ‘And when are you two lovebirds flying?’

‘Checking now,’ Tinna Lind said, eyes on the phone and scrolling back. ‘Hell, it’s a pain in the neck doing it on this tiny screen,’ she complained. ‘OK, we seem to be in now.’ She typed rapidly, using both thumbs to fill in the boxes while Össur and Magni sat in silence. ‘Right. We’re Ásta María Einarsdóttir and Jóhann Einarsson, and we’re flying at eight tonight. Card, Magni? Read the numbers out again, will you?’

‘Where are you two going with your loot, then?’ Össur asked. With his flight booked, he seemed immediately less tense, relaxed and happier than Tinna Lind had seen him.

‘We’re going to Zürich,’ she said, switching the phone off and dropping it into her pocket. ‘From there we can decide where to go next.’

‘Chief!’ Eiríkur came bounding down the stairs, his face alight with excitement. ‘Gunna!’

‘What’s the matter?

‘Comms called just now. Tinna Lind’s phone popped up.’

‘Shit . . . where?’

‘Hafnarfjördur. It was live for a few minutes, no calls or texts, then went offline again.’

‘Get every car and motorcycle you can find out there right now, but no sirens, and get the best fix you can on that phone right away,’ Gunna snapped. ‘I’ll be back in two minutes, be by the door in a car.’

‘Will do, chief. I’ve already had an alert out and diverted everyone we can find to look out for a grey Skoda, and comms are working on a position,’ he said, but Gunna had already disappeared. She was back well within the two minutes and strode outside to find Eiríkur waiting for her in an unmarked Golf.

‘This thing has lights and bells, doesn’t it?’

‘It does.’

‘Use them. Hafnarfjördur, right now, if you please.’

‘Ninety-five-fifty, comms,’ Gunna heard a few minutes later with the morning traffic parting unwillingly for them along Kringlumýrarbraut as her communicator buzzed in her ear.

‘Siggi, what do you have for me?’

‘The number was somewhere in the old part of Hafnarfjördur to start with when it logged on, then seems to have shifted south towards the back end of town between the port area and the golf club before it was switched off.’

‘But on the town side of Reykjanesbraut?’

‘Looks like it, and moving fast enough for it to have to be in a car.’

‘Can you pinpoint any better where it was when it first showed up and where it was switched off?’

‘I’d say it was switched on around Lækjargata, Austurgata, Hamarshraun – that sort of patch. And switched off somewhere on the other side of town.’

‘Good stuff, thanks Siggi. Let me know right away if it pops up again, would you?’

The wail of a siren jerked Össur out of his silence in the back of the car. ‘Where the fuck’s that copper going?’

‘Relax, Össi, it’s probably an ambulance.’

But the sight of a speeding patrol car decelerating off the main road and towards the town had Magni stepping on the brake and he made a squealing U-turn back up the hill.

‘Shit. We’d best keep out of sight, I reckon.’

He accelerated and the Skoda surged up the slope, until Magni again trod hard on the brakes, turned into a side street and let the car roll gently to the end, where he shot across the intersection into a deserted residential cul-de-sac. Magni swung the car neatly into a space between two others.

‘Maybe they’re not looking for us?’ Tinna Lind said. ‘Maybe it’s something completely different?’

‘Could be, but we’d best not take a chance.’ Magni gnawed a knuckle and tapped at the wheel with his fingertips. ‘We can’t stick around here for long.’

‘Why not?’ Össur demanded.

‘For fuck’s sake, Össi. Look around you. Smart houses, kids on bikes. This is curtain-twitching territory. We’re going to get noticed by the Neighbourhood Watch here, and I’ll bet you there’s half a dozen local busybodies already writing the car registration on their kitchen whiteboards. I’m wondering how we can get back to the main road and go and hide out at the union place for a few hours until it’s time to go without being spotted. We’d have been clear if you hadn’t had to fuck about, Össi,’ he said angrily, turning round in his seat to face him.

‘You watch your mouth, boy,’ Össur snarled back. ‘And don’t you forget there’s a job to do before we leave.’

‘Before you leave, you mean. Do your own dirty work. I’ve done enough of that shit already.’

‘Boys, please. Keep it for later, will you?’ Tinna Lind said in a sharp voice that took them both by surprise. ‘Look, go back up the road towards the golf club. There’s an underpass under the main road that will bring us out on the other side.’

‘Can we get onto Reykjanesbraut there?’

‘No, but we can double back on the quiet side and get to the slip road that way instead of having to go back through town this side. Make sense?’

Magni grinned. ‘My criminal mastermind,’ he muttered, and started the car.

They went through the underpass and Tinna Lind turned around in her seat. ‘Össi, you’d best duck down.’

‘Why the hell should I?’

‘Because if they’re looking for us, they’ll be looking for a car with three people in it, not two.’

With bad grace, Össur grunted and agreed that she was right as he lay down on the seat, clasping the Baikal hard against his chest. ‘No tricks, you two,’ he rasped.

Eiríkur cruised through the streets of Hafnarfjördur while Gunna followed the traffic on her communicator. The three available motorcycle officers had stationed themselves at intersections around the town while two patrol cars combed the streets looking for the grey Skoda. Eiríkur took the unmarked Golf through the narrow streets of the old town and passed Alli the Cornershop’s house a couple of times, where Alli’s own Golf and a black van were parked next to each other. The second time Gunna had him stop outside while she inspected the place, her fingers rattling a tattoo on the dashboard as she wondered whether or not to knock and ask if there had been any visitors.

The fact that Alli would undoubtedly tell her a lie that would be difficult to disprove was enough for her to decide not to bother and they continued to criss-cross the town.

‘If you wanted to hide a car, where would you go, Eiríkur?’

‘In Hafnarfjördur? I wouldn’t bother. The place is too small. Unless you have a garage where you can park it out of sight, it’s not going to be all that easy.’

‘Yeah, but where would you go?’

‘One of the quiet streets up the top there, or else around the harbour, I reckon, but you’d still struggle to hide it away somewhere.’

‘Either they’ve been lucky and slipped past, or else we’ve missed them,’ Gunna decided.

Eiríkur looked glum. ‘You’re probably right. They could have gone along the coast road to Álftanes and gone towards Reykjavík that way, or they might have gone up Flatarhraun and got on to Reykjanesbraut. Or they might be driving around right behind us. But they probably aren’t aware that we tumbled them so quickly.’

‘What I’m wondering is why Tinna Lind’s phone popped up for such a short time. It was fourteen minutes from being logged on to being switched off, but no calls or texts.’

‘Internet? Checking email?’

‘Checking something. But what?’

‘And was it Tinna Lind or someone else using her phone?’

‘Exactly. If there had been a call or a text we’d at least have something to go on. Instead, all we know is that Tinna Lind’s phone was in Hafnarfjördur half an hour ago, with or without her. Brilliant.’

‘Gunna?’ Eiríkur said. ‘Have you noticed how many bikers there are about?’

‘Are you feeling suspicious, Eiríkur?’ Gunna asked. ‘You reckon we’re not the only ones looking for Össur?’

Magni laughed uncontrollably as he pulled the Skoda off the main road and onto the winding side road leading to the summer house. He was sweating and could feel his heart pound as he parked the car in the shadow of the chalet. He lay back in his seat as he switched off the engine. Tinna Lind put a hand on his arm and patted it.

‘It’s all right. A few hours to kill and we’re out of here,’ she said in a soft voice.

‘Pull yourself together will you?’ Össur snapped, sitting still in the back seat and taking care not to get out of the car until Tinna Lind swung her door open and stepped out.

Össur sat on a hard chair by the kitchen table and flicked his zippo to light a cigarette. Tinna Lind watched him and noticed that since the passports had been handed over the night before, Össur had been nervously on his guard, watching them both and taking care to keep something between himself and Magni.

Magni filled the coffee maker, switched it on and collapsed on the sofa with his eyes closed. He took deep breaths and tried to think of something relaxing and far away. A vision of the sun glittering on the water of the harbour at Heimaey came vividly to mind, small boys with their first fishing rods laughing and triumphant with a small pollock wriggling on the end of a line.

‘All right?’ Tinna Lind sat next to him and he put an arm around her as she nestled against him. Össur blew moody smoke towards the ceiling. Normally Magni would have told him to go outside, but it seemed more trouble than it was worth to start another argument that would never be resolved. ‘Nervous?’

‘You’re not?’

‘Maybe I don’t show it,’ she said with a fond smile. ‘We have a couple of hours to kill, so I’m going to have a shower and get myself fixed up. Do you want to go and shut your eyes for an hour? It’s going to be a long day.’

Magni opened his eyes, rubbed them and wondered if the blonde goddess wrapped in a towel and smiling at him were real or part of a dream he hadn’t woken up from. It took him a moment to remember that he was in the bedroom of the Seamen’s Union’s chalet and the goddess was Tinna Lind with newly dyed hair.

‘You like it?’

‘Wow. Just a bit.’

She towelled her hair gently. ‘It’s a little darker than I wanted it to be, but it’ll wash out in a couple of weeks.’

‘I think you should keep it like that,’ he said. ‘For a while, anyway.’

‘Maybe. We’ll see.’

Magni yawned and sat up. ‘What’s Össur doing?’

‘He was outside just now, probably just having a spliff and planning how to spend all his money.’

‘We’re going to have to be careful.’

‘You don’t trust him?’

‘Not an inch.’

A sly smile ran around Tinna Lind’s face. ‘And I don’t suppose he trusts us either.’

‘Probably not. It’s hardly in his nature.’

She sat on the bed next to him, leaned forward to let her hair fall forward and then swung her head up and back to send it in a blonde arc back over her shoulders.

‘How long have I been asleep?’

‘About an hour.’

‘So what’s the time?’

‘About eleven.’ She shrugged the towel off and swung her legs onto the bed to lie next to him. ‘We have a good half hour, if that’s what you’re thinking.’

‘That’s good, because that’s exactly what I was thinking.’

‘They say gentlemen prefer blondes, so you can tell me afterwards if it makes any difference. I’ve never been blonde before, so it’ll be a new experience.’

Their half hour together had been intense, tender and raw by turns.

Össur was nowhere to be seen when Magni pushed opened the bedroom door and went to the bathroom to splash his face with cold water. He looked out of the window and checked the car was still there, although he knew the key was still in the pocket of his jeans on the bedroom floor, where Tinna Lind had dropped them after pulling them off him.

Back in the bedroom he found Tinna Lind pulling a shirt over her head, her newly blonde locks dropping a couple of inches below the collarline and contrasting with the black fabric.

‘I can’t see Össur anywhere.’

‘He can’t have gone far,’ she said, pulling a hooded sweater over the black shirt and shaking her still damp hair out over it.

‘I hope he hasn’t run for it.’

‘Where could he have run to? It’s a long walk to anywhere from here.’

Magni opened the door and looked out over the couple of hundred metres of lava overgrown with patches of heather between the chalet and the sea.

‘You’ve finished then?’ Össur asked and Magni saw him sitting at a picnic table with a cigarette between his fingers. A carrier bag with its plastic handles tied together had been placed on the table.

‘What have you got there?’

‘Never you mind. Something I need to drop off to a friend before my flight.’

‘What? You should have said something before. We need to be out of here pretty soon if you’re going to catch your flight.’

‘Then maybe you should have kept your dick in your trousers,’ Össur snapped. ‘Anyone would think you’d never seen pussy before the way you’ve been at it.’ He ground out the stub of his cigarette on one of the planks of the table. ‘Come on, then. If we need to be going, we’d best be off.’

‘Where do you want to drop that off?’ Magni asked suspiciously.

‘Don’t worry, it’s only in Hafnarfjördur. Ten minutes there and ten minutes back. Now get on with it, will you?’

‘We really shouldn’t be going back to Hafnarfjördur if half the police force is looking for us,’ Tinna Lind said as Magni took the Skoda nervously down the slope towards the town centre. There was plenty of traffic and the place was busy.

‘That way,’ Össur ordered, pointing to a side street. Off the main road the place appeared deserted. There was no traffic here and with a steady drizzle coming down, there was nobody to be seen on foot.

‘Where are we going?’ Magni asked.

‘That way.’ There was a harsh determination in Össur’s voice.

‘You’re not going to Alli’s place again, are you?’

‘Got it in one, clever boy,’ Össur said and Magni saw his brown teeth appear in the mirror in a humourless smile.