Christmas is just around the corner when the petty criminal Bernandas from Lithuania drives into Norway with a sealed shipment, acting on orders from Russian gangster boss Doskino. But the contact meant to receive the cargo never shows up at the remote cabin near Fredrikstad. When Bernandas discovers what kind of “goods” he’s actually smuggling, he realizes he’s in danger and panics.

The following day, elderly schoolteacher Viggo Holm is found brutally stabbed to death in his home in Sarpsborg. It soon becomes clear that he was the contact Bernandas was supposed to meet.

A reluctant Anton Brekke is assigned to the case. In parallel with the investigation, we follow Bernandas’ increasingly desperate fight to escape his situation, stranded in a foreign country and caught between a murder investigation and threats from his handler back in Lithuania.

This is Jan-Erik Fjell’s second novel featuring Anton Brekke.