Never Fuck Up

54

Three weeks’d passed since the attack in the parking garage—still, the thoughts revisited him at least once an hour. Not just because the attack itself’d been so scary—he’d experienced worse violence before—but because of how big this snowball he’d started’d grown. This wasn’t just about a threat against him, it wasn’t even just about Sweden’s most famous murder—it was about a goddamned conspiracy in the middle of his own home: the National Police. And he had no idea how to stop it.

Months ago, when someone’d been standing outside his house that night, he’d been able to push his fear away into some corner of himself. Reacted like he always reacted: let the worry dissolve into cynicism and denial. His goals were more important. He was driven by anger. He was driven by the thought that reflection equaled capitulation. And when he’d begun to understand the connections to the Palme murder, he was also driven by a strange feeling—some kind of duty to his old man and to Sweden. But now, after the assault, and after Hägerström’s phone call about Adamsson, he no longer knew if he should allow himself to be driven at all.

Adamsson’d died in a car accident on the E18 highway, by the Stäket rest stop. According to Hägerström, the investigation showed that the guy’d driven into the middle divider and bounced back out into the lane. That’s when a forty-ton trailer truck made mush of Adamsson’s Land Rover. Maybe it was a coincidence, maybe it was part of something bigger.

Something would happen to him, with all certainty. He could live with that thought. But the second thought was harder: it could happen to Åsa. The third thought almost crushed him: it could happen to the child that they still hadn’t been given, Sander.

Still: let whatever was going to happen, happen. Thomas couldn’t think of any alternatives. He had to keep searching.

He talked to his brother, Jan. They didn’t really have too great of a relationship. Worn down after too many years of silence. The only thing that still made it feel like they were brothers was the irritation: it was different from what you felt toward a stranger. But they still cared for each other, sent postcards from their vacations, Christmas greetings, and birthday cards. Thomas’d made sure that he and Åsa were invited over to Jan’s house for Christmas Eve.

The next night, Christmas Day, he went up to speak with Åsa. The TV was on: some documentary about right-wing extremists in Russia. They looked fat and stupid, the lot of them. He wondered why they were showing such tragic shit today of all days.

She was sitting with her legs pulled up on the couch. On the coffee table was the folder that was so often in front of her these days, the one with the pictures of Sander.

The adoption agency’s final home visit a week ago’d gone well. It felt like the women who’d come by thought that Åsa and Thomas were well prepared to receive a small child. Åsa’d decorated the house more than usual for Christmas this year. Maybe to show off for the adoption agency women, maybe in preparation for the family life they would soon have.

She looked up. The Russians on the TV show babbled on in the background about how the motherland’s property was being sold off to foreigners.

“It was really very nice yesterday, at Jan’s,” Åsa said.

Thomas took a deep breath. “Åsa, we have a difficult decision ahead of us.”

She was breathing with her mouth open; it looked pretty dumb.

Thomas went on, “Sander will be here soon. It’s going to be the best moment of our lives.”

She smiled. Nodded. Continued to flip through the folder—uninterested in Thomas again. Almost as though she was trying to say, I agree with you, now leave.

“I don’t want to ruin that moment,” Thomas said. “And I don’t want to jeopardize it either. So we have to make certain changes. Together.”

Åsa’s smile faded.

“I am in the middle of a bad situation right now. A dangerous situation. It’s an investigation I’m involved with. Do you remember that Internal Affairs guy I was complaining about before?”

Åsa looked uncomprehending.

Thomas felt himself twist uncomfortably. “He and I are mixed up in something that I can’t handle, and the National Police can’t either. There are people who are out to get me on a personal level. Who have threatened to hurt me and who have already attacked me.”

“Why haven’t you said anything?”

“I didn’t want to worry you. Not now when Sander is coming and everything. But it’s gone too far now. And I can’t stop. I have to keep going, get to the bottom of this thing. There is no one else who can take over.”

“Can’t we get some sort of protection?”

“We can’t get enough protection. This is the price you have to pay as a police officer. I am so damn sorry. If it’d just been about me it would’ve been okay, but now it involves you, too. It might involve Sander too, when he gets here.”

“But there’s got to be some protection we can get. There’s got to be help for police officers involved in dangerous investigations. Right?”

“I’m sure that exists, but it won’t help now.”

“But it’s Christmastime!”

“That’s never mattered less.”

“What do you mean?”

“What I said. The police can’t help us now. Christmas won’t stop anyone. No one can stop what I’m involved in.”

She sat in silence. Thomas waited for her to say something. Instead, she flipped through the folder.

“You can stay with Jan for a few weeks, until this is all over,” he said. “And if it isn’t over in two months, then we can’t bring Sander here. That would be too dangerous.”

She didn’t say anything.

“Åsa, I’m just as upset about this as you are. But there is no other solution.”

The industrial area by Liljeholmen. Hägerström’s car was parked facing the water. Thomas’s car was parked next to him, but facing in the opposite direction. It was already dark out. Hägerström rolled down his window first.

“So, how was Christmas Eve?”

“We were at my brother’s place. They have a huge family. Tons of kids everywhere, dogs, cats, even a hamster. It was the first time I celebrated Christmas with him in more than fifteen years. How about you?”

“I was at my parents’ place, then I went to Half Way Inn. You been there?”

“Once or twice. It’s near the police station in Södermalm, right? The one that’s next door to that gay place?”

“That’s right. My haunt. Not the gay place, that is.”

“Maybe I should’ve come?”

“You’re welcome next year.”

“Next year I’ll have my own family. Hopefully no hamster, though.”

Hägerström looked unhappy.

“How long do we have to meet up like this?” he said. “We’d work better if we had some proper place to be.”

Thomas nodded. “I’ve sent Åsa away now. So I feel better, safer.”

“Damn, how’d it go?”

“Felt like shit. But I think she understood. We can meet up at my house later.”

“Good.”

Thomas turned up the heat even more. There was half an inch of snow on the hood of the car.

“So, what do we have to discuss today?”

Hägerström leaned out through the open window. “I actually have a whole lot to tell you. I was at work today and heard some talk in the hallway. They’ve arrested someone for the murder of Rantzell.”

Thomas felt himself stop breathing for a few seconds.

“His name is Niklas Brogren, the one I brought in for informational questioning a few months ago. The guy had a good alibi then. But it’s starting to fall apart. He said he’d been at a friend’s house the entire night of the murder, until late. The friend’s been in for questioning and confirms that Brogren was there, but the investigator is skeptical about his testimony. Apparently, the guy seems disjointed and stressed out. But the most important part is that the mother has started talking. She says that Niklas Brogren came home pretty early that night and that he was drunk and in a bad mood. You know how it is with alibis, either you have one or else you’re really deep in the shit ’cause you tried to lie.”

“Hm.”

“You sound skeptical.”

“That Niklas guy doesn’t have anything to do with what we’re looking at.”

“No, but his mom had a long-term relationship with Rantzell at the end of the eighties and the beginning of the nineties. So there are some connections and possible motives.”

“So, what’s the motive?”

“Rantzell apparently beat the mother.”

“How do they know that?”

“I guess the investigators ordered old medical records and stuff like that, I know I would’ve. They say she had to go to the hospital several times, sometimes with fractures.”

“Damn.”

“You can say that again.”

Thomas sighed. “Maybe I’m too set on our lead, but I don’t know. It just sounds too easy, that the son of an old battered woman is out for revenge. Like some pathetic crime thriller. The past visits the present, all that crap. But that’s never the way things are in reality.”

“I’ve got the same gut feeling. But what the hell. There’s a lot pointing at this Niklas Brogren. Except the forensic lab hasn’t found any matches.”

Thomas took a deep breath. “I don’t think we should end our project.”

“Absolutely not. But what does it give us? Adamsson died, but there’s nothing pointing to anything shady about it. Wisam Jibril died and we can’t get any further there. We haven’t gotten hold of Ballénius. What do we have, exactly? You’ve got a bunch of documents at home that we haven’t been able to get anything substantial from. You’ve tricked and forced answers out of a few old cops that suggest they’re right-wing extremists. So? It doesn’t lead anywhere.”

“Stop it, Martin. We have a lot. But so far, nothing that points to the actual murderer. But soon we’ll have gone through all the documents from Rantzell’s basement—I never would’ve been able to do it without you—and there are lots of weird things there. Lots of names of people to interrogate, companies to take a closer look at, payment streams to follow.”

It was true. Thomas and Hägerström’d divided the document piles between them. Thomas’d already gone through a bunch of it, but there was still too much he didn’t understand. They had to do it together. Hägerström knew numbers and finance stuff—explained as well as he could, but it wasn’t enough. The sheer amount of information almost felt overwhelming. All the numbers, addresses, names. They worked methodically. Thomas sorted and structured the material, Hägerström analyzed it. They were using a point system of their own divising. Graded the level of suspicion for the information they were investigating. Made lists of people, telephone numbers, company names. Created an order of priority: everything that pointed to a connection between Rantzell and Bolinder’s company, everything that pointed to a connection between Skogsbacken AB and something illegal.

So far, no traces led to Adamsson. But there was still so much they hadn’t gone through.

“It’s going to take us several months. Maybe years,” Hägerström said. “You can’t have Åsa living somewhere else for that long, and if they find out that I’m involved, I’ll have to look around for another job pretty quick. That won’t work. We need a breakthrough soon or else we’ll have to drop it and let the prosecutor nail that Brogren guy. Anyway, if you ask me, it doesn’t seem improbable that he did it.”

Thomas was breathing through his nostrils. The winter cold pushed down into his lungs. Filled him even though it was still warm in the car. He wasn’t going to bother commenting on whether Brogren was the murderer or not.

“I’m going to keep at it, in any case. I believe in our lead, even if it seems fuzzy right now. And there’s a particular lead we have to follow up on. We have to find Ballénius. He knows something, I can feel it. An old fox like that wouldn’t have acted the way he did at Solvalla if not for something special. He knows something.”

The Stockholmers were running around, harried as they made exchanges, returned Christmas gifts, and did post-Christmas shopping while, at the same time, everyone was trying to rest up and be on vacation. Thomas talked to Åsa a million times a day. She was sitting at home at Jan’s house with all the animals, bored. She was maybe going to spend New Year’s Eve with some friends and wanted him to come. He couldn’t say no to everything. Thankfully: what Åsa was most worried about was how she would hide the fact that she was staying with her brother-in-law from her friends at the New Year’s party. That felt like the biggest triviality ever.

Thomas’d scaled back work at the club while still doing his utmost to find facts on Bolinder. He spoke with cop acquaintances. Searched on the Internet. Asked Jonas Nilsson for help again—he was going to ask his older colleagues. Went to a library and asked to look through the newspaper archive. He asked around at the club. “Bolinder,” Ratko said. “Why are you so interested in him all the time?” After that, Thomas lay low at the club for a few days.

It was Sunday. High, clear blue sky, for once. The air was crisp. Thomas and Hägerström were standing outside the entrance to Solvalla. The day’s race was called the Silver Horse. It was a high-class V75 championship with a trophy statuette shaped like a royal silver horse as icing on the cake. The place would be packed with people. Ballénius ought to be there. This time, they wouldn’t lose him.

Agria pet insurance was still dominating the ad space. The excitement in the air was almost as thick as the mashed potatoes on the old guys’ steak platters. But there were fewer people outside than the last time Thomas’d been there—the colder weather was sending people indoors.

They worked their way through the outdoor crowd. Even though Thomas was certain that Ballénius wouldn’t be there, he wanted to be sure.

Ballénius wasn’t there.

They went into Ströget, the sports bar. Pretty much the same crowd with their jackets still on, just like last time. Definitely the same bacon chips in the bar. Mostly younger dudes here, downing burgers and beer. They wouldn’t find Ballénius here, he was certain.

Thomas eyed Hägerström; he looked nervous. Or else he was just tense, on alert. Double emotions: Thomas was grateful that the ex-IA guy was with him. At the same time, he was ashamed—hoped no old colleagues would see them together.

They moved on, up to the Bistro. The entrance was crammed with Finnish gypsies. Thomas pushed his way through. Walked up to the bar. He recognized the Danish restaurant boss with the beer gut whom he’d talked to last time. It looked like the beer gut’d swelled somewhat. He got the Dane’s attention. Asked his questions. The Dane shook his head—sorry, he didn’t know anything. Thomas asked for Sami Kiviniemi, the man who’d pointed Thomas to the right floor last time. But the Finn wasn’t there. So far, their Solvalla lead was worthless.

Thomas and Hägerström took the escalator up toward the Congress. The names of the horses that’d won the big championship were printed on the wall, year by year. Gum Ball, Remington Crown, Gidde Palema.

Before they walked into the Congress, Hägerström looked at Thomas.

“Are you armed, Andrén?”

He patted the front of his jacket. Felt the SIG Sauer through the fabric.

“Even though I’m just a traffic cop these days, I’m still the best shot in the Southern District.”

Hägerström smiled a little. Then he said, “It’s probably best if I stay by the entrance, right? You go in, because you’ll recognize him. If the old guy tries the same thing as last time, I’ll be a brick wall up here.”

Thomas nodded.

Hägerström continued, “And you call my cell as soon as you go in. It’ll be our own little radio that no one will look twice at.”

Hägerström seemed competent. Thomas tried to relax, walked into the Congress Bar and Restaurant. He held the phone in his left hand. Positioned himself at the top of the room. Tried to see down into the bleachers. Looked around. All the tables looked completely booked. He reported to Hägerström, “I don’t see him. But it’s big in here. Probably four hundred people at the tables.”

He began walking along the top row. His head constantly turned toward the tables farther down. People were loving the race, their attention was directed fiercely on the track. The voice over the loudspeaker in the venue sounded worked up: a high-odds horse was apparently about to win. Eighty feet farther off, he saw Table 118. Ballénius’s favorite spot. The place where Thomas’d found the old guy last.

Four people were sitting at the table. He could only see two of them head-on: a woman with massive lips that had to be fake, and a man in his thirties who was almost standing up in excitement over the action on the track. Thomas only saw the backs of the two others at the table. One of them could be Ballénius. Tall, thin.

He took a step closer. It would make things easier if the man didn’t turn around.

Closer. Thirty feet left. Thin, gray hair—it could definitely be him.

Closer.

He spoke to Hägerström, “I’m twenty feet away from a man who could be him.”

Thomas approached the table. Saw the guy head on.

Reminded him of Mr. Bean, except with gray hair.

It was definitely not Ballénius.

55

There were three reasons Mahmud took the job seriously: Jorge was a cool cat—Mahmud could feel it in his entire body. He and the Latino shared the same attitude, the same agenda. On top of that: Mahmud really wanted to fuck those Yugo cunts, show them that they couldn’t just play an Arab with honor any which way. There were rules, even for those who stood outside the law. Finally: it was mad exciting—an ill special-ops gig that could lead to some sick cheddar.

He’d been to see Erika Ewaldsson for the last time today. She’d led him into her office as usual. The mess, the blinds, the coffee cups—everything was the same as always. Except for one thing: she was speaking more slowly than she normally did. And she almost looked a little angry. Not like her—a pissy Erika sat still and didn’t peep. Not like today: babbled on, but still looked unhappy.

Then he had a different thought. Maybe she wasn’t pissed off. Maybe she was sad. Motherfucker, it sounded shadyish, but maybe she was gonna miss him. The longer he sat there and listened to her drone, the more obvious it became. She didn’t like that this was their last meeting. But it was even stranger: Mahmud felt funny too, like sad or something. Shit, Erika was kinda okay after all. He beat the thought away. Tried to picture Erika in front of him naked instead, coax his inner chuckle. She always wore baggy clothes. She wasn’t thin, but was she really that chunky? Her tits might still be nice. Her ass was wide, but maybe it gave her sick curves. No laughs—the opposite. Didn’t suit a G like him. But finally, he grinned to himself. Between her legs: she just had to rock a crazy Queen of Spades, major bush. Sooo Suedi.

The meeting was over.

“Okay then, Mahmud, we won’t be seeing each other again. How do you feel about that? Strange?”

What? She was the one who thought it was sad. He didn’t care.

“It’s cool. You’ll probably see me on TV when I’m a millionaire.”

Erika smiled. “I thought you already were a millionaire, that’s what you usually say.”

“Yeah, sure I’m a Millionaire, a child of the Million Program. Did you people really think that was gonna work? Pile all of us into a bunch of towers out in the concrete?”

You could see it in Erika’s eyes again: she wasn’t happy. “I don’t know, Mahmud. But I really hope things go well for you. But how are you going to be become a millionaire? You haven’t actually gotten a job yet.”

Maybe she was grinning a little bit, after all.

“Okay,” Mahmud said. “Then maybe I’ll see you at the employment agency, or whatever it’s called.”

“That would be nice.”

“Yes.”

“There’s just one place I don’t want to see you again, Mahmud.”

“Where is that?”

“Here.”

They laughed together. Mahmud got up. Extended his hand.

She extended her hand, too. They looked at each other. Stood still.

Then they hugged.

“Take care, now,” Erika said.

Mahmud didn’t say anything. Tried to keep himself from hugging her again.

Mahmud’d been to the gym. It was snowing out. Stockholm was still decked out for the holidays. The Swedes’d sat at home with their families and celebrated a few days ago. Mahmud’d gone over to his dad and Jivan’s house. Jamila came over that night. She’d brought gingersnaps and baklava. They ate dinner, watched a movie that Mahmud’d been allowed to pick: I Am Legend. Dad didn’t like the flick.

In a way, they celebrated Christmas too, except Beshar refused to say the word Christmas in front of Mahmud. “That’s the Swedes’ thing. Not ours.”

Mahmud’d taken care of his homework. The first thing he had to do was the weapons. He got contacts through Tom. A couple of real heavy hitters from Södertälje. Tight networks—Syriacs. Cash-in-transit pros. Dynamite vets. Weapons fetishists. Tom didn’t know them well, but well enough to be able to buy three pieces. Two AK4s that’d probably been stolen from some army stockpile and a Glock 17. Felt epic: to hide three badass pieces at home in the apartment. Mahmud removed the bolts, wrapped them in a bedsheet. He put the rest of the weapons under the bed, behind a couple of bags of documents that he’d picked up at that apartment many months ago. Then he put the bed sheet with the bolts up on a beam in the attic. Couldn’t be too careful: if the 5-0 got him, at least he’d be able to say that the weapons had important parts missing. That they weren’t fit to use.

Another piece of homework’d been even easier: to get bolt cutters. First he thought of boosting one, but changed his mind. Unnecessary to take risks. Instead, he bought it at Järnia in Skärholmen’s mall—the phattest model they had. He paid cash.

The final piece of homework was the most difficult: to get manpower. Not that he didn’t know a lot of people. But who did he trust? Who would never snitch, kept shit synced, could handle the job? He already knew who he would ask: Robert, Javier, and Tom. But the questions still remained: Could he trust his homies?

Tom was traveling over New Year’s—fuck. Niklas wanted a total of ten boots on the ground, as he put it. Mahmud had to have a planning meeting with the other guys anyway. Robert and Javier came over to his house that night. Javier was wearing a shirt so tight his nipples were popping out like that fucking British bimbo Jordan. Robert was rocking his usual baggy ghetto style, like Fat Joe himself: track pants and an oversized hoodie. Mahmud couldn’t help but think, Will these blattes really be able to handle the attack? They saw themselves as real G’s and maybe they were hard core. But this—this was different. He just couldn’t blow this thing. Could never fuck up.

They split a doobie. Watched Bourne Ultimatum. Mahmud tried to get himself pumped up. Soon he was gonna lay it all out. Couldn’t sound lame. Had to do it right.

He ejected the DVD. Turned to the guys. “Boys, I’ve got a thing cooking. A big thing.”

Rob took a hit on the joint. “What? You got a connect?”

“No, this is personal. And there’ll be easy money.”

“Sounds good.”

“It’s like that home invasion we rocked, Rob, in that crib. Remember?”

Rob smiled. “Sure. Damn, we were fucking saints, giving you all the gear we lifted.”

“This is my turn to give back, promise. This is like that invasion times a hundred. We’re gonna hit a huge fucking house on Smådalarö.”

“Smådalarö. Where the fuck is that? Way up north or something?”

They laughed.

Mahmud began explaining. How he’d met Jorge in the reggae apartment. How the Latino’d been set on revenge on the Yugos, 110 percent. Old wrongs and shit, mafia style. He told them about Niklas, who’d floored Jamila’s ex and who hated the whore business more than a broad-backed feminist dyke. He explained about the upper-class horndogs who thought they were gonna fuck young pussy but would get slammed with a high-stylin’ blatte attack instead. They could trust Niklas. The commando dude knew his shit: the planning, the surveillance, the maps, the photos, everything.

Mahmud could feel that they were listening. They nodded. Asked semismart follow-up questions. Dug it. What sealed the deal: the weapons. When they heard what Mahmud’d gotten ahold of, they wanted in right away.

Mahmud: the meanest attack blatte on the Stockholm battlefield. The only downside was that he should’ve talked to Niklas ages ago, but the guy was impossible to reach. Mahmud didn’t want to call, since they’d decided to send coded texts. He fired off about ten texts a day instead. No answer. Maybe he’d misunderstood the code. So he stopped by Niklas’s crib, rang the doorbell, even put a note in the mail slot: Hey corpse, call me!

But nothing happened. One day, two days, three days passed. New Year’s Eve was approaching. Where the fuck was that guy?

What’s more: he had to find another soldier. Niklas wanted five people for the attack. If it even happened.

Mahmud thought about his buddies. Dejan, Ali, lots of other players. They wouldn’t be able to pull this off. He didn’t even know if Robert and Javier would man up, seal the deal. The same thought came sneaking back—Babak would be perfect.

But how? Babak’d totally turned his back on him. Regarded him as a massive traitor. With every right, as he’d realized too late—the Yugos were the enemy. His conscience boiling like heartburn.

He got out a pen and paper. Did something he’d never done before: wrote down what he was gonna say. After ten minutes, he was done. Read through it. Made some changes. He remembered from school: bullet points, that’s what it was called.

He hoped they would help.

He picked up his phone. Called Babak.

56

The air in the jail was heavy with smoke and bad karma. Even though the smoking ban that applied in the rest of Sweden’d reached this place, too. The linoleum in the hallways and the thick, blue-painted doors to the cells were so marinated in smoke that you could probably scrape a Marlboro from them.

Niklas took note of everything. The uniforms the correctional staff wore: baggy, green, worn down until they were pajama soft. The white-painted metal borders on the windows, the four-inch-thick flameproof mattress on the bed, the wooden chair, the mini desk, the fourteen-inch TV. The three PlayStation games that you could check out in the unit were worth their weight in gold. There was nothing wrong with the COs, they were just doing their job. But the detained men shuffled around in state-issued slippers—unshaven, languid, depressed. There was no need to rush in here. Life was measured out in the windows of time between hearings or, for the ones with privileges, conversations with loved ones.

He felt lost, and at the same time, superior. Most of the people in here were duds. According to Niklas, the logic was simple: that’s why people ended up in here.

He felt like the robot in the Terminator movies. Registered his surroundings, the rooms, the people, like a computer. Scanned the placement of the cells, the guards’ equipment, tones of voices, attitude. Possibilities. He was classified as restricted, so he wasn’t permitted to speak with anyone, to make or receive phone calls, or to send or receive mail. They thought he might tamper with evidence if he gained access to the outside world. It was insane.

He thought about the interrogations he’d been through. A few’d only been fifteen minutes long. Others several hours. The investigators went over the same things over and over again. When he’d arrived at Benjamin’s place on the night in question, where they’d rented the DVD, who’d paid for the movie, if he knew what Benjamin’d been doing earlier during the night, if he’d like to comment on his mother’s testimony, when he’d left Benjamin’s place for home, what his mother’d been doing when he got home. And, yesterday: they started asking questions about Mats Strömberg and Roger Jonsson. They were on to him.

They sat in a small interrogation room in the same hall as his cell. There was a sticker on the eternal linoleum floor that pointed out the direction of the Kaaba in Mecca—someone was apparently permitted to pray in there. There was an intercom phone on the table, but outbound calls were blocked. There was a note on the wall: Important! Contact unit personnel before the client is released into the hallway. He couldn’t complain about security. His overall conclusion: breaking out of the jail at Kronoberg wouldn’t be easy.

Today: another interrogation, even though there was nothing to say. He didn’t have anything to do with Claes’s murder, that’s all there was to it.

His lawyer sat with him for a few minutes before the interrogation.

“Have you thought of anything since the last time we saw each other? Anything you want to bring up with the interrogator?”

Niklas said what he was thinking. “I don’t want to talk about the way Claes treated Mom and me. That’s none of the police’s business.”

“Then I suggest that you breathe through your nose and keep your mouth shut,” Burtig said. “Do you understand? Legally, you don’t have to answer any questions about that.”

Niklas understood. Burtig was good, but would that be enough?

The chief interrogator, Stig Ronander, came in. Gray hair and a spider’s web of wrinkles around his eyes. The old guy exuded experience and calm: a relaxed style, composed movements. Above all: a gleam in his eye and a sense of humor that allowed the interrogations to be punctuated by a laugh now and then. It was smart, nasty smart.

The other cop was named Ingrid Johansson. She was the same age as Ronander, but more quiet, watchful, on her guard. She brought a tray with coffee and cinnamon buns.

Niklas’d spent a few hours in his cell trying to analyze their interrogation technique. It was significantly more subtle than his and Collin’s methods in the heat, down in the sand. An interpreter, the butt of a gun, a boot: that was usually enough to get the information you needed. Ronander/Johansson rocked the opposite style: pleasantness attack. Self-controlled and thoughtful, tried to create a connection, trust. Force more details out of him by asking the same things over and over again. Good cop/bad cop—seemed to belong to the old school. Both oozed trust, consideration. But Niklas was on to them. They were slippery.

The first real question came after ten minutes of coffee sipping and small talk. “You wouldn’t mind telling us about your childhood, would you? Your mom already has.”

“No comment.”

“Why no comment? Come on.”

“No comment.”

“But Niklas, be nice. We’re just talking here. Do you remember a lot from your childhood?”

Silence.

“Did you like sports?”

Silence.

“Did you used to play outdoors?”

Silence.

“Did you read books?”

Even more silence.

“Niklas, I understand if this is difficult to talk about. But it could be worth it, for your own sake.”

“I said, no comment.”

“Your mom worked as a cashier, right?”

Niklas drew a line through the crumbs on the table.

“That’s private.”

“But why is it private? She told us so herself. So it can’t be private.”

Silence.

“Is it true that she worked as a cashier?” Ronander’s eyes darted quickly to the right, toward Ingrid Johansson. Niklas didn’t respond.

And that’s how it went. Repetition, gentle questioning, repetition. The lawyer couldn’t do much, they had every right to ask questions. Two hours went by. More repetition. Wasted time. His childhood was an important subject, he’d give them that. But they didn’t know how important. They didn’t understand what ought to be done to stop people like Claes Rantzell.

He wasn’t guilty of this.

Only two days left till New Year’s Eve. Niklas thought about Mahmud and their preparations. Wondered if a haji like him would’ve gotten his shit done: the weapons, the foot soldiers, the bolt cutters. Niklas himself’d done everything before he was arrested. But now: time was running out. He hoped the Arab would sit tight on the gear for a later occasion.

He tried to work out in his cell. Push-ups, sit-ups, triceps exercises, back, legs, shoulders. He brainstormed, planned, organized. There had to be a solution. A way out. At night, other, darker thoughts visited him. The face of the prostitute. Images of how they would assault, beat, and rape her. Glimpses of her vulnerability: the girl crying in a bed, pleading for help. Where was help? Where was freedom? And other images: Nina Glavmo-Svensén in the idyllic suburb. The child on her arm. The locked doors of the house. He didn’t know if he was dreaming or imagining things.

It was almost time for another hearing. They’d already had two, without success. His lawyer, Burtig, explained, “First, they weren’t allowed to hold you for more than four days without the court making a decision about the charges brought against you. After that, they have to hold a hearing every other week in order to continue to coop you up like this. But I think we have a pretty good case. You have an alibi. There are no witnesses. No technical evidence so far; they haven’t found anything on you through the forensic lab database. The question is just what your mom is actually saying. And what they’ve found on your computer about those other guys.”

Niklas already knew what to answer: “I want a hearing. As soon as possible.”

The lawyer took notes.

Niklas had a plan.

57

They were sitting at Thomas’s house, on the ground floor. If Åsa’d been there, she would’ve been watching TV upstairs. Thomas felt as though deep inside, she’d understood him. That made him feel warm. But his fear of the people he was searching for made him colder.

There was an illuminated Christmas star hanging in one of the windows. Even if Åsa’d decorated more than usual this year, they hadn’t gotten a Christmas tree or an Advent candelabra. But when Sander came they were going to decorate so damn much for the holidays that even the window displays at the NK department store would seem un-Christmassy in comparison.

Hägerström was sitting in an armchair that Thomas’d inherited from his dad. The frame was in cherrywood. Worn red seat cushion and backrest. Maybe it wasn’t the most stylish chair in the world, but it meant a lot. If you smelled closely: the old man’s cigarillo smell still clung to it. Thomas thought, I ought to reupholster it. Someday.

On the coffee table and on the floor: papers, documents, files spread out. They’d eliminated a certain amount through their point system. For an outside observer, it would’ve looked like chaos. For the cop duo, it was chronology, order, structure.

The mission: to sift through the material and find information that could lead them to Ballénius. They’d been naïve; thought if only they went to Solvalla, Ballénius would be sitting there, waiting, just like the last time. But the old fox wasn’t dumb: he understood that something was going on. He knew that Rantzell was dead.

The Wisam Jibril trail obviously pointed toward some form of crime. But they weren’t able to complete the puzzle, didn’t see how that part fit in. Jibril’d been some kind of robber king, a professional criminal, but nothing seemed to indicate that he’d had any kind of personal contact with Rantzell. When it came to Adamsson’s death, it probably meant something, but it could be a coincidence, too. Hägerström’d asked around. Thomas’d made the rounds. No one believed the man’d lost his life through foul play. Everything pointed to the car accident being as normal as a car accident can be. What was left were a few members of the Troop, all the documents, the companies, the front men, the transactions, the more or less shady businesses. What was left was Ballénius, who knew something. And what was left was Bolinder’s party that the Yugos were arranging on New Year’s Eve. Thomas hadn’t told Hägerström about that yet.

Through Jasmine, Thomas’d found out some more information about the party at Bolinder’s. They didn’t try to hide what they were up to from Thomas—but this, the fact that they were going to do an event at Bolinder’s right now, wasn’t just crazy. It was insane. He had to tell Hägerström, he might make something of it. Still, he was reluctant. He didn’t want to advertise his side job. Even if Hägerström was smart—he’d already understood that Thomas was involved with something sort of shady—he didn’t know how deep it was. Telling him could wait.

Hägerström’d brought a large bar of chocolate that he’d put on the table. He broke pieces through the foil. “Dark chocolate is still damn good. And healthy, they say.” He grinned. The chocolate was like a brown film over his teeth.

Thomas laughed. “I’m not going to say what it looks like you’re eating.” He got up. Went to the kitchen. Got two beers. Handed one to Hägerström. “Here, have something manly instead.”

They continued to go through the piles of paper. Company by company. Year by year. It all went so much better when Hägerström was there. They’d looked up the addresses where Ballénius’d been registered. Fourteen different street addresses and P.O. boxes over the years. Other people in the companies: he mostly served on boards alone. Sometimes he was an alternate. Often with Claes Rantzell. Sometimes with someone named Lars Ove Nilsson. Sometimes with someone named Eva-Lena Holmstrand. In older documents, he was often on the board with some other guys whom Thomas’d looked up—they’d all passed away. He ordered printouts from the national criminal records: a few convictions for white-collar crime and many for drunk driving. Typical alcoholic front men.

Lars Ove Nilsson and Eva-Lena Holmstrand weren’t impossible to get ahold of. Hägerström’d talked to the man. Thomas’d interrogated the woman. They didn’t know anything. One’d taken early retirement and the other was living on welfare. Both’d applied for debt relief orders. They said they recognized the names—both Claes Rantzell and John Ballénius—but claimed that they’d never met them. That they’d agreed to have their names on the paperwork in exchange for a few grand. Maybe they were lying, maybe it was the truth. Thomas’d still applied quite a bit of pressure. The woman’d cried like a child. Hägerström’d rocked the same tactic—if they knew anything, it would’ve come out.

Furthermore: they’d looked up the auditors in a couple of the companies. Hägerström’d talked to them. In some cases, he’d done regular interrogations, according to the rules. Or as close to the rules as you could get in an investigation that was being carried out completely outside the rules. The most important part: he got them sufficiently scared. They didn’t want to be involved in any illegalities, blamed everything on the bookkeepers. And the bookkeepers—the companies all used the same accounting firm—had gone bankrupt. The two owners, who were also the only employees, lived in Spain. Maybe Thomas and Hägerström would be able to find them—further down the line.

More: the apartment on Tegnérgatan was empty. Ballénius was really lying low. Thomas dug up two acquaintances of Ballénius and Rantzell’s, from recent years. They said they didn’t have a clue. They were probably lying too—but no one really seemed to know too much about Rantzell’s last months alive.

The day after the fiasco at Solvalla, Thomas and Hägerström went to see Ballénius’s daughter, Kristina Swegfors-Ballénius, in Huddinge. She was younger than Thomas’d imagined when they’d spoken on the phone. Kicki knew right away that they were cops. Thomas thought, How come people always know?

“Are you the one who called me this summer?” she asked before they’d even introduced themselves.

They pressured her like crazy—ran over her whole story with a fine-toothed comb. She worked off the books as a waitress at a restaurant in the city. Still, she reacted just like the two old front men. Thomas told her how it was. “We’re going to make sure you lose your job and are reported to the tax authorities if you don’t tell us how we can get ahold of your father.” But she held firm to the same story the whole time: “I don’t know where he is; it’s been a long time since I heard from him.”

They gave her a day to get back to them with instructions on how to find him.

They could look up places where the companies’d had their business. Check if there were people there who knew Ballénius. They ought to talk to the banks, check if there was a specific bank office that usually made payments to him. Maybe look up the customers—see if anyone’d ever met the people who supposedly ran the company they were doing business with. There was a lot left to do and it would take time. Thomas couldn’t drop the thought: on New Year’s Eve, that Bolinder character was going to have a party that Ratko and the other Yugos were helping to organize. He must be able to make use of that somehow. There must be some way.

Hägerström was chugging beer and chewing chocolate. Dropping lame jokes that Thomas grinned at. Even if the guy was a quisling, he was pretty fun, after all. Sharp, a good investigator. He was sitting bent over a pile of paperwork when he suddenly looked up.

“I don’t think Kicki will get back to us.”

“Why?” Thomas asked.

“I could just see it in her face. My unfailing instinct.”

“What do you mean, unfailing instinct? I didn’t think cops had anything like that.”

“Maybe you’re right. But I let a colleague get ears on Kicki Swegfors-Ballénius’s cell phone. We’ve been tapping it since our little visit yesterday. She called him.”

“You’re kidding? So we’ve got a number.”

“We’ve got a number, but he killed it right after that call. It doesn’t exist anymore. And she told him that someone was looking for him and that he shouldn’t call her for a while. She’s protecting him.”

Thomas felt angry, at the same time, mystified—why hadn’t Hägerström told him earlier? “That’s fucked up,” he said. “What a cunt.”

“You can put it that way. Basically, I don’t think the Kicki trail is going to lead anywhere. That’s why I didn’t say anything at first. But I have another idea.”

Thomas leaned forward from the couch.

“I’ve looked up the addresses that Ballénius has had over the years. There’s a pattern with those P.O. boxes. For all the companies that are still alive, he still uses or recently used a P.O. box in Hallunda.”

“And?”

“And that means that address is probably still in use. Which is to say, that he still uses it to pick up mail.”

“Let’s go there right now.”

They reached Hallunda an hour later. Thomas’d driven carefully. He was thinking about all the chaos in the city. A huge snowstorm was blowing in over Stockholm like a premonition: the citizens needed to be protected in the face of a catastrophe. Soon a new year would begin—with plenty of white snow, for once. Without there being time for it to be soiled and turn the usual color of snow in Stockholm: grayish-brown, full of gravel, dirt, and the inhabitants’ melted expectations.

Welcome to the Hallunda Mall. They’d created a logo for the mall that appeared on every sign: a red H followed by a period. Thomas thought about the way it’d been when he was growing up—early eighties, before the age of the malls—he and his buddies used to travel in to Södermalm and wander all the way downtown, to Sergels Torg, by cruising between shops. Records, clothes, stereo equipment, comics, and porn magazines. Maybe he saw a connection: that was the time before the malls and before the scum from the projects took over the city.

The P.O. box company didn’t have any windows facing out toward the actual mall. Instead, you entered through an anonymous glass door. They looked up the company’s name on a board, took an elevator up, above all the stores. It said, P.O. BOX CENTER in the same colors as the letters of the Hallunda Mall signs. The tagline was: Do you need a P.O. box? Are you new in town and haven’t been able to secure a permanent residence? What bullshit—everyone knew what type of people used P.O. boxes like this.

A door. A doorbell. A surveillance camera.

Thomas rang the doorbell.

“P.O. Box Center, how may I help you?”

“Hi, this is the police. May we come in?”

The voice on the other end fell silent. The speaker crackled like it was trying to speak on its own. A few too many seconds passed. Then the lock clicked. Thomas and Hägerström stepped inside.

The space: max 320 square feet. The walls: lined with two different sizes of metal-colored mailboxes with Assa Abloy keyholes. Along one short end: a small built-in booth covered with a sheet of Plexiglas. In the booth was an overweight man with a downy mustache.

Thomas walked up to him, flashed his badge. The guy looked scared out of his mind. He was probably trying frenetically to remember the instructions he’d been given in case a cop stopped by for a visit.

“Would you mind stepping out from behind there?”

The guy spoke in broken Swedish: “Do I have to?”

“You don’t have to, but I guess then we’ll have to drag you out.”

Thomas tried to smile—but he could sense that it wasn’t a very pleasant smile.

The guy disappeared for a few seconds. A door opened next to the booth.

“What do you want?”

“We want you to get in touch with one of your customers and tell him that he has to come here.”

The guy thought it over. “Is this a search?”

“You’d better fucking believe it, buddy. We have every right to get information about your customers. You know that. And if you don’t know that, I’ll make sure that every single box in here is broken into at your expense, and you’ll have to take full responsibility for the damage. Just so you know.”

The P.O. box guy started going through a binder with customer contracts. After a few minutes, he seemed to find Ballénius’s contract.

“Okay, so what are you going to do now?”

Thomas was growing impatient. “Call him and tell him a package arrived for him that is too big for you to take care of and that he has to pick it up today, or else you’ll send it back.”

“What did you say?”

“Quit it. Either you do what I just told you to do, or else we’ll make life really fucking sour for you.” Thomas walked into the booth. Pulled binders out. Started flipping through them. He found Ballénius’s contract. Actually: there was a number listed that he didn’t recognize.

Hägerström watched the situation unfold. The P.O. box guy seemed bewildered.

Thomas looked at him. “What, you want something?”

The P.O. box guy didn’t respond.

Thomas stepped back out from booth. “Maybe you didn’t understand what I just told you.” He walked over to a P.O. box. Rummaged around in his pocket. Fished out the electrical skeleton key. Started working on the lock.

The guy looked terrified. “Shit, man, you can’t do that.”

“Call John Ballénius right now and tell him that there’s a huge package here for him,” Thomas said. “Big as a bike or something like that. Just call.”

The postbox guy shook his head. Still picked up the phone. Dialed the number. Sandwiched the receiver between his chin and shoulder.

Thomas could hear his own breathing.

After fifteen seconds.

“Hi, this is Lahko Karavesan at P.O. Box Center in Hallunda.”

Thomas tried to hear the voice on the other end of the guy’s phone. He couldn’t.

“We’ve got a package for you that’s way too big for us to keep here.”

Something was said on the other end of the line.

“It’s big like a bike or something, but I don’t know what it is. Unfortunately, if you don’t pick it up today we’re gonna have to send the package back.”

Silence.

Thomas looked at the P.O. box guy. The guy looked at Hägerström. Hägerström looked at Thomas.

The guy hung up the phone. “He’s on his way, soon.”

Damn, that was some luck.

The buzzer in the office went off. Four customers’d passed through the P.O. Box Center while they’d been waiting. Said hi discreetly to the poor guy who worked there, exchanged a few words, emptied their boxes. Continued running their anonymous companies, their front-man operations, their porn stashes hidden from their wives.

The P.O. box guy signaled to Thomas and Hägerström. A man walked in. The same sad, gray face. Same thin hair. Same thin, rickety body. Ballénius.

The guy didn’t have time to react. Hägerström was positioned by the door and stepped up behind him. Thomas, in front, leaned in close. Ballénius didn’t even seem surprised; he looked despondent.

Hägerström cuffed him.

Ballénius didn’t resist. Didn’t say anything. Just stared at Thomas with tired eyes. They led him out. The P.O. box guy exhaled, as though he’d been holding his breath for the entire time that Thomas and Hägerström’d been in there.

Hägerström climbed into the front seat. Thomas in the back, next to John Ballénius. It was snowing so much outside that Thomas couldn’t even see the Hallunda Mall sign anymore. Warm air was pouring out of the car’s air vents.

Ballénius was sitting with his hands in his lap; the handcuffs weren’t pulled too tightly. Waiting for them to drive him to the interrogation.

Hägerström turned around. “We’re going to conduct the interrogation right here, just so you know.”

“Why?” Ballénius asked. The guy’d been around the block—knew: regulation interrogations were never conducted in a car.

“Because we don’t have time to mess around, John,” Thomas responded.

Ballénius groaned. His exhalation created a cloud of steam—it still wasn’t all that warm in the car.

“You know the drill. You’re an old hand at this, John. We can goof around and play nice. Laugh at your jokes to pretend to be pleasant. Coddle you, cajole you into talking.”

Theatrical pause.

“Or else we can just be straight with you. This is not an ordinary investigation. You know that, too. This is the fucking Palme murder.”

Ballénius nodded.

“You’ve laid low. You know something and you know that someone wants to know what you know. Me and Hägerström here, we also want to know. But there are others, too. Understood?”

Ballénius kept nodding.

“I understand that you don’t want to talk. You might get in trouble. But let me put it this way: you’ve probably read in the papers that they’ve arrested a man for the murder of Rantzell. Do you know who it is? The media isn’t printing his name. He’s Marie Brogren’s son.”

Thomas tried to see if Ballénius reacted to the news. The guy lowered his gaze. Maybe, maybe a reaction.

Thomas briefly went over the suspicions against Niklas Brogren. Hägerström sat with his gaze fixed on Ballénius. Five minutes passed.

“You know what this means. Niklas Brogren is probably going to be convicted of the murder of Claes. But he isn’t the one who did it, is he? Niklas Brogren is innocent. And the ones who are really behind all this, and who were behind Palme, will go free. But you can change that, John. This is your chance. The chance of a lifetime. And that’s because Hägerström and I are not part of an official investigation. We’re doing this privately, on the side. So everything you tell us will stay between us, it’ll never go public. Never.”

Ballénius looked down again. Near silence in the car. It was warm now. Too warm. Thomas was still sitting with his jacket on. Saw his own reflection in the window across from him. He felt tired. This had to end now.

Hägerström broke the silence.

“John, we’re as deep in the shit as you are. Ask any cop. Andrén’s been transferred because of his investigation and I’ve been cut off. We’re not desirable anymore, we’re outside the system. And we’ve gone rogue on this. If that comes out, we’re done as cops. Do you understand what I’m saying? If you want, you can call one of your police contacts and ask.”

“That’s not necessary,” Ballénius said. “I’ve already heard about you.” A vein was pulsing in Ballénius’s neck. “I’ll talk, on two conditions.”

“What?”

“That you release me right afterward and that you don’t tell anyone how you got ahold of me or what you know about me.”

Thomas stared at Hägerström. Then he said, “That’s fine, granted you give us useful information.”

“That’s not enough. If it is as you say, you really don’t have any right to sit here and interrogate me. I want something to hold over you as security. I want to take a picture of us together on my cell phone. If things get bad, I’ll give it to some appropriate inspector who can draw his own conclusions about you.”

Dangerous horse trading. They’d be taking a huge chance. A massive risk. Thomas could feel Hägerström glancing at him again. The decision was his. He was the one most personally affected by this whole thing. He was burning the most. Was pushing the hardest.

Thomas said, “Okay, we’ll buy that. You talk, you take a picture, then you can go.”

Hägerström turned off the heat. The silence sounded like a scream in the car.

The old guy opened his mouth as if to say something. Then he closed it again.

Thomas stared.

Ballénius leaned back. “Okay. I’ll tell you what I know.”

Thomas could feel himself tense up.

“Claes and I weren’t close for long. We spent a lot of time together in the eighties and nineties. Especially in the middle and end of the eighties—you know, there was quite the time being had at Oxen, the bar, and then there were all the companies we were on the boards of. Between us, we made some hefty dough. But neither me nor Classe have ever been any good at holding on to money. Ask my daughter, you know about her, I gather. Claes’s money mostly went to booze and you can guess where mine went. I’ve always loved horses.”

John Ballénius continued to describe his and Claes Rantzell’s lives twenty years earlier. Hash parties, gambling winnings, goalie jobs, alcohol problems, fights, all that crap. Early business structuring in the beginning of the nineties, before the police’d understood how big the front-business bubble was. Names went flying by. Thomas recognized a bunch of them from the tales the old cops’d told from earlier days. Places were mentioned, apartment brothels, underground clubs, drug hideouts. It was a rundown of the rabble of the past.

“I didn’t see Claes more than once or twice a year over the past few years. He was worn down, I was worn down. We didn’t have the energy, you know? But this spring, I heard rumors about him. Apparently he was living it up like he’d won big-time at the track. And then he started calling me. We spoke a few times, then we got together at a bar in Södermalm.”

Thomas couldn’t hold back. “What did he say?”

“I don’t always remember things too good, but I remember that night clearly. He looked like a real suave player. Newly pressed suit, gold watch on his arm, new cell phone. And damn, was he ever in a good mood; ordered bottle after bottle for us to split. I wondered what was up, and when I asked he wanted to go somewhere private. We sat down in a booth. I remember that Classe acted as if every guest was a civvy on the lookout. It was obvious that he’d made a little too much cash for it all to be clean. But that’s how we’d lived all our lives, so. Then he told me how he’d thought it over, turned it over every which way, been racked with angst, shilly-shallied, but finally—they’d paid him. After all these years he’d finally dared make demands and that’s when they folded. He was fucking ecstatic.”

“Who were they?”

Ballénius looked at Thomas.

“Don’t you know that already?”

58

Niklas still hadn’t been in touch and it was the day before New Year’s Eve—the attack wouldn’t happen. Fuck, this was some gay shit. Mahmud didn’t want to let Jorge down, lose the promised cash, let the Yugos win. But without the commando guy, nothing would work.

Where was he, anyway? Mahmud’d continued, today even, to send texts like a maniac. His note under Niklas’s door hadn’t had any effect. But he was gonna wait another few hours.

They’d been over at his place again this morning. Prepped the weapons. Tried not to snort or smoke. They weren’t exactly experts—even if they were always talking about gats and Glocks. They needed to concentrate. They inserted and removed the cartridges from the magazines. Secured them on the weapons. Flipped the safeties, changed between semiautomatic and single-shot settings.

Above all: he’d seen Babak yesterday. First a short phone call. His former homeboy kept his style clipped.

“What do you want?”

“Ey, man. Come on, can’t we start hangin’ again?”

“Why?”

“Can’t we meet up? I promise to explain. Jalla, si.”

Babak agreed. They met up in the afternoon, in the Alby mall. Mahmud drove his Benz even though it was just half a mile. Wanted to show Babak: things’re going good now.

It was snowing like the North Pole outside. Big, fluffy flakes that whirled around. Mahmud remembered the first time he’d seen snow: he’d been six years old, at the refugee camp in Västerås. He’d run outside. First stepped carefully on the thin layer of snow. Then dragged his hand over the picnic tables, gathered enough to make a snowball. And finally, while giggling—attacked Jamila. Beshar didn’t get mad that time. The opposite—he laughed. Made a snowball too that he threw at Mahmud. It missed him. Mahmud knew already then, as a six-year-old, that it was on purpose.

Inside McDonald’s, in Alby: Babak was sitting way in the back, as usual. Hadn’t even bought any food—according to Babak, this meeting wasn’t going to be long. His boy was munching on something from a green bag.

Mahmud greeted him.

Babak remained seated at the table. Didn’t get up. No handshake, no hug.

“Shit, Babak, it’s been a long time, man.”

Babak nodded. “Yeah, long time.” He fished out some green balls from the bag.

Mahmud sat down. “What’re you eating?”

“Wasabi peas.” Babak leaned his head back. Opened his mouth wide. Dropped the wasabi peas in one by one.

“Wasabi? Like in sushi? You gay now?”

Babak popped a few more peas. Didn’t say anything.

Mahmud tried to grin. His joke’d bombed. Said, “I’m really sorry, man.”

Babak continued to eat his peas.

“I made a mistake. You were right, habibi. But if you listen to me, you’ll understand. Big things’re happening. Real big. Ahtaj musaa’ada lau simacht.”

Mahmud pushed the bag of wasabi peas to the side. Leaned forward. Mahmud spoke in a low voice. About how he’d been working more and more as a whore guard, then gotten in touch with Jorge, that he’d talked to his sister’s ex-neighbor, who was a crazy fucking raider or something. He told him about the planning, the photos, the maps, the bolt cutters. And above all, he told him about the weapons: two assault rifles and one Glock. The illest arsenal since the CIT heist in Hallunda. All the talking probably took twenty minutes. Mahmud didn’t usually talk that much in one go. The last time was probably when he’d told Babak how the Yugo cunts’d picked up Wisam Jibril. That time, he felt angst. This time, he felt pride.

“You follow? We’re gonna storm that Sven party. We’re gonna lay out the Yugos. We’re gonna jizz in their skulls.”

Finally. After that last thing he’d said: a smile on Babak’s lips.

While Mahmud was driving home from Alby, he thought about the dream he’d had the other night. He was back with Mom. Back in Baghdad. They were sitting together under a tree. The sky was blue. Mom was telling him how you knew when the spring’d come because that’s when the almond tree bloomed. She stood up, picked a small pink flower. Showed Mahmud. Said something in her soft Arabic that Mahmud didn’t completely understand: “When the soul is happy, it has the same color as the almond tree.” Then it looked like the flowers were falling off the tree. Mahmud looked up. Saw the sky. Saw the tree. It wasn’t flowers falling, he realized. It was snow.

He was in a good mood. Homies again—he and Babak. His boy dug what he’d heard. Had held Mahmud by the shoulders—looked him in the eyes. They’d embraced. Like two brothers reuniting after many years. That’s how it was: Babak was his brother, his akh. A pact that couldn’t be broken.

After he’d explained everything, Mahmud finally asked the question: Did Babak want in?

Babak thought it over for a while. Then he said, “I’m in. But not for the cash. I’m in for the honor.”

Now there was just one thing that seemed like it would kill everything. Niklas was a no-show.

59

The cell was situated fifty feet above the ground, not a chance. If Niklas managed to break into a hallway, the doors had armored Plexiglas that he could probably smash in a minute or so, but that wouldn’t be enough. Even if he made his way through them, he’d need to take the elevator to get down, and it didn’t go further than to the sixth floor. After that, you had to pass through several more doors equipped with surveillance cameras before switching to a new elevator. The hallway route was a no-go too. Other alternatives: getting ahold of a weapon—taking a hostage. The crux: the jail staff only carried batons. The cops that came to conduct interrogations checked their weapons somewhere downstairs. If only he hadn’t had these vile restrictions—someone, maybe Mahmud or Benjamin, could possibly’ve smuggled in a firearm. But probably not: the metal detectors sniffed every fucking thing that moved. Another possibility was taking apart the ventilation duct in the ceiling—somehow crawling and slithering his way out. But he wasn’t thin enough for that. He could try to start a fire—split during the fake-fire chaos. Start an uprising—escape while the jail was in riot mode. Niklas crossed out the alternatives quickly from his inner list. You couldn’t escape from the Kronoberg jail—not without massive aid from the outside.

There was a better way. The other day his lawyer, Burtig, had explained that they weren’t allowed to detain him for more than two weeks at a time without a court ruling. Today it was time for his hearing in the District Court.

Niklas ate breakfast early. He did push-ups and sit-ups. When he stood up, it felt like all the blood rushed from his head. At around ten o’clock, there was a knock at the door: Markko, a big detention officer. Niklas asked to change his shirt—he was soaked in sweat and wanted to feel fresh in court.

Markko put handcuffs on him. He and two other detention officers led him down the hall. There was nothing wrong with them, they were just doing their job. Niklas eyed the information panels on the cell doors. Allergies: Nuts. No pork. Allergies: Fish. No pork. Reminded him of the Americans and their weird prisons down in the sandbox.

They walked into a small room with a metal detector. Markko undid the handcuffs. Niklas walked through the metal detector: it remained silent. The cuffs went back on. They took an elevator down. This was a part of the building that he hadn’t known existed.

“We’re going to the tunnel under the Kronoberg Park,” Markko explained. “They call it the Path of Sighs.”

The guards unlocked two metal double doors. The road to the District Court, underground. Like a bomb shelter dug out by al-Sadr’s mujahideen. Their steps echoed. The fluorescent lights gave off a cold glow, the concrete looked like the sand down there after rain: full of small holes. Markko tried to make conversation, be as nice as possible. Niklas couldn’t concentrate.

They reached another set of metal doors. He was led into the bottom level of the District Court. Granite hallways and reinforced wooden doors. A small detention room. A wooden table. Two chairs. On the other side of the table: his lawyer, Burtig, was sitting, waiting.

“Hey there, Niklas, how are you?”

“I’m fine. At least they let me make a snowball yesterday.”

“Was there snow in the rec yard?”

“Tons.”

“Yeah, it’s some climate thing, all this. It’s snowing like never before. Do you feel prepared for what’s going to happen today?”

“I’m assuming it’s pretty much the same deal as last time.”

“In principle. Some new things have come to light. They’ve gone through your computer.”

“What’ve they found?”

“Take a look at this.” Burtig handed him a pile of papers. Niklas flipped through them. Realized already by the fourth page—the seizure report—that they’d gotten ahold of his surveillance videos.

He didn’t really have the energy to read more. If it was all over, fine. There were more important things to think about right now. He couldn’t wait around for a conviction.

“Are we meeting in the same room as last time?” Maybe his question seemed strange.

Burtig held his poker face. “No, we’re meeting in room number six.”

“And where is that?”

“How do you mean?”

“I was just wondering. I’m feeling a little nervous. Is it on the same floor as last time?”

“I think we were in room four last time. So yes, it’s on the same floor.”

Niklas nodded. Continued to flip through the arrest memo. The cops hadn’t only found the files with the videos he’d saved. They had the info he’d written down, too: lists of routines, photos of the wife-beaters, bugging equipment. They had nearly everything.

He asked Burtig a few more questions. At the same time: laser focus on a different target.

The case was called a little while later. Burtig rose. The detention officers came back into the room. Put the handcuffs on. Led him through a hallway.

They stepped into the courtroom.

It was large: high windows with long curtains, the prosecutor’s desk, Niklas and his lawyer’s desk, the witness stand, a raised platform, the railing. The judge was sitting up there, along with a thin, dark-haired guy who was going to take down the transcript: the court reporter. The judge: the same old man as at the last hearing. He was in his sixties. Concentrated gaze. Tweed jacket, pale-blue shirt, green tie with ducks on it. It might actually be the same tie as last time. There was a computer on the table and a law book in front of the judge.

Niklas turned around. Stared for a brief moment. The room was filled with spectators. Burtig’d already warned him—journalists, law students, the curious public. They’d be crowding outside trying to get a seat. In the last row, he spotted his mom.

The detention officers spread out. Markko and one of the other two sat down behind Niklas. The third sat down by the entrance. Kept watch.

Markko unlocked the handcuffs and told Niklas to sit down.

On the other side: the two prosecutors. In front of them: piles of paper, notebooks, pens, and a laptop. They were also the same team as last time—one man and one woman. The man was apparently the chief prosecutor. Burtig’d explained, “You have to understand, Niklas, that this isn’t just any old case. The key witness in the Palme trial has been killed—and everyone thinks you’re the murderer.” Niklas agreed. It really was not just any old case.

The judge cleared his throat.

“The Stockholm District Court will conduct a hearing on detention in case B 14568-08. The suspect, Niklas Brogren, is present.”

Burtig nodded. The judge went on.

“And his public defender, Jörn Burtig, is present. On the side of the prosecution, we have Chief Prosecutor Christer Patriksson and County Prosecutor Ingela Borlander.”

The prosecutors responded affirmatively. Niklas thought it seemed like they were making an effort to sound authoritative.

The judge leaned forward. “Mr. Prosecutor, please present your charges.”

“We move for the continued detention of Niklas Brogren based on reasonable suspicion for the murder of Claes Rantzell on June second at Gösta Ekman Road in Stockholm. He is also reasonably suspected of the murder of Mats Strömberg on the fourth of November of this year as well as the murder of Roger Jonsson. The sentence prescribed for these crimes constitutes imprisonment for not less than two years. The special reasons for detention are due to the risk that, if Niklas Brogren is able to move freely, he may impede the investigation by tampering with evidence, that he may continue his illegal activities, and that he may evade punishment. Furthermore, we move for a private hearing for the remainder of the hearing.”

The clerk was taking notes like a maniac.

The judge turned to Burtig.

“And how does Brogren view the matter?”

Burtig was flipping his pen back and forth between his thumb and index finger.

“Niklas Brogren objects to the request for continued detention and seeks his immediate release from pretrial detention. He denies that reasonable suspicion exists for the alleged murder in June and for the alleged murder on November fourth. He also objects to the special reasons for prolonged pretrial detention. However, there is no objection to a private hearing.”

“Okay,” the judge said. “In that case, the District Court rules that the hearing will proceed as a private hearing. All spectators must leave the courtroom.”

Niklas didn’t turn around. The sound of rustling, whispering people could be heard behind him. Two minutes later, the room was empty of spectators. Go time.

Christer Patriksson, the chief prosecutor, began to read details about the Rantzell murder. How he was found, what the cause of death was, who he’d been. Then he went on. He described Niklas’s relationship to Rantzell. What’d emerged regarding Rantzell’s treatment of Marie. Finally, the information from her interrogation—in which she claimed that Niklas’s alibi didn’t hold up. Why the hell did she say that? Niklas didn’t get it. The cops must’ve pulled a fast one on her.

He waited. Thought about Claes. Those nights down in the basement. With the table-hockey game, with Mom’s old clothes and suitcases. Those nights when Rantzell’d beaten. Repressed. Humiliated.

His lawyer began to speak. Went on and on about what Niklas’d been doing that night, the movie he’d watched at Benjamin Berg’s house, the pizzas they’d bought at the local pizzeria. Burtig argued, attacked the prosecutor’s purported evidence. Burtig kept flipping his ballpoint pen back and forth the entire time. Soon they would turn to Niklas and ask him questions. He wasn’t listening.

Niklas was breathing in through his nose. Out through his mouth. Slowly. Was filling his lungs with oxygen. Focusing on Burtig’s pen.

Tanto dori feel. The pen. As if he were holding it in his own hand.

Weighed it.

Breathed in.

Relaxed.

Breathed out.

He stood up. Tore the pen from Burtig’s hand.

Ran toward the railing. The judge stood up. Yelled something. A guard reached for Niklas. Missed. Rushed after him.

Niklas leaped up onto the raised platform. The clerk looked scared out of his mind. The judge backed up. The detention officer grabbed hold of Niklas. That was to be expected.

He breathed quickly. Pen in hand. The detention officers weren’t evil, but Niklas’s mission was more important.

He made a perfect straight-motion jab. Out and back.

The pen stuck out of the guard’s gut like an arrow. The man realized what’d happened. Started howling. Staggered backward.

Niklas lifted the judge’s chair. Threw it at the window. The sound of the window breaking reminded him of Claes’s bottles, which he used to throw straight down the garbage chute on Gösta Ekman Road.

Niklas picked up the law book. Used it to break off the sharp edges of jagged glass that were still sticking up. They shattered. Would give him fewer wounds. He stepped up onto the windowsill. Markko ran toward him, yelling something. Niklas actually didn’t want to hurt him. But this was war. He kicked. Saw Markko fall backward.

It was over now.

He jumped out the window. Not more than ten feet. Easy fall in the soft snow.

Pulsed forward.

His breath steamed.

Up on the sidewalk. He was panting. Could feel the cold against his feet. He was wearing only socks. The jail slippers were left behind in the snow.

He concentrated. Knew where he was going.

Toward the subway station.

The cold filling his lungs.

Focus on his mission objective.

On his steps.

He saw the entrance to the subway station. No cops’d showed up yet.

Tomorrow was New Year’s Eve.

60

The snow continued to fall. The precipitation lay like a four-inch layer of cotton on the windowpanes. The greenhouse effect could go to hell, all the fuss about the end of winter was seriously exaggerated.

They were sitting at Thomas’s house again. Documents in piles everywhere. Searching. Looking for signs, leads, information about what Ballénius’d told them—payments to Rantzell. They worked feverishly. Like during a preliminary investigation. No mistakes allowed. Time was running out—they’d gotten hold of Ballénius, but the guy might sing, whoever’d attacked Thomas in the parking garage might understand that they were onto something, the Palme Group might get wind of their private little parallel investigation. And tonight was the night of Bolinder’s party. Thomas still hadn’t said anything about it to Hägerström. Really: if there was no reason to go to the party, there was no reason to tell him about it, either. And so far, Thomas couldn’t see that there was anything to gain from going.

The hours passed. At six at the latest, Thomas was going with Åsa to the New Year’s Eve party their friends were having. What he really wanted to do was work through the night with Hägerström, but a man has to have his limits.

On the floor, they lined up all the documents that they’d designated with the highest priority according to their point system, as well as those that had to do with finances. The total amount’d shrunk, but it was still more than five hundred documents. They crawled around like two toddlers. The crux: How would they know what was shady and what wasn’t? There were verifications for payments made to suppliers and payments made by customers, bank statements that listed transfers, price quotas, tax returns, balance sheets, ledgers. They were looking for large sums. Preferably during the spring. Hägerström decided on a minimum figure: anything over 100,000 was of interest. They checked cash withdrawals and amounts that were moved to strange accounts.

Four o’clock rolled around. They scrutinized thirty or so documents more carefully. A few concerned the more than three million kronor that’d been paid by a company named Revdraget in Upplands Väsby AB to a private account at the Nordea Bank. But the private account number didn’t correspond with Rantzell’s information. Still—the sum’d been transferred straight from the company to a private person. It could be a salary, but there was nothing noted in the accounts to suggest that this was so.

Several sums were only recorded as withdrawals in four different companies’ account statements—for example, Roaming GI AB: one million kronor. No receipts, verifications, or other documents indicated what the sum was intended for. Suspicious. But there was nothing that pointed directly to the payments having been made to Rantzell. And nothing connected the payments to any other person, either. But it was Rantzell, together with a few other front men, who’d formally run the companies.

Even more information: sums that were paid into company accounts without any indication of the identity of the recipient, sums that were paid out as loan repayment without any documents supporting the existence of a loan, dividends made out to unidentified stockholders without records of such a decision in the minutes from the shareholders’ meeting. The document piles contained a lot of oddities. Hägerström saw things that Thomas didn’t understand, even after Hägerström’d tried to explain.

Time was running out. Should he say something about Bolinder’s party? Maybe Hägerström would think of a reason to go there that he hadn’t thought of. But no, that was just too much. They’d have to continue tomorrow instead. Åsa wouldn’t be happy, but that’s just how it had to be.

Thomas went to the kitchen to put on some coffee. When he came back out, Hägerström was sitting down on the couch again. Was staring into space with an empty gaze.

“How’s it going, H.? You getting tired? I made coffee.”

“Aren’t you leaving in half an hour?”

“Yup. And what about you? You going to Half Way Inn again tonight?”

“Not impossible.”

Thomas looked at him. Weird, if you thought about it—it was five-thirty on New Year’s Eve and they hadn’t even talked about how Hägerström would be spending the evening until now.

Hägerström smiled. Slowly—the corners of his mouth slid up like on a cartoon character. He remained sitting like that for a few seconds.

“What is it?”

“I just found a very strange payment.”

Thomas looked at the piece of paper Hägerström was holding in his hand. “What? Where?”

Hägerström remained sitting calmly. “It’s a payment from a foreign account to Dolphin Leasing AB for over two million kronor, made in April of this year. And that wouldn’t be strange in and of itself, but I checked the IBAN number on the account from which the payment was made.”

Thomas interrupted him, “What’s i-ban?”

Hägerström spoke slowly, almost as if he wanted to keep the suspense going. “It’s the international bank account number, abbreviated to IBAN. It’s used to identify a bank account for a transaction between different countries.” Hägerström played with the piece of paper he was holding. “And the first thing I noticed was that the IBAN number for this payment denoted an account on the Isle of Man. What do you know about the Isle of Man?”

“Not much. I think it’s outside England. Isn’t it one of those tax havens?”

“Yes, and more than that, it’s a secrecy haven too. Companies with accounts on the Isle of Man usually want to hide something. It’s difficult to find out who they belong to because there is complete bank secrecy.”

“Very suspicious.”

Hägerström kept on smiling. “You can say that again. But so far it’s not any shadier than a lot of the other stuff we’ve seen. But, later, Dolphin Leasing paid an invoice to a company registered in Sweden called Intelligal AB for the exact same sum of money as the payment from the Isle of Man. The account number on that invoice is an account with the Skandia Bank. I recognize those kinds of accounts. It’s a private account.”

He let his last word hang in the air.

Thomas got worked up. Analyzed, connected the dots in his head: a large sum is paid from a secret offshore account to a company in Sweden that then pays an invoice to another company whose account is actually held by a private person.

Thomas’s big question: “Whose Skandia Bank account is it?”

“Guess.”

Two hours later. Thomas called Åsa and apologized—he was going to be super late. He tried to explain. Something’d come up at work that was just too important. She said she understood, but still, she didn’t. You could tell by her voice.

He and Hägerström’d gone through as many documents as they’d had time for. Tried to find information about who or what company the account on the Isle of Man belonged to. They couldn’t find anything. They just had to accept it—the shit wasn’t here. They saw the payment, the connection to Rantzell. But the essential part was missing—who’d paid.

“What we should really do is search Bolinder’s house,” Hägerström said.

Thomas looked at him quizzically. “But we don’t have probable cause to believe that any crime was committed by him yet, do we?”

“No, but one of the auditors who I scared a little told me that Bolinder is a control freak. Apparently, he saves copies of everything at his house. And he meant everything: every single document that has been issued is, according to the auditor, filed in Bolinder’s private archive. That old fox doesn’t leave anything to chance.”

Thomas felt a lurch in his gut. He knew what he had to do.

Tonight.

61

The apartment felt overstuffed with people. But really, only Mahmud, Rob, Javier, Babak, and two of Javier’s buds were there. On the stereo: some monster hit by Akon. On the TV: MTV on mute. On the table: a bottle of bubbly in an ice bucket, a transparent baggie filled with weed, and Rizla papers.

Mahmud should have felt overjoyed—his boys, the music, the smokes, the champagne. The mood. New Year’s Eve was gonna be top of the line. They were hitting the town later, were gonna snort the snort, party the party, nail bitches—rock the piranha race straight up. Hump in the New Year so hard the chicks wouldn’t be able to walk till Saint Knut’s Day, or whatever that Sven shit was called.

Still: he’d wanted to do the hit against the Yugos and the old pervs. Jorge’s story’d got him going. Niklas’s planning’d felt legit, like a real war. There was gonna be an attack, a massive guerrilla ambush. A hard-core invasion—on Million Program terms.

But Niklas’d disappeared. Mahmud was angry as hell. The elite soldier guy could go fuck himself—he wasn’t so elite after all.

He went into the kitchen. Brought out the champagne glasses.

Babak smiled. “Ey, brother, you’re doing good. Not just an ice bucket, I see you got yourself real glasses now too.”

Mahmud popped a bottle. It was only seven o’clock, but he didn’t plan on waiting with the bubbly.

Rob laughed. “You stacking them bills, or what?”

Mahmud nodded. Poured for the guys.

“I’m working double. But fuck, man, not for much longer.”

“Why, man? You deal, you watch the whores. I think it sounds like a perfect combo, like Big Mac & Co.”

“Cut it, Twiggy. I’m gonna quit the whores. That shit’s wack. Skank wack, that’s all it is.”

Babak set his glass down. Looked at him.

“Habibi, I don’t get you. You get to work with easy pussy all day. You can do whatever you want to them. Double team, triple team, hat trick.”

“Man, I don’t wanna hear it. Hookers, that’s some loser shit.”

Babak shook his head. Turned to Rob instead. Mahmud pretended like he didn’t hear—thought about Gabrielle instead, the chick he’d banged this fall when things’d gotten embarrassing. He was gonna forget that now. Party. Hopefully get between the sheets. With someone who wanted it.

The night rolled on. The clock struck eight. Babak was holding court. Bullshitting about new blow schemes, ideas for CIT robberies, bouncers he knew downtown, the new Audi R8 super car that he’d test-driven before Christmas.

Robert laughed louder and louder. The bubbles were starting to work their magic. Javier and his buddies were talking amongst themselves, half the time in Spanish.

Mahmud heard a sound that stood out from the general din. Not from the music. Not from anyone’s cell phone. Not from outside the window. He understood what it was: someone was ringing his doorbell. He got up.

The speakers were blasting top-shelf Timbaland.

Babak yelled over the music, “Who’s coming?”

Mahmud shrugged. “No idea. Maybe one of all those bitches you’re talkin’ about.”

He peered through the peephole. The hallway outside was dark. He couldn’t see shit.

It was eight o’clock on New Year’s Eve—who wouldn’t turn the lights on in the stairwell? He remembered how Wisam Jibril’d shown up at his dad’s apartment on that summer morning.

He opened the door.

A dude. It was still dark. Mahmud tried to see who it was. The person was pretty tall, shaved head.

He said, “I’m back. Jalla, Mahmud, let’s do this.”

Mahmud recognized the voice.

“Yo man. Where the fuck’ve you been?”

Niklas stepped into the apartment. He looked different. Shaved head. Thin beard. Darker eyebrows than the last time they’d seen each other.

Mahmud repeated the question.

“Where’ve you been? We were supposed to do the thing tonight. You fucked it, man.”

“Don’t use that tone with me.” Niklas sounded pissed. Then he grinned. “Didn’t you hear what I said? I’m back. Let’s do this thing. Now. Jalla.”

A half hour later. The mood was completely different from when the bubbly’d been on the table and the stereo’d been jacking up the atmosphere. Serious, calm, focused. At the same time: ready to roll, pumped, sharp. At first, Mahmud hadn’t understood what Niklas was talking about. But when he understood, it felt good. Damn good. They were gonna go through with the attack. As long as his homeboys were into it—it would be the phattest shit ever. They kicked out Javier’s friends. Their swagger sagged, but Mahmud offered them the bag of weed to take with them. They still looked sulky, but accepted. There were lots of other parties in town tonight.

Babak, Javier, and Robert were sitting on the couch. Niklas and Mahmud, each on a chair. Mahmud was still a little buzzed. But in a few hours, he would be on point. The Rizla papers, the cell phones, the champagne, and the glasses’d been put away. Instead: maps, aerial photos taken off the Internet, blueprints, photos of the house. And weapons: the AK-47s, the Glock, and Niklas’s own gun, a Beretta. A goddamned arsenal.

Niklas went over the plan with the boys. Mahmud tried to fill in here and there, mostly for show. Niklas was in charge.

Babak raised his hand, like the good schoolboy he’d never been. “The Yugos that’re running this party, they armed?”

Niklas looked at Mahmud. “Mahmud, you work with these assholes.”

Mahmud cleared his throat. Weird feeling: to sit here with his homies planning the big gig together with a half-crazed mercenary soldier who didn’t seem to give a fuck about the money, who just cared about punishing people. Like in a movie somehow—Mahmud just couldn’t think of which flick.

He tried to answer Babak’s question. “I don’t know for sure. But I’ve never seen them pack heat. I think some of them have gear like that, maybe Ratko. But why, really? The whores just need a good slap to be put in their place. The johns usually don’t pull any shit. And it’s not exactly like they’re expecting the SWAT blattes from Alby to make an entrance, right?”

The guys laughed. Babak smiled, said, “Shit, man. The SWAT blattes, that’s us.” The mood lightened.

Robert said, “The Yugos are on the decline, I’ve always said so, right?” The boys relaxed. Even Niklas cracked a smile.

At around ten o’clock, they got up. Packed a bag and put it in Mahmud’s car: the weapons and the bolt cutters. They divided up in different cars. Niklas directed them to Gösta Ekman Road in Axelsberg. Parked outside. It was deserted. Everyone who wanted to be somewhere at ten o’clock on New Year’s Eve’d already made sure to get there.

Niklas turned to Mahmud. “The bulletproof vests, the clothes, and the other gear’s inside. But I can’t go in there. Can you and one of your buddies get the stuff?”

“Isn’t this your mom’s place? Why can’t you go in? What’s your mom doing tonight? Is she home?”

“I have no idea. And we’re not going upstairs to ask. Haven’t you read the papers? Haven’t you understood my situation?”

Mahmud didn’t read the papers. He looked at Niklas. The guy really did look different from the last time he’d seen him. Thinner, harder. His eyes were darting around more than ever. Then there was the thing with the shaved head and beard, too. “No,” he said. “What’s the deal?”

“What you don’t know won’t hurt you,” Niklas responded. “Forget about it, I’ll tell you some other time. But I can’t go in. You have to do it.”

Mahmud let a few seconds pass. Thought: The guy really is quasi crazy. But still okay, somehow. He’s got guts, he fights back. Just like I should’ve done, a long time ago.

Mahmud climbed out. Keys in hand. Babak got out of his car. He was wearing a ski hat pulled down low. Walked leaning slightly backward, trying to look chill.

It was cold.

They walked in through the entrance. Down to the basement. There was a sticker on the garbage chute: Please—help our sanitation workers—seal the bag! They walked down a staircase. A steel door. A lock from Assa Abloy. Mahmud opened it. Turned the overhead light on. Inside: a row of storage units. He looked for number twelve. One minute. Found the unit. He opened it. Two black garbage bags filled with soft things. He looked. Inside: the bulletproof vests, the clothes, and the rest of the gear.

Back to the car. Mahmud started the engine. Javier in the passenger seat. Robert in the back. Niklas’d climbed in with Babak in his car.

He started. Followed Babak’s car.

Robert leaned forward from the backseat.

“Honest, man, are we gonna pull this off?”

Mahmud didn’t know how to respond. He just said, “Check out that commando guy. The dude’s as cold as a glacier. I trust him.”

Robert reached out his hand. A matchbox. A thin Redline baggie. Mahmud turned to Robert.

“Is that some white dynamite?”

Robert gave him a crooked smile.

“I think we need a little extra strength tonight.”

Mahmud fished out a snort straw from his inside pocket. Put it in the bag. Sucked.

Outside, it was snowing like crazy.

Like the ice age was back.

62

Niklas repeated to himself: Si vis pacem, para bellum—If you wish for peace, prepare for war. His mantra, his life’s mission. He’d armed himself, planned his attacks, guarded the perpetrators, hit the right people, at the right time, in the right way. Then came the latest incidents: the arrest, the escape, and now: a bunch of clowns. BOG, boots on the ground: five people—but really, they ought to count as three. Sure, Mahmud was okay enough, might hopefully equal one soldier, but he counted the other players as one. These were circumstances he hadn’t been able to prepare for.

And somehow, it was all Mom’s fault. She was the one who’d cracked his alibi—the video night at Benjamin’s place was all to hell. He wouldn’t have had a chance if there’d been a trial, even if the lawyer seemed sharp.

His escape from the hearing’d almost gone smoother than expected. As soon as Niklas’d made it down into the subway, he zeroed in on a man. It was almost New Year’s Eve, so there were a lot of people out. Still, on the platform: mostly retirees and moms on maternity leave. The man was one of the former. Niklas forced him down on the ground, didn’t even have to strike him. Took his shoes and coat. People around him hardly missed a beat—no one tried to stop him. Symptomatic: the losers just stood there and watched. That was part of the problem. Society was made up of bystanders. A train rolled in. So far, he didn’t see any cops. Everything’d gone so fast, just a few seconds since he’d leaped out of the window in the District Court. His thoughts in battle position. Strategic considerations in fast-forward. He didn’t get on the train. When it rolled out of the station, he jumped down behind it on the tracks and walked into the tunnel in the opposite direction. Hopefully, the people who’d seen him would think he’d gotten on the train, disappeared in the direction of the next subway stop.

A thousand feet or so in darkness. The light from the next station glowed like a white dot farther off. There were blue signal lights and thick cables on the walls. He ran. The old man’s shoes fit okay. He’d only need them until he got to his own gear. So far, no trains, and that wouldn’t stop him anyway—the margin between the track and the wall was several feet wide. What could stop him: the rats that ran in the gravel down there.

Rats.

A few seconds of silence. The darkness closed in around him. Sounds from the animals’ jaws.

Niklas stopped. He had to get out.

The rats were moving down there on the tracks.

He repeated to himself: I have to get out.

Images came flashing back. The basement storage unit when he was a child. All the rats down in the sandbox.

The thought was as clear as the light farther off down the tunnel: If I don’t get out now and complete the mission, my right to live ceases to exist. I will die. I WILL DIE.

He refused.

Refused to remain a passive observer of his own fate. So far, he’d let the circumstances control him. Yes, he made decisions—but always based on the situation at hand, on what others did, how he felt, what Mom thought. External facts, circumstantial occurrences that didn’t originate in the depth of his soul. He didn’t transcend himself. He didn’t steer his own path. Today, he would change course. He was a living force to be reckoned with. A counterweight to everyone else.

He saw other lights farther up.

The tracks vibrated. A train approached through the tunnel.

He pressed himself against the wall. Tried to see if the rats were still there.

A minor blast wave in the tunnel. As if the air was being pressed in front of the train.

The train rushed by. He stood still. Close, close.

Then he ran. Toward the light.

He didn’t hear the animals. He just moved.

Scrambled up onto the platform.

It was eleven o’clock. A mother with a stroller eyed him.

Niklas ran up the escalator.

He made it.

Back in the present. The car, the snow. The Arab he was sharing the car with was named Babak.

Niklas told him about the mansion. Gave directions. Explained the plan of attack over and over again. Babak just nodded. Held the steering wheel tight, as if he was afraid of losing it.

They took Nynäsvägen out toward the archipelago. Hardly any cars. Gray snow drifts along the roadside. Deep tracks in the snow.

Niklas thought about Mahmud and his men. They had energy. They were cocky. But that wasn’t enough. Guys like that: they didn’t know what structure, order, and teamwork were. They were individualists who ricocheted their way through life. Didn’t understand the importance of organization. Hopefully they knew how to handle weapons—they’d practiced, according to Mahmud. Maybe they could handle the deep snow—panting their way through one and a half feet. They might possibly pull off the attack, the storming, the invasion. But would they be able to handle the situation that followed? Niklas hadn’t had enough time. He felt unsure of himself.

He called Mahmud and ordered him to tell everyone to kill their phones.

Babak turned up toward Smådalarö. The darkness outside was compact against the windows. It’d stopped snowing.

He had to stop worrying. Get into the mood. Think about battle rattle.

The cars stopped seven minutes later. They were actually supposed to have stolen or rented cars for tonight, but there’d been no time to do that now when everything’d happened so quickly. They parked outside a large white house. Niklas knew what it was: the clubhouse that belonged to the golf course.

Niklas stepped out. Opened the trunk. Hoisted out one of the black plastic bags. Good that Mahmud’d been able to pick them up in Mom’s basement. The cops were most definitely keeping the house under surveillance, waiting to pick him up again. The media’d heated up the debate around the whole escape.

He walked over to Mahmud’s car with the bag. The sky was dark and it’d stopped snowing. The Arab opened the door. “Here, change in the car,” Niklas said. “It’s better than standing out here. If someone comes by, we don’t want to call attention to ourselves.” Mahmud accepted the bag. Niklas walked back to Babak’s car. Hoisted out the other bag. Brought it into the car.

They began dressing.

Long underwear that Niklas’d bought at the Stadium sports store. There’d be a lot of time spent out in the cold. Over that: the bulletproof vest—with the protective panels tightly packed, molded to the body. It was made to be worn directly against the body: the harness was attached to the protective panels so that the weight was distributed evenly. Maybe this stuff wasn’t the best gear on the market, but it would do. The vests would still feel lighter than they actually were. Would protect heart, lungs, liver, kidneys, spleen, and spine.

He put on the black wind pants. It was tight, getting dressed in the car. He laced up his boots. High, fourteen holes, leather, over four-hundred-gram Thinsulate lining. Waterproof, ventilated membranes for winter cold, guard duty, and armed attack. He pulled on his gloves: lined, black leather. And then the thin puffy over the vest. The heat in the car almost felt damp.

Finally: the ski mask—rolled up, ready to be pulled down over his face.

Babak in the front seat: trying to wriggle into his pants.

“I’m sorry I didn’t get any shoes for you,” Niklas said. “I didn’t have time.”

Babak chuckled.

“My regular winter shoes’ll have to work, I guess.”

Niklas looked down. Babak was wearing a pair of white sneakers. Those were going to get cold and wet. He hoped the guy would be able to hack it.

They climbed out. The road was dark. The air felt clean. Farther up, beyond the golf course, he saw the trees. Niklas brought a backpack out from the trunk of the car. Opened it. Thanked himself for his careful preparations. Pulled out the Beretta. Tucked it into one of the front pockets of his jacket, put the ammunition in the other.

He walked over to Mahmud’s car. The Arab rolled down the window. They looked like they were all dressed in there.

“Okay, boys, it’s almost game time,” Niklas said. “From now on, we’re operating according to military rules. Is that clear?”

Mahmud nodded.

Niklas continued, “I’m going to be completely honest with you. We haven’t had the planning time we needed. But this has to happen tonight. So we’re going to have to improvise a little. There are a few things you have to think about.”

The wind was picking up. Niklas had to raise his voice to be heard. “We’re going to speak English with each other. Is that clear?”

The guys in the car and Babak nodded.

“And we will never use each other’s names. Only use numbers. I am number one, Mahmud is number two, Babak is three, Robert is four, and Javier is five. Can you repeat that? Who are you, Mahmud?”

They repeated their assigned numbers a few times, until Niklas was satisfied.

“Never touch anything without wearing gloves. And finally—don’t, under any circumstances, remove your ski masks. Not even if you’ve taken a hit to the face. Never. Is that clear?”

The boys nodded.

“Now I want you, Javier, to repeat what I just said,” Niklas said.

Javier opened the car door. Recounted briefly about the names, the language, the ski masks.

“You forgot the gloves,” Niklas said. “Never, under any circumstances, take off your gloves. Is that clear?”

The boys nodded again. Niklas asked Robert to repeat. Then Babak.

After each time, they nodded. Niklas hoped that it meant something.

They’d walked through the woods, in the snow, up to the fence. Waded through the snow. None of the boys were whining, yet. Niklas stopped. Took his backpack off. Dug around inside. Fished out four handsets.

“I have four walkie-talkies here. They are much better than cell phones. No one can track that we’ve used these. Mahmud and I will have two of them, for those of us going inside the house. Robert, you’ll have the third handset and Javier will have the fourth. For the men remaining outside the house.”

He pointed down, toward the road. “Now we’re going to go check out the entrance gate.”

One hundred and sixty-five feet farther off they saw the lights from the road. A car drove by, slowly. They walked closer. Saw the silhouette of the fence against the headlights. The car stopped: a Range Rover, model XL. Niklas watched the gates. Two men walked up to the car. The windows were rolled down. One of the men poked his head in. Said something. Then he waved: all clear.

The gates slid open. The car rolled in.

It was eleven-forty.

The moon was cold and large. Niklas led his men up along the fence again. The snow was reflecting the little light that was filtering through the trees from the house and the moon. It was enough, he didn’t need to get out the night-vision goggles.

He knew this area. Knew the house’s façade, angles, distance from the fence. He knew the course of the fence, where there were larger stones and gaps in the trees.

They walked another hundred feet. Silent. Calm. Focused.

Niklas stopped. “Here, Robert, this is your position. You know what your job is. Sit on this rock and wait. I’ll inform you over the radio when it’s time to get going. It’ll be around midnight.”

Robert looked like he understood the gravity of the situation. Nodded grimly. Gripped the AK4 with both hands. Mahmud shook his hand.

“See you later, habibi. This is gonna be big.”

They pushed through the snow.

Three hundred feet. They glimpsed the back of the house through the trees. A warm light glowed from the windows.

He ran through the same procedure with Javier. Javier got in position with the AK4 held high. Ready. Prepared for his mission.

It actually felt good. So far.

Fifty more feet. Just Niklas, Mahmud, and Babak. Dressed in black, dark as the desert night. Niklas felt for the Beretta in his jacket pocket. Picked it up one final time. Popped out the magazine. Inspected it in the moonlight. He knew this piece by heart. He thought about Mats Strömberg and Roger Jonsson. Pigs who’d faced their butcher. Soon, justice would be served. The New Year would be off to a good start.

They stopped by the designated spot in the fence, where the distance to the back entrance of the house was the shortest. Niklas took off his backpack. Fished out the bolt cutters. Crouched by the fence. Began from the bottom. Cut into the thin steel: easy as paper.

After five minutes: a hole nearly three feet high and twenty inches wide.

They crouched down. Crawled through. Behind enemy lines.

Eighty feet. Slowly. Niklas in the lead. Staying low to the ground, military posture.

Sixteen more feet. They approached the house.

Another sixteen feet. Niklas stopped. Looked ahead. No people outside the house as far as he could see. He fished around in the bag again. Brought out the night-vision goggles after all. Mahmud and Babak sat down behind him. He scanned the façade. Window by window. The light from the inside was intensified by the effect of the goggles, hurt his eyes. He eyed the door: no people outside. All appeared quiet.

He took the goggles off. Turned to Mahmud. The Arab still had his ski mask rolled up. Niklas whispered, “We move in ten minutes.”

Mahmud smiled widely. Made thumbs up.

Something was fishy. Mahmud looked strange. Niklas didn’t drop his gaze. Took a step closer to Mahmud.

“Can you show me your mouth again?”

Mahmud smiled again.

His teeth were dark, almost looked bluish. Maybe it was the moonlight.

“What the fuck did you eat?”

Mahmud grinned. Responded in a low voice, “Rohypnol, of course. It makes your mouth a little blue. You didn’t know that, buddy? You want some?”

Niklas didn’t know what to do. For a brief second, he considered shooting Mahmud in the face. Bolinder could happily find a defrosted Arab corpse in the spring. Then another thought passed through his mind: he should abort the mission. Get up and sneak back out the same way they’d come. Leave these two clowns to do whatever they wanted. Still, he remained where he was in the snow. Crouching. Shivering. Completely paralyzed. It couldn’t end like this. He’d promised himself. I’m in charge. I make the decisions. I don’t give up. I make a difference.

“How long ago did you take that shit?”

“Right before we saw the Range Rover. I want to be ready. It’s not a big deal, Niklas. I promise. I always take roofies when there’s gonna be action.”

“You’ve made a mistake. But we’ll have to let it slide for now. You won’t take any more of that stuff. Is that clear?”

Mahmud’s smile died. He looked down. Maybe he understood his slip. Maybe he just didn’t want to argue.

Fifteen minutes passed. They were lying down. The snow was touching their chins. The house: fifty feet off. The kitchen entrance was clearly visible. A wood door—90 percent certain it was locked. Niklas could hear music from inside. Could see people moving around behind the curtains. Music, laughter. Whore sounds.

He fished around in his backpack. His very own IED: improvised explosive device. His homemade grenade. It looked like a black beer can.

Mahmud and Babak were lying diagonally behind him.

Niklas held the grenade in his right hand. Looked at his watch. It was five minutes to midnight.

Soon time to catapult the whore hounds into the New Year.

63

There was music coming from the floor above. Thuds in the ceiling. A bass. Laughter. Thomas thought about his dad’s old favorite poet, Nils Ferlin, and his poem about a ceiling being someone else’s floor. Then he thought, There is no room for poets in today’s Sweden. Way too few who even know Swedish well enough to read stuff like that. What’s more: the ones who speak Swedish don’t care about poetry anyway. He was pining. Not just for his old man. He was pining for a Sweden that no longer existed.

In front of him: high metal storage shelves. Probably a total of thirty yards of shelving. Classic black binders with felt spines. Binders that locked around the paperwork. Around the bookkeeping material, the verifications, the documents. Hopefully the same stuff that Hägerström and Thomas’d just gone through. Hopefully something else too. Proof.

New Year’s Eve’s night was running on. Finally, right before he got here and made his way inside, the weather’d calmed down—Åsa would get a perfect view of the fireworks. Thomas was inside, alone—alone against the power. Alone against the ones fucking with him. Now it was his turn to show some people who’s boss.

Hägerström’d looked shocked at first. “You work a side job at a strip club?” But his surprise settled quickly—the case was more important. Still, he advised against going to the party. Went on and on about how they should wait till tomorrow, try to talk to some superior, give an account of all the information they had. Rantzell’s connection to the Palme murder and Bolinder’s organization. Get a formal search warrant.

Thomas grew irritated, mostly. “You know as well as I do that what we have won’t get us anywhere. Really, what proof do we have? That Rantzell guy’d been given shady payments. It has to do with the murder weapon, that much I’m certain of. But in what way does our information really point to someone having something to do with the murder? And it certainly doesn’t point to the murder of Olof Palme. But when we add up what Ballénius told us about Rantzell and the payments that you found, we know that we’re on the right track.”

Hägertröm squeezed his eyes shut. Looked pained. He probably knew that Thomas was right. Still he said, “But come on, Andrén. We’ve been doing this on the side long enough. We have to get back on the formal route now. Do the right things in the right way. Or else it could all go to shit. Right?”

Thomas looked at him for a moment. “I’m going to be honest with you. I don’t think too highly of cops who work against other cops. People like that aren’t real cops in my eyes.”

Hägerström stared back at him.

Thomas went on, “What’s more, you’re a little know-it-all who thinks a bit too highly of yourself. You bitch about irrelevant stuff, you don’t have any sense of comradeship, and I’m not sure you could even handle a SIG Sauer.”

Hägerström continued to stare back at him.

“But, on the other hand,” Thomas made a dramatic pause, “you’re the best, sharpest, quickest cop I’ve ever met. You’ve been loyal to this private investigation we’re running. You’ve been loyal to me despite everything that’s happened. You’re funny, I laugh at every joke you make. You’re thoughtful and brave. I can’t help it—I like you a lot.”

Continued silence.

“I understand where you’re coming from,” Thomas said. “You have significantly more to lose than I do. I’ve already put myself outside the system. I just have myself to blame while you might lose your job. And practically speaking, there’s one other thing. You’d never be let in there, at that party. But I might be. I’m going to finish this thing. Tonight. With or without you.”

Hägerström rose. Didn’t say anything. Thomas tried to read his facial expression. Hägerström walked toward the hallway. Turned around. “Well, this is what I was thinking. My night is going to consist of me going home and changing, then going to the Half Way Inn and hanging out there for the rest of the night. Drinking lots of beer and maybe a few glasses of champagne. At around two o’clock, I’ll probably be so drunk that I’ll already have forgotten about midnight, ringing in the New Year, all that. What do I have to lose? That’s not a New Year’s Eve worth remembering. I’ll come with you. You’re not doing anything without me.”

They were driving on the road out to Dalarö, each in his own car. Hardly any traffic. Almost felt cozy. The warm air and the heating in the seat. The sound of the car’s engine was like a blanket of security in the background. The light from the headlights was reflected in the snowdrifts that edged the road like high banks. Hägerström was in front; he’d entered the address into his GPS. Thomas didn’t think they had the same things on their minds.

He’d called Åsa again and told her he had to work all night. She became sadder this time, started crying, questioned how it was all going to work when Sander came. Would Thomas take his role as a parent seriously? Did he understand what it meant to have a family? What did he value in life? He didn’t have any answers. He couldn’t tell her anything about what was happening right now.

Who was he, really? A mix of police mentality and self-righteousness was deeply rooted in him. At the same time, he’d changed over the last few months. Seen, close up, the people he usually worked to nail. Felt a kind of kinship with them. There was a life, a moral code, on the shady side of society, too. They were people he could become close to. They made choices based on what was the right thing to do in their situations. Thomas’d crossed the line. The step he’d taken—a cardinal sin. But there, in the valley of death, among the people he used to call the dregs, the rabble, he’d found people who felt like friends. And if they could be his friends and if their choices were the right choices—then who was he, as a police officer?

He tried to dismiss the thoughts. Concluded to himself: Tonight, it was different.

Forty minutes later, Hägerström’s car stopped by a dark forest road out on Smådalarö. Thomas parked behind him. Remained sitting in the car and called Hägerström. They decided that Hägerström would park his car on the forest road. Thomas would try to make his way in. They put all their chips on this one hand.

He drove slowly along the road until he saw the driveway. There was a full moon. A black metal gate. He stopped the car ten yards from the sign. Waited. Next to the gate was a camera and a large sign: PRIVATE PROPERTY. PROTECTED BY G4S.

Fifteen minutes later, a car pulled up. Not just any car: a limousine. Felt weird: a stretch limo à la Las Vegas on a winter road in the countryside. The car pulled up to the gate. Thomas couldn’t see exactly what was happening. After thirty seconds, the gates slid open. The car rolled through.

Thomas thought about the man outside his house and the guy who’d attacked him in the garage. Maybe it was the same person. He thought about Cederholm alias Rantzell, Ballénius, and Ballénius’s daughter. The cops who used to feel like his friends: Ljunggren and Hannu Lindberg. In his mind’s eye he saw Adamsson, the forensic pathologist Bengt Gantz, Jonas Nilsson. It’d been a long journey leading up to the situation he was facing now. Still, it almost felt like everything’d been going according to some predetermined plan.

He put the car in first gear. Drove slowly up to the gate. The car’s exhaust billowed out behind him like a minor heating plant. He stopped. Rolled down the window. Looked into the surveillance camera. A voice from the speakers: “Good evening. How may we help you?”

“My name is Thomas Andrén, let me in please.”

A faint buzz on the other end of the line.

“Tell Ratko, Bogdan, or whoever else you’ve got in there right now that I’m supposed to work tonight.”

A rustling sound in the microphone, then a different voice. “Hey there, Thomas. I didn’t know you were working. No one informed me.” It was Bogdan, a guy who usually helped out at the club.

The gates opened.

He drove through.

Outdoor lights were hidden in the bushes along the road and illuminated the snow on the branches of the trees. A hundred or so yards, maybe, then the forest opened up. An enormous three-story house, big windows, pillars by the entrance. Probably twenty cars parked outside. The limousine was turning around. A few of the rooms were lit up. He could hear faint sounds. Thomas parked next to a black Audi Q7. Walked up to the house. Thought, What is this insane thing I’ve gotten myself into?

He didn’t have time to ring the doorbell. The door slid open. A guy he recognized but didn’t know the name of opened it. Huge Yugo. Had been down at the club with Ratko once or twice. Smiled. “Hey there, copper. I didn’t know you were working tonight. Ratko and Bogdan are around here somewhere. Do you need to talk to them?”

Thomas responded politely that he was there to work. He didn’t need to see Ratko or Bogdan. He knew the drill.

He walked in. A hallway. There was a real Persian carpet on the floor. Yards and yards of sconces, paintings, and tapestries along the walls. The room was bigger than the entire downstairs of his and Åsa’s house in Tallkrogen. At the other end of the entrance hall: a number of men—they must’ve come in limousines. They were all dressed in tuxes. Loud, hungry for a ho-down. In front of them—it looked like a cloakroom. Coats were hanging in rows. A girl was in the process of taking them. Thomas should’ve been able to guess what this would all be like, but he was still surprised. Mini-mini-miniskirt, the lower part of her ass cheeks visible. Thigh-high stockings that ended in an edge of lace a ways up on her leg, a provocative show of skin, taut corset, black high-heeled shoes. Her top didn’t look cheap, but it was low cut enough for her breasts to be a perfect target for the men’s eyes. Like the strippers at the club, but even more spruced up somehow.

He needed to act quickly. He picked up his cell phone, fired off a text to Hägerström: Inside. Then he looked around again. There were three doors in front of him. The men who’d checked their coats disappeared through one. Thomas heard noise coming from in there. Not the right choice for him. He turned back around to the guard. “Hey, actually, where did you say Ratko was?”

The beefcake laughed, nodded toward one of the doors. “Where he always is during these events, in the kitchen of course.” Thomas was a fucking genius. Process of elimination must be as old as the job these chicks were working. He walked over to the last door. Opened it. Didn’t worry about whether or not the beefy Yugo wondered what he was doing.

It was almost completely dark in there. A table: probably thirty feet long. Rococo chairs in pale wood, a crystal chandelier, candelabras on the table, parquet floor. A dining room. Two doors. Both were half open. From one, he saw lights and heard the sound of men talking. That must be the kitchen. He walked through the other door.

Another type of room. Sparsely furnished: a narrow sofa against one wall. On the walls: paintings, paintings, and more paintings. Spotlights placed everywhere, like little islands of light. He didn’t know anything about art—what he saw looked mostly like pastel-colored lines on fuzzy backgrounds. On the other hand: difficult apparently equaled expensive.

He walked into the next room. The sound of music and laughter increased. If what he was looking for was in there or in the kitchen, he could forget about it. He looked around. The room was small. Again, paintings on the walls. Garish wallpaper. And one more thing: a railing wrapped in leather, a staircase. Leading down. It was too good to be true. Where do you store archive material? Not where you entertain. Not in your private quarters. In the basement. He hoped.

Walked down.

The staircase ended in a door. He tried the handle—locked. Bolinder wasn’t that stupid after all. But neither was Thomas Andrén. He fished out the electronic skeleton key. For a real cop like him, it was the most important tool, after his baton. He inserted it into the lock. Thought about the basement door at Gösta Ekman Road. How he’d found Rantzell in pieces. He was nearing the end of the story.

Down on the basement level: a spa section, a sauna, a swimming pool. A laundry room, a room filled with paintings that apparently weren’t suitable enough to hang on the walls upstairs, a smaller room with a stationary bike, a treadmill, and a weight machine. Narrow windows high up near the ceiling. Farthest in: the archive. Metal storage shelves. What looked like a hundred binders of material. Bingo.

He checked the time on his phone: eleven o’clock. He didn’t have any service down here. It was time to start searching.

Almost midnight: he hadn’t found jack shit. Still, he was familiar with the material. Recognized the company names, the names of the board members, the banks that provided accounts, the businesses. He only looked through the binders that had to do with Dolphin Leasing AB, Intelligal AB, and Roaming GI AB.

He couldn’t stay here forever. Sooner or later the guard or one of the others would wonder where he’d gone. If he was supposed to work tonight—then why wasn’t he working? He looked at his cell phone again. Three minutes to midnight. He had the feeling he was going to find something soon. He stopped briefly. Considered: Had he done the right thing? Ditched Åsa, gotten himself into this situation. He refused to think the thought: Maybe he wouldn’t come out of here alive tonight.

The sounds from upstairs seemed to be dying down.

And then: the explosions. The men cheered. Thomas climbed up on a stool and looked out through a small window. The sky was illuminated by the crackle of fireworks. The moon was like a pale disk beside the play of colors in the sky. It was beautiful.

The partygoers were making even more noise. Thomas didn’t see anyone outside. Maybe they’d walked outside but were standing somewhere where he couldn’t see them. Maybe they were still inside.

Then he heard another explosion. It was definitely closer. Harder. Sounded like something crashing. He was certain: that wasn’t the sound of fireworks.

64

It was the biggest bang Mahmud’d ever heard. Niklas’d pulled the ski mask down over his face—reminded Mahmud of the images of militiamen in his dad’s Iraqi newspapers. He’d moved forward crouching in the dark. Planted the grenade by the back door. Crawled back ten yards. It exploded. Incredible sound. The blast wave was like a kick to the chest. A screaming inside him. A beeping in his ears. Niklas hollered, “Game time!” The night was lit up by fireworks. Crackling sounds across the sky. It felt like a dream. Maybe it was just the effect of the roofies.

Niklas rushed forward. Like in slow motion.

Mahmud gasped for air. Ran after him, toward the house. The Glock in his right hand. Shit, it was cold. He could hardly feel his feet: cold, wet, stiff.

A hole gaped where the back door’d been. Gunpowder was splashed along the wall. Wood, bricks, plaster—in pieces. The light from the kitchen glowed out into the backyard. The night in color—painted green, red, and blue.

Niklas was approaching the hole. Then him. Last, Babak.

Agitated voices. Rapid gunfire in the background. It had to be Rob and Javier letting the Swedish Army’s AK4s loose on the house. Ha-ha-ha—the blattes were fighting back. Jorge the Latino’s plan was gonna kick some fat ass.

They stepped in through the hole.

The kitchen was gigantic. Felt old-fashioned. Fancy cabinets, marble countertops, clinker floor. Spotlights in the ceiling. Two sinks, two ovens, two tables, two microwaves. Two of fucking everything. Even two shocked-looking dudes. They rose. Tall. Broad. Steaming Yugos.

One of them was Ratko. Who’d humiliated Mahmud. What’s more: one of the guys Jorge’d talked about as being Radovan’s man. Who was part of the mission. Whom he needed to pop.

Mahmud stopped. Looked at Niklas. The soldier dude knew where he was going, was already about to disappear through a door. Yelled, in English, “Take that motherfucker out!”

Mahmud was tripped up by the English for a second. Double emotions: confused, at the same time, riled up. The dudes in front of him started screaming in Serbian. That’s when he reacted. He was holding the Glock out in front of him. Now he aimed it at Ratko. The Yugo was wearing jeans, a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up. Testosterone-squared jaw, his thin blond hair parted to the side, surprise in his eyes. Mahmud saw Wisam Jibril in front of him. Images in his head: how they’d picked up the Lebanese outside the grill joint in Tumba. How Stefanovic’d taken him to dinner at Gondolen and explained the situation: we snuff out anyone who messes with us. How Ratko’d laughed in his the face when he’d wanted to quit dealing. He felt the effects of the roofies pumping through his blood. The Yugos were gonna eat shit tonight.

Mahmud raised the gat toward Ratko’s head. Ratko stopped. Fell silent. Babak behind him. “Come on.” He didn’t see Niklas. The Yugo dude’s face: contorted. Panicked. Mortal terror.

Mahmud walked closer. Slowly squeezed the trigger with his finger. Ratko saw what was about to happen.

Images in his head. Like the din of the fireworks outside. In the forest clearing with Gürhan’s piece in his mouth. In the Bentley store with the scared sales kid before him. Finally: Beshar. Dad. His voice in serene Arabic: “Do you know what the prophet—peace be upon him—says about killing the innocent?”

The handle of the Glock felt sweaty. The white of the kitchen was hurting his eyes. Fucking pigs.

Ratko was not an innocent.

He fired.

Bam-bam-bam.

For Dad.

65

First POC—point of contact—with the enemy. They were inside the house. Niklas scanned the room: white, white, white. Two whore guards. Ordered Mahmud to SBF—support by fire. Pop that fucker. Woman user, abuser, enemy combatant.

Niklas felt at home with the situation at hand. The adrenaline was pumping like in the good old days. He took a deep breath in through the nose, breathed out through the mouth. He was mentally prepared. At war again. Not just man to man—but with soldiers, a battalion, a battle.

Continued through the door toward where the men must be. FEBA—forward edge of battle area. A dining room. Wrong. He walked up to another door. Opened, looked in. A hallway. Turned around. Saw Babak taping up the remaining guard in the kitchen. Nice. Ordered him and Mahmud to follow him.

Outside: Javier and Robert’d stopped shooting at the house. But everyone inside must’ve gotten the message: area controlled. If anyone were to walk outside the house, they’d have to start firing again like madmen. Pepper everything that moved.

Through the hall. The Beretta safe in his hand. A large man who seemed to understand that something was happening. Probably the guy who let people in the front door.

“What the fuck are you doing? Who are you?”

Niklas landed a bullet in the guy’s knee. He crumpled like a dead man but he howled like a wild dog.

Niklas gave Mahmud an order: “Put some tape on that asshole.”

They taped the bouncer’s wrists and mouth. Niklas kept advancing. Alone.

Got in touch with Robert over the radio. A few rapid comments: “We’ve neutralized three combatants in here, and that’s most of the ones we believe may be dangerous. But maintain eyes on the big room that I pointed out. I’m making contact now.”

A gigantic room. Red wallpaper. Crystal chandeliers and spotlights in the ceiling. Large windows along one long end of the room. A fifteen-foot bar in the other end. Probably fifty people in there: half girls, half old guys. But they weren’t just any old guys. The ones Niklas’d spied on at the pizzeria’d been middle-class Svens, Eastern Bloc pimps, and dudes from the kind of countries where he’d been at war. These johns: thriving Swedish men in black tie. They were here to party and to get something more. Mahmud’d told him earlier what he’d been told by their employer: these weren’t your everyday horndogs—these were the leaders of the Swedish business world. Industry men, finance moguls, majority shareholders. Sweden’s head honchos. Here to taste fresh young pussy.

The old guys and the girls were gathered at the windows. Impressed by the New Year’s Eve fireworks. Champagne glasses in hand. The last fanfare of gunpowder and color blasted across the sky. They still hadn’t realized that they were under attack. Hadn’t heard the explosion from the IED, or at least not distinguished it from the noise of the fireworks. Everything’d gone according to plan: they would never be able to close or lock the hole out back. Always an open retreat route: assault tactics.

Two seconds was enough. He read the mood in the room: as if they were at a regular New Year’s Eve party where some younger single girls just happened to be. As if there was nothing wrong. Nothing dirty. Nothing humiliating about the whole situation. But Niklas knew: buying women equaled abuse. And his calling was to exterminate abusers.

Most of them were still turned away from him. Looking out at the sky or at one another. Except for two younger guys who were manning the bar. One of them reacted to Niklas in the doorway: a man with a ski mask pulled down over his face attracts attention. Niklas walked farther into the room. Mahmud followed behind him. Niklas’d ordered Babak to wait outside, guard the entrance, cover their backs.

The bar guy starting yelling something. Niklas raised the Beretta in both hands. A firm grip. He knew: this is the decisive moment—everything could go to hell. A turning point. A bottleneck in the exercise. Ready. Get set. Run.

The gun in one hand. One step. Two steps. Flew. Reminded him of his escape from the District Court.

He breathed in once. Twice. Twenty feet. Reached the guy. Raised the gun. Heard him say, “What the hell?”

Bam. Rapped the guy’s forehead with the Beretta, hard. The kid collapsed. Niklas turned around. Met the faces of the men and the girls—they’d turned around as well.

It was like time stood.

Still.

Everyone’d seen the attack.

Niklas and Mahmud: in control. Niklas’d informed Robert, “We’ve made contact, we’re gonna get this show on the road. Shoot everything that moves outside the house.”

The guys were lined up against the wall. The girls were standing next to them. Mahmud with his Glock pointed at the cluster of people the whole time. The bar guy and his friend were taped up on the floor. There could be more pimps, whore guards, in the house. Or, rather, there should be more: someone must’ve been responsible for the outdoor fireworks display. The advantage that Niklas and his troops had: because of what the men were up to, they weren’t exactly overly inclined to call the cops. The men knew it too. Still, he had to be smooth. He wanted to get ahold of those in charge.

Niklas took a step forward. In English: “I want Bolinder!”

No movement among the men.

“Who is Bolinder?”

A voice in the crowd, in English with a heavy Swedish accent: “There is no Bolinder here.”

Niklas responded in his own way. Fired off a shot at one of the chandeliers. Heard the bullet bounce around up there. Pulled the ski mask up halfway, bared his mouth.

“Don’t fuck with me ’cause then I’ll take you out, one by one. For the last time, who is Bolinder?”

The silence in the room was louder than the shot itself.

A man stepped forward. Said in a thin voice, “I am Bolinder. What do you want?”

He was slightly overweight, had carefully combed gray hair, and wore his tuxedo shirt unbuttoned to reveal a tuft of gray chest hair. He met Niklas’s gaze. The man’s eyes were gray.

Niklas stared back. Didn’t bother saying anything. This was the guy who arranged everything.

Bolinder was made to stand in the middle of the parquet floor. The light from a couple of spotlights in the ceiling hit him in the face. Niklas could see it clearly: the old john was scared as hell.

Mahmud pulled out the tape. Had Bolinder put his hands behind his back. The Arab wrapped them carefully. Laid the old guy down on the floor. The duct tape gleamed serenely.

Mahmud went closer. Gun pointed at the herd of men. He waved the Glock slowly from right to left and back again. If anyone tried anything, he’d hopefully be able to take down five or six people before he was overpowered. Instinctively, the men knew it too. No one wanted to take the chance.

Niklas yelled in English, “Down on the ground, every fucking one of you. Now. Put your hands on your head. Anyone who moves…” He made two shooting motions with the gun. They understood.

Niklas rummaged around in his backpack. The moment he’d been waiting for. He pulled out the plastic bag he’d prepared months ago. His own little project, parallel to surveillance of the wife beaters. It was pretty heavy, probably thirteen pounds. From the outside, it looked innocent enough: a gray bag with black electrical tape wound around it and a compact mass within. On the inside, it was highly lethal.

Everything’d gone so fast. Just a little while ago, he’d been sitting in a courtroom, about to be detained. And now: the final battle. He thought about his mom. She didn’t understand anything. Thought repression was intrinsic to life, built in. He remembered. He was maybe eight years old, but he still understood more than they thought. The bags that Claes brought home, the mood when he and Marie’d started gulping from their glasses, which they refilled quickly with whatever was in the bottles. They told him to go down to the basement for an hour or so. He had his own life down there. He didn’t remember exactly, but something scared him. Maybe it was a sound, or maybe he saw something. He was a child then. Thought the fear down there was the worst thing in the world. When he came upstairs, he saw Mom being beaten more than he’d ever seen before. She had to go to the hospital. Stayed there for two weeks.

Afterward, he’d asked Mom if it was right. Should Claes really be allowed to come over to their house? Should it really be like this? Her answer was simple but firm: “I’ve forgiven him. He’s my man, and he can’t help that he gets angry sometimes.”

It was Niklas’s duty to restore balance.

He placed the bomb on Bolinder’s chest. The old guy was fluttering like a flag in the evening breeze outside Falluja. In contrast: Niklas’s hands were steady.

66

Thomas came up the stairs. Something was wrong. First the explosion at the same time as the fireworks. He could’ve misheard. But not what followed: the peppering that sounded parallel to the rest of the New Year’s spectacle—even a simple cop like him, who was used to his little 9-millimeter SIG Sauer, knew what that was: assault weapons. He was a gun freak, after all. Completely clear: something was really fucking wrong.

As soon as his phone had service again, he called Hägerström. It rang once. More rings went through. Was he not going to pick up? Thomas looked around. The room with the hypercolorful wallpaper was empty. He peeked through the opening in the doorway to the room with the paintings. Empty. He tried to call Hägerström again. Five rings. Then there was Hägerström’s panting breath on the other end of the line: “Good, you’re alive.”

Thomas whispered into the receiver, “What the fuck is happening?”

“I don’t know, but I’ve called for backup. There was insane shooting going on somewhere inside the building where you are. And an explosion that sounded like they were blowing something up.”

“When is backup getting here?”

“You know, it’s New Year’s Eve, on Smådalarö, out in the archipelago. They won’t be here for another twenty minutes, at best.”

“Fuck. But what should I do? Something’s definitely going on in here.”

“Just wait for the squad cars. I can’t get past the gate by myself.”

“No, Hägerström, that won’t cut it. This is our chance to get some hard evidence. I’ve got to see what’s happening. It might be connected to our case.”

Hägerström was silent. Thomas felt a drop of sweat on his forehead. He waited for Hägerström’s response. Would he support him in this or not?

Hägerström cleared his throat. “Okay, take a quick look. But for fuck’s sake, don’t do anything stupid. You said it yourself—this could be the solution to our case. So don’t blow it.”

Thomas put his cell phone back in his inner pocket. Groped for his gun. Looked at it for a second. Fully loaded. Recently cleaned. Safety on. Felt good.

Thomas went back into the salon where all the paintings were hung. Then into the entrance hall.

His first discovery surprised him: the huge Yugo—the bouncer—in a heap on the floor. Around his feet, his forearms, and his mouth: looked like miles’ worth of duct tape. A puddle of blood on the floor—the guy’s knee: ground meat mixed with pants fabric. The guard was staring sluggishly into space. Thomas bent down. Ripped the tape from his mouth in one tear.

“What happened?” he whispered.

The guard seemed groggy. Maybe the loss of blood, maybe the shock, maybe he was on his way out. Thomas loosened the tape on his forearms. The guard: completely silent. Thomas listened to his breathing. It was there. Thin but still clear. He used the tape he’d torn off to wrap the wound on his knee. Tightened—tried to stop the flow of blood. Better than nothing. Checked the guy’s back, stomach, head—he didn’t seem to be injured anywhere else. Thomas placed him in the recovery position. The guard would survive.

Thomas texted Hägerström: Call amb. Pers shot in knee.

Moved on. Silence in the house. The beat, the music, the laughter couldn’t be heard anymore. The house felt like a grave, like the basement where he’d found Claes Rantzell. Thomas thought about the guard’s breathing: so thin. Like the air in this house. Like this entire investigation. It might all go to hell now—Bolinder’s bizarre party, the Yugos’ involvement, the payments to Rantzell, the key witness in Sweden’s most important trial.

Everything was thin.

Thomas stopped.

Took a deep breath. Was there something wrong with the air in here?

Felt like he was getting less oxygen. As if he was forced to breathe deeper. As if his lungs needed more.

He raised his gun. Closed his eyes. Saw an image in front of him. A boy. A face.

Sander.

Then he opened his eyes.

It was time to keep going.

Made his way through a couple of rooms. Empty of people. Colorful wallpaper, paintings, a sculpture or two, the right lighting, the right color choices, the right designer furniture. Couches, armchairs, Persian carpets, harmonious feel. Thomas thought, These types of men hide their real selves behind fancy art that no ordinary people understand. Criminal classic—the bigger the crook, the bigger the artists on the walls. It felt good to relax into a normal, bitter line of thought.

He walked through a hallway. The lighting was built into the floorboards.

He grabbed hold of the door handle. Carefully. Slowly. Pushed down. The door opened outward. A crack. He raised his gun. Sank down to his knees to be safe. Looked in.

A large room. The crystal chandeliers in the ceiling were the first things he saw. The room felt too bright. It sparkled. Immediately thereafter he saw the people. At least fifty of them. Men and women. On their stomachs, hands over their heads. Facedown on the floor. Thomas couldn’t see who they were. Could only guess.

He looked closer. Three people were lying in front of them. Taped up, folded up. One of them looked like he was unconscious. The second one was just staring, wide-eyed. The third: wrapped in something. A heavy-looking plastic bag on his stomach. A wire led from the plastic bag to a small gray box.

There were two more people in the room. Two men with concealed faces. Ski masks rolled down, dark clothes; they looked like they were wearing bulletproof vests underneath. Maybe they were pros. One was thinner, with a Beretta in one hand and maybe something else in the other. Standing a little way off from the people. Steady, calm, focused on safety. The other was incredibly beefy. He approached the group on the floor. Said, in crap English, “Everyone hands over their watches and wallets. Now.” Thomas could distinguish a thick Swedish immigrant accent in the English. Clear: this was a Swedish blatte.

He looked again. These weren’t real pros—the beefy guy was wearing light-colored sneakers.

Thomas read the situation. Weighed possibilities. Judged alternative courses of action. What he should really do is get out. Report to Hägerström where the hostage holders and the people were. Wait for backup. Let things take their course.

Or else he could wait and see what happened. He had a personal interest in this investigation. It was completely outside the rule book, after all. If it came to light, he’d be screwed as a cop forever. Hägerström too. He was also lured by the thought of solving the situation going on in the room by himself. Become a hero—make a triumphant return to the Southern District. The lone cop who went in on his own instead of waiting for backup. Dumb as hell. Stubborn as a four-year-old. Idiot risk taker—but still a hero.

That’s exactly how he felt. But he didn’t do it. He remained where he was. Backup was on its way, after all.

The guys in there pocketed the stuff that the men’d laid out on the floor in front of them.

The guy with the Beretta was clearly taking it easier than the one with the gym shoes. Moved with ease above the men’s heads. Held the gun in a relaxed grip, but still with full control. Looked like he’d done this before.

He opened his mouth. His English was significantly better than the beefcake’s. “I want all the whores to stand up.”

No one seemed to understand. He repeated, “I want all the girls to stand up.”

He pointed the gun at one of the men. Then he screamed, “Now!”

67

Mahmud didn’t understand what Niklas was doing. The commando guy’d suddenly started asked the hookers to stand up.

In his smooth English: “Everyone point to the man who last bought you.”

They didn’t seem to understand what he meant. Mahmud didn’t either.

This wasn’t part of the plan.

His bag was full of wallets and watches. Nice stuff—he immediately saw a solid gold Rolex Submariner. Mahmud calculated. The gold watch alone: probably 200,000. The total value: at least 500,000 in just Rolex, Cartier, IWC, Baume & Mercier, and the rest of the watches. Plus: the plastic. Even if they would cancel a bunch, Tom Lehtimäki would be able to trick enough systems to get another 500,000 or 600,000 kronor. What’s more: Jorge’s promised payment—he’d popped Ratko, one of Radovan’s men. Avenged his humiliation. Completed the Latino’s mission: hurt the Yugo mafia. It tasted so good.

Time to retreat.

Then again, he hadn’t taken pictures of the men with the hookers yet. That’d been Jorge’s idea. When he’d explained, the Latino’s grin’d been wider than a fucking smiley face. “Bring a good camera, man. You’re gonna be able to use the photos for years. They’ll pay. I promise. I know.” Mahmud got the point. Blackmail was a wonderful thing.

He turned to Niklas—screw the whole speak Yankee thing.

“What the fuck are you doing?”

Niklas didn’t respond. Kept raving.

“All the whores stand up. Or else I’ll blow this old fuck into so many pieces you’ll have to wipe up brain matter all night.”

A few of the girls started to get up. One by one. Most of them looked Eastern, around ten mulattos or Asians, a few Swedes. Dressed like the sluts they were, but more deluxe. Short skirts, tight jeans, fishnets, boots, stilettos, low-cut tops in thin materials. Mahmud recognized Natascha and Juliana and several others from the trailers. They’d clearly been dolled up tonight. Girls he’d driven around over the entire city.

Niklas yelled at them. The soldier boy seemed to’ve lost his grip. The girls didn’t want to follow his orders. But he kept on making commands.

“I don’t care if you don’t recognize these men. Just stand next to one who’s ever humiliated you. Stand there, goddammit!”

Mahmud tried again.

“Cut this shit, man. I’m done collecting. We did what we came here to do.”

Niklas turned to him. Continued in English, “I told you, no Swedish! What are you? Fucking retarded?”

68

Niklas was close to the finish line. The women would point out the guilty parties. He would serve the justice that society was waiting for. That his mom’d waited for all her life. He was a one-man judge and jury.

He was holding the remote detonator in one hand. The Beretta in the other. The attack was in its final stage. Judgment within reach. In a few minutes, it would be time to pull back the forces.

But first he had to make the Arab, who’d started interfering, shut his trap. Didn’t Mahmud understand that WILCO—will comply—was in force? Shut up and follow orders.

Niklas never dropped his eyes from the whore hounds.

The Arab kept pestering him: “Let’s split. Now. We’re done here.”

He tried to calm Mahmud down. Might need him to finish things here.

This couldn’t become a SNAFU—situation normal, all fucked up. He tried a WO—warning order: “Shut up. Now. Just follow orders or you’ll wish you had.”

Mahmud, in a raised register: “Fuck man, chill out, Niklas. We’re splitting. Or else Babak and me’ll split without you.”

Niklas couldn’t wait. He raised the Beretta toward one of the men. One by one, the order determined by the gravity of their crime. The man looked up. Three prostitutes were standing over him.

69

Did he hear that right? The situation in the room’d definitely started to derail. This would end badly. Very badly.

The men in the ski masks were arguing with each other. The immigrant guy’d started speaking Swedish. Apparently wanted to leave. The pro wanted to stay. Finish something that had to do with lining the whores up. Thomas could only imagine.

But did he hear that right? The immigrant guy’d said the name of the dude who wanted to stay—Niklas. He’d called him Niklas.

It was scary. A man named Niklas was attacking Bolinder.

Only one Niklas came to mind. The guy who’d escaped from the hearing in the District Court yesterday. The guy he and Hägerström’d discussed so many times. Maybe they were on the wrong track. Thomas’d dismissed all that—too much pointed to Adamsson, Bolinder, and the others. But now: what did the altercation and the hostage taking he’d just witnessed mean?

It couldn’t be a coincidence. It must be Niklas Brogren who was standing in the room right now. Prepared to kill all the johns. Above all: prepared to blow Bolinder into a million pieces.

There was a connection between Bolinder and the man who was suspected of murdering Rantzell. Again: it couldn’t be a coincidence. Niklas Brogren wanted something from Bolinder.

It meant two things. One: Thomas and Hägerström’d been right—the guy wasn’t innocent, he was involved in the murder somehow. Two: Bolinder wasn’t innocent either. Why else was someone who was involved in the murder here at his house, of all places?

There wasn’t time to think. The immigrant guy remained where he was reluctantly. Brogren’d forced all the girls to stand over different men. Unclear if they’d actually had sex with them or if they just went somewhere out of fear and confusion over Brogren’s order.

What should he do? Backup obviously wasn’t here yet. Not his fault—what was happening in the room would’ve happened even if he hadn’t come up from the basement. Now he was the only policeman on the scene. His duty: to stop what was happening in there. Or? No one knew that he and Hägerström were here. Maybe he should just sneak out of this cursed house. Let the hostage taker deal with the hostages. Let a murderer murder an instigator. Let Bolinder meet the fate he deserved.

But no. He’d promised himself to get to the bottom of this. Despite his thoughts in the car coming out here—that some of the people he’d gotten to know were his friends—he was a police officer. A regular cop—as he’d thought so many times before: far from the most honest one in the world. But, despite that, about as honest as you can expect a cop like him to be. It still boiled down to the same principle: he liked to see the law win. He didn’t care when it was a matter of petty shit, an ounce here and an ounce there. But he wanted the law to pluck the real rabble. And deep inside he thought he knew who they were. Suit-clad, wealthy, extremist men like Sven Bolinder should rot in the same cells as the drunk drivers, the dealers, and the wife beaters. That’s what he wanted. Even if it rarely, or never, turned out that way. Actually, he didn’t know of a single instance when it’d happened. But he didn’t give a shit, that was still his goal. This was his opportunity to change things—to see the law win. They’d taken Palme. The workingman’s hero. This was his way out. To change Sweden. At least just this once.

He speed-analyzed different alternatives. Rush in, try to arrest the intruders. Wait for the blatte to possibly leave and overtake him on the way out. Shoot the guys from a distance.

To rush in was dangerous. At least seven to nine yards. Niklas would have time to detonate the bomb and shoot a fuckload of people before he reached them. To wait for the blatte to leave—might never happen. That wouldn’t work.

Try to play sniper? Yes, maybe—that was Thomas’s thing. He was one of the best shots in the police force, after all.

If he’d had his Strayer Voigt Infinity, it would’ve been easy. But now—the police gun wasn’t exactly suited for sniper duty. At the same time: he should be able to handle nine yards. First Brogren, then the blatte.

He positioned himself with one knee on the floor. Straightened his back. Stretched his arms out. As long as they didn’t see him through the crack in the door. Remembered his bull’s-eye at the Järfälla club’s shooting range on the same night that Ljunggren’d told him that they’d found Rantzell’s apartment. He held the gun as still as he could. Sought out the sight. It was slow on the SIG Sauer. Fixed the notch. Subtle tremble. Relaxed. Didn’t bother with the poor lighting. Focused on one of Niklas’s legs. No point in aiming at his chest—the guy was wearing a bulletproof vest. Thomas squeezed the trigger, slowly. The founding principle was clear: squeeze, massage, stroke it. He squinted. Lost consciousness of everything else. Even slower. One single movement. The only thing he saw was Niklas’s thigh. It was the only thing in the world right now.

The shot rang out. Reality came crashing in. The sound hurt his ears.

Niklas stumbled. But didn’t fall.

The opposite. He roared. Took a step forward toward the man he was about to pop.

This wouldn’t do. He had to do something else.

Thomas regained his position.

Aimed for Niklas again.

The right side of his chest this time. Wouldn’t injure the lunatic too much. The guy was wearing a bulletproof vest, after all.

70

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Some fucker was still around. Some cunt that Babak hadn’t spotted.

Niklas stumbled. But didn’t fall.

“I’ve been hit!”

Mahmud didn’t know what he should do. This was not part of the plan. What a fucking idiot he’d been. It could be the 5-0. A blue storm rolling in.

FUCK.

Babak yelled from the room next door, “Habibi, what’s happening?”

Mahmud responded, “We gotta go.”

Babak ran in to Mahmud and the others.

Niklas roared, “Wait, I want to complete the mission.”

Babak approached him. Mahmud wondered why he’d come in. They were gonna split now.

Babak grabbed hold of Niklas. Tried to drag him away.

Tugged at his arm. Tore. Screamed, “Fuck, man, we gotta go.”

Another shot rang out in the room.

Mahmud saw Niklas. Like in slow motion. He collapsed like a rag.

On the left side of his head: the skull was busted.

Someone’d shot him again.

Khara. KHARA.

Niklas on the floor. They had to get out.

“Come on, man. Can you get up?”

Niklas tried to say something.

Gurgled.

Babak howled in the background.

Mahmud ran.

71

The second shot was bad.

Niklas dropped the Beretta.

But he was still holding the detonator in his hand.

Tight grip.

He felt the blood over his cheek and chin. Didn’t feel the blood. Didn’t feel anything.

He saw images. So many people, stories, faces.

Mom on the couch at home. The men in the mosque they’d torched down there. Collin.

The faces drifted past as if he were seeing them in a mirror.

Jamila. Benjamin. The cop who’d interrogated him.

He didn’t see anything anymore.

No johns, no old guys.

He saw a crystal chandelier swing above him.

Swing.

All the men who’d beaten and abused.

Mats Strömberg, Roger Jonsson, Patric Ngono.

Claes. Remembered him. All the punches.

Remembered Bolinder.

Niklas gripped.

Squeezed.

So still.

The detonator.

Everything was so still.