7:15 PM
(2 hours and 47 minutes remaining)
The brick at the center and top, a light press. Then that metallic click. And a wall slid open.
Piet Hoffmann left the boiler room’s oily odor for the smell of mold and moisture in a seventy-five-meter long tunnel. He had reopened the hidden space behind the bookshelf and dragged the two bodies inside it—they’d lie there until their stench seeped out like a dead animal stuck in the wall. He’d made his way through the house and down to the basement, worried with every step that the gunshots might have attracted more notice. Halfway into the tunnel, he relaxed somewhat, he was on his way. Out. Away. Toward somebody he thought he’d seen for the last time. Because when Latifi gave him the message that Hamid Cana had left his house with his hawk eyes and his bodyguards, Piet Hoffmann assumed he would never have to think about where that Albanian arms dealer was again. When he came across the decryption key in a watery safe, he was convinced. Their paths would never cross. Then everything changed. Again. The organization’s Swedish branch realized they were at risk and sacrificed their boss to protect themselves. And to ensure that, they renewed and intensified their threats to a hidden family. They now had access to their address and their executioner.
The other end of the secret tunnel, the exit that was his entrance a few hours earlier. He pressed the brick at the bottom left and the built-in door became visible as if out of nowhere. According to the text message he’d just received from Latifi, this house was still empty, the owners still gone. Hoffmann hurried through the basement and up the stairs to the kitchen and hall and the broken window. He checked his watch. He needed to squeeze out every minute, hold on to the seconds as long as he could, so he could locate Cana and determine how their limited time would end.
7:33 PM
(2 hours and 29 minutes remaining)
Latifi could have heard the gunshots. If he had, then he would have been forced to act, regardless of who was shot or why. The murder of Albanian citizens, even if they were in the employ of the mafia, couldn’t be ignored, even by a cop working on the good side. But he didn’t say anything and asked no follow-up questions when Hoffmann climbed into his car, stating that he’d found the information he’d come for. As if they had an unspoken agreement. As long as the Albanian policeman didn’t know, he didn’t have to act.
“And where to now? The airport?”
However, he could see the obvious. Piet Hoffmann was stressed. When he should have been relieved.
“That is if you really are finished now.”
As if the Swedish visitor were hunting for something. Maybe even someone.
“I have one more thing I have to do.”
“Yes?”
“A question I have to ask Cana.”
“I thought you said you had all the information you need?”
“About something else. That’s not in his computer.”
“And it’s about . . . what?”
“I can’t tell you. It’s between me and him.”
Latifi hesitated, looked at Hoffmann, judging him.
“So what you’re saying is that you don’t want to go to the airport?”
“What I’m saying is that I need you to give me the address of the house where he’s staying.”
Latifi stretched his big body, unconsciously running his hand over his square face. He seemed to weigh what he knew against what he suspected.
“I can’t give you the address.”
“Latifi, goddamn.”
“But I can drive you there.”
Hoffmann nodded. Thankful. And, of course, realized this clever police officer’s motive—by following along, being on-site, he hoped to prevent or at least mitigate the consequences of any possible confrontation.
Latifi started the car, and they rolled out of the neighborhood.
“Hamid Cana is one of the criminals I keep track of. Because I think it’s my job. Even though I, as you already know, can’t arrest him. Or, I can always arrest him but I’ve learned it’s pointless, he’s released before I even finish the paperwork.”
It was still light, but the first signs of twilight were approaching as they left the city on a large highway headed east.
“I don’t just know that he makes his living selling off the Albania arms surplus—I can prove it, and in another country that would mean his conviction. I also know that the woman he’s with right now, where we are headed, is the same person who owns the house you were just inside.”
“Same woman?”
“The same.”
“Mistress and also technically the owner of their headquarters?”
“Mistress—yes, but she’s involved as more than just a legal technicality. I’m pretty sure they run the guns together. Vesa Lilaj. Forty-seven years old, and nothing more serious on her record than a few parking tickets. But she’s related to this on another, higher level—she’s the sister of the man who was once in charge of the gun smuggling network to northern Europe. And then he was murdered. Power struggle, if our information is correct. A clear execution in . . . Sweden, I think, your homeland, Larsson. His wife and children were shot, too. At least that’s the info we got. That will be—twenty years soon? The murder of a whole family that you, as a Swedish police officer, would of course know well?”
“What was his name? The brother?”
“Mirza. Mirza Lilaj.”
Piet Hoffmann wasn’t familiar with the names Mirza or Vesa Lilaj. But then again he wasn’t a police officer either. He wondered if Ewert Grens might have heard of them. Or the murders Latifi was referring to. He had to remember to ask him about it, later, when this was over.
“No, sorry, twenty years ago was before my time.”
“Mirza Lilaj was—and this comes from verified surveillance information, there were a few good cops before me—one of the network’s clearest leaders until his death. And he was replaced by King Zoltan, who was one of the only clear leaders until his death. That murder we talked about the first time we met, I’d guess there was another power struggle, even if I can’t confirm it. But when Zoltan was replaced four years ago, the leadership was again divided into two. If my info is correct, and it usually is. Hamid Cana and Vesa Lilaj. He’s the front, the outward face. She makes the big decisions, works behinds the scenes.”
Now twilight arrived. The dark gently pushing away the light. The car’s headlights became two searching eyes on a road that was getting more narrow, winding, and rough.
“There’s a map in the glove compartment. If you take it out, Larsson, you’ll see on page seven the property we’re heading to. I’ve circled it.”
Hoffmann flipped through a well-used atlas that Latifi had probably had since his first day on the job. His personal guide through Albanian crime. Each page contained little arrows in different colors pointing to streets and buildings and a lot of scribbled notes that were impossible to read.
The circled property on page seven sat by itself at the end of a road that led straight up into the mountains, and its nearest neighbor seemed to sit two kilometers earlier.
And that was where he had to make his way—alone.
Hoffmann glanced at the Albanian policeman. Renegotiating so that he could drive the last bit by himself was pointless. Latifi had made up his mind—if there was going to be a confrontation it was best if the authorities were there to act as an airbag. But overpowering him in the car, or trying to anyway, and then continuing on by himself, did not feel good—this was a decent man, and besides, even if he succeeded it would cost Piet time he didn’t have.
“Can you stop over there?”
With the map on his knee, he suddenly had a better option. He knew where they were heading.
“At the gas station.”
“Now?”
“I need the bathroom.”
Latifi glanced at him without slow
ing down, a look that was used to searching for alternative agendas, and it wasn’t entirely convinced.
“You seemed to be in such a hurry.”
“I didn’t really have time to take a piss in either of the houses I broke into. I was busy.”
As they passed by the gas station, Latifi was still glancing at his passenger. A couple of hundred meters later, he slowed down, made a U-turn, and drove back. He parked wedged in between two other cars, windshield facing one of the big windows.
“I’ll grab a coffee while I wait. You want one too, Larsson?”
On either side of the gas station there sat a half-full cafeteria and a small packed arcade. A place to meet in what was otherwise deserted terrain, maybe the only place in this area where you could go for company on a weekday evening.
A lot of people and lots of cars—it was perfect.
“Would love a coffee. Thank you.”
Hoffmann smiled at Latifi. That always made it easier to hide uneasiness at one’s own lies.
“And when I get back from the john I’ll finally be ready to drink one again.”
Because he wouldn’t be. Coming back.
He followed the robust metal signs that led the way to the public toilets on the back of the building, opened the door to the men’s room, and was met by the stench of urine. On the right, a urinal that hadn’t been scrubbed in a while, on the left, three stalls with shitty toilets. He checked to make sure he was alone, and acted quickly.
He removed his stomach. He waved two fingers on his right hand until the vacuum released and the prostheses slid off.
He poked away the hanging eyelids, the crooked nose, the enlarged nose wings, and the large silicone piece that constituted his fluffy cheeks and chin.
He tore off the mustache, ruffled his well-combed hair, unbuttoned the shirt, and used the knife to cut the pants above the knee.
Then he threw everything except the prostheses into the trash.
The man who walked out of that toilet in shorts and a T-shirt a few minutes later was much younger, much more fit than the man who walked in. Though maybe not as well dressed. And he walked in the opposite direction, toward the back door of the cafeteria, and settled down on a vacant chair while looking for Latifi. There. On the other side of the window. The Albanian policeman was already in the car with a plastic cup of coffee, waiting for his Swedish colleague. Piet Hoffmann put a hand over the cigarette lighter that lay on the table, grabbed it as he rose to his feet, and used the cafeteria’s back door again. Now he headed along the back of the building toward a small auto repair shop and car wash, which only had room for one car at a time. He slipped inside and over to a long workbench, looking at the tools that were hanging in perfect order on hooks on the wall. He grabbed a screwdriver, a wrench, and a thin sheet of metal that resembled a blade gauge. And then he walked in a wide circle around the gas station area before using the cover of a small grove of trees to enter the parking lot for guests who were planning to stay longer than just a trip to the toilet.
Stealing a car in Albania took him back many years. Down here it was still common to drive those old Mercedes models that were once his favorite. Dusty, often with more than two hundred thousand kilometers on them, and no modern technology that got in a car thief’s way. He looked around, made sure no one was watching, and lay down on his back on uneven gravel, sliding in under one of the four possible cars. He cut the cable that connected to the horn, crawled out, and pushed a screwdriver into the tank lid lock, twisted until the air pressure dropped and all the doors were unlocked. He sat down in the driver’s seat and warmed the thin piece of metal with the lighter until it was hot enough to insert into the ignition. He turned and rooted around with it, pulled it out again, warmed it, turned again, warmed, turned. Melting the pins on the inside of the lock a little more each time. He then chose one of the keys from his own keychain: now that there were no pins inside the ignition, just about any of his keys would work.
Piet Hoffmann switched on the headlights, so as not to attract attention, and just as he turned out onto the highway, he caught a glimpse of Latifi, still sitting in the car with an extra cup of coffee that was getting cold.
8:36 PM
(1 hour and 26 minutes remaining)
The last persistent rays of sun seeped out where the mountains touched the sky. Soon the landscape would be as black as it was deserted. Piet Hoffmann drove the stolen Mercedes as fast as he dared; his map was only in his mind, and he didn’t want to risk missing a crossing and losing more time by having to double back. Seventh exit on the right. Then the third exit on the left, still paved. Then the last five kilometers on winding gravel roads and an even denser darkness.
And just as he passed the last neighboring house and turned off his headlights, his phone started ringing. Latifi. Hoffmann didn’t answer.
It rang again, he let it.
Then an angry text.
Where the hell are you?
He stopped and turned off the engine with just a few hundred meters left. A slow walk along the fence of the property, and he was sure there was no external security. In the city the two houses he broke into had been protected by straggling rolls of barbed wire, here the visitor was met by an elegant iron gate framed by white pillars and green plants. He climbed up and jumped over.
The ground was dry, and with no flashlight his steps landed in cracked soil occasionally, a couple of times he stumbled over low, sunburnt bushes. If he turned, he could make out a few lights scattered in the valley, large farms with beautiful groves of grapes and olives.
He checked his watch.
Just an hour. Until death.
Zofia’s death, Hugo’s death, Rasmus’s death, Luiza’s death.
Or the death of Hamid Cana, someone he had never met, never talked to—an Albanian gunrunner who had been sentenced by his own colleagues just an hour ago.
9:08 PM
(54 minutes remaining)
He’d snuck in, step by step, hunched over as low as he could get.
The last stretch, from the three-car garage to the rippling fountain, he slithered.
Now he lay in a grove of five thin, newly planted orange trees, fifteen meters from the house and with a full view into the illuminated rooms.
Four people.
He was starting to feel sure there weren’t more.
Hamid Cana he recognized, his jacket hanging on a chair, shirtsleeves rolled up, comfortably leaning back in a leather armchair with a glass of wine in his hand in what seemed to be the living room. Opposite him, also with a wineglass, sat the woman who, according to Latifi, owned both this house and the two-story house in the city, who together with Cana led this gun-smuggling organization. Vesa Lilaj. A beautiful name for a beautiful middle-aged woman, who laughed and gestured and filled up more wine, perhaps in love, maybe even happy. In the kitchen, two bodyguards stood leaning against a long row of cabinets, both in suits that were more elegant than what you usually see in the Balkan area.
Piet Hoffmann waited.
Not sure for what.
Some movement—a visit to the bathroom, a walk down to the wine cellar—whatever got Cana alone, or those bodyguards at a distance from their protective target. Twenty minutes. That was as long as he could wait. Then he had to act, no matter the risk.
9:31 PM
(31 minutes remaining)
No movement. No change. Other than time ticking by.
He had to make a decision.
Taking shots from here was possible. Cana constituted a perfectly lit target, his head exposed, his chest exposed. But since the bodyguards had all the knowledge of the surrounding terrain, which he himself lacked, he wanted to get closer, maybe even inside the house, to be sure he succeeded.
One slow step at a time.
Wrapped in darkness.
He’d reached the small fence that marked the beg
inning of the entrance, where the gravel path turned to granite squares, when protective darkness suddenly turned to naked, angry light. When all of the outdoor lighting switched on simultaneously. Without realizing it he’d passed by some sensor, and the movement he’d waited for in vain came as Cana and Lilaj put down their wineglasses and turned and tried their best to see outside.
It all happened very fast.
Piet Hoffmann took his first shots through the hall window at the bodyguards who weren’t expecting a confrontation, and didn’t have their weapons up, and then hurried toward the front door. The next shot penetrated the window of the living room, then Hamid Cana’s white shirt. Vesa Lilaj sank to the floor, unarmed, seeking cover while the shooter ran into the house.
9:40 PM
(22 minutes remaining)
When Piet Hoffmann screamed don’t fucking move to the woman on the floor and then took a picture of the man lying beside her and whose heart had been pierced, it was the kind of moment Grens sometimes talked about, a moment that seemed so arranged, bizarre, and awful that the viewer had to take a few steps back to make the surreal turn real again. He took more pictures, got close to those lifeless eyes, pulled up the dead man’s shirt and zoomed in on the bullet hole, then one more, one last shot of the blood still oozing out of him. And then he sent them to the phone number that belonged to that distorted voice. He’d made it—Zaravic would soon be released, but he wouldn’t be told where his own family was hiding.
Piet Hoffmann felt his legs getting heavy and his arms hanging without any will of their own. Thirsty, dizzy. He’d hunted as far as he needed to, and when he was done there was nothing left.
He just wanted to lie down, between the dead man and the weeping woman. Curl up. Fall asleep and wake up in bed with Zofia at his side, the sound of the children’s gentle snoring in the house that was their home, even though it no longer existed.
Knock Knock Page 34
