Watching You

by Arne Dahl

  Contents

  Cover

  About the Book

  About the Author

  Also by Arne Dahl

  Title Page

  Part I

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Part II

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Part III

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Part IV

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Copyright

  About the Book

  Someone is watching.

  At each abandoned crime scene there’s a hidden clue: a tiny metal cog, almost invisible to the naked eye. Someone is sending Detective Sam Berger a message, someone who knows that only he will understand the cryptic trail.

  Someone knows.

  When another teenage girl disappears without trace, Sam must convince his superiors that they’re dealing with a serial killer. As the police continue the hunt to find the latest victim, Sam is forced to unearth long-buried personal demons. He has no choice if he is to understand the killer’s darkly personal message before time runs out.

  Somebody is killing just for him…

  About the Author

  Arne Dahl is a multi-award-winning author, critic and editor. He is the creator of the bestselling Intercrime series, which was made into a critically acclaimed BBC TV series. His books have sold over three million copies and been translated into 32 languages. Watching You is the start of a thrilling new series and has proved a sensation, topping bestseller charts throughout Europe.

  Also by Arne Dahl

  The Blinded Man

  Bad Blood

  To the Top of the Mountain

  Europa Blues

  WATCHING YOU

  ARNE DAHL

  Translated from the Swedish

  by Neil Smith

  I

  1

  The aspen leaves are trembling. He can hear them even though he’s running, even though he’s running like he’s never run before, through meadow grass that reaches up to his chest.

  Just before the meadow opens out the rustling gets extra loud. He slows down. The trees are suddenly so oppressive that it feels like someone is trying to get through from another time. But then he stumbles, and the rustling sound grows weaker once more. He manages to stop himself falling, but the golden-yellow hair up ahead almost disappears from view between the tall blades of grass, and he has to push himself even harder to avoid losing any more ground.

  It’s a summer’s day, the sort that comes all too rarely. Feather-light clouds cut thin lines across the clear blue sky, every last blade of grass shines with its own particular shade of green.

  They’ve been running a long time, first down the increasingly deserted road from the bus stop, then out across the meadow. Now, in the distance, is the barely perceptible sparkle of water.

  He won’t be able to see the boathouse while he’s running this fast – he’s aware of that – but he knows it’s there, hidden among the trees by the edge of the shore, greenish-brown and ugly and quite wonderful.

  The golden-yellow hair slows down ahead of him. As the head begins to turn he knows he’ll be astonished. He has never stopped being astonished, will never stop being astonished. And just as the first hint of the irregular profile becomes visible, he hears it again.

  There are no aspen trees nearby. Yet he can’t hear anything except the rustle of aspen leaves, which becomes a whisper, which becomes a song.

  There’s someone, somewhere, who wants something from him.

  Then they’re standing eye to eye.

  He’s still gasping for breath.

  2

  Sunday 25 October, 10.14

  The aspen leaves were trembling, and even though the sky was dark with rain in that almost medieval way, a rustling sound, just a little too loud, seemed to be forcing its way out from the fluttering leaves. Berger shook his head, suppressed all superfluous impressions and forced himself to lower his eyes from the treetops. The wooden planks pressing against his back, so rotten they felt soft, instantly reasserted their raw chill.

  He glanced towards the other ruined buildings, only just visible through the increasing downpour. Two colleagues were crouched by each one, water dripping from their bulletproof vests, weapons in their hands. All eyes were fixed on Berger. Waiting for the signal. He turned and saw a pair of wide-open eyes. Deer’s face was streaming with water, as if she were weeping.

  Six cops standing around some ruined buildings in the pouring rain.

  Berger peered round the corner. The little house was no longer visible. They could see it as they crept in from the side road and spread out across the terrain. But the rain had swallowed it up.

  He took a deep breath. There was nothing for it.

  A nod towards the two men by the closest building. They set off at a crouch into the storm. A nod in the other direction: another two men followed the first, disappearing into a murky broth. Then Berger himself set off, Deer’s breath almost a whimper behind him.

  Still no house in sight.

  One by one his colleagues emerged from the rain, four crouching figures radiating concentration.

  Plank by plank the house was conjured forth out of the gloom. Dark red with white trim, black roller blinds, no sign of life.

  Close now. Close to it all. Possibly even close to the end.

  Berger knew he mustn’t think like that. Now was all that mattered. Here and now. No other place, no other time.

  They gathered at the bottom of the steps leading to the peeling yellow porch. The bottoms of two drainpipes were spewing cascades of water at their feet. Everything was utterly drenched.

  Faces looking at him again. He counted them off. Four, plus Deer’s breathing behind his back. Berger gestured her forward, looked into ten eyes. Then he nodded. Two men started up the steps, the shorter one with adrenaline shining from his pale green eyes, the taller one with the battering ram in his hand.

  Berger stopped them. Whispered a reminder: ‘Look out for traps.’

  The rain was suddenly their ally. Its drumming on the roof tiles drowned out their footsteps as they went up to the porch.

  The ram was raised. Safety catches of various weapons were released in succession. A dull crash of splintering wood forced its way through the rain.

  A deep darkness opened up.

  The man with the pale green eyes slipped in with his weapon drawn.

  Berger heard himself breathing through the sound of the rain, peculiarly slowly. Time stretched.

  A noise cut through the roar of the storm. At first it didn’t sound human. Then it morphed into a sound more surprised than pained. The clearest tone of mortal dread.

  The officer with the pale green eyes emerged from the darkness, his face as white as chalk. His service weapon fell to th
e porch floor with a thud. Only when he toppled sideways did the noise become a scream. It still didn’t sound human. The blood merged with the water on the decking as two colleagues dragged him off to one side. There was a knife sticking out from each arm.

  Berger heard his own groan, the pain in it, a pain which mustn’t be allowed to take root, mustn’t stop him. He glanced quickly into the darkness, then turned round. Deer was crouching below the window, gun ready, torch out, her brown eyes bright and lucid.

  ‘Trap,’ she whispered.

  ‘Too late, again,’ he heard himself say as he made his way inside.

  The mechanism was mounted on the wall of the hall. It had fired blades at a specific height, in a specific direction. Deer shone her torch to the left, towards a half-open door. Probably the living room.

  The screaming out on the porch had risen to pain now, no longer pure, astonished dread. There was, paradoxically, something hopeful about it. It was the scream of a man who believed he was going to survive after all.

  Berger gestured to two officers behind, pointing them up the staircase to the right.

  His colleagues set off upstairs, beams of light playing briefly on the ceiling above the stairs, then everything was dark again. Berger and Deer turned slowly back to the half-open door to their left.

  Out with mirrors, to check for traps. All clear. Berger slipped into the darkness first, followed by Deer, as they covered each other. The weak torchlight revealed a bare, spartan living room, a clinical little bedroom, an equally scrubbed kitchen. No smell at all.

  The kitchen extinguished the last hope. So clean.

  And so empty.

  They went back out into the hall as the two officers were coming down the stairs. The first merely shook his head.

  It was lighter in the hall now. The wounded man was no longer screaming, just whimpering. Two long, thin knife blades without handles lay on the decking. The rain had washed the blood from them, from the whole porch.

  So clean.

  Berger looked up. In the distance an ambulance was heading towards the gates of the large, overgrown property. There were already two police vans there, their blue lights flashing next to two rival media vehicles. Curious onlookers had started to gather by the cordon. And the rain had eased to a heavy shower.

  Berger’s gaze settled on the porch steps – almost two metres high – then he marched back into the hall again.

  ‘There’s a cellar.’

  ‘Do we know that?’ Deer said. ‘There’s no cellar door.’

  ‘No,’ Berger said. ‘Look for a hatch. Gloves on.’

  They pulled on plastic gloves, spread out, rolled up the blinds. Light filtered in, refracted through the water. Berger pulled the bed out, dragged the chest of drawers aside. Nothing. He heard noises from the other rooms, then finally Deer’s muffled voice from the kitchen.

  ‘Come here!’ She was pointing at the wooden floor next to the fridge.

  He could make out a slightly paler rectangle. They worked together to push the fridge aside with help from the three uninjured officers.

  Between the fridge and the cooker, a rectangle had been cut into the floorboards, but there was no handle.

  Berger stared at the rectangle. When it was broken open everything would change. The true descent into darkness would begin.

  3

  Sunday 25 October, 10.24

  They had to prise the hatch open, four men armed with a variety of kitchen utensils. Berger stopped them when it was open just a few centimetres. He shone his torch around the edges of the hatch, and Deer pushed through a mirror that caught the light of the torch. No booby traps. They forced the hatch open. There was a crash. Dust flew up from below. Then silence.

  More silence.

  Berger switched his torch back on, and could see some steps. He jumped down, his torch and gun raised.

  Step by step the darkness grabbed hold of him once again. The torch hid more than it revealed. A fragmented world: no more than claustrophobic cellar walls and low, half-open doors that led to yet more darkness, new, different, yet still essentially the same.

  What struck him most was the smell. That it wasn’t what he had been fearing. And that it took him such a long time to identify it.

  The entire cellar was bigger than expected. There were doors leading off in all possible directions. Cement walls, considerably newer than the house.

  The air was thick. It left no room for anything else. And no windows, not a trace of any light but the five beams of lights that daren’t linger.

  The smell grew stronger. The mixture. Excrement. Urine. Blood, perhaps. But not a dead body.

  Not a dead body.

  Berger scrutinised his colleagues. They looked pretty shaken as they spread out into the claustrophobic small rooms. Berger was in the one furthest to the left, shining his torch around. There was nothing there, absolutely nothing. He tried to picture the layout.

  ‘Empty,’ Deer said, her pale face appearing from behind one of the doors. ‘But this smell must be coming from somewhere.’

  ‘This cellar’s asymmetrical,’ Berger said, putting his hand to the wall. ‘There’s another room. Where?’

  ‘Spread out,’ he said from one of the doorways. ‘Search along the left wall. Differences in colour, texture, anything at all.’

  He returned to the far left room. The cement looked uniform, nothing that stood out in any way. Berger hit the wall, a short, sharp uppercut. The plastic glove broke, and with it the skin of his knuckles.

  ‘I think we’ve got it,’ he heard Deer say from somewhere.

  Berger shook his hand and walked out. Deer was crouched in the corner of a room on the right, as one of the police officers lit it with a shaky beam.

  ‘Something’s different here, isn’t it?’ Deer asked.

  Berger inspected the wall. In the far corner there was a square half-metre where there might have been a tiny shift in colour. Footsteps heading down into the cellar. One of the officers appeared with the battering ram in his hand.

  Berger stopped him. Asked them all to point their torches at the change in colour. He got his mobile phone out and took a picture. Then he nodded.

  The room was too cramped, too low, for a decent swing. Even so, the black cylinder broke through at once. Berger felt the wall. Plasterboard, nothing more. He nodded, and the ram swung back and forth a couple more times, opening a rectangle in the wall. Then it struck thick concrete. That was as big as the hole would get for now.

  The hole into the abyss.

  The mirror that was poked through revealed nothing but darkness. Berger could see that Deer knew it was up to her. She would be able to get through most easily. She turned to look at him. There was fear in her eyes.

  ‘Just be careful,’ he said, as gently as possible.

  Deer shuddered. Then she kneeled down, ducked her head and slid in, with surprising ease.

  Time passed. More than was necessary.

  A flash of terror struck Berger. A feeling that Deer had disappeared, that he had sent her into hell defenceless.

  Then a groan emerged from the opening, a restrained whimper.

  Berger stared at the officers. They were pale, one of them was trying desperately to stop his left hand shaking.

  Berger took a deep breath and crawled through.

  Inside the unknown space he could see Deer with both hands over her mouth. He looked towards the other end of the room. Across the floor and some way up the wall were stains, large stains. The smell was now a stench.

  No, not one stench. Several.

  As he shoved forward, his sensory impressions began to fall into place.

  Deer was standing by one wall. An area between two floor supports made of decaying wood drew their attention. There was a large stain on the concrete floor, next to an overturned bucket. And between the pillars was a larger stain, across the wall, that was a similar colour, but very clearly had a different source.

  ‘Fucking hell,’ Deer said.

&nb
sp; Berger’s eyes followed the pattern of the stain across the wall. And it caught in his nostrils. Even with the toilet bucket spilled on the floor.

  Enough blood for it to catch in his nostrils.

  On the other hand, the stain on the wall had soaked in completely. They weren’t just too late. They were far too late.

  He looked at the walls. It was as if they wanted to tell him something. As if they were screaming.

  Deer moved towards him. They hugged, just briefly. Any shame could come later.

  ‘We’d better avoid contamination,’ he said. ‘You go first.’

  He watched her feet disappear. Took a couple of steps towards the opening. Then changed his mind. He went back to the two pillars, and ran the beam of the torch down them. There were notches in the left-hand pillar, then similar grooves in the one on the right, at three different heights. He looked down, towards the floor. There was something wedged behind the right pillar. He crouched down and pulled it loose. It was a cog, a very small cog. He inspected it closely.

  Then he put it into evidence bag that was almost as small, zipped it shut and put it in his pocket.

  He photographed the floor supports from various angles. He turned towards the dried pool on the floor. Photographed that too. He let the torch play over the wall that was partially spattered with blood. Took more pictures, even where there wasn’t any blood.

  He took care of it all so swiftly that no one even called through to check on him. He was there, sticking his hands through the hole, letting them pull him out.

  They made their way up the steps, emerging one by one into a numbing light. They slipped out onto the porch, the rain had stopped. Berger and Deer stood very close together. Breathing freely.

  A number of forensics officers, shuffling their feet impatiently, were waiting outside. The overweight head of Forensics, Robin, was on his way up the steps, but thankfully there were no other bosses, no Allan. The wounded officer had disappeared, as had the ambulance. The police vans were still there, blue lights flashing. Media people with cameras and microphones were pressing against the cordon, and the number of onlookers had increased noticeably.