The air inside the Golf suddenly felt stuffy and hard to breathe. Sarac was about to open the window, but where the handle should have been there was only a black bolt. So he opened the door instead, picked up his stick, and took a couple of cautious steps out onto the green-painted deck.
The lights of Vaxholm were approaching ahead of them. He made his way between the cars, trying to get to the far side to find some shelter from the wind. When he went around the corner of the two-story cabin he almost collided with Natalie. She had a cigarette in one hand and her cell phone in the other. When she saw him she started slightly. The fleeting expression on her face was almost imperceptible. But for a brief moment Sarac could have sworn that what he saw in her eyes was . . . fear.
• • •
All investigations consist of methodical work, intuition, and a bit of luck, Atif thought. In his case, something as simple as a call made by accident. Rico, whoever he was, seemed to be in roughly the same situation as Pitbull. For some reason he had chosen to get out of the city for a while. Perhaps he was mixed up in Adnan’s death, unless the reason for his flight was something else entirely? No matter what, he was a link to both Erik J. and his secret friend.
The building Rico lived in was big. Three stairwells, six floors, plus the ground floor, which was occupied by a mixture of shops and offices. For a brief moment Atif had the feeling he was looking for a needle in a haystack, then he noticed that one of the businesses was a gym. That could hardly be a coincidence. He parked the car where he had a good view of the building and settled back to wait. He didn’t really know what for. He had no idea what Rico looked like, and without a surname there was no point snooping about the stairwells. All he could do was keep watch and hope that the good fortune that had led him there wasn’t going to let him down.
He pulled out the blister pack of acetaminophen, popped out a couple of pills, and swallowed them dry. He was already feeling a bit better, probably thanks to the injection the doctor had given him. The pain in his arm and chest was under control now, but he leaned the seat back slightly to ease the pressure on them.
After about fifteen minutes a taxi pulled up outside the building and a man and woman got out. Atif thought the woman looked vaguely familiar, then realized that she reminded him of Cassandra. Pouting lips, bleached hair, oversized silicone breasts that were visible even beneath her fur coat. He really should have called them, to make sure everything was okay up in Dalarna. He promised himself he’d call as soon as he was back in his hotel room.
The couple went into the gym. Atif felt his cell phone vibrate in his inside pocket and had a bit of a job extracting it.
Cassandra calling.
Speak of the devil . . . Had something happened? He hesitated, gazed out across the empty pavement, then pressed Answer.
• • •
“Here it is! Sabatini’s is the middle door,” Sarac said.
“Okay, I’ll just try to find somewhere to park,” Natalie said.
The drive had taken almost an hour. He had been immersed in thought and Natalie had kept to herself. She hadn’t said a word until they were approaching the city. She had asked a question that he hadn’t been expecting at all: how common was it for a handler to lie to his source? He had replied in line with regulations, that it was forbidden to lie or make a promise you couldn’t fulfill. But he still got the impression that she had worked out what the real answer was. Of course you lied. Lying was a tool, a way to get quick results. The sources presumably realized this fairly often, yet they chose to go on working for him. Perhaps because they so dearly wanted what he was saying to be true. And as long as they didn’t see through his bluff, at least they were still in the game. They had a chance.
Natalie drove around a corner, found a loading zone, and parked the Golf. She got ready to get out.
“Er, it’s probably best if you wait here,” Sarac said. “I mean, I hope you’re not offended?”
“No, no.” Natalie sounded almost relieved. “Of course not. I’ll stay here, call if you need my help.” She pulled out her ChapStick and ran it over her lips.
Sarac got out of the car, fastened his padded jacket, picked up his stick, and walked back toward the corner.
• • •
It was Tindra calling, not Cassandra. She must have got hold of her mother’s phone and looked up his name. Her bright voice was bubbling in his ear, putting Atif in a slightly better mood.
The couple from the gym came back out onto the sidewalk. The man lit a cigarette for the woman, then one for himself. Over the phone Tindra was chattering about rabbits.
“Tindra, listen to me now. Amu’s got to hang up. I’ll call you this evening and you can tell me more. Okay?”
The woman spun around and gave the man the finger.
“And it’s going to be called Snowball,” Tindra went on.
In the distance, at the other end of the building, another man came around the corner. Padded jacket, woolly hat pulled down over his forehead, a stick in one hand. He was walking rather stiffly, as if one leg wouldn’t do as he wanted. The man seemed to be aiming for one of the entrances. Atif ended the call, reluctantly cutting off Tindra’s description in the middle of a sentence. He promised himself that the next time he saw her he’d take her to a pet shop and let her choose her own rabbit, to make up for it.
He opened the car door and put one foot down on the tarmac, trying to slip his cell phone back into his pocket at the same time. His swollen finger slipped and he dropped it on the seat instead. By the time he straightened up the woman had just started screaming.
• • •
When Sarac was thirty feet away from the door, it opened and a man came out. Sarac recognized him at once. It was Erico Sabatini. The man ran straight into a couple who were standing smoking on the sidewalk. He wasn’t wearing a coat or hat, just a red-patterned T-shirt and jeans. At the same moment the woman started to scream Sarac realized that Sabatini didn’t even have any shoes on.
• • •
Atif saw another man come out. His hair was sticking up, he had no coat on, and he wasn’t wearing any shoes. Something he’d said or done had made the woman start screaming. She was pointing at the colorful pattern on the man’s T-shirt.
Atif went to cross the street, waiting to let a car go past. The man with the stick was getting closer as well. The woman was still screaming. The sound echoed between the buildings.
The man with no coat grabbed hold of the woman’s hands, but the man who was with her quickly pushed him away. He knocked the man off balance and he fell to his knees. The woman held up her hands, still screaming. Atif suddenly realized what was on her hands . . .
• • •
Blood, Sarac managed to think just before Sabatini collapsed onto the sidewalk. He had thought the man’s T-shirt was just brightly patterned. But it had actually been white to start with. The woman’s screams were echoing through the street, sending flashes of lightning through his head.
He fell to his knees and tried to lift Sabatini’s head. The man’s eyes were half-open, his eyelids fluttering. The whole front of his T-shirt was covered in blood.
“Shut up,” he heard someone bark, and the woman fell silent instantly. She and the man with her backed away ten feet. They stood there staring, without making any move to help.
A large man with cropped hair sank to his knees beside Sabatini and pulled up his wet T-shirt. Sarac started and almost let go of Sabatini’s head. Then he realized that the man didn’t match any of his memories. Dark red blood was seeping from two stab wounds in the right-hand side of Sabatini’s stomach, just below his ribs.
“His liver,” the large man growled. “Stop your fucking filming and call an ambulance!” This was aimed at the couple, both of whom had started fiddling with their cell phones.
“Give me your scarf,” the man said to Sarac.
The large man rolled the scarf into a ball and pressed it to Sabatini’s stomach. The fabric became soaked through and da
rk almost immediately.
“Y-you . . .” Sabatini had opened his eyes. “Fuuuck!” He grabbed Sarac’s arm.
“The ambulance is on its way,” Sarac said. He suddenly realized he had tears in his eyes. “It’s going to be okay, Erico.” He took the man’s hand and squeezed it.
“Who stabbed you?” the big man muttered.
Sabatini didn’t answer, just went on squeezing Sarac’s hand. His breath was coming in shallow pants.
“T-this wasn’t supposed to h-happen. H-he promised . . .” In the distance they could hear sirens getting closer.
“Who promised, Erico? Who stabbed you? Was it Janus?” Sarac noticed the big man’s reaction.
Sabatini grabbed at the front of Sarac’s jacket. “It’s all his fault! All . . . Erik . . .” Sabatini’s speech disintegrated into a terrible gurgle. The sirens were getting louder, bouncing off the buildings. Sabatini let go of Sarac’s jacket. His face was ashen, his jaw clenching and cramping.
“He prom . . . isssed.”
• • •
Atif realized the man was finished when he saw where he’d been stabbed. The liver was full of blood, and if it got punctured it was really just a matter of time. Spilled blood always looked much worse than it really was, but Atif guessed there was almost a liter on the sidewalk and soaked into the scarf and his clothes. And probably the same amount inside the man’s torso.
He stared at the man who was holding the victim’s hand. A thin, angular face, pointed nose, sunken blue eyes. He didn’t look particularly well either. The man had called the wounded man Erico and had asked about Janus, which obviously had to mean that this was Rico bleeding to death on the sidewalk. Rico had said something to the other man, something he hadn’t heard properly. More than anything Atif felt like yanking the other man to his feet, dragging him into his car, and then quietly persuading him to explain all he knew about Erik J. and Janus. But the sirens were getting closer and closer. In a minute or so the place would be crawling with cops and paramedics.
He glanced over his shoulder and realized he didn’t have time to get back to his car. What the hell, it was pretty much fucked anyway after what happened at the health center. He could always get another one.
He straightened up and took a couple of steps back. He saw that the couple on the sidewalk had ignored his instructions and were filming what was going on with their cell phones. Slowly moving in on the dying man for a close-up, like hyenas on prey! With a bit of luck they’d only caught his back on camera. If not, he’d be under suspicion of two murders. There wasn’t much he could do about that. He took a few lumbering steps and aimed for the nearest corner.
• • •
Natalie heard the sirens getting closer. She quickly stubbed out her cigarette and pulled her phone from her pocket. No missed calls, no messages. Shit!
Rickard had simply absorbed the information. He had barely even thanked her before he hung up. So what the hell was she supposed to do now? Run after Sarac? A police car raced past, then another one. The sirens fell silent abruptly. Whatever was going on, it was very close, just around the corner.
She took a couple of steps in that direction, then stopped. Maybe it was smarter to curb her curiosity for a few minutes and just see whether Sarac showed up. But what if something had happened to him? What if the sirens were because of him?
A tall man in a dark padded coat came around the corner ahead of her. He was half running, almost lurching in a rather odd way. One of his trouser legs had a dark red stain on it. Something about the look in the man’s eyes and the fixed expression on his face made Natalie turn around after him.
She frowned. And thought about the description from the murder in Roslagsgatan. A large man in dark clothing. Could this be the man Rickard was looking for? The one known as Janus? In which case she’d just drawn the winning ticket. The thought of Rickard’s reaction made her pulse speed up. She raised her cell phone and let out a loud whistle. When the man turned around, instinctively she took a couple of quick pictures of him, then started running toward the corner.
• • •
Sarac was sitting on the sidewalk. He was holding Sabatini’s hand, feeling it getting colder in spite of the paramedics’ frantic work. In the end he had to let go as they lifted Sabatini into the ambulance.
The police were already cordoning off the area, stretching out their blue and white plastic tape and sealing off almost the entire block. Two officers were talking to the argumentative couple, who now had their arms around each other. More police had managed to open the door to Sabatini’s building and were heading inside, weapons drawn.
Sarac got slowly to his feet, brushing the grit and slush from his trousers as best he could. Jesus! He wiped his eyes with the back of his hand.
Someone took hold of his arm.
“You saw the whole thing, didn’t you?” A female police officer, she couldn’t have been more than twenty-five. No one he recognized. He saw her looking at the bloodstains on his trousers and coat. “We’d like you to accompany us to the station.”
• • •
Sarac’s been arrested, what should I do? /Natalie
Natalie was standing by the cordon, watching as Sarac was put in the back of a police car. He seemed okay, which was at least of some comfort. But what did the rest of it mean?
She received a reply to her text less than a minute later.
Hold back for now! /R
Okay, so what did that mean? How long was for now? His texts were even more abrupt than his phone conversations. She hated people who couldn’t even be bothered to write their whole name.
So what was she supposed to do now? If Sarac could just look at the pictures and confirm that they were of the man he was looking for, she could complete her mission. But instead she watched him being driven away in a police car.
• • •
The car journey only took a couple of minutes; the nearest police station was just a few blocks away. While they were waiting for the gate to the custody unit to open, the female officer’s phone rang.
“Nineteen forty-seven, Andrén,” she said curtly. Then listened to the person at the other end.
“Okay,” she said. The gate was now open, but she gestured to her colleague to wait.
“Understood, we’re on our way.” She ended the call.
“We’ve been outbid,” she said to her colleague. “We’re to take him straight to headquarters in Kronoberg.”
The driver put the car in reverse and pulled back into the street. He did a U-turn and set off into traffic.
“Who was it who called?” the male officer said when they had reached Hornsgatan. “The duty officer at Crime?”
“I’ll tell you later.” The female officer gave Sarac a quick sidelong glance.
The drive to Police Headquarters took barely ten minutes.
Sabatini’s blood was still all over Sarac’s hands and clothes. He couldn’t stop crying, and each time he sniffed, the female officer looked at him in a way he didn’t much like. As if she thought he was pathetic for crying over a stranger. But Sabatini hadn’t been a stranger.
They drove into the underground garage and stopped by the elevator leading up to the custody unit. They were met by two people, a man and a woman, both wearing suits.
“We’ll take it from here,” the woman said.
“Okay,” one of the uniformed officers replied. “You’ll sign him in as well?” She took her notebook out from her trouser pocket.
“We already have all the details,” the woman in the suit interrupted. “Thanks for your help, 1947.”
She took Sarac lightly by the arm and led him over toward the elevators. But instead of getting the elevator that went straight up to the custody unit, they carried on, toward a smaller elevator further inside the garage.
“Where are we going?” Sarac asked, hearing how flat his voice sounded.
“You’ll see,” the woman said, pressing the button for the top floor.
The cor
ridor they emerged into looked deserted. Only half the lights in the ceiling were lit, there were rolls of paper and plastic piled up along the corridor, and the whole place smelled of paint.
They led him into one of the small rooms. Two office chairs facing each other, one window, blinds drawn. Nothing else.
“Would you like something to drink?” the woman asked.
Sarac nodded. He suddenly noticed that he was terribly thirsty. The woman left the room while her colleague stayed behind. In the distance Sarac heard the sound of running water. Then the woman came back and handed him a glass.
“T-thanks.” He raised the glass, shut his eyes, and took some big mouthfuls. He tried to erase the image of the dying Sabatini from his mind’s eye. When he opened his eyes again the pair who had escorted him were gone. Instead there was a man was sitting on the chair opposite him. A fair-haired, well-dressed man with a boyish appearance. Sarac recognized him at once.
“Hello, David,” the man said. “My name’s Oscar Wallin, but you already know that. We’re old acquaintances.”
THIRTY-FIVE
“Shame about Sabatini.” Wallin leaned forward toward Sarac. “I’ve had CIs who’ve died. It gets to you, doesn’t it? It makes no difference what they put in the handbooks or teach in courses. All that stuff about not getting too close, not getting involved.” Wallin shook his head.
“CIs put their lives in our hands. We persuade them to cooperate, use all sorts of psychological tricks to snare them. And once they’ve taken the bait, as you know, there’s—”
“No way back,” Sarac muttered.
Wallin nodded slowly.
“You look awful, David. I almost wouldn’t have recognized you. The last time we met was when I approached you with a proposal, if you remember?” Wallin leaned back in his chair.
Sarac shook his head slowly. “I’ve had a stroke, in case you haven’t heard. I basically can’t remember anything.”
“From the past few years, yes, so I heard.” Wallin smiled, a boyish smile that made him look even younger, if that was actually possible.
MemoRandom: A Thriller Page 23
