The Other Son (15 page)

Sanna was making spaghetti with clam sauce, the fan above the stove was whirring, the kitchen radio was playing Sonny Rollins.

Miles was sitting at the kitchen table, leafing through a boat magazine and looking at her. She was beautiful, and she made good food for him. That was better than anything.

She lived with him now. For a while, she had said. It had started with the sofa, then a mattress on the floor of his bedroom, like she was just a friend staying the night. Last night she had crept under his covers. They lay together and talked in the evenings in the dark. Sometimes they got up and watched a film in the middle of the night, a comedy, perhaps; she said she liked comedies. They laughed at the same things. Sometimes she stripped for him. That was wonderful. So wonderful that he didn't dare ask any questions. He just let it happen, so that he could look at her, have her to himself.

She was humming something to herself over by the stove. An old dance tune. He wanted to stop time, stay like that forever. Sanna turned around as if she had heard his thoughts. She smiled.

They ate the food and Sanna talked about growing up in Malmberget, in the far north, about her first car, a Volvo. About the first time she had sex, and the first time she got drunk. She said she didn't give a damn about the northern lights, mines, politics, or anything else the people up there got excited about. She liked being cheerful, grateful, and happy. That she tried to be like that as much as possible. That she knew things always got better if you worked for it…

“Miles,” she said suddenly.

“Yes?” he said. She was different, serious, cautious.

“You're a police officer.”

He couldn't tell if it was a question or a statement.

“You're good,” she said.

Her eyes were honest, alert, almost intense.

“What is it, Sanna?” he asked.

“Promise you'll never hurt me,” she said quietly.

He didn't understand, but said, “I promise.”

Then it was as if the conversation had never happened. They ate in silence.

The days were difficult for all of them. No one was allowed out for long. One by one they could take short walks with either Leszek or Hasani by their side, or take a short drive in the rental car. But apart from that they had to stay holed up in the apartment. Not doing any of the ordinary everyday things, like being in contact with their friends, or like going to a restaurant for a meal or out to the movies. But something else developed in this isolated existence. A sense of community, of solidarity.

Sophie and Leszek had left the city to buy food at a shopping center far away, beyond the suburbs, in the middle of nowhere. These days they went shopping at places she had never heard of, and never the same place twice.

Leszek steered the big shopping cart; she walked in front and loaded it with the things they needed, things they didn't need.

There was subdued music playing in the shop, and she listened to it unconsciously as she picked things out and felt normal for a while.

Then she heard a distant peeping sound, the same signal three times in succession. At first she didn't react. The noise was thin and nondescript. But it went on spoiling the background music.

“Sophie?”

She turned around and saw Leszek trying to get her attention, pointing at her handbag in the cart. At first she didn't get it, then the signal rang again, simple and monotonous.
Jens!
The phone that only Jens had the number to…

Sophie hurried over; the sound was coming from deep inside her handbag. She pulled the bag out and stuck her hand in, feeling for the phone. Too many things. She looked down, and there was something lit up in there.

The light went out just as she answered.

“Hello?”

Nothing but silence.

No, no, no…

Leszek was giving her a quizzical look.

“Who was it?” he asked.

Sophie held up the phone. He didn't get it.

“It's the phone Jens gave me,” she said. “You said it was OK that I kept it.”

Leszek remembered, nodded his head, whispered: “Yes, it's OK…Was it Jens?”

“I don't know,” she said.

She checked the phone; there wasn't much of a charge left.

They carried on through the store, but she had no idea what she was putting in their cart.

Ten minutes later it rang again. Sophie answered instantly.

“Jens? Hello?”

“
Coming to Sweden
Wednesday. I got caught. Being handed over to the police. Coming from Mexico City, probably via the USA, but I don't know. They still don't know who I am. I mustn't be handed over….They matched my prints to Trasten….”

The call cut off. He had been whispering, sounded stressed.

Her heart was beating fast and she felt a rush of joy.

The snow covered smells and sounds. It was a thick white everything that lay there sleeping like a well-meaning but heavy dog.

The air Leszek breathed in as he was walking through the evening darkness along Norr Mälarstrand was clean. He had the ear buds from his cell phone in his ears, his hands in his jacket pockets. The phone rang three times at the other end before Aron answered.

“
Yes?
”

“Jens Vall is on his way to Sweden from Mexico, police escort,” Leszek said.

“
Jens Vall?
” Aron said in surprise.

“He's asking for help,” Leszek went on.

“
When?
”

“In two days.”

“
What's it about?
”

“He's in custody over there. When the Mexican police ran his fingerprints through the system it set off an alarm from Trasten.”

“
And now he's being transferred to Sweden?
”

“Yes.”

“
And he'll be questioned about Trasten
?”

“In all likelihood.”

“
That mustn't happen
.”

“No. Of course not.”

“
So you've already thought of something?
” Aron said.

“Yes.”

“
Tell me
.”

“Somewhere between the airport and the city.”

“
Why?
”

“Open space, fast exit.”

“
OK. Plan to break him out with Sophie and Hasani. Two cars. When you're done I want you to travel with Sophie. Hasani drives Jens.
”

“What difference does it make?” Leszek wondered.

“
Just do as I say.
”

Something was going on.

“Aron?”

“
Once you free him, you leave the apartment.
”

“Tell me.”

“
No. Not now. You'll get a call from me.
”

“And then?”

“
Then you'll find out who's going to be left behind, and who's going with you.
”

The man in front of her was North African, a prostitute, in his thirties, and the tears running down his face were fat and full of regret and sorrow.

He kept sniffing between sentences as he explained how he had stabbed Conny Blomberg in the back with a blunt old knife he found in a drawer.

The motive was jealousy, apparently, or at least that was what Antonia guessed as she listened to the man's story. But it was unclear and confused. Perhaps there wasn't a clear motive, just a sudden impulse during an evening of far too many drugs and too much extreme sex.

The man kept crying and saying he was sorry, over and over again. Antonia waited patiently for him to stop. But he seemed to think that if he kept talking, explaining, and making excuses for long enough, the murder of Conny Blomberg would become less wrong.

She had heard hundreds of similar monologues over the years, and could never figure out if the perpetrators were talking to her, to their victims, or simply to their own consciences. But it didn't really matter at all.

Antonia called two uniformed colleagues, who came and got the man and took him back to the cells.

She stood in the doorway of the interview room and watched as the remorseful murderer and the police officers disappeared down the corridor.

She leaned her head against the door frame.
Fuck
…

Antonia ought to be happy. Every police officer's dream, a solid confession from a perpetrator. Case closed. But she felt deflated…again. The same way as when Tommy had taken the Trasten investigation away from her. Then something cropped up in the Conny Blomberg investigation. A coincidence, a link to Trasten…

Some of the names led back to Trasten. Leif Rydbäck, parts of whose body were found at the restaurant, had belonged to the same gang as Blomberg, along with Håkan Zivkovic. Anders Ask, the police officer who had contacted the Security Police, had worked with Gunilla Strandberg, the detective who was investigating Hector Guzman and was later murdered by Lars Vinge….It was all very thin and circumstantial. But then, it usually was….

Antonia started walking back down the corridor to her office.

The Conny Blomberg case was concluded. She should have been happy about that.

She sat down on the chair, her shoulders slumped. She gathered everything to do with the case and prepared her report for the prosecutor. Something in the corner of her eye. Miles Ingmarsson was standing in the doorway with a cup of coffee in his hand.

“That was easy,” he said.

“Yes…”

Miles let out a quiet “Congratulations.”

Antonia raised her eyebrows and adopted her work smile.

“Thanks,” she said.

Miles was on his way out. She felt she should reciprocate his gesture of friendship.

“How are you doing, Miles?”

He paused.

“Fine,” he said.

Miles scraped one foot along the floor.

“Well,” he said, and left.

Antonia did her best to understand.

She finished her work, reluctantly put Conny Blomberg in her outbox, all the while with a gnawing, tickling, burning sensation that it wasn't quite finished yet. Conny's death, the man's confession, the link to Zivkovic, Tommy's power games. And now Ingmarsson. Had he been smirking at her? Was he making fun of her? Was God making fun of her? Was it all a big fucking joke? Was everything going to be whipped away from her every time she got close to a breakthrough? Was she doomed to live her life in a limbo of ignorance?

Antonia Miller leaned back in her chair, feeling her stress levels rise. Her anger gnawed at her nerves. But then an idea began to take shape.

Antonia took out her notepad from the desk drawer. She leafed through until she found the page where she had written down all the numbers and names she had photographed from HÃ¥kan Zivkovic's address book. She had recognized most of them. The list consisted of half of Stockholm's small-time gangsters.

She grabbed a blank sheet of paper from the printer and started work on a fake story that she wrote using a pencil, a lot of imagination, and a few of the names from the address book.

The fake story was based on drugs, whores, and murder, the fact that Zivkovic's name cropped up everywhere when she asked about Blomberg, and that he was the prime suspect for a load of minor offenses, which when taken together became big and ominous and would lead to plenty of years in prison. Something along those lines.

Antonia read through her work, and when she was happy with it she dialed Zivkovic's number. He answered, and she told him the basics of the fake story. He denied it completely, truthfully, and in all honesty—she knew him now.

Antonia suggested they meet up. HÃ¥kan was breathing heavily down the phone.

“
Please!
” he said.

She didn't feel the slightest pang of guilt.

HÃ¥kan Zivkovic looked
pale. He was sitting on his desk chair, his biceps bulging under his T-shirt, Sitting Bull staring out sternly behind him.

“You're a fucking bitch,” he said, picking at one of his molars with a toothpick.

She didn't answer, and just stared at the Sioux chieftain instead.

“Give me everything you've got and I'll let you go. Mess with me, and I'll keep getting you for minor offenses, a few at a time.”

His eyes were glowing with loathing.

“What do you want?” he grunted.

Thank you
…

“You know something. About Anders Ask and Leif Rydbäck, that's what I want.”

His eyes seemed glued to her, as if he were seeing something he'd never noticed before. He laughed.

“Shit, woman. You're buzzing with fucking curiosity!”

She wasn't prepared for that.

He laughed again, almost with relief. “That's true, isn't it?”

She couldn't let her mask slip now. She nodded.

“And you think you can show up here and threaten me just so you can get what you want?”

She said nothing.

HÃ¥kan was radiating controlled aggression, which made him dangerous, and it scared her.

He lowered his voice.

“Let's turn this around,” he said. “Instead of you threatening me, why don't you give me what you've got?”

“What do you want?” she said.

“I want a free pass,” he said hoarsely, with the toothpick hanging from the side of his mouth.

“A what?”

“A free pass. I want to be able to do something illegal and get away with it.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Are you deaf or something?”

“There's no such thing as a free pass, surely you know that?”

“There is now!”

He was stubborn.

“And protection,” he said.

“I can give you protection, but not the
free pass
,” she snapped.

“Call it what you want, but I'm going to need money to get away with. And I need a lot of it. And when I get it, I'm going to need protection. Help me with that, and look the other way.”

If she understood correctly, he was asking for big things, impossible things.

“I'm a police officer,” she said, trying to make it sound impressive.

He snorted, and he was probably right to. HÃ¥kan had seen through her at once. He knew she was prepared to pay, and pay a lot.

“Maybe you haven't got anything,” she tried.

He burst out laughing this time, and tossed the toothpick in the wastepaper basket under the desk. “You seemed pretty sure about that when you called.”

“Tell me,” she said.

“If you give me what I want.”

“If you give me what
I
want,” she countered.

HÃ¥kan Zivkovic rubbed his cheek with his thumb, emphasizing his weak jawline.

“It doesn't really matter anyway,” he muttered.

“What?”

“Ask and Rydbäck, you said?”

She nodded.

“Now, that's a crazy fucking story,” he said quietly, his thumb still on his chin.

She felt a glimmer of hope.

“Do you promise to help me?” he said.

“I promise.” She swallowed.

He thought for a moment.

“A businessman was being blackmailed. He contacted me and Leif Rydbäck for help. After a lot of work, we figured out who was blackmailing him: Hector Guzman and Aron Geisler,” he said.

A gentle feeling of happiness washed over Antonia. She was right, she knew she was right.

“What sort of blackmail?” she asked.

He shrugged. “The usual crap. The man worked for some big stock-market listed company. They wanted inside information, so they could use it to buy and sell shares.”

“And Anders Ask?” she asked.

“It was him who gave us their names. It felt like a happy coincidence.”

HÃ¥kan went on: “So Leif and I went home and worked out a plan, then a few days later we went around to Hector's house. We waved our pistols about, told them to stop blackmailing our client, that's usually enough.”

He lowered his voice: “But they were made of sterner stuff, Guzman and Geisler.”

HÃ¥kan stared ahead of him. “I realized pretty quickly that we were out of our depth, we didn't stand a chance.”

“What happened?” she asked.

“We were overpowered. Hector Guzman forced me to watch while Aron Geisler shot Leif through the heart. Without a moment's hesitation, cold as ice. Boom! Leif died right in front of me.”

Antonia listened, wide-eyed.

“He looked so fucking terrified before he died, Leif. He was a nice guy.”

“Then what?” She tried to keep her voice steady.

“They let me go. I walked out.”

Antonia studied the look in his eyes, he was difficult to read, Zivkovic. One moment he acted like he had learning difficulties, driven by impulse and mania, only to switch suddenly to self-control and common sense.

“Why did they let you live?” she asked.

HÃ¥kan was lost in his own thoughts.

“As a witness, I suppose,” he said. “To let people know what sort of people they were. What they were capable of.”

He ran his forefinger under his nose. “I'm just waiting for them to appear and pick me up.”

A vacuum cleaner started up on the floor above. The noise broke the silence, giving her the chance to absorb all that she'd been told.

She had an answer: Aron and Hector had murdered Leif Rydbäck in Hector's home, probably dismembered him there, and then moved the body parts to the restaurant. The body parts she had found when she arrived shortly after the shootout.

“Anything else?”

HÃ¥kan looked at her in surprise. “What?”

“Anything else, have you got anything else to tell me?”

A bitter smirk. “Are you kidding?”

“No,” she replied coldly.

“Forget it.”

“Why?”

He flared up. “Now it's your turn to help me, like we agreed.”

“Yes, with protection. I'll help you with protection if you need it, nothing else.”

HÃ¥kan's disappointment turned to anger almost instantly. His impulses took over. He pulled out a pistol. It must have been fixed under the desk. The barrel was pointing right at her forehead.

Antonia instinctively raised her hands. “Put the pistol down!”

For a second she saw a flash of doubt in him, as if threatening her with the pistol had been an impulse that he couldn't control. He kept hold of the pistol in his right hand but lowered it a little. If he fired she would still die, but having the barrel aimed at her chest instead of her face somehow made the situation feel less threatening.

“Put the pistol down, HÃ¥kan,” she tried again. It was pointless. He'd crossed a boundary, a transgression that couldn't be undone. And he knew that himself, which made everything twice as dangerous.

He leaped to his feet, went around the desk, and pulled Antonia up from her chair, keeping his pistol trained on her the whole time. HÃ¥kan ran his left hand over her body and under her jacket.