Never Fuck Up: A Novel (32 page)

“Stig, may I ask you something?”

Using his first name, Stig, was really too personal, but Thomas couldn’t care less at the moment. “I have a great deal of respect for you and I always thought we worked well together. If anyone were to ask who’d been my mentor and role model, I would give your name, without a doubt. You’re a straight shooter and don’t compromise with the
things we all want to preserve. And I’ve always believed you thought I was one of the good ones. So now I’m wondering, is there anything you can do in this situation? Talk to the police commissioner or someone at IA?”

Stig Adamsson breathed heavily on the other end of the line. “I really don’t know. It’s dicey.”

Thomas could feel it clearly: the irritation was welling up inside him. What was this bullshit? He would’ve done anything for Adamsson and now the old jerk wouldn’t even try for his sake. Adamsson knew something, that much was obvious.

“Come on, Adamsson. I thought we were batting for the same team. Isn’t there anything you can do?”

“Do I have to spell it out for you? I. Don’t. Know. Is that clear enough?”

Adamsson pulled the carpet out from under his feet. It was a betrayal. Just like when he’d barged into the morgue. Thomas mumbled something in response. Adamsson said good-bye.

They hung up.

He took sleeping pills in order to fall asleep that night.

Another thing’d been eating away at him, too: the unsolved murder. So many questions. The most probable answer was that the dead guy had some sort of connection to someone in the building. Or else he was a simple burglar that one of the neighbors’d caught red-handed. But something told Thomas it wasn’t a question of coincidence. There was a connection to someone—but how would they find out who when they didn’t even know who the dead man was? The murderer had to have known about the victim’s past. On the other hand: the murderer hadn’t taken care of the slip of paper with the telephone number on it. Other questions were piling up. Why was there no sign that the victim’d resisted? No traces of blood or torn skin from the murder or murderers. The victim wasn’t exactly a small person, there ought to have been a struggle. And the track marks, what was the deal with them? Finally: Whose was the phone number on the slip of paper?

Hägerström’d looked up the registered phone plans—none of the owners appeared to have anything to do with the murder. But could Hägerström be trusted? He didn’t want to think about that right now. And no matter what, there were still the prepaid phone plans that
hadn’t been checked yet. The first’d been used by some young girl without a connection to the murder. But the other one? It was still unclear who owned it. Only three numbers’d been dialed. Two people who claimed not to have a clue and a third who Hägerström hadn’t been able to get ahold of.

Just three numbers dialed—something wasn’t right. The only people who used prepaid cards that way were troublemakers.

During the first few weeks of his so-called sick leave, he’d had a hard time getting out of bed in the morning. But a few days after his conversation with Adamsson: dammit, he was going to figure this shit out on his own. As an active-duty police inspector or as a cop on sick leave. The idea about the IMEI number’d been in the back of his mind, but had gotten lost when his problems began to pile up.

He’d written down the phone’s IMEI number even though bringing home classified investigation material was prohibited. Fifteen numbers. A code. A signal that was sent out every time someone placed a call from the phone. No matter the plan. In other words: if the phone’d belonged to someone else, or had belonged to the same person who, for some reason, switched out the prepaid plans often, it was possible to find other numbers that’d been dialed from it.

The question was how. Thomas was no detective, but he knew that this wasn’t exactly rocket science. The detectives did it all the time. He wasn’t going to call Hägerström, though. Didn’t want to call anyone else in Skärholmen to ask, either. Dammit, he wished he knew this shit. Thomas: alone against the conspiracy.

Theoretically, he should be able to get the information from the major phone companies. Demand a search on all calls that’d been made on plans that they owned from a phone with IMEI number 351549109200565. But what would happen if they asked to call him back at the police’s number, just to be certain he was who he said he was? If they asked him to fax his request from a fax machine with the police’s official phone number? But what the hell: he was just on sick leave. He was still a cop. It had to work.

Three days later, he called TeliaSonera, Tele2Comviq, Telenor, and a few smaller carriers. Thomas spoke with his most authoritative voice. TeliaSonera and Tele2Comviq promised to check—it would take a few days. They bought his story. Promised to send their findings to a fax number other than the police’s usual one—Thomas’s private number. No confirmation of who he was, no double-checking from where he was calling. Nothing.

But Telenor.

He introduced himself, but changed certain information. Instead of the Southern District, he said the Western District. If they were to call back to Skärholmen or some other station in his district, everyone would know right off the bat that he was away from work. The Western District was safer. He asked to be connected with someone responsible for technology. He explained the situation. He was calling in regards to a murder investigation with high priority. The police needed to know all the calls that’d been made from the phone with the IMEI number in question. The girl on the other end of the line listened, said yes and mmm—seemed on board. Until he asked her to make it snappy.

“You know, I have to ask you something before you start a bunch of extra work for us here.”

“Okay.” Thomas hoped it’d be a simple enough hoop to jump through.

“Can I call you back at the police’s number? You know, we have our protocol and stuff.”

Thomas felt his hands grow cold and sweaty at the same time. What was he supposed to say now?

He put his bet on the authoritative voice again: “This is what we’ll do. I’ll fax you an official request tomorrow. You’ll get our official fax number to your fax. That’s what we’ll do.”

Silence, tension. Thomas thought he could almost hear the seconds ticking inside the cell phone’s digital clockwork.

“Okay,” the tech chick said. “No problem. We’ll do our best. Just send that fax and we’ll get started.”

Thomas breathed out. Just one problem left now: the fax had to come from the police station. He had to fix this thing with absolutely no suspicion.

The next day he was walking on eggshells. Woke up at 7:00 a.m. without an alarm. Ate breakfast with Åsa. Flipped through travel catalogs with her. It felt good, incredibly good. At the same time: he was thinking of when the best time was to go to the station. When were the least people there? How would he spin it if Ljunggren or Hägertsröm showed up right when he was standing there by the fax machine ready to send the shit? Or worse: Adamsson.

After Åsa left, he sat down in the living room. Remembered how
he’d sat there and listened to Springsteen. How he’d made up his mind to keep going. A promise that would be kept.

It felt good. His life needed a boost, to be remodeled from scratch. Like the Cadillac.

Quarter past five: plenty of time before six o’clock. The perfect time of day if you wanted to visit Skärholmen’s police station unnoticed. Right after the second shift’d taken over. The first shift’d left. The new guys would be in the locker rooms.

The fax was next to him on the passenger seat. He’d printed it at home in order to speed things up: in, send, out. Just one thing he couldn’t forget: to bring the fax receipt.

Weird feeling when Skärholmen’s enormous modern-art piece appeared in his line of vision from the highway: a hundred-foot-high rust-colored metal beam with a knot on it. Thomas hadn’t been gone this long from Skärholmen over the past ten years. He didn’t park in the parking garage—all his colleagues parked their private cars there. The risk of running into someone was too great. He parked by the square behind the mall instead.

The clock struck six. He took a deep breath. Got out.

Walked his usual route. Didn’t bump into anyone.

Used the main entrance: most people used the employee entrance when they went home. Swiped his key card. Punched in the code.

The elevator: two detective inspectors in the youth squad stepped out. Greeted him. They weren’t close. Either they didn’t know that he was under investigation and on so-called sick leave, or else they just didn’t give a damn.

Took the elevator up. The hallway looked empty. He walked past his own office, the one he’d shared with Ljunggren and Lindberg. Peeked in. The picture of Åsa was still in its usual place. All the tired old notes from the National Police Association were still pinned to the message board. Ljunggren’s Bajen soccer scarf was still hanging on the wall, as usual. Hannu’s speedway medals were hanging in their normal spots.

Per Scheele was sitting in a room, typing on a computer. He looked up when Thomas walked past. “Hey there, Andrén. Good to see you. How is everything?”

Scheele, two years in the department. Too green. Probably didn’t
understand what it was all about or else he was playing dumb. Thomas just nodded, said everything was fine.

The fax was grouped with the other gray plastic monsters: the copy machine, the printer, the scanner.

Preprogrammed phone numbers: Kronoberg, the Western Precinct, the Northern Precinct, the jail, the Southern Prosecutor’s Office, and so on. Thomas fed his letter to Telenor into the fax. Double-checked that it was placed with the right side up. The ultimate mistake would be sending it so that Telenor got a blank page.

Dialed the number. Pressed send. The letter was sucked in. A police secretary walked past behind him in the hallway. Elisabeth Gunnarsson. Not someone that Thomas’d talked to much. She greeted him nicely without any small talk.

His calculation’d been correct: this really was the time of day when the place was the most deserted—except maybe for two in the morning when the night shift started.

The letter was fed out the other side.

Thomas heard a voice behind him. Finnish dialect.

“Andrén, it’s been ages!” It was Hannu Lindberg. “We were almost starting to think that you’d burned out, as they say these days. Didn’t seem like you.”

After Adamsson, Ljunggren, and Hägerström: Lindberg was the worst person he could’ve run into. On the surface: a joking, jovial, happy fart who didn’t turn down a drink or shy away from getting a little rough at work. But at the same time: Thomas’d never had any confidence in him, even though he was always entertaining to listen to. He didn’t trust Lindberg the way he trusted Ljunggren or any of the other three boys he shared the squad car with. There was something about Lindberg that didn’t tally. Maybe it was his smile, which seemed to say: I’ll make you laugh as long as I know you’ve got my back. But if that changes,
I’ll
be laughing at
you
.

“Hey there, Lindberg,” Thomas said.

Lindberg looked surprised. “What’re you doing here, you old boxer?” He laughed.

“I had to come in and deal with something. But you know Adamsson’s the one who wants me to be on sick leave, not me.”

Lindberg looked down at the fax. The letter lay with the blank back facing up in the tray. No fax receipt yet.

“Yeah, I figured as much. The whole thing is so fucking messed up.
You’ve got our support, just so you know. A couple of us toasted you when we went out for beers on Friday. Ljunggren, Flodén, and me. You should’ve been there. Hell, Adamsson can’t have anything against that, can he?”

The receipt was fed slowly out of the fax machine. Thomas shook his head. “No idea what Adamsson would think about that. The whole thing makes me sick. But hey, Åsa’s waiting down in the car. I just had to fax this one thing. Tell everyone I say hi.
Hasta la vista,
Hannu.”

Lindberg grinned. Thomas picked up the letter and the fax receipt. Hannu Lindberg looked at him. Was that a hint of suspicion in his eyes? Thomas tried to see if he was eyeing the letter.

He took the stairs down. His heart was beating in time with his steps.

It was done. Smooth.

Like butter.

Back in the present. There he was, alone in a sun chair on Gloria Palace’s terrace. Seventy-seven-degree pool water and a group of smoking-hot Danish twenty-year-olds in front of him. And yet he felt so damned lost.

Still: all cops with balls had to go through tough times sometimes. It was over twelve years since Thomas’d graduated from the Police Academy, always with his sights set on working the streets, to be of some real use. He’d started as a patrol officer in the Southern District right away. Four years later, he was promoted to police inspector. A triumph. A sign that he’d picked the right career. His dad was proud. After that, three calm years. He met Åsa, made sure to end up in the same group as Jörgen Ljunggren and the others. After a while, things went a little too far, he was written up twice for excessive use of force. Some protest in Salem where he’d been called and some fucking wife-beater’d gotten too out of hand. He got off with warnings. And then Åsa had her miscarriage. He’d already realized the world was ankle-deep in shit. Now it just sank a little deeper. He tried to calm down by tinkering with the car. It didn’t work. He beat people up ten times worse, several times a month. Pounded on junkies. Split immigrant lips. Smashed shoplifting Sven swillers. But the spirit in the department was good. There was honor, a code. People didn’t say anything about Thomas using the harder method. You didn’t rat out a colleague who did his job.

Okay, maybe he was a dirty cop. A quasi-racist, overaggressive, degenerate police officer. A rotten human being. But sometimes he missed the good old beat. The part that was about seeking out the truth and nothing else. In the middle of all the shit he’d brought down on himself, in his lust for easy money, there was still a little bit of cop left in him. The one who’d been given a job to do by society: to fight crime. And yet . . . other thoughts elbowed their way to the front. What would he do about Radovan Kranjic’s offer? He hadn’t made up his mind yet—maybe he’d let the internal investigation’s verdict decide.