Project Nirvana (7 page)

“Quickly,” the Mentor ordered. “Get him conscious again.”

The man from Dignitary Protection quickly produced smelling salts. He opened the bottle and pushed it under Leo’s nose while holding a hand over his mouth. Leo twitched a few times, but remained unconscious. The bodyguard tried to shake some life into him, but was unsuccessful.

“We are losing him,” he said, with an anxious look in his eyes.

Mjasník parked the
hire car so that he had a good view of the main entrance farther down the street. Sooner or later, the flat owner would come home. Mjasník also had a view of the windows over the entrance staircase. He had already found out that the man lived at the top of the four-storey building. He only had to wait for the lights in the flat to come on to get a look at the detective’s face.

The other two policemen had secret identities. They worked for the Security Service, which apparently was not covered by the Swedish Freedom of Information Act. Therefore, his only lead was the old detective inspector. Mjasník needed to find out the type of car he drove, the mobile phone number he used and his daily routine.

According to the journalist, the detective inspector was leading the hunt for Leo Brageler. He, if anyone, could lead Mjasník to his target.

Walter took the
exit towards Solna from the Essingeleden motorway. Ten minutes later, they met up with the SWAT team, which was waiting about three hundred metres away from Sonia Rikinski’s home in Hallonbergen.

Jonna felt her heart pounding with excitement as they advanced up the staircase of the large, concrete building. The smell of urine permeated the stairs and the walls were covered in various graffiti tags. In front of her were three SWAT officers and Walter. The five other SWAT policemen were deployed to block any escape routes. Walter was breathing heavily and, with each step, was finding it increasingly difficult to keep up with the others’ pace. Taking the lift was forbidden in these operations.

“Out of breath?” a SWAT officer asked.

Walter did not answer; instead he dried the sweat on his brow. He signalled to the SWAT leader to get ready to force an entry.

“Are you sure?” the team leader queried, seeing Walter’s chest rapidly rising and falling.

“Yes!” Walter muttered, irritatedly. He rang the doorbell. The police quickly took up their positions in the stairwell. After a short wait, the door opened.

“Hello Ricki,” Walter blurted out between gasps.

A middle-aged woman with heavy make-up stared at him in surprise. One side of her face was swollen and bluish-purple. “What do you want?” she asked through gritted teeth.

“Are you by yourself?”

The woman looked at the SWAT team in the stairwell. “Yes.”

“Then we’ll come in and have a look around.” Walter pushed past Ricki into the hallway with his weapon drawn.

Two policemen quickly advanced and flanked him on either side. They continued into the flat with weapons raised. Together with a third SWAT officer, they searched the flat.

Jonna also had her gun at the ready, but was a few paces behind Walter. Her rapid pulse throbbed in her temple as she looked inside some cupboards in the hallway.

When they had finished searching the flat, the SWAT-team leader declared that it was safe. Walter thanked them for their assistance and told them to stand down.

“Didn’t you hear me say I was alone?” Ricki growled.

“I want Headcase,” Walter said and sat down in the sofa. “You wouldn’t know where he is, would you?”

Defiantly, Ricki shook her head. “Is that why you are here?”

“I heard that you and he were an item. Are you still on the game?”

Jonna rolled her eyes. Was it so difficult to say “prostitute”?

“You heard wrong,” Ricki said, lighting a cigarette. She took a few deep drags and blew smoke in Walter’s face.

Jonna studied the woman’s swollen face.

“Do you know what I spotted in the hallway?” Walter asked from within the cloud of smoke.

Ricki did not answer.

“Well, I saw a pair of size 48s.”

“Forty-eights?”

“Yes, huge shoes in other words. Two really big Jimmy Choos.”

Ricki took another drag.

“I think those shoes belong to your boyfriend.”

“He’s not my fucking boyfriend,” she cried and crushed the cigarette into a small ashtray that resembled a pair of lungs. “I’m going to kill the fucking bastard if he ever dares to come here.”

“Is he the one who hit hit you?” Jonna asked.

Ricki did not answer.

“That’s probably it,” Walter declared, pushing out his lower lip. “The way you look, there won’t be any customers around for a while.”

“Go to hell,” Ricki snarled.

“Do you know where we can find Hedman?” Jonna sat down beside the woman and tried to make eye contact. She was attempting to win her trust, although there was not much time to waste.

Ricki shrugged. “I’ve no fucking clue where he is now.”

“Not even a guess?” Jonna tried again, smiling sym-
pathetically.

“No,” she said, crossing her legs. Her foot twitched nervously in the air.

“Have you filed a police complaint?”

Ricki smiled sweetly at Jonna. “Yeah, sure thing.”

Walter shot Jonna a resigned look, so that she could tell he wanted her to give up.

Jonna could not understand what was wrong with her question. Why was it taboo to report a boyfriend for abuse? She felt frustration growing towards all three. Walter, the woman, and that damned Headcase.

“OK,” Walter said, impatiently, and stood up from the sofa. “Let’s skip the chitchat and get down to business, like your clients. We know that Headcase has been here, so you don’t have to rat on him. Just shake your head if you don’t know where he is, and we’ll leave you alone. But . . .” Walter held up a finger, “If we find out you are lying, our friends at Vice will tell everyone that you have HIV and then you can shut up shop for good. That’s not a threat, that’s a promise.”

Jonna was just about to intervene when Ricki opened her mouth. “He clobbered me outside the Hut’s,” she said.

“The Hut?” Jonna repeated. “Which Hut?”

“Pekka Hyttinen,” Walter explained. “A fence in Kungs-
holmen that villains sell stolen goods to. He has a real pawn shop as a front, but he actually resells stolen jewellery.”

“Tor was going to sell him a ring because he owes me money,” Ricki began, “but the Hut didn’t want to buy it. Instead, he started babbling about Omar and how the ring was his.”

“Omar’s ring?” Walter repeated.

“He started asking lots of questions and then he threw us out like fucking gypsies.”

“What happened after that?”

“I took the ring to try and sell it somewhere else, but Tor walloped me and took off with it. That’s all there is to tell.”

“What was the ring like?” Jonna asked. “What did it look like?”

Ricki said nothing and lit another cigarette instead.

“Was there anything special about the ring?” Jonna repeated.

Ricki glared at Jonna with contempt. “You talk like one of those snotty, upper-class bitches. Did you know that?”

Jonna was thrown by the sudden attack. “Actually, I didn’t know that,” she said, trying to make light of the insult.

“Well, now you do,” Ricki said, flicking ash into one of her lung-shaped ashtrays.

Walter pushed the
green button. The lift shuddered and started to move downwards. The walls were spattered with spit that had run down and then dried. Jonna could not understand the motive behind destroying one’s own, and others’, environment. This was a foreign world, far removed from the one she returned to after work. Yet, they lived in the same country, the same city. Only a few kilometres from affluent, suburban homes.

“It’s almost time,” Walter said.

“Time for what?”

“For a chat with SÄPO.”

“About Hedman’s possible involvement in Gnesta?”

Walter nodded. “I just can’t make sense of all the loose ends. Usually, the answers are the most obvious ones, so I think we’ll have to question Martin Borg, even if I’m not looking forward to it.”

“What do we do with the Hut?”

“Nothing,” Walter said, leaving the lift.

“Aren’t we going to pay him a visit? To find out if he knows something?”

“No,” Walter said. “Then he’ll know that Ricki has grassed on him and I don’t want to put her in harm’s way. Grasses are not appreciated. Besides, I always keep my word. Even to a tart.”

“It could’ve been Hedman that shopped him,” Jonna protested.

“For now, we’ll do it my way,” Walter finished up and tossed the car keys to Jonna.

“So what’s next?” she asked, starting the car.

“Lilja is going to set up a meeting with SÄPO.” Walter took out his mobile phone and pressed the number for Chief Inspector David Lilja.

Chapter 5

In a few
short
hours, Tor Hedman had attacked two women. His latest victim lay on the floor behind the reception desk, bleeding from a deep cut in her skull after flying headfirst into the bookshelf. Tor was relieved that he had not hit her any harder. That would have put her to sleep permanently.

There were no rooms available and, in an instant of sudden fury, he had struck her. Unfortunately, he’d used his right hand. His hand had been wrapped in a resin cast after his operation and had already been painful before he clobbered her. The pain was now shooting through his hand like knives and he was having difficulty moving his fingers. Soon, he would have to get to a hospital.

He looked at the unconscious woman, who obviously would have serious concussion. The last thing he needed right now was to be wanted for a mugging. There was no one about inside or outside the building, but he still needed to get as far away from this place as possible. His only option was to take the lodge’s van, which was parked outside the entrance.

Tor opened a door and quickly looked inside the small office behind the reception desk. A ski jacket was hanging just inside the door. He rummaged through the pockets, but found only small coins and tampons. Tor threw the useless items on the floor and angrily kicked over a wastepaper basket. His eyes scanned over the desk one more time. No sign of the fucking van keys. Maybe she had them on her? He ran back to the unconscious woman and, after some prodding, dug out the van keys from her trouser pocket.

Tor jumped into the van and its engine roared into life. The van would soon be on the wanted list and he had to get into town before the fuzz put up any roadblocks between Dalarö and Stockholm. As he approached Farsta, his adrenaline level dropped. He began to feel that his run of bad luck had finally ended and that finding the van keys had been a turning point.

The sign for the Farsta exit drew closer. Tor was not far from the garage that he and Jerry had rented. One hundred square metres of space where they used to stash their stolen goods. He would be able to hide out in the garage until everything had calmed down. He would first have to find the caretaker so that he could ask him for the keys. The guy would definitely remember Tor.

After a little thought, he changed his mind. The fuzz probably already had the garage under surveillance. Not my best idea, he thought. Perhaps he could try another fence. Radovan would buy pretty much anything that he could resell. But he was also not to be trusted and was tight with cash. Omar’s ring was unique and could get him into even more trouble. He had plenty of problems already.

He dismissed the idea and considered another possibility instead. He could call that psycho cop. Perhaps Tor had over-reacted that day in the woods on Ekerö island. The notion of a bent copper as a partner was perhaps not such a bad idea. When he had been sitting in the car in the woods, his reaction had seemed so logical. Tor had been convinced that he was facing certain death after outliving his usefulness as a stooge. But that had been his gut feeling, and he had been mistaken about that before.

Tor was confused as he turned off Ringvägen and parked the van on a poorly lit sidestreet. After over an hour of indecision, he made up his mind. He took out his mobile phone and punched the psycho cop’s number. All things considered, he didn’t have any other options.

Martin Borg’s personal
mobile phone rang. He fished it out from his jacket and read the number on the display. The caller’s number was withheld and he hesitated for a moment. At the fourth ring, he accepted the call and left the room. The Mentor and Eng were attempting to bring Leo Brageler back to consciousness. Martin had nothing to contribute to the current situation.

“It’s me,” the voice on the phone declared.

At first, Martin was confused, then a crooked smile spread across his face as he realized to whom the voice belonged.

“Not a day too soon,” he answered. Tor Hedman was back on the hook and under no circumstances would Martin lose him again.

“I’ve had stuff to do since the Gnesta job,” Tor apologized. Hedman’s voice sounded anxious. Martin suddenly wondered if he was being bugged. Perhaps the National Bureau of Investigation had finally caught Hedman and the moron was trying to cut a deal by throwing Martin under a bus. If Martin continued the conversation, his mobile would soon be traced and the area would be crawling with his colleagues within the hour.

“You must have the wrong number,” Martin excused himself and turned his phone off.

Martin felt sweat forming in his pores despite the fact that it was freezing inside the building. He pulled down the zipper on his ski jacket and brushed back his short hair. If Stockholm County CID or some other agency had arrested Hedman, this meant trouble. If he was still at large, then an opportunity had presented itself. Whatever the reason, Hedman wanted to talk with Martin. Martin needed to consult the Mentor first.

The old man looked thoughtfully at Martin after he had recounted the news of the telephone call and his first reaction to the call. The Mentor put his palms together like a church steeple and let his fingers slowly rest on his pencil-thin lips. If Martin had not known that the old man was an atheist, he would have believed that he was carrying out a form of ritual prayer.

“It is exactly as I feared,” he said, sitting down on his stool. With his talon-like hands, he started to unbutton his coat. Martin was apparently not the only one feeling the heat in this icy house.