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Kruse was in a worse state. He remained in intensive care, according to Vahtola, who had looked in a while ago, and they were going to be flying his wife up the next day.
And all because of her. She’d been sitting in the passenger seat – and she should have sounded the alarm. She should have listened to her instincts and ordered the convoy to stop at once and retreat. But instead she had hesitated. She had wasted a couple of absolutely vital seconds on worrying about making a mistake instead of focusing on doing the right thing. Kruse had managed to save the day by his own actions, but he had also had to pay the price for her mistake.
Rebecca mechanically gathered together her things, the blue bulletproof vest that had probably saved her ribs, the baton and radio that they took from her before she was put on the stretcher.
A patrol car was waiting outside to drive her home. The debriefing could wait until the morning, Runeberg had decided. That suited her fine. She wanted to go home, take a couple of the knockout pills she had been given, and sleep for a day or so.
Just as she was taking a last look round the room to make sure she’d got everything her mobile phone rang. Number withheld, she noted with a frown.
‘This is Rebecca,’ she said with one hand on the door-handle.
‘Becca?’ the voice at the other end said, and she stopped.
‘Becca, it’s me …’
‘I can’t talk right now,’ she said unnecessarily abruptly. ‘Can I call you back tomorrow?’ She tried to compensate by sounding more friendly.
‘Er, sure, I just wanted to check that you’re … okay?’
‘What d’you mean?’ she replied, and somewhere inside her his tone of voice was setting off alarm bells.
‘Er …’ A few moments of silence followed, but she chose not to fill them. ‘… don’t really know how to say this.’
‘But?’ she cut him off, as her suspicions grew stronger and stronger.
‘That business … out at Lindhagensplan … Well … that wasn’t supposed to happen, or, well … it was, but … I didn’t know it was you, Becca!’
The words came in bursts and his voice rose to a falsetto towards the end. Suddenly she felt utterly exhausted, as if her legs could no longer hold her. Slowly she went back inside the examination room and sank down on the trolley she had only just got up from.
‘Okay, let’s take this from the start, please,’ she said, as calmly as she could while she tried to take in what he’d just said.
‘It wasn’t really serious, sort of a game, I suppose. A game that went a bit wrong.’
‘A game, you say.’
Her voice sounded tired but in spite of that he couldn’t mistake how angry she was.
‘Yeah …’ he replied, aware of how lame it sounded.
‘So you were playing a game, and that’s why my partner’s in intensive care, is that a reasonable summary of the situation?’
She sounded more angry now, as if she’d already got over the initial shock.
‘Well, that wasn’t supposed to happen, like I said. Someone getting hurt, I mean … It’s sort of like an elaborate joke, I suppose.’
His voice was pleading, almost whiney.
‘A joke? Are you taking the piss? Are you completely stupid? For God’s sake, you’re over thirty and you still don’t give a fuck, you’re playing your way through life and you let everyone else pay for it! Only this time it all went to hell, or have I got that wrong?’
He didn’t answer. On the rare occasions when she swore he’d learned it was best to keep quiet.
‘Where are you now?’
The question was unnecessary, really. She already knew the answer. Why else would he have called her?
All that flannel about whether she was okay was just one of his usual smoke-screens. The cavalry to the rescue, even though what she most felt like doing was ripping his stupid immature fucking head off.
‘Kronoberg,’ he muttered.
She rested her head on her free hand.
‘Okay,’ she sighed after composing herself for a few seconds. ‘This is what we’re going to do …’
Bolin came back after ten minutes exactly.
‘Well, is a lawyer coming?’
HP shook his head.
‘I thought about it, but I don’t need one,’ he muttered, looking down at the table.
‘Splendid,’ Bolin nodded, and switched on the tape-recorder.
‘Interview recommenced at 23:43 after Pettersson declined the offer of a lawyer. Is that correct, Pettersson?’
HP muttered in agreement but Bolin forced him to repeat himself.
‘Yes, that’s correct.’
‘Okay, Pettersson, how about taking it right from the start?’
HP took a deep breath and glanced at the mobile phone.
‘Tell them everything,’ she had said, and she was usually right.
To hell with rule number one, in other words. Blood was thicker than water, after all.
‘It all started when I found a mobile phone on the train …’
‘Duty custody desk.’
‘Hello, this is Police Inspector Rebecca Normén. My partner Kruse and I were the ones who went off the Drottningholm road earlier this evening,’ she said, as calmly as she could.
‘Inspector Normén, good to hear your voice. We’ve been pretty worried about you, I can tell you. Are you okay?’
Rebecca smiled. She hadn’t recognized the voice at the other end of the line, but now there was no doubt. Her old boss was on duty in Kronoberg tonight, which was one bit of positive news.
‘Hi, Mulle. Thanks, I’m okay, a few bruises and one hell of a headache, but that’s about it. I’m afraid Kruse wasn’t so lucky.’
‘Yes, so I heard, we had three cars there when the fire-brigade were cutting you free, and the lads said Kruse didn’t look too good,’ he replied in a more serious tone of voice. ‘We’ll be keeping everything crossed for him. Did you want anything in particular, or were you just calling to reassure your old boss?’
‘Well, there’s something I could do with some help with, Mulle, and it’s all a bit sensitive.’
‘Okay, let’s hear it!’ he replied encouragingly, and she took a deep breath before she went on.
‘The bloke you’ve arrested, Henrik Pettersson … He’s my little brother.’
He’d done exactly as she said. Told Bolin everything. Or almost everything …
For obvious reasons he’d decided to leave out the business with the M84 fireworks down in Kungsträdgården, but apart from that he’d explained everything, even about the door in Birkagatan.
It had felt pretty good, it was quite a story.
Bolin had mostly just nodded, occasionally interrupting to ask a question, but mainly he had kept quiet.
When they were finished it was past one o’clock in the morning.
Bolin read the time to the tape-recorder, then switched it off.
‘That’s some story, Pettersson,’ he said as he stood up. ‘We’ll have to double-check a few things, then we’ll need to talk again tomorrow. Someone will be with you shortly to take you to a cell.’
HP merely nodded in reply. He could handle a night in the cells, no problem.
Been there, done that …
But now fifteen minutes had passed since Bolin had left, and he was starting to get impatient.
Where the hell was the custody officer?
He was tired, his head and nose ached, and his mouth was completely dry.
Two more minutes, he thought, then he’d stick his head out into the corridor and make some noise.
He realized almost incidentally that his mobile was still sitting on the table among his other belongings.
The little LED light was flashing red.
‘Okay, you’ve lost me now, Normén. Did you say we’ve arrested your little brother?’
‘I’m afraid so, Mulle. Henrik’s a decent lad but he’s incredibly immature, and he’s something of a magnet for trouble, if you get what I mean?’
He chuckled in response.
‘The black sheep of the family, then?’
‘Exactly,’ she lied.
‘Do you know what he’s been arrested for, we’ve got quite a few immature trouble-magnets to choose from up here this evening?’
She frowned. Mulle may be getting close to retirement but there wasn’t normally anything wrong with his memory.
‘His name’s Henrik Pettersson and he’s been arrested for throwing that stone at me and Kruse.’
The line went silent for a few moments.
‘I’m sorry, Normén, but as far as I know no-one’s been arrested for the attack on the pair of you. Every patrol car in the district’s out looking for the bastard, they’re still hard at it on channel sixteen, so I’d definitely have heard if they’d got him. And we haven’t got anyone by the name of Pettersson according to the book, so your brother must have been playing some sort of prank on you, I’m afraid.’
Suddenly she couldn’t think at all, then she felt a wave of fury surging through her.
What the fuck was Henke really up to?
Two minutes. The light was still flashing angrily at him and for some reason, when he stood up to go over to the door and start banging, he grabbed it and his other belongings.
As he took a deep breath ready to shout, he pressed the handle.
The door was unlocked.
He opened it and to his surprise found himself staring out into a dark corridor.
‘Hello!’
No answer.
He called in a trembling voice, ‘Is anyone there?’
Suddenly he was in the fucking Twilight Zone! This was even worse than the gorilla or Bolin’s reptilian smile.
The corridor was completely deserted, not a sound, and all he could see was a row of closed doors the same as the one he had just opened. At the far end a green and white emergency exit sign flickered irregularly. He was reminded of the mobile flashing red in his hand and touched the screen. Even though he already had a vague suspicion of what the message had to say, his stomach still clenched in terror.
Player 128
You have broken Rule Number One and are therefore expelled from the Game with immediate effect!
Your points and any remaining pecuniary
rewards are hereby withdrawn.
Please leave the phone in the premises and refrain from talking to anyone about the Game in future.
Continued violation of Rule Number One
will have serious consequences!
The Game Master
With an audible click the light in the room behind him went out.
Home, she thought.
