LITMIR.BIZ

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“What have you got?”

      “Two suspects,” replies the female officer.

      Joona looks at Kennet and Simone. “I’ll take it from here,” he says. “This is a mistake.”

      Two dimples suddenly appear in Joona’s cheeks as he tells them to release the suspects. The female officer goes over to Kennet and removes the handcuffs, apologises, and exchanges a few words with him, her ears bright red. The officer with the shaved head stands in front of Simone, rocking back on his heels and staring at her.

      “Let her go,” says Joona.

      “They resisted violently and I injured my thumb,” he says.

      “Are you intending to arrest them?” asks Joona.

      “Yes.”

      “Kennet Sträng and his daughter?”

      “I don’t give a shit who they are,” the officer says aggressively.

      “Ragnar,” his colleague says again, in an attempt to quiet him, “take it easy. He’s one of us.”

      “It’s illegal to enter the scene of a crime—”

      “Just calm down,” says Joona firmly.

      “But am I wrong?” he asks.

      Kennet has come over, but says nothing.

      “Am I wrong?” asks Ragnar again.

      “We’ll talk about this later,” replies Joona.

      “Why not now?”

      “For your own sake.”

      The female officer comes over to Kennet again, clears her throat, and says, “We’re very sorry about all this.”

      “It’s OK,” says Kennet, helping Simone up from the floor.

      “The cellar,” she says, almost inaudibly.

      “I’ll take care of it,” says Kennet, turning to Joona. “There are one or more persons in a hidden room in the cellar, behind the wardrobe with life jackets in it.”

      “Listen carefully,” Joona calls to the others. “We have reason to believe that the suspect is in the cellar. I will be leading this operation throughout. Be careful. It is possible that a hostage situation could arise, and in that case I will be the negotiator. The suspect is a dangerous individual, but fire is to be directed at the legs in the first instance.”

      Joona borrows a bullet-proof vest and quickly shrugs it on. Then he sends two officers round to the back of the house and gathers a team around him. They listen to his rapid instructions and then disappear with him through the doorway leading to the cellar. The metal staircase clangs loudly beneath their weight.

      Simone is afraid that her whole body is shaking, so Kennet wraps his arms around her. He whispers to her that everything will be fine, but the only thing Simone wants to hear is her son’s voice from the cellar; she prays that she will hear him calling to her any second.

      After only a short while Joona returns, the bullet-proof vest in his hand. “He got away,” he says tersely.

      “Benjamin, where’s Benjamin?” asks Simone.

      “Not here,” replies Joona.

      “But the room—”

      She moves toward the cellar doorway. Kennet tries to hold her back, but she yanks her hand away and pushes past Joona and down the iron steps. With three spotlights on stands filling the space with light, the cellar is now as bright as a summer’s day. The stepladder has been moved and is now under the small open window. The wardrobe has been pushed to one side and a police officer guards the entrance to the secret room. Simone walks slowly toward him. She can hear her father behind her, but she doesn’t understand what he is saying.

      “I have to,” she says faintly.

      The officer raises a hand and shakes his head.

      “I’m afraid I can’t let you in,” he says.

      “It’s my son.”

      She feels her father’s arms around her, but tries to break free.

      “He isn’t here, Simone.”

      “Let go of me!”

      She lurches forward and looks into a room with a mattress on the floor, piles of old comics, empty bags of crisps, cans and cereal boxes, pale blue overshoes, and a large, shiny axe.

       54

       sunday, december 13 (feast of st lucia): midday

      In the car on the way back from Tumba, Simone listens to Kennet rant about the police and their lack of coordination. She says nothing, gazing out of the window as he complains. The streets are filled with families on their way somewhere. Mothers and their toddlers dressed in snowsuits, children trying to make their way through the slush on sledges. They wear the same backpacks. A group of girls with Lucia tinsel in their hair woven into shiny headbands eat something out of a small bag and laugh with delight.

      More than twenty-four hours have passed since Benjamin was taken away from us, pulled out of his own bed and dragged out of his home, she thinks. She looks down at her hands. Ugly red marks from the handcuffs are still clearly visible.

      There is nothing to indicate that Josef Ek is involved in Benjamin’s disappearance. There were no traces of Benjamin in the hidden room, only of Josef. It is more than likely that Josef was sitting in there when she and her father went down into the cellar. Realising they had discovered his hiding place, he must have reached for the axe as quietly as possible. And when the tumult erupted, when the police came storming down to the cellar and dragged her and Kennet upstairs, Josef had taken the opportunity to push the wardrobe aside, move the ladder over to the window, and climb out. He got away, he deceived the police, and he is still at large. A national alert has gone out.

      But Josef Ek can’t have kidnapped Benjamin. They were simply two things that happened at approximately the same time, just as Erik has been trying to tell her.

      “Are you coming?” asks Kennet.

      She looks up and realises that they are parked outside their apartment block on Luntmakargatan and Kennet is repeating his question.

      She unlocks the door and sees Benjamin’s coat hanging in the hall. Her heart leaps and she just has time to think that he must be home before she remembers that he was dragged out in his pyjamas.

      Her father’s face is grey; again she registers how old he seems to have become. He says he’s going for a shower and disappears into the bathroom.

      Simone leans against the wall and closes her eyes. If I can just have Benjamin back, she thinks, I will forget everything that has happened, that is happening, that will happen; I won’t talk about it, I won’t think about it, I won’t be angry with anyone, I’ll just be grateful.

      She hears the water begin to run in the bathroom.

      With a sigh she slides off her shoes, lets her jacket drop to the floor, and eases down onto the bed. Suddenly she cannot remember what she’s doing in the bedroom. Did she come in to get something or just to lie down and rest for a while? She feels the coolness of the sheets against the palm of her hand and sees Erik’s creased pyjama bottoms sticking out from under the pillow.

      Just as the shower stops running she remembers what she was going to do. She was going to get a clean towel for her father and then try to find something on Benjamin’s computer that could be linked to his abduction. She takes a bath towel out of the cupboard and goes back into the hall just as the bathroom door opens and Kennet emerges, fully dressed.

      “Towel,” she says.

      “I used the small one.”

      His hair is damp

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