“Missing us already?” he said, smiling.
Jonna smiled feebly back. Despite Hildebrandt’s sympathetic nature, she felt as if she was sitting on a ticking timebomb. Just as she gathered the nerve to deliver her message, a text message beeped on her phone. She apologized, but Hildebrandt indicated that he was in no hurry. Jonna knew that would change once she had spoken. She read the text message from Dennis Carlinder.
Lilja wants hard evidence before he talks to Internal Affairs
or approves pre-paid SIM card investigation. Did not men-
tion your name.
/DC
Lilja wanted evidence? A confession, perhaps. Walter was right about David Lilja. His main concern was to protect his position as head of Stockholm County CID. Backing up Walter was one thing, but risking his own neck to solve a crime was not something he would do.
“Let me put it like this,” Jonna said slowly.
Hildebrandt listened intently.
Jonna was not sure how to express herself. After considering a number of preambles, she finally gave up and told it as she saw it.
“We have a leak in the investigation.”
Hildebrandt leaned backwards in his chair, impassively.
“A leak?” he said finally.
“Yes, a colleague who’s responsible for Tor taking Walter Gröhn hostage.”
“Explain yourself.”
“Before we started the raid, Tor Hedman was warned,” she said, “and we think we know who did it. Or rather, who was responsible for leaking the information.”
Hildebrandt’s eyes narrowed. “Why are you coming to me with this?”
“There’s no one else I can go to,” said Jonna. “My temporary boss, acting Detective Inspector Ivan Cederberg and his boss, David Lilja, refuse to get involved.”
“I can understand that,” Hildebrandt said. “There’s no proof that the leak comes from within the police department.”
Jonna looked at Hildebrandt, uncomprehendingly.
“Well,” he explained, “if Hedman was warned before the raid, he could be a confidential informant or perhaps working for an informant of the County CID.”
“Would such a person have access to our information?”
“Probably not, unless the information was leaked to him because he is working undercover. Who do you think the leak is?”
She thought twice and then decided to break her promise to Walter.
“Martin Borg at the Counter-Terrorism Unit.”
Hildebrandt was silent. His clear, stony eyes had suddenly clouded in confusion. He took a mouthful of cold coffee and then pushed his mug away from him.
“As well as you and Walter, who else thinks along these lines?”
“Dennis Carlinder at Surveillance,” Jonna said. “He’s spoken to Lilja, who wants to see evidence before he goes to Internal Affairs.”
“Understandable,” said Hildebrandt. “To expose the identity of an informant is not something to be done lightly. Personal informants do not even exist officially. Only a very few are used, for various reasons.”
“Why are personal informants used?” Jonna asked.
“To prevent leaks,” Hildebrants explained. “Sweden has almost fifteen thousand police officers on active duty. Demographically speaking, one per thousand – roughly fifteen individuals – will be amoral individuals. In other words, colleagues who would commit illegal acts given the right circumstances. It may be paedophilia, consorting with recognized criminals, wife battering and so on. Most will get caught in the passage of time as they abuse the privilege of their profession; others will avoid detection by the vetting procedure at the Police Academy because they are already offenders who have learned to hide their crimes.”
“So you think that Borg might be protecting Hedman because he’s working for him as a personal informant?”
“It’s possible,” Hildebrandt said, sounding unconvinced. “Although it’s unusual, even for SÄPO. But they have worked outside the regulations in the past; however, in such cases it’s usually sanctioned higher up in the organization.”
“Borg is definitely one of those fifteen amoral individuals,” Jonna exclaimed. “He’s the rotten apple here. Not Hedman.”
Hildebrandt laughed at Jonna’s outburst.
“Take it easy,” he said. “I’m just explaining the rules of the game. But what evidence is there to prove that it is Borg?”
Johan Hildebrandt often played the devil’s advocate and Jonna usually lost those discussions. This time she was determined to win.
“The Gnesta incident last year,” she said, and explained why she and Walter believed that Borg was lying about Ove Jernberg’s killer. That he was indeed protecting Hedman. But not because he was his informant, but because he was also implicated in the crime somehow. In addition, Borg had accomplices, indicated by the calls to other pre-paid mobile phones.
Hildebrandt looked concerned.
“If using Hedman is sanctioned by SÄPO, then he would not have been tipped off like that,” he said. “It all sounds very strange to me.”
“So what do we do now?” asked Jonna.
Hildebrandt paused for a moment.
“You won’t do anything,” he said finally. “Most of all, you will cease any surveillance of SÄPO personnel.”
“But Walter . . .”
“Walter has other problems to worry about and you are not to jump off a cliff with him,” Hildebrandt cut her off. “Let me see what I can do.”
“Such as?”
Hildebrandt smiled in a paternal manner.
“Just don’t rock the boat, Jonna. Focus on Leo Brageler,” he said. “I’ve no wish to see you nailed to a cross for impetuous misconduct. You don’t deserve that.”
Impetuous misconduct? He was obviously not aware of her infamous solo act at the caravan site.
Jonna left RSU with mixed feelings. Part of her wanted to rush into the unknown, regardless of the consequences. She went out of the police building and went to the café on the corner of Fleminggatan and Sankt Eriksgatan. Life was complicated. Nothing new about that, but the events of the last twenty-four hours had left her totally confused. Not just because of her exhaustion. She had challenges everywhere. The chaos at work and her lonely life at home. She just had to pick which problem to tackle.
After half a cup of coffee, she succumbed to her tiredness. She leaned against the wall and looked at her reflection in a mirror on the wall.
Time to make up her mind and she had done, after only half a cup of coffee. Actually, the decision had been made before she entered the café. Like a moth to a flame, she was drawn towards the unknown. To forget about Borg had never been an option.
It was time for Chief Prosecutor Åsa Julén to listen to her story. After Hildebrandt, Julén was the person she trusted most. She had helped to reinstate Walter last year and had also put in a good word with Chief Inspector Lilja about Jonna’s transfer to Stockholm County CID.
Jonna had to wait half an hour before Åsa Julén could see her. The Chief Prosecutor asked if she wanted something to drink. Jonna politely declined; she was sitting in a comfortable visitor’s chair, which was reproduction 17
th
-century.
“Your visit was a little unexpected,” Julén began. “I’m afraid I have only five minutes before my next meeting.”
“I’ll make it brief,” said Jonna and described the situation once again.
As the minutes passed, Julén’s expression became increasingly troubled. Finally, she raised her hand.
“Stop there,” she said.
Jonna glanced at her watch. Exactly twelve minutes had passed. Julén picked up her phone and cancelled the meeting that she was already late for. “I don’t know where to begin,” she said.
“The Prosecutor-General’s office?” Jonna suggested.
“Yes,” Julén said, fixing her eyes on Jonna. “I know Chief Prosecutor Torbjörn Sandell at the Prosecutor-General’s Police Complaints section very well.”
“Does the complaint have to come from our own Internal Affairs or from SÄPO itself?”
“Both or neither,” Julén hesitated.
“What does that mean?”
“This is a hornet’s nest. Especially when it involves SÄPO.”
“We have to . . .”
“Let’s calm down, shall we?” Julén ordered and poured a glass of mineral water, which she pushed towards Jonna.
“But . . .”
Julén shook her head dismissively.
“No,” she corrected Jonna. “To accuse an officer from the Security Service requires evidence so solid that not even an earthquake can crack it. Nothing short of a confession will give grounds for a warrant. Unless SÄPO hand the case over to us, which is highly unlikely. They prefer to solve their problems within the family. It’s the way that the organization works.”
“So what can we do?” Jonna asked.
“Nothing,” said Julén. “Especially if you want to have a future in the police.”
“That sounds familiar,” Jonna muttered.
“Let Walter and Lilja deal with your suspicions,” Julén suggested.
“Can’t you at least talk to Sandell?”
“And say what, exactly?”
“Let me present the case . . .”
“When Walter gets back, let him handle this by the book,” Julén interrupted and stood up.
Jonna’s time was up. The Chief Prosecutor followed Jonna to the entrance and watched her leave the building. So fearless, yet so naive, she thought. Julén wished there were more like Jonna, with the courage to challenge an institution where so many closed ranks.
Instead of taking the lift back up to her office, she took the stairs. As she walked, thoughts raced through her mind. She shut her door and sat behind her desk. She looked at her phone, still thinking. Finally, she lifted the phone and dialled the number for Torbjörn Sandell.
Mjasník was confused.
Both the policewoman and the man she was following disappeared into the garage of the police headquarters. Mjasník had found her at the café, which she left before she went for a short visit to the Prosecutor’s Office. She then returned to the police headquarters. If this was an example of her daily routine, then he could expect a prolonged stay in Sweden. The car she had followed belonged to a consultant’s firm in Nynäshamn, according to the Department of Transport. She was an amateur at surveillance, so it had been easy for him to spot the car she was following. No matter how he tried, Mjasník could not make sense of her actions. According to the go-between, Walter Gröhn was the person leading the manhunt for his next target. Jonna de Brugge was his assistant, but right now they seemed to be doing nothing that could be linked to their search for Leo Brageler.
The go-between had said that the company in Nynäshamn was a fake. There was no business being conducted by the company. The company phone number went to a call centre and its home page had not been updated for two years. An amateurish cover story that was typical of Swedish counter intelligence.
Now that’s interesting, Mjasník thought, lighting a cigarette. He blew out smoke and flicked ash onto the “No Smoking” sticker of his hire car. He needed more answers. Why was she following a car that in all probability belonged to the Swedish Security Service? Mjasník remembered the third name that he had been given. Martin Borg, the agent responsible for the search for the drug the Swedes called Drug-X. He belonged to the Security Service. But why would the policewoman follow a colleague? Was there an internal power struggle? In his homeland, conflicts between state institutions were more the rule than the exception. GRU against FSB, the OMON forces, or the police’s Special Purpose Mobile Units, against the Army’s special units, and so on. For each answer, there was a new question.
Directly after the
meeting with the NBI and their German colleagues, Martin Borg went to the garage. He had to tell the Mentor what the Germans had said. Drug-X and Leo Brageler were just a small part of something much bigger and the only one left alive who might have any answers was Brageler. Martin needed the truth serum more than ever. But finding a name on Omar’s hard drive of someone who could get him Diaxtropyl-3S was not a priority right now. Martin had plenty of other problems to deal with.
As soon as darkness fell, Hedman would make his escape as instructed and head for the meeting place, which he thought was his safe haven. The organization was exposed to one of its biggest threats in its history, according to the Mentor. Martin knew that he was to blame for its biggest problem. But he would repair the damage. Martin parked outside the superstore at Bromma airport and inserted a new SIM card. After three rings, the Mentor answered. Martin recounted what the Germans had told him. The Mentor seemed neither surprised at nor interested in Martin’s information.
“We have two problems to solve first,” the old man said in a stern voice.
Martin could not understand why he wasn’t interested.
“It could be a biological weapon of mass destruction or . . .”
“Our first problem is the solicitor, Alice McDaniel,” the Mentor interrupted. “The other problem is Hedman, as you know.”
“But we have a solution . . .”
“The problem is that Hedman has taken a police officer as his hostage, which puts things in a different light,” the Mentor interrupted again.
“Really?”
Martin didn’t understand why it was such a big problem.
“By taking the policeman as a hostage, the fool has now become public enemy number one,” the old man said. “He’ll be on all the front pages, which is bad news for us. Every investigative journalist in the country will be digging up dirt on him and all it takes is one finger pointing in your direction and it’s all over. Do you understand what I’m telling you?”
“Is it really such a big deal that the hostage is not a civilian?” Martin asked.
“Yes, and it is making certain people in our organization nervous. The risks are too great.”
Martin’s mouth was dry.
“I’ll fix the problem myself,” he said.
“That goes without saying,” the old man said. “As you perhaps understand, we will have to distance ourselves from you. You are too big a liability now. But to cover your tracks, we have asked the Albanians to furnish a body that matches your description of the Gnesta fugitive. A corpse. You’ll have to fix the rest as best you can.”
Martin went ice cold. Thoughts spun in his head and he tried to find a plan among them. A plan of action. Or rather a plan of retreat for himself.