The Father: Made in Sweden Part I (54 page)

‘You humiliated Vincent! My little brother!’

Jasper tried to drop his arms as Leo grabbed his right hand, spread his fingers and put his index finger on the trigger.

‘Stop, Leo. Stop!’

Leo slammed a cheek that was already marked with wide red streaks.

‘If you threaten my brother you’re threatening me!’

He pressed the barrel against his forehead and took a step forward, forcing Jasper backwards.

‘You humiliate Vincent, you humiliate me!’

Jasper’s back hit the wall, the dried kronor on the clothes line hanging between their faces.

‘If you’re going to kill him, you have to kill me first!’

The look that had been full of disappointment and hatred and confusion vanished, was replaced by something that came from within, something Leo had never seen before. Terror.

‘I’m sorry. Leo … I’m sorry.’

They stood like that for a long time, opposite each other.

Leo let go.

‘Now take your money. And leave.’

He removed the weapon from Jasper’s cramping hands and put the safety back on.

‘Leo …
Leo
… I’m sorry! Never again! I swear! It won’t happen, it’ll never …’

The last blow wasn’t delivered with an open palm. And Jasper didn’t fall, he slid down the wall, which caught him.

‘I swear … fuck …’

A string of saliva and blood dangling between his lips.

‘What you know about me and what I know about you stays here when you leave,’ Leo told him. ‘And you and I will never see each other again.’

He waited until the garage door had closed. He was alone again.

It could have been over.

But it wasn’t.

Not yet. Not for him.
Not yet.

It was him against them, against every fucking cop out there. He would challenge the entire police service and defeat them all – now it was his turn to make demands, and they’d listen and give him the answers he wanted.

JOHN BRONCKS NEVER
let go of something that mattered. He couldn’t. Not people, not investigations. Nor anything else for that matter. It could be a strength – never giving up or backing down, walking around with a motor in your chest that never turned off. And it could be hell – collecting and carrying, but never dropping anything.

Now he was close to doing just that. Week after week, month after month. And he still knew nothing.

They didn’t exist.

So many times he’d been on his way to tell Karlström he couldn’t do it any more. And every time he’d turned back in the corridor.

They were out there, somewhere. But this time he’d decided to argue that this case should no longer be a priority, that he should take on other investigations in order to re-energise.

‘Hello,’ said Sanna.

She no longer stopped at the threshold and held on to the doorframe, no longer looked at him listlessly, but also never spoke of the only thing he could think about when he saw her: a long walk and a kiss that could have been a new beginning.

‘Do you have a minute?’

He nodded, and she sat down opposite him on one of the cardboard boxes, as she’d been doing once a week lately, always with new pages to add to the forensic reports. This time she brought two plastic pockets and a brown envelope, and she lay them on his desk.

‘The letter was in your mailbox. And here’s 14,400 kronor.’

She pushed the envelope aside and concentrated on the plastic pocket on top. There were notes inside in denominations of 500 and 100. All pale pink.

‘We’ve been getting these from petrol stations. Unusable in a shop, but the machines can’t tell any difference.’

Broncks had often seen banknotes stained by dye packs, and they’d always been completely red.

‘I’m pretty sure that these were in the robber’s bag when he walked out of the Savings Bank at Ullared,’ she continued. ‘We’ve analysed the dye, and it matches the contents of the vials left at the branch – which we’ve also activated and tried out on discarded notes with the blessing of Sweden’s Central Bank. And the red, John, comes from the same manufacturer, same shipment.’

A pile of three or four documents. Orderly, neat, as always, as she presented the analysis and the results.

‘But this is where it gets really interesting. I found traces of acetone on each bill. I’ve never heard of anything like that. Plain acetone! How do you even begin to investigate? I tried it myself, and with the right mixture of acetone and water … John, it’s not visible at all, the red dissolves completely!’

Broncks opened the second plastic pocket and took out the notes, examined them, felt them. They were genuine. They looked normal.

‘The ones you’re holding were stained just a few days ago by dye from a vial I triggered myself. Now they look completely normal. If the robbers also succeeded in finding the right mix … then they’ve got away with almost all of their last haul, and the banking industry will have to change their routines. Again.’

She was done and on her way out, just like every other time. As if nothing had happened.

‘Hey?’

She stopped at the door.

‘Yeah?’

‘Do you want … to go for a walk? Have a beer?’

‘No.’

‘No? But … last time?’

‘Last time?’

‘You know what I mean.’

‘It was just a kiss.’

‘It was anything besides just a kiss.’

‘Sometimes, John, it’s no more than that.’

She came back into his office, cheeks turning progressively redder as they used to whenever she was gathering strength from deep within.

‘John?’

That was how she’d looked when she told him that she loved him.

That was how she’d looked when he’d asked her to go.

‘Yeah?’

‘You know I’ve thought about you too. I’ve thought about you over the years. But now that we’ve met again, worked together … how can I explain this … it’s just memories. Now it’s like I never knew you, as if nothing ever happened, I don’t remember any of it any more! Did we live together? Did we touch each other, have breakfast, assemble furniture … did we laugh and cry? You’re like a … photograph, John. Sometimes when I see a picture of myself taken long ago, it’s as if it’s of someone else. And every time I see you, John, I feel even more like that. You’re someone who doesn’t exist.’

He noticed she was shaking a little, as if she was being drained.

‘The kiss wasn’t something I planned, it just … happened. Do you realise you never gave us closure? If you’d really dared to stay until it was over, then you wouldn’t miss me. You would have been able to let go at some point.’

He couldn’t bear much more of this, her voice rising as she went over to two packed-up cardboard boxes and it seemed as if she was about to hit them.

‘Closure, John! Like these fucking boxes – just something else you never let go of. Please, please, please, John, let go! Of anything at all! I live with someone, you know. I’m on my way home to him. Someone who exists, now.’

He sat there for a long time afterwards. Pale pink banknotes next to the completely clean ones in the middle of his desk. A 41-page notice of stolen weapons on one side, 3109 pages of preliminary investigation reports on the other. And the brown envelope she’d brought him.

John Broncks slumped in his chair, braced his feet against the legs of his desk, pushed the chair backwards and rolled until he hit the wall.

He didn’t give a damn about the clean banknotes, the investigation or the letter. He didn’t even care that she was living with someone
who exists, now
. For the first time since he’d stepped into this police station, he wanted to get out before night fell, before he gave himself permission. He turned off the reading light, and had taken his first step away when he stopped.
PERSONAL
, read the envelope that she had brought from his mailbox in the corridor and put on his desk. And then his name,
Detective John Broncks.

Personal.

Nothing in this fucking building was personal.

He wormed his index finger into the gap where the glue didn’t quite stick, and ripped it open hastily.

And started reading.

Broncks searched through his top desk drawer. A pair of plastic gloves. He pulled them on, he should have had them on from the beginning. And then proceeded to read the last thing he’d ever expected to receive.

For six damn months he had searched, hunted, lived with them, without finding a single trace. And now this. Direct contact with the lead detective.

Broncks quickly wrote down the directions in a notebook and gently put both the letter and the envelope in a plastic pouch.

Just a moment ago he’d decided it was over. But they’d made contact, and he would continue to devote all of his time to them.

They were out there somewhere.

And he wouldn’t let go until they were stopped.

JOACHIM NIELSEN. THAT
was the name of the armoury inspector who stood by the red and yellow barrier, smoking. He seemed calmer now, radiating a certain power. Given enough time, everything got better.

‘The worst part is, they must have been watching me for weeks.’

One more drag.

‘Take me here,’ said Broncks, holding up his notepad with its hastily jotted down directions.

‘Why?’

‘We’re going to do a little digging.’

The inspector shrugged and strode into the woods on the first seven-metre stretch. He stopped on the path to read the instructions.

‘Thirty-five metres. Then I know where we’re going. A small hill.’

The soft path led deeper into the dark forest.

‘They knew how I moved, when I moved, where I moved. They made sure I wouldn’t be able to see it.’

The anxiety was gone, thought Broncks, but he continued to dwell. And even though he himself had not directly experienced any violence, it would continue for the rest of his life.

They jumped over a fallen tree trunk, heard an owl hooting.

‘Here.’

They stopped by five stones, a young spruce. Broncks unfolded the shovel and scraped away a layer of moss. The soil was like a sponge. Someone had recently been digging here. After a huge shovelful he hit something that sounded like metal. He took a new pair of plastic gloves out of his pocket; kneeling, he put his hand into the loose soil and grabbed hold of a black plastic bag.

‘They’ve done everything right. Until now,’ said Broncks.

The knife was in his other jacket pocket, and he used it to cut through the bag, exposing the contents.

‘They want to negotiate, so something has happened. The group has changed. As everything changes.’

He handed a gun to the inspector and lifted up the next.

‘They’ve decided to stop robbing banks.’