Slowly We Die

by Emelie Schepp

  Then she limped toward the other, listening for sounds before she gripped the door handle and opened the door. In the middle of the floor, she saw a woman sitting on a chair, her head hanging and a loose piece of tape over her mouth. Blood was oozing from her stomach, down the chair and to the floor. The scene reminded her of the photos she’d seen of the ongoing murder investigation. A person bound to a chair, sitting in a sea of blood.

  She assumed the woman was Lina Engström, but that was as far as her mind had gotten when she heard a sound from upstairs.

  She stepped in, turned around and closed the door cautiously, leaving it open a crack so she would maintain a view of the hallway and front door.

  Then she took a step backward into the room and waited for Sandra Gustafsson.

  CHAPTER

  THIRTY-TWO

  HENRIK LEVIN AND Mia Bolander had turned off E22 and found themselves deep within the dark forest. They had driven a few miles on the gravel road. Henrik kept a white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel, came quickly out of a curve, and increased his speed when the road straightened out in front of them.

  The ground was hard, rocky and dry.

  The car bumped and trembled.

  In the beams of the headlights, he saw the holes and dips in the hard-packed earth, but he didn’t do anything to avoid them. He was fully focused on driving as fast as possible.

  After another half mile, he had no other choice but to stop.

  The road split.

  “According to the GPS, it doesn’t matter which we take,” Mia said. “Both lead to Lilla Ladumossen.”

  “Are you sure?” Henrik said.

  “Yes,” Mia said. “So which way do we go?”

  “This way,” he said, turning the wheel to the left and starting down the narrower road.

  * * *

  She heard steps. First on the stairs, then in the hallway, and finally coming toward the room she was standing in, the room with the unconscious woman.

  Jana Berzelius lowered her chin, watching as the door slowly opened.

  Sandra stared at her for a brief moment. Her upper lip twitched.

  “Who are you?”

  “I’ve been wanting to talk to you,” Jana said in a controlled tone. She felt the rage rumbling inside her, felt how it was almost impossible to hold it back.

  “What do you want to talk about?” Sandra said.

  “I want to talk about a call you were on...”

  “You’re that prosecutor, right?” Sandra smiled. “I thought we were done with that. It was incredibly naive of you to come here.”

  “I’m the naive one?” Jana said. “You killed my mother. Did you think you were going to get away with it?”

  “She died of a heart attack.”

  “No,” Jana said, “she didn’t die of a heart attack. She died because she was smothered...”

  Sandra stared at her and smiled again. “You’ve done your homework,” she said. “And I’m really sorry. I know myself how it feels to lose a mother. But I had no choice. She’d seen too much...”

  “What do you mean, seen too much?”

  “Well, what can I say? She woke up just as I was pulling the ring from Philip’s finger. I assume you know who that is. She was going to destroy my plan, she could have sabotaged everything with her damn curious eyes...she should have kept them closed—”

  “You’re sick,” Jana said.

  “—but she stared at me,” Sandra continued, sneering. “I saw the panic in her eyes when she couldn’t breathe. She tried to get free, but she couldn’t.”

  Jana couldn’t contain her rage any longer. She distributed her weight evenly, ignoring the pain in her thigh, and threw herself at Sandra. She put her entire weight behind the attack, heaving herself against Sandra and making her fall.

  They tumbled backward, and Sandra twisted her body to the side, rolling around and coming to her feet again. She grabbed Jana, kicking at her injured thigh. Jana howled in pain but struck back, connecting with her stomach. Sandra gasped, struggling for breath, took a few steps back, and disappeared out of the room, through the hallway and up the stairs.

  Jana got up to run after her, but her wounded thigh slowed her down. She limped into the hallway and looked up the stairs.

  It was completely silent and still.

  She gripped the railing, hopping on one leg yet continuing upward.

  Just as she was about to take the last step, Sandra appeared, her teeth bared and her neck strained, and gave her a powerful kick.

  Jana didn’t stand a chance. She fell backward down the stairs, hitting her head, her arms, her back—hard. She landed on her injured thigh and lay still on the floor, breathless.

  When she looked up, Sandra was coming slowly down the stairs toward her with a superior look.

  Jana reached for the knife she always kept at the small of her back, but she didn’t feel it there. When she turned her head, she saw it lying on the floor six feet from the front door.

  “Is this what you’re looking for?” Sandra said, pointing to the knife. “Where did you want it? In your throat? Between your ribs?”

  She picked it up, weighing it in her hand, but just as it looked like she was going to raise it, something made her turn around.

  It sounded like the front door exploded. Danilo had thrown himself at it with all of his weight. Two hundred pounds of pure anger against a rotting door. Splinters of wood whirled around; the old planks split into pieces.

  The door hit Sandra, who screamed and was flung backward. The knife went spinning over the floor. When she didn’t get up, he went over to her.

  “Get up,” he said. “I like a challenge. Makes it more interesting for me.”

  Sandra staggered up and he let her approach.

  “Come on,” he said. “Do something. Just give me a reason.”

  Spitting with rage, she aimed her fist, but he parried. She struck again, this time toward his crotch, and he didn’t delay. He grabbed her, putting his left arm around her neck, grabbed his pistol from the waistband of his pants, pressed the muzzle against her temple and shot.

  She was dead before she hit the floorboards.

  Danilo wiped his pistol on his sweatshirt, placed it in Sandra’s hand and pressed her fingers against the steel multiple times. Then he laid the pistol near her body.

  “Are we done?” he said, turning to Jana. Her hands trembling, she felt her thigh. She tried to get up, but the pain stopped her. Just then, she heard the sound of an engine far down the gravel road.

  “We have to go,” she said, noticing that Danilo was also conscious of what was going to happen.

  She tried to get up again, but the pain was unbearable. She doubled over and felt Danilo’s hands around her waist, felt her body being lifted into the air.

  Her first thought was to stop him, to tell him she could walk by herself, but she knew it would take far too long for her to get back to the car. She breathed with her mouth pressed against his sweatshirt as he carried her all the way to the car.

  He carefully let her sink down into the driver’s seat. They let go of each other, and he sat down in the backseat. Then they sat quietly and stared into the darkness.

  It was less than thirty seconds before they saw the headlights of cars dancing through the trees. She raised her eyes, looked at him in the rearview mirror and saw him nod. It was a slight movement, almost imperceptible.

  She nodded back, just as subtly.

  Then she started the car, turned the wheel and drove back down the same road.

  * * *

  Henrik Levin picked up the binoculars and aimed them toward the white Volvo and the dilapidated house. The GPS coordinates had led them here, and now three units were in place. Two officers to the east, behind the house. Two to the northwest, in front of it.

  “What
the hell’s going on?” Mia said from the passenger seat.

  “We wait until we’ve gotten the all clear,” Henrik said.

  “But the car is just sitting there,” Mia said impatiently. “What are they waiting for?”

  “Everyone has to be in position first.”

  “Give me the binoculars,” she said, holding out her hand. “Give them to me.”

  Henrik handed them over.

  “Hard to see any movement in the fucking dark,” she said.

  “True,” Henrik replied.

  “But look, the front door?” she said, staring at him.

  He took the binoculars and tried to zoom in as close as he could.

  “It hardly looks like there is one,” Henrik said.

  Mia crossed her arms over her chest, sighing.

  “Nope,” she said. “There’s nothing to wait for.”

  “Calm down now,” he said, casting a glance down the road.

  Mia pulled out her service weapon and checked the magazine.

  “She’s in there,” she said. “Sandra Gustafsson. I can feel it.”

  “We have to assess the situation.”

  “But does it have to take a hundred years?”

  Henrik gave her an irritated look.

  “Can you stop getting so worked up?”

  “But she’s in there, and I’m sure she has Philip’s wife, too. Who knows what she’s doing to her this very moment?”

  Henrik didn’t answer, instead raising the binoculars again and looking toward the car.

  “Screw it,” Mia said, opening her car door and stepping out.

  She ran with quick steps through the grass. It was noticeably chillier in the glade, and her short breaths were made visible with fog.

  She saw the men signal to each other. They checked their weapons quickly, followed her toward the house and got in position outside the door opening.

  One of them, the one with long hair under his helmet, held up his hand. On the signal, they went in.

  Mia waited impatiently outside until she heard the calls that the place was secured. Henrik was right behind her when she stepped into the hallway. The first thing they saw was a woman lying on the floor, her mouth open and eyes empty. A pistol lay next to her body. Henrik felt her pulse and looked up at Mia.

  “It’s Sandra,” he said. “She’s dead.”

  The long-haired officer approached them.

  “The upstairs is secure, but we found this,” he said, pointing a flashlight into one of the rooms. Mia and Henrik left Sandra’s body and went into the adjoining room.

  Mia’s heart skipped a beat when she saw the woman sitting in the chair. Her stomach was dark with blood, and her head hung over her chest.

  In the dull light of the flashlight, she saw the traces of violence. The floor under Lina was covered in blood. Mia took a step forward, reached out and felt for her pulse with her fingers.

  “Lina?” she said, but there was no answer.

  She held her breath, pressing again on Lina’s neck.

  “She’s alive,” she said. “Cut her loose!”

  They cut the zip ties and placed her carefully on the floor. Henrik ripped off his jacket and pressed it against her stomach.

  Mia took her cell phone out of her pocket and dialed 911 while Henrik continued talking to Lina. Mia heard him repeating the same words over and over and over.

  “Everything will be okay,” he said. “I promise. Everything will be okay.”

  * * *

  A strange silence filled the car. Jana Berzelius and Danilo Peña were staring out the windshield, focused on registering any possible movements. The engine was idling, and the high beams cast long shadows between the dark buildings and the tall fences. Beyond the industrial district, Södertälje hummed.

  Seconds passed, but nothing happened.

  She was just about to check the time when she caught sight of a black Mercedes driving slowly toward them. She squinted in the headlights and could make out a vague silhouette of a lone driver keeping his head low over the dashboard.

  The car stopped fifty yards away.

  They were the only cars in the vicinity, and they were directly facing each other with their headlights on.

  “And the boxes?” she said. “When do I get them back?”

  She didn’t get an answer. She heard the car door behind her open and close and knew he had gotten out. When she turned her head, she saw him. He had stopped outside her window with his bag over his arm. The wind tousled his hair, casting it back and forth. He looked at her for a long time, and a slight grin crept over his face.

  Then he began walking.

  She followed him with her eyes. She shut out the rest of the world, shut out the dark industrial buildings and the tall fences, shut out the hum of the engine, shut out the pain in her leg, shut out everything that didn’t have to do with him and the blinding headlights of the other car.

  Then she couldn’t see him any longer. Instead she heard the muffled slam of a car door and the crackling of the gravel as the car backed away.

  She felt her heart pounding as it disappeared.

  She slowly looked up into the rearview mirror again. The backseat was empty. He wasn’t there anymore; he was gone.

  At last.

  CHAPTER

  THIRTY-THREE

  Friday

  SHE SAT ON the bed with her hands behind her back and fastened the top button on her black dress. Jana Berzelius let her hand slide down to the next button and buttoned all five, one after another, slowly and methodically.

  She looked at the dust dancing in the sunlight.

  The door to her bedroom was open. The apartment was silent. No footsteps, no movements.

  She looked at the clock and knew she was going to have to stand up now, and she got up on one leg with some difficulty. The bandage, hidden by her dress, was wrapped tightly around her thigh.

  She gripped the edge of a dresser and supported herself against it for a brief moment before limping over the floor. Her thigh was throbbing, but she ignored it, had to move unencumbered. She absolutely didn’t want to call attention to herself or invite questions.

  Her black hat lay to the left on the shelf in the hall. She pulled it carefully over her hair. Then she took the flower that lay wrapped in paper, held it to her chest and gently embraced it.

  * * *

  “Where do you want this box?” Mia Bolander called as she stepped into the yellow single-family home in Smedby wearing her shoes and jacket.

  “What does it say?” she heard Henrik answer from one of the rooms.

  “Nothing,” she said.

  “Put it wherever you find room.”

  Mia looked around, observing the impressive staircase and the airy kitchen. She walked through a hallway and into a living room that opened out onto a balcony.

  Tall, paned windows looked out onto a yard where Emma was pushing the stroller in front of her. Felix was kicking a soccer ball.

  The living room was spacious. Right now, though, it contained a crib and an old-fashioned bed with a tall headboard and footboard, and a white nightstand, a secretary-style desk, a swivel armchair, a rolled-up rug and lots of boxes.

  There was a parquet floor and a tile stove.

  Indeed.

  Henrik came into the room with Vilma close behind him and a floor lamp in his hand. His hair was messy, and his forehead was sweaty.

  He put the lamp down and walked toward her. Vilma stayed close behind him.

  “How does it feel to move a few hundred yards down the street?” Mia said, putting the box down on the floor.

  “We couldn’t find any better option.”

  “This is a pretty cool place.”

  “You know it’s my mother-in-law’s,” he said.

  “
So you threw her out?”

  “Threw out Grandma?” Vilma asked, her eyes wide.

  “No,” Henrik said, ruffling her hair. “We didn’t throw Grandma out. She lives in an apartment now, remember?”

  Vilma blushed.

  “Nothing wrong with an apartment,” Mia said, smiling at her. “Fewer rooms to clean.”

  “Hey,” Henrik said. “Thanks again for helping with the move.”

  “No problem. You promised beer, right?”

  “Of course. But I know there’s been a lot going on lately at work and such, and I just want to say that it was really nice of you to take the time.”

  “But we took care of it,” Mia said.

  “The move?”

  “That, too, but I was thinking of work. Or, at least we were able to save Lina and the baby.”

  She was also about to say something about Sandra Gustafsson, but she didn’t feel like talking about her anymore.

  They had had a whole day of heated discussions over whether she had actually taken her own life, or what else might have happened there in the abandoned house in the half hour before they’d arrived. Anneli had been absolutely certain, no doubt about it, Sandra had been shot by someone else. Yes, maybe, but there weren’t many suspects to point to in the middle of the forest. Either way, it had to wait until Monday, a new week, a new life.

  “Right,” Henrik said, “but it’s a real downer that we haven’t found Danilo Peña yet.”

  “No more talking shop now,” Mia said, opening her jacket pocket. “I have a housewarming present for you.”

  She handed him a plastic bag.

  “But you shouldn’t...”

  “I know.”

  Henrik looked down into the bag.

  “A Russian nesting doll?”

  “Yes! And there are lots of smaller dolls inside. I thought it could be cool for the kids. Right, Vilma? Isn’t it kind of cool?”

  Vilma nodded, took it from Henrik and immediately began playing with it.

  “See, it’s really cool,” Mia said.

  “Thanks,” Henrik said.

  “You’re welcome,” she said, lifting the box again with an exaggerated groan. “It’s heavy, where should I...?”