Bubble: A Thriller

by Anders de la Motte

  But she had procrastinated and avoided the subject long enough for the neighboring flat to be sold. Maybe she’d already had a suspicion that it wasn’t going to work out, and that she was going to need a backup plan.

  She opened the window and let in some cool night air. Then she tipped out all the belongings she had picked up from his place onto the bed.

  A failed relationship, boiled down to a toothbrush, a few crumpled clothes, a couple of dog-eared books, and few other random possessions.

  Fired and dumped on the same day. Nice work, Normén . . .

  Weirdly, losing her job hurt more. Getting fired was somehow the ultimate failure. She and Micke had been on the slide for a very long time, he had actually been right about that. There were reasons why she had preferred the time when they were dating without any fuss, then later when she was going behind his back and seeing Tobbe Lundh. All the security and predictability that most other people seemed to crave made her skin crawl. Kept her awake at night.

  And the happy pills hadn’t been much help.

  Over the past few months she had tried to find new ways of handling her restlessness. More time in the gym and the firing range, and, most of all, more work. Loads of work.

  But that had all just been a way of postponing the inevitable. She simply wasn’t in love with Micke anymore, and maybe she never had been.

  Not properly . . .

  A shame, because he was a nice guy, really nice.

  But if she looked in the rearview mirror, nice guys didn’t really seem to be her thing. According to convention, she was now supposed to shut herself away in her flat, put on her dressing gown, eat rocky road straight from the tub, and fast-forward through ten seasons of some American sitcom.

  But what she felt was mostly just weary disappointment mixed with a few spoonfuls of relief. Besides, she didn’t have time to feel sorry for herself.

  The safe-deposit box, Uncle Tage/André Pellas, and everything she had seen up in Henke’s flat—the whole lot was probably connected somehow, and she needed to work out how.

  She opened the bathroom cabinet, found the right box, and took her evening medication.

  Then she got the business card out of her pocket and fetched her phone.

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  The pills, the wet pack of cigarettes, the lighter, the key to his flat, and a roll of soaking-wet notes from his secret stash . . .

  He lined the objects up on the windowsill in the spacious shower room. The tiles on the walls reflected some of the light from outside, enough for him to get his bearings without the lighter. In one jacket pocket he found the pay-as-you-go cell phone he had been given by the gang in the vet’s clinic.

  Shit, he thought he’d ditched it in the park.

  But so what, the cheap plastic gadget was full of water now and bound to be stone-dead.

  He turned on the shower and to his surprise discovered that there was hot water. After rinsing off the worst of the dirt and mess, he moved on to cleaning his clothes.

  His underpants were ruined, there was no point even trying to rescue them. But he scrubbed his jeans hard on the rough floor until most of the shit was gone.

  The jacket and T-shirt were easier, and he draped everything across some hooks in the corner of the room to dry. When he was finished he sat on the floor as the water continued to rain down on him.

  He leaned back against the wall and closed his eyes. The spiral of thoughts in his head began to slow down.

  Spinning sloooower

  and

  sloooooooweeer . . .

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  “You were very easy to find . . .”

  The voice came out of nowhere.

  He flinched, hitting his head on the tiles, making him dizzy.

  Then he tried to stagger to his feet as his heart raced and his brain tried to work out where he was and who the hell had crept up on him while he was asleep.

  “Not very impressive, is he?”

  The man’s voice again, evidently addressing someone else. HP squinted at the door where the voices seemed to be coming from.

  Instinctively he moved his hands to cover his crotch. The gruff voice sounded familiar.

  Two shadowy figures emerged from the darkness and he took a step back.

  “Here, we brought some new clothes . . .”

  He definitely recognized that voice.

  It was Nora, the vet. She dropped a gym bag on the floor beside him.

  For one terrible moment he thought it was stripy, made in needlework class when he was at school, and had his phone number on it. But when he touched it he found to his relief that this bag was made of nylon.

  “Th-thanks,” he managed to stammer.

  “Get dressed quickly, we have to go!” the man muttered, and now HP had no trouble placing the voice.

  Biffalo Bull from the vet’s, Jeff or whatever his name was.

  “What the fuck are you doing here . . . ?” he spluttered, but neither of them answered. “How did you find . . . ?”

  He broke off.

  “It was the phone, wasn’t it?”

  “Good guess, Einstein!” Jeff grinned.

  “We have to get out of here, HP, right now,” Nora said. “Every cop in the country is looking for you. If anyone in the main building works out that there are people in here . . .”

  “Okay, okay.” He quickly pulled on the pants, tracksuit bottoms, T-shirt, and hooded jacket.

  Everything fit perfectly, even the sneakers.

  As if they knew exactly what size he was.

  “You still look pretty rough, are you taking the pills?” Nora asked.

  “Mmm,” he murmured. “But I must have eaten something dodgy. I’ve had the shits really fucking bad.”

  She went past him to the windowsill and picked up the pills.

  “Okay, I’ll give you a few more in case you threw up the last lot . . .”

  He put the rest of his things in his pockets and gave his damp clothes one last look.

  “Okay, I’m done. Thanks for your help!”

  “Right, let’s get going.” Jeff pointed at the door.

  “Sorry, don’t know if you’d listened to your messages, but I’m not interested in getting involved. Not my cup of tea . . .”

  Neither of them moved.

  “Listen, mate,” Jeff said in a tone of voice that was anything but friendly. “That wasn’t a request . . .”

  He took a firm grasp of HP’s right bicep and gestured to Nora to lead the way.

  He waited a moment until she was a few meters away.

  “Do me a favor,” he hissed at HP as he squeezed his arm tighter. “You and I have a bit of unfinished business, so how about putting up a bit of resistance? Just a bit?”

  “What the fuck are you talking about?”

  “Number thirty-two Birkagatan, does that ring any bells? I had to go to A&E to get that red spray paint out of my eyes. I was out sick for a week, and my girlfriend didn’t dare to stay after you’d left your little message on our door . . .”

  So that was where he knew the musclebound moron from!

  Well, two years had passed, and he’d only caught glimpses of a bright red face and a tattooed arm, but now, in hindsight, it was obvious.

  Remember rule number one

  The fans liked it when you fried a . . .

  “Rat . . .” He blurted it out in a fit of Tourette’s, and he felt Jeff twitch. The grip around his arm got even tighter, and for a moment he thought Jeff was going to hit him.

  “Are you coming or what?” Nora said.

  A short silence.

  “Sure, we’re coming,” Jeff muttered, and shoved HP ahead of him.

  Their car was parked on the other side of the wall.

  “Get in!” Jeff held one of the back doors open.

  “Not until you tell me where we’re going!”

  “Get in, I said.” Jeff took a step closer and clenched his fists.

  “Like fuck I will.” He looked over his sh
oulder, trying to find an escape route. But unfortunately he was on an island, and he had serious doubts about his ability to cope with a long run.

  “Okay, calm down, both of you.”

  Nora again. She put her hand on Jeff’s shoulder and the intimacy of the gesture made HP dislike the bodybuilder even more.

  But it seemed to work, because Jeff lowered his hands.

  “We’re going to a meeting,” she said curtly. “It’s not far, then afterward we’ll drop you wherever you want to go.”

  He didn’t move.

  “Come on, HP, you can hardly be scared of a meeting . . .”

  She winked at him, and suddenly he found himself trying not to smile. He stood there for a few more seconds, pretending to think about it. But really he was far too tired to think about anything.

  “Okay,” he sighed with a shrug. “Let’s do it . . .”

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  The dark Volvo pulled up outside her door.

  The driver hardly had time to put the hand brake on before she was out on the sidewalk.

  She had already been waiting fifteen minutes in the dark stairwell, and having to wait had done nothing to improve her mood.

  She jumped into the backseat and slammed the door hard behind her.

  “What the hell is going on?” she snarled.

  “Calm down, I’ll explain everything. Just give me a chance, please.”

  Tage Sammer held his hands up in such an exaggerated way that she had trouble staying angry.

  “Okay,” she said, then took a deep breath. “I’m listening . . .”

  “As you already know, I work with security issues. I have done ever since I left the military. The Palace, or rather the office of the Marshal of the Realm, is one of my clients.”

  “Yes, I worked that out,” she snapped. “So why didn’t you say so when we last met, and why are you called André Pellas instead of Tage Sammer? And how does my brother fit into the picture . . . ?”

  He put one hand on her arm to get her to stop.

  “We can set off now, Jonsson,” he said unnecessarily loudly to the chauffeur.

  “Of course, Colonel.” The chauffeur put the car in gear and pulled away from the curb.

  Tage Sammer leaned closer to her.

  “You have to understand, Rebecca,” he said, “just like your father, sometimes I have to use different names. André Pellas is the name I went by earlier in my career.”

  “Military intelligence, yes?”

  It was dark in the backseat, but she thought she could see his face twitch slightly.

  “I found an old picture of you in a book about Cyprus,” she added.

  “I see . . .”

  A brief silence followed.

  “Well, I should have known better than to underestimate you, Rebecca,” he said with a wry smile.

  “Your father was also very diligent in his work, preparing everything very thoroughly, never leaving anything to chance . . .”

  He took a deep breath.

  “After the attack in Kungsträdgården two years ago, the Palace realized that they needed to improve their handling of security and intelligence. The Marshal of the Realm and I are old acquaintances, which is why he contacted me. As you know, His Majesty has had a number of . . .”

  He paused and seemed to be searching for the right words.

  “. . . PR-related difficulties, one might say.”

  “You mean that muckraking book, and the friends who employed gangsters, and the rumors about—”

  “Perhaps we needn’t go into detail . . .” he interrupted. “But any decrease in public support goes hand in hand with an increased level of risk, and with an event like the princess’s wedding just around the corner, everyone is rather more nervous than usual.”

  “I can understand that, but the Security Police are already on top of all that . . .”

  “Naturally, of course they are. But the incident in Kungsträdgården a couple of years ago showed that there were clear deficiencies both in the evaluation of the threat level and in communication between the Palace and the Security Police. My role is to act as a link. To bridge potential differences of opinion, if you understand what I mean?”

  He brought his fingertips together to illustrate his point, and suddenly she couldn’t help smiling. The gesture was so obvious, and so familiar.

  “I am also able to contribute the experience and network of contacts I have built up during my thirty years or so in the world of international security,” he went on. “Offering a second opinion, so to speak . . .”

  The car climbed to the crown of the Western Bridge, then continued down toward Hornstull.

  Down to their right they could make out the dark edifice of the old prison on Långholmen.

  “We believe that the attack in Kungsträdgården was carried out by a particular network. A group calling itself the Circus, the Event, and occasionally—”

  “The Game,” she interjected.

  “Exactly! I presume you heard about it from Henrik?”

  She nodded.

  “To begin with I thought it was just talk. Another one of his stories . . .”

  “But as time went by you became more convinced?”

  “Yes, especially after I’d talked to . . .”

  She bit her lip.

  “. . . Magnus Sandström,” Sammer concluded. “Or Farook Al-Hassan, as he calls himself these days.”

  She didn’t answer.

  “Don’t worry, Rebecca, we know all about Sandström. We’ve had our eyes on him for quite a while. We know that one of his tasks was to recruit people whom the Game might find useful.”

  “People like Henke, you mean?”

  “Precisely. Your brother is an excellent example of an active participant. But Sandström and his like also recruit other more . . . passive resources.”

  “Such as?”

  He leaned even closer and lowered his voice almost to a whisper.

  “Such as you, for instance . . .”

  17

  GAME CHANGE

  THEY PARKED IN a garage near Södra station.

  “Here.”

  Nora handed him a pair of cheap sunglasses.

  “And pull your hood up as well.”

  He didn’t really understand why until they passed a tobacconist’s and he saw his own glazed expression from his passport photograph staring out at him from the wall.

  SWEDEN’S MOST WANTED MAN! the fly sheet screamed, so loudly that he felt like covering his ears.

  “Okay?” Nora said quietly.

  “Sure . . .” he mumbled, without sounding at all convincing. “Is it much farther?”

  She shook her head.

  “We’re heading to Fatbursparken first, then we’re almost there.”

  They walked around some portacabins and made their way along a fence surrounding a building site.

  The music and noise from the sidewalk cafés up in Medborgarplatsen were clearly audible.

  Jeff stopped for a moment and looked around.

  “Through there,” he said, pointing to an opening in the fence.

  They went down a rough tarmac path, looping downward in a semicircle. Just as they disappeared below ground level the path turned to gravel and they found themselves in a narrow gulley with rock walls on either side. Weird . . . he thought he knew Södermalm like the back of his hand, but he’d never given any thought to this particular corner.

  He must have crossed the footbridge that he could see seven or eight meters above them hundreds of times without ever thinking about what was underneath. Probably because the vegetation growing from the sides of the gulley formed a canopy that blocked the view.

  The gulley stopped abruptly at a rock wall. In the middle was a large metal gate, and cool, damp cave air hit them as they got closer.

  Jeff looked over his shoulder again, then glanced up at the buildings just visible above ground level.

  “Okay?” Nora said.

  Jeff nodded.

&nbs
p; She took a large key out of one of her jacket pockets and unlocked the gate.

  Once they were inside she locked it again.

  Jeff pulled out a flashlight and shone it into the cave.

  Ten meters in, there was a folding door.

  Nora marched quickly over to it and began fiddling with the lock, but HP didn’t move.

  He was tired, exhausted, unable to walk another step, at least not until someone told him where the hell they were going.

  “Come on.” Jeff tugged at his arm.

  He opened his mouth to tell the king of the bodybuilders to go fuck himself, but at that moment a row of lamps lit up on the other side of the door, revealing a long tunnel that led into the rock.

  He hesitated a few more seconds, then his curiosity got the better of him.

  The tunnel was big; judging from its height and width, it looked like it had probably once been used for trains. The roof was bricked over, and every fifteen meters there was an old fluorescent light fitting, giving off just enough light to see by. The sides of the tunnel were mostly bare rock, but here and there water had trickled through, polishing the surface.

  The tunnel curved to the left, and the ground sloped gently down. HP’s tired legs were grateful for any help they could get. Their steps echoed off the walls, and once they’d walked about fifty meters the folding door behind them vanished from view.

  “So where are we going?” he asked Nora.

  “We told you, back on Långholmen. A meeting . . .” Jeff answered.

  “Yes, but I thought . . .” He didn’t finish the sentence.

  What had he actually thought?

  He scarcely knew. His whole system had rebooted, and only now did his head seem to have started working normally.

  They had entered the tunnel up by Fatbursparken, and it curved down and to the left. They must have walked about two hundred meters now, which meant they should be somewhere under . . .

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  Sankt Paulsgatan.

  The chauffeur pulled up in a free parking space. Then, without a word from Sammer, he got out onto the sidewalk and closed the car door behind him.

  “You must have an awful lot of questions, Rebecca, and believe me, nothing would please me more than to be able to answer them all. But, as I’m sure you can appreciate, that is sadly not possible . . .”