Never Fuck Up sn-2

by Jens Lapidus

  A broad dude opened the door. At first, Mahmud couldn’t see if he was black or Latino. Thick dreads. Fat ganja grin when he saw Elliot. The door slammed shut in front of Mahmud’s face. He remained standing outside alone.

  He thought: What the fuck is he doing?

  Mahmud didn’t know what to do. Ring the doorbell? Bang on the door? Split? The last was probably the best alternative. He started walking back down the stairs.

  Then the door opened halfway. Elliot peered out again. Called, “Hey, Arab brother, you welcome.”

  Mahmud turned. Walked in.

  In the hall: music was blaring even louder from the other rooms. Back beat. Sweet weed smell. A hallway. A blue throw rug. White-painted walls. There was a large animal skin pinned up on one wall. The lion of Judah with a crown and one paw raised in greeting. The blatte with the dreads sat down in a chair and started rolling a joint.

  Elliot nodded.

  Led Mahmud down the hallway.

  The living room: Marijuana paradise. Couches, pillows, and cushions spread out. Blankets covered other areas of the floor. Ten or so people were sitting and lying down. Above all: they were smoking. There was a hookah between two couches. Two hollowed-out wood hash pipes on the coffee table. Piles of Rizla papers. Bags of weed. Pictures of Bob Marley, Haile Selassie, and the silhouette of Africa. A stereo stood next to one of the other couches. A vinyl record with a green, red, and yellow label was turning.

  The people in there: stoned out of their minds.

  Elliot showed him to a spot. Mahmud ended up on a cushion next to a pretty girl who seemed to be sleeping. Blond dreadlocks tied back with a hair band. This place was mad wack.

  One of the guys on the couch got up. Approached Mahmud. The guy’s voice was barely audible over the music. He extended his hand. Someone lowered the volume.

  “Welcome to Sunny Sunday. I’m Jorge, Jorgelito. And you’re Javier’s friend, right?”

  Mahmud nodded.

  “May I offer you a smoke?”

  Mahmud accepted the bag of weed. Picked up a pipe. But didn’t do anything. Gaze glued on Jorge.

  Jorge smiled. “They come here every Sunday. Worship Jah. Relax with some weed. Do what the black man should do. Chill, dig the music, feel the power.”

  Mahmud didn’t know if he should laugh or split. He maintained an interested look.

  Jorge went on. “You’re not African. Me neither. But we’re still niggers. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

  Mahmud didn’t get what the Latino was talking about. He put the pipe back on the table. Got up.

  Jorge put his hand on Mahmud’s shoulder. “Chill, man. I just wanted you to relax a little. We’ll go into the kitchen.”

  They had a seat in the kitchen. Jorge closed the door. Poured two glasses of water.

  Mahmud eyed him. The dude was thin but still built, somehow. Short hair and a small, ugly mustache. Dark eyes with something in them besides weed haze.

  “Okay, I’m sorry if you don’t like this place. I love it.”

  Mahmud grinned. “I’ve got nothing against it. But I always get a little jumpy when there are too many Zinjis around.”

  “Not a problem with me, man, but don’t say anything to them out there. And, like I said, we’re all niggers. Do you understand what I mean?”

  “Nope.”

  “Let me put it this way. Segregation is like apartheid. The Million Program has the same effect on us as slavery. You understand now?”

  Mahmud had a vague notion. Jorge was trying to be serious. Comparing immigrant guys like Mahmud with how black people’d lived in South Africa. He didn’t have the energy to have a discussion. Just nodded.

  Jorge starting telling his story. The Latino’d only been in Sweden for a month. Really, he lived in Thailand. It was easier because he was wanted in Sweden since the drug incident by the Västberga Cold Storage facility.

  It’d all begun when the Yugos’d wrapped him in a trial many years ago. Slaughtered him like a dog. But Jorge busted out of the pen by climbing over a wall, like fucking Spider-Man. Mahmud recognized the story, but honestly—he’d thought it was a tall tale. Jorge explained: he’d known all along that things wouldn’t end well with the Yugos. They should’ve helped him, taken responsibility for him since he’d worked for them, but instead they’d gone south on him. So Jorge’d started fucking with them. Shit hit the fan—they beat him real bad and from that day forward he hated Radovan more than anything else in the world. Jorge wasn’t the kind of guy to let a beating slide.

  Mahmud saw himself in the story. Jorge’d had an energy he couldn’t feel right now, but still. They were driven by the same obsessions.

  Jorge kept telling his story. How he’d tried to come up with ideas to sink the Yugo empire. Shadowed Radovan, found out a bunch of things about the organization: smuggle routes, dealing technology, drug methodology. He looked at Mahmud. “Do you still use those Shurgard storage units out by the parking lots?”

  Mahmud grinned. The Latino knew what he was talking about.

  But it all went to hell. Jorge got played. Had to bust the border. Now he was sitting on a good pile of dough and a Yugo hate that was hotter than lava. But, as Jorge said, “If that’d been all, I would’ve dealt with it. Swallowed the sperm with a smile.” But there was something else, too. Something worse. Darker. Harder. He didn’t want to go into details. “It was about dirty human trafficking” was all he said. He focused in on Mahmud. “I think you understand what I mean.”

  Mahmud wondered if the Latino knew what he did besides sell blow. The blatte seemed to know about everything.

  Maybe Jorge knew what he was thinking. He said, “I know what you do, man. It’s not pretty, but I don’t blame you. You’re in their clutches now. I know you’re cool. Javier’s told me. And I trust him. He’s un hermano.”

  Jorge swallowed a gulp of water.

  “You feel what I feel. You hate them. You want to get out. Let me tell you, man.”

  Jorge began explaining stuff about Radovan’s other businesses. Blackmail, financial fraud, brothels. Mentioned the organized luxury whore parties. Mahmud felt like the pieces were falling into place. It agreed with what he’d seen the other day: the way the hookers’d been collected, made up, fixed up, the slick players who’d run the operation.

  It took Jorge ten minutes to finish. He stared out into space. Seemed like his thoughts were still stuck in the story.

  “It’s messed up,” Mahmud said. “But what can I do about it?”

  Jorge’s reply was slow in coming. “You and me, we’re not the only ones who feel like this. I’ve got contacts who want the Yugos to get what’s coming to them even more than we do. If you want, I’ve got a job for you.”

  Mahmud didn’t really understand what Jorge was talking about.

  “You earn dough by taking a hit at Radovan’s whore business. A contract. With good pay. And everything you find, you can keep.”

  Mahmud still didn’t really follow, asked him to explain further.

  Jorge explained. Someone was willing to cough up 300,000 if Mahmud took a hit at the Yugos and the luxury-whore johns.

  Three hundred thousand. Shit. Even though business was booming now, that was a lotta cash.

  Still: he asked to think about it. Needed to digest everything. Jorge understood that he couldn’t give an answer right away. “Get in touch with me within a week. Or we’ll have to find someone else.”

  When they’d walked back into the living room, Mahmud asked, “I still don’t get it. Why do you want me to do it?”

  Jorge’s response wasn’t very helpful: “Because you’re perfect.” Then he laughed. “Forget it for now. You can think about it, remember?”

  They sat down on the couch.

  “Stay awhile,” Jorge said. “Listen to some Marley. Take a hit and feel the power. Haile Selassie Jah, as they say around here.”

  Mahmud relinquished control for a while. Leaned back. Took four hits on the joint that Jorge’d rolled.
A man with a knit Rasta-colored hat was half-lying on a cushion next to them. Accepted the joint from him. Took deep hits.

  The smoke, the music. He inhaled the atmosphere.

  Mahmud: relaxed for the first time in a long time.

  No woman, no cry.

  With flow. Rhythm.

  One of life’s tranquil moments.

  His irritation over everything was released in the fog. Three hundred thousand glimpsed on the horizon.

  He floated away.

  Praise the Rastafari, Jah.

  Sunny Sunday shines.

  * * *

  Aftonbladet—evening paper

  November 25

  SUSPECTED SERIAL KILLER IN STOCKHOLM

  A man was found dead this morning in a single-family home in northern Stockholm. The police suspect that he was murdered and that there are connections to a previous murder in the Stockholm area.

  According to the police’s press secretary, Jan Stanneman, the dead man is in his forties. No arrest has been made and there are no suspects in the case so far.

  The police believe that the murder is connected to another murder that was committed in Sollentuna, where a man of the same age was shot outdoors.

  “What makes us see a connection between the murders is that both the men’s wives received a phone call from a person who may have been the perpetrator,” says an inside source.

  The murders appear to have been professionally carried out and very few witnesses have been able to report observations to the police. It has also come to light that one of the murdered men was convicted of abusing his wife and that the other man’s wife has reported that she had been abused over a number of years.

  “We’re not ruling out that it could be a question of some kind of vendetta by a madman, but it is too early to speculate,” Aftonbladet’s source says.

  The man who was found this morning had reportedly been tortured.

  Karl Sorlinder

  karl.sorlinder@aftonbladet.se

  50

  It was still dark out when Niklas was woken by a text from Mahmud: I heard they found a corpse with dirty feet, saggy balls & a hairy ass—call me so I know you’re still alive. Niklas assumed the Arab was trying to joke.

  Still, he waited to call. Needed to process the information he’d received during the night. The Operation’d advanced to the third phase: Patric Ngono. Niklas was well trained by now: he knew the mission and the SOP. The planning of the actual attack was already under way.

  It wasn’t just about Ngono: there were three others in line after him.

  Part of the victory was that the media’d started to understand what he was doing. Soon, they would get more material.

  He thought about Nina Glavmo-Svensén. He thought about what he should do with Benjamin. Hoped that Mahmud’s treatment’d sent a clear message. So many human beings in so many different roles. And he was the only one who cleaned up—made sure that Sweden became a little more fair, a little more logical.

  Niklas sat down at his computer. Opened the folder that he’d labeled “Johns.” Roger Jonsson wasn’t the only one who bought women.

  In the afternoon, after training exercises, he called Mahmud.

  “Hey, it’s me. The corpse.”

  Mahmud laughed. “So you’re alive, habibi. You got time to meet up today?”

  Niklas wondered what he wanted. Mahmud didn’t want to tell him over the phone—they decided to meet up later that night.

  “You want in on something I’m doing?” That was the first thing Mahmud asked when they met up at his house.

  Niklas thought his apartment was nasty. He could handle his own filth. But Mahmud’s dirt disgusted him: crusty dishes, bottles of protein shakes, bowls with dried powder mixes. And the Arab’s way of dressing: sweat pants and a T-shirt that said Beach Wrestling across the front. Was that really a way to dress when you had company? But Niklas owed him one. He didn’t say anything.

  What Mahmud told him was the best thing he’d heard since he’d arrived back in Sweden. He almost felt religious. How could something fit so well into Operation Magnum? Mahmud’s question was simple: he’d been asked to do a job—on contract. It wasn’t just anything—it was about striking against some big-time pimps in Stockholm. Plus hurting the people and the organization that ran the human trafficking as much as possible.

  Mahmud didn’t want to go into details. Maybe he didn’t know much more. He just said that someone who had some unfinished business with Radovan and the whore business wanted to get things done. The Arab didn’t know it, but no one was more suited for this job than Niklas.

  They discussed some ideas briefly. Mahmud wanted to establish certain principles: no conversations on cell phones or landlines, no talking to anyone on the outside, when they needed to talk they’d fire off a text first—he outlined a bunch of different codes they would use.

  They discussed if they needed to get anyone else on board. Benjamin is out, Niklas thought to himself. Would someone from Biskops-Arnö work, maybe? Felicia? Erik? No, they were too weak. Couldn’t handle the fight when the storm really blew in. They’d already proven as much.

  Mahmud had a stringency and a warrior instinct that Niklas hadn’t expected. Niklas really got going. Started discussing types of weapons, attack methods, strategic planning. Mahmud smiled.

  “Buddy, everything in its own time. We’ll get to that.”

  “But you’ve got to give me something to get started on now.”

  Mahmud thought it over. “Okay, I have the address of the place where we’re going to make the hit. We have to know the area. So it’d be perfect if you checked it out.”

  Mahmud: like a badass general. Niklas loved it. Above all: he loved having a partner. To be a part of a TF again—a task force.

  The next day, Niklas drove the Ford out to Smådalarö, in the Stockholm archipelago. The address Mahmud’d given him wasn’t a street, it was just the name of a place, maybe a house: Näsudden, and a zip code. Mahmud’d been talking about their employer’s warning: be careful—these guys have security. They’ve made a mistake before and don’t want to do it again. It was unclear if Mahmud knew whom it was they were going to be dealing with. Niklas had no clue, but he was an expert, after all.

  A good day: clear weather. Fall was turning into winter. He looked forward to the snow. When it’d been at its worst down there, he used to think about clean, white, glittering snow. Icicles dripping as spring approached. The crunching sound when you walked over hard-crusted snow. It was his childhood. Not a happy childhood, but at least it’d been clean. Not filled with dust, gun oil, sweat, and sand.

  Still, he missed the real war. Everything felt so natural when he was among the other men. He knew the shape of each day. What was expected of him. How he would make his bed, care for his equipment, joke with Collin and the others, run through the day’s guard-duty schedule, bodyguard mission, or whatever it was. And sometimes their extra missions, the stuff that was too dangerous or too dirty for the official forces. The raids in the suburbs, the villages, the small communities where the enemy gathered, prayed to their god, and hoped for luck in war. Niklas knew why he’d become a soldier. It was a meaningful life. A life with dignity.

  He drove over the bridge to Dalarö. Took a left by the sign: Smådalarö. A twisting road along the water. There were boats pulled up and protected by wood structures and tarps. It was one o’clock. Darkness would fall in less than two and a half hours. Sweden is a strange country, he thought. During the winter, you live in the dark for more than half the time.

  He continued on. Golf courses, pine forest, private drives that branched out from the road and probably led to flashy summer homes. Niklas’d memorized the map and the aerial photos that he’d downloaded from Google Earth.

  Six hundred and fifty feet left.

  The small turnoff was blocked by a black metal gate. He stopped the car. There was a camera and a big sign on one side of the gate: PRIVATE PROPERTY. GUARDED BY G4S. They could guard as m
uch as they liked.

  He parked by a small forest road. Walked back through the woods. His boots clucked through the wet underbrush.

  After a few minutes: a metal fence. Nearly seven feet high—like an industrial fence except without any barbed wire along the top—but not impossible to climb over. Still: there could be surveillance cameras. He walked along the fence, arrived at the gate after a few yards. Now he knew. Walked back along the fence, up into the woods. Lucky that the leaves’d fallen off the trees. After 330 feet or so, he glimpsed buildings beyond the trees.

  He pulled out his binoculars. The main building was easy to see. Three floors. Pillars around the entrance. Crazy castle style. Gravel in front, a parked car. Next to the big house: a building that looked like a garage and a smaller outbuilding, maybe a stable, maybe a barn. He pointed the binoculars at the big house. Could see an entrance. He counted the windows, estimated the number of rooms, the height of each level.

  Continued along the fence, his eyes locked on the trees behind it. He didn’t see any cameras. Looked closer at the fence posts and ground mounts. Concluded: no electricity. No motion sensors. It would be easy to get through.

  After another few yards, the fence began to curve. Now he could see the house clearly, just 130 feet off on the other side. Hardly any trees. He picked up the binoculars again. The back of the house. There was another entrance there. He eyed the lock, what material the door was made of, tried to calculate where it led to. He could see straight in through a couple of rooms. A kitchen, a dining room, some kind of living room. He could clearly see motion sensors in the corners, in the ceilings, in the rooms.

  He continued around the back. Estimated the distance, the possibility of climbing in through the windows. He needed answers to two big questions. First of all: Where would the target be located on the night of the attack? Second of all: Would the security staff be heavily armed?

  They should be able to calculate the answer to the first question. Figure out the floor plan. The party would be in the largest room. Phallic compensation on this scale must’ve demanded more building permits and authorization than the entire Söderleden highway. The application documents for all those building permits must be in the county archives. And those kinds of documents were public information.