by Andy Maslen
‘Have you had any recent experience with firearms?’ Oskar asked as they made their way down a brightly lit corridor to the range.
Stella pursed her lips. Recent? Not really. The last time she offed someone with a firearm was more than six years ago. But in her time she’d gotten pretty good at despatching those who’d wronged her. She’d become proficient with a hunting rifle, a Glock, other pistols, a sawn-off shotgun and a dinky little .38 revolver: more weapons, she suspected, than Oskar had ever used. Especially in anger. And, oh, such anger.
Swallowing, she shook her head. ‘Not recent. We try to avoid them as far as we can.’
‘But why, when you have armed criminals? Bank robbers? Terrorists?’
Stella smiled. ‘We have a dedicated firearms command. Properly trained. They’re usually enough.’
Oskar patted the pistol on his hip. ‘I think I prefer to have my own weapon on me at all times. That way you can’t be caught out by a bad guy.’
Stella nodded as if to show her agreement. Oskar wasn’t to know just how hard it was for a bad guy – or girl – to catch Stella Cole out. Those that had tried had ended up dead, whether or not she’d been carrying a firearm.
Through the door to the range, Oskar led her to the armourer’s office. Already she could smell the acrid tang of gun smoke.
The noise on the range was deafening, and Oskar handed her a set of ear defenders from a rack. She settled them gratefully over her head. Though muffled, the reports of the pistols were still loud through the layers of plastic and acoustic foam, but reduced to a manageable level.
She’d always thought it odd that Health & Safety regs meant you couldn’t practice without ear protection, but nobody worried once you were out on the street and discharging your weapon.
Stella handed over her completed and signed TSA form to the armorer. An overweight man in his late forties, he stamped it then dropped it into an overflowing in-tray.
Turning his back on them, he wandered over to a steel cabinet from which the paint had been knocked or rubbed off on the corners, and returned with a dull, black semi-automatic pistol in a leather holster. He placed it on the steel counter between them and added three magazines.
He pointed at them.
‘Ten rounds. Forty-calibre Smith and Wesson.’
‘Tack,’ Stella said, earning herself a brief smile.
Oskar led her to an empty booth and laid the pistol and magazines on the wooden surface of the shooting bench. Taking the pistol out of its holster, she inspected it from all angles.
The manufacturer’s name and model were engraved on the barrel. Sig Sauer P229. She racked the slide twice to check the gun was empty. Then she slotted a magazine home, making sure it was latched securely. She racked the slide a third time, chambering a round.
All this time, Oskar had been watching her. She was conscious of his proximity, and wished he’d step back and give her some room to breathe. He put his hand on the top of the barrel, pushing it down onto the bench.
‘Now, before you shoot, Stella, just be aware this is a powerful handgun. If you’re out of practice it can be a surprise when it kicks. Just take your time and—’
Stella brought the pistol up in a two-handed grip and emptied the magazine in a few seconds.
Two shots.
Three.
Three.
Two.
The smoke from the muzzle drifted back towards her: some fluke of the AC, she imagined. The spent-firework odour from the burnt propellant entered her nose and wormed its way into her brain. A couple of cops nearby had stopped firing to watch the stranger.
The recoil was forceful. But the mass of the gun meant it was manageable. Certainly compared to the Model 38 Airweight she’d used to kill Collier. Practising for a couple of hours with the little revolver had left her hand feeling like someone had stamped on it with heavy boots.
She reached out and flicked the switch to bring the shredded paper target whizzing up the range towards them on a taut wire. The ‘terrorist’ had lost most of his head. And she’d blown a football-sized hole through the torso, over the heart. Turning to her right, she encountered Oskar’s frank, admiring gaze.
‘Half the guys on the squad here couldn’t shoot like that. Where did you learn to group so well?’
She saw herself in the middle of some woods on an Ojibway First Nations reservation in southern Ontario. Plugging away at soda cans with the Airweight. Ken White Crow standing beside her.
Then climbing onto the SUV’s bonnet in the depths of a Minnesota winter. Adam Collier’s face, a mixture of terror and despair as he sank into the freezing waters, the doors pinioned by still-heavy slabs of lake ice. Her pointing the Airweight’s snub nose at him.
The kick as the .38 round left the barrel. The hole it punched, dead-centre between his eyes, blood pulsing out like a geyser. Dragging Lynne’s body out onto the ice and pushing her down through the hole where the SUV had sunk.
And then, out of nowhere, revulsion for the object gripped in her right hand swept over her. She looked down at the smoking gun and replaced it on the bench. She didn’t want it anymore. She noticed the way her fingers had cramped around the ergonomic grip. It took a physical effort to uncurl them.
‘Thank you. But I’ll leave it here. If there’s any shooting to be done, you can do it.’
He frowned. ‘You’re sure? You’re probably the best shot in the whole station.’
She nodded, feeling sick. ‘Sure.’
As they took the lift back to the Murder Squad, Stella stared at her blurry reflection in the stainless-steel wall.
Why couldn’t Collier have stayed dead? The lake floor should have held him in its embrace for ever. Now his bones were lying on some pathologist’s table in the US and Roisin was coming after her.
A dark, poisonous thought occurred to her. An echo of a voice she thought she’d never again hear.
You’ll just have to deal with her, then, won’t you? Babe.
Her stomach turned over. She’d killed enough people. Then a flash of her last kill lit up her brain: Robey sinking into a pit of used engine oil, impaled on a metal fence post.
That was ruled lawful killing and had been one hundred percent in the line of duty. It didn’t bother Stella. She knew it was a confused position. But it was the best she could manage.
Back at the desk Oskar had sorted for her, Stella pushed all thoughts of her murderous past aside and went on with the series of calls she’d drawn up for herself. First on her list was the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It was the last government department listed on Brömly’s CV.
She listened to a lot of hold music over the next thirty minutes as she bounced between different teams, records units, departmental secretaries and compliance directors. Finally she reached someone who seemed willing, or able, to help her. He introduced himself as Fredrik and told her he worked at Central Records.
Once again, she explained who she was, what she was doing in Sweden, and that she was in possession of a letter of introduction from the British prosecuting authorities. She told him that she was working closely with the Swedish Police Authority to solve the murder of a Swedish citizen.
He put her on hold. A few minutes elapsed during which she nodded to Johanna who placed a coffee in front of her, mouthing ‘Tack’. Johanna beamed her a toothy grin in return.
‘Hello, DCI Cole?’
The young man was back.
‘Yes, I’m here.’
‘So, Mr Brömly’s career in the civil service was quite illustrious. He served in a number of ministries: Foreign Affairs, Education and Research, the Prime Minister’s Office, and Employment.’
‘Is there any record of his being employed in any of those ministries between 1971 and 1976?’
‘Hold on, let me check.’ A pause. Stella heard a keyboard clicking. The young man hummed as he typed. ‘That’s odd. In late ’70 he was working in the Ministry of Employment. In ’76 he turns up again at Education. But in between there’s a
gap.’
Stella’s heart sank. ‘Yes, we believe he may have been working overseas. Volunteering in Tanzania.’
‘I don’t think he can have been.’
Her pulse picked up. ‘Why not?’
‘His employment record is uninterrupted for that period. He would have had to resign for anything more than a short sabbatical. A month might have been acceptable, but not five years.’
There. Stella felt it in the pit of her stomach. The first flickering of a fresh investigative trail. She was getting close. She could feel it.
‘Can you double-check?’
‘Yes. I am already looking at his… yes…I cross-checked to his Personnel records. He was receiving his monthly salary as normal right through that period.’
Stella thanked the helpful young man and went to find Oskar. She found him talking to Johanna.
‘Hej,’ Johanna said as Stella arrived. ‘Du ser ut som en ren som åt alla lingonbär!’
‘Hej. What does that mean?’
‘You look like a reindeer who ate all the lingonberries,’ Johanna said with a grin.
Stella smiled. ‘I think I did. Or at least a nice little bowl of them.’
‘What did you find out?’ Oskar said.
‘Brömly never left government employment. His pay cheques kept going into his account and there’s no record of him ever resigning or being re-employed.’
‘So he was never in Tanzania?’
‘Doesn’t look like it. I can’t imagine your government would have been content to pay a relatively junior civil servant for five years if he wasn’t doing any work.’
Oskar furrowed his bony brow. He scratched at his stubble.
‘We should go and talk to the two ministries where Brömly worked before and after the gap.’ He turned to Johanna. ‘Jo, can you and Stella check in with…’ He looked at Stella. ‘Where was he in ’70?’
‘Employment.’
Oskar nodded. ‘I’ll go and see—’
‘Education,’ Stella supplied.
‘Let’s meet up here afterwards to compare notes.’
‘Our flight’s at three-fifteen, remember,’ Stella said.
‘It’s fine. Police can skip the queue. We’ll leave for the airport at two-thirty. Plenty of time.’
Stella frowned. It didn’t sound like lots of time to her. But Stockholm Airport was a lot smaller than Heathrow. Presumably it was quicker to get through, as well.
Five minutes later, she was sitting beside Johanna in a silver Volvo estate pool car. Johanna drove skillfully, and fast, and they arrived at the Ministry of Employment on Herkulesgatan ten minutes later.
The civil servant into whose spare but elegant office they were ushered rose to greet them. She wore a long grey wool tunic over dark trousers. The stylish look continued with narrow copper-framed glasses that magnified already-large grey eyes, and a string of oversized amber beads across her chest.
She rounded her desk to shake hands, first with Stella and then Johanna.
‘Hello. I’m Maria Östergren, Deputy Director of Human Resources. Would you like coffee?’ she asked. Stella and Johanna both declined. ‘Then how can I help?’
‘We’re trying to trace the career path of a former civil servant.’
‘Tomas Brömly.’
‘Yes, that’s right.’
The woman smiled. ‘No need to look surprised. I watched the press conference online. How precisely can I assist your investigation?’
Johanna consulted her notebook. ‘We know Mr Brömly was working at this ministry in 1970. Could you find out for us where he went after that?’
The woman leaned back in her chair, puffing out her cheeks.
‘I don’t imagine there’s anyone around now who would have known him. I’m afraid to say, many of his colleagues and probably more of his superiors are dead, but perhaps I can find out something about his responsibilities.’
‘That would be really helpful. Thank you.’
Stella exchanged a glance with Johanna as the woman pulled her keyboard towards her and began typing. Johanna raised her eyebrows. Her meaning was clear to Stella. Do you think we’ll get anywhere? Stella shrugged.
‘Here we are,’ the woman said. ‘In 1970, Mr Brömly was responsible for children’s homes in Umeå. Is that useful?’
Stella and Johanna exchanged another glance. Oh it’s useful all right.
20
Chicago
Roisin restarted the playback and watched, hunched forward over the screen, as the seconds, then minutes ticked by. She yawned. Then pinched the skin on the inside of her wrist to wake herself up. Jesus, Mary and Sweet Joseph, Roisin, if there was ever a moment to be wide a-fucking-wake it’s now!
Then it happened. The moment when Roisin caught the biggest break of her career. Stella Cole, her arm around a curiously unresisting Lynne Collier, emerged from the front door, walked her across the street and then out of shot. But she knew where Lynne was headed. The inside of Stella’s car.
Roisin’s insides squirmed with an unsettling mixture of foreboding, puzzlement and pure, unalloyed joy. Stella was toast. And not just the nicely browned all over variety. She was burnt, blackened and smoking. Her career – ha! – was over. And so was her freedom.
Roisin rewound the footage and played it again. She looked closely at Stella’s coat. It was a long, formal garment, in scarlet, with a belt and buttons. Not a stud in sight.
She was about to move on when she remembered with a flash of clarity exactly why the tissue-wrapped stud in her pocket felt so familiar. She replayed the footage a second time and froze Stella in mid-pace across the road.
Her right foot, extended at the end of a stride, was shod in a black boot on which she could make out the glitter of chromed studs. Those bloody Prada biker boots she was so proud of. Well, they were going to hang her now. She zoomed in, but the boots disappeared into a haze of pixels.
She pressed play again. The montage spooled on, with several more clips of Stella heading northwest towards what Roisin now knew was a fatal rendezvous with Adam Collier. And in every shot, she was alone in the front of the car.
Stella must have stashed Lynne in the boot. That wobbly walk of Lynne’s as they came out of the house. Had Stella drugged her? It would explain her passivity. All Stella would have needed was some way of keeping her from freezing to death as she transported her to Minnesota and it was game over.
The playback switched abruptly to black. White text informed her the video was property of the FBI.
Roisin sat back and ran her fingers through her hair. Breathing deeply she thought her way through the events she’d just watched. Something about the timings of the short sequences troubled her.
She rewound and watched again, this time at quadruple speed. Adam – Adam – Adam – Adam – Stella – Stella – Stella and Lynne – Stella – Stella – Stella – Stella—
The timings! She’d watched Adam first and inferred he’d started driving before Stella. But that didn’t make any sense. She snorted. Yeah, right. Because everything else made perfect bloody sense.
No, Stella must have phoned him and told him she had Lynne.
She slowed the playback and started noting time-stamps. And then she had it. Stella had drugged and kidnapped Lynne first. Got clear of Chicago, then phoned Adam.
Questions piled in on themselves like a rugby scrum. Or, she supposed, since she was in the Land of the Free, an American Football tackle.
What possible motive could Stella have for killing Adam Collier?
Did she identify herself to him or disguise her voice somehow?
How could she have got a firearm?
How did she get to the US?
Did she leave a trail?
Where did she go after killing him?
Why did Adam kill his own wife?
And then other, hideous, questions interposed themselves. When Callie announced that Stella wasn’t dead after all, had she known all along what she was doing, and where? Why di
d she promote Stella to DCI and not Roisin? Was it payback? A reward? Oh god, was Stella sent to America to kill Adam?
Suddenly feeling nauseous, Roisin got up and left the room in a hurry, looking for the Ladies. She splashed cold water on her face and dabbed it dry with paper towels. Then she shut herself in a cubicle and sat there for thirty minutes.
Desperate to get back to the UK, Roisin made it through the rest of the day by reading every single document assembled by the FBI during its inconclusive investigation into the murders of Adam and Lynne Collier.
Like her, they’d identified the figure she knew to be Stella Cole and even given her the same nickname: Blondie. Their supposition was that Blondie had kidnapped Lynne, driven her to Preston, then lured Adam out to the frozen lake.
Like her, they’d war-gamed a number of scenarios before concluding that Blondie was responsible for at least one of the Colliers’ deaths.
Like her, they had noted down a raft of questions, from motive and means to, most tellingly of all, Blondie’s true identity. They tried running facial recognition algorithms. They looked for fingerprints on the SUV and the firearms, despite their immersion in lake water. They ran ballistics on the Airweight.
The face was a blank. The only fingerprints on the SUV were Adam’s plus a valeter and a mechanic at the FBI field office. The Airweight was clean. From the serial number, they surmised it was a Vietnam-era weapon, manufactured in the tens of thousands and distributed widely over Southeast Asia.
Unlike her, they then closed the file.
Unlike her, they wanted rid of a case that was an embarrassment.
Unlike her, they hadn’t solved the case within a single working day.
Over dinner – thick, juicy steaks and spicy home fries – Eddie Baxter asked her how she wanted to handle her forthcoming trip to Minnesota. She begged off. How could she hope to discern anything new when the entire resources of the FBI’s Chicago Field Office had been devoted to the case? The flattery worked on Eddie who shrugged and admitted he couldn’t, personally, see the point, but, hey, he wanted to offer every courtesy, yada yada yada.
She told him she had gotten – pleased with herself for using a small piece of American grammar – everything she thought she could from the evidence here. She requested that the whole lot, excepting the SUV, which was too big, be shipped lock, stock and barrel to London.