The Bucket List

by Peter Mohlin

  Social services had placed her in a foster home. She had been there for two weeks now, but John still hadn’t been to visit. He had to take care not to seem too closely involved. Officially, Nicole was just a girl he had taken a liking to as part of his job.

  In reality, she was so much more. She was the strength that Mona had talked about. It was for her sake that he had tried to stay alive when Heimer Bjurwall had been pointing his weapon at him.

  He closed his eyes and tried to picture Nicole in front of him. Then he made a new attempt at the eyes. After half an hour he was satisfied and he sent grateful thoughts to his landlady who had left her oils behind in the apartment.

  John washed his brushes in turpentine and cleaned the paint off his hands. He sat down on one of the crates at the kitchen table and opened his laptop. The clock on the screen told him it was a quarter to eleven in the evening. Trevor’s flight was scheduled to have landed at Arlanda an hour ago. If he hadn’t spent too long in the baggage hall or customs, he would be at his airport hotel by now.

  John logged on to the encrypted email service and saw that his inbox was empty. Anxiety gnawed at his stomach. Maybe it had been a bad idea to agree to his friend’s final wish to visit him. He remembered how back in the hospital in Baltimore, Trevor had always insisted he was fine—even on the days when the pain was at its worst. There was a risk he had overestimated his health and collapsed on the flight.

  John shut the laptop and reflected on the deadline he’d set for his stay in Karlstad. Three months to find out the truth about his brother. But he hadn’t counted on the consequences of every successful investigation. Christmas and New Year’s had passed by and he was having to work overtime. The preparation of the cases against Bernt Primer and Heimer Bjurwall were moving at breakneck speed and John had to be available to the prosecutor.

  The same applied to Mona, who was traveling back and forth between Stockholm and Karlstad. His relationship with her was rocky. She was keeping a professional distance from him and there was no chance of further dinners at Rederiet.

  A couple of days after the operation at Tynäs, they had been at the police station discussing what had happened. John explained why he’d gone to Heimer Bjurwall’s home in direct contravention of her orders. Billy’s death made everything personal and he hadn’t been able to step away from the investigation.

  Mona had admitted that on an emotional level she could understand what he had done. Nevertheless, she considered it completely irresponsible and she was grateful they wouldn’t have to work together after the trials were over.

  John had not yet been assigned a new witness protection liaison in Stockholm, but he assumed it was just a matter of time. It didn’t really matter who it was. With his mother back at Gunnarskärsgården and Nicole in a foster home, he would be able to leave the country with his conscience clear.

  His time in Karlstad had been a mere footnote—a necessary diversion before he went on with his original plans. He would cut all ties to the Bureau and create his own private witness protection program somewhere in Europe. First stop, Berlin: that was where he was going as soon as the trials were over.

  John opened his laptop again and refreshed the inbox. There was still no sign of life from Arlanda. He went back through the old emails and reread the early messages from Trevor. Most of what he had written resonated with John. The loneliness. The difficulty in coming to grips with a new country. The paranoia and fear of being discovered.

  Then he made some coffee and drank it while standing at the window. The harbor below was illuminated by floodlights as a boat unloaded its cargo. In the light, he saw the first snowflakes falling, forming a white blanket on the ground. He rinsed his mug and sat back down at the laptop.

  Finally.

  Trevor had sent an email. He opened it immediately.

  Landed and checked in at the hotel. Time to sleep. Catching the train to Karlstad tomorrow. See you at 6pm as agreed. I’ve lost a few pounds, but I assume there’s no need for me to look sharp. Have a good one, T.

  John exhaled. Everything was fine and tomorrow he would see his friend again. He went to the fridge and discovered there was still a little of the Sancerre left in the bottle that Erina had brought the last time she’d been around. The two had been spending time together—both in and out of bed—on a regular basis. He poured the wine into a glass and sat back down at the laptop to answer.

  He had just started writing when the final line of Trevor’s email caught his eye.

  Have a good one, T.

  There was something about it that bothered him. Something he couldn’t put his finger on. Trevor usually ended his emails with that choice of words—surely there was nothing strange about it?

  He clicked back to the old emails again. Now he saw the discrepancy. It was subtle, but still as clear as day. In six of his first ten emails, Trevor had ended with: Have a good one! T.

  An exclamation point before the T—not a comma, which was what he had just received.

  John pushed the wineglass aside. He had only had two sips and he didn’t want any more until he got to the bottom of his suspicions.

  He continued to read the conversation in chronological order and flinched when he realized in which email the comma had appeared for the first time. It was the one about Trevor’s stomach problems.

  John took a deep breath and deleted the email he had just started writing. Instead he wrote:

  Glad to hear it. I’m sure I’ll recognize you. Hope you still eat fish. There’s a great place in town that I’ve made a reservation at.

  Then he hit send and waited.

  The answer arrived just a few of minutes later.

  Sounds great. See you soon.

  John closed the laptop. He stared at the flecks of paint that had ended up on the lid during the recent period of intense painting. They fused together in front of his eyes. Trevor had never liked fish. He was a steak-and-burgers guy who had protested loudly on the few occasions that the FBI agents had brought anything from the sea to their safe house.

  John got up and went back to the window. The snowfall had intensified and he could see a thin layer forming on the quayside below. Instinctively, he put his hand to his neck and felt for the pain in the back of his head.

  But it wasn’t there.

  It seemed to have vanished for good in Heimer Bjurwall’s library.

  Instead, anger pulsed through his body. He thought about Trevor and what must have happened to him. He was presumably dead. Tortured and executed. The paranoia hadn’t just been in his head. Ganiru’s henchmen must have found him and obtained the email login. They’d used it to get John’s location and made arrangements to see him. He hadn’t been emailing his friend—he had been emailing Nigerian hitmen.

  John looked at the time. It couldn’t end like this. He had to find a way to escape—for his own sake and Trevor’s.

  He had just a few hours to figure out how.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  The authors wish to thank:

  Our first editor, Erika Degard, at Norstedts. Her keen-eyed perspective made The Bucket List a better book. Our agent, Judith Toth, at Nordin Agency, who has taken John Adderley out into the wide world. She is an unstoppable force of nature. We’re so grateful to have you on our side of the negotiating table. Our editor at The Overlook Press, Tracy Carns, and the Overlook/ABRAMS team, as well as translator Ian Giles, for their great work in bringing this book to English-speaking readers. Ralf Lyxell and Karin Jansson, who provided their invaluable knowledge of Karlstad and its surroundings. If there are any details that remain inaccurate, the fault is entirely our own. Gustaf Carlsson, who gave us insight into the world of forensics and taught us how incredibly difficult it is to get away with murder. Family, friends, and acquaintances who have read all or parts of the manuscript at different stages of the writing process. Your critical oversight and words of encouragement have been a great help.

  Mohlin would particularly like to thank:

  My wi
fe, Anna, and my daughters, Märta and Ellen, for being there for me in sickness and in health, in writer’s block and writer’s flow.

  Nyström, the best partner a writer could ask for. He always has one hand on the keyboard and the other on my shoulder for support.

  Nyström would particularly like to thank:

  My children, Smilla and Nicolas. Simply by existing you give meaning to everything.

  Mohlin, for his ability to never give up. For the fact that (as long as he receives regular meals) he is always ready to go the whole mile. Thank you for being by my side in both headwinds and tailwinds.

  AUTHORS’ NOTE

  Thank you for making it all the way to the end. We hope this book has kept you entertained for a while. If you happen to come from in or around Karlstad, or you’re just particularly interested in the world of John Adderley, we’d like to tell you a few things.

  The places mentioned in the books do often exist in the real world—although not always. We’ve taken liberties in terms of both exteriors and interiors. For example, the police station in Karlstad is on Infanterigatan, but to our knowledge it has no moldy basement.

  A genuine newspaper mogul and a bona fide music star really do live in Tynäs. However, we’ve never encountered the Bjurwall family in that exclusive neighborhood.

  The tower at Bryggudden where John Adderley lives also exists, but we doubt that the penthouse apartment consists of just one room.

  In other words, the settings in The Bucket List are a mixture of truths, half-truths, and total make-believe.

  Finally, we want to beg forgiveness from everyone who lives on Hammarö. We know it’s been many years since the mill at Skoghall has smelled. But we couldn’t resist using sulphur to set the scene for the events in this book. In our world, drama sometimes has to take priority over facts, and for that we apologize.

  Peter Mohlin and Peter Nyström