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The atmosphere in the room where the meeting was to take place was noticeably tense. Fredrika said hello to her colleagues from the Foreign Office and the PM’s office, and looped her handbag over the back of a chair. A light drizzle was still falling outside.

Fredrika looked around and spotted two familiar faces: Eden Lundell from Säpo, and Alex Recht. They were standing side by side, with their heads close together. Did they know one another? Alex noticed Fredrika and nodded to her.

‘Nice to see you again so soon.’

He didn’t mean that. His face was distorted in a grimace; he looked angry and upset.

You can’t keep any secrets from me.

‘Do you know Eden?’

‘Yes, we met yesterday.’

They shook hands, and Fredrika thought that Eden’s grip was one of the firmest she had ever felt. She could smell cigarette smoke today as well. And Eden wasn’t smiling. She looked as if she would really like Fredrika to go away so that she could be alone with Alex.

‘Fredrika and I used to work together,’ Alex explained. ‘She was part of my special investigation team.’

Eden looked surprised.

‘I would never have guessed you were a police officer,’ she said to Fredrika.

‘She’s not,’ Alex replied. ‘She’s a criminologist. And a highly skilled investigator.’

Fredrika blushed. She would never have thought that Alex knew what she had studied at university. Not that he wasn’t interested, but he did have a tendency to mix up different academic disciplines.

Alex’s words softened Eden’s expression.

‘Good to have someone with your background on board right now,’ she said.

The Secretary of State cleared his throat. ‘Perhaps we could make a start?’

They sat down around the table.

‘We have received another bomb threat,’ Eden began. ‘This time the target is a plane that recently took off from Arlanda, heading for New York.’

The silence around the table was palpable.

‘The terms are crystal clear. The hijackers have made two demands that must be met. Meanwhile, the plane is not allowed to land; if it attempts to do so, it will be blown up. In other words, they are saying that there is a bomb on board.’

‘But what is all this?’ the Secretary of State asked, sounding like a child.

‘All we know is that one of the stewardesses found the bomb threat written on a piece of paper in one of the toilets,’ Eden said. ‘How it got there is of course of great interest to all of us, but at the moment we have no information on that point. It could have been put there by one of the passengers, or a member of the crew. The prosecutor has decided to launch a preliminary investigation, and we are currently trying to persuade SAS to provide us with a list of passengers, and of the crew members on board, so that we can compare them with our own databases to see if we find any matches.’

‘So that hasn’t been done yet?’ the Secretary of State said.

‘No. But we’re expecting a quick turnaround. We’re also working on the specific demands made in the note. One is directed at the US government, and calls for the closure of Tennyson Cottage.’

‘What’s that?’ Fredrika asked.

‘An American detention facility in Afghanistan,’ Eden explained. ‘It’s relatively unknown, so it’s not at all clear how the person who made the threat could be familiar with the place. We have already made contact with our American colleagues. It’s important that we’re all on the same page in our dealings with the American side. I assume you’ll take care of communications with the political leadership over there?’

‘Yes,’ the cabinet secretary from the Foreign Office replied.

‘Good.’

Eden turned to Fredrika and the Secretary of State.

‘There is a further demand, this time aimed at the Swedish government. It concerns the matter we discussed during yesterday’s meeting: Zakaria Khelifi.’

The Secretary of State folded his arms; Fredrika had noticed that he often did this when he felt under pressure.

‘Whoever made the threat is calling for his immediate release, and for the restoration of his residence permit.’

The atmosphere in the room was oppressive.

‘Had you been expecting this?’ the Secretary of State asked, much to Fredrika’s surprise.

‘No, of course not,’ Eden said, unable to hide her irritation. ‘And I must add that we don’t know if this is another hoax.’

‘Hard to say, isn’t it?’ the cabinet secretary said.

Eden’s eyes narrowed.

‘I don’t think this kind of discussion is particularly helpful.’

‘True,’ the Secretary of State said. ‘So what’s our next move?’

‘My suggestion is that we start talking to our respective American colleagues. Säpo will also try to establish direct contact with the captain of the plane in order to find out what his intentions are. Personally, I would prefer to see him go for an emergency landing as soon as possible, but bearing in mind the way in which the threat is expressed, and that we still don’t know if it’s genuine, or if one of the perpetrators is on board, I daren’t make that recommendation at the moment.’

‘How much time do we have?’ the Secretary of State asked.

Fredrika saw Eden and Alex exchange glances. Alex looked deeply distressed.

Eden explained what the note had said about how much time the two governments had to meet their demands: when the fuel ran out, their time was up.

‘Oh, my God,’ the cabinet secretary said, covering his mouth with his hand.

‘I must point out once again that we don’t know whether this is a threat we need to take seriously, but I can say that Säpo are extremely concerned,’ Eden said.

Fredrika hesitated for a moment, then asked a question.

‘You didn’t say how long we’ve got. How long will the fuel last?’

Eden bit her lip.

‘We have just over thirteen hours, starting from now. Then the plane will crash, unless it’s allowed to land.’

12 10:45

Tennyson Cottage. A dark corner of the earth where dubious activities took place.

Eden Lundell hadn’t wanted to say too much about it during the meeting, but she knew exactly what it was. An American so-called secret detention facility in Afghanistan, close to the Pakistani border. Notorious to those who had been there, unknown to everyone else. The turnover of inmates was low. Most of those who ended up there were suspected terrorists who had been captured in Pakistan, and who were then moved on through the system after a period in Tennyson Cottage. In the past, they had been flown to Guantánamo, but now they were taken to other facilities. The Americans had never confirmed it, but Eden suspected that there had been fatalities among the inmates.

Eden hadn’t had anything to do with Tennyson Cottage herself, but she had heard the name mentioned when she was working in London.

They gathered in one of the larger operational meeting rooms: Eden, Sebastian, whom she still hadn’t apologised to, and a number of investigators and analysts. A total of twelve people were seated around the table. Only one of them wasn’t wearing a black suit, and that was Eden. She was wearing a blue pinstripe suit by Hugo Boss. As she often said to Mikael, ‘Authority doesn’t come for free.’

And Mikael would usually reply, ‘Particularly when it stinks of smoke.’

Eden had to bite her lip to stop herself from laughing. One day, she would make her husband happy by stubbing out her very last cigarette. But not today.

When everyone had settled down, Eden opened the meeting. She didn’t waste any time, but got straight down to what she considered to be the key question as far as Säpo was concerned.