Carina made a sound somewhere between a howl and a hiss. Then she leaped onto the hood of the car, brandishing the wrench, and swung her arm to give Irene a backhanded blow to the head.
This fit Irene’s strategy. She took two steps back to find support against the wall. Now Carina would have to jump off the hood and cover that distance to reach her. She did so, pouncing like a cat, the wrench still in a backhand swing. She was totally unprepared when Irene stepped forward and blocked her blow with her lower arms. Before Carina had the chance to react, Irene turned to the right, keeping her grip on Carina’s arm, and took her down in a shiho-nage. The adrenaline rush made her use more force in her control grip than she needed. Carina screamed and dropped the wrench without resistance. Irene snatched it up.
Luckily, her muscles remembered her old handball moves. She targeted the window next to the garage door, which was two meters above the cement floor and just beneath the ceiling. The pane broke with a loud crashing sound, and the wrench, with a metallic bang, fell to the ground outside. The sound of the glass breaking seemed to bring Carina back to life. She began to wriggle beneath Irene, her strong, sinuous body tensed. Carina was the stronger, but Irene was a master of fighting techniques. Sweat poured down Irene’s back as she parried each of Carina’s attempts to free herself. The woman seemed to feel no pain. Irene’s only chance was to grip Carina’s hand even harder. Finally Carina’s wrist broke, and she began to howl uncontrollably. Beneath the sound of her yowling, Irene heard Tommy pounding on the locked garage door and yelling something she couldn’t understand. Then she heard running steps. A second later she heard the sound of a car screeching to a stop and Tommy’s head and shoulders popped up on the other side of the broken window. She realized he’d parked the squad car under the window and had climbed onto its hood. He used the wrench to knock away the rest of the glass in the window frame. He was able to reach his hand in and unlock the window, which was wide enough for him to wiggle through and then slide down feet first. Irene felt her leg pound and throb. Her strength was ebbing, and she was relieved to have backup.
Tommy took out the handcuffs, and between the two of them they were able to cuff Carina, who yelled and writhed and somehow even managed to roll onto her back with her handcuffed wrists beneath her. Her broken wrist should have been unbelievably painful, but she kicked with undiminished power. Tommy managed to catch her legs and sit on them.
“As far as you’re concerned, it’s all over,” he told her in a hard voice. “It’s all over.”
The result was immediate. Carina stopped still and stared at Tommy. If looks could kill, Tommy would have been her fourth victim. Fifth, if you included Nils Peterzén.
Chapter 22
“SHE REFUSES TO talk. Honestly, I don’t think she even hears what I’m saying.” The prosecutor, Inez Collin, looked concerned. She crossed her legs, one foot swinging impatiently. Irene admired her shoes, a deep burgundy made of kid leather, very expensive. They were the same color as her outfit, and Irene inwardly complimented her on her color sense. Inez wore a long jacket and a knee-length skirt. Her nails were impeccably manicured in deep wine red, and her blouse was a shimmering light gray silk. The same gray tinted the prosecutor’s nylons and, incredibly, matched her eyes. How did she do it? Did she wear colored contact lenses? Probably not. Inez had always had the same gray eyes and platinum-blond hair in a severe ponytail. Irene couldn’t help admiring her because she was good-looking and well-dressed, but Inez still didn’t hold a candle to Carina Löwander.
Carina remained as silent as a nun. Three times a day, she did her workout in her cell. She played her gym routine on a tiny cassette player, the only item she was allowed. Her arm, in a cast, and her broken ribs didn’t seem to trouble her in the least. When the investigators tried to question her, she sat with a faraway smile on her face, her eyes focused on the wall. A psychological evaluation had already been requested. It would take some time before her mental state could be assessed. Before then the investigative team wanted to clear up the last remaining questions.
“Our difficulty with finding proof is that only Carina herself can answer how the murders actually took place—and why. We really don’t have much. Our main evidence is the flashlight, of course, which was found in the trunk of her car. Can you believe she kept that?! Especially since it was engraved with the letters ICU and M.S. The hair and fingerprints in the suitcases were hers. Still, none of this proves that she was the killer. All we really have is the attack on Inspector Huss,” Inez Collin concluded.
“She’s been pretty damn good at eliminating any witnesses,” muttered Superintendent Andersson.
“She missed one,” Birgitta Moberg said, then pausing for dramatic effect. “Siv Persson. I called her in London last night. She’s returning home this afternoon with her son.”
Jonny snorted. “She’ll never admit that it wasn’t a ghost.”
“But she already has. I think it was her initial shock that made her believe she’d seen a ghost. On the phone she told me, ‘That image is turning around in my head. I’ll figure out who it was soon.’ Maybe she recognized Carina as the ghost nurse after all,” Birgitta concluded.
“That lady is completely nuts,” Jonny said.
Irene carefully shifted her leg, which was in a cast. It was itching terribly. The operation on her muscles and tendons had gone well, but she’d have to wear the cast for several weeks more. Thankfully, no bone had been broken. At least osteoporosis wasn’t showing up yet.
Inez Collin looked at Irene’s leg thoughtfully. She cocked her head and finally said, “A cast on a leg looks more dramatic than one on a wrist.”
The assembled group of investigators raised their eyebrows. The prosecutor said pensively, “I’m thinking about Carina’s personality. My impression is that she believes she is above other people. Smarter. Stronger. More beautiful. She seems to believe she’s entitled to use whatever methods she wants to reach her goals. Sociopathic. I believe she’s as vain as other sociopaths. Extremely vain, in fact. Perhaps we should use that.”
Inez quickly sketched her strategy. Irene protested at first, but then let herself be convinced. It was worth a try.
THEY BORROWED A wheelchair from Central. Irene sat down in the chair, and her colleagues helped unfold the foot-rest. With her leg sticking straight out, she definitely appeared pathetic, defenseless, and vulnerable.
Fredrik Stridh was playing her caretaker. The chair’s wheels burned rubber as he cleared the corner to catch the elevator. He punched the top button, and soon they started their journey up to the prison floors.
CARINA HAD JUST had a shower and was drying her hair with a towel. The cold cell smelled like expensive perfume with an undertone of coconut, the same aroma that had alerted Irene’s subconscious that day in the garage. So far Carina’s prison stay had not even made her tan fade. Hard to believe that this woman is a serial killer, Irene thought.
Fredrik went in first and said, “You have a visitor.” Without waiting for an answer, he went back to the hallway and returned pushing Irene in her wheelchair. Carina stopped in the middle of drying her hair and stared straight at Irene, still not saying a word.
Fredrik said, “It’s crazy what you did to poor old Irene Her leg practically fell off. She’s on months of sick leave.”
Irene fumed inwardly. Fredrik was taking his role a little too seriously; he was overstepping the script as well. Carina did not appear to react, but there was a touch of curiosity in her eyes as she regarded Irene’s cast.