Ordinarily, he likes their film nights, but this time he says no.
The others laugh and make fun of him. Does he have something secret on the go? Someone secret?
He laughs with them and says there’s no secret at all, he’s going to work out. He gestures to his bag.
As a joke, one of the other guys bends down to grab it and remove the obstacle to their film evening.
But when he takes the handles and tries to lift the bag from the ground, he’s completely unprepared for the weight of it. He can’t even make it budge.
“What the hell?”
Inside the spacious gym bag is a long, thick chain. One that has metal barbs soldered onto it and which will be stretched across Elektravägen at the crossroads with Västbergavägen in a few hours’ time.
He swings the bag up onto his shoulder.
He’s keen for it to look like a simple motion.
Then he laughs at how heavy it is and starts making his way toward the bus stop.
He has a job to do. He takes out his phone and makes a call.
50
5:01 p.m.
The minute the phone rings, everything gets under way. Months of planning, years of dreaming about the building in Västberga.
It’s time.
Michel Maloof gets up from his chair and goes over to the kitchen counter. He picks up and hears his chain man say that he’s on the way. His task for the night is to stretch the string of caltrops across Elektravägen at the crossroads with Västbergavägen, and also across Västberga Allé by Drivhjulsvägen, to put a stop to any police cars which might come racing out of the station on Västberga Gårdsväg.
Maloof quickly confirms and then hangs up.
He returns to his chair by the window. It has rapidly become his favorite spot in the newly built, sparsely decorated apartment in Norrtälje that Zoran Petrovic swore no one would be able to link to them. Petrovic knows the guy who installed the HVAC when the apartment were built a few years earlier, who’s the one who got them the key.
Maloof has been staring out that kitchen window for four days now, and there’s one thing he’s sure of: He’ll never move to Norrtälje.
His mind turns to Alexandra Svensson. He hasn’t missed anything more than her soft body over these past few days. The scent of her skin has filled his dreams. He can’t remember that ever having happened before.
Soon, he’ll be able to look her in the eye without having to worry that she can see straight through his pupils and into his soul, finding him out. Over the past few weeks, he was worried she would be working tonight, that for some reason he would bump into her in Västberga in the middle of it all. But a week or so ago, he learned that Alexandra’s night shifts didn’t start until Thursday, meaning she would be at home in Hammarby Sjöstad tomorrow morning. That was an enormous relief.
Soon, everything will be different.
Soon, he won’t have to lie to her about what he’s doing anymore. Never telling her what he did won’t be a problem for him; it’s the basis for every relationship Maloof has ever had.
He sinks into daydreams and mentally ticks off the list of things that could go wrong tonight and tomorrow morning. There are so many that he no longer has the energy to care. He hears Sami talking about his “plan F” and smiles. When reality gets its teeth into their plans—as it always does—it’s the ability to improvise that separates the pros from the amateurs. That’s why he’s working with Sami Farhan and Niklas Nordgren: they both know how to improvise.
All three set up filters earlier that week. Went underground. Nordgren calls it “ducking.” A week or so before a big job, you vanish from the radar. Then you find somewhere to lie low, alone, for a few days.
It’s not just because of the police, it’s also because of their own families and friends. If no one knows where they are, no one can give them away or accidentally reveal anything important.
Maloof sighs. It’s as much a sigh of satisfaction as it is of fear. He hates these last few hours of passive waiting ahead of a job. During the planning phase, he’s always calm and methodical. He makes lists in his head and ticks off the points one by one. And once things get started, it’s as though he transforms. With a mask covering his face, it’s like he rediscovers his true identity. His senses are heightened, he breathes more calmly and thinks more clearly.
But this period of limbo between planning and action is unbearable.
He throws his phone onto a cloth on top of the dishwasher, tips the last of the cold coffee out of the pot and refills it with water to brew a fresh batch.
Petrovic isn’t coming until one. Maloof smiles at the thought of his tall friend and the way he made the Swedish police think the robbery would be taking place on the fifteenth.
Petrovic enjoyed doing that, and he spoke extensively about how he did it. He said it’s hints that are reliable, not loud statements.
And he was right.
51
10:50 p.m.
The old man in the hat walking northward toward Karusellplan in Västberga could, without doubt, have lived in one of the three-story buildings in the area, and though it was approaching eleven at night, he wasn’t drawing any attention to himself.
Nor had he done so earlier that day, when he spent just over an hour tending to his car at the gas station overlooking the G4S cash depot. Or when he sat down on the grass behind the depot reading a book in the still-warm sunshine. He just looked like an old man taking care of his old car, someone who liked to read old books.
He turns off into the Västberga industrial park, a place people don’t tend to go for a late-night stroll.
He isn’t worried about being seen. He isn’t doing anything illegal, he has no criminal record, and tomorrow morning he’ll head back to Åkersberga, where he lives.
In his jacket pocket, he has two cell phones. One of them is his, and the other has been loaned to him. Only one number has been saved in that phone, and his job is to call it and report on the situation.
If he sees anything out of the ordinary.
Police officers out on patrol, guards that don’t seem to belong in the area. Or any unusual activity around the building itself.
He’s even meant to call if everything seems fine.
Just to report that.
52
11:05 p.m.
The phone rings.
Though he has been waiting for the call, the sound still surprises Sami. He jumps up from the sofa and runs into the kitchen. He has four phones, lined up in a perfect row on the table, each loaded with a brand-new SIM card. The vibration from the ringing phone makes the others tremble in anticipation. He had programmed the numbers he would need that night and early morning the previous Sunday.
TEAM 1, he reads on the screen. That’s how he’s labeled them, with different numbers, and that’s what he’s planning on calling them. Nordgren had pointed out that a “team” needs more than one member. Sami explained that this isn’t some grammar exercise.
He picks up the phone and answers.
“Still quiet,” says Team 1.
“Good.”
That’s all.
The afternoon has been a long one. It felt endless. Sami Farhan has been in the apartment on Kocksgatan in Södermalm for three days now, two floors up, facing the courtyard. This is where he has been lying low ever since driving back from Hamburg.
He hasn’t been out during the day. Instead, he has watched TV, slept and eaten. His sister had left food for him in the fridge and the freezer; the apartment belongs to one of her friends, currently traveling around Asia. The friend has no idea that her place is currently being used by a robber who, for the past few days, has turned his sleeping patterns on their head in order to be able to perform at his best during a night that has been six months in the planning.