‘Jesus Christ, we did it!’ he shouts, putting his arm around her and giving her a kiss.
‘Shit!’ she shouts, raising her arms to the roof of the car.
12
THE PORN POLICE were wandering around in the clear morning light. The asphalt was covered with a layer of scented dew. It isn’t often that dew has a scent, but on that morning, Midsummer’s Eve, you could really smell the dew. Even the porn police had noticed it, though they had other things on their minds.
Their night’s work made their uniforms feel like week-old underwear. All that effort instead of just sitting in the staffroom, watching high-quality videos.
The porn police enjoyed watching high-quality videos in the staffroom. So much so that someone on the outside had found out, and this person had told the tabloids. The result? The porn police were given their far from honourable nickname.
Maybe the night’s events would wash it away. That’s what they were hoping, in any case, as they wandered around in the clear morning light, growing used to the unusual sight which greeted them.
This should be able to wash away even the most stubborn of stains.
It was no later than five, but they had already managed to turn away five or six carloads of their friends from the tabloids. Not without a certain sense of Schadenfreude.
They went over to the blue-and-white plastic tape which was surrounding a square of the Sickla industrial estate. Another vehicle was approaching, one with TV 4’s colourful logo printed on the side. Behind that, an old red BMW sports car came chugging along.
The porn police went over to the TV 4 vehicle and gestured very clearly that they should leave. The TV 4 people didn’t give up easily; there was moment of fuss which ended with someone in the van blurting out their tired but well-known nickname, and the porn police started kicking the van. Eventually, it moved off and parked, slightly ruffled, next to the others in the designated space ten or so metres away. Still irate, the porn police moved on to the BMW behind them. When a short, dark figure stepped out of the car and, without a word, lifted the blue-and-white plastic tape, something inside the porn police snapped. They rushed over and grabbed the dark man in an iron grip.
‘What the hell d’you think you’re doing, you little Mediterranean shrimp?!’
‘You see a nice car, you can be sure there’s a spic in it! Clear off! As fast as you bloody can!’
They could already see that the man’s mouth was starting to form the ominous words.
‘The porn police, I assume,’ he said.
‘Little prick!’ the porn police snapped, twisting their grip.
‘What are you doing?!’ shouted a man dressed entirely in denim, running over from inside the roped-off area. ‘This is Detective Superintendent Chavez from CID. Let him go immediately.’
The porn police let go and dropped back without a word.
‘It’s not that nice a car,’ said Jorge Chavez, rubbing his upper arms. ‘Ancient. 1978 model. And I’m not Detective Superintendent.’
Yet, he thought. But then, apparently there aren’t any porn police.
The denim-clad man held out his hand and said: ‘Sorry about that. They’ve had a rough night. I’m Bengt Åkesson, local CID night staff.’
Chavez managed to extend his aching right arm to return the greeting.
‘Haven’t we met before?’ he asked.
‘We met very briefly on the Power Killer case. I found a Russian called Alexander Brjusov when we busted an illegal poker club.’
‘Right,’ Chavez nodded. Åkesson.
He didn’t normally forget people.
On the other hand, he hadn’t had much to do with people lately. More with his books. After the strange resolution of the Kentucky Killer case, he had studied and studied and was now, theoretically, the most qualified policeman in Sweden. Even in terms of practical experience, there was a lot in his favour, despite all that had happened. All he was missing for a superintendent’s job was years. Years en masse.
He was still little more than thirty years old.
‘Well, Åkesson,’ he said, ‘the only thing I know is that I got a confusing phone call in the middle of the night, from Waldemar Mörner, a division head I know from the National Police Board, saying that I had to lead the investigation into, and I quote, “an unbelievably grim mass murder”. Can you give me any more info?’
‘We could always take a trip around the sights,’ said Åkesson, as they started walking. ‘A few hours ago, at 03.08 to be precise, we received a call from an old lady who was out walking her dog in the middle of the night. She had a mobile phone with her and she said she was standing in the middle of a slaughter site, that there were bodies everywhere. When we got here, it was already light, and this is what we saw. Five dead. All shot apart from one, who’s been blown up. He’s in the car here.’
Chavez glanced into a burnt-out Mercedes, and regretted that he had wolfed down a quick sandwich on the way over. It felt as though it was just making a brief visit to his stomach. He spent a few seconds trying to prevent its reappearance, and then his professional side took over.
Sure enough, the man in the back seat had been blown up. Chavez didn’t want to expand on that observation, the medical examiners could do that. The remains of a chain lay by the man’s wrist.
Chavez was content with what he had seen. He looked up and glanced around the surrounding area. Sickla industrial estate. A worn asphalt road. A black Mercedes parked between two industrial sheds. Signs: ‘Rickard’s Auto Repairs’ on one of them, and ‘Sickla Boats and Building’ on the other.
He looked further, along the left-hand side of the Mercedes. A man was lying face down in a pool of blood next to the driver’s seat. Further away, there was a smaller pool of blood, this one lacking a body. He walked around the car. Here, on the other hand, there were two bodies. The one next to the passenger seat was riddled with bullet holes. The one slightly further away was wearing a black balaclava. Where his eye should have been, a fleshy mass protruded from the socket.
Jesus Christ, Jorge Chavez thought, allowing himself a few more seconds to keep the sandwich in place.
‘You said there were five?’ he said to Åkesson.
Åkesson rubbed his hand slowly and firmly across his forehead. For the first time, Chavez noticed how pale he was.
‘The last one’s over here,’ he said, pointing. ‘Round the back of Rickard’s Repairs.’
‘A bit of alliteration never goes amiss,’ said Chavez, following him. Åkesson didn’t comment.
They went round the corner of the shed in front of the Mercedes. Lying on the ground was a well-built man wearing a balaclava. He had been shot in the back. In front of him, a still-wet pool of blood had spread out. It was like an irregular frame around a perfect, dry rectangle. Beyond that, ten or so bloody footprints, growing increasingly faint the further they went.
‘Hmm,’ Chavez said, like Sherlock Holmes. All that was missing was him reaching for a magnifying glass from the inner pocket of his worn old jacket.
Chavez and Åkesson exchanged a long look.
‘OK then. Have you drawn any conclusions?’ asked the former.
‘Yeah,’ said the latter. ‘They’re pretty clear. Make your own, then we’ll compare them. Intuitive versus reflective.’
Chavez gave Åkesson an appreciative glance, and said: ‘Two gangs. Those with balaclavas attack those without. The latter arrive in the Merc. They brought something attached to a chain, probably a briefcase. They’re on the way to a meeting place, to exchange it for something unknown. Somehow, the robbers blow up the car and take the briefcase. Him with the chain, he’s already dead. They cut the chain. The other two get out of the car. From their positions around it, we can assume they were frisked.
‘Then it gets tricky. Something happens. The one whose face is oozing out of his balaclava is shot by one of the two next to the car, then they’re shot. This lone pool of blood suggests that another of the robbers was shot, but only injured, since he’s not here. The fact they’ve left the bodies behind means they don’t care whether they’re identified, and that worries me. It’s hardly over. Then what? What’s the robber behind Rickard’s Auto Repairs doing so far from the others? Shot in the back. OK, so he’s running off, but gets shot from behind. The shot probably went right through him, through his heart. The blood gushes out forwards, down his chest. OK. Should we assume that this blood pattern in front of him means he had the briefcase? He’s running off to get the briefcase to safety when the fight breaks out and then, when it’s over, the robbers grab the briefcase from the pool of blood, take a couple of careless steps in the blood and clear off.’