Assassin's Game (12 page)

The release of tension was massive and immediate. Those sixteen characters brought Slaton’s eyes closed, and the air that had been locked in his chest purged. Only then did he realize how heavily Christine’s disappearance had been weighing on him. He had fallen so readily into his old rhythms—op plans, objectives, contacts—that he’d lost sight of what was truly at stake. The simple message in front of him brought undeniable relief, yet there was also a sense of unease. It served as a reminder that he was walking a very narrow wire. No room for error.

Slaton again referenced mapping software before typing a final group of characters into the browser window, an impossibly obscure sequence of numbers and special characters. He doubted the site had been disabled because its function was as relevant now as it had been a year ago. The page that came to the screen was like a million others—an advertisement for cheap Viagra, complete with a picture of a little blue pill. Below that, highlighted in red, was a lone file available for download. It was the kind of web link that anyone in their right mind, on the miniscule chance they should navigate here to begin with, would immediately write off as spam. They would close the page and never go back. More to the point, the download link would be treated by any casual user as the web equivalent of a bomb. Which, as it turned out, was exactly what it was.

Slaton clicked on the download and the computer began to hum, extracting a Mossad-designed malware that worked with ruthless efficiency. First, all information on the hard drive would be destroyed. Subsequently, the program would corrupt the operating system in a manner that left it useless and completely unrecoverable. After three minutes—or so Slaton had been briefed—the machine he was using might as well have spent a month at the bottom of the sea. He pushed back from the workstation and placed the
OUT OF SERVICE
placard on the keyboard.

Sixty seconds later Slaton was back on the street. It was time to leave Stockholm. With each passing hour Inspector Sanderson, or someone like him, would start making connections. When that happened his ability to move within the city would be severely constrained. Fortunately, there was no longer a need for him to be here. Slaton had a new destination, albeit ground that would be difficult to cover. His immediate need—to separate cleanly with no hint of where he was heading. Walking down a cobblestone sidewalk under an azure sky, his pace seemed to quicken with every step.

FOURTEEN

That a second shooting had occurred in the space of forty-eight hours, in the same block of picturesque waterfront, generated a storm of critique around Stockholm. The press was swarming both the scene and police headquarters. The mayor was asking questions. The prime minister of Sweden had even called the National Police commissioner to his luxurious carpet for an explanation. All of this rolled downhill, of course, to land at the well-worn Birkenstocks of Arne Sanderson.

He spent an hour at the scene watching his men string yellow tape around the shambles of yet another Strandvägen café. One look at the victims confirmed what Sanderson already suspected—these were the two men being sought in relation to Friday’s shootings, the same pair who had chased Christine Palmer across the waterfront. Initial eyewitness interviews, including Elmander from his hospital bed, made it clear who they should now be looking for—the American stonemason.
Two steps forward, one step back
, Sanderson mused.
Progress in a sense
. He gave careful directions to the on-scene forensic team, and was back at the station by one that afternoon. He had not yet reached his desk when Sergeant Blix intercepted him.

“Assistant commissioner wants to see you, boss.”

Sanderson rolled his eyes, but did not feign surprise. “God, not again. How am I supposed to get anything done? While I’ve got you, Gunnar, check with Metro for any new surveillance footage on today’s disaster—I know it’s a Sunday but get them out of bed. This one looks a lot like the last, and I’m tired of spinning our wheels.”

“Ah … right,” Blix said. “I’ll get on it.” The sergeant turned away, and Sanderson watched him go with a sense that something wasn’t right.

He approached Sjoberg’s open door with caution, and saw the assistant commissioner frowning at his laptop. His mild exterior had acquired new edges, reddened eyes and a furrowed brow—the sea captain was enduring some heavy weather. Sanderson supposed he was getting heat from above. Sjoberg did not like high-profile cases, and this one was nearing critical mass.

With his mouth already set in an upside down
U
, Sjoberg’s glare deepened when Sanderson breached the door. “Arne, please come in.”

“I was just down at the waterfront,” Sanderson began. “It’s a damned war zone out there. Has National given us—”

“Arne,” Sjoberg interrupted, “please sit down. And close the door, would you?”

A cautious Sanderson did both. “Is something wrong?” he asked. “Is it Elmander? Has he taken a turn for the worse?”

“No, no,” Sjoberg said, “nothing like that. He’s stable.”

“I’m told it might have been serious the way he was bleeding. It was a damned good decision that dispatcher made to scramble EMTs along with the uniformed backup. She should be put up for a citation, if you ask me.”

Sjoberg said nothing.

Sanderson asked again, “What’s wrong? Have I botched something up?”

Sjoberg reached into his desk and pulled out a mobile phone. Sanderson’s mobile phone.

“Thank God! I’ve been looking for that all morning. Where on earth was it?”

“In the unmarked department car you were using yesterday.”

Sanderson reached out and took his phone.

“An officer found it this morning,” said Sjoberg. “It was in the ashtray.”

Sanderson pocketed his phone and said, “Silly of me—that’s where I keep it in my car.”

“But it wasn’t your car.”

Sanderson didn’t like the trajectory of the conversation. “What are you trying to say?”

“I think you know.”

“You can take that idea and—” he squelched the words rising in his throat, words sure to earn a reprimand.

“Friday I took a call from Dr. Samuels, Arne. Your preliminary evaluation was inconclusive, and he feels he must follow up. Unfortunately, you haven’t done your part.”

A silent Sanderson watched Sjoberg steel himself with a deep breath.

“I’m afraid my hands are tied. You’re off the case, effective immediately.”

“What?”

“I’ve booked you in with Samuels tomorrow morning—nine o’clock sharp.”

Sanderson was incredulous. It had all started this summer with a regular physical examination. Sanderson had mentioned that he’d seemed forgetful lately, and the department physician began asking questions. His interest came acute on learning that Sanderson’s mother had suffered from early-onset Alzheimer’s. Now it had come to this. A few misplaced bills had snowballed into a false crisis.

“First of all,” Sanderson insisted, “I would expect a little privacy when it comes to consultations with my doctor. Second, what gives you the right to—”

“To what? To reschedule your Alzheimer’s evaluation because you forgot about another appointment?”

Sanderson shot from his chair. “I did not forget! I was called unexpectedly into court to give evidence!”

Sjoberg stood and met him face to face. “Do you know
why
your mobile was found earlier? It was ringing. Ringing because Sergeant Elmander, who is now in the hospital, called you to ask for instructions. The man he was tailing on your orders engaged in a conversation with a suspicious character, and Elmander wanted advice on how to proceed. He needed to talk to his superior, and his superior was nowhere to be found!”

Sanderson turned away, stung by the idea that he’d let a fellow officer down. He said nothing for a moment, then, “This is ridiculous. Tell me you’ve never misplaced your mobile.”

“Arne … I’m sorry. There’s probably nothing to this, but I can’t take the chance. This inquiry has become very high profile.”

Sanderson’s urge was to battle, but he knew it would only work against him. He asked quietly, “Who will take over?”

“Anna Forsten from National.”

“A rising star, that one. Ambitious, telegenic. Not suffering from dementia.”

“Please … let’s not make this more difficult than it is. SÄPO has gotten involved. The terrorism angle is getting a lot of play.”

“It’s not terrorism,” Sanderson said quietly. “At least not in the way SÄPO thinks about it.”

“Which brings me to my next point—you’ve got a meeting after lunch with all of them. I want you to get them up to speed on everything we have so far.”

Sanderson sank back into his chair. Sjoberg did the same.

“Please understand my position, Arne. I know this can’t be easy for you.”

Sanderson stared blankly at a display of knotted ropes under glass hanging on the far wall. “And after I brief them? Then what?”

“You’ll be on medical leave until I have an evaluation from the department physician clearing you for full duty.”

Sanderson forced a quiet calm. “All right. I will go see the doctor, do whatever testing is necessary to clear up this nonsense. But I want to stay involved in this inquiry.”

“I don’t see how—”

“Put me on desk duty, whatever you want to call it.” Sanderson looked across the divide and swallowed his pride. “Paul, please—don’t pull me off this one.”

“I’m sorry, Arne, my hands are tied. The sooner you clear this up, the sooner you’ll be reinstated.” Sjoberg looked at him sympathetically.

It was all Sanderson could do to not leap for the man’s throat. With an exaggerated vitality, he rose and strode to the door.

He was reaching for the handle when Sjoberg said, “Arne—”

Sanderson paused.

“Expand on what you said.”

“About what?”

“About SÄPO being convinced this is terrorism. You think otherwise. Why?”

His answer was some time in coming. “By definition terrorism is violence in the pursuit of political aims. Intimidation of the masses. If you look at these shootings no one has been terrorized. This is something else, more like a gang war in our front yard. Everyone involved seems to be a foreign national, but I don’t see anything directed at Sweden.”

Sjoberg nodded. “Yes, I see your point.”

“We should be working with Interpol and the foreign intelligence services. The Americans, to begin—we have to find out who the hell Edmund Deadmarsh is. The man is clearly at the center of it all, but he’s a damned enigma. All the information we have on him has either been disproved or vaporized in the last twenty-four hours.”

Sanderson kept talking for five minutes, rattling off what was essentially a dress rehearsal for his afternoon meeting. He saw Sjoberg actually taking notes. When he was done, he said, “Anything else?”

“No, Arne, that’s all for now. Carry on.”

FIFTEEN

The man they were looking for was, at that moment, thirty miles southwest on an express train paralleling the E4. The window at Slaton’s shoulder framed an interlaced mesh of freshly turned fields and conifer forest, brown leaves tumbling across land that was done with the business of summer and preparing for another season of survival. The
kidon
noticed none of it, his eyes a blank as they floated over the ever-changing portrait. His lost gaze was in part due to distraction, his thoughts managing the next few hours, but it also served to disengage the passengers around him. Happily, they all seemed similarly inclined, silently grappling ill-timed investments, marital disharmony, or whatever crisis had turned up on the threshold of their lives.

Everyone had problems. It was simply a matter of degree.

The train arrived after an hour in Nyköping, and there Slaton bore a ninety-minute layover at a station-side restaurant, taking espresso and a robust Smörgåstårta of ham, cucumber, and caviar on rye, before stepping onto his connection. The second train arrived at the village of Oxelösund, by the station clock, at 4:21.

Outside the terminal, Slaton stopped to get his bearings. To his right he saw an expansive iron mill fronting the Baltic Sea, acre upon acre of piping and machinery, mountains of ore rising from the scarred ground, all of it burnt rust-red by a windswept sea. Adjacent to the mill were working neighborhoods that had sprung up to house the attendant workforce. The homes reflected the mill—dated and worn, but soldiering on tenaciously in a changing world.

Slaton reckoned what he needed would be in the center of town, and a five-minute walk put him in Oxelösund’s market district, a modest arrangement of shops and restaurants. Turning left onto the main boulevard, Slaton saw a shoe repair shop, its faded sign overlaid by a banner for mobile phone service. Farther on, a sandwich board in the middle of the sidewalk advertised a restaurant’s new menu, traditional fare having given way to pizza and cappuccino. Slaton recognized the commerce of survival, and it was an inclination that suited him well. Unlike Stockholm, strangers here would not be regarded with suspicion. Quite the opposite, they would be welcomed openly for the kronor that might be in their pockets. And the chances of anyone on Oxelösund’s Esplanaden linking Slaton with a rash of terrorism on Stockholm’s Strandvägen? That was a chasm he was more than comfortable with. Better yet, there was probably not a Mossad operative within fifty miles.

On a waning Sunday afternoon the less robust establishments had already closed for the day, but Slaton was lucky to catch the owner of the local outfitter as he was reaching for the sign in his window. Even better, the man steered him to a rack where summer gear had been marked down for quick clearance. Assassins appreciate a bargain like anyone else, although Slaton’s direct reasoning—that he would not soon be forced to steal more money—was less than conventional.

Explaining to the proprietor that he was gearing up for some late-season hiking, Slaton selected a good set of trail boots, two pairs of heavy socks, a small backpack, and a GPS navigation device. From a half-price rack he selected a pair of trousers with multiple pockets down the side of each leg, and paired it with a thick cotton shirt and a rain-resistant jacket of medium thickness. That done, he turned to the main counter and committed to full price for a compact set of Zeiss field glasses and a handful of energy bars. His bill was driven higher by taxes—always the case in Scandinavia—but the owner allowed a reasonable exchange rate. Slaton walked out of the shop four hundred dollars lighter than when he’d gone in.