The Man Who Watched Women (72 page)

Sebastian could no longer feel the pain. He felt nothing. He crawled and crawled, but it seemed as if he was moving only a millimetre at a time.

It would all be over at any second.

As Hinde raised the knife, a voice suddenly came from the doorway.

Sebastian thought it looked as if Billy was standing there.

Billy. What was he doing here?

He heard a shot and saw Hinde fall backwards.

Then everything went black.

Sebastian didn't remember anything about the ambulance, his arrival at the hospital, or the operation. Not a thing. The first thing he became aware of, after seeing Hinde fall backwards, was opening his eyes as he came round. His wounds were extremely painful, and some overenthusiastic doctor was telling him how incredibly lucky he had been, before going into detail about the injuries he had actually sustained, and how much more serious the consequences could have been. Sebastian stopped listening.

He was alive and he was going to recover; that was all he needed to know.

They carried out the usual checks. Then Vanja and Torkel came in. Asked how he was feeling. Filled in the gaps between the stabbing and now.

‘Have you had to put up with a lot of crap?' Sebastian asked Torkel, who looked exhausted. He probably hadn't slept at all.

‘Not yet. But the day has only just begun.'

‘Sorry.'

‘I'll survive.' Torkel shrugged. ‘Vanja is fine, we've got Ralph Svensson and Roland Johansson, and Hinde is dead. You know how things work in the police service. The way you get there doesn't really matter. It's the result that counts.'

‘So you got Roland?'

‘Yes, in another stolen car on his way back to Gothenburg.' Torkel paused; he seemed to be wondering whether to go on. ‘And you remember Trolle Hermansson?' he said in a more subdued tone of voice.

Sebastian adjusted his position in the bed. He hadn't expected Trolle's name to come up. Not now. When it was all over. When he was safe. And Torkel sounded so serious.

‘Yes?'

‘We found his body. In the Toyota.'

‘Fuck.'

Torkel shook his head wearily. ‘He must have been working on some kind of private surveillance or something. He had no idea what he was getting into.'

Sebastian nodded feebly. That was true enough. Trolle had had no idea what he was getting into when he decided to help Sebastian.

‘Poor bastard.'

‘Yes …'

There wasn't much else to say. The case was closed. It was all they had had in common this time. It would probably be quite a while before they saw each other again. Both Sebastian and Torkel knew that.

‘I need to go back to the office to finish things off,' Torkel said, waving vaguely in the direction of the door. He turned to Vanja. ‘Would you like a lift?'

‘I'm going to stay here for a while.'

‘Okay. Take care, Sebastian. See you soon.'

A stock phrase.

Which meant nothing.

Torkel left the room, closing the door behind him. Vanja went and fetched a chair; Sebastian watched her with curiosity as she sat down by his bed.

‘I wanted to thank you.'

‘There's no need.'

‘I heard you. On the landing. You offered to take my place.'

‘Yes.'

‘Why?'

Sebastian shrugged. It was painful. He winced. ‘Because I enjoy charging in like a knight in shining armour.'

Vanja smiled and stood up. She leaned over and gave him a big hug. ‘Thank you,' she whispered.

Sebastian couldn't answer. Didn't want to. He wanted to freeze this moment forever. This was what he had been yearning for. For months. Longer than that, to be honest. How long was it since anyone had shown him genuine affection? Ellinor, yes, but she was … Ellinor. He hugged Vanja back. For slightly too long, but she didn't seem to mind.

She was smiling at him again as she sat down.

Sebastian exhaled as slowly as he could. The hug had been very painful, but it had been well worth it.

‘So what are you going to do now?' Vanja asked.

‘Have you seen that slightly older nurse who …'

She gave him a push. That hurt too. He wondered if there was anything he could do that didn't hurt.

‘I meant as far as work goes.'

‘I don't know.'

Vanja nodded and glanced down at her hands, then she looked up at him, her eyes full of sincerity. ‘I wouldn't mind working with you again.'

‘Really?'

‘Yes.'

‘That means a lot to me.'

He held her gaze, hoping she could see that he really meant it.

Vanja's telephone rang. The moment, if there had been one, was gone. She fished her phone out of her pocket and looked at the display. ‘I need to take this.'

She turned away from the bed for a moment as she answered. ‘Hi, Dad … No, I'm at the hospital. Visiting Sebastian … Yes, that Sebastian.'

She flashed him a brief smile. He smiled back. At least, he hoped that was what he was doing. There were so many emotions.

Joy, sorrow, pride, pain.

‘Yes, I was there,' Vanja went on. ‘It's a long story. Can I call you later? … Okay. Love you too.'

She ended the call and put her phone away. ‘That was Dad. He's seen the news about Hinde on the net.'

‘He doesn't know what's happened?'

‘No, and I'm not sure how much to tell him. He worries about me. I want to protect him. And Anna.'

It must run in the family, Sebastian thought. The desire to protect one's nearest and dearest from unpleasant truths. Like him.

‘I'll let you get some rest,' Vanja said, getting to her feet. She picked up the chair and carried it back to its original spot.

‘He's lucky to have you. Your dad,' Sebastian said to her back.

‘I'm lucky to have him. He's the best.'

‘I'm sure he is.'

Vanja headed for the door. She stopped, her hand resting on the handle. As if she was slightly reluctant to go. ‘Okay, I'm off. Take care of yourself.'

‘You too.'

He watched her go. Not in anger. Not after a heated exchange of words. Not after a fight. He made a decision. Whatever Trolle might have dug up about Valdemar, he was never going to use it. He wasn't even going to look at the papers to find out what Valdemar had done. As soon as he got home, he would burn the contents of the carrier bag. Valdemar's secret would die with Trolle.

He turned over. It hurt. Of course. He gazed out of the window. It was just after five o'clock. The sun had been up for about half an hour, and there was no heat in it yet. But it was going to be a beautiful day.

She had asked him what he was going to do.

He knew what he wasn't going to do.

He wasn't going to be her father. Ever. He was going to stop trying. If he played his cards right, he might get to be close to her. Be accepted. Not loved, but perhaps liked.

That was good enough.

He didn't have many things in his life that were good, so it would be stupid to throw this one away.

It would be all right.

He could feel it.

Everything would be all right.

Billy got to work early; he was the first one there. Maya had spent the night at her own place, so there was no real reason for him to stay in bed. He hadn't slept properly anyway.

He had shot a man.

Dead.

He had had no choice, nobody needed to tell him that, even though both Vanja and Torkel had said it immediately afterwards. Billy was absolutely certain that Hinde would have killed Vanja if he hadn't shot him. Had it been necessary to kill him? Impossible to say. Even an injured Hinde would have needed no more than a second to inflict serious injuries on Vanja. Fatal injuries. Billy just couldn't take the risk.

He and Vanja had talked briefly while she was waiting for the ambulance. The first one had taken Sebastian.

They had sorted things out.

A kidnapping and a fatal shooting had turned out to be very effective when it came to resolving conflict.

Suddenly everything else seemed fairly petty.

Unimportant, easily sorted.

He sat down at the computer and started up Ralph's damaged hard drive. Not that there was any real necessity. They had everything they needed on Ralph Svensson: fingerprints, DNA, traces of blood from the victims, the nylon stockings and the collection of press cuttings, not to mention a confession. Nobody would be looking for anything Billy might retrieve from Ralph's computer in order to secure a conviction.

He wasn't doing this for the case.

He was doing it for himself.

Just as it had been when he was worried about Vanja, work was the best way of suppressing those unwelcome thoughts. Thoughts about the shooting. About the fact that he had taken a life. Besides, this was what he was good at. This was what he enjoyed doing. This was where the challenge lay. Where he got results. Maya could say whatever she liked, but it was these skills that had led them to Hinde. Saved Vanja.

Billy had reached the part of the conversation where Hinde told Ralph it was time to move from fantasy to execution. Hinde gave Ralph the names of his victims. One by one. Maria Lie. Jeanette Jansson Nyberg. Katharina Granlund. Gave him their names and addresses.

Meanwhile Ralph reported back on Sebastian's fresh conquests, including Annette Willén. On that occasion the reply from Hinde was almost immediate. She must die that same day. So that the link to Sebastian would become crystal clear. It was a strange feeling, reading the brief, precise lines and knowing that they had led to the deaths of four women.

He carried on reading.

There was a name he recognised.

Anna Eriksson.

Wasn't that …?

In Västerås, Sebastian had asked Billy to help him find an address. For someone called Anna Eriksson. Same name. Admittedly it was fairly common, but it still seemed like a bit of a coincidence. Billy had found the address for Sebastian; now where was it?

He minimised the window from Ralph's hard drive and selected the ‘Västerås' folder from the desktop. Opened it and selected the file that contained all the loose ends that he hadn't been able to link to anything in particular. Including that address.

Storskärsgatan 12.

He looked it up on Eniro. Discovered that Anna Eriksson lived there with Valdemar Lithner.

Lithner.

Hang on.

Vanja's mother was called Anna.

Was Sebastian's Anna Eriksson Vanja's mother?

All the pieces of the puzzle were laid out in front of him, but he couldn't see the whole picture. He approached the problem methodically. Started from the beginning.

Sebastian had been looking for someone called Anna Eriksson.

It turned out that she lived on Storskärsgatan.

Anna Eriksson was Vanja's mother.

Ralph reported Anna Eriksson at Storskärsgatan 12 as a possible victim.

Did that mean Sebastian had slept with her? It had to, surely. At some point, anyway.

Sebastian and Vanja's mother.

Was that why Vanja disliked Sebastian so much?

Billy leaned back, convinced there was more to all this. Why had Sebastian been searching for Anna when he was in Västerås? If he knew she was Vanja's mother, then surely he could simply have asked Vanja about her? But he didn't. What did that mean? He didn't know, or he didn't want to ask Vanja?

Instinctively Billy felt he ought to stop there. Perhaps he should even delete the information he had just discovered relating to Anna Eriksson. Nobody was going to need it, after all. He thought it over for a while. In the end his curiosity got the better of him. He copied the relevant pages onto his computer and deleted them from Ralph's hard drive.

Everything was on the internet – that was what people said. Billy knew it was true. And once the internal investigation started, he would have all the time in the world. Because he would be investigated. Not only had he drawn his gun and fired a shot, it had been a fatal shooting. His conduct would be examined, and he would be cleared of any wrongdoing. And while he was waiting, he would have his little project.

Ellinor woke just before six. Sebastian wasn't home. It looked as if he'd been out all night. His side of the bed was untouched. Ellinor stayed where she was. She didn't really need to get up; she had taken the whole week off work, and no one was waiting for her.

But she was waiting for someone.

She reached over to the bedside table and picked up her phone. Called Sebastian's mobile. He didn't answer. He hadn't answered yesterday evening either. The last time she tried it had been after one o'clock in the morning. Where was he? What was he doing? There was no way she would be able to go back to sleep, so she got up, pulled on one of his shirts and went into the kitchen. Filled the kettle and switched it on. Made herself two substantial sandwiches of cottage cheese and tomato while she waited for it to boil. Made herself a cup of tea and fetched the paper from the hallway before settling down with her breakfast. She glanced out of the window and found herself staring at the guttering on the building opposite. She hadn't known Sebastian very long, but he didn't seem to be the kind of man who worked all night. So where was he? Why hadn't he called, or picked up when she called him?

Was he with another woman?

He had spoken about someone called Hinde on the phone before he disappeared yesterday evening. Or spoken to someone called Hinde. Was it a surname? Was it a woman?

Perhaps it was someone who was in need of a friendly, explanatory chat about who belonged to whom, and how wrong it was to try to steal a person who belonged to someone else. Her ex-husband had been unfaithful. Left her.

He was dead now.

But when she thought back to the last couple of days, that didn't really add up. Sebastian had been very persistent; he had made a real effort to get her to be with him. Surely he wouldn't deceive her as soon as she had moved in, as soon as he had got what he wanted? So far he had been nothing but loving.