Lars Kepler - The Sandman

She tells him to stop, but he roughly pulls off her underwear, leaving red marks on her hips.

‘Anders, I—’

‘Don’t look at me,’ he interrupts.

‘Sorry...’

She doesn’t resist as he ties her tightly, a bit too tightly. It’s possible that the drink has made her less sensitive than usual. He ties the rope round one of the bedposts, and forces her thighs apart.

‘Ow,’ she whimpers.

He fetches the blindfold and she shakes her head as he pulls it down over her face. She tries to pull loose, tugging at the ropes so hard that her heavy breasts swing.

‘You’re so beautiful,’ he whispers.

It’s four o’clock by the time they finish and he loosens the ropes. Petra is silent, her body trembling as she massages her sore wrists. Her hair is sweaty, her cheeks streaked with tears, and the blindfold has slipped down round her neck. He had stuffed the remnants of her underwear in her mouth when she wanted to stop, didn’t want to go on.

Saga abandons any attempt to sleep at five o’clock. Ninety minutes left. Then they’re coming to get her. Her body feels heavy as she pulls on her jogging outfit and leaves the flat.

She jogs a couple of blocks, then speeds up down towards Söder Mälarstrand.

There’s no traffic this early.

She runs along the silent streets. The fresh snow is so airy she can barely feel it under her feet.

She knows she can still change her mind, but today’s the day she’s going to give up her freedom.

Södermalm is asleep. The sky is black above the glow of the streetlamps.

Saga runs quickly, thinking about the fact that she hasn’t been given an assumed identity, that she’s being admitted under her name and doesn’t have to remember anything but her medication. Intramuscular injections of Risperdal, she repeats silently to herself. Oxascand for the side effects, Stesolid and Heminevrin.

Pollock had explained that it didn’t matter what her diagnosis was: ‘You still know exactly what medication you’re on,’ he said. ‘It’s a matter of life or death; the medication is what helps you survive.’

An empty bus swings into the deserted, well-lit terminal for the Finland ferries.

‘Trilafon, eight milligrams three times a day,’ she whispers as she runs. ‘Cipramil thirty milligrams, Seroxat twenty milligrams...’

Just before she reaches the Photography Museum, Saga changes direction and carries on up the steep steps leading away from Stadsgårdsleden. She stops at the highest point of Katarinavägen and looks out across Stockholm as she goes through Joona’s rules once more.

I have to keep to myself, say little, and only in short sentences. I have to mean what I say and only tell the truth.

That’s all, she thinks, and keeps on running towards Hornsgatan.

Over the last kilometre she speeds up again and tries to sprint the last stretch along Tavastgatan to her building.

Saga runs up the stairs, kicks her shoes off on the hall mat and goes straight into the bathroom for a shower.

It feels strange to be able to dry herself so quickly afterwards without all that long hair. All she has to do is rub a towel over her head.

She pulls on the most basic underwear she owns. A white sport bra and a pair of pants she only wears when she’s got her period. A pair of jeans, a black T-shirt and a washed-out tracksuit top.

She doesn’t usually feel worried, but all of a sudden she has butterflies in her stomach.

It’s almost twenty past six. They’re picking her up in eleven minutes. She puts her watch back on the bedside table, next to her glass of water. Where she’s going, time is dead.

First she’ll be going to Kronoberg Prison, but she’ll only be there a couple of hours before she’s transported to Katrineholm. Then she’ll spend a day or so at Karsudden Hospital before the decision to transfer her to the secure psychiatric unit at Löwenströmska Hospital is put into action.

She walks slowly through the flat, switching off lights and pulling out a few plugs, before going into the hall and putting on her green parka.

It’s not such a difficult mission, she thinks once more.

Jurek Walter is an elderly man, probably heavily medicated and not really with it.

She knows he’s guilty of terrible things, but all she has to do is stay calm, wait for him to approach her, wait for him to say something that could be useful.

Either it will work, or it won’t.

It’s time to leave now.

Saga turns off the lamp in the hall and goes out into the stairwell.

She’s thrown out all the perishable goods from the fridge, but she hasn’t asked anyone to look after the flat, water the flowers and take care of the post.

Saga double-locks the door, then goes downstairs to the main entrance. She feels a flutter of anxiety as she sees the Prison Service van waiting in the dark street.

She opens the door and gets in beside Nathan Pollock.

‘It’s dangerous to pick up hitch-hikers,’ she says, trying to smile.

‘Did you get any sleep?’

‘A bit,’ she replies, and fastens her seat belt.

‘I know you already know this,’ Pollock says, glancing at her. ‘But I’m still going to remind you not to try to manipulate him into revealing any information.’

He puts the van in gear and it pulls out into the silent street.

‘That’s almost the hardest thing,’ Saga says. ‘What if he only wants to talk about football? What if he doesn’t talk at all?’

‘That will just be how it is, there’ll be nothing you can do about it.’

‘But Felicia might only survive a few more days...’

‘That’s not your responsibility,’ Pollock replies. ‘This infiltration is a gamble, we all know that, we’re agreed on that... we can’t second-guess the results. What you’re doing is entirely separate from the ongoing preliminary investigation. We’re going to carry on talking to Mikael Kohler-Frost, follow up all the old lines of inquiry, and—’

‘But no one believes... no one believes we’ll be able to save Felicia unless Jurek starts talking to me.’

‘You mustn’t think like that,’ Pollock says.

‘OK, I’ll stop now.’ She smiles.

‘Good.

She starts tapping her feet, and raises her arm to shield a sudden sneeze. Her pale-blue eyes are still glassy, as if part of her had taken a step back to observe the situation from a distance.

Dark buildings flit past as they drive on.

Saga puts her keys, wallet and other loose possessions in a Prison Service personal effects bag.

Before they reach Kronoberg Prison, Pollock hands her the fibre-optic microphone inside a silicon capsule and a small portion of butter.

‘Digestion of fatty foods takes longer,’ he says. ‘But I still don’t think you should ever wait more than four hours.

She opens the pack of butter, swallows the contents, then examines the microphone in the soft capsule. It looks like an insect in amber. She straightens up, pops the capsule in her mouth, tips her head back and swallows. It hurts her throat and she can feel herself breaking out into a sweat as it slowly slips down.

The morning is still black as midnight and all the lights are on in the women’s section of Kronoberg Prison.

Saga takes two steps forward and stops when they tell her to. She tries to shut herself off from the world around her and not look at anyone.

The radiators are ticking with the heat.

Nathan Pollock puts her bag of personal effects on the counter and hands over Saga’s papers. He is given a written receipt and then disappears.

From now on she will have to cope on her own, no matter what happens.

The automated gates whirr briefly, then fall abruptly silent.