Lars Kepler - The Nightmare

“I’ve led this entire effort for more than a year,” she’s pleading. “I’ve been on stakeout for twenty-four hours at a time-”

“This is something entirely different,” her boss says with a smile.

“Please, please… You can’t just bypass me again!”

“Who says I’m doing that? A technician from CID is seriously wounded and an investigator has been attacked. That apartment could have exploded and-”

“I know. I need to get over there now-”

“I’ve already sent Goran Stone.”

“Goran Stone? I’ve been here for three years and I haven’t closed a case yet! This is my field of expertise! Goran knows nothing at all about-”

“He did a good job with the underground tunnel case.”

Saga swallows hard and then she replies, “That was also my case. I found the link to-”

“But it got dangerous and I still believe I made the right call.”

Saga’s cheeks turn red. She struggles to collect herself. “I can do this. This is what I’ve been trained for-”

“Yes, but I’ve made a different call.”

Verner sighs and props his feet up on the wastebasket next to his desk.

“You know my record. Affirmative action had nothing to do with my being accepted here,” Saga says, as calmly as she’s able. “I wasn’t part of a quota. I was top of my class in all the tests. I was best at sharpshooting. I have investigated two hundred and ten different-”

“I just don’t want anything to happen to you,” Verner says softly, and his coal-black eyes meet hers.

“But I’m not a doll, I’m not a princess, or some elf!”

“But you are so… so…”

Verner lifts his hands helplessly.

“All right, what the hell, let’s do it. You be the lead preliminary investigator. But Goran Stone is part of it and I want him to keep an eye on you.”

“Thanks,” she says, relieved.

“But this is a big deal. Remember that,” he warns. “Penelope Fernandez’s sister has been killed execution-style and Penelope is missing-”

“And we’ve noted increased activity among the left-wing extremist groups,” Saga says. “We want to know if the Revolutionary Front is behind the theft of explosives in Vaxholm.”

“The most important thing is if there is an immediate threat,” Verner emphasizes.

“Right now the radicals are sounding more threatening,” Saga continues, a little too eagerly. “I’ve just been in contact with Dante Larsson at Military Intelligence and Security, and he says there will probably be acts of sabotage this summer.”

“Right now just concentrate on Penelope Fernandez,” Verner demands.

“Of course,” Saga answers swiftly. “Of course.”

“The technical investigation might be a cooperative effort between the National Criminal Investigation Department and us, but, basically, keep them out of it.”

Saga nods and waits a moment before she asks one last question.

“I want to bring this investigation to its conclusion. It’s important to me because-”

“Right now, you’re in the saddle,” he says. “But at this moment we don’t know where it’s leading or where it will end. We don’t even know how it began.”

Along Rekylgatan in the town of Vasteras, there’s a shiny white apartment building. The people in the area enjoy being close to Lillhagen School, the soccer fields and tennis courts.

A young man is leaving from Door 11. He’s carrying a motorcycle helmet. His name is Stefan Bergkvist and he’s almost seventeen years old. He attends an automotive vocational school and lives with his mother and her partner. He has long blond hair and sports a silver ring in his lower lip. He’s wearing a black T-shirt, saggy jeans ripped at the cuffs from being walked on, and skate shoes.

In no hurry, he saunters to the parking lot. He hangs his helmet on the bar of his motocross cycle and slowly drives down the sidewalk next to the building. He continues alongside the double train track, then underneath the Norrleden viaduct and into a large industrial area. He finally stops near a construction shed covered in silver-and-blue graffiti.

Stefan and his friends like to meet here. They compete on their own motocross track that they built along the train-track embankment. They drive over various sidings and then circle back along Terminal Road. They started coming here after they stumbled upon a key to the construction shed buried in thistles by the back wall. The shed hadn’t been touched for ten years or more, forgotten after all the renovation work.

Stefan climbs off his motorcycle, retrieves the hidden key, and unlocks the padlock underneath its cap. He pushes aside the steel boom and shoves open the wooden door to the shed, closing the door behind him. He checks the time on his phone and sees that his mother has called. He doesn’t realize that he’s under surveillance from across the train tracks. A sixty-year-old man idles near a Dumpster that belongs to a nearby industrial building. He’s wearing a gray suede jacket and light brown trousers.

Stefan walks over to the small kitchen and picks up a bag of chips lying in the sink. He pours the last crumbs into his palm and licks them up.

Light enters the shed from two windows covered with bars. The glass is dirty.

Stefan is waiting for his friends. He flips through an old magazine found among others scattered on a drawing table. On the front cover, a headline screams: JUST THINK! PEOPLE PAY ME TO LICK MY PUSSY!

The man in the suede jacket saunters from his spot and passes the high lattice poles with their looping electric lines. He crosses the brown grass on the embankment and walks over its double train tracks. He continues until he reaches Stefan’s motorcycle. He releases the kick-stand and quietly wheels the motorcycle to the front.

He glances around once before he lays the motorcycle on its side and shoves it with his foot until it blocks the door. He opens the gas tank and lets the gasoline run out. It leaks underneath the shed.

Stefan is still flipping through the magazine. He looks at the faded photos of women in jail. A blond woman is sitting with her legs open, showing her pussy to a jailer. Stefan is immersed in the picture until he’s interrupted by a rustling sound outside. He thinks he hears someone walking around and closes the magazine quickly.

The man in the suede jacket has pulled out the red gasoline can stashed by the boys in the brush next to the shed. He now begins to empty it all around the perimeter. Only when he reaches the back does he hear the shouts from within. The boy is banging on the door and is trying to get it open. He hears the boy’s footsteps before the boy’s face appears at one of the dirty windows.

“Hey, open the door! This isn’t a joke!” the boy says in a high voice.

The man in the suede jacket continues around the shed, emptying the last of the gasoline. Then he puts the container back where it had been hidden.

“What are you doing?” the boy yells.

He then throws his whole body against the door and tries to kick it open, but it doesn’t give. He tries to call his mother on his cell phone. Her phone is off. His heart is thudding with panic as he goes from one filthy window to the next.

“Have you lost your mind?” he yells.

As the boy recognizes the stinking smell of gasoline vapor, terror seizes his body and his stomach cramps.

“Hey! Hello?” he yells with fear in his voice. “You know I’m in here!”

The man takes a match from his pocket.

“What do you want? Please! Tell me what you want!”

“It’s not your fault,” the man says. “But a nightmare must be reaped.” He hasn’t raised his voice at all. He strikes the match.