Ларс Кеплер - The Rabbit Hunter

Saga hurries off in the other direction, along the side of the building, and glances back to see that the woman has stopped on the path.

Saga runs across an open space, away from the studio and towards the building where she met Grace earlier.

The entrance is lit up but all the windows are dark. Saga walks up to the door and tries it, but it’s locked. She looks in through the glass, sees the dark cafeteria and the glow of the snack-vending machine.

She startles when she hears an unsettling noise behind her — like bare feet running across a wet floor — and quickly looks around.

There’s no one there. Everything is peaceful: the stillness of the pond, the park with its dripping leaves.

Saga hurries around the building and walks across the grass towards a park bench next to a large rhododendron, then stops to figure out which window is Grace’s.

She hears manic laughter and darts into the shadows, then sees the woman with the wig hiding behind a tree, waving in her direction.

Saga stands motionless and watches as the woman smiles and turns away, rubs her nose hard, then wanders off into the park.

Saga quickly drags the bench under the window, then climbs up and tries to see into Grace’s room.

Between the curtains she can just make out a bedside table with a porcelain musical box on it.

Saga barely has time to register the figure rushing towards her before she feels a jolt of pain in her back, like the bite of a raging dog. Her legs buckle and she tumbles sideways, hitting her chest on the arm of the bench and letting out a groan.

Her back is throbbing painfully, her body is jerking spas-modically, and she doesn’t know how she ended up on the ground.

She opens her eyes and stares up at the dark, rain-filled sky, assuming she’s lost consciousness.

There’s another burst of pain, like someone kicking her repeatedly in the side, and her vision fades, but she can feel herself being dragged by the legs across the path and out onto the wet grass.

Saga gasps for air, opens her eyes and sees Mark, the guard from earlier, leaning over her with his Taser in his hand.

He’s breathing hard and has a fevered look in his eyes as he stares at her.

She tries to raise one hand to push him off, but has no strength in her muscles.

‘I’m a big boy, a nice boy too, but the rules say I have to check if you’re armed.’

Saga’s heart starts to beat faster as he unzips her jacket. He finds her phone and throws it hard against the nearest tree. It shatters, and the pieces fly out across the grass.

He leans over her again and shoves his cold hand under her shirt, beneath her bra and pinches one of her nipples hard.

‘Nothing here,’ he mumbles, and pulls his hand out again.

He’s breathing hard through his half-open mouth as he holds the Taser to her neck and unbuttons her jeans. She manages to raise her right hand and grab the sleeve of his uniform, and tugs at it feebly.

‘Stop,’ she snarls.

‘I need to look for concealed weapons,’ he says.

Mark starts to pull down her jeans and underwear, but then his radio crackles. He rests one hand on her chest and presses, forcing the air out of her lungs as he stands up.

‘We’ve got an intruder — get the police out here,’ he says, walking into the light beneath one of the lamps.

Saga tries to pull her trousers back up as she sees two guards running towards them from between the buildings, and two nurses approaching anxiously from the other direction.

The day after Joona arrested Oscar von Creutz a short custody hearing is held in Police Headquarters.

Oscar sits in silence between his defence lawyers, looking up at the high windows. The sun emerges from behind the clouds and makes the dust particles in the air sparkle.

As if from a great distance he hears the prosecutor request that he be remanded in custody on suspicion of kidnapping, attempted murder and aggravated assault.

They’re serious charges, but he knows he can be held only if there’s a risk he might reoffend, destroy evidence or attempt to evade justice.

When the court decides that Oscar should be granted bail he hides his smile behind his hand. It occurs to him that he ought to say thank you, but he doesn’t. He just walks towards the exit with his lawyers.

‘Now you don’t have to worry about this any more,’ one of them smiles when they stop in the doorway.

‘Thanks, Jacob,’ Oscar replies quietly, shaking their hands.

His legal team have already put together a defence plan if the prosecutor can’t be persuaded to drop the preliminary investigation.

During Oscar’s first meeting with his lawyer, a doctor was present, and took eight blood samples from him. They weren’t going to be sent to a laboratory, but could later be used during any ensuing trial.

Seeing as they know precisely which substances the prosecutor’s office tests for, they’ll base their defence on the substances the prosecution is guaranteed to have missed.

The fact that those substances were never in Oscar’s blood is irrelevant.

The plan is to fabricate a convincing picture of illness, where different doctors have prescribed different medications without checking the side-effects and their interaction. The lawyers will be able to prove that Oscar’s temporarily confused and erratic behaviour was the result of that interaction.

Oscar doesn’t care about the trial. He’s paid to be freed because he can’t just sit in a cage waiting to be shot.

Prison can’t offer him any protection.

That’s why he’s thinking of leaving the country and staying away as long as it takes for the police to catch the murderer.

But Oscar doesn’t know that the Rabbit Hunter is waiting for him outside Police Headquarters, watching as he walks away from his lawyers.

He doesn’t notice someone follow him, walk past him through the park, and overhear him call a taxi to the Silja Line terminal in Värtahamnen.

During the drive to the harbour Oscar books a cruise on the M/S Silja Symphony , pays for the taxi in cash, then checks in and goes on board.

He finds his cabin in the back, a suite with sloping glass windows between sea and sky. He locks the door carefully and gives the handle an extra tug just to make sure. As soon as he gets to Helsinki he’s planning to catch the ferry to Tallinn, then hire a car and drive south through eastern Europe, all the way down to southern Turkey.

Oscar gets up and opens the minibar door, which rattles with bottles. He takes out two small brown bottles of whisky, fills a glass and then sits by the window and looks down at the long line of vehicles slowly rolling onto the ferry.

Rabbits are nervous creatures. They huddle up; sitting motionless they’ll remain unseen, but they can’t handle it if the hunter stops to wait them out.

The silence makes them panic and start running, because they think they’ve been spotted.

The Rabbit Hunter goes down into the garage beneath Rådhusparken, opens the boot of the car, and makes sure he can’t be seen on any security cameras as he packs a black overnight bag with weapons, a change of clothes, vinyl gloves, wet-wipes, bin bags, tape, box cutters and a special crowbar for opening security doors.

Taking the bag with him, he leaves the garage and walks down to Fleming Street, where he catches a taxi for the ferry terminal and buys a cheap ticket under a false name.

He’s been given another chance to stop Oscar, but knows there’s still a lot that could go wrong. There are always unforeseeable factors. The plan is to get off the ferry before it leaves, but Oscar may be sitting in a crowd of people in one of the restaurants when the boat leaves. In that case he’d have to go with him to Finland in order to get the job done.