Jo Nesbo - The Thirst

Not since the hiss of the hydraulics.

Not a sound.

That was what was wrong.

She hadn’t heard the door close.

Penelope didn’t have time to turn round, didn’t have time to put her hand in her bag, didn’t have time to do anything before an arm swung round her, locking her arms and pressing her chest so hard that she couldn’t breathe. Her bag fell onto the stairs and was the only thing she managed to hit as she kicked out wildly around her. She screamed soundlessly into the hand that was clamped over her mouth. It smelt of soap.

‘There, there, Penelope,’ a voice whispered in her ear. ‘In space, no one c-can hear you scream, you know.’ He made the whooshing sound.

She heard a noise from down near the front door, and for a moment hoped someone was coming, before realising that it was her bag, her keys – and the pepper spray – sailing through the railings and hitting the floor downstairs.

‘What is it?’ Rakel asked, without turning round or stopping chopping the onion for the salad. She had seen from the reflection in the window above the kitchen worktop that Harry had stopped laying the table and had gone over to the living-room window.

‘I thought I heard something,’ he said.

‘Probably Oleg and Helga.’

‘No, it was something else. It was … something else.’

Rakel sighed. ‘Harry, you’ve only just got home, and already you’re climbing the walls. Look at what it’s doing to you.’

‘Just this one case, then it’s over.’ Harry walked over to the worktop and kissed the back of her neck. ‘How are you feeling?’

‘Fine,’ she lied. Her body ached, her head ached. Her heart ached.

‘You’re lying,’ he said.

‘Am I good liar?’

He smiled and massaged her neck.

‘If I ever disappeared,’ she said, ‘would you look for someone new?’

‘Look for? That sounds tiring. It was bad enough trying to persuade you.’

‘Someone younger. Someone you could have kids with. I wouldn’t be jealous, you know.’

‘You’re not that good a liar, darling.’

She smiled and let go of the knife, leaned her head forward and felt his warm, dry fingers massage the aches away, giving her a break from the pain.

‘I love you,’ she said.

‘Mm?’

‘I love you. Especially if you make me a cup of tea.’

‘Aye aye, boss.’

Harry let go and Rakel stood there waiting. Hoping. But no, the pain came back again, punching her like a fist.

Harry stood with both hands on the kitchen worktop, staring at the kettle. Waiting for the low rumble. Which would get louder and louder until the whole thing shook. Like a scream. He could hear screams. Silent screams that filled his head, filled the room, filled his body. He shifted his weight. Screams that wanted to get out, that had to get out. Was he going mad? He looked up at the glass of the window. All he could see in the darkness was his own reflection. There he was. He was out there. He was waiting for them. He was singing. Come out and play!

Harry closed his eyes.

No, he wasn’t waiting for them . He was waiting for him, for Harry. Come out and play!

He could feel that she was different from the others. Penelope Rasch wanted to live. She was big and strong. And the keys to her flat lay three floors below them. He could feel her relinquishing the air from her lungs and tightened his grasp round her chest. Like a boa constrictor. A muscle tightening a little more each time the prey lets air out of its lungs. He wanted her alive. Alive and warm. With this wonderful desire to survive. Which he would break, little by little. But how? Even if he managed to drag her all the way downstairs to get the key, there was a risk that one of the neighbours would hear them. He felt his rage growing. He should have skipped Penelope Rasch. Should have taken that decision three days ago when he discovered that she’d changed the locks. But then he had been lucky, had made contact with her on Tinder, she had agreed to meet at that discreet place, and he had thought that it was going to work out after all. But a small, quiet place also means that the few people who are there pay more attention to you. One customer had stared at him a little too hard. And he had panicked, had decided to get out of there, and had rushed things. Penelope had turned him down and walked out.

He had been prepared for that eventuality and had the car nearby. He had driven fast. Not so fast that he risked being stopped by the police, but fast enough to reach the cluster of trees before she emerged from the metro. She hadn’t turned round when he was following her, nor when she got her keys out of her bag and went in. He had managed to stick his foot in the gap before the door clicked shut.

He felt a shudder run through her body and knew that she would soon lose consciousness. His erection rubbed against her buttocks. A broad, fleshy woman’s arse. His mother had had a similar backside.

He could feel the boy coming, eager to take over, and he was screaming inside, wanting to be fed. Now. Here.

‘I love you,’ he whispered in her ear. ‘I really do, Penelope, and that’s why I’m going to make an honest woman of you before we go any further.’

She went limp in his arms and he hurried, holding her up with one arm as he fumbled in his jacket pocket with the other.

Penelope Rasch came to, and realised that she must have passed out. It had got darker. She was floating, and there was something tugging and pulling at her arms, something cutting into her wrists. She looked up. Handcuffs. And something on one of her ring fingers, shimmering dully.

Then she felt the pain between her legs and looked down just as he pulled his hand out of her.

His face was partially shaded, but she saw him put his fingers to his nose and sniff. She tried to scream, but couldn’t.

‘Good, my darling,’ he said. ‘You’re clean, so we can begin.’

He unbuttoned his jacket and shirt, pushed his shirt aside, revealing his chest. A tattoo became visible, a face screaming as soundlessly as her. He was thrusting his chest out, as if the tattoo had something to say to her. Unless it was the other way round. Perhaps she was the one on display. On display to this snarling image of the devil.

He felt for something in his jacket pocket, pulled it out and showed her. Black. Iron. Teeth.

Penelope managed to get some air. And screamed.

‘That’s right, darling,’ he laughed. ‘Just like that. Music to work to.’

Then he opened his mouth wide and inserted the teeth.

And they echoed and sang between the walls: his laughter and her screaming.

There was a buzz of voices and international news broadcasts on the big television screens that hung on the walls of VG ’s offices, where the head of news and the duty manager were working on updates to the online edition.

Mona Daa and the photographer were standing behind the head of news’s chair, studying the image on his console.

‘I tried everything, but I just couldn’t make him look creepy,’ the photographer sighed.

And Mona realised that he was right, Hallstein Smith simply looked far too jovial, standing there with the full moon above him.

‘It’s still working,’ the head of news said. ‘Look at the traffic. Nine hundred per minute now.’

Mona saw the counter to the right of the screen.

‘We’ve got a winner,’ her boss said. ‘We’ll move it to the top of the website. Maybe we should ask the night editor if she wants to change the front page.’

The photographer raised his clenched fist towards Mona and she dutifully touched her knuckles to his. Her father claimed it was Tiger Woods and his caddie who had popularised the gesture. They had switched from the obligatory high five after the caddie had injured the golfer’s hand by high-fiving him a bit too enthusiastically when Woods pitched the sixteenth hole in the final round of the Masters. It was one of her father’s greatest regrets that Mona’s congenital hip defect meant she could never be the great golfer he had hoped. She, on the other hand, had hated golf from the first time he took her to a driving range, but because the standard was so comically low she had won everything there was to win with a swing that was so short and ugly that the coach of the national junior team refused to select her on the grounds that it was better to get beaten with a team that at least looked like it was playing golf. So she had dumped her golf clubs in the basement at her dad’s and headed for the weight room instead, where no one had any objections to the way she lifted 120 kilos off the floor. The number of kilos, the number of blows, the number of clicks. Success was measured in numbers, anyone who claimed otherwise was just scared of the truth and seriously believed that delusion was an essential fact of life for the average person. But right now she was more interested in the comments section. Because something had struck her when Smith said the vampirist didn’t care about the risks. That it was possible he might read VG . That he might post some sort of comment online.