The condom hung loosely. She pulled it off. Started kissing his cock. He got hard again. She pulled back his foreskin and licked the tip. Kissed his balls. He got rock-hard. She pulled out another condom from the same drawer. JW tried to relax. Took the condom in his own hands. Put it on. Remained lying on his back. Guided her on top of him. She grabbed hold of his cock to put it right.
The smell of latex.
He went flaccid.
She said, “That’s okay. It can happen to any guy.”
JW thought back to something he’d read in the paper two years ago: a list of the most common lies.
21
Mrado was sitting at a table under the vaulted ceilings on the cellar level of Cafe Piastowska, on Tegnergatan. He’d ordered schnitzel Belwederski with sauerkraut and Okocim, Polish beer. He liked the venue. Brick walls and dark wood paneling. A flag with the Polish eagle hung at one of the short ends of the room. Beer ads were glued to the ceiling. Genuine feel to the waitress: middle-aged gray-haired woman with integrity.
He took out pen and paper.
Around him: a racket. It was the weekend. Someone was celebrating their thirtieth birthday-the tables were pushed together to form one long one. The birthday celebrators ordered beer and called down the troubadour from the upstairs level.
A longhaired toothpick with an acoustic guitar attached to a black sash around his neck came down the stairs. Sang a folksy classic with a soft voice. The thirtieth-birthday revelers hooted with joy.
Mrado shut them out. He was tired, had slept worse last night than in the trench in Bosnia.
Was trying to think. Compartmentalize. Analyze. Find leads. In front of him on the table: a ruled notebook. Wrote questions in a column on the left-hand side of the page. What’d Jorge done? Where’d he gone? Who would know where he was? Wrote down probable answers in another column on the right-hand side. The Latino’d asked for a passport; the call’d come from a Swedish pay phone. Conclusion: Jorge hadn’t left the country.
Jorge must’ve planned large parts on his own. In other words, he was on the run, without too many helpers. He wasn’t hiding at his sister’s, probably not at his mother’s. If he was in the Sollentuna area, the Latino was staying indoors at all times. He couldn’t have that much money stashed away, either. According to what Mrado remembered, the blatte ’d been cleaned out worse than Lehman after closing when he’d been locked up at Osteraker one and a half years ago. And now he was hitting up Rado for money, too.
In summation: Jorge was hiding somewhere cheap, in Sweden, probably in the Stockholm area. Alone.
Left in the middle of the page: a column for unanswered questions. Who’d last been in touch with Jorge? Where’d he gone directly after the breakout? Mrado underlined two central words: location now. He hadn’t really gotten anywhere in his search. Figuring out where the blatte was hiding was as easy as completing a jigsaw puzzle of a sky with all blue pieces.
He could wait for Jorge’s call and scare him then. Threaten to hurt the Latino’s sister, his mom. But those weren’t Radovan’s orders. Instead: Find him, hurt him, and make him understand who’s in charge. Also: Jorge’d broken with his family. In that case, threats wouldn’t help.
Mrado took a final swig of beer. Asked for the check. Paid. Tipped. On his way up the stairs from the lower level, he felt a vibration in his pocket. Service again. A text. He picked up his cell. Didn’t recognize the number. Read the text: Call me on this number at 8:00 p.m./Rolf. His cop connect. The pussy used his son’s or daughter’s cell when he got in touch with Mrado. The text: good news. Maybe Rolf knew something.
It was eight o’clock. Mrado was sitting in his car outside the shoot club, Pancrease, on Odengatan. Called Rolf. Was careful not to be explicit with his own name, Rolf’s name, or other details. Kept it brief, as usual.
“What’s up? It’s me.”
“Everything cool?”
“Yep. And you?”
“Sure, sure, but I’ve had a tough day. Sat hunched in the driver’s seat of a car all day. My back’s giving out.”
“You should work out more. Go running sometimes and do fifty back-ups every night and I’ll bet you’ll feel better. Whattya got for me?”
“I’ve checked up on what we talked about. The northern precinct brought a guy in for questioning a month ago. Sergio Salinas Morena, a troublemaker from Sollentuna. He’s cousins with your guy. Didn’t lead to anything, but apparently he was suspected of aiding.”
“Nice. I bow in thanks. Will check it out. That all?”
“That’s all. Later.”
Mrado started up the car. Drove to the intersection of Sveavagen/Odengatan. Turned up toward Norrtull. There wouldn’t be any working out at the club tonight. He called Ratko-needed his contacts in Sollentuna. Ratko was with his girl in Solna. Didn’t seem too hot on joining the hunt. Despite that: agreed to be picked up at Rasundavagen. What could Ratko do? The bottom line: When Mrado asks, you deliver.
They drove on the E4 highway toward Sollentuna. Ratko didn’t know anyone named Sergio Salinas Morena. Called Bobban. He recognized the name. Thought the guy still lived in the Sollentuna area. Didn’t know more than that.
The road was poorly lit. Ratko made calls to old friends from Marsta and Sollentuna, asked about Sergio. Mrado was strangely unfocused. Didn’t have the energy to listen to Ratko’s phone buzz. He was tired. Thought about Lovisa. His preparatory hearing in family court was coming up. Annika didn’t even want him to see his daughter every other week. So fuckin’ low.
They tore down the highway. Mrado’d busted the speed limit more times than he could count. He remembered one time in particular: when Lovisa was born. Immediate cesarean. He’d been at Solvalla with some buds. Gotten a call from Annika that the contractions’d started but that the water hadn’t broken. She called the hospital. They said, “Take it easy until the contractions come more frequently.” Mrado stayed at Solvalla. Why go home if it wasn’t time? When he was leaving, he called home. No answer. Worry. Had she gone without calling him? There was a note on the kitchen table. Went to Huddinge. Had to hurry. Mrado ran back out to the car. Gunned it. Drove 110 to Huddinge Hospital. Took the turns on two wheels. Worried more than he’d ever done in his entire life. Ran the entire way to the hospital’s main entrance. When he arrived, drenched in sweat, Lovisa’d already been plucked out. Her heart rate’d started to plummet-there’d been no time to spare. Before Annika went under, she heard the surgeon tell the rest of the team they had only five minutes of game time. From emergency to catastrophe. Mrado’d been late to his own daughter’s birth. He would never forgive himself for that. But the following two hours had been some of the best in his life-in an adjoining room with Lovisa, 6.9 pounds, lying on his chest. She folded her head in under his chin. Grazed his neck with her tiny mouth. Seemed to become calm. Annika was still not awake after the cut. Just Mrado and Lovisa-the way it should be, always. Maybe the way it could be if he threw in the towel. Stopped with this shit.
Ratko shoved him, “Hey, are you listening?”
Someone’d bitten the bait. Sergio Salinas Morena: worked as a courier driver, lived on Allevagen in Rotebro.
Mrado slammed his foot on the gas. They drove past Sollentuna. Continued on E4 north. Took a left by Staketvagen. His pulse was rising. The tension was soaring. Mrado was in the mood.
Salinas Morena lived on the fourth floor. They looked up at the windows. Six out of nine were lit on the fourth floor. Three apartments on that level. At least one window in each apartment was lit. Hopefully, people home in each of them. The house looked run-down. The sky was darkening, but the crap graffiti was still visible. The paint on the outer walls was peeling.
Ratko positioned himself down in the foyer. Mrado went up. Covered the peephole with his finger as he rang the doorbell.
A girl’s voice yelled something in Spanish inside the apartment.
Nothing happened. Mrado rang the bell again.
A guy opened. Mrado assessed him. Around twenty-five years old. Dressed in a black T-shirt with large white
