“The police, maybe?”
“No, not the police. I know all the police. Four men, not white but not black. From Middle East, maybe?”
Once she was gone, Dominic shouted in Brian’s ear, “Monday. Three days after Rolf’s aunt said he didn’t come home.”
“Maybe he doesn’t want to be found,” Brian replied. “Shit, man, it just had to be footballers.”
“So?”
“You never watched the World Cup, bro? These guys like fighting more than they like drinking.”
“Shouldn’t be too hard to get a reaction, then.”
“Dom, I ain’t talking about boxing. I’m talking about rip-your-ear-off, stomp-on-your-guts street brawling. Add that whole group together and you know what you get?”
“What?”
“A mouthful of teeth,” Brian replied with an evil grin.
Hey, guys, we’re looking for Anton,” Dominic said. “Waitress said you’re his friends.”
“Don’t speak English,” one of them said. He had a latticework of ropy scars on his forehead.
“Hey, fuck you, Frankenstein,” Brian said.
The man scooted his chair back, stood up, and squared off. The rest of them followed suit.
“Speak English now, huh?” Brian shouted.
“Just tell Anton we’re looking for him,” Dominic said, raising his hands to shoulder height. “Otherwise, we’re going to pay a visit to his aunt.”
Brian and Dominic stepped around the group and headed for the alley exit. “How long, you figure?” Brian asked.
“Thirty seconds, no more,” Dominic replied.
Out in the alley, Brian grabbed a nearby steel garbage can and Dominic picked up a piece of rusted rebar as long as his forearm, and they turned in time to see the door swing outward. Brian, standing behind the door, let three of the footballers come out and go for Dominic in a rush, then kicked the door shut on the fourth and stepped in, swinging the garbage can like a scythe. Dominic took out the lead footballer with a shot to the knee, then ducked a punch from the second and brought the rebar down on his extended elbow, shattering it. Brian turned as the door swung back open, rammed the garbage can’s rounded bottom edge into the bridge of the fourth man’s forehead, waited for him to go down, then tossed the can at the knees of the last two charging across the threshold. The first went down at Brian’s feet, then pushed up to his hands and knees, but Brian heel-kicked him in the head, dropping him back down. The last footballer, fists clenched and arms windmilling, was charging Dominic, who kept backing up, staying out of range, letting him come, before sidestepping and backhanding the rebar into the side of the man’s head. He crashed into the alley wall and slumped down.
“You okay?” Dominic asked his brother.
“Yeah, you?”
“Anybody awake?”
“Yeah, here, this one.” Brian knelt down beside the first footballer through the door. He was groaning and rolling from side to side while holding his shattered knee. “Hey, Frankenstein, tell Anton we’re looking for him.”
They left the footballers in the alley and walked across the street from the bar into a park, where Dominic took a seat on a bench. Brian jogged back to the hotel, retrieved their rental car, then returned, parking on the opposite side of the park.
“No police?” Brian asked, approaching Dominic’s bench through the trees.
“Nah. Didn’t strike me as the police-loving kind.”
“Me neither.” They waited five minutes, then the front door opened and two of the footballers came out and shuffled toward a car parked down the block. “Good friends,” Brian observed. “Gullible but good.”
36
THEY FOLLOWED the footballers’ car, a dark blue Citroen, through downtown Soderhamn to the eastern JL outskirts of the city, then into the countryside. After four miles they pulled into a town, this one a quarter the size of Soderhamn. “Forsbacka,” Brian read from the map. The Citroen pulled off the main road, then took a series of lefts and rights before pulling into the driveway of a mint-green saltbox house. Dominic passed the house, took a right at the next corner, and pulled to the curb beneath a tree. Out the back window they could see the saltbox’s front door. The footballers were already on the porch. One of them knocked. Thirty seconds later the porch light came on and the door opened.
“What do you think? Go in now or wait?” Dominic asked.
“Wait. If it’s Rolf, he’s been smart enough to stay out of sight for a week. He’s not going to bolt before giving it some thought.”
After twenty minutes, the front door opened again and the footballers emerged. They got back into the Citroen, pulled out, and headed down the block. Brian and Dominic waited until the taillights disappeared around the corner, then got out, crossed the street, and walked down to the saltbox. A hedge of overgrown lilac bushes separated the house from its neighbor. They followed the hedge, passing two darkened windows, until they reached a detached garage, which they circled until they could see the rear of the house: a back door flanked by two windows. All were dark except one. As they watched, a male figure walked past the window and stopped before a kitchen cabinet, which he opened, then closed. Ten seconds later the man emerged carrying a suitcase. Brian and Dominic ducked back. The garage’s side door opened, followed by a car door opening and closing. The garage door closed again, then the house’s back door slammed shut.
“Taking it on the road. Better assume Anton’s a footballer like his buddies.”
“I was thinking the same thing, too. Doubtful he has a gun-Swedish laws are kind of a bitch on that count-but better safe than sorry. We swarm him, put him down hard.”
“Right.”
They took positions on either side of the back door and waited. Five minutes passed. They could hear the man moving about inside. Brian opened the back screen door and tried the inside doorknob. Unlocked. He looked back at Dominic, gave him a nod, then turned the knob, eased open the door, stopped. Waited. Nothing. Brian stepped through and held the door for Dominic, who followed.
They were in a narrow kitchen. To the left, past the refrigerator, was a dining room. To the right, a short hall leading toward the front of the house into what looked like a living room. Somewhere a television was playing. Brian sidestepped and peeked around the corner. He pulled back and signaled to Dominic:
Brian took a step, paused, then another, then he was halfway down the hall.
The plank floor beneath his feet creaked.
In the living room, Anton Rolf, standing in front of the TV, looked up, saw Brian, and bolted for the front door. Brian rushed ahead, bent over, and placed both hands against the long wooden coffee table and bulldozed it, pinning Rolf against the partially opened front door. Rolf lost his balance and fell backward. Brian was already moving, up on the coffee table and across it. He caught Rolf’s head by the hair and slammed his forehead into the doorjamb once, then twice, then a third time. Rolf went limp.
They found a roll of quarter-inch clothesline in a kitchen drawer and tied up Rolf. While Brian watched over him, Dominic searched the house but came up with nothing unusual, save the suitcase Rolf had been packing. “He did a quick pack job,” Brian said, sorting through the clothes and toiletries that had been shoved into the case. It seemed clear that Rolf’s decision to leave had been precipitated by his friends’ visit.
Outside they heard the squeal of brakes. Brian went to the front window, looked out, then shook his head. Dominic went into the kitchen. He reached the sink window in time to see a woman come around the corner from
