Page 67 of The Sleepwalker (Joona Linna #10)

Joona is driving down the narrow roads between the grand villas at high speed, tyres roaring against the frozen ground. Flurries of snow dance in his blue lights.

He reads his colleagues’ tyre tracks on the ground up ahead, sees their skid marks and the collision with the rubbish bin, and he eases off the gas, cuts over the snowy patch in the middle of the road and accelerates out of the bend.

*?*?*

It all happens so quickly, as it often does when a person’s fate is sealed. A brief moment of both supernatural greatness and vulgar normality.

Petrus Lyth realises that the scraping noise sounds like metal on sandstone, and has only just had time to follow that thought through to its conclusion when his head is cleaved in two from behind.

He is effectively already dead when he receives a kick to the back and slumps forward.

‘Pingu?’

Danny turns around and sees a bloody figure with long blonde hair, and he manages to raise his pistol halfway before the axe strikes his lower arm.

His hand, still gripping his gun, drops to the floor.

Blood sprays out of the stump in powerful spurts.

Danny sees the axe cutting through the air again, and he throws himself back. The blade swings past his face and buries itself in the wall.

He turns and runs out of the bedroom, gripping his bleeding forearm with his remaining hand. He stumbles over the pile of towels, crashes into a mirror and hears it shatter on the floor as he scrambles away.

He staggers out into the hallway, through the broken front door and into the heavy snow outside.

The icy air claws at his lungs, and he has to stop and splutter. His field of vision has begun to shrink, his breathing is much too rapid, and he hurries over to the car and falls to the ground.

‘I can’t die,’ he whispers to himself. ‘I can’t.’

With trembling fingers, he loosens his belt, wraps it twice around his arm and twists it tight to stem the bleeding.

He can hear footsteps approaching, and he holds his breath until he realises that she has already seen him.

The killer is standing right in front of him.

Danny gets onto his knees and holds up his hand and his stump, pleading for his life with a bowed head.

‘Please,’ he begs her. ‘I haven’t seen you, you don’t need to kill me. This has nothing to do with me.’

*?*?*

Joona has almost reached the house when he learns that dispatch has lost contact with his colleagues.

To the left, the low crash barrier races by.

The Widow’s car is no longer parked just beyond the lamppost.

Joona brakes gently and turns off onto the driveway as he requests helicopters and roadblocks from regional command.

He pulls up behind the patrol car, reaches for his Colt Combat and loads a round into the chamber as he gets out into the cold air.

A police officer in uniform is slumped on the bloody snow beside the car. His body is still twitching slightly, despite the fact that he has been decapitated.

Joona can hear sirens in the distance.

He takes his gun off safety and makes his way towards the broken front door.

There are flecks of bright blood on the snow that has drifted into the hallway.

With his Colt Combat raised, Joona follows the bloody trail, securing the space as he goes. He crosses the entrance hall and enters a dressing room, opening each of the wardrobe doors in turn. He kicks a pile of towels out of the way and closes the door to the linen cupboard.

On the floor in front of him, another decapitated man is lying flat on his back. His shirt has been torn open, and he has a vertical cut stretching from his breastbone to his navel.

The second police officer is face down on the floor following an axe blow to the back of the head.

Joona goes into the bathroom, taking in the sink unit, bathtub and shower. Behind a near-invisible door in the limestone wall, there is a toilet and bidet.

He repeats the same search process as he returns to the entrance hall and makes his way through to the living area.

Joona gives command a quick status update and then runs up the stairs to the first floor, coming out onto a large kitchen. He sees a video camera, plus several studio lights on tripods.

Outside the house, two patrol cars pull onto the driveway. The wind blows the snow across the spacious roof terrace.

Joona goes through to the living room, where four white sofas are positioned around a grey marble coffee table and a large projection screen on one wall.

The air is heavy with the sour stench of vomit.

Behind the sofa closest to the far wall, Nina Silverstedt is huddled with her knees pulled into her chest, rocking slowly back and forth. Keeping his voice low, Joona explains that she is safe, and soft sobs begin to escape from her lips.

*?*?*

Joona wrapped a blanket around Nina’s shoulders and held her until the trembling started to ease, then led her out to one of the ambulances.

They came so close to catching the killer this time.

He is now in his car, driving back to Kungsholmen as he talks to regional command.

Thus far, their efforts to trace the Widow’s Opel have proved fruitless.

The Northern Link motorway is just too big and sprawling.

Some twenty police cars are currently involved in the search, three helicopters are still in the air, and a team is busy scouring the CCTV footage.

Agneta rings, and he takes the call over the car’s Bluetooth system, giving her a quick update on the latest murder and the pattern of incomplete arrows on the victims’ bodies.

‘It feels like things are moving faster and faster,’ she says.

‘Serial killers can be a bit like a wildfire after the wind takes hold of it .?.?. too big for their own good, uncontrollable.’

‘Well, I’ve spoken to Hugo,’ she says. ‘He says he’s willing to give the hypnosis one last try .?.?. Bernard has agreed, too, but he wants me to be there.’

‘Thank you for your understanding.’

‘You have to promise not to put too much pressure on him, though .?.?. He’s already traumatised, and we can’t make things any worse.’

‘I agree. I’ll let Erik Maria Bark know,’ Joona tells her.