Bubble: A Thriller Read Online Free PDF Page B

months had passed since her confession, and even though he had never raised the subject again—not even during one of their rare quarrels—she had no trouble at all picking up the emotion that was bubbling beneath his urbane exterior.
    He didn’t trust her . . .
    And he was hardly alone in that . . .
    He picked up the paper from one of the kitchen chairs and leafed through until he found the right page.
    “It’s playing at Filmstaden on Södermalm, we could aim for the nine o’clock screening and grab a beer afterward . . .”
    Her first instinct was to say no. Her computer was full of work she needed to do, things that couldn’t really wait. But a late film and a few beers might manage to reinforce the illusion that their relationship was still working. It might even get her brain to skip the usual nightmare and make it easier for her to sleep.
    She could always hope.
    “Sure, great! Let’s go for it!” She tried to sound as though she meant it. “Do you want to get the tickets now?”
    “Yep!”
    He got up to fetch his laptop and she took the chance to read the letter once more.
    A tin box hidden in an underground vault . . .
    For some reason she couldn’t help shivering.

4
KNOWLEDGE IS POWER
    “HELLO, MY NAME’S Rebecca Normén. Apparently I’ve got a safe-deposit box here?”
    She held out the letter and her driver’s license to the man behind the counter.
    She was in a small reception area behind an anonymous door right next to Sergel’s Square in the center of the city. She must have walked past it a thousand times without ever noticing it. A buzzer and an entry phone, a reception desk, and one solitary man in a suit. Behind him a short flight of steps led down to a dark steel door. It all would have looked perfectly innocent if it hadn’t been for the unobtrusive little round cameras in the ceiling. Five of them, exactly the same sort as in Police Headquarters, which had to be at least three more than necessary. Every point in the room was covered from at least two angles.
    “You need to use your card . . .”
    “Sorry?”
    “Your pass card . . . To get into the vault you need to use your pass card,” the man explained, gesturing backward with his thumb at the metal door behind him.
    “It also opens the right section of the vault. Then you use the key to open the box itself. You’ve got a key?”
    She shook her head.
    “I’ve haven’t got a pass card or a key. To be honest, I didn’t even know I had a deposit box until I received this letter from you. I was hoping you might be able to give me a bit more information . . .” She nodded at the sheet of paper in front of him.
    “I see. Just one moment . . .”
    He began typing on his keyboard, and she suddenly noticed a little screen set discreetly into the counter.
    When the man turned slightly to one side she noticed another detail. On one of his shoulders there was a slight but very familiar bulge, a thicker garment under his shirt and well-tailored suit. She’d seen it a thousand times in her work, on herself and other people. The man was wearing a bulletproof vest. She wondered whether he was armed as well.
    She took a cautious step closer and leaned carefully over the counter. Her eyes slid down the line of the jacket toward the man’s hips.
    “That particular deposit box has two key holders.” His voice made her jump and she straightened up unconsciously.
    “Sorry?”
    “You and a Henrik Pettersson. Do you know him?”
    She nodded. “He’s my brother.”
    “Maybe he’s the one who’s got the key and pass card?”
    The idea of Henke having a deposit box seemed very odd. He didn’t exactly own anything that was valuable enough to need this sort of protection. But, on the other hand, the bill for the box hadn’t been paid, and that sounded just like him. And given the way he’d been behaving over the past few months, maybe it wasn’t impossible that he had secrets he needed to keep hidden.
    She