The Other Son Read Online Free PDF Page B

wrecked, for some reason. He’d changed in the past few months, with mood swings—a very short fuse, caustic and arrogant. He was micromanaging her, getting in the way of her work. And he reeked of a hangover pretty much the whole time. Probably because of the stress of living with a wife with a fatal disease. Even so, Antonia was sick to death of trying to adapt to his bad qualities. Not that she could deny that she had some of her own. It was obvious Tommy thought she was a nuisance, a lot of people thought that. That she was trouble, too eager, too pushy. What was she supposed to do about that? Give in and back down?
    Antonia had grown up in a loving home. That was how she remembered it anyway. But in that love there had also been a fear of the truth. Lots of whispering and hushing when she approached adults having a conversation. Maybe her parents were just scared that so-called reality was too cold and raw for her gentle little ears. In itself it didn’t actually matter. What did matter was that because of the whispering that surrounded her when she was growing up, she had developed an almost obsessive need to know things. Whatever it was, she needed answers in order to carry on living and breathing.
    And she had found many answers over the years. That had accelerated her career, and she was recognized as a good detective. But Tommy had started to whisper when she approached. And she wanted to know why.
    She looked at the men over in the corner again. The dark-haired one stood up, shook hands with Tommy, and left the table. He walked in her direction, and they looked at each other as he passed. She recognized him: he worked for Economic Crime. One of the thousands of disillusioned men she had seen coming and going. What marked him out from the crowd was the way he dressed. Jeans, black oxfords, a smart shirt under an expensive lambswool sweater. A thin beige coat over his arm. There was something tiresomely stylish about him….
    Antonia looked around among the police officers, firemen, and ambulance staff, looking for Ulf in the crowd. Ulf was the only reason she had come. He was a brawny surveillance officer from Ludvika, in the backwoods of Dalarna, taciturn but decent. She didn’t find gym-trained cops attractive. But what she did find attractive was that he was so focused about sex, was kinky in an unthreatening way, and kept his mouth shut, and he was kind, deep down.
    She caught sight of him, and their eyes met. They had a drink together, with nothing to talk about. Then they took a taxi back to his tidy two-room apartment in Sundbyberg, with scented candles in the bathroom.

Sophie walked out into the arrivals hall with its row of car-rental desks. She presented her reservation at the correct desk and was soon sitting behind the wheel, heading toward the city of Cartago, southwest of Pereira.
    The window was open, heat was flooding in, and her sunglasses allowed her eyes to relax in the bright daylight.
    This was a routine job, like all the other trips she had made over the past six months. She was going to calm people down and reassure them that everything was under control. She was good at it; it had become something of a talent.
    She wondered if she was going to see Alfonse, was seeing him in her mind’s eye. Alfonse Ramirez, Don Ignacio’s nephew. He had been at Trasten….
    Six months prior, late summer. She and her boyfriend, Jens, had been pursued through the center of Stockholm by Russians he had sold weapons to. The Russians were wired and violent. They wanted their money back, and they wanted to kill him. They fled in a car but had nowhere to go. She had called Hector: he was in a business meeting at the Trasten restaurant in Vasastan. Ernst Lundwall, Hector’s adviser, was there, Alfonse Ramirez was there, and the restaurant’s owner, Carlos Fuentes, was there. She and Jens arrived. The Russians showed up, waving their guns, and they beat Jens until he was more dead than alive. They were about