Free Red Wolf: A Novel by Liza Marklund Page B

back in the phone.
    No sooner had she done that than her mobile rang, and she put a hand to her forehead.
    ‘I’m so fucked up,’ she said to Anne Snapphane. ‘Why on earth don’t I call from this phone instead?’
    ‘
Que?
’ Anne said.
    The noises behind her suggested alcohol and minimalist décor.
    ‘Where are you?’ Annika asked.
    The line crackled and hissed.
    ‘What?’ Anne said. ‘Hello? Are you in the middle of something?’
    Annika spoke slowly and clearly. ‘I’ve uncovered the murder of a reporter. Call me at midnight if you’re still awake.’
    She hung up and called the first of Suup’s numbers, but reached a fax machine. She called the second and heard the theme-music of the evening news.
    ‘So you’re the sort of person who disturbs people at home?’ Inspector Suup said, not sounding particularly upset.
    Like Benny Ekland
, Annika thought, shutting her eyes as she asked: ‘That Volvo you found in Malmhamnen, was it a V70? Gold?’
    The newsreader’s reliable tones filled the line for a few seconds, then the volume of the television was abruptly turned down.
    ‘Okay, you’ve got me really curious now,’ the inspector said.
    ‘There’s no leak,’ Annika said. ‘I spoke to a potential witness. Is the information correct?’
    ‘I can’t comment on that.’
    ‘Off the record?’
    ‘Can I switch phones?’
    He hung up. Annika waited for an eternity before he picked up again, this time with no television in the back-ground.
    ‘You might have got the duty officer to read out the details of cars stolen from Bergnäset on Saturday night,’ he said.
    ‘So it’s correct, then?’
    His silence was all the confirmation she needed.
    ‘Now I’d like
you
to tell
me
something,’ he said.
    She hesitated, but only for the sake of it. Without the inspector she didn’t have a story.
    ‘I spoke to someone,’ she said, ‘who says they saw Benny Ekland get run down on Skeppargatan in Svartöstaden. There was a gold-coloured Volvo V70 parked in the entrance to the football pitch, the front facing the road, with a man at the wheel. When Benny Ekland stumbled past the engine started, the car pulled out and drove at Ekland at full speed. My witness says Ekland tried to get out of the way, running from one side of the road to the other, but the car followed him. The collision happened more or less in the middle of the road.’
    ‘Bloody hell,’ the inspector muttered.
    ‘It gets worse,’ Annika said. ‘Ekland hit the car twice, and was thrown into the air, landing in the middle of the road. The car stopped, reversed and drove over him again, and then over his head. After driving over his skull the driver stopped – definitely a man – got out of the car and dragged the body up the slope towards the football pitch. There he wiped down the body somehow, then drove off towards – what’s it called? – Sjöfartsgatan, down towards LKAB’s ore terminal. What was the damage to the car?’
    ‘Front and windscreen,’ Inspector Suup said without hesitation.
    ‘You must have worked out that this was no ordinary accident. The skull was crushed and his back was broken, all the internal organs mashed up.’
    ‘Quite right, the results of the post mortem came through this afternoon. So someone saw the whole thing?’
    ‘The witness wants to stay completely anonymous.’
    ‘You can’t persuade the person in question to contact us?’
    ‘I’ve already done what I can, but I’m happy to try again. What do you think?’
    ‘If the witness information is correct, which it may well be, then we’ll have a premeditated murder on our hands.’
    Annika typed the quote directly onto her laptop.
    ‘Can you think of anything off the top of your head that Benny Ekland wrote that could explain why someone wanted him dead?’
    ‘Ekland wasn’t afraid of controversy and unpleasantness, so it’s not impossible. But I wouldn’t be doing my job if I speculated like that at this point. If the witness