The Complete Game Trilogy: Game, Buzz, Bubble. Литагент HarperCollins USD

black sheep of the family, then?’

      ‘Exactly,’ she lied.

      ‘Do you know what he’s been arrested for, we’ve got quite a few immature trouble-magnets to choose from up here this evening?’

      She frowned. Mulle may be getting close to retirement but there wasn’t normally anything wrong with his memory.

      ‘His name’s Henrik Pettersson and he’s been arrested for throwing that stone at me and Kruse.’

      The line went silent for a few moments.

      ‘I’m sorry, Normén, but as far as I know no-one’s been arrested for the attack on the pair of you. Every patrol car in the district’s out looking for the bastard, they’re still hard at it on channel sixteen, so I’d definitely have heard if they’d got him. And we haven’t got anyone by the name of Pettersson according to the book, so your brother must have been playing some sort of prank on you, I’m afraid.’

      Suddenly she couldn’t think at all, then she felt a wave of fury surging through her.

      What the fuck was Henke really up to?

      Two minutes. The light was still flashing angrily at him and for some reason, when he stood up to go over to the door and start banging, he grabbed it and his other belongings.

      As he took a deep breath ready to shout, he pressed the handle.

      The door was unlocked.

      He opened it and to his surprise found himself staring out into a dark corridor.

      ‘Hello!’

      No answer.

      He called in a trembling voice, ‘Is anyone there?’

      Suddenly he was in the fucking Twilight Zone! This was even worse than the gorilla or Bolin’s reptilian smile.

      The corridor was completely deserted, not a sound, and all he could see was a row of closed doors the same as the one he had just opened. At the far end a green and white emergency exit sign flickered irregularly. He was reminded of the mobile flashing red in his hand and touched the screen. Even though he already had a vague suspicion of what the message had to say, his stomach still clenched in terror.

      Player 128

      You have broken Rule Number One and are therefore expelled from the Game with immediate effect!

      Your points and any remaining pecuniary

      rewards are hereby withdrawn.

      Please leave the phone in the premises and refrain from talking to anyone about the Game in future.

      Continued violation of Rule Number One

      will have serious consequences!

       The Game Master

      With an audible click the light in the room behind him went out.

      Home, she thought.

      She just wanted to go home. Take her clothes off, grab a quick shower to get rid of the sweat and blood. A handful of pills and then sleep, wonderful fucking sleep.

      But it didn’t turn out to be that easy. And of course it was Henke’s fault.

      She’d tried his home number but the line had been disconnected. The same thing with the two most recent mobile numbers he’d given her. She couldn’t get hold of her idiot little brother, which only made her more angry.

      What had he actually said?

      She tried to remember what his exact words had been, but it was practically impossible. He had at any rate confessed to throwing the stone. But how the hell could he have know that she was in the car? Was this some sort of elaborate, delayed revenge?

      No, that sounded crazy, she realized that as soon as she had thought it. No matter how messed up her and Henke’s relationship was, he’d never set out to hurt her on purpose. So what was this all about?

      Why had he dropped a stone on their car from a bridge, or at least claimed to have done so?

      ‘Kronoberg,’ he had said, but that had turned out not to be true. Just to be sure she had called Södermalm and the Western District too, but neither of them had a Henrik HP Pettersson in custody.

      Had he been lying to her?

      He could very well have been, that had happened far too many times in the past. But there was something about his voice, something … it sounded stupid to use the word when you were talking about Henke, but nonetheless … something honest. As if he really believed he’d been arrested. The only way she’d get any answers to any of her questions was to get hold of her little brother.

      The question was: where the hell was he?

      He ran. First in sheer panic. Along the dark corridor, towards the door – although he was prepared to bet it was locked. Then relief as it opened onto a stairwell.

      Stone steps down into the darkness, more unlit corridors along the way. His steps echoed on the concrete walls. Finally, at last, a way out.

      Damp night air hit him as he crossed the street to get as far away as possible from that corridor. A quick glance over his shoulder, then one more just to be sure.

      Suddenly he felt soft grass under his feet and it took him a few seconds to get his bearings. Large black trees splayed towards the night sky above him, and ahead of him was an iron railing and some unkempt gravestones.

      Kronoberg Park, close to the Jewish Cemetery. Only a block or so from where he’d thought he was to start with.

      His legs were working by themselves. Up the hill, through the park and finally out onto Polhemsgatan. The most western of the police’s three copper-coloured towers in front of him. For a few moments he considered carrying on to the entrance down on Kungsholmsgatan, knocking on the copper doorway and handing himself in. But before he’d had time to make a decision his legs were already carrying him out onto Fleminggatan, then right, towards the city centre.

      His head was spinning as his feet drummed on the tarmac.

      Tramp, tramp, tramp.

      The monotonous sound calmed him down a bit. The whirlpool in his head gradually slowed down and the panic slowly released its iron grip of his chest.

      Tramp, tramp, tramp.

      A set-up!

      Tramp, tramp, tramp.

      The whole thing had been a fucking set-up!

      Tramp, tramp, tramp.

      The more he thought about it, the better he could see how it all fitted together. He had thought that three thousand points was a bit too much just for throwing a stone at a car, even if it was a cop-car.

      And he’d been right!

      The stone, the car, the cops – all of that had been secondary, or a sort of prologue. The assignment, the real assignment, had been all about him. A sort of evaluation, really.

      Or a test …

       Only a very small number of people are qualified for this level …

      They had tested him to see if he had what it took. If he could handle the storms up on the summit.

      And the result, ladies and gentlemen?

      He had fucked up.

      Big time.

       9

       I lost the Game

      ‘Okay Rebecca, we’ve been through the details a couple of times now, but could you say a bit more about how you feel?’