The Ice Cage — A Scandinavian Crime Thriller set in the Nordic Winter (The Baltic Trilogy) (28 page)

Temporarily on hold? It sounded ominously close to death and the last place I wanted to be, but Boeck had another surprise in store. Anna’s body shook when he
activated the defibrillator pads.
When
he tried again
, he
got a heartbeat
,
Andri took over, wrapping her
in the blanket again and giving her mouth to mouth. T
he whole thing was surreal and I
really
couldn’t
understand
Boeck. When Anna finally came to, Andri gave her a hot drink. I could
n’t believe she was alive again a
fter what she’d gone through.

‘
I told
Carrie
. If she doesn’t hear from me she’ll call Eva Mikaelsson.
’

Boeck paused for a moment, but it
was a
futile attemp
t to call him
back to reality
.
I had to do something t
o break h
is
bubble, not that I had any high hopes.
I’d damaged his body,
s
cratched the surface
, even made him limp, but that
was it. H
e ha
dn’t flinch
ed
, h
is fanaticism outdid the pain
by far
.
There was no limit to what his ideas could drive him to.
He was so manic, on such adrenalin
,
or whatever
it was that
kicked in, that
it was as if his body ceased to
exist. He didn’t
care about the physical world, about us, only about stimulating his own fantasies
.
He was deranged,
disconnected,
and I had nothing to lose.
Telling him the truth
might be the only way to make him engage
.

‘
I don’t buy your
pseudo
-
po
litical drivel.
Y
our
Swedish greatness
talk
is
only an excuse to kill people. You need to take a good look at yourself.
What you need is
a head doctor. It’s so bad you have to
jerk
off at people dying in
cages
.
’

Boeck gave me a glacial stare
. I may have been wrong, but
I’m sure some of it hit home, because for the first time he’d fallen silent. H
e didn’t lose his focus though
. He nodded at Andri, who grabbed my arms and dragged me towards the cage
, but
I wasn’t finished with Boeck.

‘
Y
ou talk about being a man. K
illing people is never going to make you a
man.
It’s never going to get you out of this backwater.
What are you really trying to prove?
’

‘
NO!
’

Anna
had come to
and
co
uld
see me approaching the hole.
There was a
terrified, empty look in her eyes
–
shock
.
Boeck
’s scenario of pain
had
been
planned
to the minute and n
ow it was my turn to be the bait
.
Anna was going to watch me die.
I’
d
almost
reached the
cage
and if I didn’t stop Andri,
everything would be over for me
. Boeck would be wetting himself with excitement
.
Andri was my last hope.

‘
How do you know you won’t be next?
’

Andri
ignored me, his e
yes locked on
the
cage
.

‘
Hey! I’m talking to you! You’ll end up in prison. You…
’

Andri still didn’t react
, even though I kicked away at his legs and lashed out trying
to free my arms.
When
I bit h
is arm and pulled his pony
tail, he finally reacted by giving me
an elbow in the head. I was out.

51

She
entered the hall holding her gun.

‘
Magnus!
’

When there was
no
response to her calls
,
she
walked into the living room to look around.
Magnus should be in.
She’d seen the
car parked outsi
de and
didn’t think he would have gone swimming again. H
e
’d
learnt his lesson and
didn’t come over as
the suicidal type.

She kicked against something on the floor.
As her eyes
adjust
ed
to the dark
,
s
he could distinguish a broken chair.
It wasn’t
just broken, it was t
rashed.
She checked the bed
room
,
but it
was impossible to tell when Magnus
last slept in the bed
–
no one ever
made the
ir
bed
s properly
any more.
She went back to the
hall
,
where his
coat was hanging on the hook. Where was he? Had he gone back to the museum?
It seemed insane
,
but s
he decided to check.

52

I was still
out
,
but
the faint sound of voices
wa
s starting to get through
to me
and when
Andri lowered the cage
into the c
old water I came to immediately,
staring
straight into Anna’
s
panicking
eyes while
scream
ing
in horror. I
was completely numb; crushed by the cold,
gasping for air,
imploding. My limbs felt thick; my feet were gone;
my
hands
too
sti
ff
to move
. I kept trying to cling onto the cage
, or I imagined I did, because my movements were futile compared to the effort I felt I was making
.

Locking eyes wit
h Anna’s pain, I saw
my father and t
he images of my father’s death mixed
in
with my own. I
t was as if I was
dying with him. I fought, clung, slipped, and climbed
, f
rantically, in vain.
Boeck wasn’t even looking at me. He was staring at
Anna.
My death had no purpose. Not for me, but of course
to
Boeck it was loaded with
meaning.
I was dying to provoke the atrocious emotions refle
cted in Anna’s
expression. He had revived her
, but w
ould he
bother to
revive me?
Would there be a point? I didn’t know but it
gave me
some
hope.
It was
false
hope
–
I had to die to live, t
o find out
whether Boeck would resuscitate me. If he did, what new experiment did he have in store? I was wasting my last few seconds of consciousness
on speculation
. I
had
to let go and soon
lost track of time
, quickly feeling warmer, calmer
.

53

The window behind the museum reception h
ad been boarded up and t
here weren’t
any traces of new a break
-
in by Magnus, so
Eva decided to drive by Boeck’s
and her mother Riita’s
place.
Although she had seen Boeck’s car
around the co
rner from the Sandberg house, she
still
found
Magnus’ suspicions
against
Boeck
hard to believe
.

H
er mother’s house
was
completely
dark.
Eva knew that her
mother
was visiting her sister
in
Helsinki
–
Boeck had said she’d
be back in a couple of days. He should be there though, but Eva couldn’t see his car.
Where could he be at this time? Did he have someone on the side?

She returned to the Sandberg house
,
but
Magnus still wasn’t back. Where was everyone?
There
was definitely something wrong
,
but
w
hat should she do?
Where could Magnus have gone?

54

This was it
. My life was over and t
here was nothing I could do. My visit
had been shorter than expected
,
but at least I was dying where I was born, not that I was convince
d
that
it
was
necessarily
a sign of fulfilment
.
My home was in
London
now
.
I was l
eaving
wit
hout seeing my unborn child, unable to say
goodbye to
the woman of my life
–
Carrie
.

I didn’t want to die, especially as
I’d never felt more
alive than in the last 24 hours
. I
t had been a
horrible
experience
, but
coming so close to death
also made me feel
much
s
tronger about everything I had and a
bout the people I cared for.

I
simply couldn’t accept that
this was happening.
I wasn’t ready to go
this way
.
I’d expec
ted to die of prostate canc
er, possibly killed by a terrorist bomb or
a super bug, but most likely
in a bike acciden
t o
n
Euston Road
.
That would have been a predictable de
ath, a coherent statistic. T
his wasn’t
.

I’d given
up, because
I was d
etermined not to die in anger, n
ot to give Boeck my last moments. Maybe I should have prayed like when
I locked myself out of the car, but t
his was d
ifferent. There was no escape, n
o miracle to expect.
I couldn’t rely on
Boeck
resuscitating
me like he did with Anna. I had no choice
–
I
accepted
that
I was dying and
did my utmost
to focus on the
people I loved
, trying
to detach
myself from the pain.

I was
numb,
hovering in a blizzard. The whiteness was blinding
, with voices echoing
in the distance,
Carrie
appearing and disappearing
. When
I reached out,
she did too,
but t
he
snow storm separated us again
.
I was
left
alone in the turb
ulence
,
until
Anna
appeared with my father
.
T
hey were close
,
pointing at me r
eproachful
ly
.
I
tried to move
,
but
I was stuck on a trajectory.
We were on u
nalterable orbits, kickin
g our legs, flapping our arms
. The
storm intensified
and
I tried
to push
Anna and my father
away
, but they kept pointing at me
.
The
w
ind became violent, almost piercing.
Carrie
sh
ot past with her pregnant belly while
Anna and my father blew away. I couldn’t see them
anywhere
. I was alone in the
over
-
bearing whistling of the storm
. I
t all became a blur.