Bad Blood: A Crime Novel by Arne Dahl Read Free Book Online

application
of Commando Cool’s method. The method is based on a single special instrument: specially designed micromechanical pincers that, when closed, closely resemble a terrifying cannula. A big syringe. It’s driven into the throat from the side. With the help of small control wires, tiny claws unfurl inside the trachea and grip the vocal cords in a manner that makes it impossible for any sound to escape the lips of the victim. He or she is rendered completely silent. Even in a tight spot in the jungle with Vietcong soldiers in the bushes all over, you can see to a bit of refreshing torture.
    “Once the victim is silenced, you can then heap on the conventional methods, best directed at fingernails and genitals, where small, quiet motions incur the most pain. And then you just release the grip around the vocal cords a tiny bit so that something like a whisper can slip out. The victim can reveal his secret, quietly, quietly. For this purpose, Commando Cool developed related pincers, based on the same principles as the vocal cord pincers, but these other ones were aimed at the central ganglia in the neck, which are tugged and pulled a little bit from the inside, at which point an appalling pain radiates up into the head and down through the body. The two holes in the neck with their associated internal injuries have been discovered on all twenty-four victims of the Kentucky Killer, andthere have also been distinctive torture wounds on their genitals and fingers.
    “Larner has been a bit secretive about what distinguishes the workings of our friend from those of the commando task force, but obviously it has to do with the design of the two micropincers. It’s as though something like an industrial development process was used to make the pincers even more perfect for their atrocious purpose.”
    Hultin looked down at his lectern.
    “I want you to restrain yourselves for a second now, so you can absorb all this,” he said gravely. “Lars-Erik Hassel died one of the most horrific deaths a person can die. I would like you to think carefully about what we’re up against. It doesn’t resemble anything we’ve ever had to deal with in our whole lives. There’s not an ounce of similarity to our good old Power Murderer. It isn’t really possible to imagine such ice-cold indifference to other people’s lives and such twisted pleasure at their suffering. This is a seriously damaged person of the sort that the American system seems to produce on an assembly line, and that they would have been welcome to refrain from exporting. But now he’s here. And the only thing we can really do is to wait for him to start. It could be a long time; it could be tomorrow. But it will happen, and we have to be prepared.”
    Hultin stood to go to the restroom. He had held it for a surprisingly long time for someone who was incontinent. As he left, he said to the dispersing group, “As soon as I receive Ray Larner’s material, you’ll get copies. The outcome of this case hinges on you all studying it diligently.” He nodded at them and hurried toward his private, special door.
    Jorge Chavez interrupted his departure: “How old is Edwin Reynolds, according to the passport?”
    Hultin made a stiff face, dug through his pile of papers with his legs in a need-to-pee stance, and brought out a copy of the photographed passport page. “Thirty-two this year.”
    Chavez nodded. “Of course the passport was fake,” he said, “but why choose to play fifteen years younger than he must, in all likelihood, be?”
    “An element of risk, maybe,” said Hultin against his better judgment, and rushed off with papers floating through the air.
    Chavez and Hjelm looked at each other.
    Hjelm shrugged. “Well, he could have bought or stolen a ready-made fake passport.”
    “Possibly,” said Chavez.
    But no one could really shake the feeling that something was wrong. Utterly wrong.

6
    There really wasn’t anything they could do.
    Naturally, there was