Vanished by Liza Marklund Read Free Book Online

reason, and did a quick search for the Paradise Foundation. The computer took its time, and failed to find anything. Shetried Paradise on its own, and got a number of results: a travel agency, a Free Church minister in Vetlanda, a film starring Leonardo DiCaprio, but nothing about an organization that helped threatened women and children.
    She went back to her desk and checked the news agency site. No breaking news. She dialled the internal number for the archive on the third floor; they had a folder containing the details of various foundations that were registered with the Tax Office. She asked for it to be brought over, but by the time the porter turned up with it she didn’t feel like looking through it. Instead, she went for a walk round the office, rubbing her eyes, feeling tired, sluggish, unmotivated. She sat down at her desk again, wishing her shift was over, wishing she could go home. But she knew that she would soon be counting the hours until she could come back to work and get out of her flat. Her chest felt tight, oppressed by a feeling of how pointless it all was.
    ‘Sjölander,’ she called, ‘do you want me to do anything? A fact-box about the history of the Yugoslavian mafia?’
    He was on the phone, but gave her the thumbs-up.
    Annika shut her eyes, swallowed, went over to Jansson’s desk again and looked up the Yugoslavian mafia in the cuttings database.
    To judge by earlier articles, criminal gangs from Yugoslavia had been established in various places in Sweden for several decades, big cities and small towns alike. Their main occupation had been smuggling and drug-trafficking, often using restaurants as a front, but in recent years the business had changed. When the government jacked up the tax on cigarettes a few years ago a lot of them had switched from smuggling drugs to tobacco. A carton of two hundred cigarettescost between thirty and fifty kronor in eastern Europe, where Scandinavian brands like Prince and Blend were produced under licence. They were shipped either directly to Sweden or via Estonia.
    Annika sat for a while reading some of the articles, then went over to Sjölander. He was off the phone and typing with just his index fingers.
    ‘Are we going to say this was an internal dispute among the Yugoslavians?’ she asked.
    Sjölander sighed deeply. ‘Well, that depends on what angle we go for. But it’s definitely gang-related, some sort of mafia dispute.’
    ‘Maybe we shouldn’t blame any particular national group yet,’ Annika suggested. ‘There are loads of criminal gangs that have been active here for years. Do you want me to come up with an overview of the different groups and their favourite crimes?’
    Sjölander was getting his index fingers ready to strike again.
    ‘Why not?’
    Back at her desk, Annika called her source. He answered after one ring.
    ‘You’re working late,’ Annika said.
    ‘Oh, so they’ve let you come in from the cold again, have they?’ the detective said.
    ‘Nope,’ Annika said. ‘I’m still frozen out. Have you got time for a few quick questions.’
    The man groaned. ‘I’ve got two bodies here,’ he said, ‘shot through the head.’
    ‘Ah,’ Annika said. ‘Sounds painful. So are you sure they were from Yugoslavia?’
    ‘Get lost,’ Q said.
    ‘Okay. A few general questions about different ethnic gangs. What do the South Americans do?’
    ‘I haven’t got time for this.’
    ‘Just some little questions?’ she pleaded in a small voice.
    The detective burst out laughing.
    ‘Cocaine,’ he said. ‘From Columbia. We doubled our seizures last year.’
    ‘How about the Baltic States?’ Annika wondered, frantically taking notes.
    ‘Partly cigarettes. A lot of stolen cars. We think Sweden’s becoming a transit country for the trade in stolen vehicles. Cars stolen in Italy and Spain are driven right up through Europe and put on ferries to the Baltic States and Russia.’
    ‘Okay, what about other groups? You know them better