The Dangerous Game Read Free

with admiration wherever she went. It was incomprehensible.
     
    When only ten minutes remained before the start of the show, the tempo behind the scenes escalated. Even in the dressing room everyone was aware that the audience members were beginning to take their seats on the other side of the curtains. Suggestive techno music was pulsing from the loudspeakers, adding to the air of anticipation.
    Jenny went over to the wall one last time to check the list showing the order in which the models were to appear. She was first, and of course she knew why. There was no doubt that she was the star of the group. And this was particularly exciting because, tonight, he would be sitting out there. She had decided to pretend not to notice him, as if he had no effect on her.
    In her mind she went through the eight different garments she would wear during the course of the show. She cast a quick glance at the rack of outfits assigned to her; everything seemed to be in order.
    The stylist gathered all the models, by now giggling and giddy, for one last run-through. Lined up behind the curtains, they looked like women depicted by the nineteenth-century French artist Toulouse-Lautrec. With their elaborate hairdos, extravagant dresses and bright-red lips, they could easily have stepped out of a painting of the red-light district in Paris more than a century earlier.
    The stylist sternly admonished the glittering beauties to stop whispering and urged them to focus on the task at hand. It was almost time. She put on a headset so she could stay in contact with the technicians. A minute to go. On the other side of the curtains they could hear an expectant hum of voices from the six hundred invited guests.
    The make-up artists quickly moved among the models, doing some last-minute touch-ups, as the hair stylists sprayed and poked at their hairdos.
    Jenny was caught up in the mood; she loved this moment. Seconds before the show started, her mind cleared of all thoughts. She stared attentively at the stylist, waiting for her cue. Then the curtains parted and she stepped out on to the catwalk. A gasp passed through the audience when they caught sight of her. She paused for a moment and couldn’t help smiling. She looked for his face and found it at once.
    Then she moved forward.

A PALE NOVEMBER light strained to make its way through a few gaps in the heavy cloud cover. All the stones worn smooth by the water lay untouched on the shore. No one had walked along that stretch of beach in a long time. The sea was grey, with hardly a ripple. Far off in the distance, leaden waves lapped steadily at the scattered boulders that seemed to have been randomly tossed into the water.
    Anders Knutas, who had just stepped out on to the front porch of the summer cottage, shivered and pulled up the collar of his jacket. The air was fresh but raw, and the damp cold seeped through his clothes. There was almost no wind. The bare branches of the birch tree down by the gate didn’t move. They were covered with drops of water that sparkled in the morning light. The ground was spongy with tiny yellow leaves that had fallen when the autumn chill crept in. But a few roses were still blooming in the garden, glinting like red and pink will-o’-the-wisps against all the grey; they were reminders of another season.
    He headed out along the muddy gravel track that wound its way parallel to the sea. Their cottage was a couple of kilometres beyond Lickershamn, an old fishing village on Gotland’s north-west coast, also called the Stone Coast. Nowadays, it was a summer paradise with only a few permanent residents. At this time of year it was peaceful, and he enjoyed the quiet.
    Knutas, who was a morning person, had slipped out without waking Lina. She was sleeping soundly, as usual. It was no more than eight o’clock on this Saturday morning, and he had the road all to himself. It was uneven and muddy, with countless potholes that had filled with water after a night of rain.