The Dangerous Game Read Free Page B

house and turned on the TV, but he’d been unable to fend off the feeling of being abandoned. And it got worse each day. If the children were spending the night somewhere else or didn’t come home for dinner, he lost any desire to cook or even make a cup of coffee for himself.
    He had suffered through the silence of that month, without fully working out whether the empty feeling was because he was missing Lina in particular, or because he missed having someone else’s company in general.
    The day before she was due back home he was suddenly seized with a great surge of energy. He cleaned the whole house, filled the refrigerator and pantry with food, and bought fresh flowers, which he put in a vase on the kitchen table. He was determined to do his utmost to be loving and considerate.
    And it had worked. They’d started talking more to each other. Their relationship seemed deeper, more intense, and they’d drawn closer.
    On Friday afternoon they had cleared the toppled tree from their property, then raked up leaves and burnt them on a bonfire. They ended the day by cooking a good meal together, and then sat in front of the fireplace, drinking wine and talking. Before going to sleep, they had made love. It almost felt like old times.
    Knutas drew the fresh sea air deep into his lungs and continued walking. He passed the home of one of the permanent residents and saw smoke coming from the chimney. Off in the distance, he noticed light in a window. A flock of black jackdaws was perched in the treetops. With a loud shriek they all took off at once when he approached. The sea birds, clustered on rocks out in the water, reacted the same way. As they rose up into the sky, he realized how many there were.
    The fishermen’s huts that were lined up down by the harbour were all empty. Some of the larger ones had been turned into summer homes with kitchenettes and bunk beds.
    Knutas sat down on a bench and gazed out at the sea. One evening in September, they’d gone swimming here on their last visit to the cottage. He thought about Lina’s voluptuous body and soft white skin. Her long, curly red hair, her smile and warm eyes. He was still very much in love with her.
     
    When he got back, he saw her sitting on the porch wearing a long grey cardigan and thick socks, with her pale, freckled hands wrapped around a coffee mug. She waved and smiled at him as he came walking along the road. He waved back.

WHEN THEY REACHED the road that connected the peninsula of Furillen to Gotland’s north-east coast, Jenny rolled the car window down halfway and breathed in the sea air. She hadn’t been here in a long time, and she’d forgotten how beautiful it was. Solitary, barren, and nothing but sea, sea, and more sea. In the distance she saw several wind turbines reaching towards the sky, their blades turning slowly in the light breeze. The beach was deserted, the road bumpy and dusty, the landscape bare and rocky; the higher up they drove, the more stripped everything looked. Like a moonscape, devoid of all traces of civilization.
    The photographer Markus Sandberg was driving; she sat next to him in the passenger seat. There were two other people in the rental car: Maria, the make-up artist, and Hugo, the stylist, who were both going to work on the photo shoot, which was expected to last three days. They were quietly talking in the back seat and seemed to be completely absorbed in their conversation.
    So much the better. That meant Jenny could enjoy the company of her companion in the front seat. As often as she dared, she let her eyes rest on Markus. She couldn’t believe how attractive he was, so mature, so worldly. He was one of the fashion industry’s most sought-after photographers and a favourite of the agencies. He’d travelled the globe with all the most famous models and stylists, working for the best magazines. He was nicely suntanned, with several small tattoos on his muscular arms and a silver bracelet on one lean wrist. He had