silently before Pain’s new orders interrupted her.
‘Restraint and release, groups of three, two holding, one trying to get loose. Questions? Okay, get going, and I want to see some speed! Go, go, go!’
She ended up with two big blokes that she knew slightly already. Stefan and Dejan, the former a muscle-bound bloke about one metre ninety tall, the latter only a bit smaller.
‘I’ll start,’ Dejan said and gestured to Rebecca to grab him from behind while Stefan took up position to lock Dejan’s arms from the front.
‘Ungh …!’ Dejan twisted loose easily with some sort of advanced martial arts technique as he let out a loud roar.
‘Nice, Savic, but drop the Karate Kid bullshit!’ their instructor said from the side of the mat.
Rebecca glanced up at the glass passageway. Vahtola was still watching, and it looked like the head of the unit was focusing particularly on her trio.
‘Ungh!’ Dejan was free again, this time even more easily.
Shit, she’d lost her concentration and Pain wasn’t the sort to let it pass.
‘Get a grip, Normén! If you want to belong to the elite you need to step it up!’
The third attempt, and now she knew pretty much how his tactics worked. Dejan took a quick step to the side before twisting free, so what would happen if she kneed him at the back of his knee in the middle of the step?
The answer proved to be that he fell backwards into her arms, and that she and Stefan could easily spin him round and lay him out on the mat.
‘Good, Normén, that’s how it’s supposed to look!’ Pain clapped his hands and Rebecca couldn’t help throwing a smug glance up at the glass passageway. Vahtola’s expression hadn’t changed.
‘Let’s switch!’ Dejan said tersely. He was red in the face and clearly not happy about being bundled over in front of their new boss.
‘I’ll take the back.’
Before Rebecca had time to react he’d taken up position behind her and got her in some sort of headlock. Both arms round her neck, his right arm over her throat locked onto the other arm, his left hand clasping the back of her neck.
It felt like she was in a vice.
She quickly tried to get at the arm across her throat, but Stefan, standing in front of her, caught her wrists and held her arms tight. She struggled and jerked, trying to get free, but Dejan evidently wasn’t about to let that happen.
It was payback time, and instead of loosening his grip to give her a chance, he tightened it. Her feet were almost off the ground.
‘Come on, Normén,’ he snarled in her ear. ‘Show us what you can do!’
Rebecca could feel her eyes starting to flutter. His grip was so tight that both her airway and blood-supply were being cut off. She tried to get free again, this time more frenetically, but Stefan was still holding her wrists tight, not appearing to notice that everything was on the point of spiralling out of control.
Her field of vision was shrinking and she could feel herself on the verge of panic. She was stuck, she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move; she was immobile and in another person’s power, someone who wished her harm. Exposed. Helpless. And all of a sudden she was no longer in a gym in Kronoberg but in a flat in one of the southern suburbs and the man holding her was no longer a colleague whose pride had been wounded.
‘I’m going to kill you, you little bitch,’ the man snarled in her ear, and she could tell from the tone of voice, the one that terrified her so, that he meant every word. This time she would die for sure!
The panic she usually kept such a firm grip on welled up and filled her head, pumping adrenalin into her fading muscles and taking command of her body. And suddenly she felt a new burst of life.
She let herself fall towards the floor like a sack, and when the grip on her neck relaxed a couple of millimetres she launched up with both feet and thrust backwards and upwards with such force that they all three almost toppled over.
Rebecca felt the back of her head hit something hard, felt something break, and when she kicked out in front to strike a different target, the force of the kick altered their centre of gravity and then they collapsed onto the mat.
For a moment everything went black, but her sight gradually came back.
She was sitting on the floor with her back against the flattened Dejan with his legs on either side of her. A few metres in front of her Stefan was curled up, clutching his stomach. In a flash she was up on her feet, turning towards Dejan who was still lying down. His hands were over his face, but to judge by the trickles running between his fingers, more than that was needed to stem the flow of blood.
‘What the fuck, you crazy or what, Normén?’ he squeaked as he stared at her, sounding simultaneously suspicious and accusing.
She didn’t quite know what to say.
‘I …’ she began uncertainly, but Peter Pain interrupted her.
‘Damn fine work, Normén, that’s the way to bring them down! Savic, you were asking for that so you’d better take yourself off to the nurse to get yourself patched up. Wikström, do you need to go too?’
Stefan waved his hands dismissively as he got heavily to his feet.
‘Just lost my breath, nice hit, Normén.’ He nodded towards her.
Rebecca blushed, feeling simultaneously guilty and pleased. Maybe Dejan’s nose was a bit unfortunate, but on the other hand he had been asking for it with his stupid macho posturing.
She’d done her job, managed to get free on her own. She hadn’t been some helpless victim.
Not like then.
Absolutely not like then!
She was different now, stronger, better, braver. A completely different person.
When she eventually dared to glance up at Vahtola, she saw a faint smile on the other woman’s face.
Birkagatan 32, be there at 18:00.
It wasn’t exactly a difficult instruction, but this time he had at least prepared himself better. In spite of the heat he had dug out an old army jacket that someone, he couldn’t remember who, had left in his flat after a party ages ago. The jacket had loads of pockets which he stuffed with various useful things, and it had straps on the front which would be perfect for holding the phone.
The clip of number twenty-seven had finally made him realize where the camera ought to be to get the best pictures. No more rubbish bouncing at waist-height like on the train or at NK, from now on nothing but head-shots.
The viewers, or fans as he was calling them more and more often, had been impressed with the NK stunt.
Even if he didn’t know who they were, he felt increasingly sure that they were his kind of people, solid guys that he’d be happy to share a chilled beer with if the opportunity arose.
He’d
