Helsinki White Read Online Free Page B

syringe tube with it, and pressed it into his upper lip. I explained to her that it’s like American snuff, but drier, and users don’t have to spit juice. She asked why she couldn’t see a lump under his lip where he put it in. I told her it had salt or some irritant in it, which abraded the tissue, so that nicotine would hit the user’s system faster.
    Over time, it cuts a hole deep through the gum.
Nuuska
users like it better after the hole cuts and rots through, because the nesting place made it unnoticeable and less messy. She was appalled.Sale of
nuuska
is illegal in Finland, so people buy quantities of it from the shop on the ferry to and from Sweden for themselves and their friends, and tobacconists keep it under the counter for preferred customers. Police ignore the infraction. Some of them enjoy their
nuuska
as well. I got hooked on nicotine with it when I was a young athlete. It’s popular among hockey players.
    Sweetness took breaks and went outside, he claimed, for fresh air. He was lying, and I wondered what he was hiding.
    After a couple hours, I noticed that a car, an Acura, had been parked across the street for a couple hours, wedged in a slot cut by a plow in the snowbank. I thought I caught a glimpse of binoculars. I asked Milo and Sweetness to go out and investigate.
    “Yes,
pomo—
boss,” Sweetness said, put on his coat and made for the door. Milo trailed behind. I went out on the balcony to watch. I must have asked Sweetness not to call me
pomo
at least a dozen times, told him that if he has to call me anything, to call me Kari. Milo approached the driver’s-side door, Sweetness the passenger’s side. Milo held his police card up to the glass. The driver’s-side window rolled down. The man reached toward an inner coat pocket. Milo drew his pistol so fast that I barely saw it. Milo hammered the man in the face and head with the butt of his Glock multiple times. I heard him scream.
    The other watcher went for his pistol. Sweetness smashed the passenger’s-side window with his elbow—protected by his overcoat—and reached through the window. He grabbed the man’s shoulder with a massive hand and the man howled in pain. Sweetness held the man in check. Milo took their wallets, checked their identities. He tossed the wallets back into the car. The men drove away.
    Milo and Sweetness came back inside. Milo laughed. “I just beat the fuck out of a SUPO agent,” he said.
    “I asked you to investigate, not rearrange his face,” I said.
    “He reached inside his coat. He could have been reaching for a weapon.”
    I didn’t criticize further. Milo was right to stop him, even if he was overzealous.
    So the secret police were watching us. I didn’t know if it was a big deal or not. I had a meeting with Jyri the next day. I would ask him about it then. We finished counting the money. Two hundred and fifty-two thousand euros. We’d stolen almost half a million that weekend. A good start. I figured what the fuck, and tossed the boys packets of ten thousand each. “This is a onetime event, I’m not even taking one for myself, but these are bonuses for a job well done,” I said.

4
    I t was a pleasant Sunday afternoon. I met Jyri for coffee at Café Strindberg, which overlooks Esplanade Park. Most of the customers at Strindberg are rich forty-something face-lift fraus with little manicured rat dogs. Jyri asked about the weekend.
    I told him the total, minus a ten percent skim, not because I intended to steal it, but because he might take every cent, and we couldn’t do without funding. In this scenario, he might just keep it all and tell us to fuck ourselves. He’s not above that.
    “All told,” I said, “we took in about three hundred and fifty thousand. It’s in the trunk of my car. I’ll give it to you when we leave.”
    He smiled so wide I thought his face might rip. “Hang on to it for now. But three hundred and fifty thousand. Jesus fucking Christ. That’s incredible!”
    He’s a