White Russian

by Steven Henry

  “Sounds like she was trying to get out of the life,” Brown suggested. “It happens. Some of them even make it, but if they've got no one to go to, most are back turning tricks inside two months.”

  “Maybe she did have someone to go to,” Erin said, thinking of what Natalie Markov had said about her husband. “She was killed when she was with a guy with a rep for helping down-and-out immigrants.”

  “She from overseas?” Brown asked.

  “We think so,” Erin said. “She had some dental work like you'd get in Russia eight or ten years ago.”

  “Okay,” Brown said. “I don't know who she was, but I can tell you what she was. Human trafficking. Jesus, I hate that term. Sounds like we're handing out parking tickets. Pretty teenager gets grabbed by Russian Mafia goons, they fill her head with promises about the great life in America, or maybe it's just straight-up kidnapping. They ship her over, fill her with drugs, beat her till she knows who's in charge, then have her make money for them on her back till she gets used up and kicks off.”

  Erin nodded. “You're probably right. You think she came here illegally?”

  “I'd bet my shield on it. That way they can threaten her with deportation, too.”

  “If she was kidnapped, why the hell would she be scared of being sent home?”

  “You have any idea what it's like over there?” Brown retorted. “You want to understand Russia? Think of it like this. They're the people who put up with the Communists because the Commies were better than the Czars. Russia's a pit, O'Reilly, just like the human soul. It's big, it’s black, and believe me, there is no bottom.”

  “Brown,” Erin said, “if I ever feel like I'm not taking my work seriously enough, I'll come talk to you for a half-hour or so.”

  “Glad to help.”

  “So how do I find who this girl was?”

  “You find who she worked for,” Brown said.

  “I was kind of hoping to use her to find who she was working for, not the other way round,” Erin said.

  “I don't mean talk to the pimp,” he said. “Those Russian Mafia are serious sons of bitches. They're the guys who wouldn't talk when the KGB went at them with the pliers. The stuff we're allowed to do in this great country of ours won't even tickle 'em. No, you gotta find one of her coworkers.”

  “So I should start chatting up hookers?”

  Brown snorted. “You have any idea how many streetwalkers we've got in this city?”

  “No.”

  “Neither does anyone else,” Brown said. “There's about a million in the USA, give or take. That's one for every three hundred people. They pull in about fourteen billion dollars a year. If they incorporated, they'd be Fortune 500.”

  “I need an in,” Erin said.

  “You need an in,” he agreed. “A CI. You got anyone you can lean on?”

  “Not really,” she admitted. “I haven't got a network built up yet.”

  “I'll ask around,” he said. “But don't hold your breath. There's too many girls like the one you've got on your desk.”

  “Okay,” Erin said. “Thanks anyway.”

  “Don't mention it,” Brown said. “You need anything else, don't hesitate to ask. After all, that's what Vice is all about. Whatever you want, we know how to get it for you.”

  She rolled her eyes and got the hell out of there.

  Chapter 6

  Vic and Jones were at their desks when Erin and Rolf walked in. Vic was chewing a toothpick and scowling at his computer. He was twirling something in his fingers. At first she thought it was a pen.

  “What's up?” Erin asked.

  He tossed the small, dark cylinder to her. She caught it and saw it was black, with a gold filter. “Sobranie Black?” she guessed.

  “Yeah,” he said. “Picked it up on the way in.”

  “Not as rare as we were hoping?”

  Vic snorted. “Rare? Bought it off a newsstand in Little Odessa. Any Russian neighborhood has 'em.”

  “But it is a Russian import,” Jones said. “I'd never heard of them until last night. These have got to be Russians.”

  “They're your people, right?” Erin said to Vic. “You think we've got a chance of finding them?”

  He gave her a flat stare. “Christ. You think there's America, and then all the other countries are these little places where everyone knows each other? Russia's the biggest country in the world. Eleven time zones. Eleven. Anyway, I was born here. I'm a New Yorker.”

  “Okay, okay,” Erin said. “I'm just thinking you might know some things about Russian immigrants.”

  He sighed. “Yeah, I've been thinking about it all night. I can ask around the old neighborhood, see if anyone's talking, but don't get your hopes up. It's just like the Italians back in the '40s. They're a lot more scared of the gangsters than they are of anyone else. No one's gonna say anything, not to you, not to me.”

  “We need a CI,” Erin said, thinking what Brown had said. “Someone who'll get us insider info.”

  “Good luck with that,” Vic said. “These guys are probably Russian Mafia. They find out there's a snitch, the biggest piece of him you'll find will be his tongue, and you'll only find that 'cause they'll mail it to you.”

  Erin made a face. “You need another cup of coffee. That'll cheer you up.”

  “I don't want to be cheered up,” he growled. “I want to find these sons of bitches. I checked gun registries, just in case. The Makarov isn't registered, of course.”

  “The girl was pregnant,” Erin said.

  “Really?” Jones looked up. “Damn.”

  “Yeah,” Erin said. “Who do you think the dad is?”

  “What's it matter?” Vic retorted. “What it's worth, I'm betting it's Markov. But it could be any of her Johns.”

  “Yeah, maybe,” Erin said, unconvinced. She sat down at her own desk and logged on to her computer. Rolf settled onto his carpet square beside her.

  “So, the Fourth's coming up next week,” Jones said after a few minutes. “Anyone got big plans? Setting off some fireworks?”

  “I used to love the Fourth of July,” Vic said. “Then I became a cop. Explosives plus alcohol. Fun times for New York's finest. I just hope no drunken assholes blow up their houses this year.”

  “How about you, Erin?” Jones asked.

  “I'm going up to my mom and dad's,” she said. “Dad bought a place upstate after he retired. Hunting in the winter, fishing in the summer. He always said he wanted to get out of the city. My whole family's going to be there.”

  “How many of you are there?” Jones asked.

  Erin counted them off on her fingers. “Three brothers. Sean Junior, Michael, and my kid brother Tommy. Sean's married to Michelle, two kids, Anna and Patrick. Michael's married to Sarah, no kids yet. Tommy's... well, Tommy's got a guitar.”

  “Wow,” Jones said. “Irish Catholic, huh? I'll be hanging with my mom, just the two of us.”

  “What about the Lieutenant?” Erin asked.

  “What about him?” Webb asked, coming into the office. “You're all here. Good. I hope you're not making big holiday plans. We've still got a case to crack.”

  “You know, sir,” Jones said, “recent research shows that a forty-hour week is actually less productive than a four-day week. Working long hours erodes efficiency.”

  “That so?” Webb said. “Forty-hour weeks. God, the private sector. I wish I had forty-hour weeks.”

  “Nine to five,” Jones said wistfully. “But what would we do with all that free time?”

  “I was thinking,” Vic said. “Maybe I'll go out tonight, grab a beer, pick up a hooker.”

  Jones shook her head. “You're worse than the dog. At least he's housebroken.”

  “Leave Rolf out of this,” Erin said.

  “I'll expense the hooker to the department,” Vic went on.

  “Jesus, you sound like you're serious,” Jones said.

  Erin got it. “You're gonna troll Little Odessa, talk to some of the street girls, see if
you can find one who knows our victim.”

  “You got a better idea?” Vic asked.

  “I'll keep grinding on Markov,” Jones said. “I don't care how clean he looks. Everybody's hiding something.”

  “This job will make you cynical,” Webb observed. “Ten more years and you'll be just like me.”

  “God, I hope not,” Jones said. “I don't ever want to look that bad in a trench coat.”

  Webb gave her a sarcastic smile that barely twitched one corner of his mouth. “Okay, enough grab-ass. Back to work.”

  The word Jones had used was “grinding,” and that was what they did. Erin went through hundreds of mug shots and Vice prostitution reports, hoping to find something that would lead to the Jane Doe. She got nothing. There were just too many teenage hookers in New York, and more coming in all the time. The only useful conclusion she came to was a negative one. If the victim had been in town more than a few months, she'd probably have some sort of record, so the absence of information suggested she was a relative newcomer. That didn't help if she'd been brought in illegally, which was almost certainly true. That way her pimp could threaten her with deportation along with her heroin dependency and the physical intimidation. This girl hadn't had a chance.

  Vic stayed on the phone most of the day, talking in Russian. Judging from the length of the conversations, and the way he kept pounding his fist into his desk between calls, he got hung up on a lot.

  Jones, despite her guarantee that everyone had secrets, had to admit that Gregory Markov just might be clean. “No mob connections at all,” she said. “Never arrested. If it wasn't for the INS, we wouldn't even have had his prints on file. Just married the once. No drugs, no domestic abuse. Uniforms never got called to his house. I don't believe it. How's a guy like that get mowed down?”

  “Same way everyone else does,” Webb said. “Bullets aren't like Santa Claus. They don't care if you've been naughty or nice.”

  “Wait a second,” Jones said. She'd been leaning back in her chair, stretching. Now she sat forward.

  Everyone looked her way. “What've you got?” Erin asked.

  “Something weird,” Jones said. “I've got Markov's bank records here. I was looking for extra money coming in, money laundering, drugs, that sort of thing. Nothing popped.”

  “So?” Webb said.

  “So there's nothing like that,” she said. “But there's money going out.”

  “What do you mean?” Erin asked, coming over to stand behind Jones's chair. She was still a beat cop at heart. Struggling through her own income tax returns was the best she could do at accounting.

  “I mean Markov's got cash withdrawals,” Jones said. “Sizable ones. And they're regular. Look, about five thousand a month. Always in cash.”

  “Gambling problem?” Vic guessed.

  “Blackmail payouts?” Webb suggested.

  Jones shrugged. “How do I know? Maybe he got in deep to loan sharks and they gunned him.”

  “No,” Erin said. “You owe a Shylock, he doesn't kill you. Besides, Markov had plenty of money.”

  “No kidding,” Jones said. “He kept a healthy balance all the time. You think the wife knew about this?”

  “Try this for size,” Webb said. “Markov's banging nice, young teenage tail, fresh from Mother Russia. But he knocks up this one girl, and she starts blackmailing him. Maybe she keeps the cash, maybe she hands it on to her pimp. Anyway, he pays so the wife doesn't find out. But she does find out. And she gets pissed.”

  “So she hires a Russian death squad to gun both of them?” Vic said. “I dunno.”

  “If it was a crime of passion, she'd probably kill him herself,” Erin said.

  “Maybe she did,” Webb said. “She's from Russia, maybe she knows some tough guys from over there. We don't know she wasn't at the scene.”

  Erin thought about Natalie Markov. She somehow couldn't see the woman spraying submachine-gun fire into a motel room. But it wasn't like she had any better ideas. “How long till we get the DNA back on the baby?” she asked.

  Webb sighed. “This isn't TV, O'Reilly,” he said. “Last I checked, the DNA lab was three months backlogged. On important cases. We'll get the results in time for the trial. Maybe.”

  “Levine can at least get us a blood type,” Erin said. “If it doesn't match, that would eliminate Markov as the father.”

  “Which leaves us nowhere,” Vic said gloomily. “Like we were before. Picking up teenage hookers is sounding better and better.”

  “You want me to come with?” Erin asked.

  “You've gotta be shitting me,” Vic said. “A guy like me, sure, maybe I could be looking for some action. The two of us together, we might as well put on our dress blues, throw our hats in the air, and sing 'New York, New York.'”

  “Okay, Neshenko,” Webb said. “Go out there, see what you can find. But watch your step. These are serious players. Have a piece on you, and make sure backup's in the area.”

  “If I'm extra-special good, can I stay up half an hour past my bedtime?” Vic asked.

  “Knock it off,” Webb said. “I ask for a detective squad, I get standup comedians.”

  There wasn't much to laugh about. They only had one real lead to follow, and that was the money from Markov's accounts. It was pretty thin.

  “He might be laundering money for the Russian mob,” Jones said. “But I doubt it.”

  “How can you tell?” Erin asked.

  “The income looks legit,” Jones said. “The withdrawals are sloppy by comparison. If this guy was a professional, he'd have disguised the outflow better. And there's just not enough of it. Mob money launderers move lots of money, seven, eight figures. Our boy's shifting what, five K a month? That's nothing.”

  “People get killed over less,” Erin said.

  “But not mobsters,” Webb said. “What's his highest account balance?”

  Jones glanced through Markov's bank record. “Forty grand. His jewelry business account carries higher balances, mid six figures, but nothing out of the ordinary on it. I'm still double-checking some of the transactions, but it looks clean.”

  “Why don't we ask the wife?” Erin asked.

  “You think she knows about it?” Vic replied.

  “That's why I want to ask her,” Erin shot back.

  “Okay, go for it,” Webb said.

  “I'll keep going over the business records,” Jones said. “See if I missed anything.”

  Erin dialed Natalie's number. The Russian woman picked up on the third ring.

  “Yes?” Natalie said, sounding very tired.

  “Hello, Ms. Markov, this is Erin O'Reilly, with the NYPD,” Erin said, reflecting that death in America meant a lot of phone calls for the survivors. “I'm sorry to bother you, ma'am, but I was hoping I could talk to you a little about your husband.”

  Natalie hesitated. Then she cleared her throat and spoke firmly and clearly. “If it will help you to find who has done this terrible thing to Gregory, I will do everything I can. Do you have the address?”

  “Yes, ma'am,” Erin said. She'd gotten it from Markov's driver's license.

  “Then you will come at once,” Natalie said, more order than invitation.

  “Thank you, Ms. Markov,” Erin said. “I'll be there as soon as I can.” She clipped on Rolf's leash and headed to her car. She caught up with Vic on the way. ”You heading to Little Odessa?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “But we ought to go separate. I don't know how long I'm gonna be.”

  “I won't wait up for you.”

  The Markovs lived in Brighton Beach, an enclave at the southern tip of Brooklyn which had the largest population of Russian immigrants in the Western hemisphere. Erin took 478 through the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel under the East River, then Ocean Parkway the rest of the way. She wasn't in a rush, which was good. The drive took 45 minutes. All the way down, she thought the case over. She didn't have enough pieces. They not only didn't have any suspects, they still didn't even know who one of the
victims was.

  “Maybe Markov knew her,” she said to Rolf. “Hell, maybe she wasn't a call girl. Maybe she was out of the life. What do you think?”

  Rolf didn't have an opinion.

  Brighton Beach had been hit hard by a hurricane the previous summer, and Erin could see signs of damage. But the neighborhood was as busy as any in Brooklyn. She rolled down her window out of old Patrol habit as she drove through the streets, trying to get a sense of the local atmosphere and maybe catch something out of place. She heard as much Russian as English from the pedestrians.

  The Markovs lived in a brick building near the beach. She parked in a police zone near the apartment, got Rolf out of the car, flipped her shield at the doorman, and went in.

  Natalie answered the door immediately. She obviously hadn't slept much, if at all, judging by the dark shadows under her eyes. They went with her black silk blouse and skirt. She was very polite; her voice was calm and collected, with a heavy Russian accent.

  “Come in, Officer O'Reilly,” she said. “The water is ready. I will pour you some tea.”

  “Thank you, ma'am,” Erin said, glancing around. It was a very nice apartment, spacious by New York standards, especially for a childless couple. The ceilings were a little low, but the place was clean and well-furnished.

  “Please, make yourself comfortable,” Natalie said, gesturing to a couch in the living room. “My home is yours.”

  “Thank you,” she said again. While Natalie went into the kitchen, Erin took the opportunity to look around the room. There was a bookshelf full of books with a mix of English and Cyrillic titles. The mantelpiece had photographs of a serious-looking older couple, probably Natalie or Gregory's parents, a wedding picture of the two of them, and a photo of a Russian city, probably St. Petersburg.

  The smell of tobacco hung in the air. An ashtray sat on the coffee table with a butt that was still smoking. Erin saw it was black with a gold filter.

  “I am sorry,” Natalie said as Erin was bending over to examine the ashtray. “It is a terrible habit, I know, but those are the most difficult to break.”