by Grant Pies
Carter tugged on Sam’s coat to pull him away. “It’s strip clubs and bookies. Like I said, the more things change, the more they stay the same.”
“Here.” The man in black pointed to a door at the end of the hall, then held a hand up. “Wait.” He stepped towards Carter and patted underneath his arms, then around his waist and down each leg. Sam was next. He was still peering into one of the fake bedrooms. As the man patted Sam’s ankle and traveled up his thigh, the Russian man looked up.
Shaking his head, Sam said, “It’s the girls, don’t flatter yourself buddy.”
The man in black nodded at the door then made his way back through the warehouse.
Carter entered the room. A man in his forties sat at a desk, fingers interlaced. Two other men dressed in black stood on either side with submachine guns slung across their chests.
During their time working together, Leland had forced Carter to study all types of guns, models, calibers, which guns were made in which countries, ammo types. So Carter knew the men carried PP-2000s; compact and lightweight enough to ship large quantities overseas, they were standard issue for Russian police.
“Mr. Muratov.” Carter reached his hand out. The two men stepped forward and gripped their guns. Carter pulled his hand away and stepped back.
“Maxim,” the man said without standing. His Russian accent was present but not nearly as thick as the man who led Carter and Sam here. “Call me Maxim. My man tells me you have information. Information on my attorney?”
“Yes,” Carter said. “George Kingsley.”
“King George, I call him. Got me out of a few tight spots,” Maxim said. “I trust him … I don’t know you.” The single overhead light in the small room reflected off a large gold ring Maxim wore on his thumb.
“My – my name is Will Carter.” He thought about handing him a business card, but decided against reaching into his pocket. “This is my partner.” Sam nodded, but otherwise didn’t move.
“Okay. So, fucking what? You’re here to get me to switch attorneys? Bad mouth King George then pitch me on your services?”
“No, sir.” Carter gripped the envelope in his hand. “We’re private investigators, not attorneys.”
“You look like fucking cops. If I didn’t own all the cops on the force, at least the ones worth knowing, then I would’ve pegged you for a couple pigs. But a couple private dicks? Huh. What happened to your face?” Maxim leaned back in his chair and stretched his hands behind his head.
“Car accident.”
Maxim tilted his head and stared at Carter’s face, then squinted and shook his head. “I know you.”
“What?” Carter glanced back, thinking he meant he knew Sam from when he was on the force. “Me?”
“Yes, you.” Maxim jabbed his finger towards Carter. “You are the PI that found the dead girl. No?”
“You mean Beth Friedman?”
“Yes!” Maxim clapped his hands together and smiled. “Beth Friedman. The girl the cops gave up on. I remembered that case because it embarrassed the cops. Fucking pigs.” He scrunched his face and frowned. “The detectives I own … they were pissed at you. Made them scramble. Spin the story.” Maxim grinned, revealing a gold tooth. “You made them sweat. What can I do for the man who embarrassed the pigs?”
“We have information about George and—” Carter hesitated. This was it, the point of no return. “George and Kristy.”
Maxim sat forward again. His smile faded quickly. “What did you say? What the fuck did you say?” He raised his voice with each word. His two bodyguards stepped forward, each of their hands tensed around their guns.
“George,” Carter said. “Uh, King George, well here.” He held out the envelope. “It’s probably best if you see for yourself.” One of the men stepped forward and ripped the envelope from Carter’s hand and passed it to Maxim.
“What the fuck is this?” He tore the envelope open and spilled the photos out onto his desk. “You following Kristy?” He spread the photos out, his eyes darting around each one. “What the fuck,” he mumbled. He picked up the photo of George and Kristy, both naked. Kristy on her knees at the foot of the bed, and George Kingsley sitting on the bed in front of her. It was a picture no man wanted to see of their girlfriend.
Maxim shouted a string of Russian words and swiped the other photos off his desk. “Where’d you get this!” He stood from his desk and stepped around until he was only a foot away from Carter. Sam stayed behind, ready to turn and run out the door.
Carter held his hands out to try and stop any confrontation. He knew he would have to take anything Maxim threw at him, or else he’d be shot dead before he knew what happened. “George’s wife hired us to follow him.” He backed up one step and bumped into Sam. “We weren’t following Kristy … or you. Mrs. Kingsley thought her husband was cheating on her. We took these.”
“You saw this?” Maxim held the picture in the air. “You watched Kristy … you saw her—"
“No. No, sir. We just placed the camera and developed the pictures. We didn’t watch them,” Carter said.
“What do you want? Why are you showing these to me?”
Carter couldn’t answer. He knew what he was doing, trading information in exchange for making Kingsley go away, but he couldn’t say it. Didn’t want to say it.
“We knew who you were,” Sam jumped in. “We knew George represented you, and once we figured out who Kristy was.” Maxim scowled at the mention of Kristy’s name. “We didn’t think it was prudent for us to withhold this information from a person like you.”
“Just out of the goodness of your heart.” His eyes pierced Carter and his mouth remained straight. Maxim looked at the picture again. He cringed, but couldn’t look away. He shouted in Russian again as he turned and kicked the desk. It shot back a foot and the chair behind crashed into the wall. “What do you want!” he yelled.
“Nothing, sir,” Sam said, ready to turn and leave.
“There is one thing,” Carter spoke up. He hadn’t discussed this with Sam, because he knew Sam would have refused to go along with it. “You said you knew all the cops on the Chicago police force?”
“What the fuck?” Sam whispered through clenched teeth.
Maxim looked down at the photo, gripping it until it bent and crumpled in his hand. “Not all cops – just the ones that can tell the rest what to do.”
“There’s a guy. He was arrested…” Carter thought back on the previous days. They all bled together, blurred into one. He glanced back at Sam, but he refused to help, his eyes burning into Carter. “Five days ago. Six?” Carter counted backwards. “Dennis Orcheck. I need to talk to him.”
“Jesus Christ,” Sam muttered and shook his head.
“This guy’s in jail? Then just go visit him,” Maxim said.
“No, I need to talk to him … privately. No one listening in. He’s probably waiting for a bail hearing.”
“Unbelievable,” Sam sighed behind him.
“What’s he in for? And what do you want with him?”
“He confessed to raping a young girl, and he’s a suspect in a missing persons case. Another girl the cops gave up on. The parents of the missing girl hired us to find her. I want to talk to him. Find out what happened to the girl. Give the parents some closure.”
“Orcheck you said his name was?” Maxim asked.
“Mm-hm.” Carter nodded. He wiped his sweaty palms on his jeans and held his breath.
“I suppose I owe you,” Maxim said. “I will arrange it.” He held up the picture of his girlfriend and Kingsley. “And I will take care of these two, personally.”
Poisoned Pawn
Carter and Sam walked around the back of the Fifth District Police Station. Sam took a large step to avoid a puddle, while Carter veered around it.
Sam shook his head. “Can’t believe you asked Maxim Muratov for this.”
“Yeah, you’ve said that already.”
“I mean, I’m surprised you asked him for anything. But
this? C’mon!”
They reached the back of the station and Carter pounded his fist against the metal door. “You’re just pissed because he got us what you couldn’t.”
“Oh yeah, I’m real jealous.” Sam rolled his eyes and tossed his cigarette. “I just don’t think it’s good to owe a guy like Muratov.”
“I don’t owe him. We gave him info, and he did this for us in return. Even Steven.”
“You brush off anything I say, tell yourself I’m just bragging about being a cop or dreaming of better days on the force, but you don’t stop for one goddamn second and consider that maybe I know what I’m talking about. You spent a few years with fucking Leland Garrett, a man whose best case, aside from Beth Friedman, was him tracking down a new battery for his hearing aid.”
Sam shook his head, like he was at a breaking point. “There are some things you need to trust me on, and this is one of them. Guys like Muratov, it’s never even. The Great Will Carter is no different. You opened the door to him asking things of you, and the only thing dumber than asking for this favor is saying no when he comes asking for something else.” He looked at Carter, wide eyed and frightened—at least more frightened than Carter had ever seen him.
“I’ve seen a guy who tried to tell Maxim no. It wasn’t pretty.” He swallowed and squeezed his hand over his throat. “Maxim dunked a rag in water, spun it up real tight, then forced one end down the guy’s throat, but he left his airway open so he could breathe. He worked until he got the rag down into the man’s stomach.” Sam cleared his throat again.
“But he held onto the very end of the rag, kept it out of his mouth. He waited until the stomach started to try and digest the fucking thing. Then he pulled it out, taking the guy’s stomach lining and intestines with it.”
Carter looked at Sam. The image was vivid, but he wondered if it was a sort of myth passed around the police force, a cautionary tale, created to frighten and create an image of Maxim Muratov. Or perhaps something Maxim himself has spread, making himself a boogeyman. Carter pounded on the door again.
The door opened. The same detective Sam spoke with at Orcheck’s house, Detective Shaker, stood in the doorway. He was short with a buzz cut, and his stomach hung slightly beyond his belt. His sleeves were rolled up past his elbows.
“Don’t want to know what you had to do to get this,” Detective Shaker said, still blocking the doorway. “What you want with a piece of shit like Orcheck anyway? Guy hasn’t said a thing since we brought him in.”
“Has he asked for an attorney?” Carter asked. Shaker shook his head. “Good.”
Detective Shaker just stood in the doorway, not budging.
“You gonna let us in or not?” Carter asked.
“What do you want with him?” He tilted his head to the side and narrowed his eyes. “Your job’s done, isn’t it?”
“My job’s done when I say it’s done.”
“Word is the parents paid you. Released you of your duties.” Shaker crossed his arms over his chest and pushed his large stomach down further beyond his waist.
“Was that a question?” Carter asked.
“What do you expect to get out of this? You know he’s guilty.”
“And what happened to innocent until proven guilty? Hm?”
“Save that shit for the courts. You saw the letters. And those pictures … sicko. Murphy, you better know who you’re working for.” Detective Shaker leaned to look past Carter and meet eyes with Sam. “Any guy who sticks up for a pedophile this much makes you wonder.” He looked back at Carter. “Why not let the professionals take over from here? Free you up so you can go back to being a paid peeping Tom.” Shaker smirked and looked at Sam for agreement. Sam didn’t respond. “You find one dead girl two fucking years ago, and you think you’re better than us?”
“I thought I was better than you long before Beth Friedman,” Carter said, wondering how much he could say to Shaker and still get access to Orcheck.
“You know, Murphy, you work with an arrogant piece of shit.”
“That may be true.” Carter stepped closer to Detective Shaker. “But the mere fact that you opened this door tells me you answer to someone other than the Chief of Police. And that person ordered you to let us talk to Orcheck. So, you gonna let us in or are we going to have a problem?”
Detective Shaker’s smirk faded, and he stepped aside. He led them down a hallway. “You got ten minutes,” Shaker said, stopping at a solid metal door. His breath smelled of old coffee. He pulled the door open, and the two men stepped inside. The heavy door slammed shut, the lock latching from the other side.
There was no large two-way mirror or windows, not like in the movies. There weren’t even any cameras hanging in the corners. Carter wondered what other things went on in this room that weren’t supposed to.
Orcheck, in an orange jumpsuit three sizes too big, sat at the table in the middle of the room, his wrists shackled and the cuffs looped through a metal clasp in the middle of the table. A circle of blood on Orcheck’s chest had leaked through the bandages underneath his jumpsuit from where Sam shot him.
“How many stitches did they tear?” Carter asked, pulling the only other chair out from the table. Sam took only a couple steps inside the room and leaned against the wall, his arms crossed over his chest.
“You!” Orcheck instinctively pulled his arms inward, but the cuffs didn’t budge. He winced at the quick movement.
Carter checked his watch. Ten minutes to figure out what Orcheck knows. Not long.
“What are you doing here?” Orcheck’s face was bruised on one side, his left eye black. These were fresh bruises, nothing that happened the night Orcheck was arrested.
“I’d ask how they’re treating you here, but,” Carter motioned at Orcheck’s face, “well.”
“I have nothing to say to you.”
“We don’t have much time. I need answers. Now.”
“They’ve been trying for days to get me to confess to killing Rose. But I didn’t do it. I didn’t hurt Rose. I didn’t kill her. I won’t confess to something I didn’t do.”
“Ha,” Sam laughed, but otherwise stayed quiet.
“Okay, okay,” Carter said. “Let’s assume that’s true.” He didn’t have the time to argue with him.
“It is true!” Orcheck winced and coughed. “I loved her.”
“Fine.” Carter held his hands up and conceded the point. “So who did it then? Who took Rose? You knew her better than most. Who wanted her gone?”
“What about her friend?”
“Who? Mike?”
Nodding frantically, Dennis said, “Yeah, yeah, that kid. He walked around, dressed in black, painted nails. I’m sure he’s capable of doing something.”
“Nah.” Carter shook his head. “Kid’s harmless. We talked to him. I just don’t think he’s got it in him, plus what’s the motive? That’s why you gotta help us out. You’re the only one with a motive right now.”
“What, because she was pregnant?”
“Yeah, that’s a big motive, don’t you think?” Carter leaned back in his chair. He glanced down to check his watch. Eight minutes until Detective Shaker comes in and kicks us out. Carter assumed Detective Shaker wouldn’t give them one second more than he had to.
“That wasn’t supposed to happen.” Dennis looked down and away from Carter. It was brief, but something Carter noticed. A slip, something Orcheck was torn about discussing.
“What do you mean ‘supposed to happen’?” Carter leaned forward. It was something at the surface. Something he was barely fighting to keep down.
“Nothing,” Dennis said, still looking away. “I got nothing to say unless you can help me get my meds.”
“Meds? What meds? Are they withholding prescriptions from you?”
“Yes – well, um, I don’t know.”
“They’re not legal,” Sam interjected from the corner of the room. He uncrossed his arms and pulled a flask out from his coat pocket. “If they were legal, then they�
��d have to give them to him.” He threw his head back to drink from his flask, then stuffed it back in his coat. He lit a cigarette and paced around the table, spreading smoke into the cramped room.
Carter turned to face Sam. “Yeah, cuz your boys in blue are treating him so well as is.” He turned back to Orcheck. “I can help. If you know something. I can help.”
“How do I know you can help?”
“I’m here, aren’t I?” He motioned around the room. “I’ve got connections,” he said, hoping Sam kept his scoffing and eyerolling to a minimum. “You talk now, and I’ll be back here in one hour with whatever it is you need. What do you know?”
“I need my meds first.” Orcheck leaned back defiantly. At least he was bargaining, not simply stonewalling.
“That’s not how it works. First you talk.” Carter sat in silence with Dennis, playing a game of chicken. Neither giving in, except Orcheck had time on his side. “You told me you cared for Rose. Why not help us. Don’t you want justice for her?”
Orcheck gradually slumped in his chair. He uncrossed his arms. “I – I wasn’t – how could I know I would develop feelings for her? Much less get her pregnant? It just happened. They wanted me to keep an eye on her. But it turned into more.”
“An eye on Rose?” Carter asked. “Someone wanted you to keep an eye on her?”
Dennis clenched his jaw, like what he’d just said somehow slipped out before he even realized what was happening. He shook his head. “I need my meds.”
“Just fucking talk!” Sam stepped out from the corner.
He hovered over Dennis, leaning down and placing one hand flat on the table and the other hand on the back of Dennis’ chair.
“I’m getting sick of this shit! I didn’t even want to come here. My partner might fall for your bullshit, but I know you. I’ve seen you before in rooms just like this. Spinning some tale to undo what you’ve already confessed to. Throw someone else under the bus, or just backpedal and say whatever happened was a mistake.” Sam’s eyes burned into Dennis, and he looked away, cowering in his chair.