The Beamer accelerated quickly and Larsson stopped.
When it was about twenty yards off, Larsson recognized the driver. The coupe pulled up and Larsson opened the passenger door.
“Hey. Nice to see you,” said Sara Lehto. She was pretty: tall and thin, with a nice figure. Her bleached hair was gathered into a ponytail. She had appeared in various domestic adult videos and magazines.
Larsson circled to the rear of the Z3 and tossed his bag in the trunk.
No sooner had he slid into the car than they began to passionately kiss. Larsson’s hand pawed at Sara’s heaving breasts.
“Sure is,” Larsson said.
Sara Lehto had been convicted as an accessory to the same extortion charge as Larsson, but had received a suspended sentence as a first-time offender.
She swung the car around and punched the gas. Even on a short stump of road, the Z3 gained impressive speed.
“Who’s wheels?”
“Mike’s,” she answered, braking at the intersection. “He thought you’d want a proper ride.”
She turned onto the old Lahti Highway heading south.
“From you, sure… Where we going?”
Sara smiled at her bald-headed man. “Kalastajatorppa. Mike got us a suite there.”
Kalastajatorppa was one of the finest hotels in Helsinki, located on a sprawling campus overlooking the sea. Its beauty and remote location had made it a favorite for visiting statesmen.
Sara’s right hand slipped from the stick shift to his thigh.
* * *
Suhonen strode down the bleak, fluorescent hallway of the Violent Crimes Unit. The undercover officer glanced into Takamäki’s office, but the detective lieutenant was away.
The floor was quiet. He wondered if something serious had happened-where was everybody?
He walked into the detectives’ shared office and saw Sergeant Joutsamo staring at her monitor, presumably typing out some case notes.
“Hey,” Suhonen said as he proceeded to his desk in the corner.
“Take a look at this,” Joutsamo said before Suhonen could take off his coat.
Suhonen circled behind Joutsamo and shrugged off his jacket.
Joutsamo pointed at the screen. “This is last night’s security footage from a downtown restaurant.”
The video was dark but clear, though jumpy, as it only recorded one frame per second. The time appeared in the lower right corner: 2:45 A.M. The seconds ticked by one by one.
The video began with a view of a street and a group of four young men staggering down the sidewalk-obviously drunk. Suhonen fully expected one of them to throw a punch and for the victim to fall over and crack his head on the asphalt.
But that didn’t happen. Instead, one of the guys ran across the street and climbed onto a metal bridge railing. A set of train tracks ran fifty feet below. The other three came closer and cheered him on.
Joutsamo slowed down the tape. Nonetheless, things happened quickly. In the lower corner, the restaurant’s burly bouncer took a couple of steps toward the group and apparently said something, since one of the men turned his head to look. The man on the railing was still standing upright, but in the next frame he was pitched backwards at a peculiar angle with his arms spread wide, and in the following frame, he had disappeared. In the next three frames, the trio and the bouncer dashed to the railing.
Joutsamo stopped the video. “He died immediately.”
“How old?”
“Twenty-two. The night-shift guys interviewed his friends at the scene. They were university students celebrating their friend’s birthday, and this twenty-two year-old got the drunken notion that he should jump onto the railing for a balancing act. No mental health problems, suicide threats or anything like that.”
“Finnish machismo,” Suhonen yawned.
Every year, about six hundred young men died of violent causes or of accidents, so there was nothing extraordinary about the incident…except to his family and friends.
“I guess. Risky behavior in a blur of booze,” she went on. “This morning I went to deliver the bad news and the parents took it pretty hard.”
“Not many laugh in that situation. Crime scenes are a piece of cake compared to that.”
Suhonen laid his hand on her shoulder.
“The mom cried the whole time and the dad went mute from shock. I listened to her cry for an hour, but then I had to leave. Apparently, he was a good kid. The police pastor stayed with them for support.”
“Accidents happen,” Suhonen said. He returned to his desk, tossed his jacket over the chair and booted up the computer. He took his keys out of his pocket and checked to see that his gun was still in the bottom drawer. Check.
“How was Estonia?”
Instead of answering, Suhonen tossed out a question. “Did you know that Estonia’s Supreme Court ruled that if a defendant changes his testimony in court, then the court can only take the new testimony into account. So all police interviews have to be scrapped. And if the defendant doesn’t testify, then none of the police interviews are admissible.”
She nodded. “I heard about that, but I meant your case.”
“Oh, some progress. Face-to-face meetings are always better than phone conversations,” he said evasively. He hadn’t told Joutsamo about his dinner in Tallinn. “Toomas recognized the guy in the photo as an Estonian-Russian named Sergei Zubrov.”
“Means nothing to me.”
“Same here, so far.”
* * *
Dressed only in boxers, Larsson gazed out the bedroom window of their suite at the Kalastajatorppa resort. The gangster’s body was almost entirely etched in ink, from just below his knees to the nape of his neck. The sea looked just as gray as the sky. It was almost dark outside, though it was just past noon.
At least the view here was better than staring at the fields surrounding the Turku brig.
Sara had gotten the key from the lobby and Larsson had come straight to the suite from the garage. He knew his appearance attracted attention, and that cops paid the porters for information on interesting guests.
The suite had two rooms: a bedroom with a large bed, and a living room with a sofa and wet bar. A bottle of champagne on ice had been waiting for them in the living room and they had popped the cork before decamping to the bedroom.
Now Sara was lying on the bed, watching pay-per-view.
Gonzales had arranged this nicely. The room had been ready right away in the morning, not at two in the afternoon, which was the usual check-in time. Maybe he had slipped the porters a little extra. The 350-euro check had been pre-paid. Larsson wondered why Mike seemed so eager to please. What was behind all this? He’d have time to reflect on that later.
“What movie’s this?”
“It’s not a movie. It’s a TV series called Rome. First season.”
Larsson glanced at the enormous screen. Legionnaires were smacking at each other with swords. It couldn’t have interested Larsson less. “Uh-huh. Looks good.”
“It is. Sex and violence. Just like our life.” Sara reached for the half-empty glass on the nightstand. “We were born at the wrong time. Should’ve lived with these guys.”
Wrong time, wrong place, thought Larsson. An airplane cleaved through the sky.
He needed to get the Skulls out of their slump and back on their feet. The simultaneous sentences of the kingpin and second-in-command had weakened the gang. Their president was doing life for shooting a businessman six years ago. He had carried out a contract and taken the life sentence rather than rat on the customer. That was the right attitude.
The cops had lucked out too often. Sara had told him that Alanen and Lintula had been locked up for the pizzeria extortion case. Out of a good two dozen gang members, about ten were sitting in cells now.
The president, who had been with Larsson in the Turku pen, agreed. The gang’s scope needed to be broadened and strengthened.
The champagne bottle was in an ice pail next to the TV. Larsson fil
led his glass with the last few drops.
“We need more of this.”
“There’s more in the fridge,” she said without looking away from the screen.
“You warm up the sauna?” Larsson asked, slamming the champagne.
“No need. It’s one of those rapid-ready ones. Just lift the cover off the stove and it’ll warm up.”
“OK.”
His plans weren’t so urgent that they couldn’t take a sauna. But at some point, he should call Aronen and summon the gang for tomorrow. For now, he could borrow Sara’s phone, but he’d have to get his own soon.
* * *
The jukebox at the Corner Pub was playing something new for a change. Happoradio’s lead singer belted out their recent hit “Che Guevara,” “In clouds of smoke, we rebel. Against the machine, we raise hell,” The words were inaudible in the back corner, but not the pounding rhythm.
Eero Salmela, “Ear” Nurminen and “Macho” Mertala were pounding cut-rate beers. Each of them had been coming and going all day, stopping in and out of their corner table. Of course, spending time here called for money-either your own or borrowed. Stolen money was fine, too.
The conversation dealt mostly with recent activities. If things were actually going well, they told their friends that everything was going to hell. And vice versa. Anything and everything was a joke.
Weakness had to be concealed. They had all learned that in prison. Two criminals at a table could talk about real misfortunes, but three was one too many.
Ear-Nurminen, sporting a thick beard and dated eyeglasses, piped up. “So, you guys know what my social security check and a woman’s period have in common?”
Salmela and Macho shrugged their shoulders.
“Both arrive once a month and last about a week.”
All three laughed.
Ear-Nurminen had to sit further away from the table so his tremendous belly had room. According to the official story, he had received the “Ear” nickname because of his cauliflower ears, but the unofficial story had it that when he was younger, he had crept around apartment buildings and eavesdropped on people’s lives through the mail slots.
Macho-Mertala was around thirty, narrow-faced and wore a jean jacket. He had burglarized dozens of grocery stores and kiosks, but when he told the stories, they changed to department stores and electronics shops.
“Fuck,” Macho began and the others raised their mugs.
“To memory,” Salmela said, his mug in the air.
“To memory,” Macho wheezed.
The men drank. Their toast was to the memory of “Fuck” Jore, who had died just last summer. The bushy-browed Jore, a long-time member of their group, had received his nickname for his rather liberal use of the F-word. In his usual way, he had made the mistake of mocking a violent and mentally insane outpatient who was bumming a cigarette a few blocks from the Corner Pub, and took a knife in the gut for it. The ambulance had come quickly, but the eighteen stab wounds were too much for the doctors.
The killer had been found not guilty by reason of insanity and was committed to a mental hospital. Every now and then, rumors circulated in the Corner Pub that the guy had been spotted nearby.
“Jore was a good man. His heart was in the right place, but his tongue was twisted all wrong,” Ear-Nurminen grumbled. At a minimum, every third word that Jore uttered had been “fuck.”
Salmela remembered a time when he had disdained the drunks-Jore, Ear-Nurminen, and Macho-at the corner table. Big talk about the past and no hope for the future. But he didn’t care anymore. He felt he belonged with them.
Actually, crime didn’t interest him anymore. He wanted out. He’d rather sit in the pub with friends, shoot the breeze and marvel at the youth of today. That was enough for him, but his old debts were a problem. To be precise, the problem was the party to whom he was indebted. Before he could ever withdraw into retirement to hoodwink the welfare office and tell tall tales to the rookies, he’d have to pay the Skulls.
Now he had the opportunity. The money for the speed was all there, even if he had had to borrow all of it. It had demanded focus and tireless work, but he had succeeded against all odds. The middle-man had been paid, and the shipment was due to arrive any day.
The girl Saarnikangas had recommended hadn’t even wanted to talk about smuggling, but with the middle man’s help, he had found a mule.
Salmela was a man with a plan. Once he sold the dope to the buyer, he’d pay back the Skulls, plus keep a few grand for himself.
The scheme seemed a little complicated now, but if he could only concentrate for a couple of days, it would be over and all would be well. His head pounded every so often, but not so much that he didn’t know to keep quiet about certain things, even among his buddies at the Corner Pub. These certain things were two: the scheme underway and the wad of cash in his billfold.
“Life is life,” Salmela said, quoting Matti Nykänen, Finland’s greatest ski jumper. Famously flawed, Nykänen had battled alcoholism, launched an unsuccessful singing career, fallen on hard times, and even done a stint in jail for the drunken stabbing of his girlfriend.
The mugs rose once more for Jore.
“Wonder if we could get Matti Nykänen to play a show here?” Macho thought aloud. “I know a few guys who’ve hung out with his crowd.”
“Fuck,” Ear-Nurminen went on, raising his mug again. “Sure wouldn’t find me here if he did.”
Macho gave his buddy a scornful look.
Ear-Nurminen hacked loudly, clearing his throat, “Gotta give him credit for the gold medals, and he’s an old felon too, but he damned sure doesn’t know how to sing.”
“That’s why he’d fit right in,” Macho cackled. “An ex-con whose best years are behind him, but can barely manage a hum nowadays. That’s why he’s one of us.”
“Okay, you organize it, I’ll come.”
Salmela glanced at his phone. No missed calls. It would come…for sure. Probably tomorrow. He’d find out where the shipment was stashed, and just forward the location to the buyer. Hell, no. He’d have to meet the mule at the harbor, of course. That’s how it went. Then he’d have to hide it somewhere, but not at home. Maybe bury it somewhere. Then he could sell the location of the stash. That’s how it’d be. He reminded himself to focus.
Then he’d pay his debts and focus on retirement without any threats or obligations.
The pain at the juncture of his skull and spine began to throb again. Best not to think too much. He tried to empty his head of thoughts.
Hey, he was among friends at the Corner Pub. Things would work out. No worries, no woes.
He emptied his pint. “Hurry up, you old fools. The next round is on me.”
“Wow,” Macho grunted and tossed back his mug. Ear-Nurminen finished last by three seconds-his glass had been the fullest.
CHAPTER 5
THURSDAY, 5:20 P.M.
PASILA POLICE HEADQUARTERS, HELSINKI
This Zubrov was still one strange bird. There was a Sergei Zubov who played in the NHL, but that was definitely a different guy. Over the course of the day, Suhonen had drunk half a dozen cups of coffee, made about fifteen phone calls and sifted through as many police databases as possible.
Now he was even more pleased he had gone to Tallinn, even if only for a small morsel of data. He had found nothing in the Finnish databases.
Of course, there were other possibilities. Perhaps Zubrov had changed his name or had several identities. Suhonen had searched using the names “Sergey, Serghey, Zhubrov,” as well as many other alternatives and combinations. He didn’t buy the notion that Zubrov was just a law-abiding citizen, meeting Gonzales at the Velodrome to chat about the weather.
Something was up, and it drove Suhonen nuts that he didn’t know what.
Joutsamo returned. He had no idea where she had been, nor did he care.
“You find anything on that Sergei?” the Sergeant asked.
“Nope.”
“Well, we at least know wha
t he looks like if he ever actually commits a crime.”
“Yup.”
Joutsamo’s attitude irritated Suhonen. Organized crime investigations should focus on these “Zubrovs” earlier and nail them for crimes in the making. Once the murder, robbery, assault or drug deal had taken place, it was too late.
Suhonen believed that the police lacked preventative tools and needed more capable undercover officers. He had spent a lot of time thinking about it, and inevitably, the United States and September 11, 2001 came to mind. Intelligence organizations had several indications of a possible terrorist attack, but they were unable to connect the dots. On top of that, the U.S. intelligence community had forgotten the importance of human assets in the field. Because they had relied too heavily on technology, which the enemy had learned to circumvent, the connections between the terrorists and their plot remained undetected until it was too late. Effective prevention required field work.
To Suhonen, the emphasis of criminal investigations was misplaced. Organized crimes should be prevented, not pursued after the fact. Even if the perpetrators were never charged, at least a crime would have been stopped.
Typically, the police had to wait until a crime was committed to get started. But by then, the damage was already done. Detectives would prioritize the cases based on the severity of the crime and available evidence, then go after the most dangerous suspects. Even with the Finnish police solving 95 percent of homicide cases, there were still many dead victims and many criminals left on the streets. For Suhonen, undercover work was an essential part of police work.
Zubrov’s case gnawed at Suhonen because he didn’t know what it was about. Or was he paranoid? Who could tell him more about this character without word of his interest drifting back to Zubrov himself? Somewhere, someone knew more about the man. At least Toomas Indres had promised to dig up more. At some point, he’d have to put in a follow-up call to Estonia.
Suhonen had also considered a possible connection from Zubrov-through Gonzales-to the Skulls. The Skulls carried out their own hits, so they didn’t need a hit-man. Recently, the sphere of the Skulls had only included drugs, extortion and debt collection contracts anyway. This was primarily because the gang’s brains, Tapani Larsson, had been behind bars. Now, however, he was back on the streets.
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