“Big balls on that broad,” said Delarosa, shaking his head.
“Who’s working it?”
“They got Peed and—”
“Peed and Hefling?” interrupted Elias. Calm down, he thought, Jesus, calm down.
“Yeah, you should of seen him—Peed comes in here last night saying it’s an inside job, it’s an inside job. Anyway, the feds are on it.” Delarosa leaned over the counter conspiratorially and continued talking: “You know how fuckin’ Peed gets all stressed—he’s going on and on about how some Russian worker at the bank took some phone call and kinda played the whole thing up.”
Elias looked down at his own hand resting on the desk and saw wrinkles he had never seen before. “Russian?” he asked.
Delarosa nodded. “Peed’s all, ‘Open and shut.’”
“Well I guess it’s not an Asian gang,” said Elias. He was an actor, and these were his lines. He breathed in deep and breathed out shallow. He already wanted to drink.
“Who the fuck knows—last I checked, Russia was Asia. But Peed gets all worked up ’cause already there’s some bank VP telling him why it’s not an inside job, this and that, insurance and all, blah, blah, blah. Anyway, some chick, huh?”
“Un-freaking-believable,” said Elias, noting to himself that that didn’t sound the way he wanted it to; it sounded like something a high school student might say. “Some chick,” he tried, but this felt fake, too. Elias shook his head, and then asked, “Listen, can you forward me the report so we can work up the gang angle?” He was struggling. His mouth was struggling. His forehead was tense. His hand went to his back pocket and unconsciously patted the foreclosure letter that he had earlier stuffed there.
“Of course, sweetheart. Anything else?”
“Nope, thanks, brother.”
Thanks, brother. Thanks, brother. Thanks, brother.
He still was repeating, Thanks, brother in his head as he and Trammell drove away from the bank and headed toward the Eddy Rock projects. The clock on the dashboard said 10:20 a.m. Elias counted the hours until lunch, when he would be able to sneak away from Trammell long enough to drink some wine. He needed it. He told himself the drinking was going to last just this week; he would go back to being sober as soon as the house business was figured out. The wine was stashed in the trunk, capped up in a Gatorade bottle. White wine, he was convinced, didn’t smell as bad as anything else so long as you kept eating oranges all day.
The next day Elias went back to the robbery detail to get the report. A grumpy inspector he didn’t know disappeared to the back and then reappeared with a copy of it. He didn’t bother asking why Elias wanted it. There was a yellow Post-it note with Elias’s name on it stuck on the first page. Elias stepped back out into the hallway, folded the report, and stuffed it in the front of his waistband. He looked over his shoulder as he walked: nobody was following him.
In the men’s bathroom he closed himself into a stall, sat down on the toilet, and read the first few pages of the report. All they had given him was the initial incident report—no witness statements, no inspector’s chronology, no pictures, nothing. If he went back and asked, the inspector at the counter would probably say, “Ask Peed for those.”
Elias looked at the pages. There were fifteen witnesses in the bank at the time of the robbery. Which one was the Russian who took the phone call? Right at the top, the first witness listed had a Russian-sounding name: Rada Harkov. She was forty-two years old. Home address refused. Home phone refused. California driver’s license number D23539401. He jotted down her CDL and DOB into his notepad. She appeared to be the only Russian person of interest.
The narrative was written by an officer named Danzig:
ON THE ABOVE DATE AND TIME DISPATCH SENT MYSELF AND OFC CHEUNG #430 (3H11D) TO 3550 GEARY BLVD ON AN “A” PRIORITY CALL OF A BANK ROBBERY IN PROGRESS. AS I APPROACHED THE CORNER OF GEARY AND JORDAN I SAW A SECURITY GUARD (V/R-3) WONG RUNNING E/B GEARY AWAY FROM THE BANK. (V/R-3) WONG WAS POINTING AT THE ENTRANCE OF THE BANK. MYSELF AND OFC CHEUNG CONTINUED TO THE BANK AND EXITED OUR MARKED PATROL VEHICLE. FEARING THAT (S-1) WAS STILL IN THE BANK WE PULLED OUR SERVICE WEAPONS AND SET UP A PERIMETER IN FRONT OF THE ENTRANCE. OFC DANDLES #1422 AND OFC PAN #128 (3H01D) ARRIVED AND ALSO SET UP A DEFENSIVE PERIMETER AT THE FRONT OF THE BANK. NUMEROUS SFPD UNITS RESPONDED ON SCENE TO ASSIST.
AFTER APPROXIMATELY TWO MINUTES WHILE ATTEMPTING TO COMMUNICATE WITH DISPATCH (V/R-1) HARKOV EXITED THE FRONT DOOR WITH HER HANDS RAISED IN THE AIR. HARKOV WAS YELLING THAT SHE WAS THE MANAGER. OFC CHEUNG PULLED HARKOV SAFELY AWAY FROM THE DOOR. HARKOV TOLD OFC CHEUNG THAT (S/1) UNKNOWN FEMALE, WHITE OR HISPANIC, UNKNOWN AGE, 5’2”–5’5”, BLACK HAIR, SLIM, WEARING BLACK OR BLUE SWEATER AND DARK PANTS HAD LEFT THE AREA HEADED IN AN UNKNOWN DIRECTION. RESPONDING OFFICERS CHECKED THE PREMISES AND MADE SURE NOBODY WAS INJURED AND BROADCAST FURTHER SUSPECT INFORMATION TO DISPATCH.
(V/R-1) HARKOV FURTHER STATED THAT (S/1) MAY HAVE BEEN PICKED UP IN AN UNKNOWN WHITE VAN. I IMMEDIATELY ASKED IF ANYBODY WAS INJURED AND NEEDED MEDICAL ATTENTION. (V/R-1) HARKOV SAID THEY WERE SHAKEN UP BUT NOT INJURED. I BEGAN ASKING (V/R-1) HARKOV WHAT OCCURRED. HARKOV STATED SHE IS THE MANAGER OF THE BANK. TODAY (S/1) UNKNOWN FEMALE ENTERED THE BANK AND APPROACHED HARKOV AT HER DESK WHICH IS SITUATED IN THE MAIN LOBBY OF THE BANK. (S/1) HANDED HARKOV AN UNKNOWN CELLULAR PHONE. HARKOV SPOKE INTO THE PHONE THINKING (S/1) NEEDED TRANSLATION HELP. HAVKOV STATED THAT (S/2) UNKNOWN FEMALE SPOKE ON THE PHONE AND TOLD HARKOV THAT (S/1) WAS CARRYING A BOMB. HARKOV STATED THAT (S/2) SPOKE IN ENGLISH WITH NO APPARENT ACCENT. (S/1) AT THAT POINT SHOWED HARKOV HER BAG AND HARKOV DID SEE WHAT SHE BELIEVED TO BE A BOMB.
(V/R-1) HARKOV SAID (S/2) TOLD HER ON THE PHONE TO TAKE (S/1) TO THE VAULT AND GIVE HER THE BAG WAITING FOR PICKUP. HARKOV TOLD ME THAT THERE WAS A BAG CONTAINING APPROXIMATELY $880,000 WAITING TO BE PICKED UP FOR TRANSPORTATION THAT DAY. HARKOV FURTHER STATED THAT ONLY SHE HAD THE ELECTRONIC COMBINATION TO THE VAULT. HARKOV SAID SHE FEARED FOR HER LIFE. SHE TOOK (S/1) TO THE VAULT AND DID AS SHE WAS TOLD. HARKOV THEN WALKED (S/1) TO THE DOOR OF THE BANK. (S/1) STEPPED OUT OF THE BANK TO GEARY BLVD AND THEN RETURNED INSIDE FOR AN UNKNOWN REASON. (S/1) THEN DEMANDED THAT (V/R-3) WONG, SECURITY GUARD OF THE BANK, GIVE HER HIS GUN. HARKOV STATED THAT SHE TOLD WONG TO DO SO BECAUSE SHE WAS IN FEAR OF HER LIFE AND EVERYONE INSIDE THE BANK’S LIFE. (V/R-3) WONG GAVE (S/1) HIS GUN AND (S/1) EXITED THE BANK AND LEFT IN AN UNKNOWN DIRECTION.
5J13 INSP. PEED #1911 OF THE ROBBERY DETAIL ARRIVED ON SCENE AND TOOK CHARGE OF THE INVESTIGATION. HE REQUESTED THAT C.S.I. RESPOND TO THE SCENE TO SEARCH FOR POSSIBLE PHYSICAL EVIDENCE LEFT BY THE SUSPECTS. 5L15 INSP. PAILLE #303 ARRIVED AND BEGAN TO PROCESS THE SCENE. OFC DENNY #806 BEGAN A CRIME SCENE LOG. ROBBERY ABATEMENT UNITS RESPONDED TO THE IMMEDIATE AREA TO SEARCH FOR THE SUSPECTS. 5J200 LT. KOLTUNIAK OF ROBBERY ALSO ARRIVED AT THE SCENE.
(V/R-1) HARKOV WAS GIVEN A VICTIM OF VIOLENT CRIME NOTIFICATION AND AN SFPD 105 FORM WITH THE CASE NUMBER, AS WERE THE OTHER VICTIMS (V/R-1 - V/R18).
Blah, blah, blah, thought Elias. He had read enough. Rada Harkov was in on it; he didn’t need Inspector Peed or Delarosa to point that out. He stepped out of the stall and rinsed his face at the sink. The skin around his nose was red with rosacea. His armpits were visibly wet.
He went back into the Gang Task Force office, sat down at his desk, and punched Rada Harkov’s name into his CLETS computer. No record. No tickets. Nothing. He picked up his telephone, looked around to make sure nobody was listening, and dialed the California DMV’s law enforcement hotline. He got her address and asked that a photo be mailed to him.
Harkov’s last known address, as of September 10, 2008, was 417 Poplar Street, San Bruno. He looked at the house on Google. He could almost see right in the window. It was near the cemetery.
Elias called Trammell on his cell phone and told him that he was ready to go.
That night, when their shift ended, Elias drove out to Rada Harkov’s San Bruno address. He parked a few houses down and stared at her front door. San Bruno was a su
burb; the houses had small lawns, and there were plenty of open parking spots.
The neighborhood was quiet. The fog had rolled in. The lights of Rada Harkov’s house were on, but the shades were drawn. The outside walls, Elias noticed, needed cleaning.
A neighbor walked by with a dog. Elias, aware that a man speaking on cell phone draws less attention than a man sitting silently in a car, opened his phone and put it to his ear. “I know, honey,” he said. “No you listen. Listen to me, please. I didn’t say that.”
He sat in the dark. His mind drifted. He thought about Trammell. Trammell had it so easy. He was everything that Elias was not: twenty-eight years old (Elias was forty-two); from Los Angeles (Elias was from San Mateo); laid-back, quick-minded, and handsome. Where Elias was soft, Trammell was fit. Elias was white, Trammell was black. Trammell moved easily through life. People liked him. All kinds of people liked him. And girls, too—female cops were always asking him out. They would do it right in front of Elias.
Elias’s first partner, back when he had just joined the force, had been a red-faced Irish cop, named Gary Sheehan. Sheehan was loud. He was from San Francisco. He knew everybody. He must have only been about forty-five at the time, but he seemed older. His sideburns were cut high, like a boy. His stomach was shaped like a basketball.
Elias was so nervous back then. He was scared of almost everything. Not just the violence and the action; he was scared of the other cops, too. They were so confident. So urban. He hadn’t hung out with many black guys, and here it seemed that everyone was black; even the Chinese cops seemed black. Even Sheehan seemed black. Everyone had loud voices. They walked around like cowboys.
There was one week, early in Elias’s career, that was worse than all the others. He was still riding with Sheehan. The week started with a call for a medical emergency. They arrived at the scene before the paramedics. The house was occupied by a Mexican family. A little baby was lying on the floor. Its diaper had loosened and rested under its body. For one absurd second, Elias thought the loose diaper was the issue. The mother was crying and listening to the baby’s chest. There was a purple bruise running diagonally down the baby’s neck. Later, they learned the baby had wedged its head into the side of the crib and had accidentally hung itself.
The room, crowded and filled with shouting, seemed too small to hold all the people. Sheehan took over. He was so focused. He cleared the room, began checking the baby, gave it mouth-to-mouth. Elias remembered feeling useless. He stood behind Sheehan and prayed the ambulance would show up. Eventually, he ran outside; it was too much. He pretended he had gone out to wave the paramedics in, but the truth was, he just couldn’t take it. He threw up between parked cars on the street.
The very next night there had been a shooting. There was a young black kid, probably about fourteen years old, who had been shot. They found him on the ground at the corner of Sargent and Ralston streets. Nobody else was around. The kid was on his back, his arms wide open like he had been boasting about something. He was wearing a T-shirt that showed a smiling Ronald McDonald. The right side of the kid’s face was crushed in. His left eye was white and open, but his right eye was a red mess. There was bone and brain on the street next to his head.
The day after that, Elias had come into the locker room to change into his uniform before shift. He’d heard Sheehan talking to three other cops in the locker room. He didn’t hear everything Sheehan said, but he distinctly heard the words Elias and faggot followed by laughter.
This was shortly before Elias’s promotion out of the Ingleside District and into the Gang Task Force. He had been at Ingleside for six years. Most of that time he’d been Sheehan’s partner. Sheehan would drink almost every day. He didn’t even try to hide it; he’d drink on duty, in uniform. Occasionally, he’d convince Elias to join him.
There was other trouble, too. Sheehan had been taking payments from a Plymouth Street crack dealer. It wasn’t much, just a hundred every week. He told the dealer he’d keep the other cops away, but he never actually did anything, just took the money and laughed.
One day one of Elias’s sergeants told him to call an inspector named Telfore, from Management Control—SFPD’s version of Internal Affairs. Elias knew the call was about Sheehan. The inspector asked him to come to the Hall of Justice the next day. Inspector Telfore told him not to tell anybody. “You know how these guys get,” he had said.
The next day Elias met with Telfore. He was skinny and gray. He was with another inspector whose name Elias couldn’t remember. They sat him down in an interview room. It was before Elias’s shift started; he was in uniform, he was sweating.
They questioned him about Sheehan. Eventually it became clear that they were only interested in a minor issue. They wanted Elias to confirm that Sheehan regularly left the district on shift. Elias, so relieved that they weren’t asking about the drinking or the payoffs, told them what they wanted to know. At the end of the interview, during the handshakes goodbye, Elias—figuring that in this life you only got what you asked for—asked if they could possibly help him get transferred to a plainclothes unit. They told him they’d put in a word.
One month later Sheehan got transferred to Traffic and Elias got transferred to the Gang Task Force.
Both units were based out of Southern Station and Elias used to run into Sheehan. It was always awkward; Sheehan overcompensated, he was all handshakes and smiles. How you doing? he’d ask, and slap Elias on the back. How’s the big Gang Task Force? he’d ask, his ruddy face looking truly interested.
Elias sat in his car, outside Rada Harkov’s house, and wondered what ever happened to Sheehan. His mind went from Sheehan to Trammell, and he wondered what Trammell really thought about him. He liked to think he was a better partner than Sheehan had been, but he had a hard time imaging Trammell either being scared of him (like he himself had been of Sheehan) or even simply respecting him.
No other neighbors walked by. Elias didn’t want to go home. He didn’t want to see his wife. He wanted to walk up to Rada Harkov’s door and knock and make her give him the money. He wanted to solve the case, make friends, and be happy. He wanted to save his house. He listened to sports talk on the AM radio and drank his wine.
The next day Elias and Trammell drove around the Fillmore looking for a gang member called Duda Rue. They had information that Duda Rue had shot a man named Wilkes. They drove and looked and listened to the radio.
Later their sergeant called and asked them to go with six other cops to arrest a parolee on a warrant. Elias kicked in a front door at the Banneker apartments and felt ecstatic. “You gotta kick right below the lock plate, follow through!” he yelled at Trammell afterward. He high-fived with the other cops. They looked like sports fans. The uniforms came and helped clean up and Elias and Trammell went over to Northern Station to write some quick supplemental reports about the arrest. They were back out on the street just in time to grab food.
Rada Harkov was Elias’s secret, and he savored it. At lunch he didn’t eat much. When their shift ended he asked Trammell to grab a beer with him. It was the last thing Trammell wanted to do, but he agreed.
They went to Ace’s on Sutter Street. They had a few shots of whiskey—Elias slammed his shot glass down each time—and a few beers. Elias was quickly drunk. He sat there leaning on the bar, unconsciously mimicking Trammell’s expressions. Trammell would arch one eyebrow while he listened, and so Elias would, too, which made his eyebrow quiver. Drink by drink, he was starting to talk in a different way; he was starting to talk like the bad guys did.
After the fourth shot, just when Trammell was going to make his exit, Elias opened up.
“Listen to me, man, fuck this shit, I’m gonna tell you something.” His eyebrow twitched and rose. “You know that bank robbery motherfucker?”
Trammell looked at him. “Yeah.”
“The one in the Richmond?”
“Yeah,” repeated Trammell, looking like he was wondering where this was headed.
�
�I’m fin’a break that motherfucker wide open,” said Elias, licking his wet lips.
“How you gonna do that?”
“Listen to me, partner,” said Elias, “listen to me, buddy, I’m gonna beat that shit. On and on we—let me tell you something, you know how much money they took out of there?”
“Eight hundred racks,” said Trammell.
Elias looked over his shoulder and continued in a whisper. “That’s right. And guess what else? Me and you—that’s our money. You hear me?” Elias raised his beer to toast, and Trammell clinked beers with him.
“You’re kidding me, right?” said Trammell.
Later the next night Elias drove back out to Rada Harkov’s street and parked and stared. The lights were on and the shades were drawn. He could solve this case. He could be on TV. He could have sex with the bank manager. He could fuck Trammell. He drank four beers and peed into an empty can. He hadn’t had a panic attack all day. He wanted to sleep in the car, but it was cold and his back hurt.
Thirty minutes later he saw two cars pull up outside Rada Harkov’s home. One of the cars was a black sedan and the other was a gray sports coupe. The sedan pulled into the driveway; the coupe parked in front.
Elias’s left hand pulled on his seat adjuster and he let himself lean back so he was out of view. His car was about two hundred feet from the coupe, and was facing it. The coupe’s lights went off, but the driver stayed put. Three men stepped out of the sedan and walked toward the front door of the house. Two of the men were younger, dressed casually in jeans and sweatshirts; the third—older, tall and bald—wore a dark suit, and seemed like the boss. The young men looked around them as they walked to the door. One of them rang the doorbell and the door swung open. Elias couldn’t see if it was Rada Harkov who let them in.
Elias jotted down the coupe’s license plate number. He couldn’t make out the sedan’s plate. He tried to take a picture with his cell phone, but it came out too dark. He was suddenly wide awake. He wished Trammell was with him. These men were gangsters, it was obvious. Elias was a member of the Gang Task Force, but he had never had any dealings with the kind of gangsters that wore suits; the gangsters he dealt with were teenagers—they killed people, but they were still teenagers.
The White Van Page 5