Nobody Rides For Free

by Neil S. Plakcy

  21.

  Cruise Control

  I went back to the data. It appeared that Verenich managed—or advised—some legitimate businesses as well. There were a dozen individual accounts at Florida Southern Bank & Trust, a local bank with a branch in Sunny Isles Beach. Each of them had a name that probably meant something to the owners but nothing to me—combinations of numbers and words that might have referred to addresses, or family members, or perhaps nothing at all.

  A couple of checks on Verenich’s office account had been written to Eric Morozov. I knew that he had been chauffeuring Dimetrie and Ozzy around. Was Verenich paying him to watch the guys at the house? Or for something else?

  I called Verenich’s office, hoping to ask the secretary about Eric, but I got a recording saying that the office was permanently closed and all inquiries should be directed to the Florida Bar Association.

  That was pretty quick, wasn’t it? She had assembled those materials for the U.S. Attorney the day before. I called the attorney who had prepared the subpoena and he said he hadn’t been in touch with her since she called to let him know the courier could pick up the materials.

  He had no way to contact the woman other than through the office phone number, but he did give me her name: Zinaida Afanasyev. I found a phone number for Boris Afanasyev in Sunny Isles Beach, and called it.

  “Mrs. Afanasyev? Mrs. Zinaida Afanasyev?” I asked the woman who answered.

  “Yes. Who is this?” I recognized the heavy Russian accent of the woman who’d answered the phone at Verenich’s office.

  “Agent Angus Green of the FBI,” I said. “I’m investigating Mr. Verenich’s murder and I have some questions to ask you.”

  “I’m about to liff for a cruise,” she said, flattening her hard e’s the way I was coming to recognize with Russian speakers. “I haff no time.”

  “You’re leaving from Port Everglades?” I asked.

  When she agreed, I said that I could meet her at the port. “You’ll have to wait in line to check in,” I said. “We can talk then.”

  In the background, I heard a man’s voice in Russian, and she turned away to speak with him in that language. When she came back to the phone she said, “The boat is Ecstasy of Seas. We are there in about one hour. But I only speak for few minutes.”

  I said that was all the time I needed, and I got her husband’s cell phone number so that I could connect with them at the port. Then I called Katya. “I might need some translation help,” I said. “And your ability to persuade in Russian.”

  She agreed to meet me at the port. On the way there, my brain was buzzing as I tried to make connections. Jonas had said that Eric did odd jobs for the owner of the car dealership and his friends. Did those friends include the people behind the LLCs—and whoever had killed Verenich?

  Could Zinaida Afanasyev tell us what Eric Morozov had done for Verenich? Could we convince her to tell us who was behind the LLCs? Did she know anything about the porn house? There had to be money coming in from that—where was it going?

  I showed my badge to the guard at the entrance to the port, and drove to the garage closest to berth 23, where the Ecstasy was docked. As I walked out, I spotted Katya, and when we met up, I had her call Boris’s cell phone.

  She spoke to him for a minute and then hung up. “They just got here, and they’re in line to check their bags.”

  We hurried across the busy street to the dock. The Ecstasy was a huge ship, one of the newest designs, and a long line of people waited to check in. Half of them were still in their northern-climate clothes and had sweaters and coats hung over their arms as they sweated in the Florida heat. The smarter group was already wearing shorts and T-shirts, though they looked as uncomfortable.

  Zinaida Afanasyev was a short, plump woman in her fifties, her husband of similar stature and build. Katya began the conversation in Russian, introducing herself and me, and after some handshaking, Zinaida asked, “What you want to know?”

  “Who is Eric Morozov?”

  She looked surprised. “Eric? He is a man Mr. Verenich knows. Knew.”

  The line moved forward quickly, and I helped Mr. Afanasyev with the bags. “How did Mr. Verenich know Eric?” I asked.

  She shrugged. “We are Russians. We know each other.”

  I had the same connection to gay men in Wilton Manors. We knew each other, too.

  “Do you know what Morozov did for Mr. Verenich?”

  “Whatever Mr. Verenich ask. Clean boat, deliver papers. He is big, strong man, so he do all kinds of work.” She leaned forward. “Sometimes, when one of Mr. Verenich’s clients want to buy a property and the owners are not to sell, he send Eric to speak with them.”

  I looked at Katya and could see she thought the same thing I did. Eric Morozov was some kind of enforcer.

  The ship’s horn sounded, reverberating around us, and the Afanasyevs were only a few parties behind the check-in desk.

  I chose not to ask Zinaida about flakka distribution. I was pretty sure she’d say she had no idea what that was. “Who is taking over Verenich’s work now that he’s gone?”

  Zinaida shrugged. “Is up to Mr. Kurov. He was Mr. Verenich’s big client, and is one who tell me to shut down office.”

  “Vadim Kurov, the real estate developer?” I asked.

  Zinaida nodded. “I am lucky—his company run contest to win this cruise, and I don’t know he enter my name until he tell me I won.” She beamed. “Eleven days, through Panama Canal. Is first time we have had such vacation.”

  “What can you tell me about the house in Wilton Manors?” I gave her the address.

  She shook her head. “Mr. Verenich represent many property owners. I had no contact with them.”

  “What about a company called Gay Guys LLC? There must have been money coming into that operation.”

  “Mr. Verenich, he handle all money. Me, I am answering phones and sending faxes.”

  The check-in clerk called them forward. Katya and I told them to have a good trip, and we stepped back.

  “Isn’t that convenient?” I said. “Zinaida and her husband won an eleven day cruise a short time after Verenich’s murder. You think someone wants to get her out of the way?”

  The Afanasyevs checked in and waved to us as they moved forward in the snaking line to board the ship.

  “At least no one is killing her,” Katya said. “Though I hope she stays away from the railing on this cruise.”

  22.

  Exotic Imports

  “Who is this Morozov guy you asked about?” Katya asked, as we walked back to the garage. “I haven’t heard that name before.”

  “He keeps popping up.” I explained how Jonas had noticed him at the gym. “And then I saw him pick up one of the boys from the videos at a dance class on Tuesday night. He drove him to the house in Wilton Manors owned by Gay Guys LLC. Yesterday, I saw him chauffeuring around the first boy, the one who was e-mailing with Brian Garcia.”

  “He works for the company producing the porn?”

  “Not clear. Verenich paid him for something, but it could have been enforcer work, based on what Mrs. Afanasyev said. Maybe he’s friendly with the guys at the porn house and doing some favors. Though that’s unlikely.”

  “Could he have killed Verenich?” Katya asked.

  “What motive would Morozov have to kill the guy who was paying him?”

  “Maybe Verenich owed him money?” Katya asked.

  “Not likely,” I said. “There was plenty of money in Verenich’s accounts, and all the checks to Morozov were no more than a few thousand dollars each. Not worth killing someone over.”

  “How about roid rage?” Katya asked. “The guy I dated in New York was a bodybuilder too, and he took steroids that made him crazy sometimes.”

  “Eric Morozov looks like the kind of guy who takes steroids,” I admitted. “Yeah, he might have gotten angry with Verenich. But torture him? Shoot him? That’s doesn’t fit. It’s more likely that he was the muscle to hold Ver
enich down while someone else tortured him.”

  “Vadim Kurov?” Katya asked. “We already know he’s behind at least one of the LLCs that Verenich was bleeding cash from. From what I’ve heard of him he wouldn’t take kindly to being ripped off.”

  “Makes sense,” I said. “Maybe that’s what Verenich was tortured for, the information on where he put the money he took from Kurov.”

  As we reached my car Katya said, “I have some stuff to show you about Kurov. But I’ll need internet access. There’s a Starbucks around the corner, on the 17th Street Causeway. I’ll meet you over there.”

  It was slow leaving the port, a jam of cars, taxis, and buses, and I had to pay attention to avoid an accident. As I crept past one of the big ocean liners, I wondered if Eric Morozov was in danger. Or would he leave town quickly like Verenich’s secretary? How long did I have before the porn house and its flakka connection would shift operations?

  At the coffee shop, Katya opened her laptop and initiated her VPN software. She pulled up her research report on Vadim Kurov and I shifted so I could look at it with her.

  Kurov, Vadim Artemovich. Born August 1, 1955 in St. Petersburg, Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic to Artem Vadimovich and Valeria Denisovna Kurova. Received his certificate of secondary education in 1973 and enrolled in St. Petersburg Technikum.

  Though the family did not identify as Jewish, Artem Kurov established Jewish descent through a grandmother, and his family was allowed to immigrate to Israel in 1974. Vadim dropped out of the Technikum at this point and never resumed formal education.

  His family remained in Israel for only nine months until relatives sponsored them to immigrate to the United States, where they settled in with the Russian community in Brighton Beach. Vadim began as a construction laborer, but quickly ascended to the position of superintendent. By the time he was twenty-five he owned a small apartment building on Coney Island Avenue.

  At about this time, his name began to come up in investigations of the Organizatsya in New York. Kurov was suspected of laundering money for Russian mobsters in the purchase of properties for cash. He would then renovate them and sell the properties, turning criminal proceeds into legitimate income.

  In 1985 he married Alla Alekseyevna Golubkina, who bore him two daughters: Diana and Irina. In 1995 the family moved to Sunny Isles Beach, where it is common knowledge that he is a real estate developer, yet it is very hard to attach his name to any projects, built or in the process of development. Agent Green discovered that Kurov was behind the development of a condominium tower called the Heron Beach Club. Word of mouth among real estate agents and brokers in the area is that funding was provided by Organizatsya members but I have been unable to establish concrete proof as of yet.

  Kurov maintains a fairly low social profile and most of his personal connections remain in the New York area. Both his daughters graduated from a private high school and the University of Florida. Diana is unmarried and teaches fourth grade at an elementary school in Gainesville. Irina married Leo Mitkin in 2013 and lives in Manhattan.

  Kurov’s passion is expensive foreign sports cars, and he owns a Porsche Cabriolet convertible, a Ferrari Testarossa, a Bentley Mulsanne, and a Lamborghini Aventador.

  The list of expensive vehicles sparked something in my brain. “How’d you find out about these cars?” I asked. “DMV records?”

  She shook her head. “Kurov doesn’t have any cars registered to his name. A source told me about them.”

  “You didn’t happen to get their license plate numbers, did you?” I asked.

  “I did. Why?”

  “That commercial I told you about, the one with Eric Morozov in the background? It was for a dealership in Fort Lauderdale that sells expensive cars, called Exotic Imports.”

  “I can pull up the sales records from the DMV,” Katya said.

  “While you do that, I’m going to research the dealership.” I turned to my own laptop, and did a quick search. Exotic Imports was the only one in Florida that sold the Aventador.

  I brought up the company’s website, and the “about us” page. Antonio Cruz, the man from the TV commercial, was listed as owner. In the photo above his name, his white mane appeared to be a toupee, and the skin of his face was so tight and flat that he looked like a victim of bad plastic surgery. His bio bragged that he had been in the luxury car business for nearly forty years, first in his native country of Venezuela, then in South Florida since 1995.

  Cruz looked familiar, and I wondered if that was because I’d seen his commercials on TV. Or had I seen him in person?

  On a hunch, I started Googling his name in conjunction with gay charity events in Fort Lauderdale over the past year. I found Cruz in several shots taken at fund-raising events for various LGBT causes in south Florida—the Stonewall Archives and Library, a non-profit focused on archiving and lending out LGBT literature; The Gay Men’s Chorus of Fort Lauderdale; and Lazarus Place.

  Exotic Imports was a few blocks to the left of the library’s location on Sunrise Boulevard, and the Publix where Dimetrie Beauvoir bought his money orders was right across the street. The thrift shop where I’d spotted Ozzy Perez in company with Eric Morozov was a few blocks farther east.

  Did Cruz hang around bars like Lazy Dick’s? Was that how he met Eric Morozov? Did Cruz’s tastes run to young boys? Was that why he supported Lazarus Place?

  “I found a connection,” Katya said, and I looked up. I’d forgotten she was there.

  “I went into the DMV records to see who sold him the cars and I discovered that yes, they came from Exotic Imports.” She shifted her screen around so I could see. “But there’s something more. Each car was bought by a different LLC.”

  “All cash sales, I’m sure,” I said.

  “Most likely. And here’s what’s most interesting. Verenich was the registered agent for each of these LLCs. That’s a direct connection between Verenich, Kurov, and the LLCs.”

  “Was one of them bought by Gay Guys LLC? Maybe with profits from drug dealing or porn?”

  She shook her head. “Nope. All real estate operations.”

  I sat back in my chair and we began to outline all the connections. “We have a nexus of activity focusing on Wilton Manors,” I said. “The porn house, the Publix, the thrift shop, the library, the dance class at Lauderdale High, and Exotic Imports. And Eric Morozov is right in the middle of that.”

  She nodded. “Morozov is also connected to Verenich through the checks Verenich wrote him, and what Mrs. Afanasyev told us. Kurov connects to Verenich through the LLCs, which invested in property in Sunny Isles Beach. Those transactions appear to be money laundering with a connection to the Organizatsya.”

  “Well, we’ve been thinking that your case and mine were connected somehow,” I said. “Looks like more connections than we thought.”

  I showed her what I found on Cruz. “I wouldn’t be surprised if he met Eric at a bar and hired him to be eye candy for his dealership ad, then gave him other odd jobs to do. He could have in turn introduced Eric to Kurov.”

  “Or the other way around,” Katya said. “Maybe Eric knew Kurov through the Russian community, and Kurov introduced him to Cruz, knowing Cruz was gay.”

  “It’s like a Venn diagram,” I said. “Where the gay circle and the Russian circle intersect.” It reminded me once again of what a small world it was, where a Russian mobster by the beach could be connected to a gay bodybuilder and a porn house.

  My brain was firing on all cylinders but there wasn’t much more I could search for online. I needed to get to a bar. “It’s four o’clock,” I said. “Happy hour in Wilton Manors. I’m going to see what the gay grapevine has to say about Antonio Cruz.”

  23.

  Sexual Tension

  I’d been avoiding Eclipse, a gay bar on the outskirts of Wilton Manors, since I broke up with Lester, the bouncer there. But it was the closest bar to the Exotic Imports showroom and I knew I’d have to get there eventually to look for information
on Antonio Cruz.

  I ripped off the metaphorical bandage as I parked in the lot. I hoped Lester would be on the late shift, as he usually was, and I’d be long gone before he showed up to work. If he was even still employed there. Bar staff in Wilton Manors tended to move around at the drop of a jockstrap.

  The parking lot was half-empty, which meant I’d have a good chance to speak to the bartenders and servers and show them Cruz’s photo. I stripped off my tie and suit jacket and left them folded on the seat beside me. I pulled the tails of my shirt out to cover my belt holster and opened a couple of buttons on my shirt.

  Unexpectedly, Lester was a few feet inside the door sitting on a bar stool. He was a dark-haired, muscle-bound hunk, six-foot-four with an oval face, and a small goatee at his chin. “Of all the gin joints in all the world, he walks into mine,” he said as I stopped in front of him.

  So Lester was a fan of old movies. I hadn’t known that about him. But then, we’d only gone out on a couple of dates, and most of the time we were in bed together.

  “How’s it going, Lester?”

  “Same old, same old,” he said. “The guy who works the day shift quit so I’m pulling a double.”

  He scanned me. “You look good.”

  “Thanks.” I looked down and toed the floor like a nervous pony. “Listen, I’m sorry I blew you off,” I said. “Getting shot rocked my world, and it wasn’t fair to keep you hanging on if I couldn’t even face getting out of bed.”

  “Must be feeling better now if you’re hitting the bars.”

  Was there a note of resentment in his voice? Should I have called him more recently? I knew what it felt like to be dumped and I hated to have put him through that.

  “I’m here on a case.” I pulled out a screenshot of Antonio Cruz.

  Lester got off the stool and took the picture from me, then turned so he could see it in the light. “Yeah, I know him. Chicken hawk,” he said. Chicken hawk was an old-fashioned gay-slang term for older men who liked younger boys.