by Joanne Pence
“She’s been asking questions about this case, about the past. Maybe she’s getting closer than we realized.”
“Don’t worry, pal,” Yosh said. “We’ll find out who’s targeted her.”
“That’s half of the million-dollar question,” Paavo said.
“Half? What’s the other half?”
“A bullet killed the bomber before he rigged it up to the car. Who pulled the trigger?”
Yosh nodded. “That’s right. Whoever did had to have been a good shot.”
“They found the slug—identified it as a Federal Premium hollow-point. It’s high-powered rifle stuff—a sniper’s weapon. Just like the slug that ended up in my front door.”
“You don’t see many people walking around San Francisco with one of those.”
“That’s what I would have thought, but all of a sudden we seem to be holding a convention for them, starting with Leonid Stavrogin.”
“Why would Stavrogin try to take out his own man?”
“He wouldn’t, unless there’s been a falling out within the mob.”
“Shoot,” Yosh said, rubbing his temple. “With friends like that, who needs enemies? I don’t want to have a war going on in the middle of this city between those guys.”
“A cat-and-mouse game with the Russian Mafia is too dangerous to play. And I won’t have Angie being the goddamn mouse. I’ve got to get her out of the way, then go after them directly. I want a piece of those bastards!”
“Whoa, Paavo. You’re making this personal.” Yosh eyed his partner steadily. “We know personal gets cops killed. Watch yourself.”
“Yosh, it is personal.”
“I don’t want to do this, Paavo,” Angie insisted. “Filbert Street is home now.”
He didn’t like it either. He had come to love the cottage and the garden-filled Filbert steps that led to it. But it was known that Angie lived there, and he couldn’t take any chances.
“And I don’t want you dead.” He hustled her and her luggage into the enormous red, gold, and marble lobby of the Fairmont. He chose a big hotel where they could enter from a number of entrances and not be noticed. A place in which she could simply get lost among the crowds of tourists.
Angie had called ahead from Connie’s for a reservation, then registered as Mrs. Nancy Yoshiwara, using one of Yosh’s wife’s credit cards. The desk clerk looked questioningly from her to Paavo, but didn’t say a word.
“I don’t want to stay here,” Angie repeated quietly while the clerk stepped away to process the registration. “I want to be with you!”
Paavo didn’t answer as the clerk returned with the key-card for the room.
They headed toward the tower elevators. “You can leave as soon as I know it’s safe,” Paavo said. “In the meantime, keep out of sight. I don’t want you in any more danger.”
They stepped onto the elevator. Angie pushed floor eight.
“It’ll be hard for me to travel very far anyway, with no car,” she said moodily.
“Good!”
They stopped talking as others got on. On the eighth floor, Angie had a question the minute they got off. “Will you come back tonight?” she asked.
“I’ll try, but if I don’t make it, be ready to leave early tomorrow to pay a visit to Eldridge Sawyer.”
She frowned. “What about Aulis? Can I go see him?”
Paavo found the room and unlocked the door. He went in first. “They know you’ll be wanting to go there,” he said as he checked closets and the bathroom. “They’ll be watching his room. I don’t want them following you the way they did when you were on TV.”
“You don’t know that’s what they did.”
“I don’t for sure, but it’s a good guess. Keep away from Aulis. He’s in a coma and won’t know if you’re there or not. If he wakes up and you still can’t see him, I’ll explain why not. He’ll understand.”
Angie sat on the bed. The hotel room was lovely, but it wasn’t her apartment, or Paavo’s house, and not even the bungalow they’d shared. “I don’t like this, Paavo. I feel lost here.”
He put his hands on her shoulders. “It’s better you feel lost than I lose you.”
She gazed up at him. “Be careful.”
“I will.”
“I love you.”
“I love you, too,” he said. “That’s why I want you here and safe.”
He kissed her, then left the hotel room. She put the dead bolt on the door, and turned around to face the tiny room alone.
If Paavo thought she was going to cower in some hotel room, he still didn’t know her very well. She spent a while thinking through her plan, stopped in the Fairmont gift shop for an I LEFT MY HEART IN SAN FRANCISCO hooded sweatshirt, and headed for the hotel entrance where taxis flocked like hungry vultures.
As she rode across the city she kept glancing through the back window. She quit looking when the cabbie started staring at her in his rearview mirror. Judging from his smirk, he must have thought she was completely paranoid.
When the cab stopped outside Aulis’s apartment, she paid the fare, pulled the sweatshirt hood up, and ran indoors.
Aulis had hidden Cecily’s letter in a Ford mailer. Other important clues could be lying all around, waiting for someone to find them.
She began with the drawer filled with important papers. An hour later, she’d gone through every envelope, then continued on to the rest of the bureau, checking under clothes and even pulling out drawers to look under and behind them. She found nothing.
In the living room Aulis had a small desk where he kept bills and such. Going through each item there met with the same result.
Several cabinets lined the kitchen walls, but the house contained only one large closet. She headed for the bedroom.
Two boxes leaned against the back wall of the closet. Christmas decorations filled the first one. The next held yearbooks, report cards, and class projects from Paavo and Jessica’s school years. Angie was awestruck as she went through them, the latest on top to the earlier ones farther down, glimpsing this part of Paavo’s childhood. He was so skinny during early adolescence, she wondered that he didn’t stab himself with his elbows. His haircut was probably cool at the time, but it made her laugh now. She had to force herself to stop reading school papers or she’d never get through this.
At the bottom of the box was a large paper bag. When she opened it, her heart lurched. She lifted out a little boy’s blue and white striped T-shirt and jeans. They had a slightly gummy feel to them as she unfolded them and smoothed them over her lap.
Next she took out a pale yellow T-shirt, larger than the blue and white one, but not big enough for an adult. Girl’s jeans, light blue tie-dyes, were under the T-shirt.
She checked the sizes, ten for the girl’s clothes and six for the boy’s. Didn’t lots of boys wear that size when they were about four years old? The significance of the clothes—of the age—hit her.
“Oh, my!” A little brown stuffed bear, only about six inches tall, lay in the bag, right next to a half-dressed, scraggly-haired Barbie doll. She picked up the bear. One black-button eye was loose, and the red ribbon he wore around his neck was limp and bedraggled. He looked like an often-played-with little bear. Angie’s chest tightened. He must have been a well-loved bear besides.
She smoothed his bow and felt tears form in her eyes. Could these have been the toys, the clothes, the children brought when they came to Aulis? Or an extra set Cecily sent with them? Was that how they ended up forgotten in this box?
Angie gazed at the spotless clothes. The memory came to her of how Paavo once described his childhood. That he was the boy in school whose clothes were too big or too small, who wore sneakers with holes, and socks that didn’t match. He said he was the boy who other kids stayed away from. How different his life would have been had his mother lived—or stayed with him.
She put her hands in the pockets of the little boy’s jeans. A Bazooka bubble gum was in it, plus a shiny black rock. Her hand tigh
tened on them.
In the girl’s jeans pocket was a pink plastic wallet with 101 Dalmatians on it. She found herself smiling as she looked inside. A picture of Paavo and Jessica was covered in clear plastic, in the spot where “big people” would put a driver’s license. It was an adorable photo—Paavo, about age three, sat on a carousel pony, Jessica behind him, her arms around him, holding him in place. She leaned forward, cheek to cheek with him. They were both smiling broadly.
She searched the other compartments in the wallet, but all she found were three movie-stub halves, one adult and two child tickets, with the letters LOVE S before the tear, and BHT plus a string of numbers along the other edge of each.
What movie could the children have gone to back then with that title? Love Story? An odd choice for kids, but maybe Cecily had wanted to see it, and brought them along. Jessica probably appointed herself the keeper of the tickets. Angie had liked to be similarly “in charge” when she was a child.
She tried to remove the photo from the wallet, but it stuck to the plastic cover. In the kitchen she found a sandwich-sized Ziploc bag, put Paavo’s pocket treasures in it, then placed it and the wallet in her tote bag. She picked up the bear and put it in as well. Paavo should see these things again. It wasn’t all misery and sadness in his childhood. Happiness existed, too, and he shouldn’t dismiss it so readily.
And it just might be good for Paavo to know his mother had a romantic streak and saw movies like Love Story. This wasn’t the time to talk to him about love and romance, or to think much about them, but day by day in the little cottage, she could see the word marriageable appearing on his forehead with more and more clarity—no matter how much he outwardly dismissed it.
From Aulis’s house, she took a taxi to the hospital.
She firmly believed that even though Aulis was in a coma, he had awareness, at some level, of what was happening around him. The idea that this man could be lying there feeling frightened and abandoned was more than she could handle.
The moment she realized she was going to go against Paavo’s wishes and leave the hotel room, she decided to visit Aulis as well. For the sake of his recovery, calming his fears and letting him know how much he was loved and cared for was important.
When she reached the hospital, the knowledge that she’d been followed in the past caused her to pull up the sweatshirt hood and draw the strings tight around her face. On the main floor, she slipped into the women’s room near the cafeteria and removed the sweatshirt, black chinos, and running shoes she’d been wearing, and changed to a jersey jumpsuit and heels. She put the running shoes into her tote bag, and the other clothes, rolled up, under her arm. She hoped to have a chance to speak with Aulis’s doctors. Although in the great scheme of things, it didn’t matter how she dressed to meet with them, for whatever reason, it did to her.
She left the bathroom and rode the elevator to Aulis’s floor.
In his room, she put her tote bag and clothes on a chair in the back, then walked to the side of his bed and took his hand. He looked thin and terribly frail, yet the way his eyes were closed and the peaceful look on his face made it seem he was simply asleep.
“Hello, Mr. Kokkonen,” she said. “It’s Angie. I know it must seem like it’s been a while since I was here last. Believe me, I came back as soon as I could. Your doctors are wonderful. They keep Paavo and me informed of how well you’re doing. You’re going to be fine very soon. They’ve assured us of that. You know how Paavo is. He wouldn’t let the doctors get away with anything less than your full recovery. It will take a few more days, though. You have to be patient. We all do. We’re so much looking forward to you coming home once more. I’m sure you are looking forward to it as well.”
She bent over and kissed his cheek. The doctors weren’t nearly as upbeat as she had just said, but it would do Aulis no good to hear the truth. What he needed now was hope, and it was her job to give it to him.
“I love you, Mr. Kokkonen, and so does Paavo.” She had to wait a moment to control her voice. “He loves you very much, so please be strong for him. Fight this. Come back to us. We want to talk to you and laugh with you. We’re here waiting. Please come back to us.”
She waited, but as always, saw no reaction whatsoever. She let go of his hand and turned around. To her surprise, the nun was standing in the back of the room beside the chair she usually sat in. Angie’s things remained on the seat.
“Hello,” Sister Ignatius said, stepping toward the bed. “I didn’t want to disturb you, but I also didn’t want to leave without Aulis knowing I’d been here.”
“Please stay. I’ll move my belongings from the chair.”
Angie hurried to her tote, but mistakenly only grabbed one strap. As the nun was saying, “Don’t bother, I have some other patients to visit,” the bag tipped over and dumped the contents onto the floor.
Lipstick rolled, the electronic planner case flew open, the cell phone took a wicked bounce, Paavo’s bear tumbled, Jessica’s wallet opened and rotated end over end, the coin section of Angie’s wallet unclasped and loose change scattered, and little pieces of paper fluttered and skittered around the room like snow in an updraft.
“Oh, my God!” Angie cried, running about, gathering up pieces of her belongings. She shook the Palm Pilot—luckily, nothing rattled.
“Let me help you,” Sister Ignatius said, as she picked up the bear and gently smoothed the bow, and then picked up Jessica’s wallet. She studied the photo silently.
“My boyfriend and his older sister,” Angie explained.
“What lovely children they were,” the elderly nun said softly.
Together they quickly dumped everything back into the tote bag. “Thank you, Sister,” Angie said. Then she glanced at Aulis and again her face fell.
“Somehow this will all work out,” Sister Ignatius said. “Have faith, Angie.”
They both smiled at that, and the nun said good evening.
Angie stayed a short while longer, then went in search of his doctor.
Afterward she returned to the women’s room near the cafeteria. Once again she changed into her black pants, sweatshirt, and sneakers, and walked out of the cafeteria with the hood covering her head.
Chapter 31
It was all Paavo could do to stand in Bond’s waiting room while his secretary announced his visit. Visit—hah! He wanted to punch the guy’s lights out—but Bond was a SAC. Paavo wouldn’t be doing any investigating at all if he was locked up in a federal prison.
The secretary told him he could enter. Bond glared at him as he marched into the room. “What’s this about? My secretary said you insisted on seeing me. That isn’t how I operate, Inspector Smith.”
“Your memory isn’t what it should be, Special Agent Bond,” Paavo said coldly.
Bond stiffened.
“You seemed to have forgotten not only that Cecily Campbell Turunen was married, but that she spied on her husband and his associates and he ended up killed by the Russian Mafia.”
Bond took a nail clipper out of his top drawer and began to trim his nails and cuticles. “I have no idea what you’re talking about, Inspector Smith. Turunen? Are you getting this information from Eldridge Sawyer?”
“No.”
Only the click-click of Bond’s manicure could be heard. “Have you found Sawyer?”
“I haven’t found anyone,” Paavo said truthfully.
Bond put the clippers away. “I think someone’s been telling you outrageous tales, Inspector. We don’t use research clerks to spy on anyone. My understanding is that she was a research clerk, and nothing more.”
“You’re wrong, Bond. What I’ve said is the only explanation for what’s going on now. For people like Leonid Stavrogin accosting me and following my girlfriend. Or didn’t you know about that either?”
Bond’s face went white with restrained fury. “We keep an eye on men like him. If he confronted you, it was a warning, or you’d be dead. You’ve gotten too close to something. He could have
simply put a bullet in you and ended any threats you might pose that way.” Bond rubbed his fingers across his mouth. “Stavrogin had to know you’d recognize him as soon as you looked at some mug shots.”
“I did.”
“Damn! What are they thinking!” He ground his fist against his palm. “You understand this changes everything. The S.F.P.D. isn’t equipped to handle the Russian Mafia. Few local law enforcements are. Since they’re a part of this, we’ll have to take over from here.”
“I don’t think so,” Paavo replied coldly. “This—now—is about me, my stepfather, and my girlfriend. I’m not backing off.”
“You have no choice.” Bond’s eyes narrowed. “The Russian Mafia is FBI jurisdiction.”
“Just like Cecily Campbell Turunen’s death? The FBI was called in to help find her, and apparently scarcely bothered to look.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You should. You’re the one in charge. Eldridge Sawyer was the S.F.P.D’s contact.”
“Sawyer.” Bond paled. He stood up then, his hands in his pockets, and walked to the window peering out onto Polk Street before he turned and spoke. “None of that matters, Inspector. It’s ancient history. Stavrogin is now. He’s a killer. A sniper. He got his training in Afghanistan, fighting on the Reds’ side. He nearly took down a whole squad single-handed over there before the CIA and the Muhajadeen busted his base camp and he had to move. The guy’s too dangerous for the S.F.P.D.”
“No way I’m pulling out of this,” Paavo said, bristling at the man’s high-handedness. “I intend to find out what’s really coming down and stop it. With the FBI’s help or without it.”
Bond folded his arms. “It could be Washington’s choice. A few well-placed phone calls. Do you really think the chief of police will argue? Do you think the mayor will? They’re political creatures. They’ll tell you to keep your mouth shut and your nose clean, and you know it.”
“Call whoever you want!” Paavo stood up and headed for the front door.