by Neil Plakcy
As soon as Biff’s feet were on solid ground, he grabbed the chain link fence to steady himself, closed his eyes, and dug into the reservoir of power he kept deep inside. His breathing was shallow and he was vaguely conscious of Jimmy’s concern, but he was focused inward.
Like molasses inching out of a bottle, the healing energy circulated through his veins and capillaries, and the anaphylactic reaction to the salt water began to abate. After a minute or two he felt his strength returning, and the welts fading.
When he opened his eyes Jimmy was staring at him. “You’re a piece of work, Biff, is all I can say.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
Biff didn’t hang around much longer. His strength had returned and the welts had disappeared, but he knew he’d have to get back to his lamp soon.
“Thanks for your help today,” Jimmy said. “I know this is getting off track for your case, and I appreciate your taking the time.”
“All pieces of the jigsaw,” Biff said. “Pleasure to be of service.” He tipped an imaginary hat to Jimmy and got into his Mini Cooper.
10 – Squirrely
Biff returned to the Aventura Beach Shopping Center shortly before noon, touched the painted eye on his office door, then walked inside. He wanted to do some investigating on Viktor Petrov before he checked in with Sveta. He was hoping to tell her he had something the FDLE either hadn’t found, or hadn’t been able to use legally.
He’d just gotten his browser open and begun his search when he heard the shots.
He jumped up and raced down the sidewalk to Sveta’s studio, his slippers occasionally catching on the pebbled surface. As he passed the store selling orthopedic supplies, two elderly women, one in a wheelchair, the other with a walker, stepped out the door and into his way.
He concentrated power in his feet and pushed down against the air with both hands. As if he was on a pogo stick, he rose right over the wheelchair, landed a few feet ahead, and resumed his run, leaving the two women squawking behind him. He didn’t even bother to try to erase their memories; if they tried to explain that they’d seen a muscular man jump five feet in the air and sail overhead, people would think it was just dementia.
He hurried past the café, where the Haitian waitress lazily cleaned the tables in preparation for the lunch rush. She didn’t appear to have heard the shots, and Biff realized that because of his super-sensitive hearing he was most likely the only one who had.
The glass front door to Sveta’s studio was locked from the inside, the curtains drawn over the plate glass storefront. He slipped between the door and the jamb, not caring if the old women, the waitress, or anyone in the parking lot saw him.
The studio was empty, and a strong metallic odor of blood rose from the back. Careful not to enter the workroom, Biff stepped into the doorway and saw Sveta’s body on the floor. She was lying on her back, and there was a big hole in her chest, with bright red blood staining her white top. Her blonde hair was still pulled into an efficient knot at the top of her head, and her blue eyes were open and unseeing.
She wasn’t breathing, and she had been dead long enough that her spirit was gone, and there was no possibility Biff could use his healing powers to bring her back. They were only so strong, and a lot depended on how long the person had been dead. As well, it was easier to bring back children and small animals because there was less mass to reanimate.
He was angry, at whoever had killed Sveta, and at himself, for not being able to prevent her death. He had seen her every few days for the past couple of years, stood behind her in line at the coffee shop, even flirted with her now and then. Now she was gone.
He could not stay there; in addition to the harsh coppery smell of blood, there was a strong sense of absence that disturbed him. The universe had not yet adjusted to Sveta’s death and a vacuum filled the studio and the workroom.
He retreated the way he had come in, between the front door and its jamb, and then pulled his cell phone from the pocket of his sweat pants and punched out Jimmy Stein’s number.
It must have been Ovetschkin who killed her. But why? Sveta had given him his files back. It wasn’t her fault that Ovetschkin’s wife had cheated on him. All Sveta had done was document the evidence.
“Stein, Homicide.”
“You’d better get out here,” Biff said, rounding the corner of the shopping center. “Sveta Pshkov’s dead.”
He came up to the studio’s back door and noticed that it was ajar, but didn’t touch it.
“I’m still working on Ovetschkin’s boat,” Jimmy grumbled. “Jesus, this case is a runaway train. Where are you, exactly?”
“Back service drive behind her studio. She’s in the workroom.”
“I’m on my way. But as I’m walking quickly to my department-issued vehicle, please tell me how you know she’s dead if you’re outside the studio and she’s inside.”
“I heard the shots, and I came running. Saw the back door ajar, and I used my shoulder to nudge it open a bit more. I saw Sveta lying there, not breathing. Then I called you. I didn’t touch a thing.”
“Fingerprints will tell me that,” Jimmy said. “Stay put.”
For once, Biff did as he was told. He might unknowingly contaminate the crime scene, and for now he could focus on looking for clues outside. He stepped close to the door, doing his best to isolate the metallic tang of the blood and ignore it. There was a confusion of other scents there, including sweat, feces, urine and cologne. He assumed that in death Sveta had lost control of her bowels and bladder.
The sweat and cologne were clues, though. He recognized the echoes of Igor Laskin’s Italian cologne, but there were two kinds of sweat, both male. Who was with Laskin? The aroma was faintly familiar but he couldn’t place it. Was it Kiril Ovetschkin? But he was in Nicaragua, wasn’t he?
Biff paced backward from Sveta’s door to the parking spaces beneath the stand of Australian pines. A squirrel resented the invasion of his privacy and chittered noisily above Biff’s head. Absently he flicked a finger at the little monster, basically a rat with a fluffy tail and good PR, and the squirrel toppled from the tree to a pile of pine needles.
“Oops,” Biff said. He hadn’t meant to kill the creature, just knock him around. But at least he could do for the squirrel what he hadn’t been able to do for Sveta. He twirled his index finger in the squirrel’s direction, and it sat up on the ground and looked at him, its head turned quizzically. “I’m sorry, all right? Now go about your business.”
The squirrel didn’t move, just sat there on its haunches staring at Biff.
A Miami-Dade police cruiser pulled into the service drive and parked behind the studio, and the same uniformed female officer who had come to investigate Sveta’s theft complaint stepped out. She gave a brief wave to Biff and adjusted the gun and nightstick on her equipment-laden belt.
Biff and the squirrel stayed where they were as Officer White walked up to the studio door and knocked. “Miss Pshkov? Are you in there?” she called.
After getting no answer she looked over to Biff. “You’re the one called this in?”
He nodded. “She’s on the floor in the back room.”
Officer White pulled a rubber glove from the pocket of her black polyester slacks and put it on. She gently pushed the back door open. She stuck her head inside, looked around, then backed away. “You got that right,” she said. “There any other entrances to this place?”
“Glass door into the mall. Locked.”
They looked at each other for a minute. He saw her shoot a glance at his black slippers. “You’d better wait here until the detective arrives,” Officer White said.
Jimmy Stein’s unmarked sedan pulled in behind the cruiser. “I’m seeing an awful lot of you lately, Biff,” he said, getting out. He rubbed one hand over his brush-cut hair.
“And there’s no food involved this time.”
“Watch the mouth.” He turned to Officer White. “You checked inside?”
She n
odded. “Mr. Andromeda says the front door is locked.”
“First lesson,” Jimmy said. “Don’t trust anything a witness says. Check it out for yourself.”
“Yes, sir.”
She stepped up to the back door of the studio.
“Don’t walk through the crime scene, numb nuts,” Jimmy said. “Go around.”
“Yes. Sorry, sir.” She took off at a trot to the end of the center, and Jimmy pulled a pair of gloves from his pocket.
“Let’s see what we’ve got,” he said. He sniffed the air. “Nasty. You stay out here. I’m going to want to talk to you.”
Biff leaned up against one of the skinny Australian pines in his sweatpants and muscle T. He could feel the roughness of the dirt through the soles of his slippers. His emotions were jumbled, after seeing Sveta’s body. He tried to focus on the area again, but there was little evidence so far from the crime scene. He kept remembering things Sveta had said or done.
The squirrel remained on the ground next to him. “What?” Biff asked. “I can’t go back in there until the cops are done.”
The squirrel chittered something. Despite his command of various languages, Biff did not speak squirrel, so whatever it was didn’t matter.
Biff sighed. “I know, Sveta was my client. I should do what I can to help Jimmy figure out who killed her. Of course, I already know that, don’t I? Kiril Ovetschkin.”
He looked up and down the service drive. The UPS truck was parked behind the medical equipment store, though the skinny, tattooed delivery man was nowhere in sight. Biff walked toward the store’s back door, and as he approached, the delivery man stepped out, pushing a hand truck loaded with boxes.
“Hey, Mario,” Biff said. “You see anybody going into Sveta’s studio this morning?”
“Not going in,” Mario said, beginning to load the boxes into the back of the truck. “Coming out.”
Biff noticed that the squirrel had followed him, remaining under the pine trees that ran alongside the drive. “Really? Who?”
“Don’t know him. Bodybuilder asshole type. Had his fucking Beemer blocking my way in and I had to wait for him to pull out.”
“He was alone?”
“Yeah.”
That would be Igor Laskin, Biff thought. But he thought he had sensed two visitors to the studio. Had they been there at different times?
Jimmy appeared at the door of the studio. “Andromeda! I need you over here.”
“Hold up, Jimmy. You need to talk to Mario here.”
Mario looked at his watch. “I’m running late, Biff.”
“Just take a minute.” When Jimmy approached, looking irritated, Biff said, “Mario saw somebody leave Sveta’s studio.”
Mario repeated his story to Jimmy, though without the expletive, and Jimmy took down his name and contact information. As Mario drove away, Biff and Jimmy walked back toward the studio. The squirrel stayed where he was for a moment, then followed them. “You forget to mention something?” Jimmy asked, when Biff reached him.
“What?”
“Have a look. This time pay attention.”
Biff bristled at Jimmy’s comment, but he did his best to protect himself against the smell and the lingering aftereffects of death, and then stepped into the workroom. There in front of him was Sveta’s body, just as he had seen before. But then he noticed something he had missed—the toe of a man’s highly polished cordovan loafer.
He stepped around the light table that blocked his view and looked down. The loafer was attached to a foot, which connected to a leg, and then to the rest of a man. A dead man. A portly, bearish Russian man in his mid-fifties.
Kiril Ovetschkin.
11 – Cafecitos
Biff looked at the entrance behind him. The squirrel sat on the threshold, looking inside. “What are you doing here?” he said crossly. “Go on, shoo.”
He stepped toward the squirrel, who turned and scampered away. Then he walked back outside, where Jimmy Stein was on the phone. “Loi is on his way,” he said, when he ended the call. “So tell me again, exactly what happened.”
Officer White reappeared from around the corner. “Mr. Andromeda was correct, sir. The front door is locked.”
Jimmy nodded. “Good. You watch this door and wait for CSI. We’ll be in the coffee shop inside.”
Biff was still numb. Though he had been around for a long time, and seen his share of dead bodies, they still upset him. It was one thing to go through the home of a murder victim, as he’d done with the parking valet Usnavy. It was a hundred times, a thousand times, worse, to be in the presence of a corpse—or two. Especially when he had known the victim, spoken to her, even been kissed by her just a short while before. The psychic reverberations were almost too strong to bear.
Jimmy steered him down the service drive toward the corner of the shopping center, and the squirrel followed them. “You got a new friend?” Jimmy asked.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with him.” He turned around and waved his hands at the squirrel. “Go on, get out of here. Go eat a nut or something.”
They walked around the corner and down the sidewalk to the café. It had just opened for lunch, and the only customers were a pair of elderly white women in pants suits that had been fashionable in the seventies. “Dos cafecitos, por favor,” Jimmy said to the short, dark-haired woman behind the counter.
Biff thought it was an excellent order. He could use a gulp of the strong Cuban coffee brewed with demerara sugar after seeing the two dead bodies. “Make mine a cortadito,” he said, adding milk to the drink.
Jimmy led Biff to a table by the glass storefront, out of hearing of the other customers. When they sat down, Biff said, “I got the files for Sveta and returned them to her yesterday morning.”
Jimmy was taking notes in a small spiral-bound notebook. “How’d you do that?”
“I found the place where Igor Laskin had them stored.”
“And?”
“And nothing. I retrieved my client’s property and returned it to her. End of story. She gave them to Ovetschkin, but he didn’t believe he had all the originals and he threatened her again. I wanted to find something I could use against Ovetschkin, to protect her from him. That’s why I was asking about The Professor—I thought maybe he might be Ovetschkin’s boss, or that he might have some kind of hold over Ovetschkin I could use. That’s why I went down to the marina this morning.”
The waitress brought the two tiny espresso cups, and the aroma of the strong, sweet coffee swirled up and filled Biff’s nostrils. He picked his up and sipped it, feeling the mix of caffeine and sugar pulse through his system. When he looked up again the squirrel was sitting on the sidewalk outside the storefront, looking at him. Biff noticed that his tail was long and straight, not curled around at the end like some squirrels, and he was staring at Biff like he wanted some of that coffee.
“What the hell?” Biff banged on the glass.
Jimmy looked up. “Must be your animal magnetism.”
The squirrel rolled over onto its back, waved its little legs in the air, then went still. “Jesus, you killed it,” Jimmy said.
“Me? I didn’t do a thing.” And that time at least it was true.
Then the squirrel hopped back up and danced around on the pavement. Jimmy laughed, and Biff couldn’t help joining him. “Fine, stay out there if you want,” Biff said.
“Let’s get back to what happened when you returned to your office from the marina,” Jimmy said.
“I’d just opened a browser to do some Internet searching when I heard the shots.”
“How many?”
“Two.”
“Then what?”
“I knew the shots had come from Sveta’s. I ran down the hall but the front door was locked.” Biff couldn’t tell Jimmy he’d slipped in the studio in a puff of smoke. “I knocked and called out for her, but I didn’t get a response. So I went around to her back door.”
“You see anybody in the service drive?”
&n
bsp; Biff shook his head. “Nope. The door was ajar, so I pushed it open with my shoulder. I saw her on the floor and I backed right out. That’s when I called you.”
A young mother entered the café, pushing a double stroller. The two boys seemed to alternate screaming, like an infant tag team, as the oblivious mother debated her pastry choices from the low counter. “Isn’t there something you can arrest her for?” Biff groused. “Disturbing the peace, at least.”
“Now, now,” Jimmy said. “A long time ago you were a brat like that.”
Biff thought Jimmy had no idea how long that was. But he just said, “Me? Never.”
Jimmy’s cell rang. “Fine. Get started on the workroom. I’ll be there in a few.”
He picked up his cafecito. “CSI’s there. I’m sure there’s more to your story than that, but we’ll save that for another day.”
He drank a bit, then sighed appreciatively. “Any idea who might have killed her?”
“My first thought was Kiril Ovetschkin, because he’d threatened her. But that was before I saw his body there.”
“And?”
“And I wonder if Igor Laskin might have turned on Ovetschkin. That’s the only other guess I’ve got right now.”
“What about this Professor guy? You said you were looking into him.”
“Couldn’t find anything useful, though. As far as I can tell from Hector, the Professor is the boss, but I don’t know if Ovetschkin worked directly for him or just, you know, paid him a tribute or something.”
Jimmy’s phone rang again and he turned away from Biff to answer it. Biff sat back against the hard metal chair and remembered walking into the studio, then the workroom. How had he missed Ovetschkin’s body? Was there anything else he had overlooked?
He admitted that he had been freaked out by seeing Sveta’s body, and by the assault on his senses from the blood and the psychic reverberations. Now he understood those had been magnified because there were two victims.