L.A. Boneyard (23 page)

“I’m sure it sounded too good to be true,” David muttered after they completed both interviews and released the three women.

“He is one sleazy character,” Konstatinov concurred. “I hope you can make a strong case against him.”

“You and me both.” David glanced at a nearby wall clock. It was nearly six. “Well, I’m calling it a night. We can pick this up tomorrow. Maybe our friend in lockup will decide to spare us all and confess.”

Konstatinov snorted. “Even I am not so naïve.”

David grinned, though the effort felt strained. “Listen,” he said. “Maybe we can get together over breakfast this week and we can talk about what you’re looking for in the LAPD. I’ve been around a few years, I might know a thing or two that could help.”

“I would like that very much.” David noticed that when Konstatinov became excited, his accent thickened. This time David’s grin held more warmth. “Does tomorrow work for you?”

“Is fine. Is great!”

“There’s a place down the road that has a pretty decent breakfast. O’Malleys. Come hungry, they feed large. How does seven sound?”

“I will be there.”

“Then have a good night,” David said and headed for the parking lot where his Chevy waited.

He stopped into the florist again. This time he ordered a dozen red roses, suppressed his inner wince at the bill and sent them to Chris with the message:
I love you, David
. Then he broke
188 P.A. Brown

down and ate in the diner beside the hotel. The food wasn’t quite as bad as he had feared; he still didn’t have much of an appetite, and left most of his meatloaf and mashed on the plate.

He wasn’t surprised to find Konstatinov already seated when he walked into the diner the next morning. There were two menus on the table and Konstatinov was half way through what David assumed was his first coffee. Or he could be wrong and the guy had already been here a while, waiting. It wouldn’t have surprised him. He’d been that gung-ho in the beginning, too.

“Coffee,” he told the waitress when she came by the table.

She brought a steaming mug.

“So tell me what are your plans for the next five years?

Where do you want to be then?”

Konstatinov put his coffee down and grew serious. “I wish to be a homicide detective, like you.”

“Do you know what’s involved in that? I mean really involved? It means no more seven-thirty to four shifts, or even ten hour shifts, then off for the night or four days. It means working forty-eight hours straight, no sleep, then being lucky to grab a thirty minute lay down in the pod, before going into another forty-eight. It means considering yourself lucky if you’re only working a half a dozen homicides at one time. Only RHD gets the luxury of picking and choosing their cases, and getting the time to actually work them. I’ve got a light caseload right now, only five active ones and a couple of 60-dayers I still have to work on occasionally, at least to keep my hand in, in case something breaks.”

“I am prepared to go the far way. I am strong.”

“I’m sure you are, but it’s not just strength. It’s fortitude, too. With the second guessing pundits always hanging over us all, policing isn’t what it used to be. It’s a bureaucratic nightmare and I don’t know if it’s ever going to get better.”

“Then you will quit, no?”

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189

David sighed. The kid was shrewd. He saw right through David’s bluster. “No, I’m not quitting, though some days I question my sanity.”

“Ah we are all Rasmussen crazy. Like a fox, eh?”

“Yeah, crazy like a fox. You can do something for me today.

Can you check out some Russian websites and look up those soccer games—Sweden and Russia. I’ll see you get an Internet-capable PC.”

“I would like that much.”

Tuesday, 10:20 AM, Northeast Community Police Station, San
Fernando Road, Los Angeles

After breakfast, Konstatinov went back to his patrol assignment. David promised to procure him a computer. He found Jairo away from his desk, hopefully for the day. Just before noon he looked up to find the desk sergeant standing over him, a shit-eating grin on his dark face. “You got an admirer, Detective.”

The fat, balding ex-NYPD cop set a monstrous bouquet of mums, carnations, lilies and baby’s breath ferns on top of his already cluttered desk. He had to grab a pile of folders that threatened to spill onto the floor and find space for the thing.

The sergeant was still grinning, and belatedly David saw everyone else was, including Lieutenant McKee, who stood outside his office, arms folded over his chest.

“Laine.”

“Er, yes, Lieutenant?”

“What is this about? Some fan of yours?”

Jairo appeared at his desk. He was smiling even more broadly than the desk sergeant. He pulled one of the red mums out of the basket and inhaled the smell. “Maybe a little psychic bluebird sent them.”

“Get them off your desk, Laine. This is a work space, not a flower shop.”

David’s face grew hot, but he obeyed, with some reluctance.

He carried the flowers down to his locker, hating to shut them up where he knew they would wilt and die, but he had no choice. Once he was sure he was alone, he pulled out the small gift card that had come with the flowers. It said simply.
“I love
you. Let’s talk.
”

192 P.A. Brown

He smiled down at the colorful array of blooms, and plucked a carnation out. He wove the stem through his buttoned down shirt front and paused to admire the effect. He knew he was going to be razzed by the guys, he knew someone would make some stupid crack about not bending over to pick up anything off the floor when David was around. Sometimes their taunts were so predictable. Yesterday’s news.

He touched the bouquet, inhaling the smell of cut flower, green fern and earth. He knew it was a test Chris had sent him.

A message, how far was he willing to go for his lover? Into the land of ridicule? Or would self-loathing hold him back? His heart felt twenty pounds lighter, and though it wasn’t an admission that Chris wanted him back, things were looking up.

At least he wasn’t sending David his clothes. Maybe they could work this out for real.

After lunch Konstatinov called David and told him the results of his morning search. “Eight and a half weeks ago the Russian national team played the Swedes. Sweden won by twelve points.”

“Any other plays between them around that time?”

“The only other game was about a week later. That one was won by the Russians.”

Around two Mikalenko’s mouthpiece, a high-priced lawyer from Brentwood, showed up. David and Konstatinov met him and the prisoner in an interview room. He set Jairo to watch the proceedings through the two-way.

After introducing themselves, David gestured for the lawyer and Mikalenko to sit at the table.

“What exactly are you charging my client with?” the mouthpiece, Donald Fishburn, asked, before they had even taken seats.

Before he could start, David recited everyone’s name, his rank, the time and place for the recording device and video.

Then he ticked points off on his fingertips, “Forced confinement, solicitation for the purposes of sex, crossing interstate lines, the illegal procurement of children for sale, murder.”

L.A. BONEYARD
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“Murder!” Mikalenko sat bolt upright, his face flush with anger and fear. “Who did I kill? You have proof? You have no proof!”

Fishburn put his hand across Mikalenko’s arm. “Don’t speak, Mr. Mikalenko. They’re trying to goad you into speaking rashly.”

“I’m trying to get your client to tell us the truth, that’s all.

He can do that and we can wrap this up.”

“My client has nothing to say to you.”

“Then I suppose we should go ahead with charging him. I’ll strongly support no bail, as your client is clearly a flight risk, since he’s not even American. He’s already shown his skill at getting people in and out of the country, it’s only one step further to getting himself out. I’m sure the judge will agree.”

“I did not kill anyone!”

“Then tell me who did.”

Mikalenko folded his arms over his chest. His arm muscles bulged. If David had to guess he’d say Mickey lifted weights.

The better to intimidate the smaller, lighter females he smuggled into the country?

“Did you know a Doctor Jozef Sevchuk?”

“No,” Mikalenko said.

“He was a gynecologist,” David said helpfully.

Mikalenko shook his head violently. “No, I say.”

“What did you do with the children, Mikalenko?”

“What children?” But this time Mikalenko’s eyes shifted left, moving to study the far wall. He licked his fleshy lips. “I know nothing of any children.” He muttered something in Ukrainian.

Immediately Konstatinov wrote something down and passed it to David. It said “Damn children. Should never have gotten involved.”

“Hush,” Fishburn snapped to his angry client. “Don’t you know they would bring an interpreter?”

194 P.A. Brown

Mikalenko scowled and picked at the skin of his cuticles. “I did not kill her.”

David leaned forward. “I don’t recall giving a sex for the victim. Who is ‘her’? Halyna Stakchinko?”

“I did not kill Halyna.” He raised his head and glared at David. “I love her.”

David glanced at Konstatinov, then back at Mikalenko.

“Love?” he said, filling his voice with loathing. “You sold her into prostitution. Did you impregnate her too? Easy enough to prove. Once we get a warrant for your DNA we’ll be able to match you to the baby Stakchinko was carrying.”

“Bah, your witchcraft does not scare me. If Halyna was carrying my baby then it was God’s will she do so. Just as it was God’s will she fall to her death—”

Two things happened then, Fishburn leaned forward and hissed in his client’s ear, “Shut up!” and David stood up.

“Mr. Valerian Mikalenko, you are under arrest for the murder of Halyna Stakchinko and for causing the premature death of a fetus.”

“My client is invoking his right to silence,” Fishburn said.

“He can invoke anything he wants; he’s still under arrest.”

David nodded toward the two-way. The door opened and Jairo entered the room. He held a pair of handcuffs in his hands.

Mikalenko went pale at the sight of the bracelets dangling from Jairo’s lean fingers.

“Stand up, Mr. Mikalenko—”

“I did not kill her!”

“Three women are dead at your hand, Mr. Mikalenko. You can make this a whole lot easier if you just tell us about them—”

“Three?” Mikalenko gaped at him and David saw genuine confusion in his blue eyes. “What are you talking about?”

“Halyna Stakchinko, Zuzanna Konjenko and Natalya Lapchuk. Halyna and Zuzanna roughly five months pregnant at the time of their deaths. All having resided in the same address, L.A. BONEYARD
195

1208 Leland Way in Hollywood, between November of last year and eight days ago.”

“I never touched any of those girls.”

“You better have more than just some DNA on my client to bring on such charges. Being the father of a woman’s child does not automatically make him a killer.”

“Having all three women under his roof at the same time, having all of them wind up dead, is pretty strong circumstantial evidence. I’m sure a Grand Jury will agree.”

“I wish to leave,” Mikalenko said.

He and his lawyer stood up. “This interview is at an end.”

David rose too. He nodded at Jairo who cuffed their prisoner and pulled him out of the room followed by his still protesting lawyer.

“I’ll see you in court, counselor.”

The interview room door shut behind them. David met Konstatinov’s gaze. “Did he really say that?”

“I exaggerate a bit. I make an inference on what he means.

Was I wrong?”

“No, your instincts are dead on. You spooked him good.

We’ll see if the seeds you planted bear anything interesting.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“You can probably go back to your Lieutenant for the rest of the day. I’ll call you if Mikalenko wants to talk more.”

“Yes sir!”

David had a bounce in his step when he headed back to his desk. He didn’t even mind facing the blank screen of his PC

while he formulated the right words to do his report of the interview. He could taste success. After a grueling—not to mention frustrating—investigation they were about to nail their killer. It was always a heady feeling.

Jairo returned shortly after. Some of David’s good mood evaporated. He ignored his partner and concentrated on his computer.

196 P.A. Brown

“Whatever you did to him, I’d say it’s working,” Jairo said.

“What do you mean?”

“The little twerp was sweating bullets while I was taking him to lockup. His lawyer spent the whole time trying to get him to shut up but he blubbered all the way there.”

“Did he say anything incriminating?”

“Nah, he may be a stupid asshole, but even he’s smarter than that. But he sure didn’t like your inference that he lit up those other two broads.”

“The other two—you mean Zuzanna Konjenko and Natalya Lapchuk?”

“Yeah, those two. He didn’t seem too put out you told him he did the other one, but for some reason the mention of those two got his ticker all in knots.”

David frowned and leaned back in his chair. “So he seems willing to cop to Stakchinko, but denies the other two? I wonder why.”

“Hey, the guy’s a whack job. How can you expect him to sound sane?”

“You’re right. But I think I’d like to schedule another interview with the guy soon anyway. See how he likes his new home over at Men’s Central. It might soften him up a bit, make him even more talkative.”

“Works for me. You going to do it today?”

“Tomorrow’s good enough. Let him stew in lockup for a night.”

“You have a cruel streak, anyone ever tell you that?” Jairo’s voice dropped. “I like that in a man.”

David glared at him. “What did I tell you about that, Detective?”

“I can cool my jets,” Jairo said with a shrug. “For now. I know it won’t be permanent.”

“You
know
too damn much.”