Chapter 7
Friday morning, 9 o'clock. Nancy had a splitting headache. Probably the lack of caffeine, but she was determined to cut back on the coffee. She couldn't indulge the habit anyway, the coffee maker was gone, a casualty of last night's rampage. Of course, the fact that the office was in shambles didn't help matters nor did the heart-wrenching fact they had no clue where Tasha was.
Nancy sat at her desk massaging her throbbing forehead. They needed a break in this case, and soon, they had to find Tasha. Nancy brushed a strand of strawberry blonde hair from her weary eyes. She'd done her hair up in a French braid – her go-to hair style when life dealt her too many cards as it had last night.
This morning Nancy and the Hardys had a long list of things to do. First on the list was security. A phonebook lay in front of Nancy opened to the appropriate yellow page. Might as well start with the first company on the page, best to check out all the prices and what each company had to offer.
Joe stumbled out of his room looking none too good. Late nights and shoot-outs will do that to you, Nancy thought as she listened to the salesman on the other end of the phone drone on about his company's security package.
"Thanks," Nancy said ending the one-sided conversation. "I'll get back to you."
Frank came down the stairs cell phone in hand. "The glass guys will be here in an hour. With any luck we'll have a window by the end of the day."
Nancy wasn't holding her breath, but she perked up at the news. "I'd love that. That would certainly make my day." She stood and hugged herself. "It feels like a cave in here with the window boarded up." Instantly she thought of Tasha. Where was she? Was she being held in some horrible black hole? Nancy bit the corner of her lower lip. The office, even with a boarded up window, two destroyed chairs and cabinets, was probably a lot better than wherever Tasha was.
Tasha lay on the filthy mattress in the small room. No windows, no light, no air. No way to measure the passage of time. This was a black void. A place where spiders lived and small animals came to die. It smelled of dirt and decay and the air was dank and cold. The cold penetrated her clothes, her skin, and spread its icy fingers like an ache along her body clawing into her joints and bones. She shivered and tried to burrow into her turtleneck sweater, into the mattress, into any warm spot.
What she wouldn't give for a big woolly blanket and a soft pillow.
Tasha had slept, but not a restful sleep. Hers had been the sleep of the exhausted, the sleep of the condemned.
As she slowly awakened Yuri's face floated in her mind – tempting and teasing – haunting her fragmented thoughts and dreams. Would he be proud of her?
How could he? She'd gotten caught, captured, there was no excuse for incompetence. Yuri had taught her everything she knew about escape and evasion. She had been a good student, learning quickly, often surprising him with her natural ability and instincts. For three years his training had served her well. She had lived on the run evading her enemies. But it all came to nothing because in the end she had failed.
Wednesday, the midnight meeting, everything had come undone then. Where had she gone wrong? Going to the Endeavor Agency? Perhaps.
Why had Joseph Hardy been at the mall? How had he known to be there?
He must have followed her. Fool. She wanted to scream at him. Protect the envelope! Forget about me.
Rage boiled up inside of her and warmed her frozen limbs. She wanted to punch something. She turned into the filthy mattress and pounded it with a fist. A cloud of dirt and dust rose causing her to cough violently. Her ribs revolted in a chorus of sharp pains. Her neck, head, arms and legs followed suit.
Her captors had not been kind. The two guards, Boris and Ivan, were unduly cruel. Boris, the more sadistic of the two, took any opportunity he could to inflict a kick, a punch, or a slap.
If she did survive this, heaven help these men, they would pay for what they did to her.
The room's light snapped on. The feeble beam cast the space in a murky, gray shroud. Tasha heard keys at the door and squinted as her eyes adjusted to the gloom. She pushed herself up and winced at the aches and pains playing an unholy symphony along every part of her body. She felt like an old woman – hunched and crippled.
Ivan appeared in the doorway, a white paper bag in one hand and a machine gun in the other. He tossed the bag in her direction.
Food! The smell hit her like a summer breeze and warmed her.
The bag fell on the floor beside the mattress, its contents falling out, some of the eggs and toast spilling onto the dirt. She was ashamed to admit it, but she ate it. Hunger and the will to survive forced her to devour every grease covered crumb and every bit of cold rubbery eggs.
Ivan had tossed a bottle of water on the mattress, slammed the door shut and locked it. Thankfully he had left the light on. Or was that something to be thankful for? Tasha could see the absolute utter squalor she occupied.
Push away the depressing thoughts as Yuri trained you to do she told herself. Concentrate on survival and escape.
She grabbed the bottled water and almost downed the entire thing then thought better of it. She didn't know when, or if, they would give her water again. Make this one last, ration it out. She sipped – small greedy sips – relishing each one, letting the cool liquid sate her thirst.
The food and water warmed her and brought her mind to life. Her thoughts began to gel. A plan. She needed a plan. Study the guards and their routine. Look around now. See what this room has to offer.
Joe tossed a piece of paper on Frank's desk. Frank looked up from his computer, eyed the paper and said, "What's this?"
"Information on that P.O. box you asked me to check out." Joe grinned broadly. "Ready for a history lesson?"
Seeing the gleam in Joe's eyes Frank laced his hands together, put them behind his head, leaned back in his chair and said, "Sure. Why not?"
Nancy swiveled her chair toward the brothers. Frank and Joe's desks stood side by side along the same wall and were separated by a tall filing cabinet. The desks faced the wall with the overstuffed sofa.
Joe sat on the edge of his desk closest to Frank and got comfortable. "Okay," he said, "the Kiev Village is just one of many ethnic communities located in the greater Chicago area. That P.O. box Boris Kozlov used is on Division Street. About fifty years ago that would've been a great place to live, right in the center of Kiev Village. Not today. The neighborhoods surrounding that Post Office are all rundown and filled with low-income families, street gangs, and drugs. According to the latest police statistics those neighborhoods see more than their fair share of crime and murders. It's not a place you would want to live or own a business."
Joe hopped off his desk and scratched his head. "So, if the guys we're looking for have money why are they in the worst part of the Kiev Village? That P.O. box doesn't jive with what we know about these guys. If they have money, why live there?"
Nancy stood and got closer to the brothers' desks. "Perhaps," she said, "they don't live in any of the neighborhoods. Maybe they're just using the P.O. box as an address and a place to get mail."
"But why that one?" Joe insisted. "Why not use the Post Office in the West Village, a nice Russian community, just a few miles away."
"Because," Frank said getting to his feet, "there's more to it than just having an address."
Nancy and Joe looked at Frank expectantly.
"Drugs," Frank elaborated. "Drugs and guns." His face turned grim. "We know they have guns. Nice ones. And where you find guns, you usually find drugs."
A knot of fear formed in the pit of Nancy's stomach. Drugs and guns were a lethal combination and usually provoked senseless violence. Drug and gun dealers were people the police had trouble dealing with let alone three private investigators.
"I don't like the sound of that," Nancy told Frank. "And what about Tasha? How does she and her brother fit into all this?"
Frank didn't have a chance to speculate. The front door opened and in walked Detective Cutter. He had a manila folder in one hand and a smug expression on his tanned face. Nancy's eyes were drawn to his silk tie, a stunning hue of azure embellished with razor thin gold lines.
Cutter smiled and pushed up his Fedora hat. It matched the tie, same shade of azure. The hat's wide gold band was adorned with a small black feather attached by a gold clip. Nancy smiled appreciatively – the man did have excellent taste in ties and hats.
Cutter crossed to the center of the office. "Good morning folks." It was noon, but no one corrected him.
Frank stepped forward. "I'd offer you a chair, but they were destroyed last night. Oh, but you already know that."
Nancy was surprised by Frank's open sarcasm. She shot him a warning glance. She didn't want his irritation to get the better of him.
Frank got the message and toned down the bitterness. "So detective, any information on our gunman?" He eyed the folder in Cutter's hands.
Cutter gave a brusque, "No."
Frank's anger flared as did his nostrils. "I find that hard to believe. How many black vans can there be in the greater River Heights area owned by a Russian national with a facial wound. Not to mention he's packing a machine gun and shooting at people? That's a helluva lot of information. I'd think you'd have something on him by now."
So much for keeping the anger in check. Nancy laid a hand on Frank's arm silencing him. She didn't mean to minimize his anger – she shared it – but she thought it best if the confrontation didn't get out of hand. Her tone strident, she said, "Detective, I'm sure there's a reason you stopped by this morning."
"There is." Cutter ran a slender finger along the edge of the folder. "What can you tell me about a Kurt Swanson?"
Nancy frowned. "Nothing. I've never heard of him."
"You sure?" Cutter's dark brows rose.
"Of course," Nancy responded hotly. Frank couldn't resist throwing her a glance and a sly grin. Now who was getting hot under the collar?
"Well," Cutter said, "he was found dead in your client's condo this morning, a bullet in his head. You sure you don't know him?"
"Yes. I'm sure." Nancy's voice held a trace of irritation.
Frank's grin grew. He coughed chasing away the grin and said, "We haven't heard of him." He looked at Joe seated on the sofa. Joe stuck out his lower lip, shook his head and shrugged.
Cutter's voice was as smooth and silky as his tie, "Really? Hmmm. Well, then we have a problem folks."
"And what would that be?" Frank asked.
Cutter smiled savoring the probing look Frank gave him. "We dusted the condo for prints. Seems the perpetrator didn't bother wearing gloves. He left fingerprints all over the patio door. We got a match."
Joe sank back against the sofa dread seeping into every inch of his body.
Frank's eyes narrowed. "You've already had the prints analyzed? That was fast." He knew full well where this was going and he didn't like it. This was a train wreck waiting to happen and there was no way he could stop it. "It usually takes days to process fingerprints," he protested.
"Usually it does," Cutter agreed, "but this is a high-profile case. We're dealing with a car bombing and the possible kidnapping of a foreign national. That tends to make people and things move a little faster."
Frank stroked the back of his neck as thought occurred to him. "How about the FBI, are they involved yet?"
"No, and I'd like to keep it that way." On this point Cutter and Frank were in perfect agreement.
"Me, too," Frank said with relief.
"Partly it's early in the case," Cutter said, "partly it's because there's no hard evidence as to what happened to Miss Romanoff. Is she dead? Murdered? Kidnapped? Maybe she just took off. No one knows. And then there's the fact she holds dual citizenship – Russian and American – at the moment no one's willing to claim her or declare her missing."
A stony silence fell over the office as everyone digested the news. Nancy was deep in thought her arms crossed and the fingers of her right hand drumming her left arm.
"So," Cutter said breaking the silence, "back to Kurt Swanson and those fingerprints. One last chance, anyone know him?" His eyes slowly traveled from Nancy, to Frank, and then to Joe where they lingered.
Joe had his head down staring at the floor.
Cutter adjusted his tie and cleared his throat. "Ahem, well then, let me cut right to the chase. Those fingerprints belong to —"
"Me!" Joe came off the sofa. "But I had nothing to do with a murder. I left those fingerprints Wednesday night and I haven't been back to the condo since."
Unfazed, Cutter calmly stared at Joe. "Too bad fingerprints don't come with a date-time stamp Mr. Hardy. There's no way to know when you left those prints."
Nancy stepped forward. "Excuse me Detective, but I believe you're letting us jump to some conclusions here."
Cutter turned to Nancy and one dark brow slowly lifted over his right eye. "Such as?"
"Those fingerprints," she said, "you dusted for prints yesterday, the day the condo was broken into and ransacked. And I'm willing to bet you only got confirmation of a match today. That's how you know Joe's fingerprints are there. I'm sure the condo is being dusted again now that there's been a murder, but there hasn't been enough time to process any new prints." Nancy paused, drew back her shoulders, crossed her arms, and lifted her chin. "Am I right?"
"Bravo," Cutter said without cheer. "You're right. But I still want to know why Mr. Hardy's prints are there." He turned to Joe. "This better be good. The print pattern indicates you broke in."
Joe was sullen. "I did." Might as well get it all out in the open he figured. He told about breaking and entering and reading the e-mails. He ended with, "I didn't go beyond the kitchen."
Cutter gave everyone a withering look. "Would've been better if you told me this yesterday. Like I said before, it helps if we all work together not against each other."
"So, let's start working together," Frank said. "When did this Kurt Swanson die?"
Cutter noticed the change of topic and decided to go with it. "The coroner places the time of death between midnight and three a.m."
Nancy said, "Detective, what do you have on Kurt Swanson? Is he connected to the shootings?"
Cutter liked Nancy quick intellect. "He was just your average tattooed street thug. He was into drugs. He has a record."
"Tattoed?" Nancy's eyes widened. "Do you have a photo of him?"
Cutter frowned. "Yeah, right here." He waved the folder. "But it's .. I .. he's dead. It's not a pretty picture."
"That's okay," Nancy said. "I'd like to see it."
Joe knew what Nancy was thinking and stepped beside her. He wanted to see the photo, too.
Cutter opened the folder and handed it to Nancy. A photo of Kurt Swanson was paper-clipped inside. The young man was lying on his back, his lifeless eyes stared at the camera, and a bullet hole made a perfect circle in the middle of his forehead.
Nancy gasped.
"I warned you," Cutter said.
"No, no, it's not that," Nancy said. "It's that I've seen this man before. I recognize the scar on his chin .. and the tattoos .. and piercings." She told the detective about her encounter with Kurt the previous day and explained, "It seemed to me he backed off when he saw someone across the street. Someone he might have been working with – or for. I can't be sure. It's just a feeling I got. He asked if I worked here. He seemed interested in the Endeavor."
Frank spoke up, "Maybe he was the get-away driver last night. Our gunman might not like witnesses and in that case Kurt would've been expendable."
Cutter put forth another idea, "Swanson could have been the gunman. His arrest records are for drugs and gun trafficking."
"No," Joe said studying the photo, "I don't think so. He's not the right build or height. Kurt was tall and lean. The gunman was short and stocky."
"He's right," Frank said. "Plus the gunman had a heavy Russian accent. Is Kurt Russian?"
"No," Cutter sighed. "He's strictly American born right here in the Chicago area. I don't have much background on him yet."
Nancy felt there was a connection between Kurt and Boris Kozlov. If she could make the connection and follow the trail it might lead her, and the Hardys, to Tasha. "Have you contacted Kurt's family or friends yet?" she asked Cutter.
He checked his watch. "Yes. Ingrid Swanson, Kurt's mother, is meeting me at the station in an hour."
"If you don't mind detective, I'd like to join you when you interview Mrs. Swanson."
Cutter considered the idea. "Okay Miss Drew, in the spirit of cooperation. Besides, it can't hurt to have a woman with me when I do the interview. Sometimes a woman responds better to another woman. Can you be there in forty-five minutes?"
Nancy smiled. "You bet."
Cutter wasn't exactly smiling when he left the office a few minutes later, but his step seemed lighter.
Nancy ran upstairs to get her jacket.
Frank turned to Joe and said, "Looks like Cutter's finally letting us work with him. Maybe I was wrong about him."
"Ha," Joe scoffed. "He hasn't given us any information on Boris or the van. He's got to have something on that license plate by now."
"True," Frank admitted. Very true, he thought his dark brow wrinkling.
A/N: Thank you reviewers and readers it's always nice to hear from you. I'd like to answer a few questions that came up in the reviews:
Yes, it is Iola that Joe is still not over. More of his feelings will be revealed as the story progresses.
Just to clarify, Nancy does not live at the office. I should have worked that information into the story better. Nancy lives with her father and Hannah. Nancy and Frank have been dating for a year - most of it long distance. They started the Endeavor four months ago and that's how long they've been in the same town and able to date in person. Of course, setting up the business, looking for jobs, etc.. has gotten in the way of personal time. As the story progresses, so does N/F's relationship.
