Genie for Hire (6 page)

“A couple of Russians. One of them stole something that
belongs to a client.”

“The photographer?”

“I don’t care what they say about you, Jimmy. You’re a sharp
guy.”

“I saw the report yesterday,” Jimmy said. “I figured her
office is near yours, you’d be involved. But all she said was stolen were some
computer files of photos.”

“You know what kind of pictures she takes.” Biff stretched
his long legs out next to the table. He had left his pointy-toed shoes back at
the office, replacing them with his Nike cross-trainers.

“No shit? Somebody stole some naked ladies?”

Biff nodded. “Pictures of a certain woman whose husband
wasn’t happy with the way they came out.”

“You think it was the husband?”

“Sveta didn’t discover the theft until he came by demanding
the files.”

“You have a name for this couple?” Jimmy pulled a pad out of
his pocket and slid a pen from the metal coil at the top.

“Ovetschkin,” Biff said. “Kiril and Douschka.”

“This just gets better and better.” Jimmy took a big bite of
bagel and washed it down with a swig of heavily-creamed coffee, while Biff
waited impatiently.

“You don’t know who Ovetschkin is?” Jimmy asked, when he
finished swallowing.

“I get the feeling he’s not a very nice guy.”

“He’s a yutz, is what he is,” Jimmy said. “Thinks he’s a big
shot because he’s wrapped up with the
Organizatsiya,
because he’s got a
bundle of loose cash and a pretty young wife. But he’s really just a small-time
jerk.”

“The
Organizatsiya
,” Biff said. “You mean the Russian
Mafia?”

“Whatever you want to call it. But Ovetschkin’s slippery.
The Feds haven’t been able to pin anything on him yet.” Jimmy took another swig
of coffee.

“How about arms smuggling?” Biff asked. “You think he could
be involved in that?”

 Jimmy nearly dropped the coffee cup on the table. “I
thought we were talking about stolen pictures.”

“I overheard something last night.”

“I swear, you’ve got better hearing than my poodle. What do
you know?”

“I was at the Marouschka in Hallandale Beach. Ovetschkin was
talking to a guy named Igor Laskin about a problem getting some AK-47s through
Customs. I think Laskin’s the thief I’m looking for.”

“AK-47s? That’s some serious shit.” He wiped his mouth with
a paper napkin. “Laskin is an independent operator, but he reports to
Ovetschkin.”

“Kind of like one of those network marketing things?”

“Yeah, one of those, but with guns and drugs.” Jimmy
scrawled a name and phone number on a sheet from his pad, then ripped it off
and handed it to Biff. “Call this guy at the ATF. He knows more about
Ovetschkin than I do.”

Biff took the paper and slipped it in his pocket.

“I know that look,” Jimmy said. “You think you’re smarter
than the cops, you don’t need to talk to anybody. Yeah, yeah, don’t bullshit
me.” He pulled out his cell phone and punched in a number. “Hector? Jimmy
Stein. How you doing?”

He listened for a minute. “Yeah, same shit up here. Listen,
I got a guy you should talk to. Private eye up this way who’s been nosing into
the Russian Mafia.”

Biff finished the last bite of bagel, lox and cream cheese,
and leaned back in his chair. Jimmy listened some more. “Yeah, he’ll even buy
you lunch.”

“Thanks, pal,” Biff said, when Jimmy had slapped the phone
shut. “I don’t exactly have a bottomless expense account, you know.”

“All part of my mission to put some fat on your bones,”
Jimmy said. “You’re too fit, you know that? Meet him at this Cuban dive near
his office. La Guajira. One o’clock.”

They finished eating, talking about Jimmy’s wife, the
poodle, and the lousy rain the week before. As they walked out together, Jimmy
said, “Watch your back. These Russian guys, they’re trouble.”

“Thanks, Jimmy. I’ll talk to your guy, let you know how it
all spins out.”

Biff left the bagel shop and walked along the winding
sidewalk, so caught up in his brain that he narrowly missed being hit by a
falling palm frond. When he reached the Aventura Beach Shopping Center, he
passed his own office, only touching the painted eye on the glass door,
continuing to Sveta’s studio. “Mr. Andromeda! You have found my files?” she
asked, as he walked in.

She was sitting at a table in the front of the studio,
sewing the leg back on a plush stuffed dog.

“I believe so.” He handed her the jump drive, and she got up
and led him through a beaded curtain back to the workroom. She slid the drive
into her laptop and called up Photoshop.

The shots of Douschka Ovetschkin were even more beautiful
when properly displayed. Even Biff, who had been around the block a few times,
was impressed with her. The see-through negligee she wore, covering a black bra
and panties, didn’t hurt either. They were not pornography; Douschka was never
naked, and the photos were all in good taste. They were designed to enhance her
beauty, not cheapen it. A lesser photographer might have made her look like a
cheap hooker; instead, Sveta had taken a beautiful woman and turned her into a
goddess.

“How I can thank you!” Sveta turned to Biff and kissed him
on the cheek, stepping up on her tip-toes to reach. Without even thinking, he
identified her perfume, Jean Paul Gaultier’s Classique. He also noticed the way
she bunched up her girls so that they flowed out of her blouse.

When she landed on her feet again, she said, “How much do I
owe you for this great service?”

“Nothing. I collected my fee from the thief.” He reached
into his pocket and retrieved the check she had given him as a retainer. “You
can have this back, too.”

She squealed with delight as she took the check back. “How
nice!”

He walked back outside, then down the sidewalk to his office.
He brewed himself a cup of coconut aloha tea and then wrote up notes on the
case for his file, saving the document in a folder on his hard drive called
Closed Cases.

All he had to do was talk to the ATF agent and pass on what
he’d learned, and then he could put the whole business behind him. The AK-47s
and whatever else Kiril Ovetschkin was up to would be someone else’s problem.

It was closing in on noon, and Biff had a long, tedious
drive diagonally across the county to reach La Guajira, the restaurant where he
was to meet the ATF agent. He went west on Miami Gardens Drive, through miles
of urban sprawl, the roadside dotted with insurance offices, mobile phone
stores, and check-cashing operations. Oh, for a couple of good alligators, he
thought, as he reached the Turnpike entrance. Wipe out a lot of the population,
let the Everglades claim the land again.

But that would mean less business for a private
investigator. He shrugged. It was the way the world was.

He used the mindless drive south on the Turnpike to think
through the case. Where could the files be? His search the night before had
established that they weren’t in Igor Laskin’s apartment. Did Laskin have an
office? A safe deposit box? Had he given them to his girlfriend Natasha for
safe keeping?

He pulled up in front of La Guajira a few minutes before
one. It was a simple storefront boxed in by a credit union and a discount
linens store. A painting of a young peasant girl, presumably the
guajira
of the restaurant’s name, was propped in the window.

A tall, slim Cuban guy in a white guayabera and tan slacks
stood outside the restaurant, talking on a cell phone. As Biff approached he
snapped it shut and said, “You must be Andromeda.” He stuck his hand out.
“Hector Hernandez.”

They shook hands, then walked into the tiny storefront.
“Doesn’t look like much, but the food’s better than my mother makes,” Hector
said. “Just don’t tell her that.”

“My lips are sealed,” Biff said. “Until it’s time to eat.”

They ordered platters of
ropa vieja
and fried
plantains. Biff got a can of Jupina pineapple soda from the cooler, and a Tazo
iced tea for Hector. When they were sitting at a table in the back, waiting for
the food to arrive, Hector said, “So how do you come to be interested in Kiril
Ovetschkin?”

“His wife Douschka ordered some boudoir photos from my
client,” Biff said. “A photographer named Sveta Pshkov. Kiril didn’t like the
pictures, so he came to Sveta demanding the files. Only someone had stolen
them. Sveta hired me to recover them.”

“Douschka,” Hector said, shaking his head. “You know what
she looks like?”

“Haven’t seen the pictures. And I haven’t been able to get
in touch with her.”

The waitress delivered the plates of food and walked away.
Hector inhaled deeply and sighed. “Douschka is beautiful. Any woman in the room
looks like nothing next to her. And she’s not even my type. Honey blonde hair,
skin like peaches and cream, built like a Victoria’s Secret model.”

“I’ve seen Ovetschkin,” Biff said. “He’s a frog, she’s a
princess?”

Hector laughed. “You could say that.” He took a forkful of
beef. “He’s very jealous of her. Imported her from some peasant town in
Russia.”

Biff decided that Hector knew his Cuban food. La Guajira did
a better job than a lot of places he’d eaten in Havana, back in the day. “You
know a guy named Igor Laskin?” he asked, between devouring the tender beef and
the soft, sweet plantains. “I think he works for Ovetschkin.”

“Yeah, he’s Kiril’s go-to guy when anything needs muscle
power. Early thirties, bodybuilder, born in Russia but raised here. Kind of a
loose cannon—he’s heavy into steroids so he gets that roid rage sometimes. He’s
beat up a couple of guys, but we can never get anyone to testify against him.”

“Ambitious?” Biff asked.

“You bet. I don’t think he has the brains to be a boss,
though. He’s strictly muscle, in my opinion. What do you know about him?”

“I think he stole the digital originals of the photos. I’m
trying to figure out why. You think maybe he has a thing for Douschka?”

“Haven’t seen it,” Hector said, shaking his head. He speared
a rogue plantain that tried to jump off his plate. “That’s all this is about?
Stolen pictures?”

“I was tracking the pictures last night and I overheard a
conversation. At the Marouschka in Hallandale Beach.” He paused. “About a shipment
of AK-47s coming in through Customs in Miami.”

Hector put his fork down. “And you heard what, exactly?”

Biff repeated the conversation. “Sound familiar to you?”

“It’s another piece of the puzzle,” Hector said. “One of the
Customs guys is named Fiorentino, and he had a heart attack yesterday. From
what you’re saying it sounds like he might be on Ovetschkin’s payroll.”

He pulled out a pad and made a couple of notes. “Thanks for
the tip,” he said, when he was finished. “And for lunch.” He smiled.

“My pleasure.”

Hector pushed his empty plate away from him and drained the
last iced tea from the bottle.

 “I’m inclined to think Douschka didn’t order those photos
to give to Kiril. And that’s why he’s so eager to get the originals and destroy
them.”

“She cheating on him?”

“She’s a pretty little country girl, like La Guajira over
there.” He pointed at the portrait in the restaurant window. “Though a whole
lot more luscious, in my opinion. Very spoiled, not exactly the sharpest knife
in the drawer. I think it’s possible. And then Kiril finds out.”

“Any idea who the boyfriend is? Igor Laskin?”

Hector shook his head. “Igor’s hot for this girl named
Natasha, daughter of a guy they call The Professor, much bigger than
Ovetschkin.”

“Then who?”

“No idea. We keep trying to set up surveillance on
Ovetschkin, but money’s tight, and we didn’t have much to go on. Now at least
we can look into these arms shipments.”

Biff promised Hector Hernandez he’d let him know if he heard
anything more about the AK-47s. He left La Guajira wondering who Douschka
Ovetschkin had ordered the photos for, how Kiril had found out about them, and
why Igor had stolen them.

His cell phone rang as he was getting on the Turnpike. “Mr.
Andromeda, he is here again!” Sveta whispered. “I give him files but he does
not believe they are only ones. I am frightened! You can come here, please?”

“I’m way out in West Dade,” he said. “It’s going to take me
at least forty-five minutes to get there.”

In the background, Biff heard Ovetschkin roaring in Russian.
“Hang up and call 911, Sveta,” Biff said. “I’m going to call a buddy in the
police too.”

He disconnected the call and pushed the speed-dial for Jimmy
Stein. “I’m in the middle of shit here,” Jimmy said.

“Ovetschkin’s at Sveta’s studio and he’s threatening her,” Biff
said. “I told her to call 911 but can you get a unit over there?”

“The things I do for a bagel with a shmear.” Jimmy hung up,
and Biff hit the accelerator on the Mini Cooper, darting around slower traffic.
He called Sveta’s studio again, but the line was busy.

He kept trying as he sped up the Turnpike, exiting at the
Golden Glades interchange, where he picked up I-95. When he pulled up at the
Aventura Beach shopping center, a white Miami-Dade police car with its
distinctive green stripe was parked in front of the mall entrance.

He hurried into Sveta’s studio, where he found a police
woman trying to convince Sveta to go to the hospital. Sveta’s right cheek was
bruised, and she had a hell of a black eye growing. Her filmy pink chiffon
blouse had been torn, and she was struggling to keep it up over her ample
breasts.

“What happened, Sveta?” Biff said.

“Nothing. Was accident,” she said, her eyes glancing over at
the plump African-American police woman. Her name tag read White.

“Are you a friend of Miss Pshkov’s?” Officer White asked.

“Biff Andromeda,” he said, reaching out to shake her hand.
“I run the detective agency a couple of doors down.”