Helsinki Blood (9 page)

“More,” I say.

The two Andy Warhols look at each other and the room is silent for about sixty seconds. They’re trying to decide who they’re most afraid of. Sweetness’s knife is a lock blade, designed to be opened with one hand. He depresses the lock with his thumb. He closes it, opens it. Closes it, opens it. Seconds tick by.

Mack the Raper stares at me, takes in my cane and gunshot face. “Yer that famous cop I seen on the telly, ain’tcha?”

“Yep.”

“Is this method the secret behind yer crime-solvin’ success?”

“Yep.”

He looks at his brother and nods. The Ripper says, “If I give ya everything you need, I want it forgotten. No rat jacket and coppers showin’ up here regular.”

“Agreed.”

“Yer in luck. Once a month, the real toffs have a poker game, which is tonight. They meet, play, and make deals for women, gambling rights, guns, dope. Even gas and oil. The whole shebang on a global level. Need a tactical nuke to build yer own dirty bomb, that’s the place to go. Different men are invited, dependin’ on the business at hand, and fly in from around the world to play. I’m told the Russian ambassador was invited tonight. You find him, and he can find yer girl.”

“Where?”

“King’s Royale. The game starts at midnight.”

King’s Royale. Helsinki’s other major whore bar. Owned unofficially by a Finnish billionaire—actually now a citizen of Monaco—Pasi Palo, who reputedly uses King’s Royale to launder money in Finland. Officially, it’s owned by a holding company owned by a holding company owned by a holding company registered in Singapore, and there the trail goes cold.

I know this because so many police want to see him jailed for trafficking in arms, women and dope, but especially arms. His business partners are reputed to be Russian mafiosi, including generals in the Russian army and the FSB, the new, democratic Russia’s KGB. His best clients are said to include Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, Omar al-Bashir of Sudan, and Than Shwe of Burma. Some of the world’s most vicious dictators.

“You ever been to a game?” I ask.

“We went once, cuz they wanted to talk to us about girls,” the Raper says, “but it costs a hundred thousand euros to get in. Too rich for our blood.”

“How tight was security?”

“Not like you might think. It’s in Punavuori, and you can’t exactly line up fifty men with Uzis in that trendy little part of town, can you, mate? Just a few men. Two at the door that leads from the nightclub upstairs, but they can’t hear nor see nothin’ downstairs. Two outside the delivery entrance to usher the players in—they come and go that way—one bloke stays at the door and the other escorts the players in when they arrive. A couple are posted outside the door of the room they play in, and more bodyguards are inside the room itself.”

It’s odd to hear that area, the district of Punavuori, called “trendy.” It used to be considered a dangerous place inhabited by lowlifes. Gentrification. “How can they run a high-security game with a nightclub in full swing?”

“For you, mate, that’s the beauty of it. Ya got one club upstairs, and another one downstairs, as they spin different kinds of music, so each one’s soundproofed. An’ behind the downstairs club is a private room, very posh, and also soundproofed. You could set a bomb off in there and nobody would know. A word to the wise. If ya go there, yer a dead man.”

“Do they always use the same security people?”

“Palo’s boys.”

“And do you know them?”

“Yeh, since he owns thet club we cross paths once in a while, us bein’ in the same trade and all.”

I snap open the lion’s mouth on the handle of my cane, run my fingers along the razor teeth, feel the sting and think. I turn to Sweetness and switch to Finnish. “Do you want to do this? We might get killed.”

He puts his knife back in his pocket. “I don’t think we have any choice. We probably won’t get another chance, and you promised her mom.”

At the moment, I’m so depressed about Kate, her problems and our marriage that I don’t care if I live or die. “
I
promised her. Not you. Aside from creating an international incident that may land us in prison, it has all the hallmarks of a kamikaze mission that only an addled mental defective would consider.”

Sweetness chuckles. “I figured that out on my own. But a promise is a promise, and if you go, I go. I just don’t know how you can do it with your knee as fucked up as it is. And if I said no, I have a feeling you’d try to go by yourself.”

“Yeah, I would.”

“How?”

My pain level has gone down considerably since getting the cortisone shots. “Slowly and carefully. And that’s why I brought the sawed-off room sweeper.”

“Then let’s go.”

I check the time on my cell phone, wish I hadn’t destroyed my watch. It’s a few minutes after midnight.

I switch back to English and say to the whore-mongering brothers, “Put your thinking caps on and figure out how to get in and out alive, because you two are coming with us.”

“Why us?” the Raper says. “We gave ya what ya wanted!”

“Because,” I say, “the two of you are such harmless, pathetic, brainless morons that no one would suspect you of doing anything that requires balls.”

Pissed off and afraid, the Ripper says, “Ya told us you’d leave us be if we told yer what ya wanted.”

“No, I promised you no rat jacket. And you may not pimp the girls in your club, but you make deals with their pimps—don’t tell me you don’t take kickbacks—and in my eyes, that makes you scum.”

“They’ll fuckin’ kill us. We’ll have to leave the fuckin’ country.”

I draw my silenced .45. “It’s me now or them later. You boys are good at plying your trade. I’m sure you’ll start over somewhere else and prosper.”

In fact, I wouldn’t kill them or have Sweetness cut off their fingers, but I’ve done a good job of convincing them otherwise.

“Ya can’t just murder us. You’ve been seen. You’ll end up in the nick same as any other murderer, copper or not.”

I show him the taped-up .357 Magnum. “You pulled this. It was self-defense. We had no choice.”

Fear: the great motivator. He doesn’t hesitate, makes a call. The table is full. He says they’re happy to sit in when other players want breaks, and really, they want to come to talk business more than play. He gets the invite. My guess is they’re bush-league players and the others just think of them as easy money. Two idiots to fleece and send packing.

“You’re going to need the cash as a stage prop,” I say, “to convince them you’re there to play. Find it.”

“You expect us to have two hundred thousand euros just layin’ around to no purpose?”

“I hope you do,” I say, “for your sake.”

He turns even paler, scowls, furious at having his life turned upside down, calls me a “filthy fucking rat bastard prick,” and says, “I guess we gotta take it with us to flee the fuckin’ country anyway, cuz of you.”

“It would likely be in your best interest,” I say.

He pulls a cheap reproduction of a Pre-Raphaelite painting off the wall to reveal a safe behind it. It’s stuffed with cash. He jams it all into a gym bag. “I guess you win, mate,” he says, “but goddamn you to hell fer it.”

“We’re not fucking friends,” I say, “so if either of you calls me fucking ‘mate’ one more time, I’ll shoot you on general principles. So fuck you and let’s go.”

W
e go out to the Wrangler. The Ripper sits in front beside Sweetness. I sit in the back beside the Raper, my silenced Colt pressed against his side. They might try to bolt and run while we’re at a traffic light. This gives them incentive to stay in the vehicle and behave. We park down the street from King’s Royale. To reach the back of the club and the delivery entrance, a vehicle has to pass through an alley. The buildings on both sides of it make the alley a perfect shooting gallery, while hiding and protecting the guards at the club door around the corner at the back of it. I have no visibility for the first leg of this operation.

How to do this? The Harper brothers could just forewarn the guards that police are coming, walk in, the door locked behind them, and earn some points from Pasi Palo for the tip-off. No doubt they’ve both already considered this.

“You two remember who you’re dealing with,” I say. “Two cops from the National Bureau of Investigation.” They don’t know Sweetness is officially employed as a linguistic specialist. “If you screw us, we’ll kill you tonight if we can. If not, we’ll ruin your business, charge you with all sorts of shit, have your books examined and nail you for tax fraud. I’ll make it my personal business to see you get max prison sentences. The list of our ways to fuck up your lives is long, and if you fuck us over, it’ll be your own asses you’re peddling, as if anyone would want them, instead of spending your evenings drinking cognac with spies and getting your dicks sucked.”

I take the Raper’s cell phone, put my number in it, and give it a speed dial with the number one. I call my own phone number, give it back to him and tell him to keep the line open so I can hear everything that’s said.

I ask Sweetness for his Taser, take out my own, and show the brothers how they work. “You two are going to talk your way into getting the door unlocked, then zap the men guarding it with these. Keep shocking them until they’re unconscious. Look for security cameras and get out of sight of them. Then you tell me and we’ll be there in a heartbeat.” I pull the sawed-off in its black garbage bag out from under the seat and show it to them. “We’ll be right behind you with this, and when we get there, I’ll tell you what to do next.”

I smell fear sweat and they both tremble. “Pull yourselves together, goddamn it, or you’ll end up dead.” I hand Sweetness the bag with the lockbuster shotgun and he takes a roll of duct tape from the glove box.

They nod, and we pile out of the Wrangler. They have trouble making themselves walk down the street. Sweetness kicks the Raper in the ass. “Move.”

Off they go, and we trail a little less than a minute behind them, shotguns hidden in the bags, but cocked with our fingers on the triggers. It gets dark a little earlier every night as summer progresses. The light is dim. For a moment, I think it makes us unobtrusive, but realize my limp and Sweetness’s size make that impossible.

We reach the corner and peer into the alley. The brothers walk into it. We give them a head start and follow. They reach an inner courtyard and turn right. I listen to them blabber inane bullshit to security about why they want to attend the game. But they flash the cash and it gives them an appearance of veracity. I hear electric zaps.

The Raper unpockets his phone and speaks to me. “The blokes are out cold. Me satchel full of cash made ’em believe we’re here to play. I got me foot keepin’ the door open, an’ there’s a security camera on top a the door.”

Sweetness peers around the corner and blows out the camera lens with his pistol. He motions for me to follow.

I recognize one of the bodyguards. He answered the door once when I visited Veikko Saukko’s home. I take it he’s on loan this evening. He had an iPad and used it to check Saukko’s appointments, appeared to serve as Saukko’s secretary as well as security. We use zip-lock plastic ties to cuff their hands and feet. Saukko’s man is an obvious powerhouse. I double-shackle him to make sure he can’t use his strength to snap the zip-locks. I take his iPad, it might have some useful information in it. We tape their mouths shut. They start coming around.

“Can we scarper now?” the Raper asks.

“Soon,” I say. “Take us to the game, put on happy faces, and tase the guards outside the door. Same deal. I’ll listen. Tell me when they’re down.”

“Yer a God-rotted bastard,” he says, and does as he’s told.

We follow the brothers through the kitchen storeroom, they motion for us to stop, and they start down a hallway. Upstairs in the nightclub, the music must be blaring. Here in the staff area, I can’t hear a goddamned thing. The soundproofing is excellent. The Raper gives me the go-ahead. We start down the hall. I go as fast as I can, which isn’t very. Two more guards are down. We secure them, disarm them, pull the batteries out of their phones and fling them back toward the storeroom. I tell the brothers to get the fuck out of here.

We take the shotguns out of the bags. I cradle the sawed-off under my arm and take two flash-bangs out of my pocket. I press myself against the wall to avoid shrapnel. Sweetness angles himself away from the door to do the same. We do it fast. He fires and kicks the door open. The roar is deafening in this confined space. I pull the pins on the grenades and toss them into the room, turn, plug my ears and close my eyes. Three seconds. Thunders like the cracks of doom and flashes like supernovas.

We charge in. Some made it under the table when the door flew open. Those standing went down. Six players at the table. Two gunmen bodyguards. They’re all deaf, blind and disoriented. A couple puke from inner-ear-liquid imbalance. We start screaming. “Everybody facedown on the floor. Lock your fingers behind your heads.”

I realize I’m shouting in Finnish. I scream it again in English. Sweetness takes my cue, shouts orders in Russian.

All but two players suck floor. A bodyguard behind the bar must have understood what was happening, closed his eyes and ears. He comes up shooting. He turns his head as I let the right barrel go. Smoke and flame blast out of it. I cut loose with only one hand gripping the gun. It almost flies out of my grasp from the recoil jolt. The guard gets his side and the back of his head scorched with rock salt. He drops his pistol. Not out of fear or pain, but because he sees what he’s done. He put a bullet square between Pasi Palo’s eyes. That won’t be forgiven. As Milo would say, before long he’ll be dead as a bag of hammers.

The only man left upright is Veikko Saukko. He’s in a chair on the right side of the poker table, resting his right elbow on it and resting his head on his hand. He’s drumming on the table with the fingers of his left hand, as if all this bores him. I guess he recognized the flash-bangs, plugged his ears and covered his eyes as well.

I chuck the spent shell and replace it with a fresh one. We keep shouting, keep the fear and confusion maximized. They think this is a heist, that we’re taking down their game. I cover the room, Sweetness goes through all their pockets, looks for weapons and electronic devices. Veikko Saukko is an arms dealer. One of the players is Arab. Another is black, so perhaps African. Each has a man of his own race beside him, I assume translators. This really is criminal planning on a global scale. None of them are packing, except for security. Their communications devices—BlackBerrys, Androids, iPads and iPhones and others—go in a pile on the table, so that they neither call for help nor record this event.

It’s a nice place for a game. The card table on the left of the room is covered in green felt. Its walnut trim has drink holders built into it. On the right side of the room, leather armchairs are arranged in a semicircle around an entertainment center. A full bar lines the back wall. Another door leads out of the room. I check it out and find a sauna.

I pat down Veikko Saukko myself and pocket his iPhone. Further, I get a pen and paper from beside the game bank, which has hundreds of thousands of dollars in it, and instruct him to write down his e-mail user name and password. I test it to make sure it’s correct. There might be messages in it concerning the attacks against us. If he’s behind the assaults and threats leveled against my family and me, I intend to find out and put a stop to it. How, I don’t know. The über-rich aren’t subject to the rule of law as the rest of us are. But I’ve learned a valuable lesson over these past months: All men are subservient to the laws of pain.

By the time we’ve secured the room, tended to our own safety, and made certain our activities aren’t on video, its occupants have pulled themselves together for the most part. I tell them all to be seated with their hands placed in front of them on the table, and assure them that we’re not here to steal from them and mean them no harm. Sweetness simultaneously translates from my English into Russian.

“Which of you is Russian Ambassador to Finland Sergey Merkulov?” I ask.

“I am.” The man is in his late fifties or early sixties, tanned and running to fat, has thinning hair and an Armani suit. He lights a cigar and motions for the flunky who killed Pasi Palo to bring him a drink.

I shove Palo’s corpse out of its chair onto the floor, take his seat, lay the sawed-off on the table in front of me, and address the ambassador. “Sir, my business here is primarily with you.”

Palo was a billionaire and a man of great power. His death seems not to disturb the other men in the room, his colleagues, one iota. I file this away in the tome in my head titled
What I Know About Human Nature
.

He smiles, reptilian, and answers in English. “I doubt that, unless you’re referring to the horrendous diplomatic incident now taking place as ‘business.’”

“This is business that, if I went through official channels to discuss with you, would be dismissed as insulting fiction and result in me being tossed out of your embassy on my ear. Our dramatic entrance was required to get your attention and cooperation.”

I take Loviise’s photo from my pocket and slide it across the table to him. “I’m looking for this girl. I want you to find her for me. She was lured here from Estonia, was promised work. She’s easily identifiable. She has Down syndrome and it makes her stand out.”

His smile broadens, then turns to laughter. “Why in the hell would you think I have any idea where this foul little creature is?”

“I don’t think you do, but that you know who does.”

He exhales a voluminous plume of smoke and knocks his double vodka back in one gulp. “And to what do you attribute this certainty?”

I say nothing.

“And if I refuse?”

I return his smile and still say nothing. The way we made our way in here speaks volumes.

“And if I do locate this child for you, are you going to piss off and let us play cards in peace?”

“Most certainly.”

“Then give me my phone.”

“In a moment.”

I turn to face Saukko. He still wears his façade of boredom. “I’ve had some problems with harassment. My windows broken out. My family threatened and home teargassed. Insinuations concerning your ten million euros in ransom money that someone believes I stole and wants returned. Which is impossible for me to do,” I lie, “because I don’t have the money. And as whoever is threatening me hasn’t identified himself, I wouldn’t know who to give it to even if I did have it.”

He sits upright, drains his glass and folds his arms. “You stupid piece of shit. I know goddamned good and well you and your buddies stole that fucking money. I couldn’t give a fuck less. That’s candy money to me. I sent you to find my son and bring him home to me, and you killed him. And you killed his pregnant girlfriend and deprived me of a grandchild. You think I would play kids’ games like knocking out your windows? If you believe that, you really are one dumb son of a bitch.”

I glance over at the security flunky. “Get my friend and me beers and vodkas.” He looks at Saukko. Saukko nods assent.

“Your son called you ‘a human monster,’” I say, “‘the worst sort of pig.’ He hated you. He shot at me and tried to kill me. He would have killed my partner if a bullet hadn’t stopped him. Adrien Moreau, who you hired, killed his mistress. He shot her through the belly to kill the fetus and watched her bleed out. It may be that I bear guilt for those deaths, but you share it.”

The security flunky parks drinks on the table for me and Sweetness, took the liberty of making a fresh gin and tonic for Saukko. Flunky’s white shirt is streaked and speckled with blood from the salt that blew through it. His head is seeping blood. I’m guessing that, as the salt dissolves into his system, he’s going to be really thirsty for a couple days.

My pain is bad from so much activity. I chase painkillers with beer.

“None of this makes any difference,” Saukko says. “You were sent to do a job, you failed, and my boy died. You’ll pay dearly, far more than ten million is worth to you. An eye for an eye. Your child belongs to me now. Her name is Anu, isn’t it? We’ll forget tonight ever happened, because I have dibs on you and want to see you suffer before you die. No one here will have you killed. Finish your business with Sergey and get out.”

Sweetness says, “This is a card game. I want to play cards.” He points at Palo’s dead body. “You’ve got an empty chair.”