there.
At the corner of Espanola and Washington Avenue, a small crowd milled through a dozen stands at an outdoor farmer’s market. The blonde lingered in front of a wooden box of yellow and orange mangoes. I came up beside her, reached into the bin, and pulled one up, bringing it under my nose. A rich and lusty fragrance, the skin yielding to the touch. “Nearly ripe,” I said.
She turned and peered at me over the top of her sunglasses. From her expression, she might have been looking at a two-hundred-twenty-six-pound cockroach.
“Better than peaches, if you ask me,” I said.
“I didn’t,” she replied, turned, and walked on.
She passed up the avocados, lychee nuts, and carambolas, and so did I. She crossed Washington, heading toward Collins and the ocean, then turned abruptly into a cramped alley behind a Thai restaurant. I thought for a moment I might lose her, so I broke into a jog and turned the corner, the fragrance of ginger sauces heavy in the air. Then I stopped dead, not six inches from her. She stood near a Dumpster, facing me, hands on hips, scowling.
She said something in a language that sounded like loud snoring. It had a lot of k’s and t’s and, whatever the tongue, probably was the equivalent of, “What kind of asshole are you?”
I didn’t respond. I just looked at her. Pretty. Pouty lips. Blond hair spilling out of the white hat. She looked familiar, but behind the sunglasses, I couldn’t place…
“ Kusipaa! ” she yelled at me. “ Idiootti! ”
She took a half-step toward me and snap-kicked a knee into my groin. The pain was a spear straight through the spine. I doubled over, and she let fly a fist that came from her hip in a half-circular movement, the mawashi-zuki in karate. This time I saw it coming and pivoted the other way, twisting my bad knee. The punch glanced off my temple but I was off balance, and a second later, I was flat on my back in a puddle of foul-smelling water coming from the Dumpster. I looked up at her with my best choirboy demeanor. “Okay, so you don’t like mangoes.”
“You son of a bitch!” she yowled, with a tiny lilt of a singsong accent. She moved back a step and peppered me with three or four kicks in the ribs. The ribs might have hurt if my crotch hadn’t claimed an exclusive on agony. I got to my knees, reached out and grabbed a slim ankle that was attached to a foot that was trying to kick my brains through my ear. I yanked hard and down she came, right on her nicely tailored rump. The hat spun off her head and the sunglasses slid down her nose.
“ Alypaa! ”
“Ali-Baba,” I said.
I kept hold of the ankle and yanked again, as she tried kicking me with the other foot. I dragged her toward me and gave the ankle a twist until she yelled. Then I hopped on top, straddling her, pinning her arms to the cool stones and sitting on her rib cage. Her pale hair was swirled across her mouth, and she looked at me with very blue, very angry eyes.
“Get off me, you big slug!”
“I believe the expression is big lug.”
“ Paskianen! You weigh a ton.”
“And you kick like a mule.”
I heard a door bang open and looked up to see an Asian man in a kitchen smock staring at us from the rear of the restaurant. “It’s okay,” I said. “We’re married.”
“I would rather be dead,” she spat, and the man ducked back inside.
She was breathing hard, so I eased a little weight off her. As I did, she tried to buck me off. I kept both hands around her wrists, and pushed her back down. She struggled again, and I dug my right thumb into the ulnar nerve of her left forearm. Wincing, she fell back.
She shook her head, tossing a long strand of hair out of her face. Then I saw it, a gold pendant on a necklace. A rabbit holding a red egg flecked with tiny diamonds. I looked up from the necklace to her full lips, and it was slowly coming back to me. A blonde in a white bathing suit. “Jillian from Minnesota! What are you doing here?”
“It’s Eva-Lisa from Helsinki. I’m a Suopo agent.”
“Sue-poh?”
“The Finnish Intelligence Agency, you moron.”
“I don’t believe this. I thought you were a sunburned tourist who wanted a windsurfing lesson.”
“A lesson! From you? Toope! I won the Scandinavian freestyle championship three years in a row. Tell me, what makes men so vain and stupid?”
Practice, I thought.
I stared into her arctic blue eyes trying to figure it out. A windsurfing lass from Finland frolics in the water off Miami Beach, pretending she needs a lesson. Now, she’s playing games with a Russian who most likely held a potato in front of the gun that shot Francisco Crespo. Small world, isn’t it?
“Jillian… Eva-Lisa, whoever you are, what are you doing here?” I asked, and not for the first time.
“I told you, I’m on assignment. I am working. What are you doing here?”
I didn’t answer her. I couldn’t. I didn’t have a clue.
17
You work for Yagamata,” I said, dusting myself off, my voice I an octave higher than an hour earlier.
We had untangled, said mutual apologies, and were walking toward Ocean Drive. She shook her head. “For the Finnish government under contract to Yagamata, who in turn works for your government.”
No wonder I couldn’t tell the players without a scorecard. “What are you, some kind of spy?”
That made her laugh. “I am little more than a clerk.”
“What were you doing with Kharchenko?”
“Making him a delivery boy for Yagamata.”
“I don’t get it.”
She looked at me from under the white hat and dark glasses. Though I couldn’t see her eyes, I thought they were appraising me. “I am not sure I can trust you.”
“Funny, I was thinking the same thing about you, or if I wasn’t, I should have been. The way I figure it, you’re part of a conspiracy to steal Russian art.”
“Nothing is as simple as it seems,” she said, and I wondered if Charlie could put that in Latin for me.
“Tell me about it. Tell me why an old friend of mine got killed and why I’m getting set up.”
“Give me some time,” she said. “Maybe we are on the same side.” We stopped in front of the News Cafe on Ocean Drive, and she motioned me toward a silver Saab parked at the curb. I let her unlock my door, and I settled into the seat, buckling the shoulder harness.
Eva-Lisa got behind the wheel, turned the key in the ignition, and asked, “Do you know what tonight is?”
“Sunday,” I said, “June twenty.”
“ Seuraasaari. Midsommareldarna. Midsummer’s Eve, a national holiday in my country. It is the way we welcome the longest day of the year. In Helsinki tonight it will be cool and clear, and it will not grow dark. The sun will seem to set, but it will hover at the horizon, casting a most beautiful glow. Then it will slowly rise again.”
Of course, Finland, land of the midnight sun.
She swung the car into traffic, heading south past all the trendy sidewalk cafes. “You probably know of the Finnish community in Lake Worth.” When I nodded, she continued. “My father has a house there. It is reminiscent of our home in Tapiola. Very Finnish, made of stone and wood, an authentic sauna on the edge of the lake. We Finns try to keep up our traditions. My family is in Spain on holiday, and I was going to spend the night alone. If you would like, you may be my guest at the festivities tonight. It is really rather simple. Just a bonfire, some folk songs, and dancing, but we can talk there about Yagamata and Kharchenko if you wish.”
It sounded better than being chased by Robert Foley, so I said fine, and we turned onto Fifth Street, which
