“Tony,” I said, leaning closer so he could hear, “Mio and I have to go out for a bit. It shouldn’t take long. We’ll either come back to the club when we’re finished, or I’ll call Karla’s cell and you can come pick us up.”
Tony nodded assent and I headed downstairs. The club was now packed, the music thunderous. About half way along the right balcony, I caught a clear view of Mio. In my normal speaking voice, I said her name. Thirty feet away, her eyes turned instantly to mine. I motioned with my head toward the front. She stopped dancing and beckoned Karla to come closer. Karla leaned down and she and Mio conferred briefly, then Mio turned and moved cat-like through the crowd of dancers.
At the door, I gave Mio her handbag and we left the club. The night had grown dead calm. The Ukrainian was about twenty yards away from us, headed, I guessed, to his car. There was no need to be surreptitious, so we followed, Mio taking my arm as if we were just another couple enjoying the local version of the good life. The guy’s destination turned out to be the same garage where we were parked. He stopped in front of the street-level elevator, pressed the button and waited. Mio and I continued past him and into the stairwell. We paused at the bottom of the stairs, listening for the elevator to start its ascent, then went up following the sound. It stopped at level 4. We heard the doors open, then watched through a small window in the stairwell door as our Ukrainian emerged. I opened the door and followed Mio into the parking area.
Not far from the elevator, the Ukrainian aimed his electronic key at the long row of parked cars. A double beep followed by blinking taillights: a late model BMW about six cars further along marked our destination. Mio slipped silently away, moving fast and low along the front of the parked cars. I was only a few paces back, walking down the center of the driveway.
“Pardon me,” I said, when the Ukrainian reached his car.
He stopped and turned around, but didn’t say anything. He was a big one, six-two or three, probably two-sixty, or so, and lots of muscle. I thought I’d try being polite.
“Sorry to bother you, but I’m wondering if you might be able to help me with something.” I stepped forward while saying this. There was something surprisingly mild-mannered about the guy. His size probably made him scary to most humans, but he didn’t strike me as being volatile. I stepped closer and extended my hand. “My name is Shake.”
He shook my hand, flinching slightly, probably at the temperature of my skin. “I am Levko.”
“It’s a pleasure, Levko.”
I let go of his hand and took a step back, giving him some space to cooperate in. He glanced behind him and saw Mio standing next to his front bumper, her feet shoulder-width apart, hands hanging relaxed at her sides, so motionless she could have been cast in bronze. I noticed that she was not holding her purse, which meant, in all likelihood that she was holding her new knife. Her presence seemed to confuse Levko. His head kept snapping back and forth between Mio and me, as if it were operating independently of his volition.
“You’re probably wondering if a big guy like yourself needs to be concerned about a woman, especially one her size.” My voice compelled his head to stay turned toward me. “That’s the primitive part of your brain trying to take over. You know, fight or flight? You don’t want to listen to it, Levko. You need your higher faculties right now.”
At that point, it was obvious we weren’t there for a friendly chat.
“Am I supposed to be afraid of you and little girl?” he asked. He said this with a certain bravado, but when he glanced back at Mio, he jumped like he’d been goosed. Mio was standing in exactly the same posture, but closer, next to the driver’s door.
“Be smart,” I said, “and this will be easy for all of us.”
People are peculiar creatures. If you tell them what the smart move is, sometimes, not often, but sometimes, they’ll make it, just to prove they really are smart.
“What is this about?” he asked warily. “You are not cops?”
“We are not cops.”
“Then I don’t have to talk to you,” he said, as if that settled the matter.
“You don’t have to, Levko. But it would be better if you did.”
“I want to go home now,” he said, almost as if by saying it, he would be able to follow his own lead. But his feet weren’t cooperating. Instead of moving toward his car door, he stepped around the front of the adjacent car, putting some additional space between himself and Mio. There was something slightly humorous and a little bit endearing in the discrepancy between his words and his actions.
“You’re not going to run home, are you?” I asked.
With Mio no longer directly behind him, he seemed a fraction more relaxed “What do you want?”
“Just some information.” I said.
He was still looking at Mio, standing motionless as stone. “Is she alive?” he asked.
“More alive than you’ll be if you play this wrong.”
Direct threats like that generally increase the human male’s flow of testosterone. I expected him to puff up, show us he wasn’t afraid, and dare us to fuck with him. But that’s not what happened. Instead, he looked me in the eye and I could see that he was frightened and tired and constitutionally disinclined to fight. “So ask your questions,” he said.
“About a year ago, a Sacramento cop named Dean Arnaud was killed shortly after buying cocaine from a mutual acquaintance of ours.”
“We did not kill cop,” he exclaimed. “We are not criminals.”
Something in the way he’d said it made me think he was telling the truth.
