Dead Game (2 page)

Anna’s green Honda
was in the middle of the lot, passenger door wide open, contents of a purse dumped on the seat. Marquez shined the flashlight beam into the wheel well at a soft leather purse turned inside out, lying like a rag in the corner. He went back to his truck and talked to the Sacramento County watch commander again. Far away, out across the delta, he heard the first siren. He read off the license plates and told the watch commander he recognized her car.

“I’m going to take a look out along the water.”

But he swept his flashlight over her car again first. In the backseat was a nightstand, a desk lamp in an IKEA bag, sandals, running shoes, clothes folded and stacked on a seat as though she planned to carry them from the car to a drawer. He knew she was moving back to Sacramento, the company she worked for no longer willing to contribute rent toward a San Francisco apartment.

“Anna!”

He’d called her name when he’d gotten here and called for her every twenty yards as he moved away from her car now. He stepped into the reeds, the flashlight beam fracturing as it shined through them. He walked the path out to the river, checked between driftwood logs, picnic tables, the reeds and brush and swept the light across the dark water of the river. Across the river the lights of Rio Vista shone hazily through fog. Seals barked out on a buoy. She was a strong swimmer, but the man’s voice had been right there. The phone had hit something hard, clattered. The voice had been so close he didn’t see her running away.

A CHP unit, its light bar milky, siren loud, dropped down from the levee road, and Marquez lifted his badge as the officer put a light on him. County units began to arrive. They gathered near her car, and one CHP officer recognized it. He turned to Marquez.

“Dark-haired woman, right? I pulled her over a week ago. She was close to a DUI. How’d you end up working with her?”

“She’s helping us on a sturgeon poaching case.”

He left it at that and organized a search. Through the incident command system, until someone with higher rank and more experience arrived, Marquez was in charge. They covered the reeds and brush, the embankment up to the road and into the field on the other side. A Sacramento County deputy found a crushed cell phone in reeds not far from the picnic table.

Forty minutes later a Sacramento County detective named Brian Selke took over, and a K-9 unit from Contra Costa crossed the Antioch Bridge and dropped into the delta. Marquez related the phone conversation to Selke and gave him what he had for addresses and phone numbers on Anna Burdovsky and Don August. He gave Selke license plates and a description of August’s Porsche.

“Are you going out with an All Points Bulletin?” he asked.

“Not yet.”

Selke was a solid-looking guy, balding, broad nose, thick wrists, shoulders rolled forward. He stood close to Marquez as he asked his questions, then left him when a dog found a wallet in the brush. Selke bagged the wallet, waved Marquez over.

“Let’s look at this together.” He opened the evidence bag so Marquez could see the wallet and asked, “Why was she meeting you tonight?”

“It just worked out that she was coming through the delta. I haven’t seen her in a couple of weeks, so it was really just to touch base.”

“Are you married?”

It took Marquez a moment to register what he was being asked. He nodded and said, “Yeah, I’ve got a wife and stepdaughter. There’s nothing between Anna and me.”

“If she was going to stay in your room tonight, now would be the time to tell me.”

“Nothing like that.”

Selke showed him the contents of the wallet. An REI card, Macy’s, membership in the Wilderness Society, a couple of folded Visa receipts, both from gas stations, three photos, one that was probably her mother, one of a much younger Anna standing in snow with a building behind her and a young boy, a toddler in a coat that came down to his shoes standing next to her. A man was alongside her. The third photo was of a landscape, a lake and green-blue forested mountains climbing behind it. Marquez lingered on that photo a moment.

“You said she speaks Russian and that’s important in this investigation of yours.”

“Some of the people we’re looking at are Russian immigrants.”

“Was this photo taken in Russia?”

“I’ve never seen the photo before, but I know Anna left Russia and came here with her mother when she was a kid.”

Marquez studied the photo again. In it Anna looked nineteen or twenty. If it was Russia she must have gone back when she was older.

“Do you recognize the man?”

“No.”

“What about the boy?”

“No.”

He watched Selke walk back over and talk to the dog handlers. Earlier, when Selke had refused to do anything about August yet, Marquez had called Shauf at the safehouse and she’d driven to San Francisco. A few minutes ago she’d called to say she was down the street from August’s apartment. He’d told Selke that, and Selke had asked for Shauf’s phone number.

Now Selke walked back to where Marquez waited. He picked up the photo again, held it steady, studying the black-haired man with a mustache, wearing a shirt open at the collar, older than Anna in the photo by at least a decade, black leather coat down to his thighs, smiling down at the kid who looked a little like Anna. No other photos but more receipts, and an old W-2 from Adventure USA and another plastic card in Cyrillic that Marquez guessed was a Russian ID of some sort.

“Let’s go talk in my car,” Selke said.

After they got in his car Marquez listened to Selke go back and forth on the radio, and he was still having a hard time understanding Selke not going out with an APB on August’s car, or
getting the warrant application going, getting in touch with the on-call judge in San Francisco. He watched Selke type into a Blackberry, his thumbs thick on the small pad. He couldn’t watch this much longer.

“What business is this Don August in?”

“He owns three specialty-food stores, one in Seattle, one in LA, one in SF, all named August Foods.”

“So what’s he going to tell me when I ask why he was in the delta today?”

“He buys product from small producers, artisanal food products. We’re pretty sure he also buys sturgeon roe that’s been processed to caviar out here and gets that repackaged as Caspian beluga. The eggs are similar in size and color, gray and about like a little glass bead. All his labels have the proper stamp, but we think they’re either forged or bought.”

“What do Customs and U.S. Fish and Wildlife think?”

“Everything appears legit.”

Selke surprised him. “But you’ve checked DNA and it’s not?”

“What we’ve checked is legit, all from the Caspian.”

Selke’s cell rang. The radio crackled at the same time. He answered the radio call, which was to tell him a vehicle stop was in progress—two white males in a black Lincoln sedan just north of Patterson, about fifty miles from here. They waited, talking about August until more information came in. The officer who’d made the stop had run the driver’s license and then called for backup. The individual was wanted on a felony drug charge. Marquez listened to the names spit out of the radio and shook his head. He didn’t know them. Then his cell rang.

“August is home,” Shauf said. “The lights just came on; I can see him through the window. There’s a woman with him. Where are you?”

“Still at the fishing access but about to leave here.” He saw Selke react to that. “Hang on a minute.”

He turned to Selke. “August is home.”

Selke was quiet, looking through the windshield, watching the dog getting loaded back into the K-9 car. Half the officers standing around were gossiping. There was nothing left to do here.

“All right, Lieutenant, we’ll go knock on his door.”

Shauf slumped back
against the driver’s door, blond curls flattened from the headrest, a Diet Coke resting on her left thigh. Selke and a San Francisco homicide inspector were up on August’s porch. Two SFPD patrol units were on the street, their light bars reflecting off the white-painted stairs. Getting to the on-call judge and getting a warrant had delayed Selke’s arrival, and lights were no longer on in the front rooms of the apartment. Through binoculars Marquez watched Selke hit the bell a second time.

“Selke called me on his way here,” Shauf said. She took a sip of Coke. “He wanted to know if you and Anna have something going on.”

“He’s got to ask.”

“Not the way he does it.”

The front door opened, and August moved onto the threshold, silhouetted by the light from behind him. Selke badged him,
showed him the warrant, and August handed it back to him. He stroked his goatee and smiled.

“Why does he remind me of the devil?” Shauf asked as August stepped aside and ushered the detectives in. “The woman he came home with is also in there. She looks like a kid, but he had his arm around her when they went up the stairs, and I think I’ve seen her in his store here. I’m pretty sure she works there. She’s got a little ruby stud in her nose.” After a pause, Shauf added, “The guy is a scuzzball.”

The door closed and Marquez laid the binoculars down. The street was mostly commercial buildings, shops, boutiques, a Tully’s Coffee at the corner. Two blocks down the street was August Foods, the neon script with the store name not unlike the neon over his wife’s two coffee bars, Presto on Union and Presto on Spear, a third about to open down near the wharf.

“Did you talk to Chief Bell?” Shauf asked.

“Yeah, after the BOLO went out.”

“How’d he take it?”

Bell had immediately assumed it was their fault, that the
be on the lookout for
going out meant the SOU had somehow screwed up. But Marquez didn’t volunteer that yet. It was the kind of information Shauf was fishing for, and he didn’t want to get into that with her tonight.

“He wants me in his office tomorrow morning.”

“He’s going to say the operation is blown.”

He’d all but said it tonight.

The front door opened and they watched Selke come back outside alone. He held his cell phone under the porch light to punch in numbers. Seconds later Marquez’s phone rang.

“Does Anna Burdovsky have a cat?” Selke asked.

“She does.”

“Could you describe it?”

Marquez pictured the cat. He’d been to her apartment here in San Francisco after she’d called CalTIP saying she might have information on sturgeon poachers. But that was about four months ago.

“It’s black and white, a male, it looks a little like a Holstein cow. The name is Jim or Pete, something like that.”

“Bob.”

“That’s right, it’s Bob. What does the cat have to do with anything?”

Selke turned to face the street. He seemed to like delivering the bombshell.

“Mr. August says Burdovsky and her cat have stayed here for the last week. He told her she could stay with him a week or two and showed us the room she’s been staying in. The cat is part of the deal and I don’t know what else is, though August’s friend here is sure she knows and she wants to leave, but we’re holding her because we want to get a statement, otherwise you’d see her stomp down the stairs. Have you ever been up here?”

“No.”

“Do you know, he’s got four bedrooms? How much money is this guy making? This place has to be worth a couple million bucks minimum. It looks like a magazine and I can see why Burdovsky would want to stay here. There are clothes and items he says belong to her and we’re welcome to take. He also admits talking to her today but it was closer to noon and they argued because he told her he wanted her stuff and the cat out today. He told me the cat’s next home is the Humane Society if she doesn’t show up by tomorrow. Is any of this making sense to you?”

Marquez didn’t have to answer that.

“Well then, try on this idea, Burdovsky isn’t who you thought she was. Mr. August is very cooperative. Anything we want we can have. Even the sheets off the bed or his phone records, whatever we want. Hell, he’d give us the cat if we had a carrier. He’s also coming in tonight to sit in an interview box.”

“Where?”

“The Richmond Station.” Selke waited a beat then continued. “The young lady he’s with works at his store here in the city and told us August was in the store from 10:00 this morning forward. I don’t think she’s lying, particularly since she can’t wait to get out of here. Either way it’s easy to check. She says they left the store together and went to a bar at around 5:30.”

Selke walked over to the edge of the porch and looked down the street, perhaps trying to locate them.

“I also called the number you gave me for the apartment Burdovsky is moving out of and got the ex-roommate who just got back from Chile two weeks ago. She’s not a big fan of Burdovsky. She told me she got back from Chile and found the cat in her bedroom with a litter box and food. Apparently, whenever Burdovsky was gone for a day or two she put the cat there. The room smelled like a litter box and the rent hadn’t been paid in two months. She claims Burdovsky lied about paying it, was supposed to have sent the check and didn’t do it because she didn’t have her half. There was an eviction letter on the kitchen table, and Burdovsky had some story about her employer owing for the rent. She’s thinking of taking Burdovsky to small claims court, so she’s right there with you, she wants her found.”

“We’ll see you at the Richmond Station,” Marquez said.

“Sure, you’re welcome to listen in.”

At the Richmond Police Station they watched Selke and the
SFPD homicide inspector go into an interview box where August was already waiting. Coffee sat untouched in front of August, and he’d changed clothes. He wore a dark green cashmere sweater, gray slacks, polished loafers.

“My ex-wife loves your store,” Selke said. “She always ran up a big bill. I ought to lock you up just for that.” The SF inspector laughed. August smiled. Selke smiled back at him.

“We appreciate you coming in.”

“Frankly, detective, I think you know I only came down here because I lied to you earlier. You asked if I was sleeping with her, and I couldn’t tell you with Dara there.”

“So you were sleeping with Ms. Burdovsky?”

“Yes, but I told her yesterday I wasn’t interested in continuing the relationship. She got hysterical and told me she was falling in love with me, so maybe you ought to dredge the river. Maybe she got lovesick and threw herself in.”

Selke walked August through the past few days, where he’d been, whom he’d talked to, who else knew anything about his relationship with Anna. The interview ended at 12:17. Shauf left to drive back to Sacramento, and Marquez stayed to talk with Selke and the SFPD inspector.

“It’s going to turn out that she was staying there,” Selke said. “We’ve got a downstairs neighbor that recognizes her and has seen her come and go with August. We showed the neighbor photos, and she said they had their hands all over each other. You’ve got to face the very strong possibility Burdovsky burned you.” Selke looked at the SFPD inspector, then back at Marquez. “We have to ask you something.”

“Go ahead.”

“How is it she’s staying with your suspect and you don’t know about it?”

It was a fair question and not easy for Marquez to answer. Watching August interviewed he’d realized Anna most likely had burned them.

“My team is down to three wardens, and we’ve had our hands full in the delta.”

Selke nodded. Sure, that explained it. The SFPD inspector nodded in understanding, but the answer didn’t cut it for either of them. It stank of incompetence. Selke studied his face, looking for a further answer there, then backed off.

“What is it about sturgeon?” Selke asked, smiling again. “Isn’t that what Scott Peterson said he was doing that night, going sturgeon fishing Christmas Eve?”

Selke and the SF inspector had a laugh over that. Marquez left them there, the two of them still joking about Peterson and sturgeon fishing as he walked down the corridor and out the door.