Undercover Lover (4 page)

Chapter Six

R
alphie Brooks tore off the fake beard as soon as he was in the elevator heading down. He was halfway to the van when he heard the sirens. Pam hadn’t wanted him to go, but she’d seemed to buy that he didn’t want to answer questions from the cops, in case they ousted him for living in the janitor’s closet.

“Did you get it?” Drake asked, climbing into the back of the van.

The police techs, Frank and Joe, gave him a thumbs up from the control panels. Drake looked at the monitors. They were playing back the gangster that had taken the bag of drugs.

“Who is he?” Drake asked as he started shucking off the janitor’s uniform.

Joe piped a vaudeville stripper song over the speakers.

“Nice,” Drake said, removing the wire and microphone he was wearing.

“Not sure, yet. He’s definitely
vor,
what with all those friggin’ tattoos,” Frank said.

“Each one tells a story,” Drake said, jumping into a pair of jeans and shrugging on a sweater. “We can read him like a book later. Those are prison tats. He’s in the system somewhere. Find him for me.”

“You got glue all over your face,” Joe said helpfully when Drake sat down to pull on a pair of sneakers.

“Looks like I can stop being a bum.” Drake grinned. “Too bad. I’m going to miss good old Ralphie.”

“Looked like the doc liked him too,” Frank said. “She’s a firecracker.”

“Too hot for you,” Drake said, picking at the residual glue and hair from his cheeks and chin.

“You’re not going up there, are you?” Joe said.

“Why?”

“She’s going to know you’re Ralphie. Your hair is a dead giveaway,” Frank told him.

“I didn’t bring any gel with me,” Drake said, running a self-conscious hand down his riotous blond curls.

“She’s going to kick you, again, when she finds out you’ve been tricking her.”

“I was just doing my job. Besides, it’s not like we ever suspected her for selling drugs.”

“Women don’t like to be lied to,” Joe said, shaking his head.

“Who cares, anyway? It doesn’t matter anymore. We got the guy supplying the
vor
with the hospital’s drugs. My case is closed, brother,” Drake said.

“Not according to the captain,” Joe said. “He likes you as a bum. It looks like there’s some gang activity going on lately involving torturing street people. We’re back on the streets tomorrow night, same as tonight.”

“Are you kidding me?”

“If you checked your voice mail more than once a week, you would have gotten the message.”

“Where am I supposed to put my Blackberry? I’m supposed to be homeless.”

“The only homeless guy that gets Reiki massages.”

“She never touched anything but my knee,” Drake protested, pulling his phone out of his jeans pocket.

“Did it work?”

“It didn’t hurt.” Drake was astounded that after the treatment, he had felt more relaxed, although that could be from taking a mini nap in a dark room while a beautiful woman soothed him. Beautiful? Drake guessed she was, but the thought had snuck up on him. She wasn’t his normal type. He liked his woman a little on the trashy side, like the song goes.

The funny thing was, he still couldn’t picture her from the old neighborhood. They were about the same age. They knew some of the same people. He should have remembered her. She had probably been a cheerleader or a brainiac. Had she worn her hair long in high school, like she did now? It was a silky black that made him think of it splashed across his pillow. She had a mouth on her too, and she pushed back when confronted. So what if she wasn’t trashy. Who cared? Maybe after all this was over, they’d go grab a pizza.

There were three text messages from his partner, Mark O’Reilly, telling him to call in with various tones and levels of urgency. And one voice mail. The voice mail was from Captain Francis.

“Logan, we’ve got trouble. Two homeless guys have been torched in two days. Both deep in gang territories. Our sources say it’s a new initiation. I need you out on the street ASAFP.”

“Great,” Drake groaned.

“Go home and get some rest,” Frank said. “We’ve got it from here.”

Drake grumbled and called his partner.

“Drake, man, where have you been?” Mark said.

“Undercover. You know that. We got the bastard.”

“Uh, that’s good,” Mark said, sounding distracted.

“So what the hell’s so damn important you had to text me three times instead of leaving a message like a normal person?”

Mark blew out a long sigh, and Drake didn’t have to be a detective to know the news wasn’t good.

“It’s your godfather, Nikolai,” Mark finally said. “He’s been murdered.”

Drake had slicked his blond curls back into a tight ponytail that he’d tucked into his shirt. He stood at parade rest over the casket of his godfather and clenched his hands behind his back so he wouldn’t go for Oksana Bobrov’s throat. She was dressed in a leopard fur coat that made her look like a color blind Cruella DeVille. Her hair was painstakingly set high on her head, and all the rings and bracelets she wore flashed into the priest’s eyes when she dabbed crocodile tears off her heavily made-up face.

Standing next to her was her son, Stefan, and Pam. Her face looked red and blotchy. She wasn’t a pretty crier like Oksana was. And it burned him that she clung to that moron Stefan’s hand like a life line. Surely, she had to suspect that his mother had ordered the hit on Nikolai. Drake had pulled on the mirrored sunglasses as soon as he saw her. He didn’t need her to recognize Ralphie, who had quit the hospital the day after Dr. Chris Mastandrea’s arrest.

Andrej’s sobs brought him back to the reason they were there. Andrej was built like a bear, even resembled one with all the hair. But he was a marshmallow inside, always had been. His father had tried to toughen him up by making him take boxing lessons, but Andrej would skip out to feed an alley cat. He was a veterinarian now. Doing as well as he could.

“Papa,” Andrej cried. “I’m so sorry. I should have been there.”

Drake put a bracing arm on him. “It’s not your fault.”

“I told him to move out of that house. It’s no good.”

“The house wasn’t the issue. It was the junkies looking to score and Nikolai not backing down.”

“He never backed down from anything in his life. He certainly wouldn’t have let punks come into his home and steal from him.”

“That’s true,” Drake said.

“Would you have gone on your knees and let them rob you?”

“No, I would have shot them. Why didn’t your father?”

“What are you saying, Drago?”

Drake pinched the bridge of his nose to stave off the stabbing pain that felt like his brain was leaking out of his head. “I don’t know what I’m saying. They let me look at the crime scene and the evidence as a courtesy. I’m not officially on the case.”

Andrej stuttered, and Drake interrupted him.

“I said not officially. I’ll find who did this.”

“Why his home? Why not take the bar? There’s more money.”

“He was isolated at home.”

“I should have been there.”

“You might have died too.” Drake gripped his arm. “Was your dad into anything stupid?”

“You ask me this now, at his funeral?” Andrej turned tear-filled eyes at him.

Drake shook his head. “Forget it. I’m just pissed, and I hate standing here when he’s in the ground.”

Andrej clasped him in a hug that nearly cracked his ribs. “He loved you like a son. He wanted me to be tough like you.”

“He loved you just the way you are,” Drake said.

“You find his murderers and leave the rest to me. I’m going to kill them.”

“No, you’re not, Andrej. You’re not a killer.”

“Or maybe I get someone to do it for me.”

“Don’t go down that road. Let me handle this. Let me do this for you and for him.” Drake gestured to the coffin.

Andrej gave a tight nod and let Drake steady him when it was time to leave the gravesite. Drake should have expected it, because Oksana had brass balls the size of meteors, but he was still taken aback when her entourage approached them.

“Andrejechka.” She put her red-painted claws on his face and kissed him. “How we will miss your father. He was the light of the neighborhood.”

“Thank you, Babushka Oksana.”

Despite the circumstances, Drake’s lips twitched at her reaction. Oksana didn’t see herself as a grandmotherly figure. But she let go of Andrej’s face before she scarred him with her nails and turned to Drake.

“And you, Drago? What are you going to do about this?”

“We will catch the killer and bring him—or her—–to justice.”

Oksana snorted. “Thieves killing respectable businessmen. It’s an outrage.”

“I’m shocked it happened on your watch,” Drake said.

She was too shrewd to take the bait. Instead, she gestured and asked, “You remember my son, Stefan?”

Stefan was literally the golden boy. Slavic blond and ice blue eyes, he didn’t have to work for much in his life, even without his mother’s money and influence. He’d tried his hand at the Olympics, but didn’t make the final cut. Drake recalled that he worked at a gym somewhere in New York.

Stefan shook both Andrej’s and Drake’s hands. “I’m so sorry for your loss. I didn’t know Nikolai well, but I’ve been to the bar a few times.”

“Who is your friend?” Andrej said, looking at Pam.

“Doctor Pam Krupin, this is Andrej Bobrov, Nikolai’s son, and Detective Sergeant Drake Logan. He was Nikolai’s godson.”

“I’m so very sorry, Andrej,” she said, “Your father was one of my patients. He was a wonderful man. I will miss him. He would brag that you were the best animal doctor in the world.”

Andrej blinked back tears and pulled Pam in for a gruff hug before kissing her loudly on both cheeks. He set her back down when she cleared her throat.

“I don’t know if you remember me?” Pam said to Drake. “We met at Tea Time?” She held out her hand, but let it drop when Drake just stared at her. “Nikolai spoke very highly of you too. He was proud you were a detective.”

Drake realized he was clenching his jaw and forced himself to ease up before he ground his teeth into powder. He couldn’t manage a thank you without his voice cracking, so he nodded instead.

“Thank you,” Andrej said. “You must come back to the bar with us.”

Pam shook her head, even as Oksana and Stefan nodded.

“What else did Nikolai say to you?” Oksana asked sweetly.

Pam glared at her and gently extracted herself from Andrej’s grip. “I need to get back to the hospital.”

“I insist,” Drake said to her, bringing her attention back to him. “I want to talk to you about what happened at Harding General a few nights ago. If that’s agreeable with you, Miss Krupin?”

“That doesn’t matter now,” she said, turning to Oksana and her son to explain. “It was an unfortunate situation involving a coworker of mine and some poor choices.”

“Do you think that’s related to my father’s murder?” Andrej said.

Drake looked over at Oksana, who was trying not to appear too obvious about listening to the conversation. “Maybe.”

Pam gaped at him. “I don’t see how. But I gave my statement to the investigating officer that night. I would be glad to go over it with you, but right now, I need to get back to work.”

“You’re on call. Jane said she’d page you if anyone needed you,” Stefan said.

“Please,” Andrej said, his voice shaking. “Drink for my papa.”

Pam looked at all of them, and it was obvious she was out of excuses. “Of course,” she said reluctantly and threaded her arm through Stefan’s again.

Oksana’s face looked like she was sucking on a lemon.
That was interesting.

Drake handed off Andrej to Marishka and followed the trio back to their cars. “So, where do you two know each other from?” Drake said.

“We were high school sweethearts,” Stefan said, giving Pam an adoring look.

“I don’t remember you from high school, Miss Krupin.”

“Why don’t you call me Pam, Officer?”

“Detective.”

“Really?” She raised her eyebrows at him. “I would think a detective would remember that I was introduced to him as
Doctor
Krupin.”

Drake grinned. She really didn’t take any guff from anyone. “Pam, I would have remembered you.”

She shook her head. “I doubt that. I wasn’t in high school for long. My parents moved around a lot.”

Drake saw the sneer on Oksana’s face again. It warranted investigation, but he didn’t think there was any love lost between the two of them.

“I cannot stand out in the wind anymore. It’s wrecking my hair. Stefan, get in the car,” Oksana said, and Stefan jumped like a frog to open the door for her.

“Do you know the way to Nikolai’s?” Stefan asked Pam.

She nodded. “I’ll see you there.”

Drake and Pam watched Stefan pull the big Mercedes out of the parking lot and speed away.

“You’re not thinking of ditching us, are you?” Drake said.

“It crossed my mind. Wakes aren’t my thing.”

“They’re not anyone’s thing.”

“True,” Pam said and rubbed her eyes. “I haven’t been sleeping well.”

“Have you had any other stalkers since the incident?”