“All you’ve told me is that some man is killing women, and that a mysterious link ties the two of us together. That does give me a fair basis for helping you.”
“The man we’re looking for hates women. He judges them. He would be uncomfortable with promiscuity, most likely with women generally. He may also think of himself as religious. He is fascinated with something called the Book of Enoch. You might have seen him reading religious text, or quoting spiritual verse. He may do this either because he truly believes it or is a cynic who uses religion to justify the things that he does. We also know that he has an acumen for computers. He uses public Internet connections so he is not traceable. And – this is right up your alley – he used a stolen credit card to create an account with the company I mentioned, FirstDate. Does any of this remind you of anyone?”
Grosha was staring at her with an amused expression.
“I can keep your name out of it. We just need a lead. He’s murdering innocent women.” She placed pictures of Caroline Hunter, Amy Davis, and Megan Quinn on the table in front of him.
“The only thing that sounded vaguely familiar from anything you mentioned was the use of another person’s credit card. That, as you know, is something I am familiar with. But the people I run with? We are what you might call believers in the capitalist system. We break rules to make our way, to make money. These three women, you said they were innocent. They did not buy drugs or steal or con?”
“No.”
“In that case, the men I know? If they saw these women, they might try to fuck them, but hurting them – what would be the point of that, you know? And religion” – he waved a hand dismissively – “I do not know anyone who gives a fuck about that.”
“How about Vitali Rostov? Do you know anyone by that name? Or he might go by Vitya Rostov.”
His eyes were calm, but she noticed a slight left-leaning head tilt. “Vitya is what you’d call a nickname for Vitali,” he explained. “But no, I do not know a man by that name. He is the man you think is hurting these women?”
“No, probably not. Just a name that’s come up. You’re curious for someone who doesn’t even know him.”
“You have me intrigued. A serial killer. Like Hannibal Lecter, no?”
“Without the cannibalism or the bad face mask.”
Grosha laughed, caught off guard by the humor. “Like I said, I do not know anyone like the man you described, nor do I know any Vitya – what name did you say?”
“Rostov. Vitali or Vitya Rostov,” Ellie clarified.
Grosha shook his head slowly. “I’m sorry. I cannot help you. But it has been nice to meet you, Ellie Hatcher. You are the kind of visitor that a man in prison does not mind seeing, even under these circumstances.”
“Well, since you don’t mind the company, and since you asked a question out of mere curiosity, maybe you won’t mind if I do the same.” He gave her a slight nod of consent. “When did you get the ink?” She glanced at the green bars of the swastika on his forearm.
“Three months after the United States government put me here.”
“Looks like pretty decent work for a prison tat. Your jacket didn’t say anything about having white ethnic pride.” She used the white supremacists’ preferred euphemism for racism.
Grosha double-checked the empty area around them before speaking. “I don’t give a fuck what color people are. Even the men you Americans call white look brown compared to me. But inside this place, you cannot be alone. I learned that quickly. The brothers, they do not want to take care of a man who looks like me. This?” He pulled his sleeve to cover the ink. “This was the easy way. I have it removed later. Big deal.”
“You do what you have to in order to survive.”
“Exactly.”
“Not unlike the way you refused to tell the U.S. Attorney’s Office who you were feeding the credit card numbers to after you got them from the motel clerk. That was about survival too?”
“Like I said, the tattoo was easy. You know that I cannot say any more than I have. But I promise you this. I am telling the truth when I say I do not know any man like the one you are looking for. If I did, you would not need to give me – what did you call it – substantial consideration. I would help you, or I would kill the man myself. Men like that in Russia, they do not get away with hurting women, not like in this country.”
On the way out of the prison, Ellie stopped to see the young, shorthaired guard at the entrance.
“Did you get what you needed from your Russian?” he asked.
“Unfortunately, I didn’t, but I was wondering if maybe you could help me with something. In order to see anyone in here, you’ve got to have your name on the inmate’s visiting list, right?”
“Yep. It’s got to all be done in advance. No such thing as a pop-in at a corrections facility.”
“Can I get a list of Lev Grosha’s visitors?”
“No problem.” He hit a few keys. “It’s a short one.” The printer churned out only five names, including hers. The other four were Russian, two females and two males. One of the women, probably his mother, shared the Grosha surname. The two men were named Ivan Ovinko and Mark Jakov. Neither name was familiar to Ellie, and neither Zoya nor Vitali Rostov was on the list.
STUCK IN STOP-and-start traffic for over forty minutes on the Gowanus Expressway, Ellie felt too antsy to return to Murray Hill for a quiet night alone in her apartment. She was close to a breakthrough, she could tell, but she couldn’t piece the tangents of her wandering mind into a coherent thought. Tatiana’s sister knew something. Ellie had seen the unspoken concern on Zoya’s face, and knew that it had something to do with her husband. The woman also seemed a little too interested in Ed Becker, betraying more than just idle curiosity when she asked if he’d known about Tatiana’s cooperation with the FBI. And all those connections that Flann had pointed out between Becker and their case – how did they fit in? And how did they relate to FirstDate and all of the women who’d been killed?
She dialed Flann’s number on her cell. “Hey there, it’s me.”
“You’re all done seeing the sister?”
“I talked to her, and I also went to see Lev Grosha at MDC. I think there’s something more to what Zoya knows. She might not know how it fits into her sister’s death, but I said something to her that – I don’t know, confused her or something.”
“No idea what it was?”
“She’s hard to read. She said she didn’t recognize Grosha, but it’s possible she’s lying. She remembered seeing Tatiana with Dixon, but I don’t see why that would be so upsetting. The one thing I did find curious was that she asked if Becker knew Tatiana was an informant. At first I thought she was upset because Becker should have told her, or should have connected it to her murder. But I don’t know, she still seemed troubled even when I told her we didn’t know until today. Then Vitya came home, and she basically made me leave on the spot. I’m wondering if maybe Vitya’s involved in whatever criminal activity Tatiana was pointing the FBI to. She gave up a couple of people, but not her own brother-in-law.”
“And what did Lev Grosha say?”
“That he’d never heard of Vitali or Vitya Rostov. But, again, I think he was probably lying. He did this weird head tilt.”
“Ellie Hatcher, human lie detector.”
“Did you find anything more about Becker’s old cases?”
“Charlie Dixon was right. Becker and Tendall carried a pretty high clearance rate, and Becker’s remained above average even after Tendall died.”
“So if he was slacking on Tatiana’s case, it’s not because he’d lost it altogether, like he told us.”
“Exactly. But, again, as with everything, we still don’t know how it ties into our case. My spidey senses are going off though. That note in Hunter’s binder is about Ed Becker.”