As he turned the car off Thirty-third Street, Aparo’s phone rang with the Dragnet theme tune. He made me proud so often. He took the call, said, “Aparo,” listened for a long moment, grunted a couple of “uh-huhs,” then ended the call with a laconic “Got it.”
“Three dead at the docks,” he informed me. “Two Russians. One Korean. The no-necks are covered with ink and the Korean kid had no ID. They’re running all the prints. They also found enough shell casings to suggest a major firefight-10mm, probably from an MP-5; point 338s, that’s a specialist sniper caliber; and some custom nine mils.”
“Jesus. Sounds like Jonny and his friend took on Ivan the Terrible and his goons.” Which was impressive, if foolhardy. “Anything else?”
“An Escalade. Grounded. Its front tire was hit.”
Just to rub it in. He’d faked us using an identical SUV.
I said, “We need to find out how Ivan got away.”
“Maybe the dead sniper had a car?”
“Possibly. They sending the tats to Joukowsky?”
“Yep.”
We parked across the street from the Green Dragon, but made no move to exit the vehicle.
Aparo looked at me. He knew how I got when something was nagging at me.
“Spit it out. I’m hungry.”
“It’s the van. I know it’s stupid, but… none of it makes sense. Sokolov hides it from his wife. Then he takes it to the docks. We’re missing something.” I shook the thought away. “Any sign of it?”
“Kanigher’s pulling up any CCTV and traffic-cam footage he can find around the area. Maybe we’ll pick up a trail.”
It would have to wait. “Okay. Let’s get you some kimchi before you pass out.”
We got out, walked past the ubiquitous bunch of smokers huddled outside the restaurant, and went in.
The place was surprisingly huge. It consisted of one long, high-ceilinged room, dimly lit and elaborately decorated. It felt old and authentic, without the merest soupçon of fusion. Even this late, it was packed with wall-to-wall diners crammed around small tables and an army of waiters and waitresses navigating the narrow aisles between them while ferrying massive platters of food. The clientele was overwhelmingly Asian, young and old, and they all seemed like they were having a good time.
We’d barely been standing there for a few seconds when a young Korean woman wearing a silk dress with a green dragon print on it spread her arms with a welcoming smile.
I smiled back while Aparo and I flashed her our creds.
Her expression soured. “We’ve already had our inspection,” she said, moving me discreetly to one side. “We have a Grade B. Only seventeen points.”
Aparo grinned. “Sweetheart, right now, I’d eat here even if they’d given you a D minus.”
I asked, “You must be Ae-Cha?”
She looked surprised, then nodded cautiously.
“We’d like to talk to Jonny.”
Her expression didn’t alter to acknowledge the name. “Jonny isn’t here. Try him at home.”
Aparo nodded. “We will.”
I gestured deeper into the restaurant, toward the kitchen. “But while we’re here, we’d also like to have a chat with your mother. She in there?”
Ae-Cha fluttered her eyelashes at Aparo. “You look hungry, yes? What would you like? Some Kal-bi? We have a Son-sol-lo. Today’s is with pork and grass carp. The fish is flown in all the way from Seoul.”
Aparo was clearly having some trouble keeping his mind on the investigation, so I stepped in. “We won’t take up much of her time.” I maneuvered around her and headed in.
Aparo smiled at Ae-Cha, shrugged, then continued after me.
The hostess called up after us, “Okay, okay, wait up.”
She led us through the swinging doors and into the kitchen, which was as busy as an iPhone factory the week before a launch. We cut through to the left, where a door led to a dark stairwell.
“Third floor,” she said.
We headed up.
Aparo called it first. “Jonny’s here,” he mumbled. “And definitely not all the way up there.”
I said, “Not a bad poker face though.”
Aparo chortled. “As long as she doesn’t say anything.”
Her face may not have changed, but her voice had lost all its color when she lied. Jonny was in, and he was probably already aware that we were on our way up. A quick call from Ae-Cha would have seen to that.
We hit the first floor with Aparo already out of breath and went for the apartment door off its landing in deliberate contradiction to what we’d just been told. We crept up to it and drew our sidearms, neither of us willing to take a risk with a trigger-happy gangster who’d been in a gun battle only a couple of hours earlier. Regardless of which side he was supposedly playing for.
Aparo checked my readiness, then he knocked.
After a beat, the door opened, revealing a sprightly fifty-year-old Korean woman. She was dressed in a plain navy-blue tunic and cream-colored slacks. Her hair was cropped short. Her face gave the dual impressions both of having seen too much and of having the innate strength to deal with even more.
“Mrs. Yaung. I’m Special Agent Sean Reilly. This is Special Agent Nick Aparo. We’d like to talk to your nephew Jonny.”
“He’s gone to bed. He work very hard today.” Then, almost on autopilot, she added, “He’s a very good boy. Never any trouble.”
Aparo cut in, “Please wake him up.”
Mrs. Yaung peered down at our drawn weapons with a high school principal’s look, then padded down a short hallway and said something in Korean through the door at the end.
We all heard the studied groan from behind it. Aparo caught my eye and we re-holstered our sidearms.
As we waited for Jonny to emerge, we took a quick look around the apartment, which was all but bare except for a top-of-the-range 3D plasma TV and a large statue of the Buddha.
Eventually a tall, slim, black-haired young man appeared. He was dressed in gray track pants and a white T-shirt and his hair looked unkempt. Even if he hadn’t been sleeping, he had certainly put the effort into appearing as if he had been. He said something lightning-fast to his aunt-who immediately disappeared-then casually ran a hand through his hair and slumped down into an armchair, swinging one leg over an arm.
We followed suit, though without the trailing limbs.
“We’re-”
Jonny interrupted before I got any further, “Special Agents Reilly and Aparo, FBI, and I have no idea what you want or why you’re here.”
I opened the betting. “We know you were at the docks. Daphne Sokolov told us.”
He gave us a confused-amused look. “She could have been with any one of us. We all look the same, don’t we? I assume you don’t have me on camera, or we’d be talking at the precinct.”
Aparo raised, “Why would she lie?”
“I didn’t say she lied. I’m suggesting that maybe she is confused. Trauma is well known to have this effect.”
He glanced over at his aunt, who had come back into the room unnoticed. She was holding a tray that had a teapot, cups, and a plate of Korean pastries on it.
“I was here all night. Me and my ee-mo watched a CSI rerun.” He paused, then added, his tone flat and sardonic, “It was the one where someone killed a prostitute.”
He flashed us a grin. I couldn’t fault his sense of humor, but his arrogance was starting to piss me off.
Mrs. Yaung insisted on serving everyone with green tea and a sticky bun. Once the cups and plates had been distributed-Aparo eyeing his bun greedily-I decided it was time to cut to the chase. Mrs. Yaung interjected before I could speak. “Jonny definitely here all night with me. Grissom find killer like always. Neighbor also here for three-player mahjong. You ask him too.”