Maddocks cracked open the lid of his pad Thai noodle carton. He inserted wooden chopsticks and delivered a helping to his mouth. Chewing, he popped open a can of cold pop. He hadn’t eaten since grabbing a coffee and doughnut on his way to the heliport. He swallowed his mouthful, took a deep swig of his drink, and opened the dossier Takumi had given him in order to familiarize himself with the scope and details of the massive Aegis investigation. To do this, Maddocks had commandeered a small L-shaped workstation in the corner of the incident room at the Surrey RCMP station where he was partially screened from the rest of the bustling room by a partition. In front of him was a phone, to his right a computer, to which he’d been given a security code unique to his badge number. The computer was linked to a confidential database of files and other relevant documentation associated with the operation.
Grabbing another chopstickful of noodles, he ate as he began to read. A noodle escaped his sticks and fell to the floor, and for a second he felt a knee-jerk instinct to tell Jack-O to get it. He already missed the irascible three-legged beast. And he worried a little because Holgersen had offered to babysit the dog, at least until Maddocks knew how long he might be stationed in Surrey and could thus make longer-term arrangements. Maddocks wasn’t certain that Holgersen had ever cared for an animal. But he’d vowed to take Jack-O with him to the station every day, where the dog could sleep in his basket under the desk in the incident room—as long as no one complained. He was an old hound. He didn’t need much exercise and was more than happy to make up for time spent as a stray on cold streets by sleeping in a warm bed. As long as Holgersen budgeted for regular bathroom breaks, took him home at night, and fed and watered him, Jack-O should be okay. Besides, Maddocks told himself, those two suited each other. He figured like Jack-O, Holgersen had a dark and dismal past that no one could know about, and both were twitchy and slightly off-center because of it.
Maddocks ran through the content list of the dossier, then turned to the intelligence section that listed suspected Russian organized crime members and associates along with their allied businesses and holdings.
Strings of names filled the pages and connected in a series of family-tree-style diagrams that detailed a suspected web linking across the country from Vancouver, to Toronto, to Montreal, and down into the States.
He focused on the Vancouver section and began to peruse the supporting material compiled by RCMP and FBI analysts based on intel from various investigations and UC operations in both countries.
As Takumi had noted, Russian organized crime in Vancouver tended to circle around Club Orange B—possibly ironically named after a discontinued food dye that was used to color hot dog sausage casings bright red until the FDA declared it unsafe due to the presence of carcinogenic contaminants. Maddocks snorted—the lethal Reds. Ruskies, as Holgersen would have it. The mob was known by various other colloquialisms, including the Red Octopus. Maddocks scooped up his last mouthful of Thai noodles.
The intel noted that Club Orange B offered exotic dancers and Russian cuisine, and it ran an escort agency from upstairs rooms—a front for prostitution.
Maddocks skimmed the information. Like the seafood import companies mentioned in the briefing, Club Orange B was held by a complex assortment of numbered companies and holdings. Numerous criminal investigations and criminal charges against the club had never resulted in anything of significance sticking, although individual members had been convicted of various felonies. The club’s legal business appeared to be handled primarily by one firm—Abramov, Maizel, and Dietch.
Maddocks turned to the information on the law firm and whistled to himself. They had branch offices in Vancouver, Montreal, Ottawa, and Toronto and had defended several high-profile criminal cases across the country—those tried had been suspected of Russian mob links. He reached for his pop and took a drink as he turned the page, running through the list of cases. The list went back decades, with the firm adding or subtracting partners to the title as the years passed, but always two names remained consistent—Abramov and Maizel, passing the banner on to sons. And the farther back in time, the smaller the cases, but even in those cases many of their clients were highlighted in the dossier as being—or having been—suspected mob affiliates. The firm was founded in the late seventies by Abramov, a Russian expat who’d emigrated from Israel. He appeared to have started small, handling cases for fellow Russian expats. The early cases ranged from robbery, to sexual assault and battery, to illegal weapons and narcotics possession. Over the years, Abramov had taken on meatier criminal battles until he’d built his company into a massive outfit that defended and managed alleged mob business.
Maddocks ran through the list of Abramov’s early cases, and . . . stilled.
He reread the name of a client charged for sexual assault and battery in 1991. Milo Belkin. Flagged as a mob affiliate. Maddocks’s pulse quickened—the felon Angie was going to see in prison. The same man whose prints had been on the outside of the angel’s cradle door in 1986. Maddocks checked his watch. Shit. Angie would have already interviewed Belkin by now—she’d be on her return trip to Vancouver. He quickly scanned farther down the document.
Belkin’s 1991 sexual assault charges had mysteriously been dropped just days before he was due to appear in court when the complainant—Nadia Moss, an exotic dancer at Club Orange B—had recanted everything, saying she’d mistakenly identified the defendant. Moss had later ended up as a bar manager at the club.
Abramov was also the lawyer who’d later defended Belkin in the 1993 drug bust and shooting charges. Additionally, Abramov served as defense counsel in a second trial for one of Belkin’s accomplices arrested and charged in the drug bust—Semyon Zagorsky.
Belkin had refused to identify two other suspects who’d fled the scene in a black Chevrolet cargo van, one of whom was believed to have killed a VPD officer in the shoot-out. Belkin was up for release in six months, having served time almost to his WED date, no doubt because he’d refused to cooperate with law enforcement on the identity of a cop killer. This told Maddocks something—if the drug haul confiscated in the bust had belonged to the Russian mob, Belkin had remained loyal throughout his sentence. This meant he was likely going to be repaid for his loyalty and looked after by the mob once he got out.
Semyon Zagorsky, his accomplice, had been slapped with a longer sentence than Belkin. The prosecution had successfully argued that the ricocheting .22 slug that had hit an innocent bystander in the spine came from Zagorsky’s gun—he’d been the only one firing a .22 pistol. Zagorsky, too, had refused to name his associates who’d fled the scene. While his WED date was some years out, he was up for a parole hearing in two days.
Maddocks swung his chair around to face the computer and logged in with his access code. He wanted more detailed information on Belkin and Zagorsky. He typed MILO BELKIN. A mug shot of the convicted felon came up instantly, with details of his arrests and charges. A pale-blue crab tattoo decorated the left side of his neck. Maddocks’s mouth went dry with adrenaline. He punched in SEMYON ZAGORSKY. Same tattoo, but smaller and on his wrist. His name had been flagged as being part of an active new investigation. Maddocks hit the link.