Nothing but the Truth (12 page)

“What’s next?” Suhonen asked as Salmela took the helm.

“We troll around for a few hours and hope for

a bite.”

“You brought a knife, right? If we catch something?”

“Figured you could do the honors with your Glock. You brought it, right?”

Suhonen smiled. The boat was cruising along smoothly at a couple of knots, the planer keeping the lines neatly spaced outboard of the gunwales.

“Heh,” Suhonen began. “So this one time one of our detectives ends up in a foot chase with this guy who must have been some kinda track star or something, and slowly but surely he starts losing the guy. You know, it’s really embarrassing if the bad guys get away on foot, so he starts cursing the fact that there’s never a dog around when you need one. So he barks real loud a few times and hollers, ‘Stop! Police K-9! Stop or I’ll release the dog!’”

“He barks?”

“Ruff! Ruff!”

“You’re shitting me.”

“He really did. So the runner stops in his tracks and lays face down on the pavement in the X-position, all on his own. Detective comes up, slaps on the cuffs and hauls the guy up. He goes, ‘Where’s the dog?’ The detective says, ‘They already took him back to the wagon…he’s got a mean streak.’”

“Ohhh. That’s rough,” said Salmela with a laugh. “I like dog stories. I ever tell you about the time I was lifting stuff from this grocery store about ten years back? Might have been earlier, but anyhow this security guard almost busted me. I managed to split just in time, but he spots me heading into the woods on the other side of a little field. So I dive under a tree and hide. Just then this squad car pulls up and they start talking to the security guard. The guard opens the hatch on his wagon and out pops this huge fucking dog. I still remember its name because the guard kept going, ‘Search, Nemo, search!’ So the dog takes off straight towards me, just jerking at his leash. The cops come slogging through the mud after them and I think one of them lost a shoe in the muck. I’m pretty much scared stiff and about to give myself up when the dog stops about thirty feet off and takes a shit. Once he finished up, he just wanted back in the wagon. The slack-jawed cops just watched the whole show and finally headed back to the road cursing up a storm. So then the security guard’s petting the dog and one of the cops asks him, ‘So…you train him all by yourself?’”

Both men laughed.

Salmela dug a small silver flask out of his breast pocket and offered it to Suhonen, “French cognac.”

“No, thanks.”

Salmela took a swig.

“So how you been?” asked Suhonen. Already at the dock it had been obvious that Salmela had set up the fishing trip so they could have a little privacy to talk. Suhonen also knew Salmela wasn’t going to bring up his son’s death himself. He would have to be the one to ask.

Salmela took another swig and sighed. “Like shit. I spent all day yesterday trying to play detective… With Korpi and all, but then last night it hit me hard. That’s why I…”

“I know.” Suhonen nodded as he looked his friend in the eyes. Salmela thumbed away a tear.

“Just got to thinking about all the shit I should have done. What I could’ve done to keep this from happening. How I could’ve been a better dad. Not that I had much choice with the ex and me always going at it. But I could’ve tried harder. Or should have, at least.”

Suhonen had encountered many people grappling with the death of a loved one. For some, the grief spiraled into overwhelming emotional problems. Salmela seemed ashamed of neither having been the kind of father he would have wanted to be nor having taught his son the ways of the criminal world. But the past was gone.

Suhonen thought for a moment. Salmela had spent time in prison, had seen the darker side of life. Maybe it was best to just be straight with him. That was Suhonen’s style anyway.

“Yeah, grief ain’t easy,” he said. “Some struggle with it their whole lives. For you it’s just starting. But there’s one thing you need to keep in mind: letting go of grief is hard because you can’t help but think it’s an insult to the dead. You shouldn’t stop grieving today or tomorrow, but soon. And that doesn’t mean you have to forget your boy. Those memories will always be with you.”

“They were pretty good times,” said Salmela, wiping tears openly now. “Damn, this fucking wind…” he said with a sad smile.

Suhonen nodded.

“But the more you get to thinking, the more you start to regret,” said Salmela. “I’ve made a lotta dumb decisions.”

“And that’s what they’ll always be,” said Suhonen, as he put his hand on his friend’s shoulder. “You can’t think like that…in hindsight. Life is pretty random—some days are good, some bad.”

“Feels like the bad have been coming outta my ears lately.”

Suhonen kept his hand on Salmela’s shoulder. “Well, then they are. That just makes the good that much better…like this fishing trip.”

Salmela laughed. “Yeah, right. But tell me this…”

“What?”

“You say it’s all random…”

“Right, and nothing you can do about it. No point blaming yourself for what happened to Tomi. You didn’t get drunk and drive him off a bridge. You didn’t bounce his head off the pavement. Nyberg came to the door and shot him.”

Salmela looked Suhonen sharply in the eyes. “I know all that. I’m talking about something else. Back when we did that attic job in Lahti. I got busted and you didn’t, ’cause you were sick at home. How you make sense of that?”

“Pure chance. Had I gone with you guys, I doubt I’d be alive right now. It would’ve changed the course of my life. No doubt about it.”

“Yeah. Sometimes I wonder how you’re still kicking, being a cop and all.”

“I’m not so sure I’m better off for it, either. At least you got the memories of your son. All I got are a bunch of random women and motorcycles.”

“But you’re a hero, a police officer.”

“It’s a shitty job… Ain’t much different than a criminal’s—except the government gives us the guns, so we don’t have to buy them off the black market.”

Salmela waited a while before responding, “I’ve always considered you a hero.”

Suhonen laughed. “Right.”

“If there’s anything I can be proud of, it’s that I can call you a friend.”

Suhonen gulped. “Getting kinda serious here.”

“Gotta be serious sometimes. If you don’t, you never realize what really matters.”

“Yeah…you’re right.”

Slowly, the forty-horse engine pushed the boat onward through an empty sea. The fish weren’t biting, but the coffee was good.

* * *

Takamäki was on the phone when Joutsamo stepped into his office at Pasila police headquarters. “Hockey? Sure, I can bring him,” Takamäki was saying as he glanced at Joutsamo. “Least I think so… Let’s see, one-thirty now. I suppose around three I’ll know for sure… Yeah, I’ll be there… Bye.”

“Driving the hockey shuttle?”

“Among others. How’s things with our interview subjects?”

“Neither one’s much of a talker.”

“No surprise.”

Joutsamo sat down on the opposite side of Takamäki’s desk. “What about Guerrilla? Hold onto him or let him go? The twenty-four-hour holding period will be up soon.”

“The prosecutor’s position on that was pretty clear. And I’m not arguing, either. He wasn’t in the car and nobody’s fingered him, but still, if he’s not Korpi’s right hand, then he’s his left. If the hit was planned, then what are the chances he would’ve known?”

“I’d say pretty good.”

Takamäki looked his best detective in the eyes. “How good? What standard of proof are we

looking at?”

“What, this the lieutenant-level test?”

“No. You already know I think you ought to go for lieutenant. Just mulling some things over.”

“Like what?”

“Like might Siikala cross the threshold of reasonable suspicion for murder based on the fact that the NBI classifies Korpi’s outfit as an organized crime ring and Siikala is high up in the ranks.”

“So you want to keep him?”

“Well, no, actually. If he’s not talking, he’s no use to us. But might he talk to someone else?”

Joutsamo nodded. “I see where you’re going. Phone tap or bug?”

“Why not both? Let’s start with a phone tap and see how far-reaching Korpi’s outfit really is. That might tell us if there’s any cross-over between their contacts and Tomi Salmela’s.”

“With Korpi and Nyberg both in jail, it stands to reason Siikala might be up for a promotion. That might put him more in the jurisdiction of Narcotics, though.”

“I’ll have a chat with them. If it starts looking more like their case, then they can have it. But as long as you’re in agreement, I’ll say we have reasonable suspicion to suspect Siikala and that we’re only letting him out for strategic purposes. Then we’ll get a warrant for a phone tap and see who he calls.”

That made Joutsamo pause. “And what if he just gets a new prepaid SIM card?”

“Didn’t he just have some old beat-up Nokia? Least that’s what I remember seeing in the report.”

“Yeah. I don’t remember the model, but it

was old.”

“Well, at any rate, if he bought a new SIM card he’d still have to turn on his old phone to save the numbers onto it, so the phone will connect to the network then. Once we see that, we’ll just wait for the new prepaid number to come up in the same location and get the new number.”

“I already copied all the numbers from his cellphone directory.”

“But the court won’t grant warrants for those numbers in relation to this case. Maybe
Narcotics could get one, but not us. So based on the info we have so far, the trail seems to end with Siikala.”

Joutsamo nodded. “OK. Fair enough. So you’ll get the warrant for Siikala’s phones and I’ll set up the tap. You think Siikala’s phone calls for round-the-clock surveillance?” she asked, conscious of the resources such an operation could devour.

“Let’s assess it on a daily basis. Initially, at least in the daytime, we’ll have someone listen in live so we can see when he changes his SIM card, but no need to burn the midnight oil. The case is not at a critical stage at this point,” said Takamäki. All conversations and call data would be saved on a computer hard drive anyway.

“Alright. In other news, Kannas says they’re still working on the laptop, but that they did pick up some information from the Mazda’s onboard computer.”

“What’s that?”

“The engine was started on Sunday afternoon about three o’clock and ran till almost five. Went about thirty miles.”

“So that supports our case.”

“It sat idling somewhere for a while, but we don’t know where.”

“And the gas tank?”

“Half full, so I don’t think we’ll find them on any service station cameras.”

“Well, we’ll have time to think about that for a day or two. Some other places might have got them on camera. But this isn’t the kind of case where we’d really need to determine the car’s route. We have Nyberg’s picture from the store by Salmela’s apartment and a statement from an eyewitness that puts Korpi in the car. That’ll take us a ways.”

“Hopefully far enough for a conviction,” said Joutsamo.

“Well, sometimes it’s a sprint, but just as often it ends up being a marathon. Anybody heard anything from Suhonen, by the way?”

Joutsamo shook her head. “Nope. One more thing: I’m having a chat with Mari Lehtonen this evening. She wanted to meet.”

CHAPTER 11

TUESDAY, 5.30 P.M.

GULF OF FINLAND

The bait had been in the water for three hours already without a single bite. No coffee left, either.

“You got anything going on tonight?” asked Salmela.

“I’m in no hurry,” said Suhonen, despite the boredom that had set in after the novelty of a majestic, desolate sea had faded. His life vest kept out the cold and he could piss in the sea—all was well.

They didn’t broach the topic of Salmela’s son again, nor any other difficult subjects. On their last coffee break, Suhonen had promised to help with the funeral and other arrangements, but that having been settled, he didn’t care to bring it up again. Of course, he was more than willing to continue that conversation if that was what Salmela wanted. But Suhonen had said his piece about grief and getting over it, and there wasn’t much more he wanted to add.

“Let’s give it another hour,” said Salmela. “Should make land before nightfall.”

“Fair enough.”

“Who knows, might even get something once it gets a little darker.”

“What, like a fine for fishing without a license?”

Salmela was quiet, which made Suhonen pensive.

After a minute, Salmela spoke up again. “About Tomi…”

“Uh-huh.”