Secret Target

She ascends the stairs to the apartment where the corpse was discovered. The Tadpole, still wearing his motorcycle helmet and toting a heavy backpack, can barely keep up behind her. Through the half-open apartment door, she catches a momentary glimpse of a shoulder draped in a familiar jacket. The glimpse is accompanied by a confident gesture, curtly pointing somewhere – and she’s recognized him. Elena is pleased to find Captain Marat Valeyev working the crime scene – and this is not simply because they had once made out at their senior prom and she still remembers going hot all over from his slightest touch.

Life had separated them since that night and only reunited them last year when Valeyev was transferred from the Organized Crime Unit to her district. It was a demotion. But following the death of Valeyev’s partner during an attempted arrest – a death that was caused by Valeyev’s actions – he could consider himself fortunate. Elena never asked Marat about that tragedy. She was confident that he was an excellent officer. He never complained about all the assignments she gave him, was always willing to work on weekends – just as she was – and knew how to get results in a way that would move the case forward. Not every detective knows how to do that. It’s not hard to work with your fists and wave your gun in people’s faces – the problem is that any evidence obtained that way will be crushed to dust by the lawyers at trial.

And the fact that she sometimes catches his masculine gaze lingering upon her – that’s just flattering, no more. She is a woman after all.

«Hello Marat.» Petelina paused long enough to catch his eager but disciplined smile. «What’s the situation look like?»

«Hi Lena. The situation here is looking thusly: A wife patted her husband on the head with a cleaver and the poor guy didn’t find the joke very funny.»

«Alcoholics?»

«God no. Middle class, decked-out apartment, wife’s covered in diamonds. To be fair, there’s an open bottle in the kitchen – but it’s genuine cognac, not the cheap stuff.»

«I hope you haven’t touched anything?» Mikhail Ustinov, the forensic expert, barged into their exchange, moving the captain aside as he entered.

When the Tadpole went to a crime scene, he always brought with him a large backpack stuffed full of cutting-edge electronic devices which he referred to as his gadgets. These enabled him to set up a mini-laboratory on site. Misha pulled off his helmet and passed further into the apartment.

«Nothing but the money and the valuables,» Valeyev grumbled after him.

«Have you examined the windows and the balcony?» asked Petelina.

«Of course. Everything is locked from the inside. There’s nothing in the apartment but the corpse and the murderer.»

«The murderer? That fast?»

«Come on, Lena. We weren’t born yesterday. You’ll see for yourself. Open and shut case, a domestic dispute.»

The detective made her way down the hallway. Ustinov was already fiddling around next to the corpse in latex gloves, taking pictures and bagging evidence. Petelina carefully examined the dead man lying in a bathrobe with a staved-in head.

«The blow came from behind. Unexpectedly. The murder weapon has been left for us as a parting gift,» she stated.

«Simple female imprudence,» Valeyev rushed to explain. «It’s a normal thing with them: a fit of rage leading to a momentary weakness.»

«You’re quite the expert,» Elena smiled wrily.

Valeyev flushed.

«She’ll confess. I’ll bet you anything.»

«That doesn’t mean we don’t have a job to do. Where’s the suspect? What’s her name?»

«Inna Maltseva. She was discovered unconscious right beside the corpse. Here’s her passport. She lives with her husband, Dmitry Maltsev. Or, to be accurate, she now lives without him. At the moment, the little lady is in the other room with an EMT. There’s a PPS sergeant watching over her.»

«Which room?» the Tadpole stirred. «I need to take her fingerprints.»

«There’s the door,» pointed Valeyev.

«And who made the call?» asked Petelina.

«The neighbor. An old bird. A very curious elder lady. I reckon that she’ll be happy to tell us everything she knows.»

«Then she’s the one I’ll start with,» Elena decided. «Take me to her.»

Before they could leave the apartment, however, a disgruntled-looking EMT appeared in the hallway.

«Are you the detective? We need to go. We’ve got other calls to attend to.»

«A couple of questions and you’ll be free.» Petelina wrote down the number of the ambulance and asked a few rudimentary questions: When did they get the call? How quickly did they get to the scene? What did they see? What condition was the suspect in?

«At the moment the lady is alright,» the medic came to the end of his story. «She suffered from a severe loss of consciousness resulting in delayed reactions, but she doesn’t need to go to the hospital. As for the victim – obviously a fatal case. Instant death. We didn’t even touch him. Can we go now?»

Petelina nodded. She spent the next half hour talking to the Maltsevs’ neighbor and the PPS unit that responded to the call. The neighbor had noticed one inconsistency. The police confirmed it. The inconsistency required prompt verification and so Elena sent Valeyev on an urgent assignment.

5

An hour had passed since she had arrived at the crime scene and Petelina had not even laid eyes on the murder suspect. She knew that her first impression would be pivotal. It could as much help as hinder her subsequent investigation. At times, a suspect could look so innocent and exude such charm that you would need to make a conscious effort to avoid becoming their lawyer. Other times, it would be the opposite – you’d think you were faced with a coldblooded killer when, in reality, the softie couldn’t hurt a fly. However, conundrums like these threw Elena off her track only in the first years of her service. These days, she preferred to conduct her first interrogation only after she had studied all the details of the suspect’s character, as well as the circumstances surrounding the crime. Before first meeting the suspect, she would always compose a mental portrait of her antagonist and, more often than not, it would turn out to be accurate.

Elena Petelina entered the kitchen where Mikhail Ustinov had unfurled his field lab. Fingerprint recognition software was scrolling through the patterns on his tablet computer.

«Any results?» inquired the detective.

«Too early,» the Tadpole cut her off without so much as a look.

Such brevity did not annoy Petelina. She knew that Ustinov would notify her as soon as anything substantial turned up. It did not serve to hurry the young forensic expert. He was already all afire to examine the slightest hair or fingerprint at the scene of the crime. If anything, the Tadpole needed to be restrained at times: Enough, we’re already up to our ears in evidence – save your energy and equipment. The experienced detective envied his enthusiasm and at the same time feared that the monotonous hours and paltry pay would soon turn this enthusiast into a lazy hack. To delay this as long as possible, she went to the top brass every quarter to wring funds for yet another intricate piece of lab equipment.

«Did you pull the Maltsevs’ files?» she asked.

«Sent it to your phone.»

The possibilities afforded by modern communications, which her pushy forensic expert had initiated her in, never ceased to amaze Elena. Her hand darted into her purse. A few gentle swipes of the screen with her finger and, voilà, your standard personal file.

Maltseva, Inna Olegovna. Forty years old. Married ten years. No children. Residence permit matches current address. Studied Education. Has not worked in the last few years. Husband’s name is Maltsev, Dmitry Nikolaevich. Forty-two years old. Businessman. Owns a construction and building repair company. Two years ago figured as a witness in a criminal case. This is interesting, Petelina made a mental note, should check this out further. Both husband and wife have cars registered in their names.

The detective dialed Valeyev right away.

«Did you find it?»

«Nothing yet. Maybe the neighbor got it wrong?»

«I thought you were an expert on women, Valeyev. Clothes are the first thing women pay attention to.»

«The neighbor’s already retired.»

«Sorry, forgot. Your social circle is limited to twenty-year-olds.»

«My favorite memories involve a certain classmate of mine,» came the operative’s repartee.

«Let’s stick to work, shall we? Here’s a slightly simpler task for you: The Maltsevs have two cars. Look around the yard.» Petelina read aloud the license plate numbers. She put the phone away and said to herself, And now it’s time to meet the lady of the house.