15. Evgeny #4
I bite my tongue, refusing to laugh at the grotesque image.
Knowing they’ll have a translator go over everything he says today, he’s careful to not direct anything at me or say anything that could be used against him.
Dick insults are expected, and even though it won’t earn him any brownie points with Alvarez, it’s not something that raises any red flags.
Pulling out the chair next to Sasha, I sit down and say, “Care to explain what happened to my client’s face?”
“I guess he was just born that way,” Alvarez says, taking the chair opposite us while Bronson does the same.
“I did get lucky,” Sasha says, switching to English. “Or unlucky as it may be,” he adds, using a cuffed hand to gesture to his swollen mouth. “Somebody else thought I was pretty, too, Detective. Didn’t they?”
“You had him with other prisoners?” I ask, not bothering to hide the fury in my voice.
Alvarez holds up a hand to try and calm me. “It was a momentary mix-up with the cell assignment. It’s been fixed, and your client here is looking a hell of a lot better than the other guy.”
“I did tell him I wasn’t interested,” Sasha says. In Russian, he adds, “He’s lucky I didn’t fucking kill him for what he tried to do.”
“I think he got the message,” Alvarez says. “He’ll be in the infirmary for at least two weeks.”
“Maybe next time he’ll remember that no means no,” Sasha says.
“There won’t be a next time for my client,” I say, looking at the two detectives. “He’s supposed to be kept separate. This was already agreed on, and any more mix-ups will result in more paperwork than you want to deal with, Detectives. That I can promise you.”
“He’s being kept separate now,” Detective Bronson says, trying to diffuse the situation. “You have my word that it won’t happen again.”
“Wonderful,” I say. “Now, why did you bring me down here?”
Bronson starts laying out paperwork while Alvarez says, “You work for the Melnikov Bratva.”
I huff out a laugh. “You’ve got to be kidding me. You have no proof of that, and my client isn’t on trial right now.”
“He has the tattoo,” Alvarez says. “His last name is Melnikov. It doesn’t take a genius, Nikitin.”
“He has a lot of tattoos, and it’s a free country. He can choose to get whatever tattoo he wants. It means nothing. I bet you have a lot of Jesus tattoos in this place. You want to tell me all the men sporting them are devout Christians?”
Sasha huffs out a laugh. “The guy who tried to rape me had a crucifix tat on his bicep.”
I shake my head in disappointment. “Jesus would not approve. So what else do you have besides a guess?”
Alvarez’s cheeks heat up, and it’s not nearly as cute as when Harper does it.
“We have witnesses that place Sasha at the crime scene, we found a knife at his home that matches the wounds we found all over Rosalie’s body, and we have a very probable connection between your client and an organized crime family,” he says, raising a brow and daring me to dispute even that.
“All that can be disproved,” I tell him, because he knows it’s true.
Eyewitness identifications are notoriously unreliable, and knives are not an unusual object to have in your home, especially not one fitting the width of a stab wound.
Unless there’s DNA evidence tying the knife to Rosalie, then it’s useless information.
The Bratva issue is a problem, but, again, without proof it doesn’t mean shit.
Alvarez ignores me and looks at Sasha. “What were you doing at her apartment? How did you even know her?”
“Don’t answer that,” I say just so it’s on record that I’m not letting him speak.
While Alvarez huffs out an annoyed breath and shares a look with his partner, I glance down at the crime scene photos.
My eyes land on the small black star that’s tattooed on Rosalie’s ankle.
Anyone who knows anything about the organized crime in the surrounding area would recognize it for what it is—a symbol of the DeMarco family.
The two detectives in front of me are either choosing to ignore it or they’re genuinely bad at their jobs.
I’m not sure which is worse for our situation.
“Interesting tattoo,” I say, glancing back down at the photo before meeting their eyes.
Alvarez keeps a blank face, but Bronson has the decency to quickly look away and busy himself with gathering up the photos, unknowingly answering my question.
They’re choosing to ignore obvious clues that point in a different direction than Sasha.
They’re hell-bent on getting him convicted of this.
Knowing they’re willing to so blatantly disregard solid evidence is not making me feel better about this.
Finally, Alvarez gives me a smug grin and says, “It’s a free country, remember? Tattoos don’t mean shit.”
Well played, fucker.
Opening my briefcase, I grab one of the folders I brought and flip it open. It’s several pages of nothing important, so I don’t turn it around and share it with the room. Instead, I ask, “Why are you so convinced my client was at Rosalie’s house?”
“We have witness statements,” Alvarez says.