Jarkko Sipila - Darling

“So who stiffed her then?” Suhonen quipped and faked a chuckle at his own pun.

Niskala stared at Suhonen coolly.

“We don’t know. And if we did, we wouldn’t be broadcastin’ it in here.”

Suhonen answered with a cold stare. “Good answer. I wouldn’t, either.”

He finished his beer and got up. He considered buying everyone a round of drinks, but decided against it. Being overly friendly would seem suspicious; Officer Suhonen might do it, but not Suikkanen.

Suhonen walked to the counter and said, “I’ll have one more.”

The bored bartender nodded and filled a glass while Suhonen dug change from his jeans pocket.

“The guys were saying that some customer had been killed somewhere around here this morning.”

“Yeah, I heard. It’s too bad,” the bartender said, nodding.

“Yep, that’s what the guys said,” Suhonen repeated.

“It’s sad news.”

“They said she hung out with them sometimes.”

“Yeah, guess she sat over there occasionally, but elsewhere, too. These groups get mixed sometimes and such.”

“Yeah,” Suhonen said. “So these guys weren’t shitting me, then?”

Suhonen wanted to explain why he was asking questions, as if he was just verifying what the guys had told him.

“Nope, they weren’t. Laura seemed to like to hanging around with those four. I didn’t quite get why, but that’s really none of my beeswax. My job is to sell beer, not to get mixed in customers’ business.”

“You’re alright,” Suhonen grinned at the bartender. “I like you. You’ve got a good attitude.”

Suhonen picked up his glass and walked back to his table. He got the sense from the bartender that the core group was all here. That was enough.

He sat quietly, and the guys at the other table didn’t talk to him anymore. He pulled his phone out and texted Joutsamo. “At the Alamo Bar. Niskala and three of Vatanen’s buddies are here. Probable cause.”

Suhonen knew Joutsamo would reply right away and the incoming text alert would give him an excuse to leave. He had made a point of looking at his phone when he walked in. Joutsamo replied with a short text: “Should we come now?”

“Thirty minutes so I can get out of here,” he answered.

Ten minutes later Suhonen finished his beer and got up. He nodded to the group and said he was going to work. That was the truth.

Irwin’s song “Saint Paul and Reeperbahn” blasted from the loudspeakers.

WEDNESDAY, 9:00 P.M.

HELSINKI POLICE HEADQUARTERS, PASILA

Kulta took a bite of his pizza and noticed Joutsamo approaching. She was walking fast-and smiling, which was unusual.

“Bingo!” Joutsamo said as she joined the others. Takamäki, Suhonen, Kulta, and Kohonen were sitting at one of the tables in the lunchroom. A kitchenette on the side sold candy on the honor system.

The homicide team was in temporary quarters at the old courthouse while the Pasila police station was being renovated. The structure, built in the 1980s, had major mold issues and had to undergo a total remodeling. The building was visible from the homicide unit’s lunchroom through the old court building’s high open lobby. Outside, the glare from the streetlights made the falling snow appear yellow.

Their temporary quarters didn’t have a cafeteria, and the officers had to eat out or pack a lunch. Kulta had picked up three salami pizzas from a pizzeria at the Pasila train station, and the officers were eating them with their fingers.

“Well?” Takamäki asked, chewing on his pizza.

“We found a match for the prints on the coffeemaker.”

“Who?” Kulta got excited and the others stopped chewing. The fingerprints would very likely lead them to the killer.

“Jorma Korpivaara,” Joutsamo said with a smile. “The custodian.”

“Really?” Kulta said with awe. “How about that! I’m surprised he kept his cool when he unlocked the door for the police.”

Joutsamo nodded and said, “He has some explaining to do.”

The police had picked up Niskala, Korpivaara, and the two others from the bar around seven. Despite the men’s protests, the detainment went without too much drama. The bartender had confirmed to Joutsamo about Vatanen hanging out with these four men, like Suhonen had said.

Korpivaara, Niskala, Mustache-Raksa, and Quiet Guy Heku were sitting in their cells at the station. The men were examined and fingerprinted, and their DNA samples were taken before they were put into individual holding cells. Mustache-Raksa’s real name was Pekka Rautalampi and quiet Heku was Heikki Lahtela. Rautalampi had a few misdemeanors on his record, and Lahtela had been arrested several times for public drunkenness and vandalism.

Kulta grabbed the last slice of pizza from one of the boxes, leaving a few in the other two.

“If I remember correctly, Korpivaara never mentioned being in the victim’s apartment that morning, when we met him at the door.”

“No. He said he was at home having a beer and watching a movie. Besides, he knew the victim better than he let on, and they even had some sort of a relationship. It looks pretty promising, if you ask me. I believe the DNA samples will confirm that he’s been in the apartment.”

Kulta continued, “We might even have a motive-sex. He wanted it and she didn’t. They argued and Korpivaara got fired up. It might explain the cut on his hand, too. He could’ve gotten it during the slashing.”

“What about the others?” Kohonen asked.

“We’ll get to the bottom of it,” Joutsamo said. “Niskala might’ve been there too that morning, since his fingerprints were on the fridge, but we don’t know when the prints were put there. I’ll talk to the men tonight, but we can’t legally interrogate them until tomorrow because they are still legally drunk from all the beer they had.”

“I’d say at least five,” Suhonen inserted. “But probably closer to ten.”

Joutsamo glanced at her notes. “Looks like the latter is more accurate. They each blew around 0.2.”

“Alright,” Takamäki said. “Next we should check out the suspects’ apartments. Who’s going?”

Kohonen glanced at Kulta, who nodded. “We can go.”

“Good. I’ll take care of the paperwork.”

“Can I have those?” Joutsamo asked, eyeing the last two pieces of pizza.

“Go for it,” Kulta replied.

* * *

The man was sliding his finger down the list of names on the smudged piece of paper, slowly and with hesitation. The list was titled “Attorneys.”

The interrogation room was bare; no interior decorators needed here. The VCU detectives knew the room needed to have gray walls and wooden furniture-no windows or plants, nothing to give the suspects a focal point.

“No rush, take your time,” Sergeant Joutsamo said, sitting across from Jorma Korpivaara. The man glanced at her with misty eyes but didn’t say anything. Joutsamo noticed his finger trembling slightly.

The smell of cleansers lingered in the room, now mixed with the stench of booze and sweat.

The man kept reading through the long list of attorneys in Helsinki. He recognized several of the names from TV: Arvela…Fredman…Jaatela…Lampela.

Anna Joutsamo focused on the man’s face rather than his finger. He kept his gaze on the list. Suspects had the right to an attorney; they only had to ask. The man requested an attorney early on, and he did it nicely, so Joutsamo was confident he would confess quickly. Especially since he was no professional criminal.

Of course a confession alone wouldn’t be enough, but it would go a long way to support other evidence they had gathered in the case. Joutsamo had hoped Korpivaara would confess during initial conversation, but something seemed to hold him back. That’s why the man had said he needed an attorney. When a suspect requested a lawyer it meant they were halfway to a confession anyway; an innocent person would deny everything and want to leave as quickly as possible.