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4
MARK
Evaand I are sitting in a tiny interrogation room at the NPB building, waiting for them to bring the suspect Milo to us. I don’t have a lot of friends among the detectives working in this building, though after the way they treated me during the last case we worked together, some of them are trying to make amends. Not that I blame them for what happened and how they handled it. They were just doing their job. But I’m pretty sure it’s because of the guilt some of them feel that I was able to get this interview with Milo where Brina couldn’t.
They’re also letting me have copies of everything they have, and Detective Kaia Šalehar was also eager to give me a run through of what they have. Listening to her made it seem that they’ve crossed their T's and dotted their I's and have the man they’re looking for in custody.
Detective Sojer, the man who showed us into this room without so much as a, “Wait here,” was another matter. He is still certainly not my friend and is clearly against the task force getting involved in this case. This is the same room where they interrogated me, and I suppose that’s Sojer’s little idea of a joke, which I’m more than able to ignore.
There are no windows in this room, and the light coming from the fluorescent tubes on the ceiling is harsh and artificially bright. Eva’s cheeks are flushed and her sky-blue eyes are very bright. They always get this way when she’s excited about something. Or should I say,overlyexcited. They also get that way when she hasn’t been sleeping enough, which I know she hasn’t.
The baby’s keeping her up, sure. But it’s also these stabbings and the serial killer she thinks is behind them. That’s the main reason I’m hoping this Milo turns out to be the killer, so she’ll stop working on this case so much.
“I’ll sit back and you can ask the questions you need him to answer,” I tell her and pull one of the four plastic chairs into the corner by the door.
“But you can jump in any time, if you think of something,” she says and I can’t figure out if her tone is so clipped because she’s annoyed, nervous or tired. Probably all three.
I haven’t shown much interest in this case since she started working on it, and I suppose she sees me hanging back now as more of that. She’s not wrong.
The door opens, saving us from having to go any deeper into this disconnect between us, and two uniformed officers bring in Milo.
He’s twenty-six but looks much younger. A lanky kid with messed up dark brown hair and downturned, scared, hazel eyes. He’s wearing a light grey track-suit which is a couple of sizes too big for his skinny frame, yet too short in the legs, so I’m guessing they gave it to him here when they brought him in. The paleness of his face has a greenish tint to it and there are dark, almost black circles under his eyes. And all the terror of a cornered animal in them as he spots me. But he relaxes somewhat when he notices Eva, who greets him with a smile.
The officers don’t remove his handcuffs as they sit him in the chair farthest from the door, and even after Eva asks them to, they only do it very reluctantly.
“Did you speak to my mother?” Milo asks Eva as soon as the door closes behind the officers and we’re alone in the room.
“Yes, that’s why we’re here,” Eva says reassuringly and turns to me. “This is Mark Novak. He’s a Europol investigator and we’ll be looking into this case together.”
The kid’s eyes flutter to me, fearful again, but then he steels his face and sits up straighter and greets me politely.
I don’t think Eva should be promising him that we’ll take on his case, because as far as I’m concerned, that’s not a given at this point. Though I have to admit Milo doesn’t strike me as being a guilty man.
“Your mom says you found the victim last night,” Eva says. “Can you tell me exactly what happened?”
He clears his throat, pushes a lock of thick dark hair off his forehead and leans towards Eva. Solid signs he’s about to tell the truth.
“So, I was working late last night. I was fixing a bike, a tricky job that I really wanted to finish, and it was almost one AM when I got home,” he explains hastily. “Then I wanted to wind down with a beer and a couple of smokes, but realized I was out of cigarettes. The all-night gas station is only a few blocks from my house, so I decided to walk there. I don’t know why, but I walked along the river. I like how it’s been flowing so fast and wild, because of all the rain. I always liked that.”
He pauses, takes a deep breath and swallows hard. Eva wisely doesn’t say anything into the silence.
“She was just lying there, in the dirt, under one of those big trees that grow practically in the water,” he continues. “I wouldn’t even have noticed her, but she was on her back and her face was practically glowing in the moonlight. I thought she was hurt or something, or that someone did something to her and she was in shock… a lot of bad shit happens by the river at night in that part of town, you know… but when I got to her and tried to shake her awake… she wasn’t moving. Her whole chest was soaked in blood. I was actually kneeling in her blood as I tried to wake her. It was still warm. Her body was still warm. But she was dead.”
His voice shook on the last couple of words and he had to stop talking again, and take a few deep breaths.
“And that’s when you ran to the gas station to get help?” Eva asks to get him talking again.
He nods. “I was covered in blood and mud. So I’m sure they thought I was deranged. I’m not surprised they thought I did something to her, but I didn’t. I didn’t. And I didn’t stab anyone else either.”
He’s getting more and more agitated; his cheeks are flushed and he’s talking in a breathless voice. But the look in his eyes and the expression on his face are both in line with what he’s saying. He’s scared. He’s trying to convince anyone who will listen that he’s innocent. I’ve rarely met a suspect that was a good enough actor to pull such a perfect look of innocence off, and the ones I had were all older and more practiced than this kid. Still, he could just have a natural talent for deception.
I sit up in my chair and clear my throat. “You have a history of dealing drugs and are a gang member,” I say. “In fact, you were arrested several times for crimes related to that on the very stretch of the river bank where the victim was found.”
The area he’s talking about is in the north-east of Ljubljana, at the edge of a large complex of low-cost housing and a hotbed of mafia activity and crime. Though it is also considered a safe place to live, at least around the spot where the body was discovered.
He shoots me an even more frightened look than the one he had for me when he first saw me.
“That’s all behind me,” he says. “I was stupid then and out of control. I don’t have a father and my mother was always working. So I started running with a bad crowd, because I wanted to belong somewhere. And that’s why I did all those things. But I didn’t do this. You have to believe me. Please.”
