I walked into Hammer’s gym and immediately heard the loud thud of leather gloves hitting each other. I could tell by the speed of the blows that it could only be one person doing that kind of damage in the ring. Dmitri “Mechanic” Kowalski was a six-foot, hundred-and-ninety-pound killing machine with some of the fastest hands I had ever seen and a dexterity with a gun on par with the most decorated of soldiers in the elite forces. He was fearless and completely unemotional about causing pain when the need arose. For all of the aforementioned reasons, I was happy he had always been a friend and never an enemy. He got the nickname Mechanic growing up in his small Lithuanian neighborhood on the West Side, where even as a young boy, he was known for his ability to fix other people’s problems. Hammer, the gym’s namesake and a former Olympic boxer, watched from ringside, then turned away when the bell sounded.
“I don’t know what’s gotten into him,” Hammer said as he walked by me. “But I wouldn’t go in there with him today. He’s fighting like a wild animal.”
I approached the ring as Mechanic was stepping through the ropes.
“Not bad,” I said. “But you’re still dropping your hands on the one-two. If I was in there, I would’ve tapped you with a counter.”
“Assuming my first punch didn’t knock you out,” Mechanic said.
“There’s a first time for everything,” I said.
We walked over to a nearby bench and took a seat. He twisted the lid off a water bottle and drank about half of it in one swallow.
“What do you know about escort services?” I said.
“Nothing, because they’re too expensive for my taste, and I like to get mine the old-fashioned way.”
“There’s a company called Karol’s Angels that supposedly operates out of Ukrainian Village,” I said. “They take the money and supply the women.”
“You have a name and address?”
“Just an address on Division Street.”
“Let’s go knock on the door and see what we find out.”
Mechanic quickly showered before we jumped into his black Viper and headed over to the neighborhood where he had earned his stripes as a hard-knock kid. Minutes later, we pulled up to a small row of storefronts. The address belonged to a UPS Store squeezed between a pet store and a Jimmy John’s sandwich shop. Mechanic pulled into a parking spot across the street.
“The number 2027 is on the door of the UPS Store, but it could also be the apartments upstairs,” I said. “Let’s take a look.”
We walked across the street. There was no way to get up to the apartments from the UPS location, but next to Jimmy John’s we found two identical glass doors a few feet apart from each other. One was 2029, and the other was 2033. Each had a panel of buzzers next to the entryway. These were definitely the entrances to the apartments above the UPS Store. We turned back and walked into the store. A short kid with a buzz cut and glasses stood behind the counter, typing something into a computer. The nameplate pinned to his chest announced him as Enrique.
“Can I help you?” he asked.
“We’re looking for a company called Karol’s Angels,” I said.
“Are you looking to drop something off for them?” he said.
“No, we’re trying to get in contact with them.”
“Their mail comes here, but the company isn’t physically located here.”
“Who owns the company?”
“I’m sorry, sir, but I can’t give out that kind of information.”
“Do you know who owns the company?”
“I’m really not sure. We just accept their mail.”
“What about the location of their real physical address?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know that either.”
“Is there anything you know?” Mechanic said, stepping forward.
“I just work here part-time,” he said. “I don’t know all these things.”
Another guy walked in from the back of the store at the other end of the counter. He had olive skin and black hair that had been gelled and frozen several inches above his head. He looked very professional. His name badge read Ricardo.
“Is everything okay?” he said as he approached.
“Do you own this store?” I asked.
“I’m the manager,” Ricardo said. “How can I help you?”
“Who owns this store?”
“The owner’s not here,” he said. “But is there something I can do for you?”
“I’m looking for Karol’s Angels.”
I could see him visibly tighten.
“Do you need to leave a package for them?” Ricardo said.
“No, we need to talk to them.”
Ricardo looked at Mechanic, then back at me.
“I’m sorry, sir, but we’re just a mail-and-shipping service,” Ricardo said. “We accept mail or packages for them. That’s it.”
“Do you know who owns the company?”
“I don’t.”
“Does your owner know who owns the company?”
“She lives in Atlanta.”
“Maybe you should give her a call and let her know she has a customer who runs an illegal escort service and is using her store as their company address.”
Ricardo took a nervous swallow.
“If you leave a message, I can get it to her,” Ricardo said. He pulled a pad and pen from underneath the counter and handed them to me.
“The message is pretty simple,” Mechanic said, refusing the pad and pen. “Tell her the next time we come back looking for answers, we won’t be asking our questions so politely.”
We turned and left the store. When we got back into the car, Mechanic said, “Don’t worry about it. I’ll pay them a little visit later.”
I knew exactly what that meant.
When I got home that night, a small manila envelope with no markings had been slipped under my door. I knew it was from Burke. I opened it to find a single flash drive inside with a small note that had three time codes written on it. I refilled Stryker’s water and food bowls, promised to take him out for a walk in an hour, then plugged the flash drive into my computer. Three filmstrips ran across the screen. The first was an exterior black-and-white image of Kantor’s building. The vantage point looked out onto the sidewalk and street. The second strip was an interior shot coming from somewhere in the lobby and facing the entrance. It caught anyone who entered through the front door. The third strip also faced the street but looked to be from the rear of the building. I started with the first strip, where the time stamp showed 9:47 p.m. I hit the play button.
Several cars drove by over the next couple of minutes, and various people walked by with their dogs on leashes. One car drove up at 9:50 and stopped in front of the walkway. A woman and her small child got out of the back seat of the car, carrying two bags of groceries. They walked toward the camera and disappeared out of view.
9:53 p.m. A blue van with a white Amazon logo that had been painted across the side sliding door pulled up alongside the fire hydrant in front of the building and stopped. A heavyset white man in a dark uniform got out and rolled a large trunk down a ramp extending from the back of the van. It reminded me of one of those trunks that college kids pack when they head off to their first year of college. Once he had gotten the trunk cleared of the ramp and on the ground, he rolled it toward the front door of the building.
9:59 p.m. The deliveryman reappeared with the trunk and rolled it back up the ramp and into the van. He jumped behind the wheel and took off.
For the next few minutes of tape, nothing really happened. An older man with a Cubs baseball cap left the building wearing a light jacket. He lit a cigarette once he was outside, then walked west on Fullerton. More people and their dogs walked in and out of frame. I didn’t know so many people were up that late taking their dogs out to do their business.
At 10:05, a black tinted-window Cadillac Escalade pulled up to the hydrant. The driver, a middle-aged white man in a black suit and white shirt, jumped out quickly. He ran around, opened the rear passenger door, and extended his hand to help the passenger out. The older man waved him off dismissively, as if he were annoyed at the offered assistance. It was Elliott Kantor. He was wearing a two-piece suit and a light-colored shirt open at the collar. He said something to the driver, who nodded his head and promptly closed the door. Kantor walked toward the building, and after he went out of frame, the driver hurried back around the car, got in, and drove off. The time code read 10:08 p.m.
I watched the next hour of tape. The old man with the Cubs cap returned. He was still smoking a cigarette, which he discarded and stamped out before walking toward the building. A few people walked by the building, but there was nothing notable or suspicious. I slowed the tape when a woman delivering food arrived at the building a few minutes later. She parked next to the hydrant, flashed her hazards, then walked quickly to the building. She returned three minutes later, counting money before stuffing it into her pocket, jumping in the car, and driving away.
The next person to appear approached the building from the west at 11:09 p.m. She stood on the sidewalk for a moment, looked down at her phone, then back up toward the building, as if confirming she had the right address. When she made her way toward the entrance, I recognized the beautiful Jenny Lee. She walked out of frame at 11:10 p.m.
The tape kept rolling without anyone entering or leaving the building. At 11:24 p.m., Jenny Lee appeared in frame. She ran toward the street and turned west. She was gone in a matter of seconds.
My cell phone rang. It was Mechanic. I stopped the tape.
“Our friends suddenly got their memory back,” Mechanic said.
“They’re only kids,” I said. “I hope you didn’t spill blood.”
“Didn’t have to,” Mechanic said. “I just opened up my coat a little so they could see Black Betty sleeping in her holster. Suddenly they had perfect memories.”
Black Betty was Mechanic’s Smith & Wesson .500 Magnum. Forget about the sound it made when fired and the fact it could open a hole in your chest the size of a basketball—just looking at her was enough to instill the fear of God.
“The owner is a guy named Adam Mickiewicz,” Mechanic said.
“You’re kidding, right?”
“My Polish isn’t the best, but that’s pretty much how you pronounce it.”
“That can’t be his real name.”
“Why?”
“Mickiewicz might be the greatest Polish poet to ever write a sonnet. ‘Monsters merge and welter through the water’s mounting din. All hands, stand fast!’ I forget the rest of it, but I always loved those two lines.”
“Fuck sake,” Mechanic said. “You know Polish poetry too.”
“And a few Serbians, but the memory is fading.”
“I don’t know if this guy writes poetry or not, but he has an address in Avondale and a phone number with a California area code.”
“Five to one both of those are about as fake as his name.”
“He comes in once a week, usually late Saturday afternoon, to pick up his mail.”
“Maybe your new friends at the UPS Store will be nice enough to make an introduction.”
“They won’t have to. I have no problem handling my own introduction.”
Once Mechanic hung up, I went back to the tape. This time I clicked the second strip, the one with the vantage point from inside the lobby. I tapped the play button and watched the activity that mirrored what I had seen from the first video. I saw the woman with her son enter first. They walked straight back into the building and out of frame. Next was the Amazon driver. He entered with the trunk and took a right, which had him walking toward the camera, then out of frame. In less than two minutes, he was back in frame, wheeling the trunk out the door. Next, the man with the baseball cap appeared from across the hall and walked out the door. Elliott Kantor was next. He entered, took a right toward the camera, then moved out of frame. A woman who looked to be Filipino walked into view from the direction the woman and her son had disappeared into. She stopped at the entrance, opened her handbag, then went back in the direction she had come from. I made a note of the time she appeared.
Jenny Lee walked through the door at 11:10 p.m. That matched the time I had written down from the first video. She followed the same path that Kantor had taken. Over the next fourteen minutes, there was no activity at the door or in the lobby. At 11:24, Jenny Lee reemerged, running toward the door. She fumbled with the handle for a couple of seconds in her urgency to leave, then once she got the door open, she ran out and was gone. That time also matched what I had written down from the first video. From this point of view, she looked to be more than in a rush. She looked panicked.
I watched the rest of the tape. I saw the beat cop come in. Twenty minutes later, the two detectives arrived. Ten minutes after that, Burke came busting through the door. They all walked in the same direction that Kantor and Lee had taken. The crime scene techs arrived a few minutes later. The tape ended.
I pushed back from my screen and closed my eyes, trying to let it all settle. Something bothered me about the timeline and Jenny Lee’s behavior. Was she running because she was scared, or was she running because she had just done something really bad and was trying to escape as quickly as possible? Jenny Lee knew a lot more than she was letting on. I also couldn’t help wondering if she ever got her cut of that three thousand dollars.