Taken ec-13

by Robert Crais

  Graffiti covered every square inch of the wreck like psychedelic urban camouflage that was alien to the desert. It was a small airplane, and now, dead on its belly with missing engines and broken windows, it didn’t seem like much of a reason to drive so far.

  The old airplane’s carcass had long been stripped of anything valuable by scavengers and souvenir hunters. The seats were gone, and eye sockets gaped from the control panel where the instruments had been removed. In the back, where the smugglers had probably strapped down bales of weed, were more crusty cans layered with dust.

  We continued past the nose to a clear area, where Trehorn pointed out the black smudge that had been their fire, then made a general wave toward a break in the brush.

  “We parked there, put on some tunes, and built the fire. See the cut wood? People come out, they scrounge shit from the brush, but that stuff makes a shit fire. Chuck brought real wood. It gets cold out here.”

  “Was the fire still burning when you and Chuck took off?”

  “Embers, maybe, but that’s all. It was pretty much done.”

  I circled the plane, found nothing, and was thinking we had driven out for nothing when I saw a brassy glint in the dust ten feet in front of him. I walked over and picked it up.

  Trehorn said, “Whatcha got?”

  “A nine-millimeter shell casing.”

  The brass casing gleamed brightly, indicating it had not been exposed to the elements long enough to tarnish. I held it up, but he wasn’t impressed.

  “People shoot out here all the time. That old plane has more holes than Swiss cheese.”

  I found two more casings a few feet away, and then a spent 12-gauge shotgun shell so new it looked like it had just come from the box.

  Trehorn wandered off, searching along with me, then called from the center of the clearing.

  “Shit. That’s a big sonofabitch.”

  “What?”

  He pointed at the ground.

  “Tires. I run two-fifty-five-sixteens on my Silverado. These gotta be five-seventies. That’s a big honkin’ truck.”

  I didn’t know two-fifty-fives from five-seventies, but the tracks he found were from a vehicle with two large tires mounted on each side. The double-tires suggested a large, heavy truck, but a large, heavy truck would have little reason to be in the middle of nowhere.

  “These here the night you guys were here?”

  Trehorn made a face as he shrugged.

  “I dunno. It was dark.”

  A confusion of footprints and smaller tire tracks crisscrossed the dirt. Some appeared fresher than others, but I couldn’t tell with any precision how recently they were made.

  Trehorn said, “What do you think?”

  “I think a lot of people were here. Which tracks are from your Silverado?”

  “Back by the plane on the other side of our fire. I didn’t come out here. Neither did Chuck.”

  Trehorn followed the large tracks toward the road, but I went in the opposite direction past the fire to the tire tracks he had left that night. When I found a clear example, I drew a large E in the sand, then noted the location relative to their fire and the airplane. I walked past the plane to continue searching the clearing when I saw a white shape caught in a creosote bush. I reached through prickly branches and found a California driver’s license. It pictured an Anglo male with short red hair, lean cheeks, and two bad pimples on his forehead. The name on the DL read M. JACK BERMAN.

  I said, “Well.”

  Trehorn was still on the far side of the airplane, so I pushed the branches aside. Three credit cards bearing Berman’s name and a worn leather wallet were caught in the lower branches. The wallet contained three hundred forty-two dollars in cash.

  I glanced at Trehorn again, wondering if Jack Berman had put his wallet in the bush, and why. The discarded wallet and cash made no sense. If Krista and Jack had left voluntarily, they would not have abandoned the cash. If they were forced away at gunpoint, the person doing the forcing would still take the cash. Good, bad, or indifferent-anyone tossing the wallet would totally keep the cash.

  I pushed deeper into the branches. A slip of paper with a handwritten note was caught on a twig near the bottom of the bush. The note read: Q COY SANCHEZ. A second DL was on the ground at the root of the bush, showing a pretty young woman with golden skin and raven hair named KRISTA LOUISE MORALES.

  I stared at her picture, then studied the note. Q COY SANCHEZ, written in blue ink with a shaky hand that left the oversize letters uneven.

  Trehorn was even farther away, searching the ground as if he hoped to find the Holy Grail. He was worried about his friend Jack Berman, but I did not tell him about the things I found in the bush. I read the note again.

  Q COY SANCHEZ.

  “Danny!”

  He looked over as I tucked the note and the DLs away.

  “Let’s go. There’s nothing here.”

  I wanted to speak with Nita Morales first, and a man named Joe Pike.

  9.

  Three minutes after Danny Trehorn dropped me at my car, I stepped into a cold, crisp Burger King and bought an iced tea. I wanted to think about what I had found before I called Nita Morales because I wasn’t sure what it meant, or what to recommend. Also, I was hot. Palm Springs is like that.

  Here is how the detective (moi) rehearses his report to the client: Krista Morales and Jack Berman arrived safely in Palm Springs, and were seen by others that past Friday night at a remote but well-known desert location. Krista and Jack had driven to that location in Jack’s vehicle, and, at their own request, remained alone when their companions returned to the city. They were neither seen nor heard from again except for two possible extortion calls during which laughably low sums of money were demanded. Six days following that Friday night, the detective ventured (ventured is always a good word to use with clients) to said remote location where he found items belonging to both Morales and Berman, including but not limited to both driver’s licenses, three hundred forty-two dollars in cash, and an incomprehensible note. Q coy Sanchez. Berman’s vehicle was not at the scene, nor were there any overt signs of foul play. (Foul play is another good term.)

  The person who sold me the tea was a bulky young Latino maybe nineteen or twenty years old. His name tag read JOHNNY. When he gave me the change and thanked me, I showed him the note.

  “Hope you don’t mind me asking, but do you read Spanish?”

  “No, man. Sorry. Maybe Imelda-”

  He called to a chunky young woman seated at the drive-through window.

  “Imelda! You read Spanish?”

  She eyed me suspiciously before she answered.

  “A little.”

  She came over and glanced at the note.

  “What’s ‘q coy’ mean?”

  “I was hoping you could translate.”

  “Sanchez is a name.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  She shrugged.

  “I don’t know ‘q coy.’ Maybe it’s misspelled.”

  “Any guesses what they were trying to spell?”

  “No, not really.”

  A drive-through customer appeared, so she returned to her station.

  Other customers had lined up behind me, so I took the iced tea and set up shop in a booth as far from everyone as I could get. Two men wearing Union 76 shirts came in a few minutes later, but they couldn’t translate the note, and neither could a thin woman with two round little boys.

  The woman and boys took a booth near mine. The boys sat together on one side, she sat on the other, and put out cups of vanilla yogurt and French fries. Nothing like balanced nutrition. The boys pushed and pulled at each other as they shoved in the food, and laughed loud so people would look at them. When the woman told them to stop, they ignored her. She looked exhausted, but happy for the distraction when I asked if she read Spanish.

  She studied the note, then handed it back.

  “Sanchez is a name. I don’t know these other words.”

  �
��Okay, thanks for taking a look.”

  “‘Coy’ is kinda familiar, but I don’t know. I think I’m confusing it with something else.”

  “If it comes to you.”

  “I don’t think it’s Spanish.”

  “Okay.”

  The boys pushed and pulled, and when she again told them to stop, they laughed to drown her voice as if she didn’t exist.

  She stared at them with hollow eyes, then leaned toward me and lowered her voice.

  “I hate them. Is that so wrong? I really do hate them.”

  The boys laughed even louder.

  They were still laughing when my phone rang with a number I didn’t recognize.

  “Elvis Cole.”

  “Mary Sue Osborne.”

  I took the phone and tea to a booth farther from the laughing boys. I could see my car in the parking lot, and watching it gave me a reason not to look at the woman hating her horrible little boys.

  “Hey.”

  “Hey back. I looked up your article online. That was a nice piece. They made you seem cool.”

  “Seem?”

  “Check out my bad self. I cracked Krista’s password. I tried all these passwords, and nothing worked, so I got stupid and typed in o-p-e-n. Shazam, and I found Jack’s address.”

  “You made my day.”

  “This would be true. I should be rewarded.”

  “What’s his address?”

  She rattled off an address on Tigertail Road in Brentwood. Tigertail was in an affluent canyon in the hills west of the Sepulveda Pass. Jack’s parents did pretty well.

  I said, “As long as I have you, let me ask you something-do you speak Spanish?”

  “ Si, amigo. Well, poquito. I’m fluent in French and Italian, but I can get by in Spanish.”

  “I’m going to read you something. I think it’s Spanish.”

  I read it, then spelled it. Q coy Sanchez.

  She said, “It isn’t Spanish.”

  “That’s what everyone says.”

  “Did Kris write it?”

  “Would it matter? Let’s say she did.”

  She was silent for a moment.

  “I’m guessing, but I think it says ask about a coyote named Sanchez.”

  “It does?”

  “The Q. It’s a shorthand we use at the paper. Query, question, ask. Coy-you write fast, you abbreviate. I’m guessing ‘coyote’ because every article on her desk is something about coyotes sneaking people across the border. Also, I’m a genius.”

  “I loves me a smart chick.”

  “I knew you’d see the light. They always do.”

  “Okay, there’s one more thing.”

  “I know. You want me to read all these articles to see if a coyote named Sanchez is mentioned.”

  “Affirmative.”

  She made a big deal of sighing.

  “I’m so easy. You should take advantage of me.”

  “Thanks, buddy. This is a big help.”

  “Buddy. Every girl’s dream, being a hot guy’s buddy.”

  “I’m old enough to be your father. Kinda.”

  “Only small minds are limited by society’s conventions.”

  I was still smiling when I hung up and phoned Nita Morales. She was in a meeting, but immediately came to the phone. I told her where I was, launched into a rundown of what I had learned. I was just beginning to build up momentum when she surprised me.

  “She went to that airplane?”

  “You know about it?”

  “This is how I came. She wanted to know what coming north was like, so I told her. Meeting there was common then if you came up the Imperial Valley. Our guide called it the airport. It was a safe place to meet and easy to find. He would say, tomorrow we are going to land at the airport, and you will get on another airplane. I hope that pilot knows how to fly. He thought this was funny.”

  “What was your coyote’s name?”

  “We did not call them coyotes. They were our guides.”

  “Okay. Who was he?”

  “I don’t think I ever knew. I was seven.”

  “Have you heard of a coyote named Sanchez?”

  She sounded annoyed.

  “I don’t know people like this. People in my situation, we’re not part of some underground society. You think we get together, have margarita parties, and laugh it up about how we put one over on Uncle Sam? I was seven. It’s something you try to put behind you. These things are not part of my life.”

  I told her about the things I found in the bush, including the handwritten note.

  “Mary Sue thinks it means ‘ask a coyote named Sanchez.’”

  “Ask what?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe it has nothing to do with where she is or why she’s missing, but if she wanted to ask Sanchez something, then I want to ask him, too.”

  “The attorney I saw knows about these things.”

  “The attorney you saw when you looked into changing your status?”

  “Yes. He is an immigration attorney who is sympathetic in these matters. I know he represents undocumented people when they are arrested. I have his number.”

  “Okay.”

  “Thomas Locano. He was very nice. Here-”

  She gave me a number with a Pasadena area code. I asked her to call him. As her attorney at that time, he would need her permission to share information.

  “Mr. Cole? I will call the police if you think it is best.”

  “I’ve been involved less than five hours. Let’s see what develops.”

  “I would give up everything for her, Mr. Cole. Without hesitation. I want you to know this.”

  “I know you would, but you won’t have to. Nothing happening now is about you. It’s about finding Krista and bringing her home. The police won’t ask your status, and don’t care.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Outside, a red Jeep Cherokee pulled into the parking lot and parked beside my car. The man inside did not get out. He waited without moving, dark glasses locked forward, immobile as a statue.

  I checked the time.

  “Yes. I’m sure. This is why I’m the World’s Greatest Detective.”

  “You are trying to make me smile again.”

  “Yep.”

  “It did not work.”

  “I know. But I had to try.”

  I put away my phone, and went out to the Jeep. The man behind the wheel looked at me as I climbed into the passenger seat, but said nothing. Conversation was not his strong point.

  Pike, Joseph, no middle initial, learned the tracking arts as a boy who grew up at the edge of a logging town, and later refined those same arts when he hunted men first as a combat Marine, then later as an LAPD police officer and a private military contractor in Africa, Central America, and the Middle East. If I was good at hunting men, Pike was better. Pike had also been my partner in the agency since we bought it together, and my friend for even longer.

  “Thanks for coming.”

  His head dipped once. A two-hour drive, and he had come without asking why, and without explanation.

  Now, I told him about Krista Morales, her Friday night at the crash site, and what I found when I walked the scene. I gave him the nine-millimeter brass casings and the spent shotgun shell.

  “I found these. Trehorn says people shoot out there, so they might not matter.”

  Pike sniffed the brass as if the smell would tell him something, then handed them back. Maybe he could follow their scent.

  “I marked Trehorn’s track with an E. The bigger truck is a quad. I want your read on what happened.”

  Pike nodded again.

  “You want me to take you out there?”

  He shook his head. I had already texted him the longitude and latitude coordinates from my iPhone.

  “Want Trehorn?”

  “I’m good alone.”

  “Okay. I’m going to see this attorney. Let me know what you find.”

  It was one-thirty-two that afternoon when I left Pik
e in the desert, and drove to see Thomas Locano.

  10

  Thomas Locano had a nice suite of offices on the second floor of a two-story building overlooking Mission Street in South Pasadena. His was an older building with a red tile roof, plaster walls, and heavy wooden doors. Like the building, Locano was a gracious man in his early sixties. Two younger associates were employed in his practice, and his assistant was also his wife. Elizabeth, she told me as she led me into his office.

  Locano smiled when he stood to greet me, but appeared uncomfortable.

  Elizabeth Locano said, “Would you like coffee, Mr. Cole? Or something else?”

  “I’m fine, ma’am. Thank you.”

  She did not close the door on the way out.

  Mr. Locano came from behind his desk so we could sit together in comfortable, overstuffed chairs, and offered a firm, dry hand.

  “Nita tells me you’re working for her, and are aware of her status issue.”

  “Yes, sir, I am. Did she tell you why I’m here?”

  “Her daughter is missing. She believes it has something to do with her status, so she asked me to speak freely with you about these things.”

  I passed him the note from the crash site.

  “I found this twenty miles outside of Palm Springs at the crash site of an old drug smuggler’s plane. I believe it was written by Nita’s daughter.”

  He frowned at the note, then tried to pass it back, but I didn’t take it.

  “This isn’t Spanish.”

  “No, sir. We believe it means ‘ask a coyote named Sanchez’ or ‘ask about a coyote named Sanchez.’ So that’s what I’m doing. Do you know of a coyote named Sanchez who brings people north through the Imperial Valley?”

  Mr. Locano lowered the note. His cool expression told me I had insulted him.

  “My practice is immigration law. I help clients obtain visas and green cards, and fight deportation and removal orders. If you believe I’m involved in something illegal, you misunderstand the nature of my work.”