No Witness

by Warren C Easley

  I forwarded Timoteo’s email to Nando’s office manager, Esperanza, with this note: Hello dear, any way one of Nando’s photo jocks can lighten the shadows on the figures in the last two photos? I’m interested in their facial features. Thx in advance, Cal.

  I knew Esperanza would expedite my request, but the thought of waiting was still frustrating.

  I called Timoteo next to fill him in and compliment him for the job he and Mariana had done. “Keep up the surveillance on Harris this week,” I said to finish up. “I’ll let you know if photo eight reveals anything. By the way,” I added, “How was your dinner tonight?”

  A long pause. “It was, um, okay after we put out the kitchen fire. Frying tortillas in hot oil is always a little tricky.” He chuckled. “The kitchen’s fine, and Zoe didn’t get burned or anything. Please don’t tell her I told you about this. I don’t think she wanted me to say anything about it.”

  I smiled to myself. “Don’t worry, I won’t. She’s a brilliant psychologist, but she’s just learning how to cook.”

  “I know. She’s with Mamá now,” he said, suddenly struggling to control his voice. “She’s got her talking, Cal. I’m so grateful for that.”

  ***

  That night, close to midnight, I took Archie out for a stretch before we turned in. A breeze carrying a hint of winter stirred the upper reaches of my Doug firs and drove shreds of clouds across the moon like gray ghosts. I zipped my coat and put the collar up as Archie dashed ahead into the darkness. The great horned owl was silent. As I approached the gate, I could just make out my dog up ahead. He stood motionless facing the stand of firs and understory of blackberries, sword ferns, and salal that lined the west side of my property. When I caught up to him, he was growling, a low, guttural warning.

  “What is it, Big Boy?” He whimpered a couple of times and looked up at me for permission to chase whatever it was he’d heard. “No,” I said firmly. It wasn’t the first time he’d heard some creature in the night I was unaware of. It happened fairly often, but there was something visceral in the tone of his growl that made me wary. I started back, but he didn’t move. I clicked my tongue sharply a couple of times, and he reluctantly followed me.

  Back at the house, I locked up and poured myself a couple of fingers of Rémy Martin. It was probably nothing but a skunk or a deer out there, I reassured myself. But before I climbed into bed that night, I took my Glock 17 down from the shelf in the closet and set the weapon on my nightstand. I tossed and turned for a good half hour before finally drifting off.

  Sleeping with a loaded gun was not my favorite thing. Like Yogi said, it was déjà vu all over again.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  The wind intensified overnight, and owing to my ancient heating system and leaky, single-pane windows, Arch and I awoke to a cold, drafty house. I got dressed in a hurry and scampered down the back staircase to turn on the espresso machine. Scoured by the wind, the sky was bright cobalt blue, and every so often a detached branch from a Doug fir tumbled across the scene like a wounded duck. The wind was nature’s way of pruning the big trees, and it meant a serious cleanup session lay ahead at the Aerie. Lucky me.

  Carrying a cup of hot cappuccino into my study, I logged on for a quick check of the news. The local paper, the biweekly News-Register published the day before, made no mention of the Plácido Ballesteros murder, which was just as well. However, the lead headline jumped out at me: ICE ARRESTS 5 IN YAMHILL COUNTY. I skimmed the piece, which described how early the previous Friday ICE agents stopped a van on its way to a large wholesale nursery near Unionvale. According to an ICE spokesman, the van was targeted because agents were looking for an unnamed suspect, who turned out not to be in the van. “Because of state sanctuary policies,” the article went on, “we have no choice but to continue to conduct targeted arrests with less-than-perfect intelligence, which inevitably results in collateral arrests.” The spokesman was Field Supervisor Curtis Drake, I noted.

  I sipped my coffee and brooded on that for a while, trying to imagine what it would feel like to be on my way to work and have my life suddenly ripped apart. I looked back at the headline and noticed the byline for the first time—Mariana Suarez. I smiled and immediately called Timoteo. “Yeah,” he explained, “the News-Register’s lead reporter was down with the flu, so Mariana asked her boss if she could cover the story, and she let her.”

  “A front-page story. Tell her congratulations. It was well written.”

  “I will. She loved doing it, but it was painful, too, given what happened to her uncle. She said there was no way ICE had a specific target in mind. That was just an excuse to stop a van full of Latinos on their way to work. She went straight to the holding center and demanded an interview with Curtis Drake. A rude, arrogant asshole, I believe were the words she used, but she got the interview and stood up to him.”

  There was a ring of pride in Timoteo’s voice that couldn’t be missed. Small things can warm a cold morning.

  On the way to the office, I pulled over after turning onto Worden Hill and let Archie out of the back seat. My property line lay another fifty yards to the east, and I chose that spot for a reason. The soft earth on the shoulder was churned up in a couple of spots. I dropped to one knee and looked closely. There may have been evidence of tire tracks from a two-wheeled vehicle, but my untrained eye couldn’t tell for sure. A car pulling off with one set of wheels on the pavement would have left a similar track. Farther along the thick understory spanning the strip I noticed a faint trail leading toward my property, probably a path used by coyotes, skunks, and other night critters. With Archie trailing behind, I followed the narrow trail, keeping an eye out for evidence of fresh passage. I saw none, although I surmised that it would have been easy for someone to traverse the path without leaving any traces, at least none I could see. At my fence line, a sizeable, well-worn trench under the wire confirmed it was, indeed, on an active animal trail.

  I turned to leave and noticed something—a single thread caught between two protruding pieces of wire at a fence post. Not the cleanest piece of fence work, it was done by yours truly nearly a decade earlier. I probably wouldn’t have noticed had the thread not been fluttering in the breeze like a tiny flag. I plucked it off and examined it closely. It was black and didn’t look particularly weathered, although I couldn’t tell for sure.

  Had someone snagged a coat or sweater the night before?

  When I got back in my car, I called Darci Tate. “You think El Solitario is still around and might have been casing your place last night?” she said after I filled her in.

  “It’s a definite maybe.”

  She laughed softly. “Your dog growling, an indeterminate tire track, and a single black thread, yeah, I’d definitely put it in the maybe category. You know, this dude’s risking a lot by staying local and cruising around on a Kawasaki, one that we’re on full alert for.”

  “Maybe his contract’s still open, and he’s got a mortgage payment to make. If it was him last night, he came here around midnight. Carlos Fuentes thought he heard a motorcycle around three a.m. leaving Plácido’s house. It appears El Solitario moves late at night when he feels safer.”

  “Maybe. About Fuentes’s statement—we covered the houses in his neighborhood. Nobody heard a motorcycle at three a.m.”

  “Heavy sleepers?” She chuckled again, and I added, “No word on the DNA from the hair follicle?”

  “Ha,” she barked with derision. “It’s the state lab. You know how fucking slow they are. But we do have the ballistics back on the Fuentes’s shootings. The bullets match. Same shooter for Olivia and Luis, like we expected.”

  “That’s good to know. It’s not going to be Fuentes’s DNA, Darci. Count on it.”

  “We’ll see. Meanwhile, watch your back.”

  ***

  That morning at the office started slowly, but at half past ten I caught a glimpse of a dark-blu
e Land Rover as it turned off the Pacific Highway onto my driveway. A knock at the back door followed, and when I opened it, Diego Vargas stood there with a nervous grin. His boss, Gavin Whittaker, stood behind him.

  “We’re headed to Portland this morning. Saw your office and decided to stop by,” Whittaker said with what I took to be his version of a friendly smile. “Should have called first, but I know you wanted to talk to Diego.” Vargas dropped his gaze and studied his boots at the mention of his name.

  “Great. Come on in.” I shook both their hands, and after they were seated, looked directly at Vargas. “As I mentioned that night at the cantina, I’m working with the Fuentes family concerning the murder of their daughter, Olivia. I—”

  “Yes, I explained all that to him,” Whittaker interrupted with an impatient tone. “He’s here to tell you what he told the police, that he knows nothing about the murder or the attempt on her brother’s life.”

  I swallowed a comeback and kept my eyes on Vargas. “Let’s start with the present and work backward, okay?” A tentative nod. “One of the young men you counseled at the Tequila Cantina, Plácido Ballesteros, has been murdered. I know you’ve been interviewed by the police about that, but is there anything you can tell me? Something you might have forgotten or didn’t feel comfortable sharing with them?”

  “What’s to tell? I heard the police arrested the girl’s father.” Whittaker again.

  Ignoring him, I stayed focused on Vargas. His hooded eyes flared ever so slightly. His face was taut. “No, nothing. I am very sad about Plácido. He seemed like a good young man.”

  “A good young man? He was an accomplice in a murder and an attempted murder.”

  Vargas lowered his eyes, and Whittaker chimed in again. “He’s not responsible for the kid, for Christ’s sake. He was just trying to help him out.”

  I held my gaze on Vargas. “Who did he associate with at the cantina?”

  Vargas pushed out his lower lip and shook his head. “I didn’t notice.”

  “Really? You were one big, happy family. Isn’t that what you told me that night?” He hesitated. “And the shiv in my tire. Do you know who did that?”

  “He can’t give you any names,” Whittaker broke in. “You know that. He gave his word.”

  I locked onto Vargas’s eyes. “But you have names, right? You must have a list of names, addresses, a means of communicating with these young men?”

  He shot a quick glance to Whittaker, then back to me, his face frozen. That’s when I saw it—a look of fear that was eerily familiar. Deciding to back off, I smiled with as much warmth as I could muster. “I get it. I understand your reluctance, and your work is commendable, Diego. On another subject, do you know of any connections between the young men you counsel and Prosperar, the medical facility where Olivia Fuentes worked?”

  “No connections other than Luis, the girl’s brother. I just drive Mr. Whittaker there sometimes, that is all.” The answer sounded rehearsed.

  I leaned back in my chair and smiled again. “Okay.” When Vargas’s face relaxed somewhat, I came back at him with decided emphasis. “What about Robert Harris? Do you know him?” It was a gamble to reveal my suspicion of Harris, but I decided to chance it.

  Vargas looked at his boss, his face taut again, a vein pulsing in his neck. “I, ah, don’t—”

  “You know, Robert, the guy at Prosperar,” Whittaker coaxed. “We’ve given him a ride a couple of times.”

  “Oh, sí,” Vargas answered, forcing a thin, uncomfortable smile.

  Whittaker looked at me. “Why are you asking about Harris?”

  I shrugged while scrambling to come up with a suitable answer. “I’m posing that question to everyone involved. He and Olivia were rumored to be romantically linked.”

  Whittaker looked incredulous. “You’ve got to be kidding.” Then, glancing at his watch, he stood up, and Vargas vaulted out of his seat. “I’ve got a meeting in Portland in twenty-five minutes.”

  I thanked them, showed them out, and afterward sat at my desk drumming my fingers. Puppet and puppet master. There was no other way to interpret what I just witnessed. Was Whittaker simply acting out of misplaced sympathy, trying to shield Vargas from what he saw as an invasive or unnecessary line of questioning? Perhaps, although that didn’t square with the most salient fact coming out of the interview—Diego Vargas was as spit-dry frightened as Robert Harris.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  “A million, about what I expected,” Ned Gillian said over the phone an hour later. He was describing the bail that had been set for Carlos Fuentes. “Chad and Hillary Angel did a great job of vouching for Carlos’s character and emphasizing his deep roots in the Red Hills, but Judge McMaster gave a lot of weight to his undocumented status.”

  “How’d Carlos take it?”

  “Like everything else, stoically. But I don’t think it’s sunk in just how long it will be before we go to trial. A guy like him who’s work-oriented and full of energy is going to have a tough time dealing with incarceration.”

  Maybe we can short-circuit that, I thought but didn’t say. I described my interview with Diego Vargas, how he didn’t give me anything useful and how Gavin Whittaker seemed to orchestrate the outcome.

  “You think they’re trying to hide something?” Gillian said.

  “The thought crossed my mind, but if they are, I couldn’t tell you what it is.” I stopped short of relating my take on the state of fear that both Vargas and Harris seemed to share. Gillian had enough on his plate, and, besides, I was still processing it.

  ***

  The wine merchant who was being sued arrived at his appointment that afternoon, and we spent an hour going through his case. I wrote up some notes and then called my other new client, the one facing her second DUI. She’d obviously been drinking, so the call didn’t go well. I told her there were people who could help her and gave her an AA contact. I doubted she’d follow through, but it was as much as I could do at that point in time.

  At midafternoon, Luis Fuentes called. “A weird thing happened,” he said after we greeted each other. “A dude who said he hung out at the cantina called me. I didn’t remember him. Anyway, he said he wanted to meet with me, that he heard I was looking for information. I think he wants to sell it, but we didn’t get into that.”

  I became fully alert. “How did he know to call you?”

  “I’ve been quietly nosing around, like you asked. I guess he heard about it. I’d left my cell number with some folks I trust who have connections.”

  “Did you arrange anything?”

  “Not quite. He wanted to meet at his place tonight at seven.” A nervous laugh. “I told him no fucking way. I suggested Lumpy’s Tavern in Dundee, but he wasn’t down for a public meeting. I told him I’d find a private place and get back to him. What do you think?”

  “Smart not to trust him.” I paused, mulling it over. “Tell him we’ll meet at my office at seven. Tell him I’m your attorney. He’ll figure I’m good for some money.”

  Luis agreed, and that’s where we left it.

  At close to four thirty, my email inbox pinged, a message from Esperanza:

  This is the best we could do. Hope it helps. XXX.

  I clicked on the attachment and downloaded the photo Timoteo had designated as number seven. I leaned in and squinted at it for few moments. The male figure exiting the bar was definitely Robert Harris. I downloaded photo eight. The legs and torso of the figure were well resolved, but the partially shadowed face was still sketchy. I leaned in further and could just make out the traces of a beard, a beard in the style of a Vandyke.

  “I knew it!” I blurted out. “That’s Curtis Drake, no question.” My outburst caused Archie to jump up with a concerned look on his face.

  I concentrated on the enhanced image again and noticed something else—Drake clutched a flat, rectangular object
in his left hand that was partially shielded by his body. A newspaper? A file folder or sheaf of papers? I couldn’t tell for sure.

  My pulse ticked up as I went back to Timoteo’s original email and downloaded the first photograph—taken in better light—that showed Robert Harris entering the bar earlier that evening. I looked closely and this time saw the corner of something in his left hand that was almost completely obscured by his body. A newspaper? A file folder or sheaf of papers? Again, I couldn’t tell, but my hunch said the latter.

  I looked over at Arch, who was now watching me intently from his spot in the corner. “Whataya know, Big Boy? The spiderweb has another thread.” He showed his approval by wagging his backside and whimpering a couple of times.

  I was lost in thought when my phone went off a few minutes later. “Just checking in,” Timoteo said. “Mariana and I are in position at Prosperar, waiting for Harris to come out.”

  “Good.” I described what I’d just uncovered.

  “Wow,” he said when I finished, his voice inflected with youthful enthusiasm. “It looks like Harris and the guy who runs the holding center, Drake, met in that bar.”

  “For sure. That was no coincidence.”

  “And they exchanged something,” Timoteo continued.

  “That’s a little more speculative, but my hunch says yes, something was exchanged.”

  “Shit. Mariana and I missed that completely. What a couple of assholes!” I heard her moan in the background. Timoteo had the call on speaker.

  I laughed. “Hey, don’t beat yourselves up, guys. We wouldn’t have any of this without your initiative.”

  A momentary pause, their modest way of accepting the compliment. “What do you think they exchanged?” Mariana asked.

  “That’s what we need to find out. I have a hunch it’s what’s driving this whole thing.”