The Friday Edition (A Samantha Church Mystery)

by Ferrendelli, Betta

  “Well, well,” she whispered as she collected the snippets of paper.

  She set the paper on the desk to smooth out the wrinkles. “It looks like some kind of a news report,” she said softly and frowned as she studied the newspaper article.

  One section of the newsprint was in small block letters typed in bold:

  HUNDREDS OF ACCOUNTS FROZEN ACROSS THE C ...

  Sam’s frown deepened. The rest of the sentence was gone. She smoothed the wrinkles from the second piece of newspaper and felt her hope surge into anxiety. She scanned the article slowly, moving her index finger carefully beneath the words.

  “Hundreds of bank accounts, some holding as much as $400 million in Colombian and Mexican drug cartel money, were frozen yesterday. The move has been viewed by law enforcement experts as a dividend of the U.S. attack on Panama.

  The federal government announced that it had blocked access to 684 bank accounts, mostly in New York and Florida. Officials requested transaction records on 70 more accounts as part of a massive probe into the flow of drug money in and out of the United States ...”

  Sam arched an eyebrow. Her anxiety rose a notch. “When was yesterday?” She read on.

  “Drug cartel accounts were traced to banks in 22 states and the District of Columbia. Federal officials have noted that there was no evidence linking any of the banks with solicitation of drug money. Federal officials also said that some banks in America were being investigated.

  Three local banks – First Security Bank, the National Bank of Grandview and Smith National Bank – have accounts that federal authorities were planning to investigate.

  In Miami yesterday, federal agents issued subpoenas to 87 banks, ordering them either to block transfer of funds from accounts or to supply all records for these acco...”

  “Damn!” she said and read the tattered pieces again, but saw nothing else written on the page.

  Robin, I want to help you, but how? Tell me how?

  She grabbed the trashcan, pulled it within reach and dumped the rest of the contents on the floor. She scooped up the pieces of paper and put them on the desk. Slowly and precisely she began to smooth out the remaining pieces of the newspaper. Within fifteen minutes, she had reassembled most of the jigsaw puzzle.

  “… Eventually, prosecutors will file civil forfeiture papers to seize any money found in the accounts. Similar subpoenas were being served on more than 50 New York City banks.

  The actions were tied to a three-year federal investigation known as Operation Iceberg. It involved Justice and Treasury department agents in several states.

  One part of that investigation led to indictments in several American cities this past spring. Charges included drug smuggling and illegal money laundering.

  An affidavit in that case, unsealed yesterday, outlined how the operation worked …”

  Her frustration mounting, Sam looked again in the trashcan, but it was empty. She glanced at the paper again. She was surprised to see that she had missed something. A name was printed on the lower right hand corner of the article and underlined twice.

  Sam recognized the familiar script. Robin had written the name, Roy Rogers.

  The Silver Screen Cowboy?

  She half-scanned the page looking for reference to Trigger and Dale Evans. She had a hunch, however, that this had nothing to do with a western and this Roy Rogers was not one of the good guys.

  Sam last talked to Robin the morning of Christmas Eve. Robin said she planned to leave the office by two that afternoon. They were having an office party that afternoon and then she was going home. Sam knew that Robin would be home alone Christmas Eve. Todd had gone home to California for the holidays. He had asked Robin to accompany him, but she declined. As long as Nona was alive, Robin would always be with her on Christmas.

  If only she would’ve gone.

  Sam closed her eyes, rested her elbows on the desk and gently massaged her temples. She didn’t know if this was a new headache, or the nagging one that had been with her since Christmas morning. She shrugged her shoulders and forced herself to sit up straight. She grabbed the key and unlocked the center desk drawer.

  A brief search netted a Denver Post newspaper article centered in the middle of the drawer. A grainy black-and-white of two Denver police officers taking a man away in handcuffs accompanied the article.

  Sam recognized the reporter’s byline, W. Robert Simmons. Just seeing the name made her lip curl slightly. Walter was his real name, but he went by his middle name. They never got along when she worked there and nothing had changed. She read the bold-faced headline that spread across the top of the page:

  11 Arrested, $1 million Seized in Cocaine Investigation

  A deckhead explained more of the article:

  Denver International Airport hub for transfer

  of drugs from Colombia to Cheyenne

  She read eagerly, her eyes moving quickly across the page. The article reported that officials were calling the drug bust one of the largest cocaine investigations in the Rocky Mountain region in recent years. Twenty-two pounds of the drug had been seized at DIA. The street value totaled more than $1 million.

  The seizure had come after the arrest of several street-level dealers, capping a two-year drug investigation. After entering the United States, drugs were shipped from Los Angeles to Denver and Greeley. Simmons’ article reported that the Wyoming capital was also a major destination point for the shipments.

  As Sam read, she remembered that Jonathan once told her about one of the biggest drug investigation the Metro Area Drug Task Force Unit had successfully handled. As the lead officer for the unit, Jonathan was proud of his efforts on that investigation. The Metro Area Drug Task Force investigators broke a drug smuggling ring that had been operating from the Truman County Airport.

  She remembered he said that his team of investigators had used electronic intercept devices to listen to their suspects’ conversations and learned that they were disguising drug deals with electronic codes punched into their pagers. Hard to imagine now with smart phones and the like that people still used pagers, but Jonathan always used to tell her that they had their place in the drug-dealing world.

  Jonathan told Sam they had capped that drug investigation after a tip that sixty-five pounds of cocaine could be found stashed in the cockpit of a small jet that had flown to the county airport from Latin America.

  Sam recalled Jonathan had told her that the informant knew everything there was to know about the smuggling operation, right down to the details of the 100-pound bricks of cocaine wrapped in black plastic and stuffed in the jet’s overhead panel. One of W. Robert Simmons’ stories, she remembered, reported that the street value of that cocaine was almost $3 million.

  The article Sam found in Robin’s desk had the same story line, but a different day and a different drug bust with a different street value. She folded the article and put it in her jacket pocket. Then she ran her hand along the inside of the drawer and hit a blunt object. She grasped it and pulled it into the light.

  It was a pager.

  She shook her head and smiled. For a moment she did not realize the implications of the pager, then she was seized with a sudden burst of fear so bleak and powerful that she was unprepared for her own reaction. She rested her hands flat on the desk to steady herself.

  Was Robin murdered over drug deal gone wrong?

  Was she blackmailing someone? Did she know something she shouldn’t have?

  Sam felt her fear beginning to get out of control so she forced her attention back to the pager. She pressed the display button. The pager responded with only one number.

  555-1618

  She did not recognize the number. She picked up the phone and dialed, but quickly disconnected the call. She would call later from home.

  She searched the rest of Robin’s desk but found nothing. She clipped the pager to her sweatpants, slipped quietly from the office and hurried toward the fire exit, where she knew she could leave the building
without being seen.

  The cold night air took her breath away. The chill filled her with a sense of relief to be out of the building. She hurried to her Mustang, and when she was safely inside, she removed the crumbled pieces of paper from her jacket pocket. Something in one of the paragraphs had set off an alarm within her earlier.

  She scanned the paragraphs until she reached the words she wanted. Then she held her breath and read and reread them.

  “The National Bank of Grandview.”

  Eleven

  “What are you doing here?” Jonathan asked looking from his desk to see Sam standing at his office door.

  “I knocked, but you didn’t hear me,” she said.

  “Sorry,” Jonathan said and spread his hands over the paperwork on his desk as if to say, ‘I’m busy.’

  She entered the office without waiting for an invitation. She walked to a set of identical chairs facing his desk and sat down.

  The office was small and bland, but a large window behind the desk allowed a generous portion of natural light to filter into the office. A generic painting of two couples walking arm-in-arm along a waterway filled with sailboats was to the left of the window. But Sam found the picture unappealing. She thought it was odd that the artist had painted the water green.

  To the left of the painting was Jonathan’s college diploma. Next were two certificates of merit and a special commendation award for work with the Grandview Drug Task Force Unit. A smaller photograph showed Jonathan and the governor shaking hands as he received the certificates.

  A pair of in-and-out baskets stood like bookends on his desk. Even with evidence of the day’s work spread out before him, the desk was neat and orderly. There was a 5-x-7 photograph on the desk that faced Jonathan. Sam knew it was a picture of April.

  “Do you always greet people that way when they come to your office?” she asked.

  He sat back against his chair and eyed her curiously.

  “Sam,” he said matter-of-factly, “you’re never in my office.”

  “Don’t say never. I’ve been in here many times, just not recently,” Sam said and took a brief moment to study him.

  He wore a starched white shirt and an olive-colored tie with small stripes of black and white, which neatly agreed with his olive-colored slacks. She noticed that his beard was gone, making him look younger than his forty-one years.

  “Are you doing something different with your hair?” he asked, appraising her carefully over the rims of his wire-frame glasses.

  She absentmindedly raised a hand to her hair and pushed her bangs from her eyes.

  “I had it highlighted,” she said faintly, almost embarrassed by his attention.

  The black turtleneck she wore deepened the new color, making it look rich and silky. She had highlighted her hair the day after Robin’s funeral, and for no particular reason other than she had grown tired of looking fat and old, and feeling homely when she looked in the mirror. She had been leery about having it done. Now she was glad she had. It refreshed her image and made her appearance softer. She liked what she saw today. She was grateful for the compliment, even if it was from him.

  “It looks good, like you used to wear it,” he said.

  “Thank you,’ she said softly. “I don’t know what made me decide to do it. Time for a change, I guess.”

  Jonathan fidgeted with a paper clip for a moment as an awkward silence hung in the air. “You didn’t come to talk about highlights, I guess. What brings you here?” he asked.

  Sam had been hesitant to come. She wasn’t certain she could trust Jonathan. She wouldn’t tell him that she had been in Robin’s office last night, but she knew she could ask certain questions without raising his suspicions. She had called Todd and wanted to tell him about her findings and the mention of Grandview National Bank. She wanted to ask about Roy Rogers, but something about their conversation didn’t feel right either.

  “The last day Robin and I spent together we went Christmas shopping.”

  Jonathan nodded.

  “We had a conversation that, well, surprised me.”

  “Oh?” Jonathan said and leaned forward in his chair. “What about?”

  “About smuggling drugs in and out of Denver.”

  “Why were you talking about something like that?” Jonathan asked.

  Sam shrugged her shoulders, trying to act indifferent to his query.

  “We were having coffee when she brought it up.”

  “What did she say?”

  “Not much, but enough that I wanted to know more. I had planned to talk with her again after that, but, well ...”

  She failed to finish her sentence. Jonathan waited for her to continue.

  She went on. “Robin made a comment about how easy it was for drugs to flow in and out of Denver. You’re in charge of the drug task force unit, Jonathan, is it true Denver is an easy city in which to smuggle dope?”

  He removed his glasses and rubbed his eyes considering how to answer her question.

  “Actually Robin was right. Metro Denver’s a Mecca for meth-pushers,” Jonathan said, repositioning his glasses. “We’re here in the middle of the country. Lots of little county airports. Interstates running in every direction. It’s a perfect distribution center.”

  “Obviously it’s big business,” Sam said.

  Jonathan nodded. “And getting bigger. Methamphetamine use continues to rise in Colorado and the heroin chic is alive and well. Denver used to be about five years behind California and Arizona where meth use is already out of control. Everybody around here expected the worst and it happened – a meth avalanche hit Colorado pretty hard.”

  She leaned forward in her chair with interest.

  “I’ve heard so much about meth, but was is it exactly?” Sam asked earnestly.

  Jonathan studied Sam a minute before he responded.

  “Methamphetamine is a stimulant that has a lot of street names: meth, speed, well, it used to be called speed, crank, and ice,” he said and gestured with his hands as he spoke.

  “It’s also highly addictive,” Sam added.

  “Right,” Jonathan returned. “And it’s poisonous and it destroys the human body rapidly. You can spot a user almost immediately, rotting teeth, open sores on the skin and extreme emaciation. Meth has always been the drug world’s bottom feeder. Want to know what makes it such a dirty, trashy drug?”

  Her eyes widened with interest.

  “The people who make it like to throw things like diet and cold pills, antifreeze, drain cleaner and corrosive acids into the mix.”

  “How long has Denver been a major meth manufacturing center?” Sam asked.

  He shook his head. “It started a few years ago. The speed scene here was more a clique than a cartel. In fact, there are quickie meth labs all over metro Denver. These labs can crank out methamphetamine in thirty minutes by using a mixture of cold tablets, anhydrous ammonia and lithium metal found in car batteries.

  “These meth labs skimmed only the surface of the drug scene. They had developed this drug smuggling cabal into a science, a perverse system that ran smoothly, efficiently and effectively. And you want to know something else?”

  Jonathan paused, allowing Sam to catch up with him.

  He went on. “These people make money. Lots of it. Cash flows like the Mississippi.”

  A knock at the door interrupted their conversation. Wyatt Gilmore poked his head inside the office, surprised to see Sam.

  “Sam, uh, nice to see you.”

  She nodded. “How’s Brady?”

  Brady had been on her mind since the funeral.

  “Better,” Wyatt said. “I don’t know what came over him the other day. Sorry.”

  She nodded to accept his apologies.

  “Sam’s here getting background for a possible news article,” Jonathan said.

  Sam looked at Jonathan with surprise, as if to say ‘that’s not why I’m here.’ Wyatt’s face softened as he registered interest.

  “What
kind of story?”

  Sam opened her mouth but Jonathan answered for her.

  “Apparently she and Robin had an interesting conversation about drug smuggling just before her death.”

  Jonathan’s words forced Wyatt to enter the office.

  “What sort of operation?” he asked.

  Wyatt listened intently, his back against the wall and his beefy arms folded tightly against his chest as Jonathan briefed him about their discussion. After he finished, Wyatt looked from Sam to Jonathan.

  “You know you’re talking to the best man for the information,” he said. “I’ll let you two continue.”

  Wyatt looked at Jonathan. “Come see me when you’re through. We need to go to property and evidence.”

  Jonathan nodded.

  “Good to see you, Sam,” Wyatt said looking at her.

  When Wyatt left the office Sam looked to Jonathan as if to say, “where were we?”

  He took her cue.

  “As I was telling you, the meth scene here is more like a clique than a cartel. We used to know all the meth heads by name. It was the white-trash drug made in America until the Mexicans got their hands on it.”

  “What happened?” Sam asked.

  “In 1994, the feds restricted the sale of ephedrine, a main ingredient in methamphetamine. Unfortunately, the clampdown didn’t do much to put a stop to domestic meth. You don’t know how easy it is to get ephedrine in Mexico. Latino drug gangs who export cocaine and marijuana to the U.S. saw a great opportunity to diversify.”

  He stopped to watch her reaction.

  “What did the Latin American drug gangs do?” Sam asked, shifting in her chair.

  “If they weren’t shipping meth, they were sending ephedrine north to clandestine labs in rural California and Arizona,” he said.

  “So what you’re telling me,” Sam said, tapping an index finger against her lips, “Is that it didn’t take long for Mexican meth to reach Colorado, right?”

  Jonathan nodded.

  “So what does it mean?” she asked.