I’d read endless news reports about the trade in wild animals. It was a different matter to hold a quivering bird in my hands and feel the too-thin breast muscle. This one had a toe missing, a raw stump. Strangers crowded together had fought to space themselves out and the weak couldn’t escape. I released it into an animal carrier.
I caught birds and Denny stacked carriers in the van, where the heater was running. I was grateful they weren’t in the barn with meth—at least we didn’t have to rinse them. By lunch time, I had most of them caught up and we were low on carriers. I hadn’t added any injuries except a broken feather or two.
Ready for food and a break, I pulled off my gloves, shut the back-room door behind me, and looked around the marijuana part of the barn. The activity level was diminished, with only two technicians working. Denny wandered around uselessly. “This is old shit,” he announced. “The water tubes are starting to crack and so are the buckets. They’ve been growing for years.” He poked a finger into a bucket.
“Denny, these cops are focused on the drugs. They might not have looked for evidence about the wildlife violations. Don’t mess anything up.”
“Right. Maybe they missed something. I’ll look around.”
Not what I meant, but I was okay with it.
I spent a few minutes sorting through a garbage can in the corner of the grow room until a technician noticed and told me to leave it alone. I didn’t find anything useful.
The rain had let up, so we gathered our lunches and trotted to the house under a thick dark sky that promised more deluge any minute.
“I want to take a look at that VW,” I told Denny.
“The tires look good,” he said. “This might be their only wheels. Every other vehicle here has a logo on it.”
“Not if they had something to leave the jail. Unless you can rent a car from the slammer.”
I peered through its road-grimed windows. “There’s room inside for boxes of animals. You could drive this to LAX, pick up a load, and come back here to market them. No one would expect to find illegal wildlife out here in the boonies.”
“Let’s take a look.”
That had been my inclination, too. I itched to pull the door open and search the van for gas receipts, feathers, whatever. But that might mess up crucial fingerprints. Reluctantly I stepped back without touching it. “No, better not. We can make sure the cops go over it.”
Movement caught my eye—the skinny Doberman. She slipped into the brambles along the barn. I looked around for Ken. He wasn’t in sight, and his white truck was gone. If I caught her, she could stay warm in the house while I tracked him down, instead of spending the night outside in the blackberries or in a wire trap. “You go ahead. I want to see about that dog.”
I broke off a bite of meatloaf sandwich. Moving slowly through the mud in the dog’s direction, I flipped the morsel toward the place she had disappeared. She emerged to snap it up and half-crouched at the edge of the weeds, looking wet and miserable. Ken could charm a pit bull. I ought to be able to woo this one. I squatted and chatted softly, flicking another bite toward her. She gulped it. The next bite landed closer to me. She whined, took a step forward, and changed her mind, backing into the berries.
When the chill had crept up my calves and knees to my butt, I stood up stiffly and meandered closer. A spattering of rain warned me to give up soon. I squatted again and duck-waddled toward the gap where she’d disappeared. She couldn’t be so scared of people that she had to pass on a meatloaf sandwich. I make a great meatloaf.
The heavens opened and dumped water on me. In seconds, my hair was plastered to my skull and rivulets ran down my neck, under my collar, and between my shoulder blades. I heard her whine again and the sound helped my eyes and brain sort through the vegetative chaos. Through the soggy tangled brambles, I made out the dog watching me, lying down with her nose pressed flat on…a person. On the chest of a girl. A dead girl. I teetered and struggled with my balance, then scrambled up and pushed a sharp-spiked blackberry cane aside.
I’d found Liana.
Chapter Four
The afternoon was a herky-jerky blur of uniforms, questions, and prohibitions. A whole new law enforcement bunch showed up, the homicide team. I hadn’t much to contribute, but I delivered the scanty details several times. Most of the afternoon Denny and I spent, once again, cooling our heels at the kitchen table, forbidden to finish loading the parrots, forbidden to depart. We gleaned from the cautious communications of people coming and going for coffee and the bathroom that the girl I’d found had been shot in the chest, that it was not clear how long she had been dead, and that crucial information would be available only after lab results came back. We overheard comments both bewildered and snarky about how she could have lain there undiscovered since the original bust. “Hid in the bushes and caught a stray shot” seemed to be the consensus.
I topped up the macaws’ food and water. They were a task for the next day—one more visit to this miserable place. I worried about the birds already in the van and I worried about transporting the macaws, but mostly I kept seeing Liana in the cold.
No matter how strange and felonious her upbringing with this outlaw family, she should have had her chance at a decent life. So young, maybe seventeen. A small, sturdy body. Strawberry blond hair in long wisps, the white skin and freckles that came with it. A broad face with features too small for beauty but right for strength and determination.
I was reading too much into a glimpse and a clean-scrubbed kitchen.
I phoned my mother and arranged for her to pick up Robby at day care. I left Cheyenne, one of my housemates, a message on her cell phone that I’d be late. Then there was nothing to do but wait for some official’s permission to finish our task.
Denny was as rattled as I was and wouldn’t stop talking. He processed and reprocessed scenarios for her death. The first ones were reasonable: Her own father accidentally shot her during the bust or the cops accidentally shot her. After he’d sucked the juice out of those, he tried on another: she killed herself rather than be captured.
He seemed to be working out a screenplay for this last one when I noticed that, after two hours of waiting on hard wooden chairs, we were alone in the house. “Let’s blow this scene,” I said. “Load the rest those parrots and get gone.” We pulled on our jackets and walked out as if we had permission. It was late afternoon and almost full dark. Spotlights on the corners of the house and barns illuminated the yard unevenly. Our van still idled, keeping the heater on, although a glance inside showed that the tank was on its last gasp. Exhaust fumes lingered, held in place by the still air. I opened the rear and checked the birds. They seemed to be alive.
The temperature had dropped; sparse snowflakes floated down. The girl’s body was gone. The blackberry brambles were cut and piled to one side to clear the area. I paused at the tape barrier and looked at the cold ground where she’d lain. The harsh light seemed as unkind as the icy mud.
The parking area still held two vehicles, but we’d been forgotten. No one interfered or questioned us. The remaining officials must have been in the meth barn. Lugging out the last animal carrier, we startled the overweight electrician. He said, “I thought you were long gone. I’m shutting down the electricity. Another minute, and you two woulda been padlocked in.”
“Go ahead,” I said. “We got all of these birds out. But don’t shut down the house. The macaws need some heat.” He helped us find the Tipton gas can and empty it into our tank. I pointed the van toward home, eager to put this day behind us.
We didn’t get far.
Halfway between the gate and the highway, out of sight of the house, the headlights revealed a log across the driveway. It wasn’t a big log, but enough to stop us. “Blow-down?” Denny said.
I automatically shut the van off. We got out and headed for opposite ends to toss it aside. Three men e
merged from the woods. They weren’t wearing uniforms, and they didn’t look like good Samaritans. “Uh-oh,” Denny said.
“Get them,” one of the men bellowed.
Their timing was off. We scrambled back inside the van, but one of them grabbed my arm and pulled before I got the door shut. Half out of the van, I wrapped my elbow around the steering wheel and held on. He was stronger by far. I let go before he dislocated my shoulder somehow slammed the door, and hurled myself toward him. He staggered back, but didn’t fall.
“Jeff, get the other one,” came a roar from the front of the van, and my attacker hesitated. The man giving orders stood in the headlights, big-bellied and bearded. “You are trespassing and you’re stealing my property. Get the hell out of this van.”
The man who had yanked me out shoved my chest and sent me hard into the mud on my rear, and, bizarrely, winked at me before going back to the van. Whatever Denny did, it resulted in a yelp of pain. I’d barely gotten to my feet when he was standing beside me breathing hard. I turned away and dug my cell phone out of my pants pocket, only to have it slapped into the mud. Denny threw an awkward punch, and the guy shoved him against a tree. I reached into my jacket pocket and clicked the lock switch on the key. The van chirped, a bird sound lost in the fray.
The old guy stayed in front, in the headlights with snow flickering around him, and yelled at the other two to open up the van. “Get my birds out of there.” He sounded like an Old Testament despot on a bad day, rasping and furious.
I sucked in a breath. Another. The fear-fog cleared a little. I strained to think, to pay attention. Two men confronted us, fists ready. Both wore jackets, jeans, and muddy lace-up leather boots. The one that attacked me had thick dark hair and a dark beard. The other was a little smaller and clean shaven with a green ball cap. The third, the old guy, had a shaggy gray beard and a brown jacket. Father Tipton and his sons, without a doubt.
Tipton Senior closed in on us, and I stopped memorizing details.
“We don’t mind hurtin’ you if we have to. That’s my property and you’re not getting away with stealing it,” he said in a voice that could carry half a mile. His chest heaved and even in the headlight glare his face looked flushed. “Get my birds.” The two younger ones stepped away from us and started yanking on the van’s rear door. He was a grizzly bear and he had two grown cubs obeying him.
He came toward me, huge in the front beams, triggering predation-survival strategies. Don’t run, don’t cower, pray it’s a bluff charge. I stepped forward, holding my arms out to look bigger. “Stealing? You buy smuggled wildlife and let them die because you can’t be bothered to take care of them, and you say we’re stealing? We’re trying to save their lives, and you can rot in hell.” I hated that my voice shook.
He frowned and his head jerked back a little. Denny grabbed my arm, and I shook him off.
“You poison people with meth,” I ranted. “You are guilty of crime after crime. So don’t talk to me about stealing, you greedy, heartless bastard.”
That last was a little over the top, but I was full of adrenaline. I could hear the sons yanking on all the van doors.
The father’s eyes narrowed to slits and his face darkened. “Shut your face, you insolent harlot.” He moved fast and again I was sprawled in the mud. The black Boxer mix appeared out of nowhere, barking in my face like the hound of hell. Shit. Where were all those deputies and sergeants and inspectors?
Tipton yelled, “Jeff, Tom, you idiots. It’s locked, and she’s got the key. Get over here and take it away from her.”
The sons closed in, one on either side. Still on my rump, I looked around for a branch or rock and found nothing within reach. My options seemed to be flinging moss or hurling my weight at one of them in hopes he slipped and fell. Before I tried either, the father stopped yelling. He wavered a little and sank to his knees by the front bumper.
Even the dog froze.
“Huhnnn,” Tipton said in the vibrating silence. “Not now,” he whispered to something only he could see. He crossed his heavy arms in front of his chest, weaving back and forth in the muddy gravel. He began to sag and, with glacial inevitability, fell onto his face.
No one moved. Snowflakes sparkled as they floated onto his dark jacket and winked out.
I got to my feet and grabbed his arm, trying to pull him onto his side. The dog went nuts, lunging and snarling at me. The smaller son grabbed the dog around the neck. The bearded son pushed me aside and pulled his father onto his back. He leaned over, clutched the front of his jacket, and shook him. “Wake up! What’s the matter? What should we do?”
Denny crouched next to him. “He’s not breathing.”
We looked at each other. What was our responsibility here? I shoved the son out of the way, sank to my knees astride the father, and started chest compressions. Two-handed, straight-arm shove, let up, shove, let up, shove, one hundred times a minute. It didn’t feel like the dummy we’d practiced on in first aid class. This guy was big and he was fat and he had several layers of clothing on. I’m not petite, but my weight was barely adequate to budge his chest. I was sweating almost immediately.
Denny fumbled with his cell phone.
“One-of-you-start-breathing,” I said to the sons, one word per compression.
The bearded one stood wild-eyed and paralyzed. The smaller one crouched with one arm around the dog. I sacrificed my rhythm to yell, “Get down here and start blowing in his mouth.”
They looked terrified. The smaller one said, “We don’t know how.”
“Put your mouth tight over his and blow. Right now.”
Neither moved.
“I can’t get a signal,” Denny said. “You—go to the house and call 911.”
The smaller son loped off in the right direction, the dog following. The other winked—an eye twitch—and ran after him. Denny knelt beside me and blew hard into the beard, then again.
I held up a hand when the man moved. His lips twitched. His chest rose on its own. Could this have actually worked? We’d restored him to life? He coughed a little and wheezed. Denny and I crouched over him. I wondered if I should turn him onto his side.
“Look…after…stridd…er,” and the eyes closed again. Snow flecks disappeared into his beard.
No more breathing. I resumed chest compressions, and Denny blew into his mouth, an endless cycle.
A deputy skidded to a stop next to me, followed by another. I relinquished my position and got to my feet, arms trembling. The two of them were smooth and skillful and, better yet, they had a CPR mask. The one doing chest compressions said, “Defibrillator in a minute.”
But I was pretty sure it was over.
I glimpsed the two sons standing at the road’s edge like lost sheep waiting for a shepherd. A wailing ambulance arrived bearing paramedics, who disembarked with their gear, knelt over the father for a minute or two, and straightened back up. The deputies nodded and one reached for his radio.
When I looked again, the sons were shadows backing away from the angled light beams and erratic clots of snowflakes. They stepped through tall ferns and vanished among close-spaced trunks.
Chapter Five
Denny drove hunched over the steering wheel staring into the wipers. Wet snow made raspberries on the windshield, obliterated in a steady rhythm. Sad little chirps came from the rear of the van, also small chewing and scratching noises. I was shivering from cold and lingering adrenaline, unable to decide whether unzipping my jacket and letting in the heater blast was a better option than keeping it zipped. I struggled with my boots and finally got them off, wet socks, too. Boots that leaked were the curse of my profession. “Why would a judge let these guys out on bail? What was he thinking?”
Denny threw open a hand, focused on me instead of the road. “Only one possible reason—that family’s got connections. Mover and shaker custo
mers for hash or meth. Or they’re part of some religious group. Maybe they spent all that drug money on extremist politicians and the judge is connected with that. Or—”
“I’m still freezing. Turn the heater up, will you? My pants are soaked.”
“Ire, it’s ninety degrees in here. It’s maxed out. Take your pants off and use the towels in back.”
I knew he was right. Bare skin is warmer than wet clothes. My feet were proving that. Still…
Denny glanced at me sidelong. “I’ve seen you naked. I can take it.”
Also true, although that was long ago and a different Iris Oakley.
I unclipped the seatbelt and wriggled out of my damp jacket, tossing it in back over an animal carrier. Then the pants. I grabbed a towel covering the mesh door of one of the carriers. Seatbelt back on, towel over my knees. No dignity, but slowly warmer. “They pushed me in the mud. Twice.”
“Yeah, I thought we were doomed. Jumped us out of nowhere.”
“That Jerome Tipton is a piece of work. Was.” Despite his anger and power, death had come and taken him. “Once he was out of commission, those sons were useless.” I pulled out my cell phone for the third time to check that it still worked and wiped a little more mud off.
“Robotic storm troopers obeying their commander. I’d bet my next paycheck they skip bail. They’re probably heading for Idaho. That farm needs a good exorcism. Doesn’t always work, but sometimes it makes a difference.”
I drew a deep, halting breath. “Denny, kudos for mouth-breathing that ugly bastard. Don’t know if I could have done it. I feel like we should get vaccinated.”
“I rinsed my mouth from my water bottle. If he’d been chewing tobacco…”
Heat was seeping in. “I guess I should feel bad that it didn’t work. I wonder if CPR ever does.”
Endangered Page 4