Deadly Stillwater

by Roger Stelljes

  “He was in a cell next to a guy named David Mueller, who was also in the pen for a federal drug charge,” Mac answered, reading from his notepad. “David Mueller was the son of Thomas Mueller. Thomas Mueller owned a trucking company that Lyman sued for sexual harassment. Lyman hit the jackpot with a $3.4 million verdict from a jury.”

  “That’ll piss a guy off,” Lich said.

  “Well, Thomas Mueller can’t be pissed anymore,” Mac said. “He committed suicide within a year or two of the verdict. The case killed his business. His wife left him, and his two sons were in prison for drug dealing, apparently trying to make money to help the old man save the trucking company. There’s a newspaper article Sally found from up in Chisago Lakes, where Mueller Lived. The article quoted his daughter Monica as saying between his sons being in jail, the loss of the business, and losing his wife, he simply couldn’t go on. And there’s one other thing.”

  “Which is?” Flanagan asked.

  “Mueller had two sons, both, it turns out, in Leavenworth. The other Mueller is named Dean. And there’s one other thing about the brothers. They’re…”

  “Twins,” Lich finished. “They’re not just brothers, but twins, aren’t they?”

  “Identical, in fact,” Mac answered. “They’re both six-three and about two hundred forty pounds, with dark hair, according to their prison records.”

  “Damn,” Lich said. “Fuckin’ Fat Charlie actually came through for us,” he said, shaking his head.

  “So, we have Brown, who the chief put in, and Mueller’s father, who Lyman put out of business and who then committed suicide. Mueller and Brown spend years in prison together and probably get to talking about how they both ended up in jail. Brown talks about the chief becoming chief. Mueller sees Lyman getting rich off of cases like the one that did in his father. The two of them probably start talking about payback, revenge. They were in the can together for what? Twelve years?” Mac said. “That’s a lot of time to talk about payback, to plan it and to get the courage up to seek it. Then they get out about the same time and put this all together.” Everyone nodded. Perverse as it was, the connection made sense.

  “This could be it,” Riles said. “Brown was a DEA agent. He’s probably a pretty bright guy.”

  “He was, as I recall,” the chief added.

  “So he’s running it. He’s the voice on the phone,” Rock said. “He’s the one calling the shots.”

  “The one who said Shannon was the appetizer and Carrie was the main course,” Mac noted. “It fits. Brown’s the brains of the operation.”

  “And the Mueller brothers are the brawn,” Riles added. “They fit the general descriptions we had on both kidnappings. Big guys, dark hair, and so forth.”

  “That looked like brothers,” Lich added, “just as Fat Charlie’s guy told us.”

  Everyone nodded, running it through their minds.

  “Where are these guys now?” Flanagan asked, breaking the momentary silence.

  “I’ve got Sally looking into that,” Mac answered. “Dean and David currently share an Osseo address, and Smith apparently has an address in Chicago. Sally is calling CPD to have someone check on him, see if he’s around.”

  “He’s not,” Peters said, pointing at Mac. “He’s here. These are our guys.”

  “I bet they are,” Riles added, and then pivoted. “What do you think, Mac? Do we let others know? We might need their help.”

  Mac thought for a moment, his arms crossed. “Not quite yet. If we’re right and someone is feeding Brown information, we don’t want to tip them off. We don’t know where the girls…” Mac stopped, aware of having spoken about the girls as if the chief wasn’t in the room. “Sorry, Chief.”

  The chief didn’t flinch, “It is what it is, boyo.”

  “We don’t know where these guys are, or where they have the girls. If they do have someone on the inside, and we come out with this, the kidnappers get tipped off and the girls could pay the price.”

  “Agreed,” the chief said. “You don’t have much time. We’re getting a phone call at six. You’ve got…” everyone looked at their watches, 12:15 PM, “less than six hours.”

  29

  “ This is where it gets interesting.”

  Smith Brown sat in a desk chair in a fifth-floor hotel room, looking east through binoculars down Kellogg Boulevard on the south side of the Xcel Energy Center in downtown St. Paul. He checked his watch: 12:28 PM. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky. The heat radiated off the pavement as the temperature continued its inexorable climb to triple digits. He was happy to be inside.

  On a national holiday, there was little activity around the brick and curved glass of America’s finest hockey arena, which sat kitty-corner from his perch. A digital marquee on the corner of West Seventh and Kellogg announced upcoming events, which in the summer were generally concerts. Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band were coming to town the last week in July.

  Smith glanced to his right, looking south down the ever-expanding restaurant-and-bar-district that was West Seventh Street. There was little car traffic and less on foot. It was one of the traits that made St. Paul unique. The downtown area was generally quiet when the working folks weren’t around. Of course, a Minnesota Wild game or event at the arena across the street changed all that, bringing 20,000 people downtown. However, if there wasn’t a specific event, activity moved to the other neighborhoods around the city. Given that it was a holiday, the foot and car traffic was even less than its normal negligible amount.

  He turned his gaze back to the east to see Monica coming into view, dressed attractively in white tennis shorts and a low-cut, dusty-rose tank top. She was walking toward the hotel along the sidewalk of Kellogg Boulevard, a black nylon computer case hanging over her shoulder. As she crossed the street and stepped under the canopy of the hotel entrance, Smith scanned the area outside, making sure nobody followed or watched her. Satisfied that she was free and clear, he moved away from the window. A minute later he heard the key card slide into the reader, and Monica entered the room.

  “Everything go okay?” he asked as he dropped some ice into a hotel glass and poured himself a Diet Coke.

  “No problem. It’s pretty empty in there.”

  “You tested the camera?”

  “Yes,” she answered, putting the shoulder bag onto the bed. “It worked fine. We’ll be able to monitor what they’re doing.”

  “Excellent.”

  “What’s next?’ she asked as she opened a bottle of water.

  “We sit and wait for awhile, try to relax,” Smith answered, turning on the TV. “At five thirty I’ll drive the minivan over to Eagle Street and wait.”

  “Dean and David get the easy duty, don’t they?”

  “At least for now,” Smith replied. “David saved my life in prison. If things go awry, he and Dean can walk away, as can you.”

  “Have you changed your mind about the girls?”

  “No,” Smith replied.

  “You know how Dean and David feel.”

  “I do,” Smith replied looking out the window. “They don’t think the girls should pay.” He turned back toward Monica. “The thing is, if everything goes according to plan, nobody will ever know who we are. Or if they do eventually figure it out, it will be too late. We’ll be long gone. If we let them know where the girls are, that increases the risk that we’ll be found before we’re safely away. If we give them the girls, the police very likely will discover who we are, probably before we’ve made the necessary changes to our looks.”

  “I know, I know,” Monica answered, looking down and picking at the carpet with her toes. “Thing is,” she started quietly, “the girls are guilty of nothing other than having the fathers they have.”

  “And what about my daughter?” Smith asked, anger rising in his voice. “What was she guilty of besides having me as her father? She died because of Charlie Flanagan. I’m in prison, and my wife can’t get insurance. She can’t get treatment for my little
girl. When the state finally comes through, my little girl’s on her deathbed and it’s too late. That’s all on Charlie Flanagan.” Smith turned back toward the window, away from her. “He needs to feel what I felt. He needs to feel what it’s like to lose a daughter. He’s going to feel that before he dies.”

  Mac and the others burst into the conference room to find Hagen’s fingers dancing frantically over the keyboard and a printer spitting out reams of paper. “What do we know?” Mac asked, walking up to Sally.

  “It doesn’t look like Brown is in Chicago,” Sally said. “I had CPD go to the last known address. It doesn’t exist.”

  “What do you mean it doesn’t exist? The address doesn’t exist? It’s a fake?” Rock growled.

  “Yeah. Brown served his full sentence and was a free man, free to go wherever he wanted,” Sally answered. “It would appear that in his six months out he has chosen to fall off the grid.”

  “And this is the guy who was in prison with David Mueller?” Rock asked, looking at a picture of Smith taken six months before he was released. Six feet tall, Brown had black hair graying at his temples. He had brown eyes and a knot at the bridge of his already large nose.

  “Yes,” Sally replied. “For twelve years. We looked at Brown’s records for Leavenworth. It appears he had trouble on his arrival.”

  “He’s probably lucky to be alive,” Lich said. Cops have issues in prison.

  “That’s where David Mueller comes in,” Sally added, flipping to a different page. “He saved Brown’s life. Apparently David was pretty good with his fists. He, and his brother Dean, who I’ll get to in a minute, were in the Golden Gloves back in the day. Anyway, David seems to have used those skills to save Brown, or at least that’s what we’re seeing as we read between the lines on some stuff from Leavenworth. Apparently, David, and later Dean, took it upon themselves to apply a couple of beatings, to send a message and that probably allowed Brown to make it out alive.”

  “So he’s loyal to them,” Rock said. “And I suppose vice versa.”

  “What about the Muellers?” Mac asked, looking at pictures taken prior to their release from Leavenworth. The brothers were definitely twins, thick necks, black hair, unibrows, but all-in-all decent-looking boys. The only noticeable differences were their eyes and noses. Dean’s eyes were spread a little farther apart from his nose. David had an unnaturally crooked nose, probably broken from boxing.

  “This is where it gets interesting. The brothers have an Osseo address, an apartment complex a block off of the main street,” Sally gave him a sheet with directions and the address. “I spoke with the Osseo police chief. He says give him a holler at that number,” she handed a yellow sticky note to Mac. “He and another officer will meet you at a gas station a few blocks away.”

  “Okay, but you said ‘interesting’ a minute ago, what else?” Mac pushed impatiently, reading from the sheet. “What’s so interesting?”

  “The Mueller boys have an older sister named Monica Reynolds — her married name.”

  “Tell me the older sister looks like our missing woman,” Riles said, hopeful.

  “Here’s a picture we got from the DMV for her license,” Sally responded. “Tell me what you think.” Her tone said she thought it was a match.

  The group gathered around the table to look at the artist sketch of the woman from Cel’s Care next to the blown-up DMV photo. They also had security camera stills from Milwaukee and St. Thomas University for comparison. The hair color was right, as were the lips and nose and the eyes. The hair of the woman at the cafe didn’t match, but again, the eyes, nose, and lips looked about right. Mac spoke for everyone. “It could be her, there’s certainly a similarity.”

  “Where is Monica Reynolds at these days?” Rock asked.

  “Again, interesting,” Sally said, as Summer Plantagenate handed her another set of papers, as smoothly as if the two were going through exhibits at a jury trial. “Up until two months ago, she owned a house over on the east side of St. Paul by Lake Phalen. She sold it for $225,000 and left a P.O. Box as a forwarding address. It doesn’t appear she has established another home.”

  “At least not one I can find,” Hagen added, looking up from his computer. “I’m still searching.”

  “The money from the sale ended up in a checking account at Wells Fargo,” Sally said, “an account that she closed shortly thereafter, we can’t find any evidence she’s opened another one somewhere.”

  “So she’s floating out there with a nice chunk of walking-around-money to finance whatever it is these guys might be up to,” Mac said. “This is adding up.”

  “It is,” Sally said.

  “So we’ve got a solid connection between the chief and Lyman in Brown and the Muellers. We have physical descriptions that are consistent. They’ve got motive. Brown gives them the intellect to pull this off,” Riles summarized.

  “And Brown and Monica at least seem to have pulled a disappearing act,” Mac said.

  “So what’s next?” Sally asked. “What do you think?”

  “We check out this last known address,” Mac answered. “Lich and I will do that.”

  “What do you want Rock and I to do?” Riles asked.

  “Stay here and work this for now,” Mac replied. “We need to look into family for the Muellers and Brown. Do they have family around and where? If they do, we need to be talking to them. We should have someone run Monica’s photo over to the cafe, see what people over there think. Also, run these four against the department personnel files. Maybe we find the mole that way. And one other thing.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Someone should be around when the ransom call comes in,” Mac said. “I’ve got a bad feeling about that. Brown and the Muellers have been ahead of us every step of the way. There’s no reason to think they aren’t now.”

  “Especially if they have someone on the inside,” Sally said.

  “Exactly,” Mac answered, pointing at Sally. “But now maybe, just maybe, we’re evening out the odds here. We finally know who we’re up against. Now we just need to find them before this all shakes out.”

  Mac and Lich turned to leave when Jupiter and Shawn McRyan came into the room. Jupe was holding up a DVD and color pictures.

  “Tell me you found something?” Mac said.

  “Maybe,” Jupiter said, briefly explaining the pictures pulled off the video. “If we can figure out where the PVC piping was purchased, maybe it’s another way to get a line on these guys.”

  “Do that,” Mac ordered and then turned to Sally. ”Let’s get on the horn to this company, figure out a way to find out who’s selling this pipe in Minnesota.”

  “I’ll give it a shot,” Sally replied skeptically. “The Fourth of July keeps getting in the way. It’ll be tough to track somebody down.”

  “Sally,” Hagen interjected. “While you’re trying the legal way, why don’t you give me what you have there,” he said pointing at the picture. “I might be able to find another way.”

  30

  “ This will serve as my last will and testament.”

  After talking for a couple of hours, even having a few laughs along the way, conversation between Carrie and Shannon had faded. It was a pattern. Neither of them slept for long or stayed awake and alert for more than a couple of hours. Sleeping, if you could, was the best of the two options. If you were awake, especially if the other was sleeping, you just lay there thinking about where you were. Carrie was also trying to sleep lightly so that she could monitor Shannon’s condition. She was beginning to get worried about her and how long she could last.

  Following their last conversation, Carrie slept for a little while, but she was awake now and her mind had started racing again. What else would your mind do when you were buried alive? Flanagan thanked God repeatedly that she wasn’t claustrophobic. What she needed was something to do, something to occupy her mind.

  Carrie picked up the Dictaphone, contemplating its use. What if the kidnappers wouldn�
�t let anyone know where they were buried? She figured since they were buried alive, it was intended that they were to be found. But what if that wasn’t the case? What if they weren’t found in time? Carried sighed, and tears welled in her eyes for the first time in hours. What a way to go.

  Her thoughts turned again to her family, to her parents, brothers, sisters, ever her boyfriend. She never had the chance to say good-bye. She took another look at the Dictaphone. There was plenty of space left on the tape — the message from the kidnappers had been short and to the point.

  She remembered watching M*A*S*H with her dad. He loved that show and could recite from memory the dialogue from entire episodes. She chuckled at how many times her dad would say, for no reason, “Nope, its oak.” Or if Mom cooked a bad meal, he would get that mischievous smile and quote Hawkeye Pierce behind her back, “I don’t know how our cook got off at Nuremburg.” Her father loved the episodes with Trapper and Henry Blake, the early years of the show. But right now she remembered an episode from the later years, when the show got preachy. It was where Hawkeye was sent to an aid station at the front. Between triaging injured soldiers and ducking bombs exploding all around, he sat and wrote his will on a yellow legal pad, bequeathing gifts to everyone in the 4077.

  Carrie was in the same situation for real. She could die. She wanted to say something to the people she cared most about, even if they never got to hear it. Twirling the Dictaphone around in her fingers near her face, she contemplated what to say. She closed her eyes. “I still can’t believe this is happening,” she uttered quietly, tears still pooled in her eyes. She hoped this was just an awful dream that she would awaken from, but it wasn’t and she hadn’t.

  Flanagan opened her eyes and pushed the record button on the Dictaphone, “This is Carrie Marie Flanagan. I am the daughter of St. Paul Police Chief Charles Flanagan.” She stopped the tape and sniffled, getting her emotions in check before she continued. She didn’t want her family to hear the terror in her voice.

  “I was kidnapped on Monday, July 2nd. I’m buried in this box with Shannon Hisle. Shannon is the daughter of Lyman Hisle, A St. Paul lawyer, a friend of my father’s. Shannon was kidnapped the day before on July 1st.” Carrie stopped again and rested the Dictaphone on her chest, breathing harder.