Ledger unpretzeled herself and sat cross-legged on the floor with her two charges.
“Did you learn that here in Portland?” Brittany asked.
Ledger shook her head. “No, I’ve only been in Oregon a few months.”
“I didn’t think so.” She cocked her head to one side. “You sound American but you don’t look American. You have blue eyes, but your skin is almost as brown as mine.”
“I wasn’t born in America, but I’m definitely American,” Ledger said.
Brittany was perceptive. She had picked up on the subtle differences in Ledger’s features. Ledger didn’t think she had given herself away in any other aspect. There was no way Brittany could know the nightmares from a time before America that leaked into her sleep when Ledger was particularly stressed or tired.
Ledger raised a hand to her heart and signed a cross. “I promise I am American. My birthday’s even the 4th of July.” She didn’t explain that was because nobody had a clue when she was born.
Brittany nodded. “My mother wasn’t born in America, but she’s American,” she declared.
Ledger offered a weak smile. She wished it was that simple, but she knew Bogel wouldn’t agree with Brittany’s assessment. Ledger was guilty of shortening Maria’s odds of being extradited from Oyster Bay when she told Wyche about Dallenbach’s drug suspicions. The guilt left a sour taste in her mouth.
“Shall I show you some more tricks?” she asked. Entertaining Maria’s kids seemed to be the least she could do to make amends.
“Yes, please! I want to try everything!”
“Me too!” John squealed. “Me too!”
Ledger pushed the furniture aside and threw the sofa cushions on the floor to make a soft landing pad. She spent the rest of the hour teaching them how to do flip ups and side jumps and various vaults into somersaults.
When Wyche walked Enzo back into the room, the children rushed forward, melting against his legs. Anxious lines fanned out from Enzo’s eyes as he squinted down at them. “Everything okay?”
“We had the best time.” Both Brittany and John were beaming. Enzo threw a confused, but grateful, glance in Ledger’s direction.
“You’re free to go home, Mr Garcia, but don’t leave town,” Wyche said.
Outrage replaced the gratitude on Enzo’s face. “You’ve still got my wife in custody. I’m not going anywhere!”
“I’ll escort Mr Garcia out,” Ledger volunteered. “Why don’t you get the kids a drink and a snack at the vending machine in the lobby and I’ll be with you in a minute,” she said to Enzo.
Ramrod stiff and with his jaw clenched in angry frustration, Enzo grabbed Brittany and John’s hands and walked out the door.
“I take it the interview didn’t yield anything useful?” Ledger asked Wyche.
Wyche shook his head. “I didn’t expect it to.” He looked immensely uncomfortable. She couldn’t decide if that was because he was unsure how much to reveal to her because of Bogel’s directive that she be taken off the case. Or whether it was simply the stress of how to end the conversation with a work colleague he wasn’t particularly close to. Ledger decided not to cut him any slack.
“What did you expect when you took Mr Garcia away for an interview?” she asked.
Wyche struggled to contain a frown. That could be because he was again wrestling with Bogel’s orders to keep her away from the case without seeming rude. Or it could be because the case was stalling. Her money was on the latter outcome.
“I mean, did you learn the Garcias are living beyond their means which leads you to think drug smuggling gives them a secondary income?”
In the end, Wyche simply wimped out. “I’d better get back to help Cherry wrap up Maria Garcia’s interview. I won’t forget to send through those names though.”
“Sure.” Ledger nodded. She wouldn’t be sorry to leave the building for some fresh air. She despised the part she was playing in separating the Garcia family, but she was still bound by her oath to the job. It just meant this wasn’t a case she’d be proud to feature on her resumé. She had quickly grasped the idea that working for Bogel wasn’t going to be good for her career advancement anyway.
Ledger caught up with Enzo and his children at the vending machine and escorted them through security procedures to the parking lot. The long evening twilight streaked the sky with shades of lavender and purple, broken by the yellow glow from lights on tall poles circling the lot’s periphery.
Enzo was carrying John. The little boy’s head bobbed against his shoulder. Crumbs fell from rosy lips as his eyes fought to stay open. Brittany was still wide awake, marching beside her father, but Ledger could see deep shadows under her eyes. It was well past the kids’ bedtime.
Ledger remained at the doorway. Enzo turned away without thanking her. Brittany gave her a shy wave. Before the family could step off the curb and collect their car, they were approached by a diminutive woman. Ledger recognized Valentina Galliano, the Washington reporter Dallenbach had pointed out to her earlier that afternoon.
The woman leaned in close to Enzo. They spoke quietly. Ledger couldn’t overhear their conversation, she could only observe. What she saw was Galliano speaking in a short, intense burst of words. Enzo’s response was even briefer. The woman reached out her hand, Enzo reached out his. They met in the middle. An exchange of some sort. Perhaps a business card. Perhaps a slip of paper. Ledger couldn’t discern the details in the dusk. The woman spoke again. Enzo didn’t respond, he simply stepped off the curb and headed towards his car.
Galliano swiveled. Ledger remained standing outside the doorway. Their eyes locked. Galliano tilted her head to one side as she considered Ledger. Her short, dark curtain of hair swayed with the movement. Ledger broke free first, turning around to head back inside. She had some personal items to collect before heading home.
Behind her she heard Galliano snap her fingers. “Wait a moment, please!”
Ledger paused. Footsteps rattled out a hurried tattoo until the woman joined her in front of the building.
“Thank you for waiting! I saw you with Sheriff Dallenbach this afternoon. I didn’t know you worked for ICE.”
Ledger twisted back around. “And you were with Oyster Bay’s mayor. What are you doing here in Portland?”
A glimmer of tiny, pearled teeth showed between crimson lips when Galliano smiled. “That’s right. Sherman Telsey Junior. He was selling me a crock of shit about Oyster Bay being Disneyland perfect. He thinks I’m writing a saccharine story detailing the beauties of the inlet. But no town’s as pristine as he’s peddling. My newspaper didn’t send me down here to write that type of story.”
Over the top of Galliano’s head, Ledger could see the diminishing figures of Enzo and his children. They had stopped beside an outdated sedan. Enzo buckled John into his child restraint before looping around the car to open the passenger door to help Brittany climb into the seat beside her brother. Then he reversed the action to climb into the driver’s side.
“Just what kind of story are you writing instead?” Ledger asked. She was waiting for Enzo to drive out of the lot, but he didn’t move. He was waiting for something.
“Let’s just say I’ve had contact with a concerned citizen from Oyster Bay who has a very interesting theory about a number of people who have been disappearing from the town. Colleagues suddenly not turning up for work. Parents dropping their kids off at school and then not picking them up. Leaving abandoned cars on the school grounds and in driveways. Poof! Neighbors here one day and never to be seen the next.” Her voice was clear and confident. As if she was a woman who had experienced her press ID opening more doors than it closed against her.
“Sounds like a science fiction plot.”
Galliano narrowed her eyes at the remark and refused to smile. “Unfortunately, Sheriff Dallenbach wasn’t particularly forthcoming with me. He seems to be well and truly under Telsey’s big fat thumb, or else he’s already campaigning for the next election.”
“Both scenarios have nothing to do with me.”
“I’m not sure I buy that. I saw you having an indepth conversation with Dallenbach. You’re an ICE officer. You have dealings with the Garcias and others. The exact people my contact says keep disappearing. It’s not too difficult to make the numbers add up. ICE is shipping people back over the border. Would you consider going on the record for an interview? Or at least becoming an anonymous source who might help these families with missing members find closure?”
Ledger shook her head. “My conversation with Dallenbach was private. What would the mayor have to say if he knew what you were trying to dig up?”
“I’ve got the mayor’s side of the story. I intend to write a balanced view of the town. This is your chance to explain why people like the Garcias are being targeted by ICE.” Galliano extended a business card. “Just think about it. If you change your mind this is where you can contact me. Day or night. I don’t sleep much when I’m chasing down a story.”
Don’t hold your breath waiting for that. Ledger didn’t voice the thought. Unlike most law enforcement personnel, Ledger didn’t blanket all reporters as liars. In her experience they were about average for the general population. Some told small lies, others distorted the truth simply to satisfy their needs. It didn’t mean Ledger was under any obligation to help her and at the moment she hadn’t decided what category Galliano fell into.
To get the woman off her back, she took the card between her fingertips and slipped it into her jacket pocket. Galliano acknowledged the action with a smile.
“I hope to hear from you soon.” Galliano turned away.
Ledger stood and watched her transverse the parking lot. With small, mincing steps, she made a beeline for Enzo’s sedan. Now Ledger knew what Enzo had been waiting for.
Thirty seconds later Galliano was settled inside his car and the sedan nosed out of the bay, the car’s body swaying and lifting over a speed bump. Then it picked up speed and Ledger watched it zoom past other vehicles as it headed for the exit. She had no doubt Enzo and Galliano were discussing Maria’s plight and just how that might play into Galliano’s story.
She should warn Bogel about Galliano’s interest. Then she figured he probably wouldn’t listen to her advice anyway. In her head she could imagine his response.
“The department is just doing its job. Nothing to report there.”
So she would let Bogel get on with his job and she would do hers.
5
It was Ledger’s third day staking out sites in Oyster Bay taking note of license plate numbers of cars coming and going.
Tasked with car surveillance, she had spent the first day planted a few yards from the spot Mayor Telsey had parked his Viper while showing off the town to Galliano. From there she could directly overlook the parking area in front of Kendrew Shellfish Farms. With its view over the bay, that strip of road was a popular spot with tourists. She hoped the white SUV she had rented would blend in rather than stand out to anyone from Kendrew’s who might be paying attention.
She had spent the second day parked at the outer rim of Northern Shore Oyster Cannery, Maria’s employers. Close to the entrance into the parking lot, it was the same spot CC had formerly staked out. At certain times of the day, such as when shifts changed, employees’ cars spread to the outer reaches, but otherwise they snuck in close to the buildings. Northern Shore didn’t sell product from their farms so the only vehicle traffic was from employees and delivery trucks.
Ledger split her third day between Kendrews and Northern Shore. This time she had rented a brown Ford Taurus. Not for her the muscle cars employed by Wyche and Guzman when left to their own supervision. Ledger thought sometimes they enjoyed taunting their suspects about being under surveillance. Why else use such stand-out cars that were bound to attract attention? Unless both men were too stupid to know or care that those types of cars would stick in people’s memories. Ledger wanted to sneak under people’s radar, so she had traded the white SUV for the Taurus. Even inattentive people noticed when the same vehicle was stationary in the same spot day after day.
Kendrew’s was the busiest oyster farm in the town. The food outlet attached to its main building attracted plenty of short-term parks. That was why she had returned for the morning shift. If someone wanted to disguise their movements this offered plenty of cover. After lunch she would head to Northern Shore.
Ledger used her phone whenever she could to snap images of the license plates. When she couldn’t get a good image, she manually noted the plate numbers. At the end of each eight hour surveillance shift she took the drive back to the Best Western in Long Beach. It was where the ICE officers overnighted during their surveillance trips because accommodation was scarce in Oyster Bay over the summer months.
Tucking into a greasy steak sandwich, she sat on the bed and checked the numbers against each other and against the manifest Wyche had emailed to her. These were the license plates of individuals of interest to ICE. Men and women suspected of breaking the law by residing in Washington. Some of them would be arrested and released back into the community if they could make the bond payments. But sitting between $10,000 and $20,000 often these payments were out of reach. The rest would go into detention before they were deported.
While Ledger’s choice was always to prioritize targets with serious criminal histories, Bogel’s targeting decisions depended more on who was easily findable. That often meant people who left a discernable trail. People with driver’s licenses, who paid utility bills and posted to social media. These were the people with stable homes and, more often than not, with children born in America, living ordinary lives and hoping and praying their law-abiding lives would escape ICE’s notice.
Bogel’s choices were about filling political quotas. Ledger’s were about keeping her fellow citizens safe.
Sitting off the perimeter of Northern Shore’s black-topped parking lot, she was looking for patterns that indicated workers versus visitors, regular arrivals and departures versus one-off outings. But the lists didn’t tell the full story. It was the power of human observation that filled in the gaps. Did the plates belong to late model cars and drivers in suits? Or did they belong to battered pick-up trucks driven by men and women in coveralls and cotton work shirts sporting corporate logos?
She had her eyes peeled for a particular license plate.
Before leaving Portland she had emailed the Department of Licensing’s fraud squad, asking for any details pertaining to Dean Woodle, the name Dallenbach had mentioned. Two days ago DOL had responded with Woodle’s plate numbers and his driver’s license application form. That contained plenty of key details. An address in Wisconsin. A date of birth, making Dean Woodle 45 years of age. Place of birth listed as Aurora, Illinois. A birth certificate had been listed as part of the identification process.
Ledger had even obtained a copy of his driver’s license photo. It showed a pale-skinned male with a tuft of light brown hair receding back in a steep V from a narrow forehead. A prominent nose supporting black rimmed glasses and a pointed, dimpled chin completed the picture.
When her stomach grumbled, Ledger considered taking a short break to refuel. As she slotted the keys into the ignition, a dual cab pickup truck passed her. The number plate matched Woodle’s. Ledger turned off the engine and brought the binoculars to her eyes as she watched the F-150’s silvery-blue aluminum body roll to a stop at the southern most end of the parking lot, close to the workers entrance into the oyster shed.
The truck was a nice-looking vehicle. It had dark tinted windows that she couldn’t see through. Ledger had a good working knowledge of cars. She knew the Ford’s aluminum body made it lighter, safer and, an important consideration for a coastal community, more rust resistant than earlier generations. The F series was one of the most popular pickup trucks on the mainland and Ledger counted no fewer than five in the parking lot, beside Woodle’s. What made his stand out was that it was the super duty four wheel drive version, weighing in at a m
assive three tons. It had enough horsepower in its V8 diesel engine to tow Mount Rushmore behind it. It was not a truck to mess around with.
It was not the vehicle she could imagine Woodle driving around in. She knew she was sterotyping the man from a single photo, but her instinct suggested that something was amiss. What had Woodle done? Driven to Oyster Bay from Green Bay? Was he a man who enjoyed bays as a natural feature of the environment?
Dallenbach had told her he believed Woodle was a Mr Big in the drug scene on the west coast, but the DOL details she had on hand didn’t match that kind of profile.
Ledger buried her hunger and settled down with her binoculars.
Incoming traffic into the parking lot had slowed to a trickle as the sun inched towards late afternoon. She knew from her previous observations staff would soon be finishing their shifts. That was when there would be a mass exodus of men and women from the oyster shed.
No other vehicle followed Woodle’s pickup into the lot.
Minutes ticked by. Then workers in coveralls and denim work pants shuffled outside in a steady stream. Heading to their vehicles, they had to walk past Woodle’s pickup. Her attention sharpened when she noticed individuals stopping briefly at the driver’s side window. The vehicle was parked sideways to her so she couldn’t see what type of exchange happened between the driver and the workers. When a young woman came out the pattern changed. Instead of lingering by the driver’s side, she was ushered around to the passenger side and slipped inside the cab. Two minutes passed, then the woman emerged and moved off.
Ledger sat and watched as three more times whenever a young woman approached the pickup, she was directed to loop around to the passenger side and climb into the cab. Her time inside varied from two to five minutes, before she hopped out and walked away. The older women and males were spoken to at the driver’s window.
Either the women were in possession of a particular set of skills that warranted more attention, or the driver had a penchant for young, attractive women.
One Way Out: Scout Ledger Thriller Page 5