“Where’s my little Hayes?” Phyllis asked, pushing past her daughter-in-law without any further attempts at niceties. She moved about the small house, Trish following. The woman just couldn’t stand still, stop talking or avoid mentioning bowel movements.
“Just waking up,” Trish explained. No matter her own relationship with Phyllis, it was good for all to have a grandmother around.
In a voice that grated like bad brakes, Phyllis admonished, “Don’t forget some shower scrub, will you? Sidney says the shower is growing into a rain forest.”
Phyllis then turned in time to watch Trish blush scarlet at the idea that her husband was reporting her housecleaning abilities to his mother.
“It’s the climate,” Trish explained with the knowingness of a transplanted Californian. “Hang out a fresh towel, it’s damp by evening.”
“Which, though it’s bad for a lot of things, is good for the skin. You know, Trish, you could use a little moisturizer around the eyes.” She winked. A little harder and the entire fake lash would have fallen off.
Trish reminded, “I’m at the gym ’til two, then the market.”
“Same as always,” the older woman said. “I’m not stupid, you know.”
“Home at three,” she reminded, heading to the back door, glad to be out of there.
Throughout the crunches, the leg lifts, the treadmill, the Northwest News Station carried updates on the Pied Piper kidnapping. A blonde-it had to be dyed-realtor was said to be a possible eyewitness that police and FBI were questioning. An adorable picture of the missing child was repeatedly shown and an 800 number superimposed on the screen. Trish felt God-awful for the poor parents. The TV reporter said something about thirty thousand children going missing each year, though most were over six years old. But for Trish and the rest of Seattle, it was only one child that mattered right now, and that was Rhonda Shotz.
She didn’t know what she would do if she ever lost Hayes. The kidnapper had overcome some teenage baby sitter. Thank God for Phyllis, she thought, in a rare moment of appreciation. She pitied the man who crossed Phyllis.
CHAPTER 7
On Friday morning, March 13, two days after the Shotz kidnapping, Boldt pulled a chair into his former office cubicle, now occupied by LaMoia. “A lesson,” he said, opening a file. “Flemming’s people loaned us a look at their report on the AFIDs found at the various crime scenes.”
“Stolen,” LaMoia guessed.
“But of course,” Boldt answered. “An entire shipment of the replacement cartridges for the air TASER went missing when an eighteen-wheeler was hijacked west of Chicago two years ago. Until the first child was kidnapped in San Diego, the FBI had lost track of it. The ATF had not. Three dozen of the cartridges were bought out of Las Vegas seven months ago using a counterfeit card-”
“Surprise.”
“At a gun shop that dealt black-market goods. These militia boys love untraceable hardware. The ATF did some good work. The owner of the card was under surveillance by the FBI for three weeks before any questions were asked. This cardholder lives in Kansas City, runs a commercial air-conditioning company-wife, kids, the whole number. When they get around to questioning him, he says that only the one errant charge was ever made-six hundred and change-and this is supported by his formal complaint to the card company. But as you and I know, it’s not how a stolen card is typically used, so the Bureau takes a handoff from ATF and grinds this one in with their toes. They ran every possible lead-tracked this guy’s movements for a two-year period, his wife’s, their phone records, even UPS and FedEx histories. Clean bill of health-he’s not connected.”
“Too bad,” LaMoia said.
“But they have the Las Vegas connection, so they pursue it-maybe they bust the rest of the cartridges and plea bargain information on the three dozen sold. Together they had two dozen agents on it, including a half dozen undercover.”
“But did they find the cartridges?” LaMoia asked. Hill’s dislike of the federal agencies had infected LaMoia.
“No. They chased some information-it’s all in here-conducted maybe twenty interrogations, but the cartridges were long gone and not one of the gun dealers was saying to where. The Bureau now believes that maybe a third of the original shipment made Las Vegas. Trail went cold. But keep in mind: The AFIDs found at each of the ten crime scenes are for cartridges part of that original shipment.”
“So, cold or not, it’s still a trail to follow,” LaMoia suggested.
“Exactly. The Bureau followed the evidence.”
“But-” LaMoia said sharply, all too familiar with Boldt’s inflection. He considered where Boldt might take this and said, “You would pursue the victim.”
“Yes.”
“And the only real victim in sight is this credit card holder.” LaMoia thought a moment and said, “They considered him a suspect but never made the jump back to victim. They chased the cartridges instead-the evidence.”
“For which no one can fault them.”
“But whoever used this guy’s credit card number had to get it somehow. A discarded carbon-”
“Telephone mail order …,” Boldt contributed.
“A waiter at a restaurant, any number of cashiers, Ticket-Master.”
Boldt nodded and said, “Random or not, they got hold of this guy’s card number. The Pied Piper made contact, directly or indirectly.”
“He could have bought it off any of hundreds of counterfeiters who knew the number was valid.”
“Maybe,” Boldt agreed, “but there’s still a bridge there between the kidnapper and that cardholder.”
“And you want me to pursue it,” LaMoia added sarcastically, “because I’ve got nothing better to do.”
“Intelligence doesn’t investigate,” Boldt reminded. “We collect and analyze.”
LaMoia mimicked the man, making faces and mouthing his words. His pager vibrated at his side. He held it into the light: Its message screen carried a string of ten numbers.
Boldt tapped the file and picked it up. “If you need any specifics, I’ve got this. Happy to help.” He stood and left before LaMoia could think of a way to beg some investigative work from him. He looked back at the pager.
The time of day told him as much as the page itself: an hour before lunch. He dialed the first seven numbers. An operator’s voice answered, “Mayflower Hotel.” He hung up. Fancy digs, he thought.
He had logged nearly fifteen hours of O.T. since Wednesday night. One thing about a major crime: It made you rich. But he had traded sleep for the O.T. and knew that despite his surface energy he would pay. Lack of sleep seemed to galvanize him, at least for the first three days. After that, it was all downhill. He was in a holding pattern, awaiting results from the lab on the broken glass-the penny flute had come up clean. Boldt had pointed him toward a good chase, the credit card.
Doris Shotz, mother of the abducted child, maintained a vigil on the oak bench out in the hallway, her young son at her side. To pass by her out there made LaMoia sick to his stomach. His offers of coffee or pop went refused, attempts to communicate went unreciprocated; she sat there, an icon to the task force’s incompetence, which in turn reminded him of the four o’clock meeting the day before.
Thursday’s four o’clock task force meeting, the first of its kind, had run about as smoothly as an elementary school play. With the FBI and SPD in the same room, both believing themselves in control, the meeting had ended in a confrontation.
Sheila Hill lorded over the head of the table, passing judgment with her stern facial expressions.
Homicide’s situation room, a glorified conference room wrapped around a large oval table that sat twelve, doubled as task force headquarters. At the near end, behind Hill, a white board held scribbled notes in colorful markers. To Hill’s right, a well-worn cork bulletin board adorned with crime scene photographs carried family photos not only of the Shotz residence and child but of nine other small and smiling faces.