Boldt felt as if he’d had his pocket picked. “The location is nearby. Southeast, in SoDo. Foreman’s Escalade has been in this area three times in the past twenty-four hours. It’s not a firm address, but it’s got to mean something.”
“When you’re right, you’re right,” LaMoia said. “I stole your thunder. Didn’t I, Sarge?” His eyes remained closed.
“Yes, you did.”
“Good.”
“Why’s that good?” Boldt asked, after a long period of reflection to consider this.
“Because then you’re probably pissed off at me,” he said. “Am I right?”
“Mildly irritated.”
“And if you’re pissed off at me, then your juices are flowing, and we’re going to need our juices flowing by the time we get there.”
“And what about your juices?”
“Sarge? This is me we’re talking about.”
“One of these days, John… ”
“Yeah, I know.” A stifled yawn, well practiced. “I know.”
LaMoia asked about the Escalade’s current location according to On-Sat. Boldt said it was last recorded at the edge of a rail freight yard nearly directly west of their present location.
“And why aren’t we looking there first?”
“Because that, if anything, would give us Foreman, and we want Hayes.”
“Why are we so anxious to get to Hayes, Sarge?”
This was the question Boldt could not allow himself to answer, for it would reveal too much of his upcoming plan. In his own unique way, LaMoia had wormed into the heart of the matter, drilling for the truth and ripping Boldt open in the process. There was little these two men had not shared over the past decade, and Boldt’s silence suggested a line not to cross for LaMoia, and the man was briefly but clearly hurt.
LaMoia placed a call from his cell phone, interrupting himself to ask Boldt for the address where they were headed, which Boldt then supplied begrudgingly, wondering what he was up to. He spoke to a woman, judging by the way he flirted, and she apparently did everything he asked, because he kept continually thanking her. He disconnected the call, clipped the cell phone back to his waist, and sighed.
“Sometimes I wish I wasn’t so smart.”
“Oh, yeah,” Boldt said, “there’s a problem.” Now LaMoia would make him drag it out of him. Unlike Bernie Lofgrin, who had to bore you to death explaining everything in excruciating detail, LaMoia never volunteered his information, his little game.
Southeast of SoDo was a no-man’s-land of brick and cinderblock, chain link and rusted signs, a DMZ-like stretch between the city and Boeing Field. Sidewalks sprouted weeds; broken windows called attention to themselves. For a while gangs had used the area, moving in and then driven out, like livestock crossing neighbors’ property lines. Mom-and-Pop shops, burger houses, delivery businesses, and car repair had started the process that would lead the former warehouse and light industrial space into offices and retail storefronts. The unstoppable evolution of neglected urban space under pressure. Even an unpredictable economy couldn’t stop the city from growing-the bacterium had grown immune to antibiotics.
“Okay, I give up,” Boldt said. “Why are you so smart?”
“There’s a building within a block of where the On-Sat put Foreman’s car that’s on BCI’s impound list.” Law enforcement agencies, SPD included, took possession of assets in narcotics raids and RICO convictions, often to offset taxpayers for a particularly expensive or time-consuming investigation. Vehicles, boats, homes, commercial properties were all impounded. Most of the time these were put on the auction block and the proceeds returned to the public coffers once the court case settled. On occasion, a vehicle or boat would be impounded and later put into service by the agency of possession. Real estate in particular typically lagged in the process, sometimes staying on the books a year or two before auction. Locked and chained and standing vacant, they dotted the urban landscape, tracked by some bureaucratic auditor. On occasion, as appeared to be the case now, an arresting agent later came to believe the car, or boat, or commercial real estate in fact belonged to him or her as long as no one was using it. LaMoia’s discovery of such a property within walking distance from the various locations where Foreman’s parked Escalade had been tracked suggested anything but coincidence.
LaMoia checked an address written in pen on the back of his hand and indicated a turn to Boldt. A moment later they parked and climbed out. “Place was a print shop. Supermarket coupons, some counterfeit lottery tickets, sports tickets. Went on BCI’s impound list a year ago September.”
They faced a sturdy steel door. Looking up through a rusted steel fire escape, Boldt said, “I asked both the On-Sat people and BCI to call me if they saw Foreman on the move, especially returning to this neighborhood. Who knows if they’ll oblige us.”
“So we stay ready to be surprised,” LaMoia said. “You want to take it alone, have me play sentry, or do we do this together?”
“Together. We’ll call for backup if we manage to get inside.”
“I saw you looking at the fire escape,” LaMoia said.
“Yes, you did.”
“You want me up there?”
“We take the dime tour first, aware of the fact that Svengrad may have already gotten to Foreman. If so, Svengrad’s people may have arrived ahead of us, or could even be on their way right now.”
“They got to him once. I don’t see that happening a second time. Foreskin’s got more sense than that.”
“Danny’s playing Lone Ranger. That makes him vulnerable to all sorts of mistakes. If I’m Svengrad, I want to know where Foreman is at all times. That is, if Danny isn’t working for Svengrad. Seventeen million can go a lot of ways.”
“Point taken.”
They walked along the front of the building and then down an alley where they spotted a distinct architectural division that designated a change in structures. A second fire escape led down here in the alley.
LaMoia said, “I could maybe get up there… you see that third-floor window?” Several panes of glass in the window were broken out. “Maybe I can get back down to the first floor from inside.” The impounded print shop had occupied the entire first floor and the basement, according to John’s information.
“We don’t have a warrant. And good luck getting one when it’s a BCI-impound property without involving BCI. Just go ahead and imagine that nightmare. Foreman’s working an investigation, and we’re interfering. That’s how the prosecuting attorney’s office and BCI are going to view this, especially if Foreman ends up making BCI look bad.”
“We’ve got a BCI agent gone missing, and an informant telling you he may have met foul play.”
“That informant’s not on the books and is never going to put herself there.”
“But that right there is probable cause to enter a place our missing guy may have visited several times in the past twenty-four hours.” LaMoia added, “I’ll tell you what: The Sturgeon General sure as shit is not waiting around for a warrant. If Foreman or Hayes is inside this building, we gotta get swinging on some ropes here, Sarge.”
After hours, Boldt thought. Not the greatest time to go hunting down a search-and-seizure. “Mahoney could expedite this for us,” Boldt said. DPA Lehla Mahoney and Boldt had forged a good working relationship over the past few years, and she’d proven willing to go out on a limb for him. He took a moment to call her while LaMoia began his ascent of the fire escape toward the broken window, an act that required them both to push a Dumpster beneath the fire escape to give LaMoia a leg up.
Boldt had to leave a callback number on Mahoney’s service, but to his surprise she returned the call within a minute. LaMoia had reached the second floor. Boldt detailed their situation, and the attorney listened closely, interrupting with a number of interrogatives along the way. In conclusion she said she’d try to get Boldt a paper bag warrant-a verbal warrant from an on-duty judge known to be slightly to the left of Ralph Nader. Boldt warned her that he and LaMoia considered time a factor and were therefore going to kick it, counting on Mahoney to come through. She didn’t like that the initial information came from an informant working for the U.S. Attorney’s Office through SPD’s Organized Crimes unit, seeing that a possible obstacle, and warned Boldt they might not get their warrant.