Pleasant Harbor

by Thomas Bloom

  “Dusty, see if you can find the trunk release.”

  Dusty opened the door and fumbled with a few switches on the dashboard. Finally, the trunk lid popped up. Amanda raced to the car.

  “Mom, mom, he locked us in here.”

  “I know, I know. It’s okay now.” Dusty, Amanda and the kids spent a few minutes in each other’s arms.

  Tamourini turned to the officer. “Okay, point made. If you guys had just listened to us we would not have had to use any force. For your future information, a federal agent who properly identifies himself or herself and who declares an emergency has precedence over a local officer of the law. You guys are not even sworn officers, you’re private security. Understood?”

  The officer nodded.

  Tamourini holstered her weapon. “Get me your boss on your radio then tell him I want to talk to him.”

  The officer spoke into his radio then handed it over to Tamourini. “This is FBI agent Tamourini. We have been pursuing a kidnap suspect from Michigan to here. We have just recovered the two kidnapped persons. Our suspect has presumably entered the terminal and booked a flight. We have reason to believe he is operating with a stolen ID. Your officers were not only not of assistance, they actually impeded our pursuit. You will shortly get a call from the head of the FBI in Washington confirming our authority. Because you are not sworn officers you are actually subject to prosecution for impeding our activities but we will not pursue that. I would suggest that you have a training session with your staff as to which agency has precedence in a given situation. If you don’t want to run the class we will be happy to provide one of our local agents to do it. Do you understand?”

  Tamourini waited a few moments then smiled. “Okay, let’s get beyond that. I have about twenty agents who will arrive her in a few minutes. We want to interview every TSA agent in departures and every airline agent who could have seen or checked in our suspect. I would appreciate your cooperation but if not just don’t get in our way.”

  Tamourini got on her radio and started barking instructions. Then she turned to Dusty and Amanda. “Look we’re twenty to thirty minutes behind him. He almost certainly has false ID and has probably disguised himself. By the time we get a lead he may have already taken off. We’ll just have to follow any lead wherever it takes us. I have plenty of people. Why don’t you two check in to a local hotel and spend some time with your boys. Text me your location. I’ll call you when I know something. Assuming you even care at this point. If you just want to rent a car and drive back to Michigan I understand.”

  “Oh, we care,” Dusty said. “We care a lot. This guy has caused so much damage and suffering that I will not rest until we have him. I don’t know how long it will take our boys to get over this. We’ll go someplace and let you know. Please get back to us when you can talk.”

  They checked into the nearest hotel with a pool and a restaurant. They bought the boys the biggest lunch they could eat. The hotel shop didn’t carry swim suits but it did have some wacky short pants. They got one for each boy and an hour later they were by the pool. The boys were swimming and yelling. Dusty and Amanda just sat on a couple of lawn chairs with a drink in their hands and watched.

  “The resilience of youth,” Amanda said. “It’s like nothing ever happened.”

  Amanda had asked Elliott how he ended up keeping his phone. “I saw him take Bill’s phone so I just shoved mine down the front of my pants. He searched me everywhere but there. But I was low on power. I could only use it once in a while.”

  “I know,” Amanda said. “You did great.” Go jump in the pool and forget it.”

  “The worst is over,” Dusty said. “He’s gone and can’t do any more damage to our kids, to us, our town or our state. But we have to find him and bring him back. I meant it when I said I will not rest until that happens.”

  “Let’s wait and see what the FBI comes up with. They have the resources, we don’t.”

  “Okay, but if they strike out and Croft made it out of the country then we have to think of something.”

  “Look, I want Croft as badly as you do but I’m not going to leave the boys. And the boys need a dad. If you go after him he will not hesitate to kill you. Look at what he’s done already. We know that he’s resourceful and merciless. I just thank God that he did not harm the kids.”

  “Well we aren’t going to do anything today. Let’s wait until we hear from Tamourini.”

  Chapter Seventy Nine

  At 9:00 PM there was a knock on the door. It was Tamourini, looking very tired and frazzled. “I’m going to give you a quick summary then I’m going to bed. I just checked in here. It’s been a very long day.”

  “Want a beer?” Dusty asked.

  “As a matter of fact, that would be great.”

  Dusty got three cans from the mini-bar and they all sat down.

  “First, he left his police radios in the car. He apparently did not want to risk going through security with them. We checked and one was tuned to the Midway security frequency. That means that he heard us call in and advise them we were landing at the airport. That spooked him so instead of parking the car he just abandoned it at the terminal. Except he out thought us again by going to arrivals instead of departures. We talked to every TSA agent and every gate agent. No one could give us even a possible ID on Croft. Of course these guys see so many people every day that it’s unlikely any one will stand out. We’re terribly handicapped not knowing what name he’s traveling under. He knew we were about to land at the airport so my theory is that he just went in one door and out another and jumped in a cab.”

  “But why Midway in the first place” Dusty asked. “That’s why we were headed for O’Hare. He couldn’t get an international flight from Midway.”

  “Look at his M.O.,” Tamourini said. “He always does the unexpected. Plus Midway is a lot closer to Michigan than O’Hare. My guess is that he had an international flight booked from some other U.S. airport which he planned to fly to first. An airport where we wouldn’t know or think to look for him. If we had a name this would be easy. Without it, we’re up the proverbial creek.”

  “Wait a minute,” Amada cried. “You’re saying that if he hadn’t been spooked he probably would have parked the car, bought a ticket to someplace and just left.’’

  “That’s the most logical assumption.”

  “Then what would he have done with the boys?”

  Tamourini just shrugged.

  “Oh, God,” Amanda cried. “That close. The bastard.”

  “Is there anything else we can do now?” Dusty asked.

  “We’re going to go through O’Hare tomorrow but I don’t expect any results. Too big, too many passengers and even if we get a hit he will have too big a head start. He could be well out of the country by then. Look, I’ve got twenty agents here. I don’t need you. Take your kids and go home. I’ll contact you either way. I’m headed for bed. Thanks for the beer.”

  “One more thing,” Dusty said. “Where did he get the vehicle he was driving?”

  “Believe it or not he rented it in his own name. At first that threw me but then it made sense. He’s traveling under some kind of alias. He didn’t want to use that name to rent the car so he used his own. By the time we figure it out he’s gone and we still don’t know what name he is using.”

  Chapter Eighty

  They got back to Pleasant Harbor late the next afternoon. They had let the boys sleep in and have another swim before they left. Both Dusty and Amanda scheduled several meetings with their staffs—one for the start of each shift and one for the end. That would allow them to meet with every officer not off duty for the day. They agreed they would share everything they knew about Croft and the events of the last several days. Obviously, if anyone knew anything they wanted it.

  Dusty spent his first day back sorting out his own office. He had finally received approval from the City Manager to replace his vehicle. The next day he went into Croft’s office. He still had a load of work
but he wanted to see what he could find. He sorted through several piles of routine paperwork on Croft’s desk and then started checking the case folders in his file cabinet. Most of it was stuff he was already familiar with. He came across a file that meant nothing to him. It was labeled “Mark Putney.”

  First he checked the dates on the file and then the calendar on his IPhone. He had taken a week off last spring to take his daughter to the Bahamas over her spring vacation. The trip had two purposes. First, to spend some time with his only child who he rarely saw any more and, second, to keep her off the Florida beaches with the spring breakers. The dates matched his time out of town.

  He began reading. Mr. Putney, age 38, had been found dead in his home. A friend had tried to contact him for several days with no response. He finally called 911. Croft and two other officers had broken into the home and found Putney dead. After an EMT unit confirmed his status his body had been transferred to the county coroner who later stated the cause of death as a massive heart attack. Croft and the two other officers had gone through the home looking for evidence of a will or relatives. The two officers left on an emergency call and Croft was then alone in the home. Finding no evidence of a will, a spouse or other relative Croft referred the case to the nearest probate court which was in Muskegon. He then called a carpenter to repair the damage to the front door, posted notices of no entry on both the front door and back door and left. Absent a will or a relative the probate court would appoint an administrator to supervise the disposition of the estate. This person was usually a local attorney who needed the work. The whole thing looked proper and routine to Dusty but he had a strange feeling about it. No spouse, no family, Croft alone in the home. What had he found?

  On a hunch he called the Muskegon County court house and obtained the name of the administrator. It was a Muskegon attorney named Wilson Banks. Dusty called his office and after a long wait was connected. He explained the reason for his call.

  “I know there are confidentiality issues. I’ll get a court order if necessary. But I just need to know a few simple things at the moment.”

  “Well, first, we finally found a living relative. He has a brother who lives in Seattle but he has not seen the deceased in years and expressed no interest in returning to Michigan to settle the estate. He has signed a waiver in my favor. He just said to call him if he had any money coming. It’s too early to know that. Anyway, I have latitude here so tell me what you want to know.”

  “First, did you find any evidence that Mr. Putney had a passport?”

  “No, but I didn’t think that was odd. Lots of people don’t have passports.”

  “Did you find Mr. Putney’s driver’s license?”

  “No. And I definitely found that to be odd. He owned a vehicle and lived alone.”

  “Was anything else missing that you could tell?”

  “Not at first. But we got several credit card statements on cards that we did not find in the home or on his person. I thought that was pretty odd too.”

  “Anything else you can think of?”

  “No. But now that I know what you’re after I’ll go back through my files just in case.”

  “One more thing. Do you have a picture of Mr. Putney?”

  “No. But give me your email address and I’ll have the coroner send you one.”

  “Thank you sir. You’ve been of great help”

  A few hours later Dusty had the picture. There was a rough likeness to Croft. The hairline had receded more than Croft’s and the face was a little chubbier. With a little work it would probably be good enough to get through an airline check in.

  A few hours later he got a call from Attorney Banks. “I printed off the last twelve months of Putney’s bank statements just to look for leads on assets or bills. Six months before his death there was a check for $140 for a passport renewal to the Department of State. But if he had the passport he must have hidden it or lost it. Oh, by the way, we always check for a safety deposit box but I could find no evidence of one. If anything more turns up I’ll let you know.”

  “Thank you again. This could be the information we’ve been looking for.”

  Bingo, Dusty said to himself. He picked up the phone to call Tamourini.

  “Great work, Dusty. If this pans out we can track him. But it’s convoluted. We have to go to each airline and the TSA. The airlines are usually pretty responsive. They don’t want to piss off the FBI. But the TSA could care less and they respond when they’re good and ready. I’ll see if my boss can put a little pressure on them. It will probably be a day or two before I can let you know what we’ve learned.”

  “I’ll wait. Call when you can.”

  Dusty stewed for two days. Then, late in the afternoon, just before he was ready to leave for home, Tamourini called. “It’s a bullseye,” Tamourini said. “A Mark Putney flew from Indianapolis to Dallas the afternoon he disappeared and then caught a flight to Los Angeles. He never went to O’Hare. He must have paid some cabby a fortune to take him to Indianapolis. But then we know he has a fortune—mob money and Arab money. Anyway, from Los Angeles he took a flight on New Zealand airlines to Auckland, laid over for nine hours and then took a flight to Samoa. As far as we know, he’s still there.”

  “Samoa, why the hell Samoa? It’s the end of the earth.”

  “Not quite, but it’s pretty remote. I’ve done some research. Samoa is one of the few nations in the world that has no extradition treaty with the United States. To understand why you have to understand some history. Greater Samoa is made up of four major islands. Going back a century or so, the two eastern islands were controlled by the U.S. and the two western islands were controlled at one time or another by New Zealand, Germany and Britain. When the allies divided up the world at the end of World War One the U.S. ended up with the two eastern islands as a protectorate, now called American Samoa. The two western islands ended up independent and were originally called Western Samoa but now just Samoa. But there’s a lot of bad blood here. Samoa thinks all four islands should have been deemed independent. American Samoa thinks all four islands should have been part of the protectorate. That appears to be why Samoa never signed an extradition treaty. They’re still pissed that they only got half a country and are in no mood to cooperate with the United States.”

  “Okay, what happens next?”

  “This is the hardest part, Dusty. Nothing happens. We probably can’t extradite him. We can try even though there’s no treaty but it’s a very long shot. As I said, there’s a lot of bad blood here. The FBI has no jurisdiction in Samoa. The CIA isn’t interested because this is not a matter of national security. We have an embassy in Samoa but we have very little influence with their government which, in any case, is very disjointed. He outflanked us again and he’s home free, at least for a while. We can make a plea for extradition but it almost certainly will not be acted on.”

  “I can’t accept that,” Dusty said. “This is both personal and professional with me. He betrayed my trust. He’s killed three innocent Michigan women and dumped their bodies here. He’s killed two of your agents. He killed that poor old farmer. He was responsible for Roberto’s death. He kidnapped my kids and might have killed them if he’d had time. He was instrumental in the Arabs getting weapons that they used to attack our government and injure several officers. I don’t care about the Mexicans but he was responsible for some of their deaths too. This guy is one of the four horsemen. I can’t rest until he answers for all this.”

  “Dusty, don’t go there. If you chase him by yourself, we can’t help you and we can’t protect you. If the Samoan government gets a hint that you’re there to harm another visitor you could end up in a local jail and, at best, be deported. I’m not up on Samoan jails but I doubt they’re as nice as the one you run. If you actually harm him, let alone kill him, you could spend the rest of your life there. Remember, these people don’t like Americans.”

  “If I did go, I would not be there to harm him or kill him but just to spoo
k him into running. If he gets someplace where we can grab him then we win.”

  “You’re not looking at two things. First, once he knows you’re there he will try to kill you. We certainly know he has no compulsions in that regard. Second, this is a third world country and he has gobs of money. A lot of money in a third world country can buy a heap of influence. If he starts buying people off, you could just go gone and we and your family will never know what happened. ‘Tourist disappears while snorkeling off beach.’ Don’t do it Dusty. You will be out of your depth. I really care for you and Amanda and you’ve got kids to raise. Please stay home.”

  “I’ll think on it,” Dusty said. “But if I do go you will not know it until I contact you with actionable information. And, by the way, I am neither stupid nor without capabilities. I know the odds but sometimes ‘you just have to,’ as I heard an associate of mine say recently.”

  Tamourini couldn’t help smiling. “One last thing then. I’m going to break protocol and give you a telephone number. It’s a Homeland Security number that is only supposed to be used by U.S. agents in the field who are in extreme danger. If you use it casually, it could cost me my job. Don’t dial it unless you are in danger and have something to exchange—like where we can pick up Croft legally. Understood?”

  “Got it,” Dusty said as he wrote down the number and put it in his wallet. He would soon memorize it. “And thank you. You’ve been a great associate and a good friend.”

  After dinner that night he had a long talk with Amanda. At first she was totally against his going but finally said, “You’re your own man Dusty. You know how I feel. You know what agent Tamourini told you. You know what the odds are. You know that the kids and I need you. If I lose you I’ll probably never find another man that I can accept and who can be a father to the boys. But, all that said. This guy needs to answer for his crimes. He’s more than just a criminal. He’s evil. He will do more damage if he’s allowed to stay free. I want him to be brought to justice, I just don’t want you to be the one to do it.”