“And let me guess: you want to drive to somewhere in the middle of nowhere, watching thousands of cars go by on the off chance that you see the one you’re after, and follow them with the aim of getting them to admit to their crimes?”
“Well, when you put it that way, it sounds ridiculous,” I muttered.
“Not at all. I’ll come pick you up in five.”
My heart leapt. I knew it was completely ridiculous, logically, but I had to try. After all, as Chief Gary said, I wasn’t allowed to leave the state. I jumped up and grabbed my purse.
“Jason and I are going to go hunt the smugglers,” I said.
“Aw, can’t I come?” Sophie complained.
“Well, it’s mainly going to involve sitting by a highway all night and hoping we find the right car.”
“Oh, that sounds boring. Never mind. Have fun!”
I grinned and said goodbye as I headed outside, where Jason was already waiting, with two six-packs of Red Bull and about four large bags of chips on the rear passenger seat. I gave him as kiss as I sat down. “Not your first stake-out, I assume?”
He smiled at me in return. “Definitely not. First one in a while though. I’m actually excited about it! At least, I will be for the first fifteen minutes or so, until I remember just how boring stake-outs tend to be. So what do you know?”
I recounted everything I’d found out with Chief Gary, and then discovered on the smugglers’ social media profiles. “So I figure if we get onto I84 they’ll eventually drive past us to get to I5.”
“That’s probably correct. We’ll find an exit with a bridge, park there and look down at cars heading west on I84. If we see their car, we’ll follow it. How’s that sound?”
“Great,” I nodded enthusiastically. “The only thing is, I’m not sure what kind of car they’ll be driving.”
“What about the post he did from the desert?” Jason asked. “Can you get any information from that?”
“Hmmm,” I said, opening the post again on my phone. We were in luck! The steering wheel on the phone, which was obviously in view, showed that the car being driven was a Toyota. “Ok! We know it’s a Toyota. And it looks to be kind of high up off the ground, so I’d say a truck or SUV rather than a sedan.”
“All right, so now we have something. Go through the rest of the photos and see if you can find a picture that might have it on the outside, if we can narrow down the model and color I think we’ll be golden; traffic in the middle of the night won’t be that heavy, and we should be able to approximate when they’ll show up.”
I did as Jason asked as we drove out of Willow Bay. Sure enough, I eventually found in Kerry’s Instagram feed a picture of her with a red Toyota Rav4–newish, but not brand new–in the background.
“Ok, we’ve got it. We’re looking for a three-to-five-year-old red Rav4.”
“Awesome,” Jason grinned. “We’ve got ourselves a stake-out!”
As much as I’d like to say the entire trip to the interstate was interesting, the fact of the matter was I was completely exhausted after barely sleeping the night before and having a pretty exciting day today as well. I ended up passing out before we even reached the highway leaving Willow Bay, and when I finally woke up, the clock on the dashboard read that it was just after midnight.
“Well hello there, sleepyhead,” Jason told me as he sipped from a Red Bull. I’m glad you’re up, this means I can open the chips without feeling bad about waking you up,” he said, reaching behind him and grabbing the bag.
“Urgh, where are we?” I mumbled, still feeling half asleep.
“We’re in the Benson Lake parking lot,” Jason replied. I looked out the window and saw headlights in the distance; a moment later a truck passed about twenty feet in front of us. “We’ve been here for about an hour. Don’t worry, I’ve kept an eye out. No red Rav4s yet.”
“Thanks,” I told him. “Sorry for falling asleep. I guess I’m not the greatest stake-out buddy ever.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Jason replied, reaching in and grabbing a handful of chips. “You were obviously completely exhausted. I had Red Bull, and even if I didn’t, I don’t really have anything to do tomorrow. It’s better that you get some sleep.”
“I feel better now,” I replied, grabbing a Red Bull myself and drinking half the can in a single gulp. I stared out the window and realized just how good a spot Jason had chosen.
“Wow, you’re basically a stake-out expert. This is great! I never would have thought to come here.” The parking lot for the lake was literally in the middle of the highway; pedestrian tunnels allowed people parked here to access the lake. Directly in front of where we were parked was the westbound highway, and this exit had streetlights lining the road as well so we could see clearly the make, model and color of any car coming past.
Jason grinned. “You’re going to love me even more. I went out to stretch my legs when we got here, and I found an old abandoned construction zone sign on the shoulder of the highway, along with an old traffic cone. I made sure no one was coming and went and put it up, so most cars will possibly slow down just a little bit when they drive past.”
“Geez, why have I been taking Sophie with me on adventures? You’re so much better at this stuff than she is,” I said, and Jason laughed.
“All right. Now all we have to do is sit and wait, and hope they actually come this way.”
I reached for a bag of chips of my own.
Chapter 18
Four hours later it was the middle of the night, the adrenaline of the stake-out had worn off, I’d eaten way too many chips and I was starting to get antsy that we hadn’t seen them yet.
“What if they don’t come this way?” I asked Jason. “What if we just sit here until sun-up and they’re long gone? Maybe they took an inside route and went straight to I5 from the south.”
“Maybe, but I doubt it. Those routes might normally be faster, but there’s a lot of construction work happening on a lot of the minor highways right now to prepare for winter. They’re going to want to come this way not only because it’s going to be faster, but because near construction zones there tend to be more cops, and the last thing they want is to get pulled over if they have smuggled animals in their car.”
“That makes sense,” I said.
“Still, you’re right. It’s a very real possibility. Assuming Trevor took the photo a few minutes before he posted it on Facebook, they should be coming by in the next hour at the very latest, assuming they stopped for dinner somewhere.”
“Great,” I muttered, stifling a yawn and popping open another Red Bull. Jason knew what he was doing when he’d bought a dozen of them. Unfortunately, I’d already had to go out and pee outside a couple of times because of it.
Suddenly a pair of headlights came toward us. That in and of itself wasn’t the least bit strange; we’d seen hundreds of cars and trucks go by in the last few hours, but what was strange was that it seemed to slam on its brakes as soon as it saw the old construction sign Jason had put up, like they absolutely didn’t under any circumstances want to get caught doing over the speed limit. Plenty of cars going by had simply straight up ignored the sign.
As soon as I saw the deep red color and the familiar shape of the Toyota Rav4, I perked up. I tried to peer inside and noticed a wavy-haired woman driving and a male passenger before the car got out of view.
“I think that’s them,” Jason said, starting up his car and pulling out onto the freeway behind them. Luckily there weren’t any other cars around, so we didn’t need to stay right on them. Jason left a hundred feet or so between us, to keep them from getting suspicious.
I wondered what would happen if they made it to I5 and up into Washington. After all, I couldn’t leave the state.
“Did you find out anything about the assault Matt Smith was involved in?” I asked Jason suddenly, remembering that I’d asked him to look into that.
He grinned and looked at me in reply. “Yeah. It’s a funny story, that one.
The short version is that Matt Smith crossed the river into Vancouver, and decided to go to a bar there. Apparently there was a girl he liked, and he didn’t exactly take kindly to her telling him off. She was just hanging out with friends and apparently he was being a huge creep.”
“Gee, I’m shocked,” I replied sarcastically.
“So the girl ends up calling her boyfriend, who shows up and tells Smith to get lost. He leaves the bar, but waits in the bushes for the girl’s boyfriend to leave, and tries to beat him up. Unfortunately for him, Smith was completely drunk at this point, whereas the guy was stone cold sober, and had about a hundred pounds on him. Smith ended up with a broken nose and an arrest on his record.”
“Well, the black eye makes me feel better, at least. I didn’t notice his nose looking weird when we saw him, it must have healed.”
Jason nodded. “I guess so. Or it wasn’t as bad as the dude made out. But anyway, he couldn’t have killed Smith. He works nights, and he was on duty the whole night when Smith was killed. He works at a warehouse in Portland, I spoke to one of his coworkers. He was there, and there was no way he could have slipped away for a few hours without anyone noticing.”
“Well, there goes the entire list of suspects,” I muttered. “Maybe we should look at Tony Fanchini again,” I suggested. “After all, he seemed a little bit off when Sophie and I went to see him.”
“Off how?” Jason asked.
“I don’t know. I just got a weird vibe from him.”
Jason nodded. “Fair enough. I imagine most major developers are like that. But we’ll check him out again for sure, see if he had a hidden motive to have Smith killed. Maybe he was going to lose his court case after all, or something.”
Before we got the chance to discuss things further, however, the Rav4 put its blinker on and turned off at an exit.
“What do you think they’re doing?” I asked.
“Getting gas is my guess,” Jason replied as he pulled off the highway as well. “Now’s our chance. Whatever we’re going to do, we’re going to do it now.”
“I’m not going to lie, I actually have no idea what to do,” I said, suddenly feeling embarrassed. Jason laughed.
“You’re more like Sophie than you like to admit,” he said. “I think we just confront them. They’re going to be crossing the border into Canada, so they won’t be armed.”
I loved how good Jason was at thinking of these things. “Ok, let’s do it,” I said as we pulled into the same gas station, Jason parking in the stall next to theirs.
“Follow my lead,” Jason said. “Remember, we have all the power. They almost certainly have smuggled animals in their car; the last thing they’re going to want is for the police to be involved in anything.”
“Are you sure you weren’t involved in the mob like your dad was?” I muttered more to myself than anything. I completely believed Jason when he told me all his experiences with these things came from being an investigative journalist in New York City.
I watched and followed as Jason made his way to the driver’s side door of the Rav4 and took the keys out of the ignition, which was easy since the car was turned off.
“Hey man, what the hell?” Trevor said when he noticed, coming around the side of the car and ignoring the fuel.
“Who is this guy, Keith?” Kerry Palmer asked, getting out of the car as well, her face obviously annoyed.
“Cut the crap, we know you’re Kerry and Trevor Palmer, don’t bother with the fake names with us,” I said, crossing my arms, hoping I looked a lot more intimidating than I felt. The siblings shared a glance with each other.
“Where’s Thomas Schiff?” I asked, and Kerry pointed a finger into the car.
“Old man’s asleep. Who are you and what do you want?”
I glanced into the SUV and noted that the old man was, in fact, snoring away. The slow breathing and drool at the corner of his mouth made me think it was legitimate, and not just an act.
“A few months ago you smuggled a giraffe out of Tarangire National Park. I need to know where it came from,” I said.
Trevor crossed his arms. “We don’t know anything about that.”
“Look, buddy,” Jason told him. “I have your car keys. I know you have smuggled animals of some sort in your car. I’m a reporter. I know all the cops around here. I can have them here in five minutes, and the three of you can spend some time in jail. After all, it’s not exactly your first arrest. Or, you can answer me and my friend here honestly, and we’ll let you go do whatever it is you want to do. Honestly, we don’t really care about any of the other animals, we just care about the giraffe. Where did she come from?”
Trevor and Kerry looked at each other. Then, Kerry gave Trevor the most imperceptible of nods. “You swear you’re not going to turn us in, man?” Trevor asked, and Jason nodded.
“Yeah. We just want to make sure the giraffe goes back to where she belongs.”
Trevor sighed. “It’s as you say, the giraffe was in Tarangire National Park. And let me tell you, it was hell trying to get her out without anyone noticing.”
“How much did Richard Steele pay you for her?” I asked.
“Two hundred grand. We got her out of the park and then into South Africa, onto a ship that ended up in New York, and we drove her in a trailer from there.”
I tried to hide my absolute disgust and keep the same neutral expression Jason did. “Where in the park did she come from? We need specifics.”
“It took us three days to find a giraffe calf that looked old enough that it would survive without its mother,” Kerry said. It was near one of those luxury safari resorts. I remember, we had to wait for the giraffe to get far enough away from the camp to avoid arousing suspicion from the staff there.”
“What was the camp called, do you remember?” I asked, and Kerry frowned.
“Does it really matter? Geez, it’s just a giraffe.”
“If you want to get out of here without getting arrested, it matters,” I replied, my voice ice cold.
“Fine, gee, no need to get your panties in a bunch over it,” Kerry said. “Let me think. It was a one syllable name. Syca, maybe? No, Sopa. That was it. Sopa Lodge.”
“And that’s where the giraffe was, with her mother?” Jason asked.
“Yeah, that was it,” Trevor said, nodding. “Now, can we please get our car keys back?”
Jason tossed him the keys and we got back into our car without another word. When we closed the door and got back onto the road I was practically trembling with rage.
“Hey, you ok?” Jason asked me softly, and I shook my head.
“No. It makes me so angry. I know we have Lucy’s information, and that’s the most important thing. But those people. They’re going to keep getting away with it. They’re going to Canada, and they’re going to come back, and they’re going to keep smuggling animals and no one’s going to do anything to stop them.”
I didn’t realize I was actually crying until I let out a sob at the end of the sentence. Jason pulled the car over to the side of the road, leaned over and wrapped his arms around me.
“They’re not going to get away with it,” he whispered to me softly, stroking my hair. I felt myself getting calmer from his touch.
“How, though? We promised not to report them.”
Jason laughed softly. “You do realize you’re dealing with criminals, right? So we lied.” He let me go and took out his phone. “I looked up the number for Canada’s Border Protection Agency, and while we were there I also took note of their license plate number. Give me a second.”
Jason called the number, and I listened, shocked, as he told the person on the end of the line about a Rav4 that was attempting to smuggle animals illegally into Canada.
“No, thank you,” Jason told the person on the other end of the line, and hung up. When he was finished, I burst out laughing. I was obviously so tired I was now hysterical.
“I can’t believe you did that! We promised we wouldn’t.”
I brushed a tear from my eye. “You really are the best boyfriend ever. You know that, right?”
“I do,” Jason grinned. “Now, let’s go back to the gas station and get some more Red Bull, and then go home.”
Because Jason was the best boyfriend ever, he let me sleep for the whole drive back to Willow Bay, then carried me into his house, where I woke up the next morning.
Chapter 19
Going by the look of surprise Sophie gave me when she saw me the next morning, it appeared my attempts at using makeup to look less like a zombie were pretty unsuccessful.
“That bad, huh?” I grimaced, and Sophie hid a smile.
“No, no, it’s not that bad,” she said. “But, uh, maybe it would be best if you stayed in the back as much as possible.”
I stuck my tongue out at her. “I need to call the Department of Fisheries and Wildlife this morning,” I told Sophie. “I know I don’t have any appointments until ten, so I’m going to stay here and say bye to the animals.”
I knew it was going to be tough. After all, Lucy was such a sweet giraffe, and Coolidge and Cherie had saved my life. But I knew all three of them–and Hehu, when he was well enough–were going to have to go home.
I made the call just after eight that morning. The department promised to send someone by shortly. Because of my work, I had a standing permit with the State of Oregon and was allowed to keep exotic animals in my care. I left a note on the front door telling them that if no one answered I was in the backyard, and I made my way to the stable.
As soon as I opened the door, I forced myself to smile. “Guess what, guys? You’re all going to start your journeys home today!”
Sleeping with the Fishes (A Paranormal Cozy Mystery) (Willow Bay Witches Book 6) Page 11
