Deadly Stillwater

by Roger Stelljes

  The chief nodded. If Mac had a hunch, good luck getting him off it until he was satisfied, no matter what anyone else said.

  Burton broke away from the group and walked down to the men from St. Paul. “We’re set here,” he said, and then looked to Riley. “Where’s McRyan and his partner?”

  “They’re in the neighborhood,” Riley answered neutrally. “He tends to draw attention when he’s around, so he wants to be on the street when the call comes in.”

  Burton nodded and then looked at his watch. “Should be any minute now.”

  “Tracking in the bags?” Rock asked Burton.

  “Sewn into the fabric. Very small, Can’t be seen or felt. Where it goes, we’ll be able to follow.”

  Rock walked over to the window, moved the drapes back, and noted the mass of media coalescing out front. There might have been two hundred people milling about. “How do we get out of here without the media being all over this?” Rock asked. “They’re hovering like flies out there. Riles and I were practically strip searched on the way in and it seems like more people are coming by the minute.”

  Duffy nodded. “We’ve got three sets of plain white vehicles ready to go in the parking ramp, which the media can’t get to. When the call comes, and we have to leave, three sets leave. If, after we leave, the main vehicle still picks up a tail, we’ll take care of it before we get to wherever we’re going.”

  “Any idea where we’re going?” Riley asked.

  “No,” Duffy replied, taking a sip from his Styrofoam coffee cup.

  Dean pulled into the parking lot of a small beige-and-brown-brick strip mall along Highway 95 in Lakeland, one of many small towns that dotted the Minnesota side of the St. Croix River, south of Interstate 94. The strip mall held a hair salon, an insurance agency, an accounting office, a law practice, and a pay phone. A flat canopy hung over the sidewalk in front of the businesses. Given the holiday, the parking lot was empty. There were no surveillance cameras, sparse traffic on the highway, and zero foot traffic. The nearest houses were on the other side of the highway, at least a couple hundred yards away.

  Dressed in flip-flops and a ball cap, Dean looked like any of a thousand men on a warm holiday. The only unusual part of his ensemble was a red nylon shoulder bag, out of which he pulled a pair of black leather gloves. Taking a quick glance around, he slid on the gloves and pulled out the portable voice changer and two quarters. He also took out a three-by-five-inch index card. Dropping the quarters into the phone, Dean looked down at the card and dialed.

  The conference room was silent, other than the sound of pacing shoes scuffing against the carpet. Burton and Duffy leaned over the phone, both hands on the table. The call would be recorded, and they would trace it, although nobody expected the kidnappers to stay on the line for any appreciable length of time. Everyone’s eyes were on the second hand on the wall clock. When the red hand hit twelve, the phone rang. The chief picked up on the second ring.

  “Flanagan.”

  “You and Hisle at the corner of Washington and West Fifth in ten minutes. With the ransom. No police. We’ll be watching.”

  “What about… the… girls,” the chief’s voice trailed off. The kidnapper had already hung up.

  Burton moved immediately. “Let’s hustle,” he said, leading everyone out of the conference room. “We’ll wire these two in the truck.” As the group approached the elevators, Peters pulled Rock and Riley aside.

  “This is no good,” Riles said through gritted teeth. “They’re going to wire the chief and Lyman in the truck? This smells. Mac’s right, this isn’t a simple money drop. They’re going to put the chief and Hisle on the move.”

  Peters nodded. “I want you two mobile. Keep a perimeter and stay on this radio frequency. We know who’s behind this, so if you see this Brown or the Muellers, move on them,” their captain ordered.

  Riles’s cell phone rang.

  Heather Foxx noted the three separate convoys of trucks pulling out and immediately recognized what she was seeing. “They’re running different groups out of here so we don’t follow,” she said to her cameraman as the trucks and cars streaked out in different directions. She looked back to the side entrance she’d seen McRyan and his friends use in recent days. Detectives Riley and Rockford burst through the doors and ran down the steps. Heather took a look at the news truck and her rental car. “Jump in the rental car,” she told the cameraman, fishing out the keys.

  “We’re supposed to stay here,” the cameraman said.

  Foxx’s instincts told her to get on the move. “Trust me. There’s nothing to do here but wait for the police to feed us a statement, and everyone gets the same thing. On the other hand,” the reporter said, gesturing toward the detectives, “Riles and Rockford, those are two of the chief’s boys. If we follow them, we might actually see something worth reporting.”

  “Less than ten minutes?” Mac yelled into the phone as he accelerated down the county road to meet up with the Washington County sheriff. “Where?”

  “Where?” Lich demanded, doubling up. “Where are they going to?”

  Mac put his hand over the phone. “Corner of Washington and West Fifth, that’s the northwest corner of Rice Park,” and then to Riley, “What then?… Nothing? They just wait? You know what they’re going to do? They’re going to run the chief and Lyman around, Riles. They’re going to try and lose you… yeah… sounds like you’re on it? Good. Yeah, I’ll have the phone with me.” Mac hung up. “I knew it,” Mac railed to Lich. “It’s not a simple ransom drop. They’re going to put the chief and Lyman on the run.” He felt no satisfaction at being right.

  “FBI will have assets all over the place, Mac,” Lich said. “They’ll be tough to shake. Especially in the middle of downtown.”

  “On a normal day, yeah,” Mac replied. “But it’s the Fourth of fuckin’ July, and it’s hotter than hell. Downtown is a graveyard. There’ll be nobody, and I mean nobody, around Rice Park at that time of day. If we’ve got people following closely, they’ll stick out like 50-Cent at a Faith Hill concert.”

  “Fine,” Lich replied, “but it’ll also be hard to lose them, with so few people around. There isn’t anyone for them to blend with.”

  “Maybe, but they’ve been ready for everything thus far. They’ll be ready for that. Mac sighed. Dick’s point was valid, but he didn’t agree. The sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach told him all he needed to know. The whole thing felt wrong. “The chief and Lyman are the real target, the money’s just so they can get away in style.”

  The Explorer’s speedometer read eighty-five, and the flasher pushed cars off to the shoulder as Mac burned south on the county road.

  “They should be up just around the bend,” Lich said.

  As Mac slowed to sixty-five and drove around a small bend in the road, two Washington County Suburbans came into view, waiting on the right shoulder a half mile ahead. Mac pulled in behind them. A paunchy man with a bushy black mustache was already out, walking up to Lich on the passenger side.

  “I’m George Head, sheriff out here. The Russell place is up on the left side, another two miles.”

  “Anyone do a drive-by?”

  Head nodded. “I had a couple of my guys drive by five minutes ago. The said it looked awfully quiet.”

  “Just the same,” Mac said. “We need to go check it out.”

  “You’re sure they’re the guys?”

  “They’re behind it,” Lich answered. “No question at this point.”

  “Let’s not dick around then,” Head said bluntly. “We’re just gonna blow right up the driveway and crash the place. You fellas got vests?”

  Lich pointed to the back seat.

  “Put ‘em on.”

  The sheriff hustled back to his Suburban while Mac and Lich pulled on and secured their vests. Once set, Mac gave a quick honk and they all pulled out, accelerating down the road. The house, a sad place with chipped and fading yellow paint and a slightly sagging green-shingled roof, wa
s set back two hundred yards from the road in a thin grove of maple and poplar trees. A large, rusted, light-blue pole barn sat behind the house. The yard was unkempt, the lawn overgrown and weed-filled. The Washington County Suburbans sped up the long dirt driveway and skidded to a stop at the front porch. Mac stopped hard behind them and everyone was out.

  The sheriff yelled, “Go!” Two men went up the porch and hammered down the front door, while Mac, Lich, and a deputy ran around to the back, weapons drawn on the back door. They heard the men working the house, with several “Clears” called out. Within thirty seconds, a deputy pushed out the back door and shook his head. Nobody was home.

  Mac and Lich moved inside. A quick inspection of the house revealed no furniture or working power. The only sign of a recent presence was a familiar-looking card table and four chairs in the kitchen.

  “They’ve been here.” Mac said. “The table. The chairs. They’re clean, new, recently used and the same as we found at that house in St. Paul.”

  Mac was out the back door and jogged to the large pole barn. The front and back doors were open. It was empty other than a few cement blocks, scraps of wood, two sawhorses, and four new garden shoves and a new spade leaning against the wall. Mac walked to the shovels, the metal still shiny. He looked to his left. At the far end a deputy was kneeling down, picking at the dirt with a pen.

  “What do you have?” Mac asked, hustling up to him.

  “Sawdust,” the deputy replied. “It’s just kind of spread here in the dirt, and it’s spread around here.” The deputy saw the look on Mac’s face. “Is this important?”

  “Yes,” Lich replied as he walked up. “Mac, did you see the new shovels and sawhorses over along the wall there?”

  “Yes,” Mac answered as he jogged out the back door of the pole barn, his hand over his eyes as he scanned the property.

  Sheriff Head walked up to them. “House is clear. I assume you noted the chairs and table in the kitchen.”

  Mac nodded, but kept the search on. “How big is this piece of property again?”

  “Eighty acres,” Head replied, following Mac as he started to walk back toward the driveway. “It runs out the back, east to the property line for the state park. What are you looking at?”

  Mac walked quickly past the sheriff’s Suburbans and his Explorer to where a jagged road ran back toward the state park. Mac kneeled down where the road ventured into taller grass. There appeared to be fresh or at least recent tire tracks. “I think someone’s driven through here recently.”

  He stood up and looked up at a thick forest in the distance, perhaps a half mile or a little more away. The road — practically a trail through the taller grass — meandered like a stream in the direction of the trees. Mac closed his eyes, tilted his head back, and thought back to the kidnappers’ video, the view out the windshield that showed high grass, weeds, and a rough road up to a heavily wooded area. Then later they’re in the woods, thick woods, burying the girls.

  He opened his eyes, looking again into the distance. The land looked right. As Mac looked around, he couldn’t see another house or building anywhere in the distance. He knew O’Brien State Park. The area that was frequented by the general public was along the St. Croix River, not on the land backing up to the farm.

  “Sheriff, how far to the state park line?”

  “Like I said, it’s an eighty-acre plot,” Head replied, pointing straight out. “It goes back, I don’t know maybe another quarter of a mile, maybe a little more to the property line.”

  “Is there a fence or boundary for the state park?”

  “No,” Head replied, shaking his head. “There are some green posts every so often that mark it, but there isn’t a fence or anything.”

  Mac turned to the sheriff. “There are a bunch of new shovels in the pole barn. Grab them!” he yelped back over his shoulder, running to the Explorer.

  “Mac!” Lich yelled, running behind him. “Where are you going?’

  “You drive,” Mac ordered, handing the keys to Lich. “Follow the trail.”

  “You think the girls are out there?”

  “No,” he answered. “I know it.”

  As the van took I-35E south into downtown St. Paul, an FBI tech taped body mics to the chests of the chief and Lyman. “Just speak normally,” Burton said. “These are very sensitive microphones. They’ll pick up any conversation you have, even if you whisper.”

  Lyman and the chief both nodded, tucking their shirts back into their pants.

  “Downtown’s pretty quiet today. Won’t be anyone around,” the chief said. “It’ll be hard for you to be close.”

  “We’ve got you wired, and we’ve got the tracker in the bags,” Duffy said.

  “We won’t be far, and your boys will be around and they know the streets,” Burton said calmly. “Just concentrate on getting your girls back, and we’ll worry about the rest.”

  The chief sat down next to Peters and asked in a whisper, “What do you think?”

  “Watch your back,” Peters replied quietly.

  “Two blocks,” the driver yelled.

  Burton and Duffy each handed bags to the chief and Lyman.

  Foxx pulled up to the curb just short of the corner of Main Street and West Fifth Street. She was parked a block back from Riley and Rockford, who’d taken a left on West Fifth Street and parked their white Chevy S-10 along the side, just short of the end of the street. The reporter could see Rockford, who had a set of binoculars put up to his eyes.

  “What are they watching?” the cameraman asked, filming across Heather from the passenger side.

  “Well find out soon enough,” Heather answered.

  The truck pulled up to the corner, and the chief and Lyman jumped out. Without a word, Burton slid the door closed. The truck pulled away down Washington Street and turned right on Kellogg Boulevard, heading out of sight.

  Lyman and the chief walked up onto the corner. The chief scanned Rice Park, a park shaded by mature trees. The park took up the entire block, with benches lining walkways running diagonally from the outside of the block to the large marble fountain in the middle. The park was empty.

  “What next?” Lyman asked.

  Just then a ringing sound came from the garbage can sitting on the corner.

  “That,” Flanagan answered as he looked down and then reached into the can, pulling out a duffel bag. A cell phone with a traditional telephone ring tone was inside. The chief answered.

  “Flanagan.”

  Paddy McRyan stood in the empty St. Paul Grill restaurant, inside the St. Paul Hotel, peering out the large picture window that looked out across market Street and into Rice Park. He watched the chief grab a bag out of the garbage can, pull the cell phone out, and start walking toward the water fountain in the center of the park. “Captain, they’re getting into the fountain, they’re going underwater,” Paddy said as calmly as he could, knowing what would happen to the body mics.

  “Copy that,” Peters replied into Paddy’s earpiece. And then, his captain confirmed his worst fears. “We’ve lost audio contact.”

  “We need to keep an eyeball,” Paddy said urgently into his radio, moving to his right to improve his viewing angle.

  “Copy that,” Peters answered, taking charge. “What are they doing now?”

  “They’re out of the fountain.” Paddy put his binoculars to his eyes, focusing the view. “The chief is on a cell phone. Do we have audio back?”

  “Negative. We are not getting that feed.”

  Paddy watched as Hisle and the chief knelt down to the ground, just out of his view. He couldn’t see what they were doing. After a minute, they slung the nylon bags over their shoulders. “They’re on the move, south, hold on…” The detective moved to his left, to the far edge of the picture window. “The chief and Hisle are walking out of Rice Park, south, back along Washington Street over to Kellogg.”

  “Are you sure?” Peters asked. “The tracking devices in the bags show them stationary.”
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  That explained why they had knelt down. “They transferred the ransom into different bags. They are now out of my line of sight.”

  I’m on the west side of the Xcel Center,” Riles said into a radio. “They’ll have to come out onto Kellogg Boulevard, and we have a good viewpoint.”

  “Copy that,” Burton replied. “But keep your distance. Hang on… I’m looking at the map…”

  “We’ll hold along West Seventh and Kellogg,” Riley responded. “We should have an eyeball if they walk our way.”

  “Do that, but hold to the corner,” Burton ordered.

  Rock pulled his truck up to the corner of West Seventh and Kellogg, holding in the left hand turn lane, his hazard lights on in case anyone pulled up from behind. Riley was looking east as Kellogg gently curved away like a half-moon. Flanagan and Hisle came into view, walking across the street to the sidewalk on the south side of Kellogg. They turned west, walking toward Riles and Rock. Three hundred yards away, a half-dozen people waited at a bus stop in front of the pedestrian tunnel entrance to the RiverCentre parking ramp, an underground ramp built into the bluff over the Mississippi River. You could enter the ramp with your car from Kellogg Boulevard on top or from Eagle Street, which ran eighty feet below Kellogg at the bottom of the bluff.

  “We have them in view. They are walking in our direction.” Riley reported into the radio.

  “They’re stopping,” Rock added. “They’re stopping.”

  “Be advised the chief and Hisle have approached a group of people waiting at a bus stop at the RiverCentre parking ramp,” Riles said. “Are they going to put them on a bus?” he asked Rock.

  “Looks like it,” Rock answered. Just then a bus approached from the south on West Seventh. It had its turn signal to take a right.

  “We have a MTC Bus, an articulated bus, approaching our position from West Seventh. It’s turning east on Kellogg.” Riles gave the bus number and read the digital board over the windshield. “Be advised. The digital board on the bus says it is going to the Taste of Minnesota.” The Taste of Minnesota was a large food and music festival taking place on Harriet Island on the south side of the Mississippi River, opposite downtown. The culmination of the Taste was the big Fourth of July fireworks show. There were thousands of people on the island taking in the concerts and food.