Not Before Midnight (Sheriff Bud Blair Oregon Mystery Series Book 5)

by Rod Collins

  Brandt moved to the doorway and said, “Yes. We’re with the FBI.” She nodded, choked back a sob, and then crumpled in a dead faint.

  Brandt caught her before she hit the pavement and carried her to the SUV where Officer Allison helped him slide the woman onto the rear seat.

  Brandt closed the rear passenger door, climbed into the driver’s seat and started the engine. He put the heater fan on high and set the temperature on 80 before walking back to the container.

  Wilcox, controlled fury in his voice, stepped out of the container. “Douglas!” he shouted, “we need back-up. I want at least four rescue teams, about eight ambulances, trauma counselors, forensics, and a dozen agents … like right now. Make sure they understand we need immediate help. And stress we want some women agents in the mix. And we’ll need traffic control.” He looked at the marine security guards and said, “Why don’t you set up at the gate and direct traffic? And see about getting the yard lights back on. Okay?”

  They both nodded and scrambled into the Jeep. Officer Martin hit the starter and slapped the gearshift into drive. The tires squawked as she accelerated. Halfway to the gate, she said, “Oh, shit. Those poor girls. What a mess. And we didn’t suspect a thing.”

  Forehead furrowed by worry lines, Officer Allison said, “When the shit hits the fan…”

  His emotions barely under control, Brandt used the radio to call for help. He sounded calm, efficient, and in control – the perfect example of a professional in a high stress setting. But he didn’t feel that way. After he put the mic back in its dashboard clip, he pounded on the padded dash with a beefy fist. “Those sonsabitches. Those dirty, rotten sonsabitches.”

  He went back to help Wilcox calm the young women in the container. “Ladies, Brandt said, “I know you want out of here, but it’s raining and it’s cold. So just sit tight. Help is on the way. We’ll get you to safety.”

  Wilcox pulled Brandt by the sleeve and motioned him outside. “We got one scrawny little gal comatose in the back bunk. Hell, she can’t be fourteen. She has a slow pulse, and I can’t get her awake. Another woman is totally incoherent … just babbles and cries like a baby. Lord Almighty, what a mess!”

  Through clinched teeth, he growled to Brandt, “I’m gonna kill Al-Alwani. Take it to the bank.”

  ***

  From the darkness beyond the fence, flat on his stomach in the wet grass under a thorn-infested blackberry thicket, former FBI Special Agent Winslow Butler watched the caravan of first responders race through the gate, vehicle lights pulsing and counter pulsing, overlapping each other with strident red, white, and blue strobe lights. The Terminal 6 lights came back on, flooding the area with glare and stark shadows. Butler pulled his black watch cap down a little lower on his forehead.

  He recognized Special Agent McDonald, leader of the Major Crimes Unit and Special Agent in Charge Dutch Vanderlin when they stepped out of matching black Ford Expedition SUV’s. Wilcox and Brandt greeted the senior agents and led them to the open door of the container.

  After the last of the eight women had been triaged and rushed to Legacy Immanuel Hospital, a short distance south on I-5, Butler saw a white van, with “FBI Forensics” stenciled in six-inch black letters on the side, pull around the cluster of vehicles and back up to the container. A short while later, Butler could see camera flashes from inside the big metal box as the forensics team documented the evidence.

  Cold and cramped after two hours of lying on wet grass, Butler crawled out the backside of the blackberry thicket. Hunched over to keep his silhouette low to the ground, he walked slowly below the berm of a drainage ditch and back to the abandoned warehouse. Safely inside the derelict building, he eyeballed his pickup and thought, Why not? I’ll wait until the fuss dies down, and just boogie on back to The Runaway. Safe enough. No one is looking for this vehicle.

  He slid behind the wheel, racked the seat back as far as it would go and locked the door. The faint odor of the girl’s unwashed body lingered in the cab. Amused by the thought, he wondered if he would catch something. And then he was asleep.

  ***

  At 4:10 a.m., the FBI forensics experts finished their work. Every surface had been tested for fingerprints and DNA, the food packages had been photographed and labels removed from boxes to preserve any information telling them when and where it was made. It was hoped the purchases could be traced to specific individuals.

  The team took every scrap of physical evidence and boxed, bagged, and tagged it. Pillows, sleeping bags, hair brushes, toothbrushes, an old pair of tennis shoes, used tampons, fingernail clippings … whatever could be collected was loaded into the Forensics van, hopefully to tell the FBI who had been held in the container. On the back wall, hidden by a mattress, they found a list of names and dates scratched into the paint. Some of the dates were two years old.

  Dutch turned to the forensics team leader, “I want your guys back here in the daylight to work this container all over again. Your team is good, but I want them to be better than good. Don’t overlook anything that might help us identify the poor women who took a sad trip in this thing.”

  Doctor Ivan Warf, a tall blonde Norwegian, nodded … emotional pain visible in his face. “I agree, Dutch. All our work is important, and this is too important to hurry. We’ll check and double check until there just isn’t anything left to do. We’ll be back at 0700 with some fresh eyes – new people who haven’t seen the box yet.”

  “Thanks, Ivan. I know you’ll do it right. Didn’t mean to sound critical.”

  “No offense taken. And now then, may I suggest you put some people here to guard this abomination until we get back?

  Dutch said, “You may so suggest. SWAT is on the way.”

  Without another word, Doctor Warf climbed into the driver’s seat of the van and drove away.

  Dutch gave Wilcox and Brandt his thermos and said, “To keep you warm until SWAT arrives. They’ll make sure this box stays put. And when they get here, go home. Get some rest. I want you in my office at 0700.”

  After Dutch drove away, silence settled around the blue container. Wilcox looked at his partner and said, “It’s an evil thing, Douglas. Slavery still exists. Only these are white, unlike my ancestors.”

  Brandt was silent for almost thirty seconds, then he opened up. “I feel damned helpless some days, Leroy. There’s so much evil in the world. My mind just can’t encompass it.”

  He set Dutch’s thermos on the hood and was greeted by the strong aroma of whiskey-flavored coffee when he filled the cup. He took a drink before handing the cup to Wilcox who sniffed at it and said, “I’ll say this much, Douglas, Dutch makes a fine cup of coffee.”

  Chapter 48

  Debrief

  SEVEN-THIRTY A.M. SAW WILCOX AND BRANDT sitting at a conference table with Special Agent Smith, Special Agent Richard McDonald, Dutch Vanderlin, and a PR specialist Brandt thought of as “that nice looking woman from Information Management.” A stenographer, a video recorder, and Dutch’s yawning secretary were there to take notes.

  Dutch nodded at McDonald. “Your show, Richard.”

  McDonald put his elbows on the table and clasped his hands under his chin. He stared at the wall behind Wilcox and Brandt for a few seconds, wondering if they were going to protect their source … again. A smile tugged at his mouth. Loyal bastards, they are. But loyal to whom?

  “Okay,” he said. “For the record, Special Agent Leroy Wilcox and Special Agent Douglas Brandt, what led to your search for a container at the Port of Portland’s Terminal 6?”

  Without hesitation, Brandt said, “A phone call.”

  “Any idea who the caller was?”

  “Yeah,” Brandt said. “I’m positive it was FBI Special Agent Winslow Butler.”

  McDonald asked, “Why would he do that?”

  “You want me to speculate?”

  “Yes. Speculate. I know you can’t tell us what Butler was thinking, but you are the last person inside the FBI to hear from him. So … what did he
say, and what do you think his motivation was?”

  “You want the long version or the short version?”

  “Short version.”

  Brandt looked at Wilcox before saying, “I think he’s suffering from guilt. He took bribe money – a lot of bribe money, according to him – and then he discovered Al-Alwani was into human trafficking. I think it offended him, so he called us.”

  Wilcox nodded and said, “And a good thing he did. I’m not sure we would have found the women without him. He said he wanted to do the right thing for a change.”

  Brandt glanced at his partner and nodded. Left out the part about Butler thinking Leroy got screwed by D.C. politics, he thought. Good for you, Leroy. It isn’t relevant.

  McDonald nodded and opened a file. He spread a stack of photos on the table, copies of the ones taken by the forensics photographer of the interior of the container and of each woman … or child in the case of the comatose teenager on a rear bunk.

  “Take us through it from the time Butler called Special Agent Brandt right on through to calling for backup.”

  Taking turns, Brandt and Wilcox led them through each step as they checked out Butler’s information. When they were through, Dutch Vanderlin asked, “Why didn’t you arrest the terminal guard, Dantonio Sims?”

  Wilcox said, “We thought about it. But we think there is more to gain, than to lose, by leaving him in place.”

  McDonald nodded. “Maybe. Somehow key players at the terminal are notified in advance of our spot checks. I’d bet containers concealing contraband are shuffled or reloaded back on ships to keep us from inspecting the right ones. We need to find who those people are, and Dantonio could be our link.”

  “Okay,” Dutch said. “He stays, but I want him watched twenty-four-seven, both to protect him and to make sure he plays straight with us.”

  “What about the marine security guards?” Dutch asked, “What do you think is going on there?”

  Almost in unison Wilcox and Brandt said, “They’re clean.”

  Wilcox appended, “But dumb as a board. Either that, or not well trained.”

  Dutch cocked his head sideways and then nodded. “Okay. But sic Forensics Accounting on them. Find out if they are on the take.”

  ***

  Back in his office, McDonald’s secretary handed him a faxed copy of shipping invoices from the Port of Portland for the past year. He murmured his thanks, accepted a fresh cup of coffee, and took the invoices to his office.

  The manifests from the Port of Portland showed the blue container, tracked by its cargo number, had made nine regular trips to Yemen and back during the past thirty-six months. It was obvious to him what was going on. Kidnapped women were shipped out, but it was unclear as to what was shipped back. Just an empty container, perhaps?

  McDonald placed a phone call to CIA Special Agent Candice Palumbo, an old flame from his Stanford University days. McDonald knew people aged and their looks changed, but he always envisioned Candice as the tall, energetic co-ed she had been, a person whose whole face lit up when she smiled. I suppose her hair has turned gray by now … like mine.

  They had gone separate ways, but stayed in touch to remain good friends over the years. The receptionist who answered the phone asked for McDonald’s phone number and said, “If that person works here and is available, she will call you back.” Three minutes later his desk phone rang.

  “Richard,” Palumbo said when he answered. “How nice to hear from you. How is life in the FBI?”

  When he finished describing the container and the women, Candice provided the motivation. “Yes. We know it happens. And we have one hell of a time stopping it. INTERPOL tells us that Yemen is a stopping place only. They are sold to wealthy men.

  A blonde like the one you described might bring a hundred thousand dollars from the right person. And twelve women could mean as much as a million dollars. Say ten deliveries a year … it might mean twelve million dollars annually. That’s just from one source. And they don’t just ship girls.”

  He swore. “Damn them.”

  “Yes,” Candice echoed. “It makes my stomach turn, but it’s the world we live in.

  So, stay cool and get those sonsabitches, will you?”

  ***

  McDonald read through his report again and nodded before his calm, professional facade turned to anger. Patience, Richard, he thought to himself. We’ll clean out this nest of vipers before we’re done.

  His report described a completely self-contained shipping container, heavily insulated, equipped with bunk beds, solar lights, a porta-potty, and a wash basin. FBI crime scene techs estimated it was stocked with enough water and foodstuff to feed twelve people for thirty days.

  Wilcox reported that the blonde woman who was first out of the blue container refused to be identified. When asked why not, she said the men who kidnapped her had shown her photos of her mother and her sister. Said they would wipe out her whole family if she didn’t cooperate. Other FBI interviewers had come up against the same wall.

  McDonald included his suspicion as to how the scheme worked, as well as speculation that a Kuwaiti citizen, living in the United States and going by the name of Al-Alwani, was the kingpin.

  When he finished the body of his report, he appended: From CIA sources, it is possible that some of the young women kidnapped are being sold in the Middle East for as much as one hundred thousand dollars.

  Chapter 49

  Dog Lake

  WRAPPED IN A BLUE WOOL BLANKET, Miranda walked out on the deck to sniff cool, pine-scented morning air. She was surprised to see BB walking the path along the lake, his brown canoe on his shoulders. “Good morning,” she hollered. “Need any help?”

  BB lifted the canoe and raised it in the air. “No. It’s not as heavy as it looks.”

  She laughed as BB left the path and headed through the scattered pines up to the house. “First time I ever saw a man wearing a canoe.”

  He dropped the canoe on the grass and took a deep breath. “I just couldn’t leave it out there.” He pointed to his pant legs, wet from the knees down. “I guess the wind pushed it off the bank. Had to wade to get ahold of it.”

  “Can you fix it?”

  BB eyed the bullet-gouged hole in side of the canoe. He nodded. “Yes. Yes, I can. I’ll tend to it when I get back.”

  She said, “Good. I’d like another canoe ride someday. For now, the coffee’s perked and hotcakes are ready.” She borrowed a line from a John Wayne film and smiled, “We’re burning daylight.”

  Showered, shaved, dressed in dry khaki trousers and a deep blue turtleneck, BB soft-footed his way down the hallway to the kitchen. A woman in his house fixing breakfast was something he hadn’t seen in years. The warmth of the domestic scene cracked BB’s resolve to never be involved again. He was about to put his arms around Miranda from behind, when she said, “You gonna sneak up on a woman, you should forego that aftershave.”

  He stopped, and then she turned around, hotcake turner in her right hand, a smile tugging at her mouth. “What are you up to?”

  He took a deep breath and shook his head. “I don’t know. I just had this terrible urge to give you a hug.”

  She tilted her head back and looked down her nose at him. “You haven’t known me twenty-four hours, Dell BeBe.”

  “I know, but I feel like I’ve known you forever.”

  She took a step closer, and without saying a word, she kissed him. She stepped back and shook her head. “This isn’t smart.”

  BB wrapped her in his arms, chin on the top of her head, and was about to say something, when TJ startled them both, saying “The course of true love runs a tortured path … or something along that line.”