The Forgotten Girls

by Owen Laukkanen

  “Intervened,” Stevens said. “And I imagine their intervention spelled the end of Leland Hurley’s career as a Ranger.”

  “And you’d be correct. After the flyboys kicked the shit out of Hurley, they reported the incident to the chain of command, and it looks like everybody just decided the United States military would be better off without someone of Leland Hurley’s ilk.”

  “So off he went.”

  “Off he went.” Windermere put her phone down. “Though if the army thought a discharge would scare our boy straight, I’d say they were sadly mistaken.”

  She’d been reading up on Leland Hurley for a couple solid hours now. There was nothing else to do, just read and feel inadequate, watch the snow accumulate and try to imagine where Hurley would turn up.

  He hadn’t appeared at the Nicola Pass, due east through the mountains from his compound. The agents from Salt Lake City and the Flathead County deputies they’d posted at the head of the pass had scoured the area until the storm hit, by foot, truck, and air, and hadn’t seen him. And then the snow started, and the helicopters couldn’t fly, and the agents in the field reported zero visibility, so even if Hurley was out there, he’d pretty much have to walk right into Norma’s Diner and order a slice of pie before anyone realized it was him.

  They had Hurley’s picture on the wire, every law enforcement agency and TV news station from Cheyenne to Calgary. They had presence on every road and railroad track out of northwestern Montana—FBI, sheriff’s departments, and border patrol. Stevens, playing optimist, told Windermere it was only a matter of time before Hurley came out somewhere and someone recognized his face, but Stevens wasn’t a very good actor. There was a lot of country out here, a lot of hiding places, and Hurley was clearly resourceful. Windermere could feel their chances dropping with every minute the man remained at large.

  But there was no way to look for him, not in this storm. So Windermere sat on her hands and drank Shelly out of coffee, read from the reams of material she’d had Mathers dig up on their subject.

  “Ranger training,” Stevens said from across the table, breaking her out of her doldrums. “You said Hurley washed out at phase three?”

  Windermere checked her phone. “Yup. Eglin Air Force Base, northern Florida.”

  “How many phases do these guys have to go through?”

  “Three, apparently,” Windermere told him. “Hurley flunked out early in the final phase.”

  “So he only finished two-thirds of his training.”

  “Right. Not that that helps us any. He finished top of his class in the second phase of training.”

  “What’s the second phase?”

  Windermere looked up. “Mountain training,” she said. “Rugged terrain. Severe weather. Combat and survival.”

  “So, everything we’re dealing with out here.”

  “Everything,” Windermere said. “He’s just about tailor-made for this.”

  90

  Hurley drove north through steady snowfall. New tires or not, he drove cautiously. The last thing he needed was to wreck the Explorer; if the law wasn’t appraised of his position already, they certainly would be once they found the truck.

  The town of Stryker was ten miles up the road. Hurley made it in twenty-five minutes. There wasn’t much there: a post office, a passing siding on the Northwestern main. The tracks branched off here, and so did the highway. To the west lay Butcher’s Creek and the tracks to the coast. To the north lay Eureka, the Canadian border.

  The pavement ended well before Butcher’s Creek. Nothing but forestry roads all the way to the Libby Dam, fifty miles through the mountains and impassible in this weather. The border was only thirty miles north, and beyond that, not much but open terrain.

  Hurley figured he had one shot before the storm cleared again and the FBI agents realized he’d pulled an end around on them. Figured, FBI or not, they’d get hung up at the border, jurisdictional issues, confusion. Figured he could buy himself some time while they sorted things out with the Mounties. Figured Canada was so big, so empty, they might never find him up there. He could get all the way to Alaska if he wanted.

  Hurley had liked his chances alone and on snowshoes in the middle of the mountains. In a truck, though? With the snow still falling?

  Heck, he was practically home free already.

  —

  The law had a checkpoint set up at the south end of town, two Flathead County cruisers angled to block the highway, cherry-red and blues blazing.

  Hurley slowed the Ford as soon as he saw the roadblock, scanned the highway for an alternate route, but it was too late; he was already made. As Hurley watched, a deputy climbed from the cruiser in the southbound lane, started down the highway toward Hurley, waved him forward with one hand, the other lingering at his hip by his holster.

  Hurley swore under his breath, inched the Explorer forward. Reached across to the passenger seat and the dead deputy’s pistol, lay it on his lap as he approached the checkpoint. Pulled the deputy’s Stetson low as it could go, adjusted the heavy coat to hide the bullet holes, tried to wipe as much blood as he could from the passenger seat, the dashboard. He crept the truck up to meet the deputy, held the pistol in his left hand, hard up against the door as the lawman approached. Figured he had about a one-in-four shot of pulling this thing off, but then, hell, he’d never been scared of long odds.

  The deputy was a young kid. Couldn’t have been on the job long. He was shivering as he ran the beam of his flashlight over the Explorer, looked downright miserable to be out in this weather. He lowered his flashlight as Hurley stopped the truck beside him.

  “How’re you doing tonight?” he asked. Squinted at Hurley’s jacket. “Deputy . . . Finley?”

  “That’s right,” Hurley told him. “Hell of a night.”

  The deputy looked up and down the highway, his teeth all but chattering. “Only getting worse, what I hear,” he said. “Got you burning the midnight oil tonight, huh?”

  “Until we catch this asshole,” Hurley said. Kept his voice calm, steady. Looked the deputy in the eye, long as he could. Felt his insides quaking, forced his body to still. “Lot of people watching this one. Lots of pressure from higher up to solve it in a hurry.”

  “Oh, I hear that.” The deputy turned his attention to the truck again, to Hurley. “Where’re you headed tonight? They told us Stryker’s the northern perimeter when they briefed us. They thinking this guy’s headed north?”

  “Can’t be sure,” Hurley told him. “They’re sending me up Butcher’s Creek way, make sure the train crews know what they’re looking for. Night like this, it’s a perfect time for a guy to try to make an escape.”

  “It sure is rotten out here,” the deputy said. He took a couple steps toward the rear of the Explorer, shone his flashlight over the rear door. Hurley gripped the pistol tighter, watched the guy in his side mirror, ready to make a move if he went to look in the back.

  “Any luck, they’ll find this guy soon,” Hurley said. “Send us all home to our families.”

  “You said it.” The deputy looked at the back of the Explorer again. Looked longingly back at his cruiser and seemed to make a decision.

  “You drive safe,” he said, waving to his buddy in the second cruiser. “Hate to see this guy cause any more mayhem.”

  Hurley shifted into drive as the cruiser backed off the highway, opening the northbound lane.

  “Take care of yourself,” he told the deputy. “Stay warm.”

  “You too, buddy.” The kid was already turning back to his car.

  Hurley idled the Ford through the checkpoint. Waved thanks to the deputy in the second cruiser, another young guy. Nudged the gas pedal again, rolled through downtown Stryker in all of two minutes, the lights of the county cruisers receding in his rearview.

  He drove a mile out of town before he let himself breathe. Pulled over,
set the pistol down on the passenger seat, his hand sweaty where he’d held it. Exhaled, long and ragged, closed his eyes, calmed his nerves.

  Then he pulled back onto the highway, drove on, saw nothing in his headlights but blowing snow and the dark edge of the night. Twenty miles to Eureka, and nothing much in between. Another ten miles to the Canada line. He’d take it slow, take it easy. Take all night if he had to. As long as the snow was blowing, Hurley knew he was ahead.

  91

  Carla.”

  Carla Windermere awoke to the smell of fresh coffee and to Kirk Stevens standing above her booth, a strange expression on his face.

  Windermere sat up, wiping the sleep from her eyes. Looked around the restaurant. The place was getting a smell to it, like your college dorm halfway through winter exams, a bunch of stressed-out bodies with no time to sleep and no time to shower, everyone starting to go a little funky.

  Windermere knew she was as guilty as the rest of them. She’d been in the same clothes for, what, three days now; wondered if she would ever get back to Butcher’s Creek, the Northwestern Hotel, her suitcase. Wondered what she would pay for a stick of deodorant, clean underwear, decided she would empty her wallet.

  At least the snow had stopped falling. Outside the diner, dawn was still largely theoretical, but already Windermere could see across the highway to the gas station, could even see the mountains to the east of town, the Anchor Valley. There was snow everywhere, obviously, piled up on the vehicles jamming the parking lot outside, heaped in mounds by the snowplows that had waged war with the winter on the highway all night. Windermere figured it would take some time to get cleaned up, dusted off, organized, but the brunt of the storm had passed. And that meant they could get back to work.

  Windermere ran her hands through her hair. “I was dreaming about Hawaii, partner,” she said. “So whatever it is you have for us, I hope it’s worth interrupting my beach time.”

  Stevens didn’t look dissuaded. Didn’t change his expression. “I just got off the phone with the deputies in Stryker,” he told her. “They had a slow night, they said. Not much traffic but a Lincoln County deputy passing through. Someone named Finley.”

  “Right. Finley said she was headed up to Eureka, remember? Some drug case or something.”

  “I remember,” Stevens said. “But the Stryker boys seemed to think the deputy had been reassigned to Butcher’s Creek, said we’d told her to go up and liaise with the train crews.”

  Windermere frowned. “We did no such thing, Stevens,” she said. “Unless you changed the play while I was catching zees.”

  Stevens shook his head. “Nope. That’s not even the weird part. Those boys at the checkpoint seemed to think Deputy Finley was a he.”

  “What?” Windermere set down her coffee. Didn’t need it anymore; she was wide awake. “What the hell does that mean? Where’s Finley?”

  “Damned if I know,” Stevens said. “Those boys in Stryker said they saw a man rolling through in a Lincoln County Explorer. Said they were sure it was a man; they could tell by the beard.”

  Windermere felt that coffee lurch in her gut, fought the urge to be sick. Hurley. Shit.

  “Find us a helicopter, partner,” she said, already halfway to the door. “We need to go north, and we need to go now.”

  92

  Eureka, Montana, was a town of a thousand, exponentially bigger than tiny Stryker. There was no way the law could mark every road in or out of the community, and they didn’t; Hurley passed through without incident in the early-morning hours, and then he was on the highway again, engine humming, the Canadian border a straight shot north.

  Here, though, Hurley knew he had to be careful. Nine miles to the border, and the guards would be watching for him. Roosville was the only border crossing between the Idaho state line and the eastern slope of the Rockies, which meant there’d be more than a handful of guards, all on high alert.

  But Hurley didn’t intend to drive into Canada, in the dead deputy’s truck or otherwise. He followed the highway a few miles into flat plain and farmland, and then he turned the Explorer east, caught up with the Whitefish Range again and its network of logging roads. There were roads here that curled so far north, they almost kissed the border. And the border wasn’t much to speak of, just a clear-cut through the forest, twenty feet wide, no fence.

  Miles and miles of unguarded terrain, impossible to fully manage, stark contrast to the fortress walls that cut the line between Mexico and the southern states. People slipped through from Canada all the time, Hurley knew. Smuggled drugs, other contraband. People. Some were caught. Most weren’t. Hurley liked his chances.

  But progress slowed to a crawl once he’d driven into the mountains. The Ford’s tires scrabbled for purchase on the narrow, uneven road and spun, the engine roaring in vain. He’d made it to within maybe three long, winding miles of the border when he decided he’d be faster on foot. He abandoned the Explorer, the deputy’s body. Strapped on his snowshoes and shouldered his rifle, his pack with the last of his supplies, and set off.

  —

  He was sweating through his underclothes by the time he reached the border. It was midmorning now, the sun high above the peaks to the east, and he’d followed the road as far as he could, winding north along the side of a low mountain to within a few hundred yards of the border. There he finished the last of his ration bars. Washed it down with water from his canteen and set out through the woods.

  The going was slow. The forest was silent, save Hurley’s breath and the occasional branch cracking beneath his snowshoes. Snow cascaded from above with every step Hurley took, nudged from the boughs packed tight above and beside him. The forest was dark and cold. Hurley kept his eyes out for cameras and detectors. Didn’t see any, and the sky above the treetops was free of helicopters. As far as Hurley could tell, he was alone, with just a twenty-foot swath of undefended snow separating him from Canada.

  He stopped when he reached the tree line, waited there for a few minutes, gathering his breath and searching the other side for any sign of the law. It didn’t seem like it should be so easy, making the crossing. The woods on the Canadian side looked just like those of Montana. Was this it? Was this all it would take?

  Nobody challenged Hurley as he crossed the snowy border. He made the Canadian trees and stepped into the forest and continued walking, and within minutes, the border had vanished behind him.

  He settled into a steady rhythm again, ignoring the fatigue in his joints and the ache in his muscles, the numbing exhaustion that deadened his thoughts and would slow his reflexes. He kept marching. Right boot, left boot, one in front of the other, as the sun arced down behind him and the forest grew darker, the shadows longer.

  Soon it would be night again. He’d made it into the vast Canadian wilderness, and every hour he kept moving and every mile he put behind him brought him that much closer to escaping the law. There was nothing to do but keep walking, let the terrain swallow him, envelop him, hide him.

  So Hurley forced himself onward, unrelenting. Let the FBI follow him here. Let them try to hunt him. In this vast, empty terrain?

  Good luck.

  93

  So, what?” the pilot asked. “Should I put you down at the border, let you hash things out with the Mounties?”

  In the back of the helicopter, Windermere shook her head. “No time. We need to find Finley and Leland Hurley before we take any meetings. Which means we’re better off in the air.”

  Beside her, Stevens was studying a topographical map, comparing it to the view out his window. The country at the border was flat, farmland and river valley, bordered to the west by long, narrow Lake Koocanusa, which stretched fifty miles north from the Libby Dam to the border and another forty miles into Canada. This was the Rocky Mountain Trench, the Kootenay River valley, and it was surrounded by mountains on both east and west. North of the border, the highway cont
inued up into Canada, following the lake and the Kootenay River toward civilization.

  They’d commandeered the Flathead County chopper, rode north over Stryker and west to Butcher’s Creek, searching the roads for any sign of Kerry Finley’s Explorer. Hadn’t found any trace of her, and turned their search north.

  “We can assume Hurley wouldn’t try to fool a border guard,” Stevens said. “Which means if he’s up here, he’ll be trying to sneak across.”

  He was trying to push down the empty feeling in his gut, trying to avoid jumping to any conclusions. They’d maintained a search presence on the east side of the Whitefish Range, the Nicola Pass area. Moved agents to Stryker, Butcher’s Creek, the forestry roads between Eureka and Libby. Held out hope they’d hear from Eureka, Kerry Finley’s voice on the radio, safe and sound, and they’d all breathe sighs of relief and laugh about the big misunderstanding.

  But somehow, Stevens knew that wasn’t going to happen.

  “So if a person wanted to make it into Canada without showing his passport, how would he do it?” Windermere was asking the pilot. “Or better yet, where?”

  “Well, he’d do it in the forest, and he’d do it at night, if he had any sense.” The pilot leaned across the cockpit, pointed down. “That land’s so flat down near Roosville, you could watch your dog run away for three days, if you care to.” He paused. “Or your wife, for that matter.”

  “Right.” Windermere checked her watch again. Noon already, daylight a limited-time offer. “I see forest to the west, all the way to the lake. And east to the mountains. So what are we thinking?”

  “Better roads by the lake,” the pilot said. “You go into those eastern mountains, you got a long, tough slog ahead of you.”