Without Trace

by Rae Richen

  A moment later, Willie nodded and said, “I will text her.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  After class at the University of Portland, two young women sat in the student lounge under a purple and gold banner advertising the Pilots Women’s soccer team. Arwain Jones pulled her dark hair into a ponytail, wrapped a band around it and let it smack her back.

  Claudia watched this maneuver, flipped at her boycut red hair and said, “Don’t you know a girl can run a lot faster without that old-fashioned weight of hair? The stuff is strictly a nuisance.”

  “True. Is it clogging your sinks or something? Am I a nuisance?

  Claudia leaned back against a squeaky chair frame. “Don’t sweat it, Arn. I’m totally fine with you staying in my apartment. The help with food and rent is great, and we can study together.”

  “And I give you someone to beat in soccer scrimmages.”

  “I always win,” Claudia rightly pointed out. “You’re too intent on finding the pass, and I know you from second grade. Gotta learn to pass with your other foot, girl.”

  “Plus, I’ve been skipping workouts to find this girl. You’d think there’d have been some clue.”

  “I wish,” Claudia said. “You should hear my friend, Javier, on the guy’s team. He’s starting a help group – tell girls and boys, especially our DACA students and students from other countries, how to watch out for each other, so they won’t get taken off the streets by ICE or any other gang.”

  “He’s got a good idea, but how about after they’re missing?” Arwain said, “Isn’t there a better way to find missing people? Shouldn’t the police be interviewing more people at the bus stations, or talk to more bus drivers? Look for a pattern among the missing?”

  Claudia’s eyes narrowed at Arwain. “I know Javier would recommend doing stuff where you aren’t alone, and where you have a plan how to get away.”

  “What are you saying? We shouldn’t do anything?”

  “I’m saying if you take that on, you’re liable to talk to the wrong guy and set off a hunt for yourself. You could maybe sit in the bus station and check out what goes on, or take the bus yourself and see what might happen, but don’t do stuff like that by yourself.”

  “Want to do it with me?”

  “Sure, but what bus station? Where did this Rosaria get on? And where did her friend Liza get on the bus to Newberg?”

  “I think Rosaria got on in the LeapFrog Bus station down near the Portland railway station.”

  “I use that system. It’s a transfer here and a transfer there . . . don’t think the LeapFrog Bus goes direct to Newberg.” Claudia said, pulling out her phone. She poked around and then said, “Yeah, there actually is a transfer. She probably took the number 44 bus to the Tigard Transfer Center, and then the number 5 bus. In between, you have to walk from one LeapFrog Bus stop to another, about a four-minute walk.”

  “Geez,” Arwain said. “I wonder if my dad knows about the transfer and the walk. They could have disappeared anywhere along in there.”

  She hauled out her phone and dialed Dad. Luckily, he seemed to have kept his phone nearby. She could hear Rosaria’s dad in the background. It sounded like they were in a car.

  “Papa, does Mr. Aguirre know that the bus ride to Newberg and George Fox University involved a transfer that includes a short walk in Tigard from one part of the station to another four minutes away?”

  “We’re on Bluetooth” Dad said. “He heard your question.”

  Arwain heard the two dads conferring. Mr. Aguirre said, “No. Didn’t know that. Where’s the transfer?”

  “Can you get online and plug in her start point and her destination, you’ll see along the way where she had to change busses.”

  “Damn!” Dad said. “So, it was never going to be a straight-on, straight-off ride.”

  “No. Claudia and I are looking at the schedule online.”

  “Okay,” Dad said. “We’ve got more questioning to do and more leg work. Thanks for the heads up.”

  After they hung up, Arwain saw the text from her Grandma Willie. “Guy at pharmacy has gun, and has used it when he feels laughed at, or for nothing. Stay away.”

  Arwain texted back. “Going nowhere near him.”

  **

  After texting Arwain to stay away from the gun- toting-short-fuse guy, Grandma Willie and the band plowed through more police ID photos and found three people they knew from Trace’s life.

  They corroborated Reese’s identification of Small Pants, identifying his photo. He was well-known as a drug dealer and importer named Heinrich Strauss.

  Toward the end of a long hunt, DeAndre found photos of Heinrich’s skinny confederates. Officer Seneca whispered to Captain Reese.

  “They IDed Franz Coron and Billy Bevit.”

  “Dagnab it!” Reese said. “We should have guessed.”

  Seneca looked at Reese with his eyebrows raised.

  “What?” Reese said.

  “Dagnab it? That’s a new cuss word,” Seneca said.

  “Yeah, and you’re liable to hear some more new ones if Willie doesn’t learn to lay low and let us do the work we were hired to do. “

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Back in her Holly Hill rooms, Willie sat in one of her pink side chairs and fanned herself. Glyn slumped into the other.

  “How’s Geneva?” he asked.

  “Vague, but afraid. And she seems to have reason for fear. I want you to look at what I found in her room besides the box of receipts.”

  “The Ketalar has to be a clue,” Glyn said, “but Captain Reese says the judge won’t give him a warrant for the Vet hospital. Not enough to go on.”

  Willie said, “When I visited Geneva, she asked me to water her plants and emphasized that I read her books. I thought it was odd, until I found this bookish sort of receipt box.”

  Glyn moved over to the sofa next to the box of receipts.

  Willie nodded and said, “Right next to the book-box of receipts was Geneva’s favorite book.”

  She put the Elie Wiesel book down and opened it to the back page where the red note had the word, ‘Warehouses’.

  “You know she kept talking about warehouses as places to hide kids before they were taken to the work camps.”

  “Yes.”

  Willie opened the box. “Well, I think I’ve found a connection to now and to why she left her job so abruptly.”

  Glyn leaned over.

  Willie went on. “From the police files, we’ve got names of drug sellers, but no locations.”

  “Sure,” Glyn said.

  “At least the police know who these yahoos are.

  “Yes,” Glyn said, “but we’re not making any headway on Rosaria and Liza’s whereabouts.

  Willie took one of the receipts from Geneva’s box, and studied the company names.

  “International Relocation Services. Hiltown Storage and Transfer, Seattle Transfer,” she read. “We need an untraceable phone.”

  Glyn stared at her and said, “You think like a thief.”

  She eyed him over her reading glasses. “Well?”

  He reached into his pocket and pulled out a burner phone. “You’ve got about ten minutes on this one.”

  She glanced at him over her glasses. “I’ll ask later why you happen to have this.”

  He pulled out another. “This one’s about used up. They’re for band reviews. Calls and texts on Yelp and Band Stand. It’s like creating seed money in the tip jar.”

  “Hmmph.” She said, but took the phone.

  He could hear the answer at the other end. “Larson Lumber.”

  “I am calling for Hiltown Storage and Transfer. We’d like to rent a backhoe.”

  “What’s the location this time?”

  “Tigard.” Grandma Willie gave the address of the Tigard Hotel.”

  “You’ll need to rent the back-hoe and its trailer, Ms. . . .”

  “I have a receipt here for the last time we rented a backhoe and there’s no menti
on of a trailer.”

  “Oh yes. That was the time you needed it at International Relocation, their main storage area, remember. That’s so close, we just delivered the back-hoe directly.”

  “Oh, yes. That makes sense. So, what is the cost of the trailer?”

  “That will be a deposit of fifty dollars plus $200 a day for the rent of the back-hoe and $100 a day for the trailer. Or you could have us deliver and take away for $250 a day, so you don’t have to store the trailer.”

  “Sounds reasonable,” Grandma Willie said, fanning herself with the receipt. She then arranged for delivery two months away and rang off.

  Glyn said, “Hiltown Storage is in for a surprise.”

  “By two months out we should have these children back with us.”

  Glyn crossed his heart, feeling a heavy weight on his chest.

  Grandma Willie looked at him a moment and said, “Onward. Look up International Relocations Services and find the address of their main building.”

  Glyn fiddled with his computer. “Looks like 199 SE 2nd Avenue. Isn’t that where ...?”

  Her eyes had gone wide. “Yes...Yes, It is.”

  “Wait,” Glyn said. “So Leneld followed the disappearing drug seller . . .”

  Willie nodded, “and he was invited off the property by the strong but cushy owner.”

  Grandma Willie pushed aside one of her stacks of magazines and stared at a map of Portland.

  “How close is that building to here?” She asked.

  Glyn moved aside another pile that fell to the floor. He opened the map further to reveal the area near the Willamette River. “Right here, near the skate park and the railroad.”

  Grandma Willie saw the fallen papers just as Glyn picked them up.

  Grandma Willie reached for the stack, saying, “Oh dear. Don Corrigan dropped those after choir rehearsal. I picked them up and forgot to give them back to him.”

  Glyn read the letterhead on the top of the stack. “International Relocation Services”.

  They looked at each other in surprise, and then Grandma Willie said. “Let’s look at the rest of those papers.”

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Nothing in the Corrigan mail envelopes was much help, but the idea that one piece of mail came from International Relocation Services made Grandma Willie want to know more about that company and whatever connection it had with Corrigan. She decided to investigate 199 Southeast Second Avenue, the main office and the building that Leneld had discovered when he followed one of the drug dealers.

  A half hour later, Glyn walked through the night-darkened dining room toward the back door, where he was to meet Henry, the cab driver.

  Of course, Henry was up for an adventure. And if it involved his precious cab, he was happy to oblige. He loved to show his daughter that the cab was still useful, and so was he.

  Glyn wasn’t so sure they should be doing this, but Grandma had vetoed calling Captain Reese or Officer Sidney Oberon Seneca.

  She had said, “They get involved in this scouting expedition and that evidence won’t be usable. They don’t have a warrant. Us? We’re just being curious.”

  Now, as he entered the kitchen by himself, a shadow loomed, a slight, short person, her head surrounded by curly hair.

  “Violeta.”

  Her shadow answered. “I thought you were through with work.”

  He thought fast. “Gotta go meet the guys for band practice.” No way did he want her in on this bad idea.

  “I thought I saw your Grandma Willie headed toward the front door.”

  “Yeah. Church thing tonight for her.”

  “And Mr. Henry Crick?”

  “I think he’s her taxicab tonight.”

  “But his daughter is selling that cab tomorrow.”

  “I don’t think Henry’s signed off on that idea. Or maybe this is his last taxi fling.”

  “Grandma Willie and Henry?” she laughed.

  “Not what I meant,” he huffed, trying to edge toward the door, afraid Violeta would follow him, and afraid Henry would leave without him.

  In the dark, against the blacklight of the dining room windows, Violeta’s head tilted to one side. She whispered, “You in a hurry?”

  “Guys are waiting.”

  “See you tomorrow,” she whispered, touching his arm.

  He couldn’t help himself. He took her hand and pulled her to him. She came so smoothly and fit so perfectly, that he lowered his head and tested a kiss.

  Her mouth was warm and soft. Her hands came up to hold his jaw as she moved her lips, touching his nose and then his mouth again.

  “Be careful,” she whispered.

  That startled him. “Just the guys,” he said.

  “Okay.” She straightened up, pulling away. “Don’t take chances.”

  He stared at her shadow a moment. “I won’t. Dad picking you up?”

  “In a minute,” she said.

  “Good,” he said, as he sidled out the door.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  That same day, about two hours earlier, Claudia Ash and Arwain Jones had been sitting toward the front of the number forty-four Leap Frog Bus headed toward Tigard. Neither of them talked much, both thinking this was where Rosaria and Liza had once sat, a mere four days ago.

  “Did you talk to Javier and the campus safety committee?” Arwain asked.

  “Yes. They want us to call Javier Lucero as soon as we get to Newberg.”

  Arwain glanced at her friend and said, “Actually, Javier wants you to call, right?”

  Claudia fidgeted. “Well, it was Javier that got on the phone when he heard what we planned.”

  “Hmph,” Arwain said. “He got on the phone when he heard it was you calling.”

  “Why do you think that?”

  “The guy clearly likes short red hair.”

  “Huh-uh! He’s always teasing me about my hair.”

  “I rest my case,” Arwain said, laughing.

  Up front, the bus driver spent some time talking on his cell phone through his blue-tooth and earphone.

  “I’m on time,” he said to the phone. “In fact, I may have to idle in Tigard. Two to transfer, there. Then back to Portland.”

  Arwain figured he meant them. They had asked how to transfer to the Newberg bus.

  Claudia glanced out the window at the cars passing them on Interstate 5. “Your dad drive an Outback?”

  “Sure. Green. You see him?”

  “You kidding? On this road, if it isn’t a gray Prius, it’s a green Outback.”

  “So true. Is there a place in the world where Prius comes in blue? Maybe yellow?”

  “We’re turning off into Tigard,” Claudia said.

  The bus driver glanced back toward them as he made the turn. The ear bud for his phone barely fit on his large and balding head.

  Arwain checked her notes. “The map says the transit mall is right at the Pacific Highway. Our transfer should be close.”

  When the bus pulled close to the metal roof over the transit center, both girls stood. The bus driver turned in his seat which wasn’t easy, given his size. He said, “Your bus to Newberg is around the other side of the block. Just get off, walk across the street and wait on the other side at the back of that small building.”

  “Thank you,” Arwain said, as they walked toward the front door.

  He grunted “Sure,” and twisted back into his seat, signaling someone outside and again talking into his phone. “When’s the Newberg coming?”

  Arwain waited to see what answer he got, but Claudia stepped off the bus and looked anxious that Arwain follow. Arwain knew her phone would tell her when the bus should arrive, so she just got off.

  “What?” she asked Claudia.

  Claudia pulled her away from the bus. “I don’t like bus drivers who are that interested in being helpful.”

  “That’s his job. He was asking about our bus arrival time. But I didn’t get to hear the answer.”

  “Let’s get across t
his street and look it up. I think there’s a restaurant on the other side of that wait area.”

  “You hungry?” Arwain asked.

  “Famished.”

  “We’ve got to get the next bus and get home before Javier starts to worry.”

  “Javier is a worrier.”

  “Me, too,” Arwain said. “So, let’s get the bus and worry about eating when we get home.

  They crossed Commercial Street, walking toward the Oregon Rifle Works and the Ballroom Dance Company.

  They passed a parked blue and white truck from Hiltown Storage and Transfer.

  Two men came out of the nearby building. The truck door opened from the inside. Arwain glanced into the empty interior just as a pair of arms surrounded her. She kicked back with her left foot and twisted to whack the man in his Adams apple, but he covered her mouth and swore.

  “Damn bitch.” Then he coughed hard as he threw her into the truck and jumped in after.

  Arwain glanced up, saw out the window on the far side, and realized that the bus driver was smoking and watching the melee surrounding them.

  Claudia landed near her. The truck door slammed shut and the truck pulled out.

  “I’ve got two transfers,” the bus driver had said into his phone. He had signaled these bastards to be here.

  Arwain knew the truck turned right at the next corner, but by then, her hands had been tied. A man sat on her legs and another yanked a scarf over her eyes.

  She tried to keep track of the turns, and was pretty certain they had turned north onto Pacific Highway, back toward Portland, but the needle in her upper arm made her throat hot and her thinking fuzzy.

  “Claudia?”

  “Here.”

  “I’m drugged. You?”

  Claudia didn’t answer.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  “Papá,” Violeta said. “Please follow that cab. Grandma Willie, Henry and Glyn are doing something they don’t want me to know about, so I think it’s dangerous.”

  “I saw Glyn get into the cab,” Mr. Aguirre said. “You call his papa and keep him informed about where we are. I will drive.”