Bonner Incident (21 page)

Family is good but feds are watching them and all of us close so don’t plan on another message soon unless shit happens. Family more worried about you than them. This part had to memorize word for word from mini me.

Sky is high, road is long but we are holding. Miss you but stay dark. Only use what I gave you near a place with others. Machines are grabbing anything in the air, keep what you’re reading this on off if at all possible. Luv u.

I ate the message mini me gave me so if I was caught they would have to shove a hand up my ass, hehe ;)’

Joshua quickly dug out a notepad and copied the message then erased it turning off the phone. The message William had made Ben memorize was a saying that Joshua used a lot. ‘As the sky is high and the road is long and trouble never comes alone’.

Joshua looked at the words he’d written, feeling irritated. When William said he would contact him when it was safe and very adamant about it, Joshua asked if he would give him a message if the feds were hassling them hard and this answered his question. Since Sonya and William thought it was worth the risk to contact him this soon, Joshua knew they believed Buck. He tucked the notepad in his jacket and kicked King in the flanks. “We have some shopping to do,” he said and King started moving as he guided him between the trees.

Pulling out his FM radio, Joshua turned it on to hear the announcer give the hourly report of what was going on.

***

Not even ten miles away, Homeland Agent Griffey looked around the table at Burrows and Moore. Homeland had taken over every resort on the west side of Priest Lake and the motel in Nordman. The local population was beyond hostile, but didn’t do anything threatening.

Outside of Elkin Lodge, they had two huge tents set up for command centers, and the restaurant was told to have a buffet set up at all hours. Inside the lodge was a conference room where the group heads met to deal with problems and outline the hunt.

Standing at the head of the table in the conference room, Griffey looked at his number two, FBI Agent Burrows. “So, any other problems with the hicks around here?”

“The owner of the store in Nordman has closed it, and the store to the small community north of us closed as well. The Dollar store is open though,” Burrows said looking at his notes. “We are starting to get caravans of cars of lookie loos and protesters. We need to stop them from getting close to the command area.”

Turning to a huge map on the wall, Griffey pointed. “I want a roadblock set up here, south of Lamb Creek at Outlet Bay. Then another, north of Priest Lake at this State Park. That will seal the area for the most part.”

“You do have people that live here, Griffey,” Moore said shaking his head. “You can’t deny them access to their property.”

Griffey looked over his shoulder at Moore, “If they have valid ID that states they have a purpose here then they can pass but otherwise, they are hindering an ongoing manhunt.”

“We don’t even know for sure Anderson is in this area,” Moore said shaking his head.

Stepping over to the table, Griffey picked up a thick folder. “Your report said it was the most likely place and we’ve had no reports of his truck being seen.”

“I know what’s in my report Griffey, but I also said he’s familiar with the area in the Lolo forest to the south. It’s just as rugged and remote. You can’t start putting all our resources in one area until we have more information.”

“It’s a place to start,” Griffey snapped. “Have you given up on getting local law enforcement help?”

Giving a huge sigh, “Yes,” Moore said. “I don’t know what you did, but boy, did you piss them off.”

“My job,” Griffey snapped harder. “We will have National Guard troops here by this evening. The governor has only allowed for them to man the roadblocks. They aren’t allowed on any search team.”

“How did you get the governor to sign off on that?” Burrows snickered.

Griffey turned with his customary cold smile. “The president said if he didn’t at least provide some assistance, he would federalize them and do it himself.”

Grabbing a legal pad, Burrows chuckled. “We have enough support now to start searching the area, where do we start?”

Moving to another map that was shaded from the west side of Priest Lake following Highway 57, to the town of Priest Lake forming the eastern border, then to the east side of the Pend Oreille River forming the western border, north to the Canadian border, and south to the Pend Oreille River. “This is our search area until we have other leads,” Griffey said outlining the box with his finger.

“Are you crazy?” Moore blurted out.

Turning around, Griffey shook his head. “It’s only twenty-five miles wide and fifty long. I’ve had larger search areas before and caught my suspect,” he almost growled.

“That’s almost a million acres and this isn’t the Midwest or the South. That is mountain wilderness out there with minimal roads, if you can call a logging track a ‘road’,” Moore said shaking his head. Then, he looked at another map that outlined the Lolo forest to the south and it was even bigger. Knowing they didn’t have the resources to search where they were now, he just left that one alone.

“Agent Moore,” Griffey said crossing his arms over his chest. “The state police and Forestry Service are providing guides, and the military searches for terrorists in mountains with much more rugged terrain than this.”

“We aren’t the military,” Moore snapped. “This isn’t Afghanistan. These mountains here are covered in thick forest, so air is all but useless. You could hide an army in that million acres and it would take an army to find them. We are looking for one man who knows how to move, live, and survive in the mountains. An army couldn’t help us find him. We need intelligence of where he would likely go, so we can narrow our search.”

“That’s your job,” Griffey said with a curt nod.

Leaning over the table, Moore looked at Griffey hard, to show he wasn’t intimidated by the man. “I was handed this mess four days ago and my staff and I are still compiling data, building a more detailed profile. Hell, I was just given a list of his mother’s assets last night.”

Dropping his arms to his side as his face hardened. “What do you mean, you were only handed his mother’s assets last night?”

“Just what I said. Last night, and my team is still going through them.”

Griffey looked over at Burrows. “You said we had everything two days ago.”

“Well, Moore wanted his mother’s holdings and a few others, like his wife and friends. It’s taking some time to gather that much data on that many people,” Burrows said nonchalantly.

Stepping over to the table and leaning over, “You get all the material Moore asked for by tonight. Call the NSA and put a priority on it now,” Griffey snapped.

“I already have,” Burrows said trying to not act scared. “They told me that much banking information takes time without a warrant.”

“Well, get a warrant,” Griffey snapped.

Swallowing, trying to wet his throat, “The judge wouldn’t give us the warrants to get information on his friends. He said it wasn’t a valid reason and referred to it as fishnet tactics.”

“Which judge?” Griffey said picking up a phone.

“Edward Wright,” Burrows said reaching for a bottle of water.

“This is Homeland Agent IC Steven Griffey. You need to get word to Judge Edward Wright that he needs to start playing ball here,” he almost yelled into the receiver. “I don’t give a shit if he’s a federal judge, do it!”

Moore shook his head, “Don’t threaten a federal judge, Griffey. They don’t like that.”

Covering the mouthpiece as he listened, Griffey looked over at Moore. “Like I give a shit, we work for the same boss and he can be replaced.”

Moore shook his head as Griffey took his hand away from the receiver. “Thank you, now find another judge to sign the warrants in the next hour,” he said and then listened. Shaking his head, “No, we can’t do that with this much information on multiple subjects. I want all financial, medical, real estate, phone, transportation… Basically, I want everything from the day they were born. If they went to preschool, I want to know what pictures they finger-painted.”

Griffey listened. “Hold on,” he said then looked at Burrows. “How many subjects?”

“Eighty-six,” Burrows said and Griffey relayed that into the phone as Moore leaned over.

“Burrows, I only asked for twelve,” he whispered.

Reaching over and grabbing the folder with Joshua’s profile, Burrows held it up. “You have eighty-six probable people of interest in here.”

“Burrows, some of those people are law enforcement and attorneys, others are rather wealthy. We really don’t need to piss them off,” Moore said as Griffey continued talking on the phone. “We are already in a shit storm here.”

Shaking his head, “Only locally, three out of four in the rest of the nation are behind us. Many believe that Joshua has powerful friends in the state government that are helping him,” Burrows said with a smile.

“How on earth would they even come to that conclusion?”

“Two of the networks reported a probable link yesterday. The others all picked up with it, and as far as the rest of the nation is concerned, it’s a bunch of hicks that don’t want to work with the government.”

Sitting back in his chair, Moore shook his head. “Three out of four ain’t bad, but that still leaves over seventy million in favor of the suspect, and that’s a lot of people.”

“When we hit Waco, six out of seven supported us,” Burrows said.

Moore chuckled. “Yeah, and six months later, three out of four were against our actions.”

“So?” Burrows said as Griffey yelled at the phone. “We were done and nothing came about, did it?”

“Depends on what you mean,” Moore said as Griffey slammed the phone down.

“The data will be here in the morning,” he said puffing and looked over at Burrows. “The NSA said they can’t risk a data sweep that big. It was too much of a risk.”

“That’s what they told me,” Burrows said relieved.

Kicking a chair, Griffey walked back to the head of the table. “You know, it’s hard to catch people when you have rules and they don’t.”

“You should’ve been here when I started twenty-eight years ago, if you think you have rules now,” Moore said chuckling.

“Fuck that,” Griffey said dropping down in his chair. “So, how should I deploy the search teams?”

Giving a startle, Moore looked up at him in shock. “How many teams are we talking about?”

“Eighty teams, each with five men can go in the field tomorrow, and another hundred the day after.”

Looking at the map, Moore shook his head. “A thousand men searching a million acres looking for one man isn’t a needle in a haystack, it’s a grain of sand on a beach.”

“Washington said they will have more personnel here in six days and I should be able to double that number then. But until then, where do you suggest we start?”

“You have the roads out of the area covered?” Moore said looking at the map.

“They will be by sundown. The Canadians are going to have mounted patrols on their side of the border.”

Surprised, Moore looked over at Griffey, “We have mounted patrols?”

Letting out a huff, “Only a few,” Griffey said. “People around here won’t give up their horses and Washington won’t give me the go ahead to seize them because they are afraid of backlash from the animal rights groups.”

“So, how many is a few?”

Leaning over and grabbing a notepad, Griffey ran his finger down the page and stopped halfway. “Three teams will be on horseback. We have fifty forestry vehicles that will be riding what few roads are in the area, but the rest of the teams will be on foot.”

“May I?” Moore said pointing at the notepad. Griffey slid it over and Moore looked over the list of search teams. “Only Idaho State Troopers. No deputies from any department?”

“Nope,” Griffey said leaning back in his chair. “They all said they couldn’t spare the manpower, except for that sheriff in Boundary County. I would like to lock his ass up.”

“You only have a few local forestry service personnel on the teams, most others are from other states,” Moore said reading the list.

“Yeah, a bunch of them quit when the regional forester fired that ranger who’d hired Mr. Anderson,” Griffey said. “We have a few departments on the coast that are going to contribute some men.”

“How in the world are we going to get these guys in every night?” Moore asked looking up at Griffey.

Griffey and Burrows laughed as Griffey leaned over the table. “Why in the hell would we pull them out every night? That would take tremendous resources. No, the teams will stay out for three days, then rotate back for three.”

Moore’s eyes got wide, thinking they were about to have a shit load of search teams lost in the mountains. “Griffey, these are officers, not troops or mountain men. You know how much shit they will have to pack in to live that long? I’ll bet you money now, less than a hundred people here have hiked with a backpack in the last five years. Your own report on the murder site admitted lack of communication was a large factor to consider. Now you’re going to throw eighty teams out and this center is going to keep track of them?”