Low Tide (15 page)

“So how are we working this, then?” Wyatt asked.

Pittman pointed at two of the SWAT guys, both young men. “Lewis and Darnell are going to head up Team B, which’ll be in position on either side of the entrance to the trail. Here,” he said, pointing with his pen. “We’ve got decent underbrush, bushes and whatnot on either side of the road. They’ll be able to see any vehicles coming through, or anyone on foot for that matter. They’ll let us know when the subjects pass, but they’ll wait on our signal to start moving into position.”

He pointed at two of the other SWAT guys at the table.

“Parker and Woodall will be with us on the closed trail. They’ll belly-crawl it from the trail to the ranger station. Once Team B is in place, Parker and Woodall fire 38mm long range tear gas rounds through both windows. That allows the rest of us to move in from the trail on this side, while Team B moves in on theirs.”

“Okay. What time is sunset tonight, anybody know?”

“Twenty-forty hours,” Darnell piped up.

“Alright, it’s almost three. Let’s meet back here at six with the whole team. That work for you, Captain?”

“It works.”

“Okay, guys.” Wayne pinched at the bridge of his nose. “Let’s not do anything the Hardy Boys wouldn’t do.”

At 11:02 that night, Maggie knelt at the base of a scrub pine on the closed ATV trail. Mosquitos squealed in her ears like radio-controlled helicopters and she’d given up on trying to wipe them from her neck. She wore a black Sheriff’s Office windbreaker, and beneath that a department polo shirt, and beneath that her black body armor. The air was thick enough with moisture to make it hard to breathe. Her left ear itched continuously from the Earhugger ear piece attached to her shoulder mic.

She was almost certain she was going to lose her mind from the heat, the bugs, the itching, and the rivulets of sweat that ran down her spine. Adrenaline made it impossible to ignore anything.

She and four other deputies were squatting or kneeling in a line behind Wyatt, James, the SWAT guys and Captain Pittman, who were squatting or kneeling in their own line. It was completely black outside, the moon overwhelmed by storm clouds that promised rain at any moment.

No one spoke. Sound carried in funny ways across this flat land and radio comm was limited to Captain Pittman, Wyatt, and the leader of the team across the field. At 10:55, he’d let them know that a car with three people inside had passed them, headed for the lookout. They could see the headlights as it pulled in. Five minutes earlier, they got word that a second car had passed, this one carrying two people.

They could hear car doors closing and the faint sound of boots on wood as the visitors made their way up the ramp to the lookout, then the creak of a seldom-used door.

Darnell and Parker had started on their crawl for the structure as soon as the door shut again.

Now they waited. Maggie could barely make out Wyatt and the other officers. They were just blotches of black ink on a black piece of paper. Sweat dripped into her eyes, and as she blinked the salt away, they heard the distinctive, hollow
pop pop,
almost imperceptible as two separate shots, as Darnell and Parker fired the tear gas rounds through the windows.

“SWAT, go!” Maggie heard Pittman snap in her earpiece, and Pittman and his men rushed the field. She pulled her .45 from her holster and got ready. Twenty seconds later came Wyatt’s command and Maggie jumped up, her thigh muscles protesting, and she, Wyatt, and the rest of the deputies started running.

Maggie heard nothing but boots thudding the ground for a few seconds as they ran, then she heard the wooden door slam open, and a lot of feet on wood. A few seconds later she could hear the SWAT members up ahead yelling “Hands on your head!” and “Face down, face down!”

By the time she, Wyatt and her fellow deputies arrived at the lookout, the SWAT guys had five men on the ground. Near one of them was a backpack that had fallen open. Two stacks of bills had spilled onto the ground.

Within thirty seconds, the SWAT guys had disarmed and handcuffed all five men. Maggie holstered her weapon and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand as the men were jerked to their feet.

None of them was Richard Alessi.

Four hours later, Maggie sagged against the wall in the small room that was connected by a one-way glass window to one of their two interrogation rooms. James and one of his deputies were still interviewing the second of the two buyers out of Gainesville in Room 1. Wyatt had gotten fed up with Joey Truman, who “didn’t know nothin’,” especially when asked about Alessi.

Now he sat across from Gary Barone, who had been holding the only meth at the scene, barely more than three grams. They’d been in there for almost an hour, with little to show for it.

Maggie watched as Wyatt slapped a file shut and raised a hand to the deputy at the door.

Wyatt got up, stretched his legs, and walked out, as the deputy moved to escort Barone back to his cell. A moment later, Wyatt walked into the dark observation room and shut the door.

Maggie watched him as he rubbed his eyes and sighed. Then he slapped the file against his thigh for a moment as he stared at the floor. Finally, he looked up at Maggie.

“We got nothin’,” he said. “We can charge Barone for possession with intent. It’s not much, but it’ll send him back inside for a year or so. Joey, he’s dumber than hell, but even he knows he doesn’t need to help us out on Alessi. We’ll charge him with accessory to a bad guy and he’ll be out on probation. The little creep has two priors as a juvenile and that’s it.”

Maggie nodded and folded her arms across her chest.

“No Alessi. No ten kilos,” Wyatt said.

Maggie shook her head. “I don’t know.”

“Well, unless Alessi’s cooking meth that can give you superpowers, I doubt these guys from Gainesville were there to pay $200,000 for three grams,” Wyatt said.

“He was somewhere out there, with the rest of the stuff,” Maggie said. “Barone and Joey give these guys a taste, and they call Alessi to tell him the money’s there.”

“Not a bad plan, really.”

“Now he’s in the wind and I don’t know. I don’t know about Grace.”

Wyatt nodded and fidgeted with his mustache a minute.

“I think we should let Joey go,” Maggie said.

Wyatt looked over at her.

“Pretty cold.”

“Yeah. But she doesn’t have a plan B. We’re supposed to have him in custody,” Maggie said. “Now he knows somebody talked to us and I can’t call her. I can’t go over there. I can’t even warn her that he’ll probably walk right back through the front door.”

“He already did,” Wyatt said. “An hour ago. It’s been quiet since.”

“We need to go over there.”

“Not you. You don’t, Maggie.” Wyatt pointed at her. “You show up, and he just might put you and Grace and the Piggly-Wiggly together.”

“Send James, then,” she said.

“I am. We’re letting him give this guy Rolfe another go first. Right now, Grace’s best bet is if Ricky thinks maybe one of these buyers is his problem.”

“Or we let Joey go.”

Wyatt stared at the empty interview room a moment.

“I don’t necessarily have a problem with that. But I don’t know that Patrick Boudreaux will go for it.”

“Patrick Boudreaux works as little as possible and he couldn’t care less about some small time wing man,” Maggie said. “That won’t get his face in the paper.”

“Well, lawyers are on the way for the out-of-towners and Barone. Truman’s gonna be sitting here till a PD shows up in the morning, anyway. I’ll talk to Boudreaux first thing in the morning.”

Late in the afternoon, Maggie sat at the computer in her office, finishing up her report on Barone and Truman. Barone had been remanded without bail due to his parole violation. The Public Defender couldn’t have cared less whether they released Joey and neither could Boudreaux, so the paperwork was underway.

Dwight, AKA Dudley Do-right, walked into the office, carrying a pink message slip in one hand and a gigantic Styrofoam cup of sweet tea in the other.

“Hey Maggie? Lafayette County called. They want some info on some guy you busted a few months back. Apparently, they’re holding him on an assault with intent.”

He handed her the pink slip and she looked at the message.

“Quinn Wilcox?” She tossed the slip on her desk. “Tell them to just take him outside and shoot him.”

“Will do.”

“Thanks. I’ll call them back in a bit,” she said, turning back to her computer.

“What time did you get out of here this morning?”

“I’m not sure. Shortly before I came back.”

“You want me to go grab you a cup of coffee?”

“No, our coffee’s crap,” she said.

“Okee-doke.”

Dwight started to turn away and Maggie sighed.

“Hey, Dudley? I’m sorry. I’m a jerk today.”

“It’s all good, Maggie,” Dwight said, and shot her a grin.

“Hey.”

Maggie looked up to see Wyatt leaning in her doorway.

“Come talk to me a minute,” he said.

“See you later, Mags,” Dwight said as Maggie followed Wyatt out.

Once they were inside his office, Wyatt shut the door. He walked over to his desk and sat on the edge of it and Maggie leaned up against the file cabinet by the door.

“What’s up?” she asked.

“You heard from the girl?”

Maggie brushed some stray bangs out of her eyes and behind her ear. “No,” she said.