Bitter Crossing (A Peyton Cote Novel) (6 page)

Morris cleared his throat, and Margaret looked at him.

“We got too attached to her.” He took the picture from Peyton, opened the drawer beneath the cabinet, put the photo inside, and slid the drawer shut. “The court sent her back to her mother. That was a mistake.” He shook his head.

“Do you see her often?”

“She’s dead,” he said and pulled the front door open. “Have a nice evening, Peyton.”

She backed her Jeep out of the Picards’ driveway and considered Picard’s two lies: First, she’d caught his slip when he’d mentioned Mann’s Garage. He eventually came clean on that. It was his second lie, the one to which she hadn’t tipped her hand, that had her confused. He’d failed to mention Tyler Timms was at the game, the Iraq War vet whom he most definitely knew. Somehow, in Picard’s version, Timms had either been left out or replaced by U-Maine professor Jerry Reilly. And Reilly, according to Picard, had not worn a blue suit.

Had the poker game been comprised of five players and not four as Radke had said?

And who was the man in the blue suit?

SEVEN

P
EYTON HAD PLANNED TO
return to her mother’s after dinner for time with Tommy before her shift. But a phone call told her that a late meeting had now been scheduled between the Maine Department of Health and Human Services, state police, and Border Patrol. The topic: the baby and the scenario surrounding her. She hoped like hell an ID had been made.

As she followed Smythe Road to Route 1, wet sleet fell, turning the streets shiny and black beneath her headlights. Coupled with the wind gusts and thirty-degree temperature, the slush would make her night-shift travels dangerous.

Her radio was set to the Canadian Broadcast Company on Sirius. She was driving slowly, scanning the thin shoulders of Route 1 for moose. If hit, given the animal’s enormous torso and pencil legs, a moose would clear the Jeep’s hood and land in the center of the vehicle, wiping out all the seats and anyone in them. She didn’t hear the CBC news. Her mind was still on Morris Picard. Who exactly had played poker at Mann’s Garage that night? And why had Morris Picard lied about it?

Amid the snowball effect of Kenny Radke’s bad tip—the lies, the unknown poker player, the possible shipment of marijuana—there was a baby to consider: Who had left the infant girl, and why? There had to be a record of the infant’s birth somewhere.

On the home front, she wished she had more to give her sister. Elise had the weight of the world on her shoulders. What bothered Peyton more than anything was Elise’s refusal to speak of it. They’d been the closest of sisters when they were young. What could there possibly be that Elise couldn’t tell her?

And the appointment with Jeff only added tension. That’s what she called it, an “appointment.” She doubted he thought of it that way. The back of her neck felt hot. More than her need for a house, Tommy needed a father, a man in his life.

Did she, too?

She turned up the radio.

Her last date was eighteen months ago in El Paso. That date, like the previous two, had been a disaster. A fellow agent she’d met at the local gym, a guy she thought she’d have lots in common with, seemed intent on doing nothing but bitching about his ex-wife. The first, a computer programmer, had been too shy to carry a conversation. And the other guy had been interested in only one thing.

Could she forgive Jeff? People did change, after all. But he’d walked out on Tommy and her, and she’d never been good at turning the other cheek; it was partly why her father had enrolled her in karate classes—help her compartmentalize her hyperactivity and give her a venue to deal with the energy she couldn’t put on a back shelf. But karate hadn’t always worked. The trips to the principal’s office kept coming, and Francis Cyr’s broken nose had led to a suspension. Could she turn the other cheek now and let Jeff back in her life, for Tommy’s sake?

A quarter-mile ahead, her headlights illuminated a curious sight: a solitary figure approaching on foot. Peyton was now a mile-and-
a-half from the port of entry. The woman looked cold and wet and lurched forward a few steps at a time, weaving from the pavement to the dirt shoulder. Then she stopped and hunched over as if in pain.

Peyton accelerated. The woman looked up at the Jeep, then struggled on, weaving. One knee of her blue jeans was torn and soiled. Despite the cold night air, she wore only a faded, short-sleeved cotton shirt, soaked and stuck to her skin like wet tissue paper. There was a stain above the woman’s chest. Blood?

Peyton pulled to the side, climbed out of the Jeep, headlights bathing the woman like spotlights on an actor.

The smear near her collar was definitely red.

“Ma’am, are you okay?”

Before the woman could respond, Peyton’s cell phone chimed. She unclipped it from her belt. “Cote here.”

“Peyton, it’s Hewitt.”

She didn’t take her eyes off the full-figured woman, who looked no older than twenty.

“Thought you’d want to know,” Hewitt said, “Kenny Radke is at St. Mary’s Hospital. Somebody jumped him. Kicked the shit out of him pretty good this afternoon.”

“Damn. He was looking around the diner the whole time I spoke to him this morning.”

“You met with him again?”

“I put him on the spot this morning about the bogus tip.”

“At the diner?”

“I knew he’d be there.”

The woman stared at Peyton, head tilted. Was she trying to follow the phone conversation?

“Get anything out of him?” Hewitt asked.

“Some names. I’m looking into it.”

“Don’t forget our talk. Anything there for DEA?”

“Not yet.”

“Well, don’t beat yourself up over Radke. He’s a shit magnet. This probably had nothing to do with you.”

She didn’t believe that, but she let it go. The woman hadn’t moved by the time she hung up.

“Is that blood?” Peyton pointed.

The woman jumped back as if frightened by Peyton’s finger.

“It’s okay,” Peyton said. “Did someone do this to you?”

The olive-skinned young woman bent over again. Peyton was certain she’d vomit. When she didn’t, Peyton waited in awkward silence for her to straighten. Finally, Peyton crouched to see her face.

“Maybe we should go to the hospital,” Peyton said.

The girl stood tall then, dark eyes opened wide as if surprised to see her. The girl had gone from terrified to astonished in a matter of seconds.

Peyton tried for soothing. “Look, whatever you took isn’t agreeing with you. We’re going to get you some help. Tell me your name and where you’re from.”

The woman’s eyes narrowed.

“
Hablas Español?
” Peyton said. Like every agent, she spoke fluent Spanish upon graduating from the nineteen-week academy.

The girl was silent, so, in Spanish, Peyton asked about the spot on her shirt.

“No spot on my shirt,” the girl said in Spanish.

“Why are you limping?” Peyton asked.

“I twist my ankle. No drugs.”

“Where are you headed?”

The woman shook her head.

“Where are you from?” Peyton asked.

“Why?”

“Let me call someone, get you a ride.”

“You a cop?”

Peyton said again, “Where do you live?”

The woman didn’t answer, shuffling past Peyton, who turned to face her.

“Downtown Garrett is over a mile away. It’s dark, and it feels like winter tonight. You don’t have a coat. Let me take you somewhere.”

“No. I’m fine.”

“Then wait while I call someone and get you a ride.” She punched in Station from her contacts list.

Stan Jackman answered.

Peyton took two steps and turned away from the girl. “It’s Peyton. Got a situation here that may involve an illegal alien and possibly drugs.”

“You off duty?”

She heard a vehicle approaching from the north and turned to see a rusted Aerostar van.

“That’s why I’m calling this in. I’ll wait for you. I’m out on Route One with a girl, nineteen or twenty. Spanish. Has what might be a bloodstain on her shirt. And she might be high.”

“Fun stuff. Glad you thought of me.”

“Wanted to start with the best,” Peyton said and glanced over her shoulder. The young woman had moved several steps farther away.

“I’m too old for flattery,” Jackman said. “I’ll radio Bruce Steele. He’s in the field. When she gets here, I’ll check for immigration documents.”

The van screeched to a halt twenty feet from Peyton.

“What’s that?” Jackman asked.

“Hold on,” Peyton said and waved the van to continue.

It passed her, pulling up to the young woman. The side door opened. Someone reached out and grabbed the girl by the arm. The van started pulling away before she was fully inside.

Peyton sprinted, but it was no use.

A moment before the side door closed and the van was off, Peyton had made eye contact with the woman—and realized her expression was not fear but relief.

But why the rush? In five seconds, the van rounded a corner and was out of sight.

Had she witnessed an abduction or a rescue?

“Tell me again how it went down,” Agent Scott Smith said.

Peyton was still standing on the side of Route 1, but now she’d been joined by PAIC Mike Hewitt and Smith.

“I was on the phone, the van showed up, and … ” She shrugged. “I tried to catch up in my Jeep. But the van had a head start, and there are just too many dirt roads around here.”

“Somebody reached out and grabbed her?” Hewitt said.

“Yeah,” she said. “I called in a description of the girl. Stan Jackman’s putting out a BOLO. I’m on tonight. Maybe someone will see her.”

It was still snowing with the forecast calling for significant accumulation. Smith removed his hat, shook the slush off, and replaced it.

“I’m still confused,” he said. “Somebody pulled to the side of the road, and she got in?”

Peyton said, “She was pulled in.”

“You said she was glad to get away,” Smith said, “but it sounds like a kidnapping.”

“I don’t understand it either,” Peyton said. “Her expression said I was the lesser of two evils.”

Hewitt looked in both directions up and down Route 1. “We’re in a small valley here. How did the driver of the van know where she’d be? Did you get a look at the driver?”

Peyton shook her head.

Hewitt said, “You look cold, Peyton. You’re not dressed to be out in the snow for an hour and a half. Go home, get warm, and we’ll talk about this more when you start your shift.”

Scott Smith took off his coat and draped it over Peyton’s shoulders.

“Thanks, but you keep it,” she said. “You’ll be cold.”

“No. I’m fine. I got one last question,” Smith said. “You said you were coming from Mo Picard’s house. What were you doing out there?”

“You know him?” she said. Smith had only been in Garrett a couple months longer than Peyton.

“No, why?” Smith said.

“You called him
Mo.
”

“That’s what you called him,” Smith said. “Isn’t that his name?”

“Yeah,” she said. “Anyway, I was asking him questions about some information I got today from Kenny Radke.”

“About the baby?” Smith said.

“I’m not sure,” she said. “Is she in DHHS custody? Is that an open file, Mike?”

Hewitt looked at Peyton. Then he looked down and kicked slush off his boot. “Tell me about the Mo Picard interview.”

“I caught him in a lie,” she said and told them what she’d learned.

EIGHT

A
T
G
ARRETT
S
TATION, SHE
gave Stan Jackman a detailed description of the woman, and Jackman ran the van’s license plate. After a quick change in the locker room, Peyton was in uniform and at her desk, running on all of four hours’ sleep. She hit Home on her cell phone. Her mother answered.

“I got tied up,” she explained for the millionth time. “I’m at the office.”

“You okay?”

“Yes, fine.”

She heard Lois sigh. “Lucky you have a supportive mother. Hey, Elise called for you tonight. She sounded …”

“Upset?”

“A little. How’d you know? What’s going on?”

The front door opened, and a woman entered, followed by a state trooper. They passed her desk and went into Hewitt’s office.

“I had breakfast with her. Something’s up with Jonathan and her.”

“Okay, but, as you know,” her mother said, “I don’t meddle. I just worry. I know he paid his debt to society and all that stuff Elise says, but he’s still got crazy eyes.”

“Don’t meddle? You? Mom, you ask me if I’m dating someone every morning.”

“That’s just being curious, not meddling. Besides, you need a man. A woman can’t be alone forever.”

“Look, Mom, can you make sure Tommy does his homework? He’s struggling in math.”

“We already did it. He did a wonderful job. We’re going to bake cookies tonight.”

“I know you had bridge tonight. I really appreciate this.”

“That’s what mothers—and grandmothers—are for, sweetie. I’m glad you’re home.”

“Me, too.” Peyton smiled and listened as the receiver changed hands.

“Mom?” Tommy said.

“Hi, Tommy gun. Sorry I didn’t make it back to tuck you in.”

“Mom, I’m not a baby.”

“I know. Well, go to bed when Gram tells you. I’ll take you for ice cream tomorrow.”

“Love you, Mom.”

Peyton closed her cell phone and walked to Hewitt’s office. Only one metal folding chair, between the uniformed trooper and the woman, remained. She slipped between them. Hewitt sat in his high-backed leather chair across his desk from them.

“Peyton, this is Lieutenant Leo Miller with the state police. Leo, Peyton Cote.”

“We spoke on the phone earlier,” Miller said. He had a crew cut and intense green eyes, his severe gaze on Peyton. Not looking her over as much as appraising her. His appraisal wasn’t modest either. Not a
she
’
s-out-of-my-league
look. She’d been a woman in a male-dominated profession long enough to know he was guessing how difficult she’d be to get in the sack.

She narrowed her eyes. He held her look momentarily before smiling as if he liked her spunk.