The Rivers Run Dry (6 page)

“And we let the Issaquah PD handle the case?” I asked.

“Right.”

I stood to leave.

“Harmon?” he said. “Check with Jack. He was wondering where you ran off to.”

chapter four

N
o Barney Mobile for him. No stinking backseat. No engine that rattled.

Jack Stephanson drove a black Jeep with a removable hardtop, the gray leather seats soft as driving gloves, and the nubby tires squealed as he sped through the underground garage. At the solid steel gate, he flicked his index finger, signaling the guard. The gate lifted and the Jeep shot up Spring Street.

“The witness is Felicia Kunkel,” he said. “Felicia's got some kids but they belong to the state now—hey, buddy, move it!” Jack honked the horn.

At the edge of the Jeep's bumper, an elderly Chinese man shuffled on the white crosswalk, his black satin slippers frayed at the heels. He stepped with an odd tenderness, his shoulders curled, as though his reedy weight might injure the pavement.

“Somebody get this guy a wheelchair,” Jack mumbled.

When the horn honked again, the man's head swung on his neck like a dandelion dangling from its stem. His dry lips uttered something unintelligible, and the moment his feet cleared the car's path, the Jeep rocketed down Fourth Avenue.

“Felicia might try to run,” Jack said. “She's scared. She doesn't want to testify. You're going to sit on this one, Harmon. Do not let Felicia get away. Without her, our entire case collapses. We spent ten months nailing these pervs. You blow this one—imagine
that
on your record.”

It was 4:00 p.m. and Seattle's office workers were purging from buildings in an anxious exodus to beat rush-hour traffic. I watched the women stride down the sidewalks in sharp slacks and jewel-toned blouses, their blonde hair cut in angles that refracted sunlight like successive shelves of gold. The men were broad-shouldered, lantern-jawed. Even the suits couldn't disguise direct Viking descent.

When the light turned green, Jack swung the Jeep down to the waterfront along the piers, to the Bureau's leased parking lot.

“Jack,” I said, “lay off the torture routine. It's already old.”

“I'm not torturing you, Harmon,” he grinned. “You're doing that all by yourself.”

I gathered my gear from the backseat, slammed the Jeep's door, and climbed into the stinking Barney Mobile.

Felicia Kunkel lived in a two-bedroom yellow rambler six blocks east of Sea-Tac Airport. Jack and I waited in our separate cars with the Bureau radios on while the tactical squad scoped the house. They wore flak jackets and gripped MP5s. Within six minutes, they radioed that Felicia's “employer” was not home.

As the tactical team took silent places within the ragged camellia bushes on either side of the front door, Jack and I walked across the dirt lawn. Suddenly the air vibrated with a sizzle like heat lightning. The sun disappeared. When I looked up, I saw grease-ringed bolt seams riveted to the underbelly of a 757. Moments later, the roar kicked in.

Jack stood on the front stoop, waiting for the jet engines to fade before knocking on the door. Waxy green leaves were scattered across the steps, creased by boot impressions. The concrete stoop miscalculated the foundation by four inches, causing the front door to appear raised.

Jack knocked again. “Hey, Felicia! You ready?”

She opened the door. “I'm havin' second thoughts.”

Her pale face was freckled with small red sores. Dun-colored hair hung in greasy curtains to her ribs, to the precise point where her torso changed shape and her bottom swelled like an inverted funnel.

“Felicia, you're not going to let me down, are you?” Jack said. “C'mon. We had a deal. You help us; we help you.”

She flicked her eyes toward me. “Who's this?”

“This?” He turned, as though surprised to discover someone standing behind him. “This is just Raleigh. She works in the office.”

“What's she doing here?”

“Raleigh's going to take you to the hotel. She'll stay with you through the night, make sure you're okay for tomorrow. You can order all the room service you want. Hey, raid the minibar, have a pajama party. Then tomorrow morning Raleigh will drive you to the courthouse. And you can get your kids back.”

Felicia's green eyes shifted. She was the nervous type who couldn't hold a stare long, but her glance over my shoulder seemed forced. The bushes never rustled.

“Bookman could come back any minute,” she said.

“So what're you waiting for, another beating? That's all he's got for you, Felicia. Pain and more pain. How much more abuse do you want to put up with?”

Her eyes filled with tears so suddenly it was as if a water pipe had broken inside her neck. “You're sure this is gonna work?” she said.

“Felicia.” He said her name in a whisper. “Felicia.”

Her green eyes rested on Jack's mouth.

“Anybody in your situation would be scared. Somebody tells you different, they're lying. Let me help you, Felicia. I want to help you.”

Then he reached up, wiping a tear from her mottled cheek.

Our double room at the Edgewater Hotel, courtesy of the FBI, had two queen beds, one desk, a chair, and a well-stocked mini-bar that Felicia raided while I checked the closet and bathroom, then under the bed.

“Hey, look,” she said. “They got Grey Goose in here.”

I stood at the window, wondering whether to draw the curtains. The hotel room hung over Puget Sound like a ship's deck, Seattle being a city that gathered its waterfront in both arms. I hated to lose the view, but I worried Felicia's “employer” might be ambitious enough to hire a boat and fire into a hotel room. I pulled the curtains halfway, leaving enough view to fire back.

“You want a drink?” Felicia bent over the small refrigerator's open door.

“No, thank you.”

“Well, I need a drink, that's for sure. Where's the ice?”

I picked up the phone on the nightstand between the two beds and dialed 0 for the front desk. The clerk informed me that the ice machine was just down the hall from our room, for my convenience. I informed her that my convenience required a bellboy with a bucket of ice, pronto, or we'd call the manager. I hung up.

Felicia stared at me. “You need a drink.”

“No, thanks.”

She shrugged. “More for me.”

Clutching tiny bottles of vodka to her narrow chest, she upended a drinking glass from the paper doily beside the sink and poured two bottles into the glass, followed by the briefest splash of orange juice. She downed it, then poured another and walked to the window, yanking back the navy chintz drapes. A gloaming twilight drifted into the room, filtering the furniture with a rosy quartz glow.

“Come away from the window, please.” I picked up the phone and dialed room service. Two cheeseburgers, extra fries, onion rings, two chocolate milkshakes, two cans of Coca-Cola, cheesecake, and a thermos of black coffee, extra sugar. And the ice bucket.

“You want anything?” I asked Felicia.

“Now you're talking.”

When the rolling table arrived, it was covered by a white tablecloth that brought the VanAlstynes back to my mind, wealthy people who ate dinner in their bedroom. I tipped the bellboy in the hallway, lifted the tablecloth, then removed the knives from the stiff swaddles of white napkins. I rolled the table into the room.

Felicia picked up the plate covers, uttering curses that I assumed meant appreciation. Golden steak-cut fries, perfectly salted. Toasted burger buns cradling green butter lettuce. Thick red tomatoes, glistening slices of red onion.

I locked the door, positioning Felicia at the far side of the table, blocking her path to the exit. She washed down every third bite with another double vodka and OJ.

“You eat like this all the time?” she asked.

“In hotels?”

“I was more thinking this kind of food. You're kind of skinny.”

“I'd eat this meal three times a day if I could.”

“You don't get to eat what you want?” She nibbled on her burger, plucking the crust from the edges.

“I live with my mother—she's a health fanatic. She cooks tofu and organic bean sprouts. Red meat freaks her out.”

“Get out.”

“Her food tastes like old newspapers.”

She dropped her head, the greasy dun hair falling forward, and laughter came soundless, a soft interior rumble that shook her shoulders, a girl used to hiding her joy. When she looked up, the light in her green eyes was bright with alcohol. She finished her drink, then walked to the luggage rack and pulled a pair of yellow pajamas from her torn duffel bag.

“I'm gonna get changed,” she said.

She walked to the bathroom and I set the untouched cheese-cakes on the desk with the thermos of coffee, then backed the table into the hall, locking the door again.

“Felicia.” I knocked on the bathroom door. “You need to keep the door open.”

She cracked it a foot.

I walked over to the big window, glancing back and forth between the bathroom and the view outside. Night had swallowed dusk, and two ferries were crossing the Sound like hovering plates of candles. Picking up one of the cheesecakes, red ribbons of syrup swirling across its creamy surface, I watched her step out of the bathroom wearing Mickey and Minnie Mouse pajamas.

She made another drink. “You sure you don't want one?”

“Yes, ma'am.”

She threw ice into the glass, half of it landing on the floor. “My daddy was stationed in Georgia. He made us say ‘sir' and ‘ma'am' all the time. He said it showed respect. If we screwed up, we got the belt. One time he beat me—I'll never forget it. All I asked was could I go to the bathroom. I was six, about to pee my pants. That buckle had my legs scabbed up for weeks.”

She plunked down on the bed, scooting herself back against the headboard, holding the remote in one hand, the drink in the other. She channel surfed before settling on a show that switched scenes with a sound like jail doors clanging.

“I love these crime shows, don't you?”

“Not particularly.” I ate the other cheesecake she didn't want.

“Yeah, you probably see this stuff in real life, huh. I bet they get it all wrong.”

“That's part of it.”

The other part, the greater part, was that I resented how residents of Hollywood's gated communities profited from tragic lives—lives like Felicia's—all the while shaking their heads sadly as though genuine concern was a legitimate part of their commerce. The only learning these shows provided went to the cons who picked up new tricks from prison.

“Can I ask you something?” she said suddenly.

“Sure.”

“They'll put Bookman away for good. Right?”

“That depends on you, from what I hear.”

Bookman, I learned, had been Felicia's pimp since she was fourteen, luring her out of Portland, taking her away from the nice Christian father who wielded a belt buckle for paternal respect. But Bookman turned out to be worse, far worse, and Felicia worked the streets of Seattle with fresh beatings that made the buckle feel like a feather by comparison. Now twenty-two, Felicia had the face and figure of a middle-aged woman.

“He'll kill me,” she said. “You guys know that?”

“When you see him in court, don't feel sorry for him. Don't hold anything back. Put him away for good, Felicia.”

Rape, extortion, battery, kidnapping a minor, crossing state lines—all the man's offenses before Felicia described the meth lab inside the house and the back door that rotated junkies through the kitchen.

On the TV, a pedophile received a long lecture from two inordinately good-looking actors wearing fake badges clipped to designer shirts. Felicia set her glass on the nightstand, bumping the telephone, and stumbled across the room to the luggage rack. She rifled through her duffel bag again, then shambled back to bed holding a plastic picture frame with a photo of two small mulatto boys and a baby girl with blonde hair as fine as corn silk. The baby looked dazed, her green eyes vague. Felicia set the frame on the table, bumping her drink.