Ice Shear (32 page)

Except for the FBI's. The surveillance that blanketed the neighborhood was evident to me because I knew where to look: the FBI listening equipment housed in a van right underneath me on the Old Mill Parkway, and an assault team parked a straight shot down Silliman Street, at the end of the alley that ran behind the Jelicksons', shiny with rain. Farther still was the Mohawk River, where Danielle was thrown, if not to her death, then to her impaling.

But that's not where my attention was focused. The dealer—the killer—had told Craig to drop the drugs in a tiny park that ran between the east side of the neighborhood and the cliffs that dropped into the Hudson River. A quarter-mile long and twenty feet wide, the undeveloped land had been too unstable for heavy industry during Hopewell Falls's boom times. Craig was instructed to slide the drugs to the center of a ring of benches a few feet from the parking area, a Ladies' Garment Workers' Union tribute to the women killed in the looms or mangled by machines. The seats were high and curved, taller than I was, and from my post the four solid ellipses formed an Irish knot, open yet impregnable. I had spent many days there the summer after Kevin died. I would lose track of time, letting the sounds of the river wash over me, drowning out the roar of the voice in my head reminding me that there would never be a time without grief. Never placid, in winter the current of air could sometimes make you feel like it would pick you up and drop you off the cliff into the water below. Inside the circle you were protected from some, though not all, of the winds.

My eyes flitted to the Jelicksons' on Cataract Street. The Merrimen had lit two oil drum fires, and the block was bright. The flames had been festive, almost pretty, when they were confined to the Jelicksons' front yard, but now they'd dragged the second barrel into the street. When they lit it, the tinder and the gasoline sent flames shooting up two stories like a Roman candle. Then the fire dropped to a low, hellish glow and seemed to be contained, but they were blatantly breaking the law and deserved to be arrested. I felt as if Hale was shrugging at me through the radio when I suggested we call in the locals: “As far as they know, the investigation is closed. Let's not give ourselves away.”

It's not like the day had started out all that great. Reporters showed at 8:00
A.M.
for Jerry's announcement of the indictment against Marty, which was—surprise, surprise—just in time for the national morning talk shows to pick up. The chief and Dave stood grimly behind Jerry while he explained how justice was being served against the killer of such a fine young woman. He didn't mention Ray.

“The people of Hopewell Falls and the Capital District”—Jerry trying to invoke gravitas, but instead sounding nasally—“everyone in the Empire State can sleep better knowing that this murderer, this craven killer, will face justice.”

The TV folks stuck around to do their establishing shots on the jailhouse steps. They seemed to think everyone wanted the attention Jerry was chasing, and took my “no comment” as the start of a discussion. At ten, Dave and I reached our breaking point, and gave the chief the heads-up that we were on our way over to the Kelly Suites to “liaise.” That's where the federal agents were holed up, planning their stakeout. As Dave and I escaped out the prisoner transport entrance we saw Denise Byrne bundling her son into a minivan. With Jerry not willing to indict Jason without more evidence, we had had to cut him loose.

The Kelly Suites was a hotel of opportunity. Travelers would check in when they couldn't drive another mile up the Northway. With its faded olive and harvest gold color scheme that couldn't muster any optimism, and the half-fallen poster announcing
FREE COFFEE EN SUITE
, the place appeared to be slumping into bankruptcy. The only thing that didn't fit was the lit no in front of the neon
VACANCY
sign.

The back of the hotel told the true story. As Dave and I walked up the steps to the second floor, we watched a half-dozen buzz-cut guys in DEA windbreakers and white-jumpsuited techs rushing around loading up hoses, tents, ventilators—meth labs could produce enormous amounts of corrosive gases and chemicals—as well as mobile kits.

“You're trying to poison me?” A voice rose above the din in the parking lot. It came from the masked tech who stood glaring at us from under the balcony. Though not currently visible, a scowl was assumed.

“Hi, Annie!” Dave leaned over the balcony. It creaked under his weight, and he pulled back. “I knew you liked to work closely with me—”

“Shut up!” Annie whipped off her mask. “I've logged more overtime in the last two weeks than I have in the last two years, and you want to make sure I die before I get paid?”

“Annie, what are you doing here?” I asked.

“My boss assigned me to do ‘interjurisdictional cooperation,' which means I get to die with all the
professionals.
” I could make out Annie's air quotes even through the sanitary mittens. “I don't know whether my boss hates me or the FBI more. Probably me.”

“Well, I'll feel safer knowing you're on the team,” Dave said. “We've got a meeting—”

“You think I came over here just to make pleasant conversation with you?” Annie seemed to like interrupting Dave more than most people. “No. I came to tell you that I should have the testing done on the clothes and the boots later today. The FBI agreed to let me use some of their equipment while we're wasting the next six hours waiting for you all to get your act in gear.”

I grinned. “Annie, did you volunteer for this operation so that you could get us our results faster?”

“I didn't volunteer! My boss insisted and I . . . agreed. I found a silver lining to this black oppressive cloud that is my life.”

A couple of other techs called her to help load some cabling. “Gotta go!” She zipped across the lot and grabbed the end of the ropy metal, the force of her small body providing what they needed to get the cable wrapped around a large spool.

“Take my calls tonight!” followed us as we entered the hotel room.

We could barely get in the door. Agents took up every chair in the living/dining room, with several more milling around, restless and weary of waiting. Plans filled every available wall space: maps of the neighborhood, broad aerial shots, as well as detailed photos of the riverside drop site and the Jelicksons' property, all posted and diagrammed. The evidence wasn't covering any sort of spectacular decorating: the main room's furniture was inoffensive, pastel and bolted down. The room had empty soda cans stacked into a tower in one corner and squared piles of warrants and chain-of-custody forms in rows on the couch, ready to be served. With no access to this room for several days, housekeeping must be freaking out. Little did the housekeepers realize that the people monopolizing these rooms made their beds with hospital corners, although the agents did skip decoratively fanning out the toilet paper.

A couple of men from the Jelicksons' case, three guys from the Albany office, and some people from the gang details in both California and Missouri were there. From across the room I spotted Ernesto Aguilar. Ernie! He sprang up, going around, under, practically over people to get to me. I was equally eager, but a huge chest blocked my path. Potreo, who had been so helpful when I almost fell at Marty's, ignored my “Excuse me's,” smirking. I used my elbows.

“Attention, all!” Hale yelled from the head of the table as Dave and I found a spot of wall to lean against. “We have a raid to plan tonight.”

“Officer Lyons”—Hale pointed to Harmony Mills on the map—“you will be here, part of the roof surveillance team, along with Agents Potreo, Zulietski, and Aguilar.”

I fist-bumped Ernie surreptitiously.

“Detective Batko, you and Agent Bailey will be assault team Bravo.” Dave got a nod from Silent Sam Bailey, tight braids brushing his shoulders. This was probably the extent of the small talk Dave would get for the duration of the operation.

With no concern for FBI hierarchy, Dave spoke up. “I'm not with my partner? Don't you want us working at our best?”

“We need our local guides,” Hale said, “to be in different places, to show us the back ways and shortcuts. We have maps, and we have run over every square inch, but if our suspects, the Jelicksons,
anyone,
zigs, we need to make sure we don't zag. Tonight's going to be tight. We're going to nail our meth cook, and we are going to stop ice from breaking on a large scale in the Northeast.”

He was hyping up the troops. I silently added to his list. We'll catch the killer—or was it killers?—of Danielle and Ray, and we'll stop the black hole of drugs and crime from sucking up everything good that was left in this town.

Hale explained that Craig would be dropping the pseudoephedrine behind a ring of benches. Dave and Sam Bailey would tail him after the drop.

“Y'all park over here behind this fish fry place”—Frank's Fish Fry: my father had picked up dinner there every Friday until the place closed fifteen years ago “because no one observed goddamned Catholicism anymore,” Frank said, with a shake of his head.

“The surveillance van will be right under Sierra 4.” He nodded at me, and pointed to two agents who could have been Kevin's brothers. One of them was wearing a hipster band T-shirt under his button-down, and both had the wide, bloodshot eyes of people who stared at computers all day.

We would then spring the trap, monitoring the only roads in, and more important, blocking off any exits. Whoever it was—including the Jelicksons—might be able to pick up the stuff, but they weren't going to be able to get it out of the neighborhood.

Once Hale summarized the timing of the evening, we calibrated our watches.

“Really? You do that?” Dave asked.

In the kitchenette, pistols, semiautomatics, and a few high-powered rifles were lined up on the breakfast bar like kindergarteners on their first day of school. They offered Dave a Sig Sauer, but he decided to stick with his Glock.

“It fits in my hand,” he said.

I breathed in. To me, the scent of gun oil was what baking bread was to others. An agent with a clipboard inspected the bulletproof vests. And the ammo? I couldn't see that as I peeked over the counter. Probably in the refrigerator.

Eyeing one of the M-15 sniper rifles, I asked which one I'd be getting. The tech took his time searching through the list. Finally he said, “It doesn't look like you have one assigned, but we assumed you would have your service revolver?” My disappointment must have shown on my face because he quickly added, “From your position, you should be surveillance only. We do have some binoculars for you—very high powered. And a bulletproof vest.”

Ernie consoled me on my lack of firepower and I helped him with his bulletproof vest.

“You hear about Bear?” he asked as I pulled the strap of his vest so that the last gap behind his shoulder closed.

I had just been thinking of the third member of Lyons, and Tigger, and Bear. “No. How's he doing?”

“Yeah, two cases back the Mara Salvatrucha made him. We found him . . .”—and I swallowed down the bile rising in my throat as he talked—“we found him with his guts, his intestines . . . unwound across an acre of land. They think he was alive when it happened. At the start, at least.” Ernie stopped talking, briefly, his ever-animated face frozen in grief.

“Ernie,” I said quietly, so only he could hear.

“We got the guys. We got them all”—Ernie's nice-guy nature nowhere in evidence. He sighed. “Another distribution network popped up the next day.”

“Good.
Good
. I'm glad you got 'em,” I said. The insult of not carrying a rifle suddenly seemed a lot less important. I dropped the vest over my head. The latest technology, it felt about twenty pounds lighter than the ones issued by Hopewell Falls. “Can you help me with the strap?”

Up on the roof, I discovered that the ninja wear hadn't changed in one key respect—it still trapped cold sweat everywhere it touched my body. “Just rain,” Hale said. Freezing rain was as miserable as you could get. I would have preferred snow. Snow, and the chance to be more in the middle of the action of this operation. I was
action adjacent,
which didn't quite count.

Hale's voice sounded in my ear, so free of static it seemed as if he were standing behind me. “Sierra 4, report.”

From the main road, Craig's SUV approached. Dave and Bailey's car followed at a safe distance.

“Sierra 4 to Alpha,” I said. “CI's vehicle passing checkpoint one.”

Craig turned left into the alley, and Dave and Sam veered right into Frank's parking lot, their headlights going dark.

Over the radio, Craig was complaining how much his arms hurt from lifting all the pseudoephedrine onto the truck.

“You just had to push a button, Craig,” Hale said. “The truck has a hydraulic lift.”

“But I had to arrange it all. And we've got eight hundred pounds of that stuff, and I didn't want to get it on me. I could have a heart attack or something. At least the drug dealers in Canada helped me carry stuff.”

“Craig, don't clog the channels with chatter,” Hale said.

Craig didn't take the hint, continuing the running commentary. That was a good thing, as far as I was concerned. While I could see his truck and the stone benches, I couldn't see him, too low and too far left.

“Shit! It's sleeting!” Craig said. “Did you guys know it was sleeting?”

“Affirmative, Craig,” Hale said.

“What?” Craig said.

“Yes,” Hale said, and I could hear a snicker, quickly muted.

“So you really just want me to back up and slide the pseudoephedrine down?”

“Yes, Craig,” Hale said.

“Are you sure? What if a bag breaks? There are eighteen of them, you know.”