The Body of David Hayes (8 page)

Boldt occupied the cracked vinyl passenger seat of a former steam-cleaning van confiscated years before in a drug bust. It served as the communications command vehicle, mobile headquarters for Riz and his black-clad squad of commandos.

With the van parked on the third level of a parking garage across the street from the bank, both Boldt and the wheel man, a guy named Travis, brandished binoculars, trained onto the bank building’s exterior. Behind them, on the other side of a black curtain, where a bank of television monitors flickered in the dim light, came the sputtering and
spitting sound of radio traffic orchestrated by a dull-voiced, unexcitable woman dispatcher who sat next to Riz.

“Reece!” Boldt called out using the universally accepted but incorrect pronunciation of the commander’s last name as the bank’s revolving door moved for the first time.

“We saw it,” Riz confirmed.

The revolving door spun like a giant paddle wheel. Riz called out commands and the dispatcher repeated them. A big guy on the sidewalk sucked on a cigarette and turned toward the revolving doors just as a woman wearing a black raincoat and carrying an aluminum briefcase stepped out from those doors and into pedestrian traffic. Even knowing what to look for, Boldt missed the switch, never saw his wife’s black raincoat tucked into the apex of that spinning wedge of the revolving doors.

“Phase two,” Riz said calmly.

A woman dressed as Liz Boldt, looking like Liz Boldt, and carrying an aluminum briefcase like the one Liz Boldt was supposed to be carrying, headed down the sidewalk as instructed. Boldt hoisted the binoculars. Even under magnification Malone passed for Liz.

Boldt popped open his door and said, “I’m on channel one-six, and I’ve got my cell. Keep me in the loop.”

“Lieutenant!” Riz complained, too loudly for the small confines of the panel van. He stopped Boldt. “I remind you: We have an operation in place. You cannot, must not, visit your wife inside that bank. Not yet. It could be watched.”

“I know that, Reece.” The guy made it sound like Boldt had never been on a surveillance. He eased the van’s door shut, inexplicably drawn to protect this woman pretending to be his wife.

Once out on the street, Boldt quickly spotted the woman
in the black raincoat walking west down the hill on Madison.

Boldt wore a cell phone ear bud in his right ear—a common sight on the streets now and one that made such clandestine surveillance easier than before. In Boldt’s case, the ear bud wire was plugged into a portable police-band radio tucked under his jacket.

In his ear, the dispatcher’s voice inquired, “LTB?” Boldt’s radio handle. He acknowledged. The dispatcher then rattled off a request that Boldt switch sides of the street. Riz didn’t want anyone from the team directly behind Malone. Boldt obeyed the request, crossing with a group of southbound pedestrians, tension surging through him in long waves. He was thinking that Malone’s walk was all wrong, lacking both Liz’s elegance and the subtle but stirring sway of her hips. Malone’s efficient stride was all about training, athleticism, and preparation. At a moment’s notice, Malone was ready to either drop to the sidewalk like a sack of cement or sprint in the opposite direction. Under that controlled movement was a body like a cat’s.

Malone continued west on Madison, down toward the waterfront now directly ahead of her. The street’s dead end into the north/south sidewalk that fronted Elliott Bay would somewhat contain her, and Boldt thought Hayes too smart to corner himself like that. So what the hell was he up to? Then he realized that Riz was being forced to reduce the number of personnel he sent into the area, for fear that in large numbers even the undercover officers might be spotted. Riz cut back from eight undercover officers to four on foot, holding the others in positions two blocks away, across the deserted stretch of parking tarmac beneath the
elevated lanes of Alaskan Way. An unmarked van of SWAT-like S.O. operatives was moved into position across from the Seattle Aquarium. It was here, the aquarium, a series of restaurants, an IMAX theater, that Riz initially focused his personnel.

Boldt understood Riz’s reluctance to accept that Hayes would make things easy for them by directing “Liz” to a ferry or a boat—fully contained and so easily tracked and followed—a criminal’s nightmare. But with the middle stretch of waterfront buildings soon to be under the umbrella of Riz’s well-orchestrated team, Boldt played the contrarian. Riz did finally direct a few of his people toward the ferry docks, but by the time he thought to do so, Boldt was already several hundred yards ahead of not only the closest operative but Malone as well, for she had stopped and stared out to sea for seven long minutes, presumably under the direction of Hayes, as she now carried Liz’s cell phone. Her pause caused a momentary paralysis for Special Ops, finding themselves unable to predict her next move.

Boldt, by playing against the grain, ended up at the ferries well ahead of the mark, and ahead of Special Ops also, the only one already in place when Malone made her unexpected move south.

South, to the ferries.

The Washington State Department of Transportation—WSDOT—operates the busiest ferry system in North America, handling nearly seventy thousand passengers per day. Piers 50 and 52 of the Seattle Terminal, a sprawling landscape of parking lots and docks, present managers with
a logistical challenge similar to that of running a small airport. In constant motion, teams of dockworkers and sailors and maintenance personnel, food service people and housecleaners, attempt to keep a fleet of thirty-one ships on a reliable schedule. The two terminals operate under a surprising calm, the result of a well-practiced routine.

Boldt faced a decision as he read from the electronic sign that listed scheduled departures. Slip 3 offered a Bainbridge Island ferry departing at 4:40, and with a short crossing time of thirty-five minutes. Right or wrong, Boldt had to commit. Boarding
ahead
of “Liz”—Malone—was something he doubted Hayes would anticipate. Police reacted, they
followed
a surveillance mark, they didn’t arrive ahead of the mark.

Hopeful that Riz might yet sneak one or more of his undercover operatives onboard, Boldt believed Hayes would be looking to identify those behind Malone. He doubted Hayes would recognize him, especially given the jeans, the glasses, and the hat pulled down over his brow, but he nonetheless stopped at a tourist stand and bought two Orca whale Beanie Babies for the kids. With the white shopping bag in hand, marking him a tourist, he felt even better disguised.

Head down, bunched in with a dozen commuters, Boldt boarded the gray-and-white ferry,
Puyallup
. Filled to capacity, as she was to be at this hour,
Puyallup
carried 2,500 passengers and more than 200 vehicles. The teeming masses of commuters contributed to Boldt’s camouflage.

He bought a
Times
from a vending machine in the main cabin and headed to a window seat with a view of the boarding areas.

As the dispatcher barked orders, Boldt realized Riz and
his team were now scrambling to deploy undercover officers onto the ferry.

Hayes orchestrated Malone’s arrival at the pier to within a few scant minutes of the
Puyallup’s
departure, leaving her one of the last passengers to board. Interpreting what he heard in his ear, Boldt saw a single undercover bike patrol officer board the ferry behind her. Boldt searched his memory for a name: Hendersen, a lanky surfer dude, blond, in his early thirties. He wore colorful Spandex bearing Lance Armstrong’s signature and the U.S. Postal Service logo, a black helmet that was pointed in front and back, a red backpack with a dozen zippers, and a pair of stereo headphones connected to a jogger’s portable CD player that strapped to his chest. The CD player was in fact a police radio. The space-age riding glasses he wore concealed a microphone allowing two-way conversation. Hendersen bobbed his head constantly, as if he were listening to music.

The ferry left the pier smoothly. Malone, deeply into the role of Liz Boldt, arrived on the passenger deck, the aluminum briefcase in hand, among a cluster of the last passengers to board. Seconds behind her, Hendersen appeared, easily spotted by his helmet.

Malone walked the length of the ship and out through the forward doors to the bow deck, Liz’s cell phone held tightly to her ear.

Boldt reached inside his jacket and turned down the radio’s volume, distracted by the clatter of dispatch. With ten staircases and three decks, an elevator, and twenty-five hundred passengers, the
Puyallup
seemed an easy place to lose somebody. Once Hayes manipulated her below deck, it would require but a matter of seconds to stash Malone into a vehicle. Smuggling her off the ship would prove
more difficult, but he put nothing past Hayes given what he’d seen so far: an organized, patient personality.

Boldt reached Hendersen and introduced himself without looking directly at the man. They divided the ship in two between them, Hendersen taking the outside deck, Boldt remaining inside.

They would pass responsibility for her back and forth between them via the radio. If she moved up or down levels, whoever was following her at the time was to stay with her because radio contact could be problematic given all the steel.

Boldt added in a whisper, well aware of the many passengers surrounding them both, “If she heads
downstairs
to the vehicles, get word to me somehow, because that’s the deal.”

“Got it.”

They split up, both aware of the difficulty of having only a two-man surveillance team. Boldt watched Hendersen head outside only yards behind Malone, the two visible through the passenger deck’s large windows. Like watching a silent movie.

Boldt noticed the horizon shift as the ferry corrected course. The dispatcher came onto the radio, announcing that personnel would be deployed on the ground at the Bainbridge Island ferry terminal in the event Malone disappeared onboard or later disembarked. The island’s law enforcement quickly proved itself ill prepared for a spontaneous undercover operation. An officer was currently racing home to change into civilian clothes and to switch cars with his wife. Boldt asked that this man and his car be available to him in the event Malone left the ferry. Hendersen
could follow on bike, if necessary. It wasn’t a great plan, but it was all they had.

Malone completed a full circle of the outside deck, and Boldt called off Hendersen with a simple command sent over the radio. Bainbridge Island drew closer. The sun sank lower, finally slipping behind the dramatic mountain range and delivering a thickening twilight. Boldt took over, following Malone to the ship’s stern, where she reentered the enclosed passenger deck. Boldt stopped outside rather than enter behind her. He glanced over the rail at the ship’s bubbling wake and the ruffled feathers of a group of hungry white seagulls riding the wind. Facing away, out to sea, he called over the radio to Hendersen and made a second handoff.

“Stairs!” came Hendersen’s blunt reply. “Ascending. Repeat: ascending.” Boldt reentered in time to catch a glimpse of Hendersen’s colorful bike uniform disappearing through a metal exit door.

The ferry sounded its loud horn. Boldt felt a jolt with the unexpected sound. Dusk settled, softening edges, blurring the horizon, running color to gray. Boldt reached the upper level with its small cabin and larger deck. Malone’s back was turned to him as she passed outside.

Hendersen and Boldt met eyes, exchanging a look as Hendersen retreated down the stairs and Boldt took over.

Malone, Liz’s phone pressed to her ear, nodded faintly as she listened.

A family of four headed past Boldt, down the stairs, leaving only him and one other man, who sat alone with his back to Boldt. Outside, Malone joined a line of others pressed against the stern rail. A chill wind blew.

It took Boldt a change of angles to spot the black wire
leading from the seated man’s ear—the same kind of handsfree cell phone wire that he himself wore. Talking to whom? he wondered.
Malone?

Boldt edged closer, excitement pounding inside his chest.
Ten feet
…
Five feet
…

On the edge of his peripheral vision, Boldt saw Malone’s movement as she glanced back over her shoulder at him. Boldt paused, instinctively knowing something was wrong.

The seated man turned, and Boldt saw his face. Not David Hayes, but a man in his sixties with poor skin.

Malone threw the briefcase off the side of the ferry with all her strength. Its brushed aluminum spun in lazy loops as it tumbled and then disappeared, out of sight.

Boldt stood paralyzed. The ferry was nowhere near landfall. Five thousand dollars in marked bills had just been tossed overboard. No matter how tempted, he could not give Malone away—could not compromise her. Instead, he casually reached inside his jacket pocket and tripped the button to speak to Riz’s dispatcher.

A moment later came the response: A helicopter would be dispatched, though it wouldn’t be airborne for at least thirty minutes. Boldt was to secure a GPS location from the ferry’s captain ASAP.

A trickle of dread swept through Boldt as he sensed a much bigger plan at work, wondering if that plan still called for the abduction of Malone, a.k.a. Liz Boldt.