‘‘Firsthand knowledge?’’
‘‘Absolutely.’’
‘‘Not hands-on knowledge, I hope.’’
‘‘You’re still joking? Are you aware of the size of the rock you’re attempting to roll over?’’
‘‘I’ll roll over any rock that I think is on top of Melissa. It’s too bad you don’t work for these people, because if you did I’d tell you to pass along to them to simply return Melissa. Give her back to me. She shows up alive on my doorstep and this story will tank so fast you wouldn’t believe it!’’ It seemed to her like a valid bargaining chip, one that he might even mistakenly believe.
‘‘Did they tell you about the raid on the chop shop?’’ he asked.
She stumbled. ‘‘Of course,’’ she lied again, working too long on her face. Her voice broke as she asked, ‘‘Does that mean what I think it means?’’
‘‘On the surface, it means her van was stolen and recovered, that’s all. In this city that would normally not constitute any kind of event. But given the rest of what we know, it holds all sorts of significance. I led that raid. The arrests were ours—federal. Chinese gang members, every last one. Connected to the illegals? Not that we’ll ever prove. But why did a gang-run chop shop have your friend’s van? Any guesses?’’
She couldn’t catch her breath. She tried brushing the spray out of her hair to cover her moment of paralysis. Two weeks . . .
‘‘We won’t get squat out of any of them—guaranteed. In their world you rat, you die. Inside or out, it doesn’t matter. Rules are rules.’’
She swiveled in her chair and faced him. ‘‘Suggestions?’’
‘‘We need to join forces,’’ he suggested, not answering her. ‘‘SPD can’t help you with an illegals investigation. Have you figured that out yet? This chop shop? That was ours! They couldn’t get a warrant fast enough. That’s my point. We can move way faster than they can. We can and do take all sorts of liberties they can’t. You want to tap a pay phone? That’s us. Take them weeks to get a warrant like that. You want to raid a sweatshop? Where do you think they’ll turn? Right here,’’ he said. ‘‘We’ve got the probable cause and they don’t. Night and day, I’m telling you. You know what I think?’’ he asked, not allowing her a reply. ‘‘I think you and me should go into business together. We start with these videotapes and we work backward. I know that you probably think you’ve already done that, but we do this for a living! You want your friend back? We start there. That’s where we start.’’
Now she was without her usual stage makeup, and she felt that she looked much older. Her grim expression wedded with her exhaustion and grief to paint a picture of pain and impatience. She tore off the paper bib that protected her dress and crunched it into a ball that she held on to, so that her fist was tight and bloodless.
He announced, ‘‘I think you should turn the VHS tapes over to me and take a vacation. I’ll push to gain access to the digital tapes as well. You leave town for a while. Long enough for us to make it safe for you around here.’’ This, she decided, was an intentional emphasis. He was threatening her. He, too, had taken the gloves off.
‘‘And if I stay?’’
‘‘After what you’ve been through?’’ he asked. ‘‘Who can protect someone that well? You don’t know these people like I do. These gang members are worthless excuses for human beings. Ask Boldt . . . LaMoia . . . they’ll tell you the same thing. One mistake, a bullet through the back of the head. Pop!’’ He clapped his hands loudly, jangling her nerves. ‘‘That’s all. No explanation. No remorse. You want to challenge those kind of people?’’
‘‘Comes with the turf. You challenge them on a daily basis, right? You look healthy to me.’’ She met eyes with him and would not let him go. ‘‘How’s that work?’’
‘‘They smoke a federal agent and they’ll never sleep. A reporter? Your friend Melissa knows how they feel about reporters.’’
‘‘So why not use me as bait?’’ she suggested.
‘‘It isn’t done. You’re a civilian. We don’t put civilians at risk. Not ever.’’
‘‘Do you think she’s dead?’’ she asked bluntly. ‘‘If it was you running things, for instance . . . Would you have killed her by now? What would you do with her?’’
‘‘Me?’’ he blurted out.
‘‘Hypothetically,’’ she acknowledged unflinchingly.
He stared back at her, trying to read in her face what she knew.
She said, ‘‘If anything has kept her alive, it’s that they haven’t found the second digital tape. Without it firmly in hand, they’d be stupid to kill her. She’s the only one who knows where it is.’’
‘‘If there’s anything they want from her, they’ll simply torture her and get it,’’ he said flatly. ‘‘These people do not play fairly.’’
Not taking her eyes off him, ‘‘But they don’t know her, do they?’’
‘‘Don’t they?’’
‘‘Her parents were great heroes in China. They survived seven months of torture by the Mao regime. Seven months of it! They’re legends. Melissa’s family honor is at stake. Do you understand? To the Chinese, family honor is everything. She won’t talk. And then they’ll have to make a decision. Kill her, and risk never finding that tape, or wait her out. What do you think?’’
‘‘I know all about the Chinese and their families,’’ he said a little too defensively.
‘‘So if she doesn’t talk?’’ Stevie asked.
‘‘You should take a vacation, a leave of absence. The only thing they would want from you is silence. I’d think about that if I were you.’’
Coughlie dragged himself forward to the edge of the couch. ‘‘If you stay, you’re making a mistake,’’ he warned.
‘‘If they let her go, then that’s the end of it,’’ she repeated.
‘‘You need to tell them, not me,’’ he said.
‘‘You have sources,’’ she pressed. ‘‘Connections. You said so. You told me you did.’’
He stood and paused at the door. ‘‘It doesn’t work like that,’’ he told her.
She spun back around to catch his reflection in the mirror. ‘‘Help me,’’ she pleaded. ‘‘I’ll keep my word on this.’’
‘‘If that break-in taught you anything, it should have been that it’s too late to negotiate. Just ask Klein.’’ He paused there at the door. ‘‘You take care of yourself,’’ he advised, turning his back on her and walking away.
When the receptionist rang almost immediately, Stevie was convinced that Coughlie wanted another chance at her. The announcement that Boldt was in the lobby surprised her. She asked that he be shown back to the set because she wanted to meet him on her turf for a change. A minute later, her head still spinning, he entered the enormous studio, taking in every detail as if a student.
‘‘Did you cross paths with him?’’ Stevie asked Boldt.
‘‘Who?’’ Boldt asked.
‘‘Brian Coughlie. He came to tell me I should leave town.’’
‘‘Did he?’’ Boldt pondered this. ‘‘Not the worst advice. We can hardly arrest him for that.’’
‘‘I offered my silence for Melissa’s safe return.’’ She kept Boldt standing because she didn’t want him to stay long. They talked between two of the large robotic cameras facing the backdrop of the Seattle sunrise that needed a few thousand watts to look realistic.
He said, ‘‘When a victim lives through what you went through, we call her a material witness.’’
‘‘Is Melissa dead, Lieutenant?’’ The only question that mattered. The one that haunted her.
‘‘We need to work together. To trust each other. You need it for the sake of your safety. I need it if we’re to find Melissa. I have reason to believe that they may not have found her yet.’’