Disappearance and Reappearance
"Hey dickless! Time for your transfer is up!" The booming voice accompanying the loud banging on the door of the confinement cell announced. "You know the drill! Get your ass over here and present your hands for the restraints!"
The inmate, a man in his early forties with disheveled brown hair, an unkempt beard and a face that might once have been called handsome, squinted as if trying to see clearly before he stood wearily and shuffled toward the door. "What time is it?"
"It's 'transfer the child abuser out of my fine and clean prison' time, asshole! Now get a move on!" the guard responded as he reached through an opening slate in the door to put two cuffs around the offered wrists. "What do you care anyway, it's not like you will see much differences. I doubt you'll get a better treatment anyway!"
The man turned and bellowed. "Open up four!" and the loud mechanic clangs of the door's locking mechanism disengaging resonated in the cell before the door opened. "Now stand still while we finish this… or better yet: Don't. I'll get an excuse to give you another taste of what you put those kids through…" The guard muttered as he moved to put the rest of the chains on the prisoner.
Soon, the inmate limped his way through the corridors, the guard always behind him with a hand on his shoulder as two others walked one step before them and two more walked one step behind.
"Inmate walking through!" the guards called as they escorted the man, passing several locked doors and locks, until they reached a small hall where two men with DOC uniforms waited with the disgusted look of people who would rather be doing anything but transferring the prisoner they were ordered to.
"Okay, none of us really wants to be here today so let's do it quickly." One of the agents grumbled as he looked at his notepad. "We are here to take custody of inmate number 2203-16093, Jefferson, Mark, to proceed from his transfer from High Desert State Prison to Pelican Bay State Prison."
He looked at the chained man, checking him with the picture on his pad. "Okay let's process him… The sooner we're done, the sooner we can sterilize the bus."
They marched the inmate to a desk, taking his print to check them against the records, then both sets of guards signed and countersigned the various forms before shoving the prisoner into the back of a windowless van with the Californian Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation markings.
Once the doors were secured the engine started, and a large armored gate opened. letting the van leave the facility.
An hour later, another DOC van presented itself at the gate for the transfer of the same prisoner.
Juliet Watson was not what one might call happy. Her life had not really taken the turns she had expected it to take, so she might have had a reason. Or so people would think. After all, a girl who had, since Junior High, participated with clear devotion into news reporting and writing would probably have been expected to become a famous investigative reporter.
In a way, she had done so. She certainly had nailed the investigative part. And she did report to people about her findings by writing. Just, she did not write news articles or books. She wrote official investigation reports.
Because, after one of her high school classmates disappeared in her last year, and rumors began that she had been killed, Juliet had decided to use her skills and her need to find the truth about everything around her in a different way.
And so, instead of majoring in reporting, she went to Washington State University's Forensic Science program where she put as much of herself into her studies as she had in the school's newspapers. She even became estranged from her friends, all in the only goal to find out what happened to her classmate and maybe prevent another similar situation.
She, as expected, aced the course and got a recommendation for an internship with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, before becoming one of the Special Agents in the Seattle's branch; and more particularly the RICO special investigation team that focused on one specific branch of the North Western Irish Mob.
Still, after working with the team for nearly a year, she had not found much more about what she really was looking for.
Today, she sat again in front of the large board covered with dozens of pictures of the various members of the gang. The picture of the leader showed a grumpy man with light brown hair and a lumberjack beard. His face was stern, merciless and devoid of emotions, yet Juliet kept hoping she could see a hint of pain in his blue eyes. Maybe because she still could not believe the man who had once crushed the knees of a boy who bullied the teenager in the picture beside his, would kill the same girl in cold blood.
Juliet's eyes lingered on the smiling face. She wasn't sure when the picture had been taken, but Juliet remembered that cheerful expression covering the girl's face for most of the year preceding her disappearance. She looked at the brunette, her blue eyes half closed as her cheeks were raised, pulled up by her beaming smile displaying white teeth. The freckled face still seemed to be laughing, and Juliet could almost hear her voice.
She certainly looked much fuller of life than her father does. She thought bitterly. I wish I knew where you were, Maxine.
Her eyes kept looking around the board, trying to make sense of it. It was not like they had no crimes to build their case on. The racketeering of the Seattle's dock, the murders, the assault, all of those were filling several boxes of files. They just had no definitive link, no witnesses, no clear and indisputable piece of evidence to tie the mobster to them.
Even the short war and the tension still present between the Seattle Irish mob and the Portland one had not brought enough evidence. Those two clans sure were smart. They had to be to last so long in this new age of science.
The Bureau had originally investigated the disappearance of the Caulfield daughter as an explanation to the hostilities between the families. After all, if the Portland mob had killed her, it would have explained why the Caulfield's had retaliated.
Except Juliet could list two reasons why that hypothesis could not work. To begin with, the first blood, if one ignored Maxine's disappearance, had been one of the Caulfield's lieutenant being sent to orbit when a bomb put under his seat had blown his car into tiny little pieces. If the war had started because the Portland mob had killed the Caulfield's daughter, then why had one of the Caulfield's lieutenant been the first victim?
Second, Juliet could not imagine even one instant that Ryan Caulfield, who everyone at her school knew would kill anyone even looking the wrong way at his daughter, would accept a truce, if not peace, with the mob family he suspected had killed his daughter. No way! Never… To her, if that family had killed Maxine, Ryan would not have stopped until Portland had been a single smoking crater.
And apparently, the Bureau had come to the same conclusion over a year after the brunette's disappearance, when her name was mentioned in a different case in California.
When she had been told of that part of the file, Juliet had almost wished the rumors had been true. Because if Maxine had not died back then, she would probably had wished she were dead if all Juliet read in the reports had happened.
At least, the fucker has been given a life sentence! Juliet thought. I just wish we could put him in general population and let the other inmates deal with him! Instead, of keeping him in solitary in the one chance he can give us some bit of information.
It galled her that they had to keep the asshole safe. Her eyes lingered on the report hanging from the board.
'Mark Jefferson, then 38, was found unconscious in his office at the 'School for the Lord's misguided sheep' – in effect, one of those supposed Catholic realignment center for problematic children, where problematic meant gay. After investigations into the assault, California State Police found out that Mark Jefferson, who had been passing for a priest, had never been to seminary school or been ordained by the Catholic Church or any Church in existence. It also came to light that Jefferson, under the pretense of treating the 'problem' of the children in his care was torturing and abusing the children to the point some had been found severely wounded and traumatized. It has been determined that during the hours preceding the discovery of Mark Jefferson in his office, he had been performing one of the 'educational session' on one of the girls placed in his care. It is the opinion of the investigators that during the course of that session, the girl found a way defend herself by grabbing a letter opener and stabbing Mark Jefferson several time before escaping; leaving Mark Jefferson unconscious with multiple lacerations, stab wounds to his hands, back and crotch, which resulted in a 25% loss of mobility of his hands, and the amputation of 80% of his scrotum as well as both testicles. While the identity of the aggressor remains undetermined, only one student had been missing at the time of the discovery, a girl by the name of Maxine Caulfield, age 19.'
Well at least, she did pay the fucker back! Juliet's lips curled a bit.
She almost leaped from her seat as the door opened. "Hey Jules!" Special Agent Hayden Jones greeted as he entered the meeting room with a couple of files in his hands. "Glad to find you here."
He walked toward the board and sighed. "Okay, I got some good and some bad news… Which one you want first?"
Juliet groaned. "let's start with the bad one…"
Hayden nodded and pulled a sheet of paper from a folder before pinning it to the board. Juliet's eyes grew wide as she noticed the Wanted poster. "Are you fucking kidding me?! Jefferson escaped?! I thought he was in solitary in a maximum-security prison! What the fuck happened?!"
Hayden shrugged. "Not sure yet. He was scheduled to be transferred from High Desert to Pelican Bay after we heard chatters that someone was after him. Everything seemed to go well, and he was transferred into the DOC's custody for the relocation… Except that when the crew scheduled for the transfer showed up at Desert High, the guard and warden reported that Jefferson had left about one hour earlier with another DOC crew… Which of course the DOC of California has no knowledge about."
Juliet slammed her hand on the table. "And the fucking guard had no suspicions when the transport showed up early? Where do they hire their staff? Stupid's R us?"
Hayden shrugged. "No idea. Anyway, the California State Police as well as California Highway Patrol, the US Marshall's and every officer and agent with an official Californian or Federal Badge down there is now looking for the escapee. They've got barrages on every road leading out of the State, and a mandatory search has been put in place at the Mexican border."
Juliet wiped her face with a hand. "Jeeze Hayden! They've got to find him! That fucker is our only lead on Maxine!"
"Easy tiger!" The man said while raising a hand. "I know you knew her, but you should not let it interfere with your job! We're here to nail her father, remember? And I think it's safe to say Ryan Caulfield might be joining the hunt for that one."
"So what? We give up on finding a missing person and let him kill our only lead so we can nail him? Because you think he'll do it in a way that let us prove he's done it?" Juliet retorted.
"Nope. I think if he does it, we'll never find Jefferson again…. Or we'll find pieces and parts reappearing now and then…" Hayden said with a shrug. "Now… I did promise you good news… want to hear it?"
Juliet rose a skeptical eyebrow. "What is it? We finally get the name of your new squeeze?"
Hayden shook his head. "Nah, not telling. So, don't ask. But we did get this." He said while pulling a second sheet of paper and placing it on the board beside the picture of the smiling girl. "A brand-new ID card has been issued by the DMV of Oregon for a Maxine Caulfield using a copy of the birth certificate of Maxine Caulfield, daughter of Ryan and Vanessa Caulfield, born in Seattle."
Juliet did jump from her seat in order to look closely at the picture. "You are fucking joking, right? You found her?"
"Yes, and no." The agent responded. "It's here alright, even with the changes, the people at forensics say the eyes and freckles are a giveaway. So, we know she's in Oregon. We know she went to the Hillsboro DMV offices and registered for a Class C license exam. However, her address on records is that of a PO box in Newport Oregon, so we don't really know where she is. She probably resides near Newport, but it would take time and a request to the Oregon State Police to find her."
"Then we should send the request already!"
"What for?" Hayden retorted dryly. "Jules, I know you joined the Bureau to find her, but what would be our reason to search for her? We don't need her to nail Jefferson, not anymore, she already gave us his balls on a silver platter, literally! She's been away from her father for years so she's out of the loop as far as our investigation is concerned, and I doubt she'd been involved in much while she was a kid, so we can't use her for that."
He reached placing a hand on her shoulder in a sympathetic gesture. "Let her go, Jules… It's good enough to know she's alive, isn't it?"
Juliet looked at the DMV card picture, her eyes taking in the differences with the picture of the girl beside it. Gone were the smile, the cheerful eyes, the shoulder long brown hair. Gone was the hipster look with its innocence. Instead, they left place to various piercings, and a lighter colored side-cut that gave the girl a punkish look. But more than all, Jules could see the cold, the ice in the eyes, so similar to those she could see on the face of her father.
"She's changed…" She whispered a bit to herself. "Seems like a different person…"
"Yeah… well considering what she went through with Jefferson, and that she's been wandering since… I guess it's not surprising" Hayden responded as he looked at his phone.
"I suppose you are right…" Juliet pondered a moment before turning. "Mind if we keep looking into her?" She rose a hand before he could argue. "I know, she's not essential to our investigation, but… Even if she wasn't part of her dad's business, even if her death wasn't what triggered the war between the Caulfield's and the Portland mob, that war began when she disappeared… it may still be related…" She turned and looked at the picture… "That and… if news that she's alive spreads…."
"Yeah… she's pretty close to the Portland area…" He typed a few words in his phone. "Might be a good idea to keep an eye on her." He turned and walked to the door with a grunt. "Okay, let's go… They found Jefferson…"
"Already?" Juliet rose an eyebrow.
"Yeah… guess he did not really escape…. They found his body near Eagle Lake… It's not pretty."
"It is done." A calm voice reported from the loudspeaker on the wooden table. In the room, a man in his fifties stood facing the window, his hands crossed behind his back. He stared at the wintery sky for a moment before turning and walking back to his desk.
"Any problems?" he asked with a gruffy voice.
"None. It went as planned. They didn't even care that we were early." The voice reported.
"Good. And any way this will be tied to us?"
You could almost hear the headshake through the phone as the man responded with amusement. "No, sir. The van we used was a legitimate one we stole from the DOC depot the night before. The men who played the guards were locally hired thugs, and they won't be able to tell the story to anyone. None of our organization was even close to a single camera or anything." The man paused a moment and added. "The only one who would have known is Jefferson himself. As per your instructions, we made sure he knew who had ordered it and why. In fact, Sean made sure to articulate every word while he nailed him to the tree he was left on."
The man in his chair grunted, the sound both expressing pleasure and displeasure. "I should have done it myself."
"It was too risky, sir. We know the Bureau has been watching you more and more closely." The man intervened.
"I know why I could not. Doesn't mean I have to like it." The man growled. He stood and paced behind his desk for a few seconds before sighing. "Okay, that prick's been taken care of. And I'm confident you guys made his final moments on earth as hellish as the Hell we sent him to. Got anything else to report?"
There was some hesitation for a moment in the voice coming from the phone. "Well… Our source at the City Hall reported someone requested a copy of Maxine's birth certificate. We tried to track it, but it was sent to a P.O Box in Oregon."
The pacing man froze. He turned and stared at the loudspeaker before asking. "Is it her?"
"I don't know, sir. It's probably her, no one else should have a reason to request it. Do you want me to investigate?"
The man sat back in his chair, his fingers tapping lightly on the desk as he thought it through. "Where in Oregon?"
"According to our source, it went to Newport. We could probably send a couple of men and stake the post office." The man offered.
"Newport is close to the Graham territory." The man responded thoughtfully. "I don't like the idea of her in that area."
"Neither do I, sir. She may be estranged, but there's too much backstory for comfort… Especially for Maxine, even if she might not realize it."
The man pursed his lips his shoulder dropping as he sighed. "Don't send the men yet. No need to stir things up and draw attention on her. Try our sources first to see if you can get anymore intel."
"Yes, sir." The man responded.
"And Paddy."
"Yes sir?"
"If you find out she's safe, you better make sure she stays so." The man added firmly.
"Of course, sir. I'll try to find more leads, sir. Now that we know she's alive, we may find more about what happened to her and how she's doing."
"Do so. And tell the guys I said good job on the Jefferson matter."
"Will do, sir."
The phone clicked as the line got cut. The man leaned back in his chair, his eyes moving to the picture resting on a corner of his desk. His eyes softened as he looked at the cheerful smile of the girl; and for a moment he pondered if he'd ever see his daughter's smile again. Not like I deserve it anymore. He thought grimly.
In a small club in Portland, a smallish Asian girl with red highlights in her black hair clenched her fists unhappily as she read the message her man had sent. Her eyes thinned behind her glasses as she cursed silently.
The bitch is back! How can it be?!
She quickly typed two messages to her source. 'Find where she is!" and "Talk about this to no one but me!"
