Part Two – Chapter Four (64):
Goyang-si, Republic of Korea – December 1997
Enos exited the train at Wondang Station and turned the collar of his overcoat up against the cold that hit him when he stepped off the car and tucked his package under his arm. The walk home took him only a little out of the way through Ilsan Lake Park. There were more people in the park than he imagined there would be considering the weather, and a lot of tourists. He met a couple from Germany who spoke English but almost no Korean and asked for directions to the lotus ponds and pagodas.
"I've only been living here for about a month, but I think you're gonna' find it thataway," he said, pointing in the direction of the walking path.
The park had only been open for a couple of years and covered more than 275 acres. According to Miz Baek, the park was something they shouldn't miss seeing with Gem come Spring. The custody process would take at least that long and they had no timetable for the formal adoption proceedings. The possibility of a year-long stay had morphed into a likelihood.
The weather report, which he could get in English, had predicted a light snow by early evening, but he needed some time before he went home to Soonie. They had already had to live through the awful stories once, having it crop up as a stumbling block to gainful employment with INTERPOL would not sit well. Why should it? Wasn't sitting well with him either.
At least they had been able to register the counter petition for sole custody of Gem. Both still recovering, Soonie from her cold, him from the jet lag, they had appeared before the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Family Affairs on November 28, just ahead of the deadline. The immigration attorney Soonie's uncle had engaged on their behalf had pled their case, in Korean of course, which Soonie had to translate for him, and they had walked away with a ruling from the court. Although Gem would continue to live in Mr. Mun's house and remain in his care, the court had agreed to review the additional petition for visitation rights until the custody case could be settled. A ministry social worker had paid calls on them several times over the past two weeks, but they'd still not been granted permission to see Gem.
Laying down the box he'd been carrying beside him, Enos sat down on the stone steps and put his head in his hands. Soonie had tried to hide her concern that everything that happened in L.A. might follow them to Korea. Considering it was holding up his application to INTERPOL, he was afraid the negative press about him might be the reason for the delay in visitation rights. She was emotional enough these days without having to deal with that again.
When Enos arrived home, Soonie was standing at the window in an off-white poofy looking slip that flared out around her ankles. In the dark, silhouetted against the whitish backdrop she watched the falling snow make soft shawls on the branches of fruit heavy persimmon trees that lined the street. He put the package next to the traditional Korean dress she had laid out on the bed and wrapped his arms gently around her waist, careful not to squeeze too tightly.
"I will not break you know," she said.
"I know...just want to be careful, considerin' what the doc said."
"I will be fine," she whispered. "Many women have babies when they are thirty six."
He kissed her bare shoulder then nuzzled his face into her neck.
"I love you," he whispered.
"I love you too," she said and put her hands over his, which were still hovering protectively over her mid-section.
"I was talkin' to the baby."
She laughed with a lightness he had missed the last month or so. She gave him a soft kiss which he, pulling her into him, turned into a deeper one. They never wasted precious moments like these - something to hold on to in the days that neither spoke of but both knew were ahead.
Reluctantly, they let the moment pass into the memory vault. Then, she spied the box on the bed.
"What have you brought home?"
"I bought the prettiest little ole' doll at the Namdaemun Market. She's wearin' a dress sort of like that one," he pointed to the chima-jeogori on the bed, "with a kind of flower do-dad in her hair." He took the top off the box to show her. "Looks a little like Gem from her picture and kind of what I thought you mighta' looked like when you were a little girl. The lady at the shop tried to get me to buy a Korean Barbie Doll® but I liked this one with the drum."
She smiled. "The flower do-dad is called a tteoljam, from the Joseon Dynasty. Like this one." From the vanity next to the window, she picked up the six-petal embroidered broach that had been sewn to a headband and showed it to him. "And the drum is called a pungmulbuk."
"Not gonna' try to say that three times fast. Havin' enough trouble with 'thank you.' Don't think my backwoods tongue is equipped for Korean." He'd told her more than once that he was afraid his Blue Ridge accent speaking Korean words might insult her ancestors.
"That is nonsense. You have been doing well with your Korean lessons. I heard you speaking with the delivery man yesterday."
"He was just bein' polite. Like most everybody else here - takin' pity on the foreigner. Smells good in here. We havin' somethin' special for dinner?"
"I made bulgogi."
He licked his lips. "Um um. You know, Mrs. Strate, I think I'm gonna' keep you."
"I certainly hope so, since it is a little late to throw me back now."
Tomorrow, since the baby was due in mid-August, they would be marrying again, this time under Korean law in a traditional Korean ceremony where he would be meeting some of her relatives – the ones who were still speaking to her, that is. Not wanting to spoil the mood, even if it was only a temporary hold on the outside world, he put off telling her about his day until after dinner.
Los Angeles, California – December 1997
Thompson planned to duck out of the unit Christmas Party early but not until he could get a word with De Pina, and managed to corner her by insinuating himself into her conversation with Mike Radakovich.
"Inez. Can I talk to you?" He had tried to broach the subject earlier that day, but she had put him off.
"Not really the time for shop talk, Thompson. Save it for Monday."
"Really? Since when did you not want to talk shop? I want to know what happened to my report about the Atlanta connection." Thompson had done a lot of work with the follow up on Lazzaro and his operation and in a very short time.
"Your report's gone to Major Crimes. They'll handle it from here. You have your own cases to work, the ones you're assigned to. I suggest you concentrate on those."
There had never been much love lost between him and Inez De Pina, even after everything that had gone down in November. But he'd come to respect her and thought that she had at least gained some small measure of respect for him. They seemed to have started backsliding since Strate left and he was at a loss to understand why. Not wanting to call undue attention to that fact, he left without getting any satisfactory answers and feeling like there was something wrong with this picture.
Unable, or unwilling, to resist, he thought that he might as well get it over with. Risking more rejection, he headed for Elektra's apartment in Santa Monica.
"Don't worry," he said, leaning with his outstretched arm on the door frame, "I'm not here to embarrass myself by asking you out again. I just need to run something by you."
"You sure give up easy," she said under her breath as she ushered him into the efficiency bungalow.
"What?"
"Nothing. What did you want to run by me?"
Hazzard, Georgia – December 1997
Even though the sun was high in the sky, a cold wind was blowing through Hazzard County, rustling the few remaining brownish leaves off the sweet gum and maple trees. November might have been uncharacteristically warmer, but Hazzard was set to be in for a wet, cold winter, in more ways than one.
Cooter stared out the window of the Duke living room. For the casual observer, everything seemed normal. Well, as normal as things got in Hazzard anyway. Watching Bo follow Annie into the open field, he crossed his arms and shook his head. Had Consul Jeong intended to leave a bucketload of cow patties in his wake he couldn't have done a better job of it. Poor man was sitting at the kitchen table as perplexed as anyone, bowing and apologizing to Uncle Jesse and trying to convince him that the South Korean government took no stock in the night soil in that magazine and that his only mission was to assure a good, safe, home could be provided for four year old Mun Eun-kyung.
What a mess.
And he couldn't do anything about it. His hands were trussed up like a Thanksgivin' turkey. Cooter Davenport might have been able to tell them what he knew, but Congressman Davenport was sitting on information he couldn't share with anyone outside the FBI and GBI - information that had now extended the scope of several investigations and brought them home to Georgia. The fact that Niki Lazarro was involved complicated everything.
The confidential FBI report had arrived on his desk three days ago. Major crime units of the Los Angeles, San Diego, and San Francisco Police Departments, as well as the Los Angeles County Sheriff's office and detectives specializing in human trafficking, had established connections between the Atlanta based criminal operation of Niki Lazzaro and at least five open cases in California: the murder of a foreign national on American soil (Radmila Kozlova, whose body could still not be released to her relatives in Belarus), robberies of five video stores in Los Angeles, the attack on an LAPD detective (one Enos Strate), the disappearance of Kate Broussard, and the death of Étienne Hebert (aka victor Mollaret).
"Niki "The Lizzard" Lazzaro was the untouchable nexus of one of Atlanta's most prolific human trafficking organizations. [In the 1980s] he protected himself from prosecution by an army of loosely connected associations and, so far, each one had led to a dead end. Sometimes literally." (1)
Following a raid in late 1986, Lazzaro had been underground for a while, until he resurfaced in 1988, still legally untouchable. Knowing that criminal activity was taking place was easier than finding solid proof that would stick to the wall.
The FBI had literally, and officially, made a federal case out of it. Now the Georgia Bureau of Investigation was also actively working on the case. This time, they were going after Lazzaro, and his various operations, with everything they could. The connections to cases involving the trafficking in California of human beings from countries other than the US put the investigation on an international scale.
And good ole Enos was smack dab in the middle of it.
1 – Quoted directly [with this author's addition] with her permission from Halls of Stone and Iron (Chapter 81), by WENN9366
A/N: Bulgogi is marinated beef barbecue, often grilled with garlic and sliced onions, and is a popular Korean meat dish throughout the world
Chima-jeogori: is the wrap-around skirt and bolero-like jacket of a woman's hanbok – Guide to Korean Culture by Korean Culture and Information Service, pub. 2010
Night soil: Consul Jeong borrowed a 19th century phrase used in Japan, a euphemism for human excrement collected from cesspools, etc. and removed by night workers.
