They didn’t even have to approach the Windsor place to see it was swarming with action. Claire kept watch with binoculars from a kilometre away while Corporal Random called for backup. A pair of utterly forgettable men in jeans, T-shirts, and trucker caps paced anxiously behind the ramshackle house, talking on cell phones and chain-smoking between shouting orders to unseen people in the falling-down barn. Claire willed the other units to hurry. The operation was much bigger than they’d previously assumed.
Yes, the crew had a black pickup truck, hidden behind the ramshackle house, but she hadn’t expected the rest. They had an entire fleet of vehicles. There was a second, identical black pickup, down to the dent on the door and a duplicate licence plate. That would cause enough confusion to provide an unshakeable alibi. Each truck had a cap on the back and was hooked to a large horse trailer. A small white car that Claire was certain she’d seen around town was parked between them. The little hatchback was innocuous and perfect for being the lead car when the bad guys were trying to sneak stolen merchandise out of the area. The car driver could contact a truck driver to get off the road if they saw any official vehicles.
What surprised her were the two rental trucks. The twenty-foot one gave her pause. “How many ATVs do you think you could fit in there?” she quietly asked Corporal Random.
“A lot. Six, maybe eight. If it were compact enough, you could fit an entire vehicle inside one of those things,” he replied.
“Are there any missing vehicles in the area?”
Owen retrieved the phone he’d slipped back into his pocket. “There aren’t many, but there is a Lamborghini in the area that would be a six-figure score for these guys. I’ll send somebody out to make sure it’s where it should be.”
A new—technically vintage—vehicle pulled onto the property. “That’s the truck I saw the other day when I was going to the Melnyks’ to drop off the eggs for Laurie.” When Pierre Beauchamp stepped out, she bit back a curse. “I knew he was involved. I didn’t see a vehicle that could be mistaken for something that ran when I was there, so how could one have gone missing?”
Pierre Beauchamp pulled a piece of paper from his short-sleeved shirt pocket and handed it to one of the cell phone men. Cell Phone One, as Claire started calling him, led him to one of the trucks, reached inside the cab, and pulled out a fat, beige envelope. Then he made a call. “How many of his neighbours do you think he sold out?” she asked.
“One is too many.”
Mr. Beauchamp looked in the envelope, and then began yelling at Cell Phone One. Cell Phone One ignored him and continued to read from the sheets in front of him until the farmer took a bundle of cash from the envelope and shook it in his partner’s face. They were too far away to discern the words, but he looked upset at his payoff. When Cell Phone One indicated the action around him, Mr. Beauchamp went from upset to irate. The other man gestured again, and Mr. Beauchamp took his money, climbed back into his truck, and drove away.
In what felt like an eternity but was actually only ten minutes later, their backup arrived. Part of Claire wanted to leave the big bust to them and hunt down Mr. Beauchamp for betraying his neighbours and setting them up to be robbed, but she knew that they could pick him up later. Instead, she donned her police vest and jacket, ensured her identification was in her pocket, and took her place on the advancing team.
She didn’t know all the other officers present, but the two detachments seem to have worked together often enough to know how everybody operated. They blocked the entrance to the farmstead and quickly flanked the vehicles between the buildings, not leaving them an escape route. Cell Phone One tried to make a run for it in a pickup, but the truck he’d chosen had a trailer attached to the back, and it got hung up in axle-deep ruts a few yards into the field. Then he tried to flee on foot, but the knee-high canola slowed him down until another constable caught him.
Four men and one woman were under arrest by the time they rounded everybody up. Claire was one of the team who cleared the house where they’d found the woman who had been hiding. The crew had been using two rooms that offered protection from the weather as a base of operations which included a room full of laptops and folding tables. Wires that snaked through doors and windows led to solar panels and chargers on the south side of the building which kept the computers running.
“If we keep their phones away from their laptops to avoid any chance of them tethering to the internet, we might get their entire organization intact,” Claire noted. “My superiors are going to be thrilled. I’m sure your commander is going to be pretty happy with you as well.”
“Don’t get excited,” the corporal said. His voice was as serious as ever, but a glint in his eyes spoiled the effect. “I’m not giving you any credit until you promise you’re going to help with all the reports since you seem to have a lot of information I don’t.”
“Deal,” she agreed. She wasn’t fond of paperwork, but after months in the field, she was looking forward to being back in her uniform and being in an office surrounded by her fellow officers and not in a barn surrounded by old cowpies.
“Did you find anything besides the computers?” he asked as he supervised the evidence collection in the main room.
“Some clothes.” There was something about the two suitcases full of women’s clothing that was bothering her. “I want to go through them again.” Four men and one woman were an odd number for a crew, especially since a couple would attract less attention than a single man. Two women would be much more efficient, plus offer more drivers for all the vehicles. She sorted the shirts and shorts and underwear, but nothing caught her attention until she began putting the various pairs of jeans in a pile. There were two distinct sizes.
If there were six thieves and five of them were in custody… “Corporal Random, we’re missing a suspect and a vehicle,” she yelled. Since they couldn’t be on the lookout for every woman in the area, she needed to find something to narrow it down. Then she spied the toiletries in a shoe box on a table beside the luggage. “Female, long hair.” Claire lifted a hair elastic from the box. “Brunette.”
“Where would we even start looking?”
The image of Pierre Beauchamp handing Cell Phone One a paper sprang to mind. “We should see what was on the paper that Mr. Beauchamp delivered. Maybe he’s already set up their next score.”
The paper wasn’t that hard to find. It listed a new cattle trailer, a four-wheeler and a little matching utility trailer, a second, used four-wheeler, and a new outdoor kitchen setup. “That’s an easy mid-five-figure haul,” Claire noted.
“I thought you’d be a little more concerned.” Corporal Random touched his finger to the numbers at the bottom of the page, indicating the rural address. When Claire shrugged at him, he elaborated, “That’s the Royal Oak Ranch.”
She shivered. “Nobody’s there right now. Tyler’s out of town. Benton’s with the fire crew. Mr. and Mrs. Lawson are at the hospital with Clay, and he’s calling in Shannon and Paul.”
“Go,” he said. “We have to process everybody here and log all the evidence. We need to round up the entire gang. We don’t want a warning getting out in case there are other groups elsewhere. If you find anyone there, call in and then hold them for questioning.”
He was right. One person getting away would jeopardize everything they’d discovered at the Windsor place. That was a professional reason to hop in her truck and get to the Royal Oak Ranch as fast as she could. Claire also acknowledged her personal motivation: she wanted to take care of Benton and his family. They’d be able to replace anything that was stolen, but the lingering effects of being robbed were as much mental as physical as they’d have to re-learn how to trust themselves and their neighbours without constantly looking over their shoulders. “I’ll call in if I see anything. I’ll hang out till one of the Lawsons can get home to keep an eye on the place,” she promised.
She didn’t get that far. Claire took a chance and began heading down the back road. She was almost positive she knew the way, and it would take ten minutes off her time instead of going the long way down the main highways. She was a kilometre away from the old homestead when a small white car, again identical to the one they’d found behind the house, approached from the opposite direction.
Claire didn’t blink. She and her truck were known around the area now. Her black vest was distinctive, but her uniform shirt underneath might pass for a regular shirt at a distance, so she crossed her arm over the word POLICE that was printed on the chest plate. She exaggeratedly scratched her face once the other car was near enough that they could see into each other’s vehicles. The female driver with long brown hair nodded at her, and Claire returned it as the locals did.
The second they passed each other, she reached for her phone and ordered it to call Corporal Random, who picked up on the second ring. “Missing suspect incoming from the west. White hatchback. Make sure somebody’s blocking the road to the highway or she’ll have a clear escape route. I’m turning around to block this exit.”
“Roger.”
Claire carefully made a U-turn at the next junction, then retraced her route. The white hatchback was parked badly at the entrance of the driveway, with one wheel off the road and the entire frame tilting dangerously into the culvert. A cruiser blocked the road from the highway side, preventing the driver’s attempt to turn that way. Claire parked sideways across the gravel road and approached the farm on foot.
Her partner for the operation met her halfway up the driveway. “We’re reading her her rights now. Nobody’s talking, but we’ve gotten everybody we think was at the farm. At least, all the clothing sizes match who we have in custody.”
“I recognize her from the grocery store,” Claire said.
“I’ve seen her in the diner too. I’ve got to admit, she was a good choice for a scout. We weren’t looking for a middle-aged woman. I’ll bet they were never part of the crew that hit their targets. Scouting only. But still guilty.”
“Where do you want me now?” Claire asked.
“Follow us back to the station, and we’ll get started on those reports.” He made a face. “Busts are never as exciting as they are on television.”
“I don’t know. This was my first one, and I think it measured up pretty well. All the bad guys rounded up. All the good guys heading home in their original condition. Does it get better than this?” Claire asked.
Corporal Random thought for a moment. “When you put it that way, not really. Come on, rookie.”