The First Victim

CHAPTER 5

The following day, for five hundred dollars in cash, the state auditor supplied Melissa with the name Gwen Klein, and the Greenwood Licensing Service Office-in Washington State the equivalent of a Department of Motor Vehicles-where Klein worked. Melissa spent hours in the back of her van with a bulky broadcast-quality video camera and battery pack perpetually prepared to record. She shot tape of Klein leaving the LSO and running errands, tape of Klein picking up her kids from day care, tape of Klein grocery shopping. Her first ‘‘report card’’ was delivered in Stevie McNeal’s sumptuous penthouse apartment over a pair of salads that Stevie had ordered by phone. The wine was an Archery Summit Pinot. Stevie drank liberally, Melissa hardly at all.

‘‘About the only thing I have to report is that the husband is driving a brand new pickup truck and the house appears to have a new roof.’’

‘‘Extra cash,’’ Stevie suggested.

‘‘Or a dead relative or a generous banker. The husband pounds nails. She’s a state employee. That’s a thirty-thousand-dollar truck he’s driving, and new roofs aren’t cheap.’’

‘‘Let’s find out how he paid for that truck,’’ Stevie suggested.

‘‘That would help us to pressure her.’’

‘‘She’s not going to talk to us,’’ Stevie said. ‘‘Not without hard evidence of her involvement.’’

‘‘Driver’s licenses are small. She could make a drop anywhere.’’

‘‘So you stay close to her,’’ Stevie suggested.

‘‘I can stay close, but I can’t stick to her.’’

‘‘Sure you can.’’

‘‘Not and get tape. At least not with that camera. It’s the size of a school bus.’’

‘‘Let me look into getting you the digital,’’ Stevie said. ‘‘There’s a briefcase for it that we use on all the undercover stuff. You can go anywhere with it.’’

‘‘That would certainly help.’’

‘‘Not anywhere dangerous, mind you,’’ Stevie informed her. ‘‘I want you to remember that.’’ Melissa had been a risk-taker all her life.

‘‘And if we don’t get something more positive out of her in a day or two?’’ Melissa asked.

‘‘Then our friend at the dim sum doesn’t get his second payment.’’

‘‘And the women in that container? We forget about them?’’

‘‘Don’t do this to yourself,’’ Stevie said.

‘‘Do what?’’

‘‘Work yourself up. Go righteous on me.’’

‘‘We have two options,’’ Melissa said impatiently, brushing aside Stevie’s concerns. ‘‘Journalism 101. The first is to confront her on-camera with what we know. The second is to make something happen.’’

‘‘Journalism 101?’’ Stevie objected. ‘‘Since when? Confront her, sure. But entrapment?’’

‘‘If you can’t break the news, make the news,’’ Melissa quoted.

‘‘That’s not you and we both know it. Make the news? Fake the news? That’s not you! Corwin maybe, but not you.’’

‘‘Not make the news-bait the news. We solicit a fake ID,’’ she suggested.

Stevie stood from the couch and paced the room. ‘‘That’s dangerously close to entrapment.’’

Melissa reminded, ‘‘Who was it that said: ‘Real news is never found, it’s uncovered’?’’

‘‘Don’t take what I say out of context.’’

‘‘Three women died in that container. The others were stripped naked, de-loused, shaved head to toe and will be on a plane back to China in less than a week. If I approach Klein and she offers to sell me a driver’s license, then we’ve got her by the thumbs. She’s ours.

She either leads us up the next rung of the ladder or-’’

‘‘We extort her?’’

‘‘We pressure her.’’

‘‘What’s gotten into you?’’ Stevie asked.

‘‘You hired me to get a story.’’

‘‘I hired you to pursue a lead. There’s a big difference.’’

‘‘Not to me.’’

‘‘Since when?’’

‘‘Look at me. Look at my face. If not for you and your father, that could have been me in that container. Those women are my age and younger! Are you going to walk away from them because we have to work a little harder to get the story?’’

‘‘You see?’’ Stevie said. ‘‘You see what happens with you?’’

‘‘Me? What if it’s a strong enough story to run nationally?’’ She raised her voice. ‘‘We may have different reasons, but we both want this story.’’

‘‘Don’t confuse the issue.’’

‘‘The issue is three dead women and more coming in behind them every week. The issue is the deplorable conditions that allowed those women to die.’’ Melissa added, ‘‘The police are investigating those deaths as homicides. That’s the story I’m interested in: bringing down whoever’s responsible. And I’ll tell you what: I’m willing to bend the rules for the right cause. If Klein sells me a fake ID, that’s her problem.’’

‘‘It’s our problem too if we handle it wrong, Little Sister. These people-’’

‘‘See? What people? Who? That’s exactly my point!’’

‘‘Let’s exercise a little patience, shall we? You’ve been on this a day and a half. Keep up the surveillance. If you want a partner, I’ll-’’

‘‘No! This is our story, yours and mine. No one else!’’

‘‘And I’m in charge,’’ Stevie asserted. ‘‘Keep an eye on her. One day is nothing.’’

‘‘Try telling that to the women trapped in those containers.’’

‘‘Patience.’’

‘‘Yeah, sure,’’ Melissa snorted.

‘‘I’ll work on getting the digital camera. That’ll help, right?’’

Melissa beamed. ‘‘Then you do want this!’’

‘‘Of course I want it, Little Sister. I brought it to you, remember? But we talk it out, work it out together. We’ve got to set aside our personal agendas. I want this as much-’’

‘‘Yeah, yeah,’’ Melissa said interrupting. ‘‘You don’t always have to mother me, you know?’’

‘‘Old habits die hard.’’

‘‘Get me that camera.’’

‘‘Work with me,’’ Stevie said. ‘‘A team,’’ she suggested.

‘‘A team,’’ Melissa echoed.

Through one day and into the next, Melissa Chow sat impatiently in her brown van, following and videotaping Gwen Klein’s movements, from home to the grocery, and for the second time in three days, to a car wash.

Mid-morning, Melissa received a phone call from Stevie.

Stevie informed her, ‘‘A friend who works with a credit rating service says that there are no loans, no liens on the Dodge 4X4 registered to Joe Klein.’’

‘‘Where’s that camera you promised?’’

‘‘Are you listening?’’

‘‘They own it free and clear?’’ Melissa asked, her eyes on Klein’s taillights as the van sat parked in the automatic car wash.

Stevie said sarcastically, ‘‘That’s just a little unusual for a couple with a reported combined income of sixty-seven thousand a year.’’

‘‘A little unusual?’’ Melissa exploded. ‘‘That’s damn near impossible. That’s a thirty-thousand-dollar truck.’’

‘‘There’s more. The Kleins’ credit cards, which for seven years had maintained balances in the mid-four thousands, were all paid off over the last eighteen months.’’

‘‘So, if nothing else shapes up we threaten to turn the Kleins over to the IRS.’’

‘‘There you go again,’’ Stevie said.

‘‘Just trying to think ahead.’’

‘‘Don’t. Stay where we are.’’

‘‘You’re not the one chasing the All-American mom from the grocery store to the-’’

When Melissa failed to complete her thought, Stevie checked that they still had a connection.

‘‘I’m here,’’ Melissa acknowledged. ‘‘Okay, so I missed the obvious.’’

‘‘Little Sister?’’

‘‘You know those trick posters that are all color and pattern, and you stare at them long enough and suddenly this three-D image appears?’’

‘‘You missed what?’’ Stevie asked.

‘‘She washed her car two days ago. I mean, what was I thinking? I sat right in this same spot! Talk about lame!’’

‘‘You missed what?’’ Stevie repeated.

‘‘She’s rolling. I gotta go,’’ Melissa said. The phone went dead.