Deadly Stillwater

Two minutes later, Mac was weaving in traffic again, the siren moving traffic.

“Five million dollars?” Mac said skeptically, turning a hard right onto Lexington Parkway and heading north. “That’s light.”

“What do you mean light?” Lich asked, confused.

“Split three ways, maybe four, that’s not that much money,” Mac said. “Four ways, my Cretin High School math tells me that’s $1.25 million per.” He shook his head. “Odd.”

“Maybe to you,” Lich said, “But to me, I could make $1.25 million go pretty far. Especially tax-free.”

“Yeah, after alimony, you’d have a buck twenty-five left,” Mac snickered.

“Smart-ass.”

“All kidding aside, think about it. You kidnap the daughters of the chief of police and a high-priced lawyer, and all you ask for is five million for the two?” Mac questioned. “I don’t buy it. All that risk for that little reward, relatively speaking. I mean in reality Dick, a million dollars isn’t that much. A nice house with some equity, some money in a retirement fund or two, a little inheritance, and you’re there. I mean, five million split between three or four people just isn’t that much.”

“If you say so,” Lich replied. “You’re the one with the money, so you should know.” Mac did have money. He had invested in a coffee business with two high school friends a number of years ago. There were now twenty-seven Grand Brew Coffee Shops with more on the drawing board. While a minority investor, Mac’s ten percent investment left him sitting pretty. It was one secret Lich had managed to keep. Mac didn’t want everyone on the force to know that he was going to be – in fact already was – wealthy.

Lich changed topics.

“God, the air conditioner feels good,” He said, wiping the sweat beads from his bald head. Sweat had already filtered through his fresh red Hawaiian shirt. He looked like Norm Peterson on a Cheers episode. “And not a cloud in the sky. We’re gonna bake today.”

“Grab the white beach cap in the back seat,” Mac replied. It’ll help keep your head cooler.” Not to mention that the last thing Lich needed was a sunburned head.

“God, it feels like this is all I’ve done for the last twenty-four hours,” Lich said, reaching in back. “Run around.”

“That’s what the kidnappers want,” Mac said, decelerating hard as he approached a left turn onto Marshall Avenue, with St. Paul Central High School on his left. Mac turned in front of the school, drove past the front door and smoothly turned right into a parking lot behind the football field. Two squad cars were there already, as well as a Tahoe from Forensics. The uniform cops had crime scene tape up, creating a perimeter. A guard waved the Explorer through a break in the tape.

As Mac hopped out of the Explorer and looked back, Riley, Burton, and the others pulled in. He noticed a few media types already loitering against the tape, including Heather Foxx, who was still looking good in that white sleeveless blouse. Her tastefully short, black skirt hugged her hips and revealed her tan legs. Heather looked happy. The Wiskowski tip put her well into first place in the morning media game.

“Mac?” He turned to see his second cousin Tip, a patrol cop, pointing to the football bleachers. “Up in the stands.”

Mac, Lich, and the rest hustled through the tunnel in the middle of the grandstand and then up the bleachers to the spot just in front of the press box, where a tech was taking photos, dusting for prints, and evaluating the package. Wrapped in clear plastic, it hung underneath a wood bleacher like a bat in a cave. Mac walked down the row just below where everyone was hovering. He crouched down, took off his sunglasses, and looked underneath. “What do you see?” Burton asked.

“Laptop,” Mac answered, noting the red and blue inputs on the back. The laptop was held to the seat by duct tape, which looked to be covering Velcro straps.

“Any prints?” Burton asked the crime tech.

“Nada. It’s clean,” was the curt reply from the tech.

“Not even on the tape or the plastic?” Lich asked. The tech just shook his head. The kidnappers weren’t leaving them anything to work with.

“Are we canvassing?” Riles asked, wiping sweat off his upper lip with the back of his hand.

“I’ve got bodies coming, yours and ours,” Burton replied. “We’ll blanket the neighborhood, see what turns up.”

Mac snorted and shook his head.

“Got to do it I know, but it’s a big fuckin’waste of time,” he said.

“Never know, someone could have seen something,” Burton said.

“You really think so? These guys haven’t left us anything up to this point,” Mac replied in disgust.

Burton exhaled and shook his head.

“No, but like you said, gotta do it.”

“What about the laptop?” Lich asked. “Want to look here or downtown?”

“Downtown,” Burton replied. “I want my people taking a look at it. I’m guessing we have video.”

15 “ How are they going to breathe?”

Channel 12 broke into its early afternoon soap opera for a special report. The tanned, toothy, and well-coiffed anchor Paul Phillips walked the lead in.