“I’m good.” I lift my travel mug from the console. I risk a sip for good measure, but my only reward is a mouthful of lukewarm sludge.
CJ unscrews the cap of his thermos and pours fragrant coffee into the cap. I ignore his slurping and focus on the drive, passing the turnoff for Gibbs. I left home before Linnea woke, so I don’t expect to see her car, but passing her empty parking spot gives me mixed feelings. When she told me about the job offer with IDFW, the relief that she’d be home and safe brought me to tears. But Sofie’s comment keeps rattling around in my mind. What if Linnie took this job because she thinks it'll please me?
“Why the empty trailer?” CJ asks, drawing me back to the cab.
“Remember how we got the ID of one of the illegal loggers from Crooked Pine Basin?”
CJ sips his coffee. “Are we gonna write him up?”
“First of all, there’s no ‘we’ in this equation today. I’ll go to the door alone. You will be observing from the truck.”
“Aw, you’re no fun,” CJ says with a mischievous twist to his lips.
“Better safe than fun.” I take the exit onto Elk River Road. “The last time I tried to apprehend these two, I got shot at.”
His eyes turn serious. “You sure you don’t need backup?”
I set my cup back in the console “Yes. And secondly, right now I know only that he owns a Polaris that matches the one I saw in the basin that day. It could have been anyone driving it. I can’t issue a citation until I can connect the dots.”
“So today we’re just gonna shake their tree. Got it.”
I give him another cautionary scowl. “Gently. Maybe he’s stupid enough to leave evidence in plain sight. Maybe he’ll confess.” The real win would be flipping this guy or his buddy into becoming an informant,but that’s tough to do without real leverage—like an arrest—and nearly impossible without partnering with local law enforcement.
CJ pours more coffee into the cap of his thermos, the steam coiling around his face. “What about the sheriff?”
“What about him?”
“Doesn’t he need to be a part of this?”
So the kid learned something about policework from his academy training after all. “It depends. Because I’m not making an arrest, I’m not required to alert him. As a courtesy, I should, but I’m not.”
“He and I crossed paths recently, and…I know the guy.” He sips his coffee while the snowy trees whiz past. “We worked on the same wildland crew.”
Unease prickles the back of my neck. If CJ’s buddies with a corrupt sheriff... “Harlan was a firefighter?”
CJ scoffs. “Heavy equipment operator. But he got kicked off the crew halfway into the season.”
“Why?” I merge onto Elk River Road.
CJ takes another gulp of coffee. “Everyone fibs a little on their timecards. Nothing huge or anything, but overtime pay is the only way to really make any money.” He shoots me an anxious glance. “But Harlan took it to another level. Heavy Equipment Operators make decent cash, but again, it’s about the overtime. In two months, he banked almost a hundred grand. I’ll bet a major chunk of that was from him rigging his timecard. He was also a dick to the girls on our crew. Most of them are tough as nails and brushed him off, but a group of us filed a complaint. It got flagged, and it led to an investigation, but he just sort of disappeared. I don’t know if he ever faced charges, or if he weaseled out of them somehow, or if he just quit. We’re also pretty sure he stole from us. Phones. Cash. Gear. Food. We never had evidence, but after he left, the thieving suddenly stopped.”
The only surprise here is CJ’s admission of filing a complaint on behalf of his female crew members. Maybe the future isn’t so bleak.
“What happened recently that you two crossed paths?” I ask.
“A request for assistance dispatching an injured animal on South Fork Road.”
“Why didn’t you call me?”
“I handled it.” He shrugs. “And you were in that winter feed meeting.”
I frown at the road ahead. He’s right, but there’s something off about this. Maybe because I’m only just hearing about it now. “You filled out your DOF-16?”
“Yes, sir. Deputy Director Shay gave me the all-clear.”
“Is that the first time you’ve fired your service weapon?”
“In the line of duty, yes.”