I was home by myself later that night. I’d just popped in Songbird by Eva Cassidy. As is my usual custom, I automatically skipped over track one-“Fields of Gold.” Don’t get me wrong, I like the song. I’m not what you’d call a “weeper” (okay, just a little) but to this day, I can’t listen to Eva Cassidy sing “Fields of Gold” without breaking down and becoming a useless, blubbering fool. Doesn’t matter where I’m at or who I’m with-if that song comes on, I have to get out before I lose it. Even if they played it at a friggin’ Seahawks game, I’d still have to bolt for the tunnels (me and probably forty thousand other people). I love all her music, but with that particular song, she reaches into me and touches something, and I’m a goner. I think it probably starts with Eva’s incredible voice. Then I think of her sad story, and then I move to thinking about all the friends I lost in combat, and then I think of lost relatives, and then it just spirals completely out of control altogether. Happens fast, too. It leaves me a wreck. So I generally do the safe thing and skip it.
Especially tonight. Toni was having dinner with her mom and sister. Cool. I mean, I need my space, right? Give me time to get some stuff done around my place. Guy stuff. So I picked up my guitar and twanged through a couple of songs I’d been working on. I’m a decent guitar player, but it wasn’t happening tonight, so I put it away. I picked up an epic James Jones novel I was halfway through, read about half a page, and then I stalled out, so I set it down. I sat there on the sofa and looked around for a minute. I got up and turned the stereo off and the television on. Five minutes later, bored, I got back up and turned the TV off and the stereo back on. I went down and sat at the table with my laptop.
Eva sang “Wade in the Water” while I stared a hole right through the computer screen, lost in thought. Damn! What was the matter with me? What the hell was going on around here?
I shook my head and refocused on the computer. Maybe I could do some work. I’d already mapped out the NSSB area north of the U-District where Reverend Art had said Donnie was living. Tomorrow, Toni and Doc and I were going to split up and start canvasing all the businesses. Our idea was to start showing pictures of Isabel around to the shop owners in hopes someone might recognize her and help us zero in on her. A bit of a long shot, to be sure. But at least we’d be doing something.
Now, I found myself staring at a map of what the Seattle Police Department calls the Track-a high-activity prostitution area just south of my apartment. The area-bounded on the north by Mercer, Westlake on the east, Fifth Avenue on the west, and Lenore on the south-is primarily a business district loaded with business-type hotels, meaning Holiday Inn, Travelodge, Comfort Suites-that sort of establishment. At the same time, it’s such a high-profile area for prostitutes that the city has actually designated it as what they call a SOAP zone-“Stay Out of Area of Prostitution.” Penalties for prostitutes with arrest records who are arrested again in a SOAP zone are high.
I never knew it before, but this area almost reaches my front door. When I saw this, I was suddenly struck with an idea. I’d never noticed any prostitution-type activity around my place before, but I suppose it could happen. But if it was happening, how did it take place? What did it look like? I decided to hop in the Jeep and take a cruise around the Track for an hour or so, just to see what I could see. I was under no illusions that I would find Isabel out there, at least not tonight. Hell, for that matter, I’d only seen one little picture of Isabel before, and I wasn’t sure I’d be able to recognize her on sight anyway. But maybe I would see some activity. I was thinking that perhaps I might be able to get a sense as to what the girls went through on the streets. I didn’t plan on talking to anybody or even stopping. Just observe, maybe get a feel for the area.
Of course, getting out and doing a little recon could have another benefit. It might help me to get my mind off Toni-at least for a while.
I shut off the computer and the stereo, strapped on my sidearm, turned out the lights, and shut the door behind me. I had no idea what to expect.
Maybe I’d formed pictures in my mind of the stereotypical scenes of streetwalkers standing in dark doorways, approaching cars as they slowed down for stop signs. Nope-I didn’t see anything like this. Maybe the fact that it had rained earlier had something to do with it, I don’t know. Fortunately, the rain had stopped, but the streets and the sidewalks were still wet. I drove around for maybe half an hour, and I think I saw three or four girls who looked more like secretaries than prostitutes. I saw no prostitutes or, I should say, no one who I thought looked like a prostitute. I suppose I should mention that I have very little experience identifying prostitutes, so it’s possible that I wouldn’t recognize one even if I saw one.
After about a half hour of burning gas with this fruitless exercise, I had a sudden, enlightening thought. I am a detective, after all. Eventually, I figure shit out. Here was my thought. If the Track fell within an official SOAP area, the girls probably knew this. If they were going to get busted, they didn’t want it to be here. So they probably didn’t make a habit of streetwalking in areas that were heavily patrolled by the police, as this area appeared to be. I’d have to get a little smarter if I wanted to discover any activity. See how this detective stuff works?
So I drove into the parking lot of a hotel called the Snuggle Inn, right off Aurora, right in the heart of the Track. The place looked like a typical suites-type business hotel-one of those where all the rooms have Wi-Fi and little mini-fridges tucked beneath a counter that holds a mini-coffee pot and a small basket of coffee packets with brand names no one’s ever heard of. The hotel was only a few years old, still neat and clean. It consisted of four buildings surrounding a central courtyard with a swimming pool.
I drove around to the back and found a space near the stairway. Then I switched off the lights and waited.
Ten minutes later, a girl walked past. Was she a prostitute? I couldn’t tell. I didn’t get a chance to see her face as she passed in front of the Jeep, but I watched her walk up the stairs and saw her knock on one of the doors and be let inside. Then, thirty minutes later, the door opened, and she walked out.
As she walked down the stairs, she was facing me, and I could see that she was a cute blond girl. She wore a bulky coat over loose, billowy pants that appeared to be gathered at the ankle. As she passed beneath the outside lights, I could see that she was heavily made up-it was impossible for me to tell her age-she could have been sixteen or she could have been twenty six. She turned and walked back to the front entrance, a path that would take her right past the front of the Jeep.
When she reached the edge of the Jeep, she noticed me. She slowed down and looked at me. Our eyes locked, and I knew. She paused for a moment, but I didn’t move, so she picked up her pace and hurried past the Jeep. I probably scared her-she must have thought I was at least a little strange, sitting in the dark parking lot. She turned the corner and walked quickly away, silhouetted in the gap between the buildings by the overhead lights.
I’d been home maybe fifteen minutes when the phone rang. Caller ID: Toni.
“I’m home,” she said. “Safe and sound.” I’d asked her to call when she got home. Don’t ask me to explain this sudden propensity to worry about her just because I’m not there. Truth be told, she’s more than capable of taking care of herself. Still. .
“Good,” I answered. “I’m glad.”
“You miss me?”
“A little.”
“Just a little?”
“Well, I had a good book.”
“Bastard.”
I laughed. “Just kidding. I missed you. A lot. How was your dinner?”
“It was nice. Mom’s good. Kell’s all antsy about us finding Isabel.”
“It’s only been two days,” I said. “Tell her I’m supposed to get my magic wand out of the shop tomorrow. Then, I’ll just go ahead and give it a wave, and Isabel will appear.”
“Very funny.”
“It’s not like we’re sitting on our hands. It won’t happen overnight.”
“I know. But she doesn’t. And besides, patience isn’t her strong suit.”
“Did you explain things to her?”
“Yeah, she’s cool. She’ll be okay. For a while.”
It was silent for a few seconds.
“What’d you really do tonight?” she asked.
I chuckled. “Really? I played the guitar. I read. I watched TV. Then I did some work.”
“You were busy,” she said. “What kind of work did you do?”
“I did a little prep work for our canvas tomorrow. Looked at maps. Looked at aerials, that kind of stuff. Then, I got a crazy idea and decided I’d go for a recon drive through the Track. You know where that is?”
“Yeah. You see anything useful?”
“It was weird. There were actually more SPD squad cars than there were people. The area seems to be really heavily patrolled. I didn’t see any prostitutes.”
“Uh, gee whiz. Maybe that’s because it’s so heavily patrolled,” she said.
“Duh.”
“Besides, most of the girls probably work through the Internet now, anyway.”
“I figured all that shit out all by myself about half an hour after I started driving around. That, plus the fact that the entire area called the Track falls into a special anti-prostitution zone.”
“A SOAP zone?” she asked.
“You know about SOAP zones?”
“Duh.” Again with the “duh.”
“Touche. I should have known. Anyway, after that, I went and parked at a little hotel, just to see if I could see anything there.”
“Did you? See anything?”
“Sure enough. A few minutes after I park, a girl walks past me, walks up the stairs, and knocks on a door. Door opens-she heads on in. Half hour later, out she comes.”
“Could you see her?” she asked.
“On the way out? Yeah, I could see her.”
What’d she look like?”
“I think she looked like a prostitute,” I said.
“Really? How could you tell?” she asked. “What does a prostitute look like? Dress? Makeup?” She asked.
“Makeup, for sure. She was dressed pretty plainly, but she was heavily made up. But that wasn’t it. You want to know what the big tip-off was for me?”
“What?”
“When she was walking past, she walked right in front of the Jeep. When she got there, she slowed down-almost stopped. Then, just for a second, she looked right at me, and our eyes locked. The thing that got me-it was her eyes. She had the same eyes as I remember from Fort Benning. The same sad eyes.”