Chapter 8

Detective Haldeman was introduced to Anton in a meeting room Schuler had reserved earlier at the Days Inn, about halfway between town and the cabin. He shook the boy’s hand and said, “Anton, I need to ask you some questions that might make you feel a little uncomfortable, but before we get into that, I want to say how sorry I am for the loss of your sister and how sorry I am that your introduction to our country was so tragic. I know there is nothing I can say or do to mitigate all your suffering, but I feel obligated to say that what you and Sophia have experienced shames us as a people.”

Anton dipped his head politely in acknowledgement. “Thank you, Detective. Since I leave that place, everyone is good to me. You ask questions now, I tell you what Mr. Schuler say is okay for me to say.”

With his attorney sitting on Anton’s right side and Dr. Widener sitting on his left, the recorded hour-long interview was relatively non-traumatic. A few times Schuler interrupted to ask that a question be phrased differently, or to say that his client would not answer a certain question, but the detective seemed satisfied with the information he was given. They parted company in front of the motel with another handshake and Anton was driven back to the cabin. He was anxious to get to his music lesson with Raul.

Sarah searched high and low, using all the resources at her disposal to try to locate Anton. She was convinced he wouldn’t still be at large if he’d just walked out of the home on his own. Someone had to be hiding him, and her money was on Widener. She wasn’t listed in the phone book, but all it took was a look through the county’s property records to discover the doctor owned two homes, one in town and a second home in the mountains. The mountain home would be a likely place to start looking.

While she didn’t fear Widener’s threats of legal action, Sarah thought it wise not provoke the woman directly by showing up and knocking on her door. She’d need to be more circumspect, watching the access road to the cabin from the main highway for any suspicious traffic, so she set up her own stakeout complete with a camera, a telephoto lens and binoculars.

The morning of Anton’s interview with Detective Haldeman, she saw Widener’s Lexus pull up to the stop sign at the highway before turning right toward town. Sarah quickly brought up her binoculars and focused. She thought she recognized Horst Schuler from his many appearances on the news, and in the back seat, YES, it was Anton! She was right! And if Schuler was representing the kid, that meant he was probably already in the system. Damn! Well, that was okay too because there was still a story there worth going after if she was the first to report it.

Sarah followed the SUV for almost twenty miles before it pulled into the parking lot of a Days Inn motel. What the hell were they doing at a motel? Is that where Anton was being kept hidden?

Sarah didn’t dare risk exposing herself, so she sat in her car in the parking lot and waited for them to come out. If they left without the boy, she’d know he was stashed in a room somewhere.

When they finally emerged over an hour later, she was even more confused because four people walked out the door and one of them was Detective Haldeman. For a moment, she though Anton must be in custody, but no! They split up with Anton going with Widener and Schuler.

Okay, there was definitely something screwy going on and Sarah Bernstein was even more determined than ever to expose it. She knew she’d burned any bridges to Haldeman with her on-air speculation that Anton had killed those people, so it would be no good trying to squeeze or charm any information out of him. She’d follow Widener instead and get her story the old fashion way — by spying.

She already had a good idea where they were going, so she hung back just far enough to keep the SUV in sight. According to her Google map, Widener’s cabin was just over four miles up the dirt road on the right. When she thought she was near, she stopped long enough that they would have time to get out of the car and get inside the house. She slowed to about ten MPH as she passed the fairly large cabin a few yards off the road. There was the Lexus. And damned if that didn’t look like Ken Early’s 4Runner parked next to it! Then she saw a man standing beside a trailer watching her.

Shit! It was Raul! What the fuck was he doing here?

Hoping she hadn’t been recognized, Sarah drove on up the road a mile, turned around and headed back to town, passing the cabin with her face averted and moving at a fairly fast clip. If Raul identified her, well that couldn’t be helped. She had work to do.

Her thinking now was that if they met up with Haldeman at a motel instead of police HQ or Widener’s cabin, Haldeman probably didn’t know where the boy was staying. That information might get her back into the detective’s good graces. It was worth a shot.

Raul did indeed recognize her and he wasted no time telling Dr. Widener.

Ken punched his fist into his palm and said, “Well isn’t that the shits? Chances are she knows Anton is here, and if I know Sarah, she’ll be back out here with a cameraman before the day is over. So what do we do, Dr. Widener, move him to another place?”

Schuler answered, “I don’t see any need for that. Helen, isn’t she the one you caught sneaking into your building to get to Anton?”

“Yes, she and Ken were the culprits, but Ken has since atoned for his transgression. I told her I was going to file charges against her for that, but I didn’t get around to it. Maybe I should have.”

Schuler laughed and said, “No time like the present. Ken, if you’ll give me the details on your little sneak-in caper, I’ll make an official complaint to her boss. I think I know a judge who might be willing to issue a restraining order against our snooper. That way, as long as Anton is staying here, if she steps onto the property, we have grounds to have her arrested. She won’t be allowed within five hundred feet of our boy.”

Ken asked, “But what about the first amendment stuff?”

Schuler shook his head. “She can scream first amendment until hell freezes over, but the Supreme Court has ruled that the press has no constitutional right to access to anyone of interest over that of the general public. They still have a first amendment right to report the news, but that doesn’t give them free rein in how they gather it. Anton is under Dr. Widener’s protection and there he will remain until he’s eighteen or the court rules otherwise.”

Raul was concerned. “Uh, Mr. Schuler, I was the one that she bribed to leave the door unlocked. Does this mean I am going to be mixed up in a legal thing now? That would not be so good for me.”

Schuler asked, “Are you saying Bernstein paid you money to gain access to the boy? I believe she can be prosecuted for that.”

“Um, no, she did not pay money, but she gave me, uh, I think you would call it a favor.”

Ken laughed and patted Raul on the shoulder. “Just say it, amigo. She bribed you with sex.”

Raul blushed and conceded, “Si, sexo.”

Schuler laughed and waved it off. “It’s still a quid pro quo, but there’s no reason to even bring that up, Raul, so don’t be concerned about it.” Turning back to Widener, he said, “If we’re done here, let’s head back to town and I’ll get that stuff underway. Eric, you’re the man officially in charge here, so if she shows up before I get a restraining order, just don’t open the door. It’ll be no big deal if she wants to stand out on the road until a sheriff’s deputy shows up to run her off, is it?

“No, I guess not.”

Ken added, “She really has nothing, and so far, every time she opens her mouth, she winds up sticking her foot in it. She definitely has more ambition than common sense.”

When Sarah called Haldeman to impress him with the news that she knew where Anton was kept hidden, the detective just laughed at her. “Jesus, Bernstein, give it a rest why don’tcha! You think I don’t know where the kid is? The point is I have no intention of arresting him because he’s not a suspect in the murder. Look, why don’t you leave the investigating to the pros because you really stink at it. You got nothing but speculation unsupported by any evidence, and for my money, that’s nothing but gossip.”

Sarah sputtered, “But you said...”

He cut her off. “No, Bernstein, YOU said, and you were wrong! By the way, how’s that restraining order working out for you?”

“Restraining order? What restraining order?”

Haldeman laughed. “Ah, so you haven’t been served yet. Well, I guess you’ll learn all about it soon enough if you show up at Widener’s cabin to poke your nose into that kid’s life again. Yeah, I know about you sneaking into the home. Consider your movements under close scrutiny from now on, Bernstein.”

Just after dark, Eric answered a knock on the door halfway expecting to confront the reporter. He was prepared to threaten her with arrest for violating the restraining order that had been issued that very afternoon. But it wasn’t Sarah who stood under the porch light, it was a sheriff’s deputy who looked like anything but a sheriff’s deputy. In truth, she looked like she could have been a model who had gained back enough weight to look like a healthy, shapely woman instead of a skeletal anorexic.

“Good evening, sir. I’m Deputy Daniels from the Sheriff’s Office.”

She was a real life Amazon. Eric stood a shade over six feet tall and the deputy was at least three inches taller, and she was wearing sensible cop shoes, not high heels. But while she was unusually tall, she wasn’t stooped, angular or misshapen in any way. Her crisp, neatly pressed uniform, navy pants with a medium blue shirt fit her like a glove, tailored to emphasize every luscious curve of her body. The Glock 9mm pistol resting in the holster on her utility belt imparted an aura of sex and danger to her already imposing presence.