The front door opened and two men wearing holstered handguns and police badges clipped to their belts entered. One looked like a rancher and the other looked Indian. If Kerry had seen them on the street without their guns and badges, he would have figured them to be just ordinary cow people.
“Who are they?” Kerry asked.
Sergeant Shaya got to his feet. “Stay put.”
He went over and greeted the men, who talked in low voices so Kerry couldn’t hear. When the jawboning stopped, the two men came around the counter, stood him up, and took off his handcuffs.
“I’m Kevin Kerney,” the rancher-looking cop said. He nodded at the Indian. “And this is Clayton Istee. Let’s go in that office and talk.”
“About what?”
“Why you were drinking and driving,” the Indian cop named Istee said.
Kerry stared suspiciously at him. “You Navajo?”
“Apache.”
“I’m not gonna say anything to you about my brother.”
“You don’t have to,” the rancher cop named Kerney said with a smile.
“Then what are we going to talk about?”
“How we can keep you out of jail.” Kerney led Kerry by the arm into the office. “Did you know the law has changed since your last DWI conviction?”
“Changed?” Kerry asked, rubbing his wrists.
Clayton Istee sat him in a chair. “Jail time is mandatory now,” he said. “So paying a fine won’t keep you out of the pokey. Because this is your second offense, you could get six months to a year.”
Kerry looked startled. “I can’t go to jail for a year.”
Kerney nodded sympathetically as he perched on the edge of the desk. “I understand. You’d probably lose your job at the ranch and get kicked out of your house to boot.”
Kerry lowered his gaze and shook his head. “That’s not good. Not good.”
“No, it’s not,” Kerney said. “But it could get even worse for you.”
Kerry looked at Kerney cautiously. “Are you trying to scare me?”
“Not at all. We believe that you didn’t know Craig was on the run from the police when he came to see you.”
“Well that’s the truth of it,” Kerry replied hotly.
“But if you know where he is now, or where he might be, that’s a totally different story,” Kerney said.
“I told you I’m not talking about my brother.” Kerry sounded much less emphatic.
“We’re not talking about Craig,” Clayton said, picking up a cue from Kerney to take the lead. “We’re talking about you. Your life, your freedom.”
“I haven’t done anything wrong to nobody.”
“We believe you,” Clayton said. He pulled up an empty chair and sat close to Kerry. “But if Craig keeps breaking the law, kidnapping and killing people, stealing and destroying property like he has been, and you have helped him in any way, or even refused to tell the police what you knew about his whereabouts, that makes you guilty of all those crimes.”
Kerry gave Clayton a sullen look but said nothing.
“Do you understand what I’m saying?” Clayton prodded, leaning closer.
“Yeah. That’s crazy.”
“No, that’s the law,” Kerney chimed in.
Kerry bit his lips. “Show me.”
Clayton got to his feet. “Wait right here.”
He left the office, got a New Mexico criminal statutes book from Sergeant Shaya, found the appropriate sections, and flagged them with pieces of paper. He returned to the office and gave the book to Kerry.
“Go ahead,” Clayton said, “read them for yourself.”
Kerry lowered his head, ran a finger along the page, and read, his mouth forming words as he went along.
He finished one excerpt, stopped, and looked up at Clayton. “This uses different words than you did.”
“But it means the same thing.”
Kerry closed the book. “What if I didn’t want to help him so instead I just ran away?”
Kerney leaned forward. “Is that what happened?”
“Maybe,” Kerry replied softly.
“What made you want to run away?” Kerney said.
“Nothing.”
“When did this happen?” Clayton asked.
“Today, just after quitting time.”
Kerney and Clayton exchanged glances. The surveillance logs on Kerry Larson, summarized at the debriefing meeting, indicated that he’d stayed at the ranch all day, spending most of his time repairing a truck.
“Come with us,” Kerney said, lifting Kerry by the elbow to his feet.
“Where to?”
“The ranch,” Kerney said. “That’s where you saw Craig today, right?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“No, you didn’t,” Kerney replied. “And I’ll make sure everyone knows that you didn’t squeal on your brother.”
On their way toward the front door, Clayton told Sergeant Shaya to alert the officer on surveillance duty at the ranch that Craig Larson might be on the property and to get a lot of people rolling to that twenty pronto.
“Are you kidding me?” Shaya asked, reaching for his handheld radio.
“Not even,” Clayton said.
“Do I still have to go to jail?” Kerry asked.
“Not even,” Kerney echoed as he hustled Kerry out the door to the unit.
Even with every law enforcement agency in the northeast quadrant of the state on high alert, it took a fair amount of time to put enough officers in place to surround the immediate buildings and grounds where Kerry Larson lived and worked. Once the perimeter was sealed, a SWAT team cleared the garage, barn, stable, and corral before moving on to the main house. Once that had been cleared, Frank Vanmeter set up his command post at the top of the lane overlooking the main house and cottage, ordered the cordon tightened around Kerry Larson’s residence, and brought a state police helicopter on standby in Springer to light up the exterior with its high-powered searchlight.
With the chopper rotors thudding in the night sky a hundred feet overhead, the cottage washed in harsh, white light, and sharpshooters zeroed in on every window and door, Vanmeter waited for his SWAT commander to report on any sign of visual or thermal movement.
“The only thing giving off a significant heat signature inside that structure is the kitchen refrigerator,” the SWAT commander said by radio after checking with his team. “Are we good to go?”
Vanmeter turned to Kerry Larson, who stood between Kerney and Clayton. “Does your cottage have a basement?”
Kerry shook his head.
Vanmeter keyed his radio. “Go.”
The SWAT commander gave the word, and the team moved in under the protection of covering snipers. Within minutes the cottage was declared clear.
Vanmeter pulled SWAT back and ordered the chopper pilot to sweep and light up the surrounding area, in the hope that Larson might be hiding nearby.
“Did you see which way your brother came from?” Clayton asked Kerry.
“No.”
“Okay.” Clayton motioned to a nearby uniformed officer to come forward. “Wait with this officer in his vehicle.”
