Toni

By Andrea Anderson

This is a story of a successful, professional, business woman who gets caught up in a situation where she is forced to go into hiding. As stressful as that is, Toni is committed to protecting an infant that she believes someone is trying to harm. While she is on the run she finds out some heartbreaking facts about her father and her brother who have been engaged in illegal and embarrassing activities. Though she is overwhelmed Toni continues to move forward in giving this child a chance to have a good life.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Dec 30, 2015
• ISBN: 9781483560199

Andrea Anderson

Andrea is a stay-at-home mom who grew up in and currently lives in Wenatchee, Washington. She has a degree in psychology from City University with an emphasis in child psychology. She taught dance at a local studio for eleven years before becoming a preschool teacher at a Christian day care center. She is married to her high school sweetheart of thirteen years and decided to be a stay-at-home mom when she became pregnant with her now preschool-aged son. Her new book, “A Family for Rudy,” was inspired by her amazing family and their timeless love for Christmas.

Book preview

Epilogue

CHAPTER 1

Toni was on her way to the cabin after a grueling workweek in the city. As she got closer to her destination, she felt the tension begin to slip away from her neck and shoulder muscles. She couldn’t wait to get to the cabin. The cabin, Toni thought that name was a joke for God’s sake. Maybe it looked like a cabin from a distance and it was really made of logs, but it had so many amenities.

The place had heating, air conditioning, modern appliances, a generator in case the power went off, a small indoor swimming pool, and a 4 car garage, all controlled by computer. Toni loved this place, as she drove closer her eyes wandered to the house high up on the bluff above the river, she often wondered about that house. You could see it in the distance and it seemed huge, though not overbearing as some large houses looked. She often saw the helicopter that shuttled people back and forth to the house. She wondered who owned the house and would love to see the inside of it. Although Toni had been coming here for a long time neither she nor the rest of the family knew many of the people who had cabins or homes in the area. Not that they were snobs, she thought and then her conscious trotted out waving a red flag saying, whoa now, wait a minute, you can’t lie to yourself Toni, maybe you’re not a snob, but your father and Skipper truly are and you can’t deny that.

Toni pulled into the garage, put the door down, got out and punched in the code to the alarm. She had turned the heat on earlier this afternoon using the remote to tell the computer to take the chill off the place and to heat the pool. She walked through the house and put her bag in her room. She took a few minutes to fix a drink, pull on her long, bulky coat and on her hat, and walked out on the porch. She would have liked to walk to the river’s edge to watch the sunset. She was disappointed that darkness had come on quickly and she didn’t want to walk that far in the dark. She sat on the porch and finished her drink. It was so different here in the mountains, it was still and quiet and ever so peaceful. She liked coming here alone, without her father, when he was here his presence made it all very different.

Roman St George was wheelchair bound, he always had his attendant Fritz with him and someone to do the housekeeping and cooking. It wasn’t that Toni didn’t like Fritz, she disliked his attitude, and maybe it was because she didn’t know him very well. She felt he looked down on people because he claimed that he was descended from some royal house of Switzerland or Germany or some such place. It amazed her how he could be a slave to her father and retain that feeling of superiority. Toni had little contact with Fritz, though he seemed devoted to her father which was a good thing because he took good care of him.

Toni and her father had a rocky relationship. Ever since her mother departed, he seemed to push Toni as far away as possible from him. Departed thought Toni that’s a good word since it seemed one day mom was there and the next day she was gone. Toni heard her say to Fritz once that he didn’t like to be around her; because she reminded him so much of his wife, Fiona and that upset him.

Toni thought about her mother often she loved her and missed her very much. Toni could never figure out what happened to make their relationship change so quickly. One day she was coming to Toni’s school events, they went on just girls shopping trips and shared secrets. Then, suddenly one day she told Toni she was sending her off to boarding school. Toni didn’t know what happened; she thought she had done something terrible that her mother was sending her away because she was angry with her. Fiona tried to reassure Toni it wasn’t anything Toni said or did but Toni was young and didn’t understand, she felt her mom was punishing her. Toni didn’t want to go away to school she cried and begged her mother not to send her away, her mother told her it would only be for a short time and for now, she had to go away to school.

Before the school year was up, Toni was called to the head mistress’s office in the middle of the night. Her father was on the phone. He told her that there was an accident, he was in the hospital, and that her mother was gone. Toni asked him what happened, and he repeated what he told her before. He told her that she needed to stay at school and not come home. He was in the hospital and her brother was away at school and no one would be there to take care of her. Toni cried herself to sleep every night grieving for her mother, comforted only by her roommates.

Roman St George, Toni’s father is the CEO and President of a company called, The Roman Style. The company imports and distributes designer clothing and accessories to posh shops and boutiques. He is financially secure. He was a good-looking man in his younger years; however the accident has taken a toll on him. Now his hair is gray and his wheelchair bound inactivity contributed to his weight gain, most of all, his stern, harsh, attitude never seems to relent. He is so cold and distant, even to Toni. Toni doesn’t really see much of Roman its better when she stays out of his way.

Roman promised that when Toni and her brother Skipper graduated from college, he would give them jobs in his company. He made good on his promise and brought each of them into the firm. On Toni’s part this was merely a gesture because she and Skipper’s jobs were nowhere near equal. Roman gave Skipper control and authority he gave to Toni grunt work.

Skipper’s real name is Conrad Steven St George. He is a few years older than Toni and thinks he should be in charge of both her and the company. Skipper treats Toni as if she is there because she is the boss’s daughter. He never acknowledges her business acumen and brags that he makes all the important decisions. This is hard for Toni to swallow because it’s so far from the truth. Often when there is an important decision to be made, at the11th hour, Skipper gets nervous and panics and goes to Toni asking for her help. Although this offends her, she always relents and shares her knowledge and research of the project. Afterward, he takes full credit for making the deal on his own and never acknowledges Toni’s input. So far, her advice had been good and the deals have worked out well, Toni wonders what would happen if a deal goes sour. What then? In the back of her mind the thought lingers that maybe Skipper brings her in on the deal at the last minute, so that he can place the blame on her if things don’t go well, this nags at her.

Toni likes to stay on top of things at the company. She works hard at getting to know the clients and is well informed about their accounts. She follows sales trends closely and keeps up with the stock market and the fashion crazes, which are important to the company. Shipper mostly flies by the seat of his pants. His desk is always filled with unread reports and ignores client mail. Often he misspeaks when asked for information on company policies or the status of contracts. Toni knows how much time Skipper really spends working, and how much he plays. That’s because Rita, Skipper’s personal secretary, keeps her tuned in to how much he works and how much he plays. She has been with the company since it started and is very committed to doing a good job.

Rita keeps Toni informed on Skipper’s comings and goings. Toni never asked her to do this but Rita feels obliged to do it. Ever since the day Rita came to Toni out of sheer frustration from Skipper’s behavior. That incident involved a company problem and Rita didn’t know where to turn to get it solved. Skipper hadn’t responded to Rita when she asked him for a decision, and he ignored Rita’s email and phone messages reminding him a decision was needed soon. Exasperated, Rita worried about the result of a lack of a decision and went to Toni about the problem. She told Toni about Skipper’s behavior and how difficult it is to get him to do his work. With no decision forthcoming from Skipper’s office, Rita had been called on the carpet by one of the production supervisors accusing her of not passing on important information to Skipper so that he could make a decision. The supervisor reminded Rita of the changes that had to be made, would save the company thousands of dollars, but they had move quickly. Rita had given the information to Skipper, he never took the time to read the report, let alone make a decision or give direction. Instead of making a fuss and going above Skipper’s head to the general manager and embarrassing Skipper, who probably would have fired her, she went to Toni to ask her to intervene. Toni came to her rescue, talked to the supervisor, and gave him permission to make the changes and saved the day. After that, Rita felt a special loyalty to Toni, and contacted her when she thought Skipper was doing something that might be bad for the company.

Skipper lives in a McMansion with his wife Fern. She was a beauty queen in her younger years and is still very beautiful, and they have two little girls. Skipper treats Fern like shit.

Skipper is a very handsome, charming and charismatic man. Toni often overheard women at parties describe him as, Hot. The first time you meet him, you are almost mesmerized by his charm and good looks, after you get to know him better, the real person behind the handsome face is shallow and selfish. Shipper is narcissistic and thinks he’s a really cool ladies’ man. He cheats on Fern every chance he gets. Not only is it embarrassing, it’s costly to the company to cover up his affairs when they go south.

Currently Skipper is seeing Connie, a woman who works at Artful Boxes. This company is a spinoff of the main corporation, created to provide boxes and shipping materials needed by Roman Style. He has her stashed in an apartment in the city. Dating employees is against company policy, Skipper could care less about following policy. He began dating Connie when she started working at Artful Boxes. Rita told Toni that rumor has it that Connie is pregnant. Toni hasn’t said a word about it to Skipper. She is disgusted with Skipper and his behavior. She can’t stand to see him make a mess of his married life. Toni likes Fern they’re friends, and she loves the little girls.

Toni tries to go to the cabin often, especially when she feels stress building up and she couldn’t stand to watch all the crap that goes down at the company. The cabin is her refuge. It plucks her last nerve and she hates it that she always has to ask her father’s permission to use the cabin, like a teenager would. Hell lately no one else goes there except her. Once when she went to the cabin without asking his permission and Roman ranted and raved for a week. Toni thinks it’s a control thing her father wants to hold on to. On several occasions, he wouldn’t tell her she couldn’t use the cabin, rather he dreams up something that he wants done at the office, which prevents her from going to the cabin.

Toni finished her martini sitting on the porch in the dark. It got chilly after the sun went down. She went back in the cabin and made herself another drink, turned on the TV and put her feet up. She thought about taking a swim, but she already had a drink and was on her second, and didn’t think it was a good idea. She wasn’t hungry now; she would snack on something a little later, since she had a big lunch. Tomorrow she would go down to the river, and cast some of the fishing lures she made, and see if she could catch some trout for dinner. If she wasn’t successful it wouldn’t be a big deal there was fish frozen in blocks of water to keep them fresh, in the walk in refrigerator box and plenty of other food too. As Toni closed her eyes and tried to relax. She tried to keep out the stinging comments her father made before she left to come to the cabin, but they snuck into her brain piled up like rush hour traffic and she was instantly pissed once more. Roman always had to bring up Brent, why, oh why couldn’t he let it die and let her move on? No, No, No, he had to torment her by bringing up her Close Call as he mockingly called it.

CHAPTER 2

The Close Call, as Roman called it was Toni’s former relationship with Brent Philips. Toni knew Brent as a casual acquaintance at first. She never really talked to him and didn’t know him very well. She thought he was single, but he never brought a woman with him or for that matter, a man either, she didn’t really care one way or the other. He was OK looking, not strikingly handsome. Toni didn’t really think about him at all in a romantic way and wasn’t particularly attracted to him.

One evening Martha, Toni’s best friend, felt down, after breaking up with her boyfriend. They decided they would go to happy hour to drown Martha’s sorrows.

Martha didn’t come from a wealth family, though through her work as an event planner she knew many people in Toni’s social circle. Martha was a tall, very attractive woman with a full figure. Martha planned many charity events that Toni’s father’s friends often contributed to or sponsored. Martha worked closely with the affluent society types and celebrities who were invited to these events and got to know many influential people.

Toni and Martha went to a restaurant close to where Toni worked and sat at the piano bar. It was Happy Hour and they hadn’t finished their first drinks yet, when the bartender brought them a second round.

Compliments of the gentleman at the end of the bar, the bartender said, as he set down the drinks.

Martha looked down the bar to see who their benefactor was and saw a man wave. As she raised her glass in thank you to the benefactor and her face lit up. Martha got off the stool and told Toni she would be right back. She walked to where the man was sitting. She gave him a hug and kissed his cheek. Then she brought him over to where she and Toni were sitting and formally introduced Brent to Toni. The three had another round and the talk got friendly. Martha invited Brent to have dinner with them. They had a nice time and Brent and Martha seemed to hit it off very well, they talked about everything. Thinking Brent and Martha might want some time alone, Toni thoughtfully excused herself telling them she had an early morning meeting and caught a cab home. Much to her surprise Brent called her the next day at work and asked her to go out to lunch with him. Toni was surprised and didn’t know what to say. Did you invite Martha too? She asked.

No, I’m inviting you, Brent said. Now for sure, Toni didn’t know what to say she didn’t want to impede Martha’s progress if she wanted to pursue this man. Toni said she was busy and would take a rain check and make it another time. She immediately called Martha and asked her if she was interested in getting to know Brent better.

No why? asked Martha?

Well Brent called and asked me out to lunch, I declined thinking you two really hit it off last night and didn’t want to spoil things if you were interested in him.

Don’t be silly, said Martha, I don’t have any designs on him, you should feel free to do what you want.

The next time Brent called Toni decided to accept. It wasn’t so much that she was attracted to this man; she hadn’t had a date in a long time.

Now as she looked back at the time she spent with Brent, Toni could see how self-centered he was, always talking about what he wanted, how he was so business savvy and important, she didn’t see any of that at first. He worked in his father’s firm and if you listened to him, he ran the whole operation. When Toni did some research on the business, she found out that Brent was more of a middle level manager, rather than someone who ran the business.

They started dating on weekends and after two months began seeing each other more frequently. Their time together increased in the next few weeks. Toni never saw Brent on Friday nights. That was his night to go out with the boys and go to happy hour at his club. Toni’s Fridays were always free, Martha stayed at home on Fridays to relax and do her beauty treatments, since her weekend nights were often long ones, attending weekend fundraisers or events.

In the next six months, Brent asked Toni out a lot and they got to be known as a couple in their social circle. Their time together was very humdrum, they went out for dinner, to the movies, and watched TV. Toni was not wildly in love with Brent, but there was no one else around. He was polite enough and knew a lot of the same people she did. Much of their time together was spent at the country club with other people, often the women gathered in one group and the men in another. He was the first man she had dated steadily, since her college days. Her father asked her often when she was going to get married. Thinking back, Toni knew her father wanted her to find a husband, she guessed he and Skipper probably thought they would get rid of me if I got married, she lamented.

After they had been dating about 9 months, Brent proposed to Toni and she accepted. Toni was glad she was engaged, she knew that’s what her father wanted, and he seemed very pleased when she told him she was getting married. Toni wasn’t sure she loved Brent although he told her he loved her, he wasn’t very warm or romantic and did not demonstrate his feelings well.

Toni invited Brent to the cabin to celebrate Skipper and Fern’s little girl, Janice’s 5th birthday party. He wasn’t enthusiastic about going to the cabin saying, I hate cabins and that sort of thing, and I’m especially not interested in attending a child’s birthday party.

When she told him the whole family including Toni’s father would be there, he agreed to go.

Toni was excited about the party. She helped Fern plan the party every year since the child was born. Toni really loved the girls and enjoyed doing things for them. Toni and Fern often took the girls out on Saturdays to lunch and to a matinee. The party went well thanks to all of Toni’s efforts. She arranged for a clown, and had a princess cake made with Janice’s favorite princess on it. Toni played games with the kids and helped serve the birthday cake with Fern. Brent seemed bored and placed himself as near to Toni’s father as he could. He talked to him whenever there was an opportunity trying to ingratiate himself to Roman. As soon as Toni’s father left the party, Brent wanted to leave also.

I want to stay and to see Janice finish opening her presents, complained Toni.

She’s not your child, said Brent in an exasperated tone.

I know, but she’s so sweet and enjoying herself so much.

Well I want to go, he hissed.

OK, Toni said giving in not wanting to make a scene. She gave Janice a hug and kiss before leaving.

When they got in the car, Toni asked in a peeved voice, Don’t you like kids?

I like them when they’re sleeping, retorted Brent.

That was not the answer I was hoping for," Toni thought, but she remained silent and had a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach. She wondered if she was making a mistake by marrying Brent.

The next time she asked Brent to go to the cabin; he grimaced, and said, What would we do there?

We can go fishing, Toni chirped with enthusiasm.

He looked at her with distain and said, Fishing you say, I’m not very fond of touching slimly things, it’s a long drive, and it’s already late.

OK, then let’s drive up tomorrow and spend the day there. Toni said, itching to go up to the cabin and throw a line in.

You go ahead, Brent said, I’m going to stay here and read.

Toni drove back on Sunday evening, she brought three nice trout she caught and phoned Brent to say she would stop at his apartment. When she showed Brent the fish he turned his nose up.

What on earth are you going to do with those smelly creatures? he asked.

They’re not smelly I caught them this morning. I’m going to fix them for our dinner, she said. Brent didn’t seem too happy about that.

Sex was not a big part of their relationship. The first time they had sex Brent had been drinking. Brent didn’t even take off his tee shirt and acted as if having sex was something he had to do. Immediately after they were done, he got up and went to the bathroom, and put his shorts back on and fell asleep. In her heart Toni was very disappointed; she tried to think why he would act like that. Maybe it was because he was a little overweight and he was self-conscious, she rationalized. The second time they had sex he did almost the same thing, but when he got back in bed, he began looking for the remote to change the channel to watch his travel program. He seemed cold and distant and there was nothing exciting or romantic about his lovemaking, it was like fucking a robot Toni remembered thinking; I guess he doesn’t like sex.

Two weeks before they were to get married Toni’s father asked them to have dinner with him, after they had eaten; Roman told Toni he wanted to speak to Brent in his study alone.

Roman asked Brent to sign a pre-nuptial agreement. Brent was surprised and very insulted by this and asked why Roman didn’t trust him. Toni’s father threw an envelope on the desk and asked Brent to look in it, when Brent picked it up he saw pictures of himself and Martha in an intimate pose in bed, he gasped in surprise.

That’s why, Toni’s father said, don’t you know you can have a mistress after you’re married, not before the wedding, especially when it’s Toni’s best friend.

Brent was livid knowing that Roman had someone spying on him. He came out of the study and gruffly told Toni, We’re done there will be no wedding. I’m not signing any prenuptial agreement or anything else. Your father doesn’t trust me and I have never been more insulted in my life."

Toni was astounded, you told me you loved me.

Don’t believe everything you hear, he said in a hateful tone, you’re so naïve.

Toni took off her engagement ring and threw it at him. That’s fine by me, she sobbed as she ran out to her car and drove away.

Brent picked up the ring and called over his shoulder as he stormed out, Thank God I’m not going to be stuck with her, he snarled as he went out the front door.

At first Toni was very upset at the breakup. After she calmed down; she realized that maybe this was the best that could have happened, she and Brent had not been getting along all that well. It was fine when they were with other people, when they were alone they often disagreed and didn’t like the same things. She wasn’t sure she wanted to spend the rest of her life with a man who didn’t like children and seemed as if he were bored with life and her. She was relieved she wasn’t going to marry Brent.

A few months later Toni and Skipper were having a knockdown, drag out fight about a big business deal that would cost the company a great deal of money if things went wrong. Toni told Skipper the company he wanted to buy was not a good deal and her research found that the company had been losing money for several years. They were in their father’s office when they argued. Skipper got very angry with her because he knew she was right after he looked at her documentation. Instead of backing down gracefully, he needled her, What do you know, you can’t do anything right, he said, You can’t even hold on to a man.

What do you mean by that? she countered.

Here, he said, opening his father’s desk drawer and throwing the envelope with the pictures of Brent and Martha on the desk, take a look at those, Miss Hotshot know it all.

Toni was enraged when she saw the photos. She threw them back on the desk and told Skipper what a hateful prick he was and ran out of the room.

What was that all about? asked their father as he wheeled into the office and saw Toni run out shouting obscenities.

Toni wanted me to buy this company and I told her it was a bad deal, she was insistent so we had an argument and she got angry, said Skipper.

Just hours ago before coming to the cabin this evening, Toni was having a discussion with her father about some stock options. She tried to tell him that she had been doing a background check on the shares he was proposing to buy and it looked like the company was in the red. What Roman didn’t tell Toni was that he already bought the stock because Skipper thought it was a good deal.

I like it, he said, it looks like a growing company to me.

The facts don’t show that dad, my research shows that they have lost money for the last two years, said Toni, I think you would be making a mistake to buy.

What do you know you’re only good at picking losers like Brent?

Do whatever you want, she shouted, as she threw down the file and left the room.

Toni had another martini and then went to bed. She hoped she wouldn’t have a headache in the morning. She wanted to get up early and get her fishing gear, poles and waders and go down to the river to fish.

In the morning, she felt good. She dressed in an old plaid shirt, bulky jacket, and jeans, had her hair pulled up under her fishing hat, and wore large sunglasses. She was having a great time and the fish were biting this morning. She skipped breakfast and had some bits of toast and crispy bacon in plastic bags in her pocket. She was enjoying herself and the fish were biting, the weather was nice and she had a whole weekend to do whatever she wanted. Life would go on.

CHAPTER 3

Butch and his partner Craig arrived at a cabin not very far from where Toni was staying in her father’s cabin. This cabin was well equipped also, but in a different way. While it had some creature comforts it had the latest technical gear for surveillance. Special cameras on the roof, sensors placed near the road warning if a car approached, special repeaters to pick up satellite messages, recording and monitoring equipment and many other toys used for spying. The St George cabin could be seen very well from the surveillance cabin, as so much of the area around the St George cabin was cleared between the two places. The surveillance cabin was nestled in the trees and almost unseen which made it inconspicuous. The surveillance cabin was used for training of new recruits from a few federal agencies. Right now the cabin was being used to watch the St George cabin.

Butch and Craig are employed by a federal agency, and work mainly as undercover agents. Butch has special talents and knows many languages. He usually does surveillance of foreign people who don’t speak much English. Sometimes when criminals didn’t speak English, he translated when they were being interrogated. This type of observation from afar which required much documentation was not really his strong suit. His agency was following this case because they suspected that goods were being brought into the US illegally by foreign nationals.

The agency had joined the ongoing FBI and ATF investigations as a joint venture and kept an eye on the cabin for almost a year. Each agency provided personnel to take the watch and shared information. They suspected Roman Style was importing clothing and accessories that were designer knock offs, putting fake labels in them and selling the items as the real thing, at high prices. This is called interstate trafficking of fraudulent items. Since the St George Company handled the shipping of genuine, high-end clothing and other items, they were committing fraud by adding cheap counterfeit items to legitimate shipments. They sold them to fancy boutiques and charged the same prices for all the items. This was breaking several laws of interstate commerce, fraud, bait and switch laws, federal trade laws, labeling laws and a host of other offenses. When they had all the hard evidence they needed they would make the arrests.

The Lanham Act, which is a law passed in 1946, which forbid false advertisement, trademark dilution, and trademark infringement, first time offenders who were caught could be given up to 10 years in prison and $2 million dollar fine.

China is the counterfeit capital of world and the two items most often copied and sold as knock offs are watches and sunglasses, bought mostly by young people. If you copy a design you are not breaking the law, but if you place a logo or label on the product that is not made by that company, then you are breaking the law. Counterfeit goods are a big business and found in almost everything that is manufactured and sold. Goods are taken from places other than the direct route of the site where they were made. For instance, Louis Vuitton sued and won a lawsuit against eBay for 51.3 million for selling fake goods. Now even in most midsized towns or cities you see vendors with knock off bargains on the streets. In big cities they are almost on every corner and especially overseas where visiting tourists are lured to these vendors looking for bargains.

The stakeout was necessary to tie the shipments of inferior imported goods which were being stored in the huge four-car garage attached to the St. George cabin, while the labels were switched. The team suspected that this was a precautionary measure by the counterfeiters, so that the items weren’t seen at the company’s legitimate warehouse or by the regular employees of the company. This way inferior goods couldn’t be identified or tied to the Royal Style Company if they weren’t shipped there. If things went wrong and the fraud was discovered the employees couldn’t testify against the company if they hadn’t seen anything. Obviously, the counterfeiters either owed the cabin or knew who did and had their permission to perform this masquerade there every three weeks. Soon after a shipment arrived, a truck with 8-10 employees would appear and begin to work on the stored goods to change the labels. They did this in one visit getting to the cabin very early in the morning and staying all night if necessary to get all the labels switched as quickly as possible. The goods were then picked up by another group and transported. The investigating team was trying to trace the goods journey to find out where the modified clothing and accessories were taken. They were trying to get all the information they could.

The operation was going slow, because the thieves were cautious, using different trucks and the type of goods was varied. The law enforcement officers had to be patient in order to find out who the overseas contacts were and where the front money was coming from. No one else seemed to visit the cabin besides the delivery/pickup crews, the employees who worked on the labels and one female visitor.

The female visitor was identified as Annette St George, daughter of the man who owed both the company and the cabin. She was either aware of when the shipments arrived and left before they came or made sure she never there when the goods were there. It was feasible she was told to stay away for another reason and possibly didn’t know anything about the operation. The team was anxious to know if she was part of the operation or could possibly be the leader.

Butch was a tall, good-looking guy with blond hair, that he worn sort of long. He had blue eyes and a rugged build. The man was articulate and worked well with most of his colleagues. After college Butch took off with a buddy to tramp around Europe. He loved camping, hunting and fishing and traveling. He got his share of that with the job and his proficiency with languages was excellent.

Although Butch is going to be doing the routine surveillance with his partner, his boss wants him to watch and see if he could get further information by observing the woman visitor, Annette St. George, nicknamed Toni, very closely. The purpose of that is to see if she is aware of the illegal activity and is involved in the operation or if she is using the cabin for recreation. If she is involved, they want to target her, thinking she could be the weak link in the chain. Gary, Butch’s boss thinks that Butch’s vast background in psychology and criminal profiling makes him the best man to make a determination of her involvement. Butch thought it will be difficult to do that from afar without talking with her and gaining some knowledge of her personality. Others in the office have prepared a file on her for him, which told him where she went to school, lived, worked, and what was known about her social life. The information was mostly factual but wasn’t much to go on. Butch would do his best to concentrate on her.

We are so happy to see you guys the outgoing team told them. There is not much activity lately except for every three weeks and of course the woman, Toni.

What about Toni? Butch asked curiously.

Mike one of the outgoing officers said, Toni is the daughter of the owner of the cabin. Wait till you get a load of her, she’s a queer duck, not very attractive, actually she looks fat, always wears men’s clothing, a big jacket, sunglasses and a hat. She never brings anybody with her. It seems as if she comes here to fish. I think that’s weird for a woman, don’t you?

I don’t know, said Butch, I kind of like to fish myself, except I’m not that good at it. One of the things the boss wants to know is if she’s in on the scheme? What do you guys think?

We really don’t know, they almost said in unison.

"My gut feeling is that I don’t think so, she never comes here when there is a shipment in the garage so we’re not sure.