“Did you tell him this operation directly effects American interests?” Armstrong asked. “Did you explain to him that if the American economy crumbles, Croatia won’t be far behind?”
“I did.”
“And?”
“And he doesn’t seem to care.”
Wizard said, “Tell Hinson I said hello.”
Armstrong didn’t even bother to ask Wizard how he knew the name of the Secret Service Agent in charge. One look was enough to know Wizard had a card to play. Armstrong said, “Your old friend Albert Dulles says hi.”
“Is Al there now?”
“Yes, he is.”
“I suppose your consultant is working closely with the old Wiz?”
“That’s right,” Armstrong said.
Hinson breathed heavily into the phone. “Okay, I’ll see what I can do. Tell Al he owes me one. When will your consultant be here?”
“I’m not sure exactly,” Armstrong admitted. “Not long. He’s en route.”
“How will we know him?”
“He’ll answer to the name Jake,” Armstrong said. “And he may be traveling with a companion.”
“Okay,” Hinson said. “I’ll keep an eye out for him.”
Armstrong hung up the phone and turned her attention to Wizard. She said, “What if that money’s already gone? What if we are too late? What if it’s already headed toward the United States? Hell, it might already be in circulation?”
Wizard breathed smoke and shook his head. “It’s not. Keiser wouldn’t risk it. He has to time it just right in order for him to profit from the collapse of the dollar. He needs that money to hit the market shortly before his puts expire.”
Armstrong passed a hand over her face. “God, I hope you’re right.”
“Me too.” Wizard breathed smoke. “More importantly, I hope Noble is right. We won’t get another crack at this.”
“So all our hopes are pinned on a grieving drunk?”
Wizard hitched up boney shoulders. “It’s an imperfect world.”
Armstrong buzzed her secretary. “Make a pot of coffee, will you?”
Chapter Sixty-One
The train pulled into the station at Zagreb a few minutes after eight o’clock. Noble and Eliška passed along a line of cars in the parking lot looking for something without an alarm system. Noble pointed to a dented yellow Citroen. Eliška nodded. There was no time for subtlety. He glanced around the lot before using his elbow to hammer out the rear-passenger window. Eliška gave a loud fake sneeze at the same time. It wasn’t much in the way of camouflage, but nobody was close enough to hear the jingle of breaking glass anyway.
Noble reached in and unlocked the passenger-side door, which he then held for Eliška.
“Such a gentleman.” She seated herself in the old clunker with all the grace of an English princess stepping into a carriage and then reached across to unlock his side. By the time he piled into the driver’s seat, Eliška had already pried apart the steering column. Noble flicked open the SpyderCo knife he had taken from her weapons cache back in Prague. Eliška indicated which wires to cut. Noble sawed through them with the blade and Eliška twisted them together. The exposed ends sparked and the engine came to life with a loud knocking.
The fuel needle pointed to half a tank. Better than Noble had hoped for. Most people drive around with their car on empty. He said, “How far to Rijeka?”
They had purchased a map of Croatia from the station. Eliška measured the distance using the stub of a pencil she found in the center console. “Maybe one hundred and sixty kilometers.”
Noble made the conversion in his head. It was about a hundred miles. He pulled the Citroen out of the parking lot and followed signs to the freeway. The E65 runs west along wooded mountain roads all the way to the coast. Noble pushed the speedometer up to eighty miles an hour and cranked his window down. A cool breeze filled the car and helped clear his head. He had been torturing himself about last night—about Eliška—and wondering what Sam would say if she knew. It was an exercise in futility. Sam was dead, and if there was a heaven, she was in it. And Noble doubted very much if he was going there when he died. And if there was no heaven? Then Sam was just dead and it didn’t matter either way. Torturing himself wouldn’t change a thing.
He shelved those questions for the moment and focused on the road ahead. He needed to find the torpedo factory and stop that money from reaching the United States. And he decided it was time to check in with Langley. There was nothing they could do to stop him at this late stage. He might as well give them an update on his position. He had been on the road nearly thirty minutes. A sign up ahead advertised gas, beer, and cigarettes, first in Croatian, then Italian and English. Noble eased off the pedal and put on his blinker.
Eliška had been slumped in the passenger seat, staring out the window at passing trees. She sat up a little when Noble started to slow. “Stopping for gas?”
Noble nodded and dug his wallet from his back pocket. He flipped it open and passed his company credit card to Eliška. “We’re going to need a mobile phone with GPS.”
Noble pulled into the filling station and nosed the Citroen up next to a tank. He got out, twisted off the gas cap, and slotted the nozzle while Eliška went inside. He watched her disappear through the glass doors and turned his attention to the digital readout, watching the gallons tick. Petrol fumes filled his lungs as he listened to the pump. The auto shutoff valve clunked and Noble wracked the nozzle.
Eliška emerged from the station as Noble was screwing the gas cap into place. A plastic shopping bag swung from one arm and she carried two cups of coffee. She hauled open the passenger door with a squeal of rusting hinges and climbed in beside him as he touched the wires together. Noble got them back on the road while Eliška worked open the plastic clamshell and booted up the phone. The screen came to life and a call came through seconds later. Eliška’s eyebrows went up.
“That will be for me,” Noble said.
Gwen and Ezra had been working furiously to figure out how Keiser planned to move the money. First, they had to calculate the space requirements. Since they didn’t know how much money Keiser had printed up, the best they could do was estimate, but even a conservative guess of one trillion dollars would require something the size of two or three football fields.
Running on coffee and Red Bull, they had crunched the numbers twice. Assuming one hundred million dollars on a standard shipping pallet, they calculated it would take ten thousand pallets stacked with cash. That ruled out cargo jets. It would take a fleet of them. Instead, they focused their attention on container ships. Keiser had several commercial shipping interests. His conglomerates controlled three different shipping companies in the area around Rijeka, but that didn’t answer the question of how he was clearing the shipments through customs. He couldn’t just stack the money on pallets and load it into shipping containers.
Gwen had her feet stacked on her desk, staring up at the fluorescents, while she tried to imagine all the ways someone could hide money. She was painfully aware of Ezra. He was on the couch with a thick packet of papers, reading through Secret Service reports on counterfeiting schemes in the hopes of finding something that would help. Every few minutes, his eyes would flick to Gwen and then back to the stack of reports. An hour ago, he had timidly brought up a new movie arriving theaters this weekend. Gwen wanted to see it, but she didn’t want to give Ezra false hope and had made up an excuse. The tension in the room had been palpable since.
Gwen felt horrible. It was just a movie. But that wasn’t all. That was never all. If she said yes to the movie, then it would be dinner, then roller skating, concerts, and eventually he would be shopping for a ring. She wondered if there was some way to explain it all without crushing his feelings. She had just made up her mind to try when she heard the gentle chirp from her computer and saw the notification appear on screen. She took her feet off the desk and sat up.
“Noble just used his credit card,” she announced.
>
Ezra set aside the Secret Service reports and pushed himself off the couch. “Where?”
“Croatia,” Gwen said.
“I knew it,” Ezra said. “That guy …”
He never finished the sentence.
Gwen was already on the phone with Armstrong. The Director appeared in the situation room seconds later. Her pinstripe suit and pressed white blouse had picked up a few wrinkles, but she still conveyed a sense of poise. Blonde hair had worked loose from the plastic clip and a few loose strands framed her face. Wizard was right behind her, looking like he always did: a brooding vulture with beady eyes and a cigarette dangling from his beak.
“Where is he?” Armstrong wanted to know.
“A gas station about sixty miles east of Rijeka,” Gwen told her. “He bought gas, coffee, a couple of protein bars, and a cellular phone.”
She expected Armstrong to rant and rave. The Director had been livid when she learned Noble missed the connection at Berlin. Instead of being angry, Armstrong seemed relieved. “Have you got the number of the phone?”
Ezra said, “Working on that now.” He consulted his computer, grabbed a pen and an empty candy bar wrapper. He tried writing on the smooth surface of the wrapper, but the ink wouldn’t take. Gwen passed him a crumpled napkin. He scribbled the number, leaving little rips in the paper, and passed the napkin back.
“Call him,” Armstrong ordered.
Gwen put the phone on speaker and dialed. The first attempt got a recorded message, telling them the phone was not in service. They tried again.
“He may not have activated it yet,” Ezra said.
It started to ring on the third attempt.
Noble’s voice came on the line. “Goodman and Associates. Goodman speaking.”
Armstrong had her arms crossed under her breasts. Her mouth was a strict line. She said, “Noble? This is DCI Armstrong speaking. You’re supposed to be in Berlin.”
“Berlin is so depressing this time of year,” Noble said.
“Is Cermákova with you?”
“Affirmative.”
Armstrong’s nostrils flared. She glanced across at Wizard.
The Deputy Director of Operations jumped into the pause. “Jake? Albert Dulles here. How far are you from Rijeka, son?”
“Thirty minutes, sir. Maybe a little longer.”
Armstrong nodded.
Wizard said, “Jake, there is a Secret Service Agent on sight by the name of Ronald Hinson. He’s working with the local police. They’re expecting you. I want you to link up with Ron and assist the SWAT commander in any way you can. Understood?”
“Hooah,” Noble said.
Ezra looked at Gwen, who only shrugged. She didn’t know if that was code for “Affirmative” or some obscure curse word.
Wizard seemed to take it in stride. He said, “Hinson and the SWAT team have set up shop in a used tire outlet a few blocks east of the torpedo factory.”
Noble said, “Let them know I’m driving a beat-up yellow Citroen. I don’t want to catch a bullet.”
“I’ll do that,” Wizard said. “And Noble, listen to me—we need Lucas Randall alive.”
“Sir, you know as well as I do that may not be possible,” Noble said. “Lucas is a SEAL. He’s not going down without a fight.”
“Randall is our only link to the man behind this counterfeiting scheme,” Wizard said. “We believe his name is Otto Keiser, but we can’t prove the connection. We need you to bring Randall in for questioning.”
There was a long pause and Noble finally said, “I’ll do everything I can to bring Lucas in alive.”
Chapter Sixty-Two
Noble clasped hands with Ron Hinson. The agent was medium height and medium build. He belied the myth that all Secret Service agents were big, burly men who protect the president. Hinson could pass for an insurance adjustor or a city planner. He pumped Noble’s hand and said, “Thanks for coming on such short notice.”
“I was in the neighborhood,” Noble lied.
They stood in the dim confines of the tire factory, breathing in rubber fumes. Refurbished tires were stacked in steel rafters fifteen feet high. The handful of employees went about their jobs, sneaking glances at the team of men in dark-blue combat fatigues with submachine guns strapped to their chests. American law enforcement would have cleared out the employees and locked down the buildings on either side as well, but this wasn’t America.
The shop was just three blocks from the abandoned torpedo factory. The large bay door stood open, letting in the sunlight and a cool breeze tinged with the fresh scent of saltwater. The loud rattle of pneumatic drills and the constant hum of machinery made it hard to hear anything below a shout. The local SWAT team had erected a pair of plastic folding tables in one corner. On the tables sat dozen ruggedized laptops with closed-circuit feeds from various cameras stationed around the abandoned factory.
Hinson directed Noble’s attention to a short, powerfully built man with iron-gray hair on a head shaped like a bullet. Blue combat fatigues were stretched taut across an expanding belly. Hinson said, “This is Captain Vuković. He’s running the show.”
Noble put out his hand. Vuković tried to crush it in a pointless display of male dominance. He had stubby fingers that felt like iron bands. Noble endured the bone-crushing grip with a straight face. “Good to meet you, Captain.”
“And your name is?” Vuković asked.
“Jake,” Noble told him.
“Do you have a last name?”
“Just Jake.”
The muscles at the corner of Vuković’s jaw tightened. “Okay, Just Jake. So long as you understand who is in charge.”
“It’s your rodeo, Captain.”
His gray eyebrows knotted. “What is rodeo?”
“It means you’re in charge,” Noble said. “I’m just here to offer advice.”
“If I need advice, I’ll be sure to ask,” Vuković told him. His eyes went to Eliška. He was obviously waiting for an introduction.
Noble said, “Meet my chauffeur, Ellie.”
They all shook hands. Noble thought he saw a flash of recognition in Hinson’s eyes, but the Secret Service agent was too well-trained to give anything away. He favored Eliška with a tight smile.
Noble returned his attention to Vuković. “What’s the situation, Captain?”
“Situation is American Secret Service department call me and tell me Germans run counterfeiting operation out of old factory. I put factory under surveillance, but nobody home. Place is empty.” He waved stubby fingers at the laptops on the folding tables. “I’m just about to breech when Americans tell me I must wait for consultant. So tell me, Mr. Just Jake. What is your expert opinion?”
“It’s empty,” Noble agreed. He hooked his hands in his pockets and chewed the inside of one cheek. The torpedo factory was a crumbling structure of brick and steel that dated back to 1930. The manufacturing side of the factory hugged the sea wall and adjoined the launch house, a three-story structure thrusting out over the cobalt waters of the Adriatic and topped by a weathered observation post. The SWAT team had their cameras pointed at doors and broken windows. Nothing moved in the dark labyrinth of abandoned halls. One of the feeds came from a thermal camera. It revealed inky blacks and deep blues. In the center of the launch house sat a large, dark angular shape. The size and shape was right for a printing press. At its base, Noble eyed a few muted blobs of lighter blue, edging toward green. He pointed, “But it hasn’t been empty long. Someone has been there recently. Your thermal camera is registering heat. See it?”
Vuković shrugged, unconvinced. “Is rats maybe?”
Noble conceded that point with a shrug. He indicated the shape to Hinson. “You see what I’m seeing?”
Hinson narrowed his eyes. “I think so.”
“Could that be the intaglio press we’re looking for?”
“It’s the right size,” Hinson said. “Can’t say for sure until we go in and have a look.”
Vuković said,
“Is settled then. We go in.”
Noble shook his head. “I don’t like it.”
Vuković turned to the knot of officers in combat fatigues. “Mr. Just Jake doesn’t like.”
They grinned appreciatively at their commander’s joke.
Noble said, “Captain, have you got bomb-sniffing canines?”
“Canines?” Vuković questioned.
Eliška translated from English to Italian which, given the proximity, is widely spoken in Croatia.
“Zagreb has K9 units,” Vuković said. “It’s takes one and a half hours.”
“Make the call,” Noble told him. “We can wait.”
Vuković gave a humorless laugh and shook his head. “I’m not waiting hour and a half, Mr. Just Jake. This is our job. This is what we train for. We go now.”
Noble said, “Captain, you send your men in there, they’re going to get killed.”
Vuković snorted. “Don’t tell me how to do my job.”
He barked orders and his men filed outside to a waiting van.
Noble cursed and circled around in front of Vuković. “Captain, listen to me. The man we are dealing with his is highly trained. He’ll be expecting this. Your men are walking into a trap.”
“You listen to me, Mr. Just Jake.” Vuković planted his fists on his hips. “Americans aren’t the only ones who know how to deal with terrorists. My men are also highly trained and experienced. They can handle any situation.”
“Then at least let me go in with them,” Noble said.
Vuković threw his head back and laughed. “You? With your long hair? You look like journalist. Do you even know how gun works?”
“I’ve spent some time on the range,” Noble assured him.
“This is real life, Mr. Just Jake. In shooting range, targets don’t shoot back. Besides”—he waved a hand at the cameras—“factory is empty.”
“That’s what worries me,” Noble said. He turned to Hinson, who only shrugged.
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