Susan knew Casey and Jim were right, but she had never thought someone would ever want to kill her. For any reason. And even if the threat wasn’t real, just the thought that it might be frightened her. She sipped her coffee and stared at the trash can across the room, still thinking through her new problem. “I guess we can’t do that.”
“Hell no, we can’t,” Casey said. “Do you know how old pizza for every meal would get after a month?”
Susan laughed and looked up at Casey. “They deliver Chinese too.”
“Yeah, but not beer,” Casey said.
There was a knock at the open door, and Phil Davis walked in. “Beer? Are you guys planning a party? I can bring some tunes. I just got TimeLife’s ‘British Invasion’ collection. We’re talking every song the Beatles ever recorded. It’s awesome.”
“You’re shittin’ me, right?” Casey said. “Tell me you only listen to that crap because you think chicks dig it.”
“You don’t like the Fab Four?” Phil asked, unable to comprehend the fact that some people actually didn’t.
“They’re overrated,” Casey answered.
“No, Phil. We’re not planning a party,” Susan said, ending the debate. “Casey and I were just talking about the fact that he might not be the only person in this room with a bullseye on his forehead.”
Phil was definitely confused now, but he didn’t press the issue. “What did Jim want to talk to you two about after the meeting?” he asked, thinking he was changing the subject.
Casey fielded the question. “He just wanted to thank Susan for helping Pete Grozny with his report on the Baltic Venture hijacking.” He didn’t know if Susan wanted to tell her friend anything more specific about the possibility that she was a potential assassin’s target any more than she already had. He figured Grozny’s death was all the buzz at IWG right now, so he thought his answer was as safe as any he could give.
“Yeah, I still can’t believe he’s dead,” Phil said. “And what timing, huh? After Bill O’Reilly just talked about that report last night.”
“You saw it too?” Susan asked.
“No,” Phil said. “George told me after the meeting. With that exposure, old Pete might have been able to wrangle a book deal out of the whole thing when it’s all over.”
Susan looked at Casey, the worry back in her eyes. Casey saw her unease and said to Phil while still looking at Susan, “I wouldn’t go that far. Bill never mentioned anyone’s name. He just said the report came from IWG. And it was just a quick statement,” Casey added, trying to downplay the importance of the company’s unexpected publicity.
“Still,” Phil said as he poured more coffee into his CIA souvenir mug, “sucks that the guy died before he could bask in the recognition. He might have at least gotten a raise out of it.”
“I have to get back to work,” Susan said. She downed the last of her coffee and threw the styrofoam cup in the trash as she stormed out of the break room.
“What did I say?” Phil asked after Susan was gone.
“Nothing, man. She’s just having a bad morning, that’s all. She’ll be all right by lunchtime,” Casey said, though he wasn’t sure if she would. “Talk to you later, Phil.” Casey left the economist to his coffee and thoughts.
Susan wasn’t all right by lunch. It was more like five o’clock. At least by then she was well enough to ask Phil if he would give her a ride home. Casey hoped she would tell her friend about what had her on edge. Maybe Phil would be able to bring her back to her old self enough that she could concentrate on something other than a nebulous death warrant that probably didn’t exist.
Casey kept his distance for most of the rest of the day at the IWG offices. He didn’t think there was much more he could do or say that Jim or he hadn’t already tried. He didn’t want to make things worse by being a burden—the uninvited guest who wouldn’t leave. And even though he knew Jim was talking more to Susan than him in the conference room that morning, Casey was listening. Jim Shelton had earned Casey’s respect from the first day Casey showed up at IWG, and whatever advice Jim gave was obviously born out of years of experience. Casey decided to follow that advice.
George Smithfield had a company laptop that he was able to lend Casey, and although George’s cubicle wasn’t as large as Susan’s, he did have an extra chair. Casey moved in for the day to try and do a little more research into the holes that still existed in the Baltic Venture story as told by Casey Shenk and the Intelligence Watch Group. Susan did the same.
By mid-afternoon, Susan came to George’s desk. She was surprised to see Casey still in the office, but she was grateful he had given her some space. She was still a little shaken by the morning’s revelations, but the work seemed to take her mind off of things. She threw a smile his way and handed a piece of paper to George, who read over the brief message quickly as Susan leaned on his desk. “I just got a call from my contact in Qom. Colonel Ahmad Rafi Alam is dead.”
“Dead?” George said.
“More precisely, he was executed. My contact said the word in Iran is that he was given up by Ja’afari as a lone wolf who had been making deals with IRGC money he didn’t have control over.”
“But the leadership didn’t buy it,” Casey said.
“I don’t think so either, otherwise General Ja’afari wouldn’t be retiring,” Susan agreed.
“And he was asked to retire instead of being put in front of a firing squad because he’s too high profile.” George was just starting to understand what it meant to be an analyst, and not just a researcher. He kind of liked it.
“Sounds like you were right on the money with that one, then,” Casey said to Susan. “Good work, ma’am. George here also found out something to firm up our theory. Tell her, George.”
George smiled and swiveled his chair back to his computer. After a series of mouse maneuvers, a grainy black-and-white photo of a middle-aged man in front of an airplane fuselage popped up on the monitor screen. “Say hello to Taras Minko.”
“And he is?”
“Your transporter,” Casey said.
“Mr. Minko is a Ukrainian-born arms dealer,” George explained. “He works the North Africa circuit, primarily. And get this, he had two heavy-lift prop jobs waiting on an airfield in East Algeria with a filed flight plan that had him leaving on August 5th for Kano, Nigeria, with a follow-on to Tanga, Tanzania.”
“Okay,” Susan said. “How does that help us?”
“He left as scheduled,” George said, “but he left empty.”
“Because his load never made it,” Casey said.
Susan quickly put the story together. “A load of S-300 missiles.”
“Bingo,” Casey said.
Susan was impressed. The transportation of the missiles from Algeria to Iran was one of the puzzles that put into question the entire theory of an illegal arms deal being facilitated by the voyage of the MV Baltic Venture. George had apparently solved the most difficult part—at least, he came up with a highly probable explanation. And that was really the name of the game, wasn’t it? Finding the most probable explanation.
“How did you come up with this guy?” Susan asked.
“Well, when I was looking into black market transportation possibilities, I started to lean towards airlift,” George said. “That seems to be the vehicle of choice on the African continent. It wasn’t long before I came up with the name Viktor Anatolyevich Bout. The name sounded Russian, so I ran it by the guys in the Russia cell. Most of them took the rest of the day off after hearing about their boss, I guess, but since Jim said Barry Messick was the go-to guy for now, I figured he would still be around. Barry’s a smart guy. He didn’t even have to look anything up. He told me everything they had on Viktor Bout. Well, turns out Bout retired after he made the radar screen in the U.S. and elsewhere.”
“A little too much exposure,” Casey said.
George continued, “We did a little more digging and found out that this guy Taras Minko kind of took over the operation when B
out stepped down. I made a few calls, and we came up with the flight information. That’s just too much of a coincidence to discount. I think it’s solid.”
The two analysts and Casey talked for a while longer before quitting time. Everyone, including Jim Shelton, was happy with the progress they had made that day. The facts and circumstances surrounding the Baltic Venture and the arms sale to Iran were lining up perfectly with their theory of what really happened. Despite how off-the-wall the whole thing may have sounded two weeks ago, no one at IWG thought it was anything other than the truth.
Casey returned to the Econo Lodge after a brief stop for dinner ala 7-11. While he made his way through a box of Cracked Pepper and Olive Oil Triscuits and finished off his first Diet Coke of the night, Casey watched television. He was flipping between CNN, Fox News, and the Mets/Rockies game when he stopped to catch a sound bite of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The story behind the clip was the Prime Minister’s public condemnation of Iran’s repeated violation of and disregard for the United Nations sanctions already in place against them. There were no specifics to back up Netanyahu’s accusations. Casey figured that was because the Islamic Republic’s past actions were well-documented and already on public record. He knew Israel needed to remind the world before the Ankara talks that Iran couldn’t be trusted, so there was nothing new there. What interested Casey more was Iran’s response.
There was only a cursory mention of the rebuttal by Manouchehr Mottaki, Iran’s Minister of Foreign Affairs. But Casey knew there was more to the rhetoric. He moved over to his laptop on the small desk in the room and went to the official website of Iran’s Foreign Ministry. He scrolled through the translated page until he found the press release. Just as Casey thought, Iran provided the specifics the American media omitted by picking and choosing which sound bites to air.
Iran flatly denied that there was ever any clandestine deal with Russia to procure air defense missiles. “No shit,” Casey said to the computer screen. The Iranian statement was true in that the Russian government had nothing to do with the deal. The denial told Casey two things. One, Iran understood the implications of being accused, again, of willfully opposing the collective world norms on good behavior—namely, “no nukes for you.” And two, Israel called them out.
Casey minimized the window and did a search for the full text of Netanyahu’s statement. There. In the second paragraph. The Israeli Prime Minister announced that Iran had attempted to smuggle illegally purchased S-300 missiles on a ship from Russia to Algeria. He praised the Russian Navy for stopping the shipment before it reached the hands of terrorists. The next part of the text was the scathing condemnation that was picked up by the American news stations. Casey smiled, feeling vindicated that Israel provided the primary source material to back the theory he had developed what seemed like ages ago. It also gave credence to what he believed was the likely answer to the question of who took a shot at him outside the Sunset Tavern, killing Mike instead.
Three paragraphs from the bottom, Casey’s smile disappeared. Benjamin Netanyahu admitted to tipping off the Russians to the fact that the missiles had disappeared from a stockpile in Kaliningrad. After giving the Russian Navy kudos for their actions, the Israeli Prime Minister threw the Russian government under the bus. He let the world know that Russia was not able to keep control of its own military—people or weapons. Not only did this all but guarantee the loss of Russia’s support for Israeli interests at the P5+1 talks, but it put a hole in the IWG analysis of why Israel would tell Russia about the hijacking in the first place. While he was confident that he and Susan were right about what happened, he was less certain now about the why. And knowing the reasons behind Israel’s motives were key to understanding the reasons behind the attempt on Casey’s life.
Casey didn’t like the doubt that now circulated through his mind. He needed to retrace the route that brought him from re-stocking Mt. Dew in Savannah to trying to solve his own murder before it happened. That was the more immediate concern, after all, notwithstanding the international intrigue and potential geopolitical implications. It all started with a blog post, so Casey logged into Middle-Truths and read. After the first story of the Baltic Venture hijacking, Casey’s vending truck was sabotaged. That was the work of a Russian ex-con, who paid for his mischief with his own life. Bad karma, Casey guessed.
The second posting Casey wrote about the incident implicated Israel had a hand in informing the Russians about the stolen missile shipment. That was followed in short order by a rifle shot that punched a hole through his friend’s skull. Casey was certain the shot was meant for him. The brainstorming by Casey and the analysts of IWG concluded that Israel was the likely culprit in the sniper attack. The thinking was that Casey, by mentioning Israel at all, had opened a can of worms that someone wanted closed as soon as possible. But Casey had just read a statement by the Israeli Prime Minister that admitted everything Casey had exposed. So what threat did he really pose?
Casey went to the mini-fridge and took out another Diet Coke. He checked his watch. Nine forty-seven. He decided he wouldn’t be going to bed any time soon, so he cracked open the can and sat back down at the computer.
Two times in as many weeks, Casey had almost been killed. The first attempt on his life he understood. The second, not really. Particularly after what he just learned. If he had gone so far as to accuse Israel of the hijacking, maybe he could see their concern or anger over that bit coming to light. And he didn’t put it past Israel or any government, including his own, to decide on an assassination on friendly foreign soil as a viable course of action in that case. Bad form, maybe, but not beyond the realm of possibility. Another scenario occurred to Casey as his vision blurred from staring at the laptop screen, not actually reading, but lost in thought.
If Alam and Ja’afari were acting on their own in the Islamic Republic, who’s to say Israel was not dealing with the same type of situation? Casey thought it was likely that Benjamin Netanyahu had his arms around the hijacking and political chess with Russia and Iran, but he might not be aware of any operation to kill a private American citizen for pointing out the not-so-obvious. Casey picked up the phone to call Susan. He wanted to talk this out with her and get her take on the new path he was going down.
Casey stopped dialing after the first three numbers. Maybe calling Susan wasn’t such a good idea. She was already under the impression that she was in the crosshairs of an Israeli assassin. If it turned out that gunman was working outside his government’s control, unrestrained, Susan could be in much greater danger than she imagined. And Casey was sure she would come to the same conclusion. No need to upset the woman any more than she already was.
Casey pulled up his e-mail and went to his inbox. He opened the copy of the IWG report on the Baltic Venture that he had George forward to him earlier in the day. He read it twice. Casey went back to the discussion he had with Jim Shelton that morning about Casey’s run-in with the stranger at Bar 50—the man Susan thought might be hunting her.
The difference between the commentary on Fox News and the IWG report was the mention of an Israeli-perpetrated hijacking. Casey initially thought Bill O’Reilly and Fox omitted that part for fear of losing viewers and being branded as “anti-semites.” Now, Casey believed it was just prudent journalism. The report from the Intelligence Watch Group only said it was plausible that Israel was behind the hijacking of the Baltic Venture. Fox News was probably wise not to perpetuate a rumor that had yet to be substantiated beyond deductive reasoning. In that sense, IWG could have come off as shooting from the hip if Pete Grozny had not framed that piece of the story as a question, admitting a lack of hard, fast evidence to support it.
Casey reached for the box of Triscuits on the foot of the bed. It was empty. He frowned and put the box in the trash can and had a sudden craving for a cigarette. Since he hadn’t purchased a pack in years, Casey was out of luck. He knew the best way to fight the urge to walk a block to the convenience
store and pay the ungodly expensive price for a pack of Camels was to keep himself occupied.
The revelations and events of the past two days kept bouncing in his head, looking for a place to land. Casey hoped they would come together in some orderly fashion that he could make sense of it all. He had already decided he couldn’t talk things over with Susan. Not yet, anyway. That left only one available medium to try and work everything out. He opened the window for the Middle-Truths blog and began writing.
Chapter 37
Casey walked through the doors of the Intelligence Watch Group offices a few minutes before ten in the morning. The noise level was abnormally high, and he saw people spilling out of the conference room. Several IWG employees were already at the water cooler or in the break room. All of them were talking. Casey wasn’t aware that so many people worked at IWG, and for the first time since coming to New York, he felt out of place. The jeans and t-shirt ensemble stood out amongst the sea of Dockers and neckties.
Casey noticed groups of people heading for the stairs. He had forgotten that IWG occupied two floors of the office building, which explained his ignorance of the number of employees the company had. He saw Susan exit the conference room with her cell phone in-hand. She was manipulating buttons as she hurriedly made her way towards her cubicle. She almost ran Casey over when she stopped and looked up.
“There you are. I was just going to call your hotel room.”
“What’s going on?” Casey asked, hoping to get an explanation for all the commotion.
Instead, Susan replied, “The boss wants to talk to you.” She turned around and headed back in the direction of the conference room she just left. When she noticed Casey wasn’t on her hip, she quickly turned around. “Come on!”
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