Threat Level

by William Christie

  “Jesus,” the younger agent blurted out.

  Moody nodded. “I heard that eight guys cleared the office at a dead run and headed home code three, lights and sirens, trying to delete the message before their wives opened it up.”

  “Jesus,” the younger agent repeated.

  “She never said a word about it,” said Moody. “And no one ever messed with her again. I got told the story, not by her, after I started working with her. I didn’t believe it at first, but I do now.”

  “Like I said, a real bitch,” the older agent replied.

  Moody nodded again. “But she can take care of herself. You go ahead, though. Do what you want.”

  The van didn’t get moved.

  Beth returned, without coffee, to a very quiet van, and went back to her binoculars.

  The radio began crackling with back-and-forth conversation. The supervisors were getting tired of waiting. All the units got a fifteen-minute warning to be ready to go in.

  The occupants of the van began putting on their body armor, and over that the navy blue windbreakers with gold FBI lettering.

  The agents of the Detroit office SWAT team, in their black assault jumpsuits, helmets, and MP-5 submachine guns, would be making the initial entry into the house.

  All the different posts checked in that they were ready. The command went out over the radio, and the SWAT team flowed into the house. Then agents came running in from everywhere. Beth shook her head at all the drawn pistols and shotguns, hoping none of the boys had an accidental discharge.

  As Beth and Moody came through the door, Supervisory Special Agent Benjamin Timmins was standing in the middle of the living room, trying to get the herd of agents under control.

  Beth immediately noticed a bookcase standing empty in a corner of the room. Which was both immaculate and spartan. She kept noticing what wasn’t there. No magazines on the coffee table, not even a TV Guide. Not so much as a crumpled gum wrapper, or half-full coffee cup.

  She walked past Timmins and into the kitchen, stopping only to put on a pair of latex gloves before opening the refrigerator. It was completely empty, but cold. A faint smell of ammonia cleaner. Nothing but cans in the pantry. No perishables.

  Timmins was still in the living room when Beth came out. “Let me guess,” she said. “Not a piece of paper in the whole house.”

  Timmins was frowning.

  Beth caught Moody’s eye, and he followed her outside. The yellow crime scene tape was already up, and a neighbor was standing there, watching the show. There were others, but he stood out. It wasn’t just that he was standing there in his T-shirt and boxer shorts, but that he seemed utterly unconcerned by the fact that he was standing out in public in his T-shirt and boxer shorts. Looking like he’d just got up, though it was late morning. White, male, late thirties. Beer gut. Unshaven, of course. Smoking a cigarillo.

  “That’s my boy,” Beth said to Moody.

  “Imagine my surprise,” he replied.

  “I’m Special Agent Royale,” said Beth, flashing her credentials according to regulation, even though the windbreaker made it somewhat redundant. “This is Special Agent Moody. Are you a neighbor, sir?”

  “Next door,” he said, with a toss of his head.

  Beth was smiling pleasantly. “Could I ask your name?”

  A complete change of posture. From professionally surly to bright as a new penny. Even standing up a little straighter. Moody knew he would have just gotten the surly part. He kept eyeing the sagging waistband of those boxers, hoping there wouldn’t be an accident.

  “Tom,” the new man said.

  “Tom,” said Beth, as if it was the best news she’d heard all day. “Tom . . .”

  “Oh, sorry,” he said, apologetic. “Tom Johansen. What do you want Muhammad for? Terrorism?”

  “Mr. al-Sharif seems to be missing,” said Beth, not quite answering the question. “What made you say terrorism?”

  “What else? All his Arab friends in and out all the time. Arabs everywhere. I remember when it wasn’t like that,” he confided. “I guess they won’t blow up their own neighborhoods.”

  Beth offered no comment on that. “Did you know him well?”

  “Not really. He wasn’t real friendly, but he wasn’t unfriendly, if you get me. Hello; how are you; have a nice day; good-bye. That kind of thing. I’m not complaining, though. Compared to some of the people on this street.”

  Moody couldn’t stand it. He’d be getting attitude and one-word answers, and here the guy was rambling on, trying to please her. He was a little curious about what old Tom thought was a bad neighbor, though. The stink of that cigarillo was making him nauseated.

  “When did you see him last?” Beth asked.

  “Must’ve been four days ago.”

  “That’s really good,” said Beth, giving up some approval to keep him sweet. “Most people couldn’t pin down a date like that. How do you do it?”

  “Oh, it was trash day,” said Tom.

  Moody hadn’t thought it was his extraordinary mental powers.

  “Trash day?” Beth said politely.

  “Yeah, I was a little late getting the trash out, and the wife was giving me hell. I hate that goddamned recycling, pardon my French.”

  Beth only responded with a sunny smile to spur him on.

  “Anyway, I’m dragging the can out from the garage, and there’s Muhammad on the curb. With his bin, about three lawn bags, full, and two cardboard boxes. I want to know how he’s going to pull this off, so I hang around. He doesn’t seem too pleased about me hanging around, but I do it anyway. The truck pulls up, and the guys are giving him that look, like there’s no way we’re taking all that. But Muhammad slips each of them a few bucks, and helps them throw the stuff in the truck. About an hour later he leaves.” Then he added, “I just happened to be going past the window then.”

  “Did you happen to see what was in his trash?” said Beth.

  “All wrapped up.”

  “How did he leave? His car’s still there.”

  “Couple guys picked him up. If he got kidnapped it wasn’t them.”

  “Friends?” said Beth.

  “They stayed in the car. Beeped the horn. That’s how I came to the window.”

  “Did Muhammad bring anything to the car?” Beth asked.

  Tom just looked puzzled.

  “Boxes?” said Beth. “Bags . . . suitcase?”

  “Oh, couple of duffel bags. Green, like army ones.”

  “Anything else?”

  Tom shook his head.

  “What kind of car?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Sedan, pickup, SUV, minivan?”

  “Compact, I guess. Toyota, Honda, something like that. It was red,” he added helpfully.

  “Did you happen to catch the license plate?” Beth asked.

  “No way.”

  “A Michigan plate? Out of state?”

  “Sorry.”

  “Is there anything else you can tell me about Mr. al-Sharif?”

  Tom shook his head again.

  “Well, thank you, Mr. Johansen. I really appreciate your help.” Beth passed him her card. “If you think of anything else, please give me a call.”

  A wide smile at that. “I just might. I just might.” He went to shake hands with her, then realized the card was still in his right hand. He went to put it in his hip pocket, then realized he didn’t have any. And instead of switching hands, he jammed the card into the waistband of his underwear.

  Moody rolled his eyes. As they walked back into the house, he said, “He was your boy all right. You can sure pick ’em.”

  “It’s a gift,” said Beth. “Careful you don’t look like that in ten years.”

  “Don’t even joke.”

  Timmins was still in the living room. Still frowning.

  “All the stuff that’s gone,” said Beth, “Al-Sharif dumped it. Three lawn bags, two boxes in addition to his trash receptacle. Waited for the sanitation truck, pai
d the crew to take it. And no, Ben, I’m not going to the landfill.”

  Timmins smiled faintly, as if the idea intrigued him.

  “He left half an hour later,” said Beth. “Red compact, no make, no model, no plate. Two males in the car, no description. He was carrying at least two army duffel bags.”

  “That’s just great news,” Timmins said sarcastically. “The whole place has been Windexed. Good thing we’ve got his prints on file. I doubt we’ll be getting anyone else’s.”

  “He’s off to do something,” said Beth.

  “I know,” said Timmins.

  13

  While it was possible to walk down a Bangkok street, catch a faint smell of incense, and turn a corner to encounter a breathtaking gilded palace or wat in the classic architectural styles of every century from the ninth to the nineteenth, there were only so many palaces and temples. The other Bangkok was rows of drab shop-houses, apartment buildings, high-rise office canyons, and dirty concrete towers. Seven million people jam-packed into an object lesson on the dangers of uncontrolled urban expansion, but also one of the world’s most exiting cities—mainly due to the Thai love of a good time.

  The outskirts were more spread out, though. On the far eastern edge of the city, Sukhumvit Road began in Bangkok and continued all the way to the Cambodian border. Few tourists made it out to Sukhumvit Road because it was far from all the attractions. But the road fed a growing business district that thrived on proximity to the airport. Popular with foreigners; good cover for Storey and Troy; good cover for their quarry—who lived in a ten-story apartment building that was home to a mix of nationalities.

  “He’s smart,” said Troy. They were sitting in a car, watching the building after a thorough reconnaissance of the area. “If he lived in a Thai neighborhood he’d stick out like a sore thumb. He blends in here.”

  “Good choice for security, too,” said Storey. “He’s in the middle of the building, so he’s hard to reach from the ground. He can look out, but not many can look in. And he stayed away from the top of the building—too expensive, attracts too much attention. What do you think?”

  Troy consulted his notes. “He walks around the neighborhood, but not on any kind of routine or regular schedule. Which means we can’t take him on foot outside, and that was my first choice. He parks his car in the underground garage—drives in, drives out. Security and cameras in the garage, so forget about that. The way I see it, we either take him in his car or in his apartment. Doing a vehicle snatch in Bangkok traffic? Yeah, makes the takedown easy, but the getting away is a bitch.”

  “I agree,” said Storey. “We’ve got to search the apartment anyway, we might as well take him there.”

  This was for their own peace of mind, since the surveillance team had already done the full-court press on the target. Full-time photo and video observation. Tapped his phone and followed him around to intercept his cellular calls. Bounced a laser off his apartment windows to listen in on what was happening inside. The only thing they didn’t do, for fear of compromise without enough payoff in return, was physically bug his apartment and car.

  Storey and Troy already knew about the building security, through the simple means of sending in one of the surveillance team to ask about renting an apartment. Foreigners were concerned about security, and the management obliged. The previously mentioned cameras and attendants in the garage. Security cameras covering the outside of the building. A manned desk in the lobby. An alarm system in each apartment, with motion sensors and wired windows and doors. A private security company took care of the response. Actually, a lot better than most buildings in Washington.

  Nothing they considered insurmountable. Hollywood loved the spectacle of rewiring security cameras and cracking alarm system PINs with portable computers as the seconds agonizingly clicked down. But reality was much more straightforward.

  The most valuable information they’d received from the surveillance team member/apartment hunter was a list of the numbers and locations of the empty units, all of which he’d insisted on seeing.

  Storey made the decision to go based on the information that came in every day from Washington. The CIA had intercepted the missile shipment before it cleared customs, inserting GPS transponders into the missile canisters so they could track them anywhere in the world. The missiles had been shipped out to the Philippines, and the CIA was preparing to move against Majed Ismail and his Thai network. With all that going on, the disappearance of Ismail’s driver wouldn’t get either side very worked up.

  Storey and Troy were both in street clothes, but were also wearing wigs, moustaches, and eyeglasses. Both Delta and the SEAL DevGroup were trained in covert operations by the CIA, and the CIA loved disguises. A person’s appearance could be changed very quickly with easily obtainable ingredients. Though there were also very expensive, custom-made full head and hand prosthetics would allow, say, a Caucasian to drive unnoticed in an African city. In fact, part of Troy’s personal reputation stemmed from his demand, during his introductory Green Team training, for what he called a “white boy mask.”

  They waited until night, always the best time to make an approach. The apartment hunter had been very intrigued by the security camera monitors at the front desk, and picked out some dead space they didn’t cover. Part of the wall at the rear of the apartment grounds was masked by the landscaping, and that’s where they went over, accompanied by one of the surveillance team. They were still masked from the well-lighted part of the grounds, and the pair of security cameras on each corner of the building.

  Their weapon against these would be a simple pen-sized laser pointer. Obligatory for any modern business presentation, obtainable in any office supply store. Attached to a miniature camera tripod, the kind that can be clamped to anything, like the branch of a tree. Which is what they did, aiming the red laser dots at the lenses of the two cameras. Anyone watching the scene from an inside monitor would see the screen brighten and bloom, and nothing else. Storey and Troy simply walked up to the building.

  The first-floor apartment terraces were up high enough that no burglar could jump and climb into them. Except, that is, if you had a few feet of climbing rope with a titanium hook on the end to grab the steel railings. Once they were on the first floor, all Storey and Troy had to do was stand on the top of the railing, grab the bottom of the railing of the upstairs apartment, and climb on up.

  As soon as they were up, the surveillance team member clicked off the laser pointers, stuck them in his pocket, and retreated back over the wall. If a guard had even noticed the problem, by the time he played with the brightness and sharpness controls, pounded on the unit a couple of times, and thought about calling someone, everything was back to normal.

  The second-story apartment was one of the empty ones. The prospective tenant had also noticed that the alarm systems in the empty apartments were not turned on. And why should they be? There was nothing in them, and no one wanted a leasing agent to set it off during a showing.

  As Storey came over the railing, Troy was picking the lock on the sliding glass door. Everything was going smoothly. Until a small dog began barking wildly in the apartment next door.

  Storey kept one eye on the next-door terrace and one on Troy. Dogs were always the biggest problem. People were lazy and stupid, but dogs noticed everything.

  After a couple of minutes of steady barking, a light popped on in the apartment. And Troy didn’t have the lock picked yet. Storey felt around in his back pocket and dug out a dog treat. He lobbed it onto the other terrace, then grabbed Troy and pulled him into the corner of their terrace, out of sight.

  They sat wedged in tight together, listening. The dog still yapping, a glass door sliding open. A man’s voice in Spanish saying to the dog, “Qué es?” As soon as the door opened the dog charged out to the edge of the terrace railing, still barking. Then it stopped abruptly, amid faint crunching sounds. Across the gap between the two terraces, a tired human sigh. The same voice to the dog, “Vamos.�
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  The door slid shut. Storey waited, listened. The surveillance team member watching that side of the building through a high-powered spotting scope came through his radio earpiece. “Light’s off. No movement.” Storey pressed his radio Send button twice to break squelch, indicating he’d received the message. A peek around the corner confirmed it. He pointed Troy in the direction of the door again.

  Troy didn’t like electric lock picks, didn’t like the noise they made. So he had to get all the pins in the lock tumbler depressed manually. In the dark. By feel.

  Storey heard a faint click as the tension wrench turned. Sliding doors were noisy; Troy was moving it an inch at a time. No bar in the door; agents didn’t like to bend over and fool with it while doing a showing.

  Inside the apartment they paused only long enough to ease the door back and lock it again.

  Listening at the interior door for footsteps in the hall. Opening the door, one eye peeking out into the hall. No cameras in the halls. People didn’t like that. There were cameras in the stairways and elevators. They took the stairway, leading with the laser pointer before turning a corner.

  One might assume that the guard watching the monitors, if there was a guard watching the monitors instead of reading a magazine, eating a little snack, or catching a bit of night shift shut-eye, would notice the succession of camera flashes proceeding through the building and think something was amiss. But security guards didn’t think that way. They thought they were dealing with a succession of equipment gremlins.

  There was another empty apartment on the sixth floor, one floor up and two over from the target’s apartment. Storey stood guard while Troy picked the lock. Ironically, the dead bolt opened easier than the terrace’s sliding door.

  Inside another empty apartment, Storey paused to check out the alarm controller box. An alarm system with room motion sensors meant the system had to be turned off while the occupant was at home. But higher-end systems had settings to deactivate the motion sensors and leave the doors and windows armed against intruders. This wasn’t one of them—all the better.