The Deceivers

by Alex Berenson

  Why the surprise? He’d surely known what was about to happen.

  Unless he hadn’t. Unless one of the other three had tricked Shakir into driving them over. But how would they have explained the AKs or the bomb in the trunk? Or had they fooled him into loaning them the car while they loaded it up? Shafer couldn’t find an answer that made sense. He knew the FBI didn’t care much about Shakir’s last seconds. It was focused on tracking his contacts, building cases against anyone who might have known about the attacks.

  But Shafer found himself desperate to understand Shakir’s psychology. Maybe he’d read too many Agatha Christie mysteries growing up. He found himself imagining Hercule Poirot, the little Belgian twirling his mustache . . . My friends, back to the mind of the killer. For it is there we find the answer. Yes, there.

  Shafer returned to the interviews of Shakir’s friends and family. Small-time coke dealing was lonely work. Lots of fake friends, few real ones. His parents had died years before. He didn’t work in an office, so he didn’t have coworkers to check up on him.

  As a result, his vanishing produced little reaction. His clients found new dealers. The employees at the bars where he dealt claimed they’d hardly noticed. A waitress at a fine-sounding place called the Dirt Hole told agents she assumed Shakir had been arrested.

  Of course, considering what Shakir had done, people might be playing down their relationships with him. But for the most part, they talked to the FBI willingly, and agents reported they were cooperative.

  Then Shafer saw a new 302, one that had landed only a few hours before.

  JEANELLE PITTS, date of birth September 9, 1995, was interviewed at DENNY’S, 4400 NORTH CENTRAL EXPRESSWAY, DALLAS. After being advised of the identity of the interviewing agent and the purpose of the investigation, PITTS was asked why her name repeatedly appeared in AHMED SHAKIR’s mobile phone records. She stated the following:

  She dated SHAKIR between mid-June and October of the previous summer. The relationship was sexual but not exclusive—

  Oh, those relationship experts at the FBI. Shafer read on. Pitts met Shakir at a bar in June. They had sex that night. Over the next four months, they saw each other a handful of times, always at her apartment. She believed he dated other women but had never asked him. She knew he dealt cocaine but claimed she had never used it with him or seen him use it. He had never spoken about Islam to her, never seemed in any way religious or expressed any political views at all.

  Then the surprise:

  PITTS stated that in October, SHAKIR told her they would need to stop dating for an indefinite period. SHAKIR stated he had gotten in “law trouble” and would need to stop dealing drugs for a while but that everything would work out. SHAKIR said she should not contact him but that he would contact her. When PITTS asked SHAKIR what he meant by “law trouble,” he declined to answer, and later asked her to “forget it.”

  PITTS stated she believed SHAKIR meant he had been arrested when he referred to “law trouble.” She expressed disbelief when she was informed that SHAKIR had not been arrested in the previous five years. She said SHAKIR might have invented the story as a way to break off their relationship but that she did not believe so. She and SHAKIR had always agreed either of them could end the relationship at any time.

  PITTS stated that she had not seen SHAKIR again. She did not know his exact address, and, in any case, preferred to respect his wishes—

  Again Shafer had to smile. He’d hand in his resignation this afternoon if Pitts had used the phrase respect his wishes. The rest of the interview offered nothing of note. Pitts had not seen Shakir again. She was shocked when the police said he had been one of the attackers. If she remembered anything else, she would call the agents, she said.

  The 302 concluded with a somewhat unusual note. Following the interview, the agents had rechecked arrest records in Dallas and nationally. They found no arrest reports for Shakir. The Bureau pulled Shakir’s fingerprints and DNA from his home. It would have found him in the national arrest database even if he’d used an alias.

  PITTS appeared willing to aid the investigation; it seems likely that SHAKIR lied to her in order to end the relationship.

  Another plausible theory. The FBI had interviewed more than a hundred people who knew Shakir. Pitts was the first to mention an arrest. She was surely wrong.

  Unless . . .

  Shafer pulled up the report from the waitress at the Dirt Hole. Lauren Hobart. She said she assumed Shakir had been arrested. The 302 report didn’t indicate if the agents who interviewed her had followed up. Probably not. They knew Shakir dealt, and they knew Hobart knew. They’d figure she had mentioned an arrest as the best explanation for his disappearance. Sooner or later, drug dealers got busted and went to jail.

  But what if Hobart had a specific reason to believe Shakir had been arrested? What if she’d seen something at the Dirt Hole that made her think he’d been targeted?

  Shafer considered calling the agents, asking if they had pursued that thread. But they wouldn’t talk to him without an okay from someone senior at FBI headquarters. Talking to Hobart and Pitts face-to-face would be faster and easier.

  Unfortunately, the last Washington-to-Dallas flight of the day took off in less than ninety minutes. Between D.C. rush hour traffic and the security lines, Shafer had no chance of making it. So be it. He could fly out in the morning. Knocking on doors at midnight was a mistake, anyway. Better to wait.

  He booked a flight and headed home to tell his wife, pleased with his progress. Wells wasn’t the only one who could handle the field. Shafer didn’t need Julie Tarnes to run interference for him either. So while Wells sunned himself in Bogotá . . .

  7

  BOGOTÁ

  Wells led Tony into the apartment, opened the door to the bedroom. The woman lay on her back, staring at the ceiling. She tried to scream as she saw them, but the tape over her mouth throttled her.

  Tony turned to leave. Wells blocked him.

  “We’re just gonna talk.”

  “I’m from Tampa, man. I deliver bags. Don’t even look inside them.”

  “Give me ten minutes.”

  Tony’s eyes blinked greed. “Ten million pesos.” Three thousand dollars.

  “Done.”

  “We talk, then we go? Promise?”

  “Promise.” Wells maneuvered Tony into the bedroom before the younger man could change his mind. “Tell her I’m going to cut her arms and legs open.” He pulled his knife. The woman squirmed wildly—

  “What?”

  “The hog-tie, I mean.” The knife wasn’t helping. Wells sheathed it. “Take as much time as you need. Tell her I’m sorry, I have to talk to her. I don’t speak Spanish, I couldn’t explain. I’m not going to hurt her. Swear on the Bible, if you have to. Swear on my life. My kids’ lives.”

  Tony knelt beside her, offered a stream of Spanish.

  After five minutes, he gave Wells a tentative thumbs-up. Wells cut her loose. “Tell her I’m pulling the tape. But if she screams, we’ll have to do it again.”

  Another chat.

  “I can’t promise what she’ll do when you take it off,” Tony said.

  Wells had to take the chance. This woman hated him more every second. He wasn’t going to torture her, so he needed to convince her to talk before she locked him out completely.

  Nobody offered advice for these moments at the Farm.

  Wells eased off the duct tape. She cleared her throat—

  And hawked saliva at him. The gob ornamented his nose, warm and wet. Wells wiped it away. Her eyes met his: Gonna hurt me, tough guy?

  “Had that coming.”

  His lack of anger seemed to calm her. She gave Tony a long speech, the words trilling together.

  “Her name is Elena. She’s not happy. To say the least.”

  “This her apartment?”

  A s
hort back-and-forth.

  “Her boyfriend.”

  So Martinez’s friend had moved Elena here as he prepared to sell his secrets and start a shiny new life in the United States.

  “She’s from Venezuela? Caracas?”

  Elena shook her head when she heard the city’s name. “Quito.”

  Quito. The capital of Ecuador, which, like Venezuela, had a hard-left government.

  “The guy’s from there, too? When did he move her here?”

  The back-and-forth was longer this time.

  “Yes, Quito, too. Last week, he called her, told her to come.” After Dallas. “He’d brought her here three times before. He’s married. He liked to take her to Bogotá when he was working.”

  So the apartment was more a love nest than a conventional safe house. Now Wells understood the location. The boyfriend was spending his own money, so he’d picked somewhere cheap. And out of the way, with no doormen or guards to pry.

  “This time?”

  “He called her, gave her money for a ticket, told her to come and wait for him. He promised that after this, he’d bring her to the United States.”

  So Martinez’s source expected his tip to convince the United States to accept not just him but his mistress? Maybe he was just nuts.

  “Ask her what’s in the safe in the closet.”

  “La caja fuerte?” Tony said. “En el armario?”

  She shook her head.

  “She doesn’t know.”

  “Thanks, Tony.”

  Tony asked something else. “Doesn’t know the combination either.”

  “Quién es el nombre?” Wells said to her. “Come on, what’s his name?”

  “Let me handle the Spanish,” Tony said. “You mangled that about four different ways.”

  “Tell her he’s missing, I want to talk to him. He has information, and I’ll pay for it.” Tell her I’ll buy her a unicorn. Tell her whatever. Just get the name.

  But nothing about this day was going to be easy.

  “Chinga tu madre,” Elena said to Wells. The words slow and clear so he’d understand.

  “Not very ladylike.”

  “Y tu padre.”

  “You know what that means?” Tony said.

  “I know what that means.”

  Now she was talking again. “She says she knows men like you, men with no hearts, who enjoy being cruel, menacing the innocent with your knives—”

  “I get it.” Tony’s translation had become a bit enthusiastic for Wells’s taste.

  “She says you want to cut her throat, it’s fine, but she has pride and she’d die before she tells you.”

  Sure she would. They were in soap opera territory now. This sort of over-the-top bravado rarely survived the first cut. Lucky for Elena, Wells wouldn’t be finding out. No more hurting this woman. Instead, he grabbed her smartphone from the bedside table.

  “Locked, señor.” Her first English word.

  “She’d die, sure,” Wells said to Tony. “Like all good telenovela heroines. But would she give up her phone? Because if she won’t tell me, I’m taking it so we can break in, check the call log and the texts.”

  She started to squawk as Tony explained.

  “I just want his name, where he lives, when he said he was coming here,” Wells said. “Por favor. I’m trying to help. Tell me, I’ll give you a thousand dollars for your trouble, you’ll never see me again.”

  Tony translated. As the answer came, he pulled a reporter’s notepad and wrote.

  “His name’s Hector Frietas. F-R-I-E-T-A-S. He lives in Quito. Married, two kids. Both grown, she thinks.” He handed Wells the pad. “His mobile number and address.”

  Wells tore the sheet, tucked it away. Hector Frietas. Must be the guy’s real name if he was planning to take her to the United States with him.

  Tony opened a browser on his phone. “Hector Frietas, Quito . . . I’m coming up with the Deputy Manager for Operations of the Banco Central del Ecuador.” The bank’s website revealed an unsmiling man in a gray suit. Late forties, maybe. He sat behind a desk, hands folded, like he was about to deny a loan. Elena nodded when Tony showed her the picture.

  A socialist banker. Odd. “Was he connected to the security services?”

  A short question that led to a long answer.

  “They never talked about his job. She says he’s nice, always kind to her, he loves her. He promises in the United States he’ll leave his wife, they’ll be together, have a family—”

  “It’s a wonderful life,” Wells said. “Did he tell her what he knew that would get them to the United States?”

  A short question, a longer answer.

  “Nothing like that. He called once after she got here, the day after she came. He said he thought he would see her in three or four days. Since then, nothing. And he doesn’t answer his phone.”

  Not what Wells wanted to hear. Still, Elena had given up the name. And Wells believed her. For the first time since he’d seen her in the apartment, the knot in his stomach unclenched. A few glasses of aguardiente, she’d be good as new.

  “What’s I’m sorry—”

  “Lo siento.”

  “Lo siento, Elena. Muy siento.” To Tony: “Tell her I thank her, the United States thanks her—”

  “How about I tell her to stay here and keep her mouth shut until we’re clear.”

  “Let’s go with that.”

  Wells counted out ten hundred-dollar bills from his pocket, left them next to the phone on the nightstand. He wanted to take the phone, but he worried she might yell. Anyway, he’d promised.

  “I really am sorry.”

  Her answer needed no translation. He saluted her as Tony turned for the door.

  Tony was still ahead of Wells as they reached the stairs.

  Below, the building’s front door opened. The men from the corner walked in. The guy in the soccer shirt, the one Wells had stared down, was in front. He saw Wells, raised his pistol in a sideways gangster grip, loose and sloppy. Showing off for his buddies.

  Tony stopped so quickly that Wells almost knocked him over. The guy downstairs yelled something.

  “He says put our hands on our heads.”

  Wells stepped beside Tony. “Back up. Behind me.”

  Tony ignored Wells, raised his hands.

  The Colombian put a foot on the bottom step, maybe twenty-five feet away. He grinned at Wells, wagged his left index finger, the sentiment universal: Who’s your daddy now?

  “Talk,” Wells murmured to Tony. “Keep him busy.”

  “Do what they say—”

  “Sí!” Wells yelled down the stairs. “Surrender!” He lifted his hands, slowly and showily. The Colombian looked over his left shoulder and muttered to the men behind him. The break Wells needed. He had to act before they realized he was armed.

  He dropped his right hand, reached behind his waist for the pistol, dropped the safety as he pulled it forward. He shouldered Tony left, against the wall of the building.

  A half second late, the Colombian turned back. Wells squeezed the trigger, knowing he didn’t have time for warnings, the first shot might be the last. The Colombian fired, too, the two shots echoing as one off the concrete walls—

  A neat hole appeared low in the Colombian’s yellow shirt. The pistol slipped from his hands and clattered down as he groaned. Wells fired again. This time, the round caught the guy in the forehead and tore through his skull, an inhuman sound, and he collapsed instantly—

  The second Colombian stepped forward, lifted his pistol—

  No morality in Wells now, no hesitation, a cat with claws outstretched. He fired again. The round tore into the guy’s chest. The Colombian stumbled back, looking up with real surprise. As if he could undo what had happened by refusing to believe it. He went to his haunches, and h
is head drooped. Wells took aim at the third Colombian, about to pull the trigger, when the guy turned and ran.

  Wells safed the 9-millimeter and shoved it into his waistband—and felt a wet spatter on his neck.

  He turned—

  Tony slumped against the wall, hands pressed high and prayerful to his sternum. Arterial blood dribbled through his fingers. His light brown skin was already fading, turning to papyrus, his life vanishing heartbeat by heartbeat. He was panting lightly, and his eyes were open. The fear in them told Wells that Tony had a chance if a surgeon could close whatever artery the bullet had hit.

  “You’ll be all right, get you to a hospital—” Wells chattering, trying to keep Tony conscious. “Walk with me and talk to me and say you’ll be my friend.” Wells put his arms under Tony’s knees and shoulders, carried him down the stairs as fast and sloppy as an overzealous groom.

  The acrid smell of gunshots lingered as Wells stepped over the dying men at the base of the stairs. He silently cursed Enrique Martinez for sending him here, for making him a killer twice more. All this for Hector Frietas’s name, a name Martinez should have given him. Wells wondered if Martinez had refused simply to prove that he wasn’t beholden to Wells or Duto or anyone else. In which case, the failure belonged to Wells, too. Maybe if he’d gone at Martinez differently . . .

  Wells expected to hear someone calling the police. But the building was quiet, its residents hiding in bedrooms and bathrooms, waiting for the plague to pass.

  At the front door, Wells listened, heard nothing. Probably the third guy was still running.

  Outside, he found Carrera 81L dark and empty. “Not far, Tony, I promise.” Tony didn’t answer. The blood sopping through his T-shirt.

  Wells turned right, hoping the cabbie had stayed. Otherwise, he’d have to hijack a ride to the nearest hospital. Tony couldn’t afford to wait for an ambulance, even if one would come here.