Storey went down to his equipment cage and put on his blue suit, white shirt, dress shoes, and conservative tie. They always traveled as businessmen, at least to get into a country. Businessmen might get searched at Customs but they didn’t get the real treatment the way someone with a ponytail would.
The mini Glock was in the shoulder holster under the dress shirt, which although it displayed buttons was fastened with Velcro. Their Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms credentials would get them on a plane in the United States. And from then on, no matter the number of connections, it was rare to pass through another metal detector. Even if they did, there were ways around airport metal detectors. That Glock pistols could pass through them unnoticed was an urban legend. The receiver was made from polymer, but the barrel and slide were both steel.
Storey’s cell phone rang. He checked the incoming number. Troy. “Where the hell are you?”
Troy was speaking into his phone in a barely audible whisper. “You’re going to have to come get me.”
Storey didn’t ask why Troy was whispering. His partner was obviously in some kind of situation. “So where you at?”
Troy whispered out an address in Alexandria.
“And what exactly is that?” Storey asked, just to be clear.
“Apartment building,” Troy whispered back. “Park on the west side. I’ll see your truck.”
“You don’t want me to blink my headlights three times?” Storey asked. “Carry a copy of Popular Mechanics under my arm?”
“Just hurry the fuck up,” Troy whispered louder.
Storey pocketed his phone. He had a feeling this was going to be good.
The apartment building was on Duke Street in Alexandria. Storey knew it; it was one of the places he checked out when he got orders to Washington.
He parked on the west side of the building as instructed. No one was in the parking lot except one guy on the far side. He was driving a car with D.C. plates and a Support Our Troops bumper sticker and the Christian fish symbol on the back, unloading his trash into the apartment building Dumpster so he wouldn’t have to pay the city for the extra bags.
No one was around any of the exits. Storey thought about going into the building, but the entrance was on the other side and there had to be a reason Troy told him to park here.
Deer never look up, because none of their natural predators is in the habit of dropping down on them from above. Which is why deer hunters use tree stands. Humans have the same bad habit, which is why whenever there was an up in the vicinity, Storey made a habit of checking it out.
As always, movement tends to catch the eye first. Someone was climbing down the side of the building, using the balconies. Storey had a pretty good idea who that might be.
He dialed Troy’s cell phone number. And was rewarded when the human fly stopped climbing and disappeared into the darkness of a balcony.
“What?” Toy whispered into the phone.
“I’m here,” Storey announced cheerfully. “Where you at?”
“I’ll be there in a minute,” Troy whispered. “Just hold on to your ass.”
“Where do I go to pick you up?” Storey inquired.
“Just ... fucking ... wait,” Troy snapped.
“You were in a such a big hurry,” said Storey. “I’ll go pull over by the entrance.”
“Just ... fucking ... wait ... right ... there,” Troy hissed into the phone.
“Quit fooling around,” said Storey, grinning as he looked up. “Where are you?”
“I’m ... coming ... down ... the side of the... fucking . . . building. Now shut up ... and ... wait.”
“Oh,” said Storey. “So you’re the naked black guy climbing down the side of the building. Okay.” He broke the connection, still wearing that smile.
The apartments seemed to start on the second floor, which left Troy a very high jump down to the parking lot. Storey was about to show mercy on him and drive over when Troy swung out onto a drainpipe and shinnied down. Not bad barefooted, Storey thought.
Back on terra firma, Troy anxiously waved Storey over before backing away into the darkness.
Storey leisurely started his engine and turned his headlights on.
Troy appeared again to wave him over a little more urgently.
Storey gave a couple of friendly taps on the horn.
When it became clear his partner wasn’t moving, Troy sprinted across the parking lot. He obviously tripped on something, because the sprint turned into a very fast hop. He grabbed the passenger door handle. “Hey, Ed, you want to unlock the door?”
There was a bright flash as Storey snapped a photo with the disposable camera he kept, as recommended by his insurance company, in the glove compartment in case of an accident. “One more,” he said. “Smile.” The flash popped again.
Then the lock clicked and Troy slid into the passenger seat, naked as the day he was born.
Storey paused to snap one more picture.
“Can we leave now?” said Troy.
“Someone isn’t coming down with your threads?” Storey asked.
“No,” Troy replied. “You wouldn’t happen to have a blanket in the redneckmobile here, would you?”
“Sorry,” said Storey.
“Don’t worry about it,” Troy assured him. “Camera but no blanket. I understand completely.”
“Don’t forget your seat belt,” said Storey, putting the truck in gear. “Safety first.”
“Yeah, we wouldn’t want to get pulled over, would we?”
“Do we need to get your car?”
“No,” said Troy. “I was planning on drinking, so I took the Metro and was going to catch a cab home.”
“Very responsible of you,” said Storey.
“Didn’t make any difference. My ass got sobered up real fast.”
“It’s kind of a cool night. Want me to turn the heater on?”
“Only if it’s not too much trouble.”
“No trouble at all.” Storey turned the heater on the first setting. “So. How did you find yourself in this unfortunate condition?”
“I don’t want to bore you,” said Troy.
Storey rolled his window down. “Does it feel stuffy in here to you?”
Troy watched his skin forming goose bumps, everywhere, and sighed. “Okay, I was at a bar in Old Town and met this lady.”
“Were you shipping out again?” Storey asked, rolling the window back up.
“Well, I am shipping out, aren’t I?” Troy demanded.
“As a matter of fact, you’re shipping out this morning.”
“See,” said Troy. “I’m always shipping out. I’m not a dog if I really am always shipping out.”
“Of course not,” Storey said reassuringly. “You crawled down the side of a building naked, but you’re not a dog.”
“I’m glad someone realizes it.”
“I’ll try not to distract you any more while you’re telling me what happened.”
Troy took him through it, being careful to emphasize, “And nobody mentioned anything to me about being married. So there I am, out on the balcony, with my wallet, phone, keys, pager, but no clothes. Why no clothes? I don’t know, maybe she had to stuff them under the couch or something. But since I don’t have my clothes, I’m trying to get that out of my head while I try to decide what to do next. Then I’m trying stay focused and not get hung up on going why me? But all I can think about is my mom. She always used to say that you never ask God, ‘Why are You fucking with me like this?’ Because He’s just going to do you like Job and say, ‘Who made the world, motherfucker?’”
“I’m giving your mom a pass on the motherfucker,” said Storey.
“But then I figure, I’ve got the wallet and keys and shit. So I’m like, okay God, I hear You now. I’m gone. I’m over the balcony.”
“Now I’m reading you,” said Storey. “But I’ve got just one question. You were climbing with both hands, I assume. So how did you manage the phone, wallet, keys, and pa
ger?”
“Stuffed the keys in the wallet, clipped the phone and pager to the wallet, and carried the whole thing in my mouth like a fucking squirrel carrying nuts.”
It was too easy. Storey let it go. “You’re lucky someone didn’t shoot you off their balcony.”
“Don’t think I don’t know it. I’m not Alexandria’s favorite color at the best of times, even with clothes on. But the Lord was with me, brother.”
“I’ll say amen to that,” said Storey. “So you experienced a religious awakening and you’re saved now, is that it?”
“Maybe. But I think I’d better take it slow. Start off by not fucking married women.”
“That’s probably best. You don’t want to rush into anything.”
“You’re not speeding, are you?” Troy asked, checking the dashboard.
“No, I’d just as soon not have to explain all this to a cop. Even though the Lord is with you.”
“No lecture, Dad?”
“Somehow I think you’ve absorbed all the lessons learned from this little experience, Son.”
“Good. Because I learned my lesson about getting laid on an operation last year in Thailand. I was really hoping I wouldn’t have to give up getting laid back here.”
“That’s up to you.”
Troy felt strangely satisfied. Anyone else, the first question they would have asked was: Was she black or white? But not old Storey. “By the way, where are we shipping out to?”
“Nuevo Laredo.”
“I figured. Are we flying to San Antonio and driving across, or flying to Monterrey and driving?”
“Monterrey. I want to be driving in a car with Mexican registration. And I don’t want to pick it up in Nuevo Laredo. We got to hurry. Lund’s team already got sent in.”
“How the fuck did that happen?”
“Usual big Army stuff. Somebody thinks he’s Patton, directing operations from behind a desk.”
“That’s fucked up.”
“That it is. You think we could figure out that al-Qaeda’s done best when they decentralized their decision making down to the lowest levels. And we’ve done best against them operating the same way.”
“A few A-Teams taking Afghanistan without one-hundred-page op orders was too good to last,” said Troy.
“Hey, I just thought of another question,” said Storey.
“Shoot.”
“Any money in your wallet?”
Caught off guard, Troy flipped it open and peered inside. It was empty. “Son of a bitch.”
Chapter Eighteen
“Something is wrong,” said Roshan Malik. “They suspect me.”
Beth Royale knew that every informant got paranoid. Some felt those accusing eyes on themselves twenty-four hours a day. Some only got twitchy every now and then. It was their handler’s job to get them through it.
“What makes you think so?” she asked. You never wanted to tell them they were imagining things. Mainly because you wanted them alert to danger, within reason. As the saying went, sometimes paranoids really did have people out to get them.
“They were always cautious speaking around me,” said Roshan. “Now they do not speak at all. Only small talk, and they act as if they are making sure of every word. Before they came to my home, now they have excuses. I can tell they suspect me by how they look at me. You must please get me out of this, Beth. Put me and my family into the Witness Protection Program. I will testify. I promise.”
“Take it easy,” said Beth. “First of all, we’re with you all the time. You’re safe. Second, this type of behavior from them is perfectly normal. They’re suspicious of everyone. Don’t skulk around and confirm their suspicions. Come right out and ask them why they’re acting strangely. If they accuse you of anything, ask them how that can be if they haven’t told you anything yet? If they want to suspect someone, suspect someone who knows something.”
Her calmness seemed to restore Roshan’s confidence. “Yes, yes, that is very good.”
“Then say that if they’re looking for someone who’s been talking too much, they should use you since you haven’t been involved. Don’t push it, though. Just throw out the suggestion and then drop it. Leave it to them.”
“Yes, Beth, very good. Throw their suspicions back into their face.”
“But don’t push it too hard. You and your brother-in-law are under indictment, after all. You’d like to know who’s talking. But take it easy on that.”
“Yes, good.”
“Is there anything else that made you suspicious?”
“No, no, Beth. I was being nervous. I see it now.”
“Don’t worry. You’re doing great. Everyone’s very happy with you.”
“Even this Mr. Timmins who never liked me?”
“Even he’s coming around,” said Beth. “Now how’s your little girl? I’ve been worried about her.”
“It was as you suspected. Just the flu, God be praised.”
“Kids are always sick. They play, and they pass whatever they have on to each other. I’ll bet she’s tired of being in the house?”
“Yes, very much. She wants to go outside and play.”
“That’s great. And the boys?”
Roshan Malik talked about his children for the next fifteen minutes. Then Beth passed him an envelope with his stipend and sent him on his way. She waited a few minutes for him to clear the area, and to settle the tab. She’d given a lot of thought as to the best place in L.A. not to accidentally bump into an al-Qaeda operative. And the bar at a four-star Beverly Hills hotel was definitely it. The Bureau would stand for it as long as they weren’t on the line for anything more than a club soda with lime.
But as soon as she got back to the Federal Building she intended to take a look at some video.
“If they never talked around Roshan, how can there be something wrong?” Supervisory Special Agent Benjamin Timmins demanded.
“They never talked in front of him,” said Beth. “But they talked when he wasn’t in the room. They go to his house and it’s all small talk and smiles. Before, when he left the room they used to huddle and plot. That’s how we got the Russian guns. Now they just sit there, not even saying a word to each other. It’s like they know they’re under surveillance.”
“That’s crap,” said Timmins. “You’ve been harping on this ever since the seizure at the port, like you wanted it to be a self-fulfilling prophesy.”
“I do not want it to be a self-fulfilling prophesy.” Calm down, Beth, she ordered herself. “Okay, Ben, then how do you explain all the clamming up everywhere we have a camera and a microphone?”
“Nothing’s going on,” said Timmins. “They’re being cautious. It could be anything. What do you think, Sondra?”
“I don’t see anything out of the ordinary,” said Dewberry.
Typical, Beth thought. If Timmins thought he saw angels fluttering outside the window, she’d be taking down a description of the wings. “Roshan feels it. He thinks something’s going on, too.”
“All CI’s get that way, you know that. He may even be picking that up off you.”
Beth had to count down from ten to keep from saying what she really wanted to. “I thought he was just being paranoid, too. At first. Then I watched the tapes. And now I think he’s right.”
“Watched the tapes? You don’t speak Arabic. How can you tell what’s going on?”
“I don’t have to speak Arabic to notice how people act. Have you seen the tapes?”
“I don’t have to. I read the transcripts when Washington sends them back from translation.”
“Do you want to see some highlights?”
“It doesn’t matter,” said Timmins. “We’re turning this case, including running Roshan, over to the L.A. office.”
“And why are we doing that?” Beth asked.
“Because that’s what a Fly-Away Team does,” said Timmins. “We come in, we assist the local field office on a counterterrorism investigation, and then we move on. We can’t tie
up a Fly Squad on case development. That’s a field office job.”
Suddenly it dawned on Beth why she’d been wracking her brain trying, unsuccessfully, to figure out the logic behind Timmins’s moves. Because she’d been thinking about making cases and running what looked like a valuable long-term informant. And Timmins wasn’t thinking about that at all.
As long as their Fly Squad was tied up on what seemed like a long, drawn-out case in L.A., it wasn’t available to respond to anything sexy like Chechens coming across the Mexican border.
So that was why she was going to have to turn Roshan over to the L.A. office. Probably the same reason the Russian arms shipment had been seized instead of played along. Timmins got his credit for the bust, and the L.A. office was getting her informant. Immediate results—everyone looked good. And as an added benefit, if she was right and the surveillance had been compromised somehow, the L.A. office would be holding the bag for it.
Timmins really was good. Beth decided not to let him know she was on to him. No matter how much she’d love to rub his face in it. This had to be saved for the exact right moment.
So she saw that Timmins was ready for a fight, and instead replied, as meekly as she was capable of, “All right, Ben.”
Timmins had suspicion written all over his face, but really, what could he say to that?
Chapter Nineteen
The hunter’s moon made the night landscape glow bright in Abdallah Karim Nimri’s night vision goggles. Too bright, but one of the penalties for having to move so quickly was not being able to choose the conditions he desired.
The four Ford Expeditions—two armored, two not—were spread out widely as they slowly climbed through the arroyo. No dirt bikes leading the way tonight. Rafael claimed they were required elsewhere. Nimri was furious at being cheated. But what could he do when they dismissed his arguments? He was totally dependent on Los Zetas, and they knew it. It was ever the same; the more money paid, the less value received.
He was not one of those brothers who did no training and no preparation, counting on the righteousness of their cause to obtain God’s protection. The Saudis were particularly like that, regarding themselves as God’s chosen people. Such arrogance tempted God’s wrath. But Nimri knew there were times, and this was one, when everything that could be done had been, and the rest was in God’s hands.
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