by Rick Jones
Now, with his team on the move, each man knew their contacts and those would move them unseen into the marked territories. Border patrol and certain passport sentries had been notified and paid well to turn a blind eye, with some receiving six-figure sums. Tel Aviv, however, would prove far more difficult to enter, but certainly not impossible. As diligent as Israel was about border security, there were those from the Arab underground who would escort the Man from Paris through established channels. This was the only measure Ahmed Jaziri had aided in since his ties to certain terrorist organizations was valued by the principals. Without so much as forking over a bitcoin, Jaziri had assured the Bangladeshi that he would have an associate see the Man from Paris to Tel Aviv, since this contact would be purely motivated by his devotion to Allah.
As the Man from Paris began his journey to Tel Aviv and the Man from Munich to D.C., the Bangladeshi drove west towards Rome. Since countries in the European Union did not require passport entry from country to country, as long as you were a member of the Union, the Bangladeshi had no problems as he was registered as a Parisian under an assumed name. So, with most of the obstacles having been rendered somewhat obsolete but not entirely dismissed, there were, on occasion, point stops due to driving a truck that transported perishable items like vegetables. But within the bed of the vehicle was a hollowed-out space that hid the suitcase of the False Prophet, a stash hole. After cursory checks from agents whose examinations didn’t amount to much, he was allowed to move along.
Taking periodic glances in the rearview mirror, the Bangladeshi noted the prosthetic pieces that adhered to his features as though they were a part of him. Even with his alterations, he believed that no man or woman who was under the microscopic eye of world authorities should simply be at ease with what they looked like. So, he reshaped his cheeks and his chin with prosthetic pieces with spirit gum adhesive, as well as to sport a faux moustache that was thick enough to overlap his top lip.
As the hours pressed on with the Bangladeshi careful to stay within the speed limits, he ended up in Lucerne, Switzerland. As the citrusy colored streamers of light started to show themselves along the eastern horizon, the Bangladeshi pulled over into a rest area and set up an Ismarsat BGAN satellite and laptop system. The benefit of this terminal was to connect a laptop computer to broadband Internet in usually remote locations. But as long as the system had a line-of-sight to one of the three geostationary satellites that existed in order to receive a feed, then he could transmit and broadcast from any location without fear of appropriation from outside sources. Within seconds, as long as the battery lasted, the Bangladeshi would have global coverage.
Onscreen, as snow showed for a brief moment before the white noise disappeared, Ahmed Jaziri’s image came online. The man’s hair was in a wild tangle. Nevertheless, he still had the presence of mind to don sunglasses to hide much of his features when he answered the call.
“Bangladeshi,” was all he said, the greeting flat.
“Ahmed, my people are on the move. One goes to Washington, the other to Tel Aviv.”
“Excellent,” said Jaziri. “Excellent. Now that the pieces are moving into position, have you allotted a time for the detonations?”
The Bangladeshi nodded. “A synchronized strike will be timed accordingly to the time zones.” Then he spelled out the mission plans in detail, with Jaziri responding through the course of the discussion with slight nods of agreement.
And then from Ahmed Jaziri. “Excellent. But let it be understood, Bangladeshi, as much as I like you, as much as you’ve been a friend to me over the years, this is still business. And business changes everything. I will expect these units to go off as agreed upon since money has been paid. Remember what I said about failure—it’s not an option here. Your life belongs to me until the final stroke. Should you succeed, rest assured that you will remain safe. Fail me—” Jaziri let his words hang.
“There will be no failures. I’ve assured you of that.”
“I’m spelling out the facts of our agreement, Bangladeshi, should unknowns enter the picture that you did not plan for. In my life, I have come to realize that such interventions enter at times when you least expect them—things you cannot plan against.”
“I’m confident, Ahmed, that everything will go on without a hitch.”
“For your sake, Bangladeshi, I hope so.”
“And your associate in Tel Aviv?”
“He’ll be waiting for your operative—the Man from Paris, I believe he’s called.”
The Bangladeshi gave Ahmed Jaziri the location and time for the two to meet.
“My man will be there,” said Ahmed Jaziri. “And believe me, the Middle East will be celebrating once these matters have concluded.”
“Your man in Tel Aviv, does he know what’s about to happen?”
“No. Just that a great thing is about to happen. But he knows nothing.”
“And it’s to stay that way, too. The last thing we need is someone with a loose tongue to draw suspicion.”
“Stop being paranoid,” said Jaziri. “You worry too much.”
“Paranoia is what kept me alive all these years. I take nothing for granted. Nothing.”
And then from Ahmed Jaziri: “Perhaps you should get some sleep. You look tired.”
“I’ve been driving through the night.”
“Let’s not fall asleep at the wheel, Bangladeshi. Go somewhere and rest. And stay in contact. I want to know every move your people make, where they are and what they’re doing.”
“Understood.”
“I assume you can contact your team without the possibility of being intercepted.”
The Bangladeshi nodded. “Each man is equipped with a number of burners,” he told him. A burner was a cellphone that had no registered operator or purchaser, so a person could use the phone and then toss the unit away to assure the impossibility of being tracked.
“Excellent,” Jaziri answered. “And remember our deal and the consequences of failure. You don’t want to cross me otherwise, believe me.”
“You keep saying that.”
“I’m merely emphasizing a point, Bangladeshi. I think a half billion-dollar purchase gives me that right.”
The Bangladeshi stared at the screen with a flat appearance.
“Now,” Jaziri went on, “get some sleep.”
The screen went dead.
The Bangladeshi closed the lid to his laptop unit, fell back into his seat, and stared out the windshield. The area was pristine in what could have been considered as God’s country, he thought. The surface of the lake shimmered with caps reflecting morning light and the trees were in full bloom.
As much as he enjoyed Ahmed Jaziri in the past as a friendly associate, his threats were becoming tiresome. Yes, this was business, he got that. But the annoying little intimidations were also becoming unnecessary pressures. The Bangladeshi always operated under cool extremes. But Jaziri was making it clear that the Bangladeshi would have a short shelf life as though he were a perishable good about to go bad, should he disappoint. And this was something the Bangladeshi didn’t appreciate at all—these threats that were hardly veiled.
The Bangladeshi nodded as though he was in a match of self-debate between his ego and alter ego. Succeed or not, perhaps it would be best if he put Ahmed Jaziri in his place by pointing the hollow eye of a suppressed weapon at his face. Surely, his respect for him would return with his apologies if his threats were meaningful and true.
Perhaps.
Starting the vehicle, the Bangladeshi would know no sleep until he reached Rome.
Putting the truck into DRIVE with the gears ratcheting in protest, the Bangladeshi went to greet his future.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The West Bank
Saheem Baghdadi considered himself to be a conduit to Allah. Though a low-level acolyte to the principals of the extremist machine, Baghdadi was a crusader by way of espionage. He was to be heard but
never seen, and someone who reached out via the chatrooms to entice and to lure individuals in the name of his god. He had established within young minds a sense of romanticism, which was a strong tool for recruitment. And now that the United States was pulling their forces from the Middle East, it was time for the masses to rise in the name of Allah to reestablish Sharia Law where al-Qaeda, the Islamic State, and the Taliban ruled. Become the soldiers of Allah and rule along the sides of true kings, future kings, and kings who would destroy the infidels and bring to the land the policy of One Rule under the One True God! It was all propaganda and disinformation, of course, but it was also a campaign that was highly effective as the online views grew from the thousands to the tens of thousands.
Online, Arabs had railed against the Americans, the Great Satan, and Israel, as well as those who were in league with the United States. Hatred filled the chat rooms which demanded an end to their enemies and to all the infidels who bowed to gods that weren’t Allah. Rally cries trumpeted over the Internet for the demise of Israel and a unification of forces with al-Qaeda, the Islamic State, and the Taliban leading the charge. Then as a rallying point, Baghdadi composed a multi-page manifesto regarding a strike against the enemy who would suffer a blow so severe that the people throughout the land would rejoice.
For the people of the Middle East, it was a proclamation of victory.
But for Vatican Intelligence, it would become a red-flag issue.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
United States Embassy
Palazzo Margherita, Via Vittorio Veneto
Rome, Italy
The United States Embassy in Rome is located in the Palazzo Margherita, which is approximately 1.5 miles from Vatican City and across the Tiber River. Now that Shari Cohen was working at the consulate as a liaison between the American and Italian governments in counterterrorism, it didn’t take long for the division to get a red-flag warning from Vatican Intelligence regarding two things. First, the sudden transfer of five hundred million dollars into an account belonging to a bogus owner, which was then converted into cryptocurrency and summarily disappeared; and two, there was some saber rattling going on inside of chatrooms that were known for recruiting jihadists.
On the surface, disappearing transactions was never a good sign when these acts are often tied to misconduct. But as far as she could tell, the chatroom discussions were little more than blowhard speak. People were simply voicing their dismay over the United States and Israel, which was nothing new. What was new, however, was that the IP address where the talk was originating from had been linked to Saheem Baghdadi, a low-level operative who recruited members to fight the good fight. He wasn’t just raging on about the infidels and their crimes against Allah, but of a pending strike that would surely make the people of the Middle East rejoice. What this action was had not been stated, but the threat was deemed valid enough to set the international alerts to near high levels.
Shari, after studying the lengthy messages and Baghdadi’s biographical records, believed that there might be a connection between the transference of funds to the timing of the posts alleging a strike against an unknown target. Baghdadi was just a mouthpiece who spewed hatred as his pitch. But his written vocalization to the masses that an assault was about to commence was a deviation from his usual tactics. Were the two incidents connected given that the funds came from Ahmed Jaziri, a known financier who backed terrorist operations? At the moment, Shari believed that the probability of this was high.
A half billion dollars transferred into untraceable currency, she told herself, with the trail dissolving immediately. And now this, a promise from a jihad recruiter who was implying a potential end of days and a new beginning. Sign right here on the dotted line and give yourself over to Allah. Sacrifice your life for the good of the cause. Shari could hear Baghdadi’s voice clearly in her mind, while reading the Arab transcript on her computer monitor.
“What do you say—lunch?”
Shari gave an eyeroll, something Toby Henderson did not see from the other side of the cubicle. For the past two days since entering the consulate, she could see that the man was enamored with her. When he first saw her, his eyes started and popped as though he had seen the sudden Light. Her dark complexion, raven hair and possessing eyes the color of newly minted pennies had captured his heart immediately.
“Toby, I told you. I’m taken.”
“I don’t see a ring on your finger.”
“Look, I’m going to be nice here, all right? This is the new millennium. People don’t always wear rings to be together.”
“So, you’re not at least going to give me a shot?”
“I’ll tell you what,” she turned to Toby and feigned a smile. “How about if I introduce you to him, so you can tell him how you feel about me? And then we’ll see what happens. If you’re still standing, then I’m all yours. Deal?”
Toby was a slender man with a thin face, pointy chin, and a badly receding hairline. And it wasn’t that he was obnoxious or assertive, but Shari had learned long ago that such advancements in the workplace needed to be stopped in its tracks before momentum could be gained.
“So, what do you say?” she asked Toby. “You want to meet him or not?”
Toby swallowed. He had tried to put the moves on her by embellishing his history and, laughably so, puffed out his chest whenever he was around her in an attempt to make him appear more masculine than he really was. It didn’t work, however. And he knew it.
“I’m getting your vibes,” he finally told her.
“Thank you,” she said. “I’m sure, Toby, there are plenty of women willing to be with you. I’m probably one of the few who can’t.” She maintained her artificial smile.
“Yeah, I hear you.”
After he walked off with his shoulders slumping with the crookedness of an Indian’s bow, Shari returned to her screen.
Saheem Baghdadi—perhaps a man who knew too much, she thought. And something to consider. Since she had worked with the Company as a field operative and knew the values as to what an operator did to protect his or her country, she realized that Baghdadi was a starting point for those who needed questions answered. And since he resided somewhere within the West Bank, she knew that the Mossad would deal with the situation through experimental interrogation. When the Mossad wanted answers, they got them.
Working in collusion with other intel agencies, Shari contacted numerous bureaus to apprise them of the Vatican’s findings. Some of the organizations had already made the possible link between Baghdadi and the transaction, though the probability of a connection at this point, though credible, was low. Nevertheless, the Mossad would run interference and try to locate Baghdadi and mine him for all the worth they could get.
Now that the wheels were in motion on a global scale, Shari continued to track down the trail of Ahmed Jaziri’s transfer of funds. Surely, five hundred million had to leave an imprint somewhere. But when she failed to register a cyber foot- of fingerprint like other agencies, she focused on Jaziri, the Yemen financier.
She studied his history and his alleged atrocities, such as the bombings of Jibla Hospital, the U.S.S. Cole, the Limburg Attack, the attack on the U.S. Embassy and many more. But Ahmed Jaziri was a faceless enemy, or perhaps the enemy with too many faces, depending on how one looked at the situation. In some of the photos his beard appeared either too short or too long, even when the photos were taken hours apart, meaning that the man changed beard styles like women changed wigs. And with the hat and sunglasses, recognition photos were hard to come by. The man was a true chameleon whose lifestyle was just as complex and mysterious, the man entering a surveyed scene and then disappearing, like magic, from the eyes of those who were watching him.
There was no known address.
There was no known IP address that could be traced.
There were no known associates outside of a few, with the Bangladeshi one of them. But like Jaziri, the Bangladeshi was just as elusive
and just as invisible. Both men were like trying to catch smoke within the grip of a closing hand.
As the hours came and went, as Toby passed her cubicle many times hoping that she would initiate a conversation, the sky outside her window grew dark. Rome, at night, was absolutely gorgeous, she considered.
And romantic.
Sending off notes regarding Jaziri to colluding agencies through encrypted and protected lines, Shari grabbed her light jacket, her purse, and left the consulate. What she didn’t know, however, was that she was under the keen observation of spying eyes who watched from afar.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Outside the U.S. Embassy, Rome
In a parked car approximately fifty yards from the Palazzo Margherita, two men were surveying a woman who had exited the main entryway of the consulate, this being their second night in a row of observation. She was athletically built, pretty, and she walked with fluid grace. As she started west, the passenger in the vehicle wrote down the time of her exit: 6:12 p.m. When she started to put distance between them, the driver started the sedan and began to pull forward to keep pace.
Shonn McKinley shook his head after penning the time into a small book. “Why don’t we just take her now instead of doing all this cloak-and-dagger crap.”
“Antle operates under the command of her handler, whoever that may be,” answered Mannix, as he continued to drive slowly with the purpose of not being spied by the mark. “If we take her now and the timing for whatever reason isn’t precise, the last thing we need is to engage the Vatican Knights. Take notes and let the plan develop.”
McKinley remained silent for a long moment before saying, “We can take the Vatican Knights. I don’t know why she’s so afraid to put her foot forward.”
“She’s not afraid. She’s being cautious. She was there when her D.C. program was taken out. Her mistake was that she believed too much in her team—that they could withstand any assault from any specialized force. But the Vatican Knights went through her entire unit as if they were children. And I’m talking about SEALs, Deltas and Rangers, seasoned fighters who’ve been there and done that. Our job is to prepare and take nothing for granted, so take notes and keep quiet.”