by J K Ellem
Still no words came, no explanation, no apology, just silent hands holding her in place.
Her limbs, head, and neck gradually clicked back into place, the heavy drowsy blanket of unconsciousness lifted, and she looked around, pulling her arms and legs together as far as the person would allow.
She was on a bed in a large timber shed. Thick leather straps around each ankle and wrist held her splayed to the corners of an old iron bed frame. The air was warm and musty. Shards of dirty sunlight filtered through gaps in the ceiling above the rafters, and between slits in the timber planks of the walls.
She was alone. The sun was up, it was the next day.
Her mind worked backwards, trying to remember. Shaw yelling at her, bloody fingernails. There was a man, it was dark, he was standing in a narrow channel of metal, between two trucks, she was running toward him. She fell, the man caught her, then smothering.
Jessie craned her neck and saw work benches, tools neatly hanging from pegboard along one wall. Strange tools, pliers, lots of tools for pulling and cutting things. She squinted, forcing her focus. Small saws, lined up by size, knives, serrated, some smooth. Chains hung from the shadows above, fixed to the rafters, different lengths and thicknesses, with shackles and D-rings. They dangled like long jungle vines, some all the way to the floor where they were neatly coiled, others only came to shoulder height.
They hung, cold and silent.
The floor was a slab of rough cement, stained in places with oil and grease and something else she couldn’t tell, a muddy brown color.
Her bed was against the wall, under a window, the blinds down but open, grey with filth, layered with dead flies and powdery moth remains.
She looked past her feet, toward a heavy door fashioned by hand from thick slabs of lumber with hammered iron hinges.
Maybe it was unlocked?
Maybe I’m stupid. Need to think, not be dumb.
Then the full gravity of her predicament hit Jessie all at once.
Enslaved not saved.
She tugged harder on the leather straps then screamed.
They untied Shaw and marched him to a secure room that resembled a prison cell. A tray of food arrived with coffee and two guards watched over him while he ate. When he was done the tray was removed and Hoost appeared. He pulled up a chair and sat down in front of Shaw. “If it was up to me, I would have killed you last night.”
Shaw regarded Hoost. It was the first time he had seen him properly, the man in the silver SUV who had been following Jessie and him. “Good thing you’re someone else’s lapdog then,” Shaw replied.
Hoost slumped back in the chair, his fingers stroking the grip of the handgun strapped to his thigh, an arrogant smirk on his face. “Tell you what.” Hoost leaned forward. “I’ll let you go. Won’t even use my gun. You just need to get past me.” Hoost stood and swung open the heavy steel door. It wasn’t locked. He sat back down and smiled at Shaw. “There you go.” His eyes narrowed. “What do you say?”
Shaw could tell it was just a taunt. His jaw still ached from last night where Hoost had hit him, the memory still fresh in his mind. “And if I don’t make it to the door?” Shaw asked. “What happens then?”
Hoost made a show of thinking, enjoying the proposition of killing Shaw. He shrugged. “Then I’ll snap your neck like a chicken’s. Claim it was self-defense, you were attempting to escape. Mr. Tanner will understand.” Hoost looked at Shaw, goading him to take the chance, to get up and try it. “He won’t be happy,” Hoost continued. “But he will understand.”
Shaw was no fool. Even fully conscious, unlike last night, he was no match for the man who sat across from him. But that didn’t stop Shaw from contemplating a way to kill the man if he had to.
“The girl that was with me, where is she?”
“I just grabbed you. No one else.”
“So why keep me here?”
Hoost seemed bored with the conversation, like he had better things to do. “I don’t make the plans, I just carry them out.” Hoost stood and gave a crooked smile. “But I think Mr. Tanner has something special planned for you.”
Outside the room Hoost slipped out his cell phone and hit speed dial. The call was answered on the third ring on a disposable burner phone. Hoost spoke while he walked. “We need to meet, there’s a few loose ends I need to tie up.” He listened for a moment then rolled his eyes. “You will get your money; I’m bringing it with me.” Hoost listened. “I know where it is. I’ll meet you there in thirty minutes. Until then don’t talk to anyone.” Hoost ended the call, his mood lifted. He wanted to kill Shaw and was disappointed he wasn’t allowed to. Not yet anyway.
But things were looking up. The person he had just spoken to was going to provide some consolation for Hoost, ease some of the angst he now felt.
Little did the person on the other end of the call know that, in fact, he was the loose end.
37
The first invasion came from the air. With the discovery of the body of Abasi Rasul and what had happened at the truck stop, which the FBI believed could be linked, the investigation and resources were ramped up.
The nearest airport large enough to handle the deployment was in Cedar City, a small regional town 250 miles south of Salt Lake City. I-15 cut through the town from north to south. Las Vegas was only 180 miles farther south.
Delta Airlines flew three flights a day between Cedar City and Salt Lake City, but the next morning the FBI flew in themselves. They brought with them two helicopters from the Tactical Helicopter Unit for standby support, and under the bright morning sky, they descended on the town with military precision.
They soon requisitioned an empty hanger at the airport where they set up their tactical command post with computers, satellite communications, and a contingent of the FBI’s elite Hostage Rescue Team that was on standby, ready to go on a moment’s notice.
The second invasion came from the ground in the shape of a stream of black SUVs that entered the town from the north. They took over the local police department under the watchful eye of Special Agent Carolyn Ryder, who assured both Beth Rimes and her fellow police officers that it was still their town and their rank and authority would be respected. Located on Main Street, the police department would serve as a secondary hub where federal agents and resources were deployed to pick up the trail Abasi Rasul had followed.
Inside the department’s main meeting room a large map was spread out that Ryder and Beth pored over. Stuck to a magnetic whiteboard were photos of Jessie Rae, Abasi Rasul, and Ben Shaw.
At 10a.m. the photo of Police Officer Vince Taylor was added to the whiteboard. He had not been seen or heard from since yesterday afternoon. His police cruiser was missing and his cell phone signal was dead.
The usually reliable Mr. Coffee machine in the small kitchen couldn’t cope with the sudden influx of male testosterone that demanded a constant supply of the strong black liquid, so someone had made a food run to DoughnutsVille on Main Street. A folding table was hastily set up against the back wall to support the massive takeout box of every doughnut imaginable together with large cardboard bulk dispensers of coffee. Apparently the DoughnutsVille franchise was spotted from the air by an HRT agent on the chopper flight in who then relayed its exact location to another agent on the ground. DoughnutsVille was given the priority it deserved for sustaining agents in the field during what could be a long deployment. Supplies were also duly sent out to the hanger at the airport.
It was agreed by all that Abasi Rasul was not the end of the line. Finding him was just the beginning. Rasul was a mule, a thread in a much larger terrorist design. They needed to follow that thread, determine where he was going when he kidnaped Jessie, whom he was meeting.
The only two people who may have had a clue about that— Ben Shaw and Jessie Rae—were both missing. With the discovery of Rasul’s body that was now being reported by all news networks, Ryder believed the rest of his network may have gone underground, cleared out, making the task of f
inding the real people behind the terrorist attack more difficult.
But Ryder had faced difficult odds before and come out on top.
Ryder gathered everyone around the map. The plan was to work in concentric circles out from the motel where Rasul had been found. Agents were still working at that scene and at Rasul’s apartment back in Salt Lake City, but clues were scant at best.
Ryder’s cell phone rang and she stepped away to answer the call.
Beth watched her as she nodded and listened to the call. Then Ryder’s eyes found Beth across the room and she held her gaze for a moment, the universal look that said it was bad news across her face.
Ryder withdrew from the room with the cell still pressed to her ear and went to the corridor outside for some privacy. When she returned her expression was a mix of anger and sadness. She pulled Beth aside and they both went out to the corridor, away from the ears of others.
“Look, I’m telling you first, because of who you are, and I wanted you to hear it from me,” Ryder said, her expression grim.
But Beth knew, she’d had a bad feeling all night. “Taylor?”
Ryder nodded. “They just found him, out on a back road, a few miles from here. Passerby noticed a police cruiser parked on the shoulder, windows down, no one inside.”
“So where the hell is he?” Beth replied.
Ryder shook her head, understanding the confusion. “I’m sorry Beth, he was inside the car.”
Beth’s face went ashen, and Ryder touched her arm. “He was in the trunk, single gunshot wound to the head. Been there a while.”
Beth just nodded but she felt numb.
“We’ve got a team there now, they’ve secured the scene. I’m heading out there. Miller can run the show here while I’m gone.” Dan Miller was a seasoned agent, dependable, resourceful and not afraid to take action if needed.
Beth nodded, trying to comprehend the news.
Then Ryder dropped another bombshell. “They found something else Beth.”
Beth looked at Ryder bewildered. “What?” She couldn’t comprehend what was happening. “What did they find?”
Ryder looked around making sure no one was within earshot. It was bad enough that one of the officers under Beth’s command was just found dead, executed; it was twice as bad as how it looked. “Come along for the ride and I’ll show you.”
It was the swarm of flies Beth noticed first. A dirty cloud, drifting back and forth above the trunk. She immediately recognized Taylor’s police cruiser, the trunk popped open, two FBI agents milling around at the rear of the vehicle, a blue tarp spilling over the edges of the trunk.
It was late morning and the temperature was rising. She could only imagine the smell and the sight of what awaited her.
They parked on the shoulder of the road next to the police cruiser. There was a black SUV farther back that belonged to the FBI agents. The person who had called it in had been interviewed and allowed to go before the grisly discovery had been made. The agents had called Ryder directly, bypassing Beth’s office.
Beth took a deep breath and pulled back the tarp. The dirty cloud buzzed in annoyance then dispersed.
She had seen plenty of bodies before but this one hit home, it was one of her own, she was connected to it.
Taylor lay twisted in the innards of the trunk, like he was in the hollow of a grave above the ground. His eyes were open, staring out at Beth. Ryder stood back a little, swatting flies, giving Beth some room, the two agents hovering farther back.
A clean hole pierced the center of his forehead, ringed in red, a ribbon of dried blood down one side of his face.
Anger swelled in Beth, then she saw what else was in the trunk. A plastic bag with a screw top bottle inside, filled with what looked like small pieces of shattered cloudy glass. Next to it was a tight roll of grubby fifty-dollar bills secured by a rubber band.
“This is such bullshit,” Beth said. “This is not him. I know him.” Beth walked away in disgust. Ryder nodded to the two agents and they placed a tarp back over the trunk.
Ryder followed Beth to where she stood looking out across the brown landscape, blue sky, and orange mountains in the distance. “Someone is playing games with us,” Beth said bitterly.
“How well did you know him? I mean personally?” It was a delicate subject so Ryder had to tread lightly.
Beth took a deep breath, trying to control her anger. “He’s not involved in the drug trade. Someone killed him then staged it to look like some bullshit drug deal gone wrong.” Beth shook her head. “This isn’t right. Not him. I knew him. Sure he was big-mouthed and arrogant, full of himself, but that was all.”
“Maybe there was something else, in his private life, something you don’t really know about.”
“I don’t accept it.” Beth glared at Ryder. “I’ve got one officer in the hospital and now another is dead.”
“So what do you think happened here?” Ryder asked. “What did he get involved in?” It was a question Beth didn’t want to contemplate. It would have been much easier if Taylor had been caught up in some drug deal. Things would have been a lot simpler. This made everything more complicated. But she couldn’t ignore what her instincts were telling her. It was much worse.
She turned to Ryder. “He got too close,” Beth said. “He was somehow involved.” Beth looked out across the harsh landscape as though the answer was hidden amongst the rocks, dirt, and prickly trees. “They’re here, close by, the ones Rasul was working for. Taylor was working for them. That’s why he’s now dead.”
Beth turned and walked away.
38
The firm of Brockton Halliwell was located on N Street, surrounded by some of the largest and well-known lobbying firms in Washington, D.C.
It didn’t occupy a prime position on the street, and many a politician or high-powered Washington attorney had unknowingly walked past its front door. It was located in a nondescript building, a small brass plaque on the stone wall the only announcement.
The firm wasn’t in the top ten revenue producers in the last edition of the Washington Business Review, if you believed the firm’s latest income statement that was submitted. However, if you included the earnings quietly channeled through its offshore subsidiary domiciled in the Cayman Islands, the firm’s earnings went far beyond any of its competitors.
Its associates were drawn from the best schools around the country: Yale, Princeton, Harvard, and Stanford. Not necessarily the top in academics, but those who showed ambition and were technically competent in the areas of business, finance, law, taxation, and political science. At Brockton Halliwell they valued ambition over academia, innovation over intellect, and loyalty and discretion above all. The world was full of academic, intelligent, and gifted people who had never achieved anything in their lives.
Its website listed research and due diligence, policy development and analysis, lobbying and government relations amongst its key services. However there was one service not displayed on the firm’s website; if it were, the firm’s executives would find themselves in jail on charges of conspiracy, treason, and a threat to national security. This service was called Strategic Initiative & Influence, or SII. The SII division generated the lion’s share of undisclosed revenue and not one dollar of that revenue had ever graced American soil.
The SII department consisted of a team of four based in the D.C. office and a team of thirty based in Grand Cayman. The D.C. team acted very much like the control room on the bridge of a large cargo ship, with most of its cargo hidden below the watery surface. It acted like a portal, feeding work and projects to the engine room on Grand Cayman across an encrypted Internet that didn’t exist. The entire operation was replicated and backed up on a dedicated computer server that sat in a temperature controlled facility in Norway, alongside ten thousand other computer servers.
The investment in technology and secrecy was huge. But so were the consequences, if they were caught.
The phone sat on a mahogany table that wa
s polished to the patina of dark honey. The walls of the boardroom were adorned with oil paintings between heavy sash windows with thick drapes that framed the Washington skyline.
The phone on the table was answered on the second ring by the only person in the room, a tall dark-haired man impeccably dressed in a custom suit of dark blue with charcoal stripes. His face was tanned, not from the bright Washington sun, but from a recent stint in the Grand Cayman office.
In front of him lay a stack of printouts. He preferred the old-fashioned method of using pen and paper to analyze the data-mining reports he had received from the Cayman team.
“The results?” No formalities, just a request for raw data came from the man on the other end of the line.
Richardson, one of the firm’s executives, read from the cover page his own summary of the report written in neat script in the margins. “All platforms show an increase in the keywords and themes we were tracking. As expected, the southern states rated better, moved quicker, but they’re all up across the board. And still rising.”
“Good,” the man on the line replied. It was better than expected. Much better. The popular opinion was trending in the right direction across all social media platforms and the top one hundred political and social blogging sites they were tracking. Just as the ancient Roman Senate was subjected to the ebb and flow of the mob, the will of the people, so too was the political landscape today swayed by public opinion. However, Richardson, and to a greater extent the man on the line, were more interested in commercial gain, the pursuit of capitalism rather than political point scoring.
“Richardson.”
“I’m here, sir.”
“Can you give me your professional opinion, your gut feel of the numbers? Skip the Orwellian prose, just tell me as a layman what the results are telling you.”
Richardson put his pen down on top of the inch-thick ream of paper, took off his glasses, and stared at the phone as though he was addressing a real person instead of a jumble of plastic, circuits, and computer chips. “Americans want blood. They want retribution. They don’t care how, they just want it done. They want immigration to be curbed, foreign aid to be reduced, and our armed forces to find and kill terrorists. They’re arming themselves. We’ve seen a dramatic increase in gun sales in the last twenty-four hours across the key states and even in those with stricter gun laws. There is an upsurge in anti-Islamic sentiment, especially against foreign-born nationals, from the Middle East in particular, and we’re off the scale on all metrics in relation to racist sentiment toward all Middle Eastern countries except Israel.”