Truth in Hiding

by Matthew Frick

  “Miller?”

  “It makes sense. The guy in the leather jacket tells the other guy, ‘I just took out the Israeli who can blow our whole operation.’ That’s something you don’t keep from the boss. So the other guy, because he’s not dressed like a hoodlum, goes on stage and tells Raad the good news,” Casey explained.

  Andie shook her head. “I don’t buy it. These guys have already tried to kill Miller once. You were there. So they probably had orders to keep trying. They wouldn’t risk causing a scene just to tell Raad something they could tell him when the lecture was over.”

  “Okay, then why do you think it had something to do with Cohen?”

  “Because they haven’t tried to kill him yet.”

  “They don’t even know who Cohen is.”

  “You keep making that assumption, but you don’t know that,” Andie argued. “Maybe they didn’t know about him before, but they probably do now.” She held up her hand when she saw Casey’s mouth open. “Let me finish. I don’t believe either of those guys would interrupt Raad during a public lecture just to tell him Miller was dead. But if they found out about Cohen, and they were able to kill both him and Miller, that would be news. ‘Hey boss, we found out there were actually two Israeli spies, and we killed them both.’”

  Casey followed her logic, but he wasn’t sure he was ready to buy it. “Okay, but how did they find out about Cohen in the first place?”

  “Cohen was going to meet Miller this afternoon.”

  Casey’s heart skipped a beat. The scenario Andie laid out played in a rapid, repeating loop through Casey’s head. The thought of both Cohen and Miller dead left him feeling exposed. And defenseless. Casey’s part, and Andie’s too, in the plan to expose Raad and flush out his source was to put the Iranian on the defensive with a public accusation that would rattle him and possibly cause him to be careless. If Raad broke protocol and took unusual risks to protect his source because he felt the noose tightening, Cohen believed he and Miller could exploit any misstep and break apart Raad’s operation. But even if Raad became careless, without the Mossad brothers, Casey and Andie were on their own. A blogger/analyst and a reporter versus trained professional Iranian killers. He didn’t like the odds.

  “You see why we should be worried?” Andie asked, as if she were reading Casey’s mind.

  “Yeah. I do. I’m also thinking we should have come up with a different plan. One that didn’t leave such a big red bullseye on my forehead.”

  “It’s too late for second guessing, Casey. We need to think about what we’re going to do next. If Cohen and Miller are really dead, I’m not so sure hanging around D.C. is such a good idea.”

  “You’re probably right. At least I shouldn’t. You might not be on their radar at the moment, so there’s a chance that if you just walk away now that you’d be safe.”

  “That might be true, but I’m not going to just let you hang in the breeze,” Andie said. “And I don’t think you should just get in your car and jump on 95, either.”

  “Then what?”

  Andie took her cell phone out of the empty backpack she was carrying as a purse that earlier held the flyers Casey now wished he had never written. “I helped out a guy once by not writing a story I was investigating, and I think he can help us.”

  Casey watched her fingers as she dialed. He could hear the phone ringing as she held it up to her ear, and his gaze followed. But something caught his eye, and his focus shifted farther down the street over Andie’s shoulder. Without moving his eyes, he reached out for Andie’s arm and pulled the phone away.

  “What the fuck?” Andie exclaimed, looking at her empty hand.

  “Hello?” the phone now in Casey’s hand asked. “Hello?” Casey thumbed it off and pointed.

  Casey’s behavior worried Andie, and she turned around to see what caused the sudden change.

  Passing in and out of the street lights, Andie saw him. Crouched but running. Silent. Deliberate.

  “Cohen,” she whispered.

  Chapter 39

  Cohen slowed when he reached the Marvin Center on GWU’s Foggy Bottom campus. The building was a kind of all-purpose community center for the university that included several study rooms and an amphitheater. But Cohen neither knew nor cared about any of that. What did interest him was the man in the gray parka who jogged onto a cross street just past the bland structure four minutes earlier.

  With only an initial direction to go on, Cohen ran hard through the streets of Washington until he caught sight of the man several kilometers back. His aging lungs were doing him no favors, and the cramp developing in his side was a stark reminder that, while his mind was still as sharp as it was in his youth, his body was not. But whether it was Cohen’s lifetime of mastering the skill of covert pursuit or just dumb luck, his quarry soon determined—wrongly—that he was not being followed and slowed his flight to a slow jog interrupted with periods of walking. Cohen had welcomed the change of pace as it gave him a chance to both catch his breath and close the distance.

  He reached the corner of the building, trying to stay in the shadows as much as the street lamps and building glow would allow. He slowed and peered around the corner, hoping to catch a glimpse of the gray parka moving slowly down the road. He stopped when he saw he didn’t need to run anymore. He almost smiled for no longer having to run through the city he started to hate more and more with each knee-jarring, shin-pounding stride. But he didn’t smile. He backed further into the building’s shadow and planned his next move.

  The group of four were arguing. It didn’t last long. Cohen knew his best hope was to take the group by surprise while they were still in close proximity to each other. If they spread out and went their separate ways, he would have to choose. Time was almost up, and Raad was priority one, but he wanted the man in the gray parka dead. The man who killed Miller. Or tried to.

  Cohen had run his own mental diagnosis as he trailed the man through the streets of Washington, and he concluded the man had stuck Miller with a dagger or some other sharp implement loaded with poison. It was the poison that had closed Miller’s windpipe so quickly. The method had been used before. Cohen had used it once himself. But in that case, in a crowded marketplace in Tunis seventeen years ago, his target was dead in less than a minute. Miller was alive when Cohen left him, so he knew whatever the killer used on the younger Mossad operative was not as powerful. But he assumed it was just as effective. Cohen had bought Miller some time, but it was unlikely he survived. Packing tape on a leaky pipe. Temporary. He hardly knew Miller, but he was Mossad. And to Cohen, that meant something.

  With a deep breath, Cohen palmed his semi-automatic pistol and let his right arm hang down by his side. He stepped from the shadows and approached the group directly at a steady but casual pace. He wanted their attention to freeze them in place, but he did not want to appear like a threat. Not yet.

  Movement across the street caught Shahin’s eye. He swung a hand back to get Jahan’s attention. “Look.”

  Jahan turned around and the others saw the man coming at them. “Can we help you?” Raad asked.

  Cohen took three more steps before answering. “I hope so,” he said, continuing to close the distance between them.

  The other three Iranians formed a semi-circle around Raad. A protective barrier for the senior spy.

  Cohen was ten feet away.

  “What do you want?” Raad asked.

  Cohen extended his arm before anyone could react and put two bullets in Jahan’s torso. Goose down feathers floated up as the man’s body fell to the ground.

  Cohen swung his arm to the next target, but the shot sailed high and wide as Shahin crashed into him like a freight train. The two men fell hard. The Iranian’s weight and the force of impact knocked the wind from Cohen’s lungs and sent the handgun skidding across the pavement.

  Casey and Andie watched from the corner of the auditorium. “We gotta do something!”

  “Do what? Get killed?” Andie asked. />
  Casey took a step forward, and Andie yanked hard on the back of his jacket. “Let Cohen handle this,” she said.

  “Fuck!” Casey said under his breath. His heart raced. His muscles tightened. “We can’t just sit here!”

  He watched as Cohen kicked the man in the leather jacket off of him. Cohen sprang to his feet, but the Iranian was faster. And he had a knife. Casey hadn’t seen that before. But maybe it wasn’t there before. The knife flashed with the reflection of a street light as the Iranian swung across to force Cohen back. Then he thrust the blade forward. Cohen caught the man’s wrist and twisted. Casey heard a crack and a clang as bone snapped and blade fell. Cohen crouched to grab the knife but was met with a kick to the jaw that put him on his back.

  “Casey! Raad’s getting away!” Andie shouted.

  Casey took his eyes off the brawl and saw the man in the coat and tie ushering Raad into the back seat of a car. Before he could reflect on everything wrong with what he was about to do, Casey bolted from the corner of the building and ran full-out to the black sedan.

  The driver’s door slammed shut, and the engine roared to life.

  “Casey!” Andie cried out.

  He didn’t hear her. The car started to pull out, and the driver slammed on the brakes as Casey landed with a thud on the front hood. The startled driver recovered from the surprise and put the pedal to the floor. Tires squealed. Rubber burned. And Casey grabbed for something to hold onto. The driver hit the brakes hard, and Casey rolled off. He looked at the windshield wiper covered with blood in his shredded palm. That was the extent of his examination.

  Tires screeched again, and engine revved high. Casey stared at the fast-approaching headlights for a split-second. Almost too long. He rolled to his left and felt the wind from the passing car on the back of his neck. Holy shit, he thought. He opened his eyes and stared at a pistol two inches from his nose. Cohen’s gun. He grabbed the weapon without a second thought and moved clear of the other parked cars along the side of the road. Almost.

  Something caught hold of Casey’s ankle, and he fell face first into the street. The pistol fell along with him, and he left half of his right cheek on the pavement. Stars obscured his vision when he rolled over. The flashes framed the bright light from a nearby lamp post in a silent fireworks display just for him.

  The lamp light faded. Or was it blocked? Casey saw a halo outlining a figure above him. He thought it might be an angel, but then, angels don’t wear winter jackets. His eyes widened when his vision, in a brief moment of clarity, revealed the identity of the glowing specter.

  Jahan raised the pen needle high and swung the lethal, poison-infused dagger in a long arc toward Casey’s heart, falling to his knees to put the force of his own weight behind the strike. But he never connected.

  The Iranian’s temple exploded. His lifeless body fell on Casey like a sack of rotten fruit.

  Casey squirmed out from under the bloody pile of dead flesh and bone. He gagged at the sight of the man’s skull, caved in and spilling blood, bone, and brain. He gagged again. And then his stomach emptied into a putrid pool on the bullet-pocked gray parka.

  When Casey pushed himself up, he was standing next to Andie. She was silent, almost in shock, staring at the dead man in front of her. And she was bleeding. Only it wasn’t her blood. He looked closer and saw the drops falling off the brass knuckles she gripped in her hand.

  “Andie?” he said hesitantly. Nothing. He inched closer, wiping the filth from his mouth with the back of his hand. “Andie?” Casey touched her shoulder.

  Andie’s head whipped violently in Casey’s direction. Her blood soaked hand was raised slightly, and her breathing was heavy.

  “Andie, it’s me. It’s Casey.”

  Andie’s eyes blinked rapidly, and she looked around nervously as if she had no idea where she was or how she got there. She looked at her fist, clenched around the brass knuckles. And then she looked at Casey. A spark of recognition was followed by a long exhalation. Then her knees began to buckle. She grabbed Casey’s arm for support, and her friend eased her to the ground. Casey followed suit and sat cross-legged across from her.

  “Are you all right?” Andie asked.

  Casey didn’t expect that question. “Me? Yeah, I’m fine.”

  “Did I...I mean...is he...” She tilted her head in the direction of the red and gray lump beside them, not wanting to look at it. “Is he dead?”

  Casey nodded. “He’s dead.”

  Andie removed the brass knuckles and turned them over in her hands. “I never used these before.” Her mouth cracked into a half-smile. “Been carryin’ these things around since I left for college. Grandaddy gave ‘em to me. Said they might help even the odds if I’se ever in trouble.”

  Casey smiled. He’d never heard Andie speak with a Georgia accent before. He figured the stress must have dug it up from way in her past. Like me, when I drink too much. “Whole lotta trouble tonight,” he said.

  Andie looked around. She realized how quiet it was. “Sure was.”

  Casey touched her knee. “Thank you, Andie.”

  Andie lowered her eyes and smiled.

  “We need to get out of here.”

  Andie and Casey both jumped.

  “Now,” Cohen urged.

  Chapter 40

  Casey noticed that a small crowd had started to gather on the corner where he and Andie had taken cover earlier. He figured they were people leaving the lecture, but Cohen’s insistence and the sound of sirens whining in the distance ended his guesswork. Andie, Casey, and Cohen turned west on H Street and didn’t stop until they hit New Hampshire Avenue. They waited in the Residence Inn parking lot until a friend of Andie’s, who promised not to ask any questions, picked up the three bruised, battered, and bloodied people and brought them back to Andie’s apartment.

  After the door was shut and bolted, Andie handed out wet towels. “Try not to get any of that shit on my furniture.” She was agitated more than usual. Both men understood. What this woman had gone through—what she had done—was not something that was just forgotten after a couple of hours. The images of this night would haunt her for a long time. Possibly the rest of her life.

  Cohen tossed the used towel by the door and leaned forward toward the others across the coffee table. “We need to find Raad,” he said. “He is likely making preparations to leave the country right now. If he’s not already gone.”

  “You think he could get out that fast?” Casey asked.

  “I don’t know what kind of organization he has established here, but it is possible.”

  “Don’t you think he will try to come after us?” Andie asked.

  “No. Not immediately,” Cohen answered. “After tonight, I think Raad has gone on the defensive. And for a man like him, retreat is usually the first option.”

  Casey’s pocket buzzed.

  “But if Raad leaves, then it’s over for us, right?” Casey stood up and tossed his soiled towel on the pile by the front door.

  “Miller was onto something that didn’t even involve Raad,” Andie reminded them.

  “Miller’s dead, though,” Casey said. His pocket buzzed again.

  Cohen sensed the feeling of defeat coming from across the room. “Because we don’t know what, if anything, Miller had uncovered, we need Raad to tell us the name of his source.”

  “He won’t just tell us who his source is,” Andie said.

  “I’ll make him tell us,” Cohen retorted.

  “Here we go again.” Andie rolled her eyes and unconsciously opened and closed her right hand.

  “You’re all-in now, sister,” Casey said with a nod.

  Andie stopped flexing her hand and raised her middle finger.

  Casey backed away and pulled the phone from his pocket.

  “Before we can move forward, though, we have to find him,” Cohen said. “Do we know where he is staying here in Washington?”

  “That shouldn’t be too hard to find out, but do you think he’d
really go back to his place?” Andie asked.

  “It might not matter,” Casey said.

  Andie and Cohen looked at Casey who wiggled the phone in his hand. “What?” Andie asked.

  “Paul Giordano came through,” Casey said. “We’ve got the names of two of the three folks leather jacket passed through in Rosslyn.”

  “Raad’s source,” Andie said.

  “What are you talking about,” Cohen asked.

  “Oh shit. You don’t know.”

  Casey recounted what he and Andie witnessed at the office building in Rosslyn, Virginia, earlier that day. Andie showed Cohen the series of pictures on her phone and the disappearing envelope as the Iranian in the leather jacket passed through the group of people leaving the building. Cohen was interested, but he was also visibly disappointed that Cyrus Shirazi appeared to have no part in the possible brush pass.

  “This is still not conclusive,” Cohen said, inviting more discussion.

  “Look, we saw this guy pass an envelope to one those people. The same guy you killed tonight. Raad’s guy. Who else would he be passing notes to?”

  “So which of those people were passed the envelope?”

  “That’s the best part,” Casey said. “We sent the digital photos to Detective Paul Giordano in New York. He was able to use facial recognition software at JTTF, which I assume is tied to some huge federal database...anyway, he was able to ID two of them.” Casey sat back down, and Andie read Giordano’s email over his shoulder while he summarized the findings.

  “No ID on the tall dude with dark hair. The woman is Erica Stanley. A staff photographer for Potomac Life magazine. They have an office in the building where we saw all this. The third person, the shorter, balding guy with the trench coat, his name is Walter Korzen. A career State Department employee who works the DSS watch desk.”

  “DSS?” Cohen asked.

  Andie answered, “Diplomatic Security Service.”

  “I think that’s our guy,” Casey said.