by J C Ryan
Unfortunately, her information didn’t do that much good. She gave them everything she had, which was access to the empty accounts, but even the banks and investment account organizations couldn’t tell them with certainty where the money went when it left their control. There were hints, of course. Obviously, the recipient accounts were located in countries with strict privacy laws. That’s where Brandt’s Finint prodigies came in. They started working on breaking through the layers of secrecy to follow that trail.
Carson must have developed secret resources among some of the CIA employees. The second prong of the attack was to suss out those human resources and grill them for information as to Carson’s current whereabouts. But it took time, and time was what America’s spy agencies didn’t have. They’d already lost a couple of good assets and had one long-term operation blown wide open, requiring them to pull out their field agents and end the mission. Carson was out there somewhere selling his secrets.
Once again delegating the task of unraveling Carson’s network, Josh and Marissa moved on to the final leg of the three-pronged attack: Sigint. Somehow, Carson was staying in touch with his resources, and he was also in touch with enemy agencies. They had to surmise he was also in touch with the middle link in the chain Rex Dalton had been trying to break: the drug trade from Afghanistan to the US. The snake had been decapitated with the raid on Usama’s compound, when the major drug lords in Afghanistan were all killed. Whether that was the work of Rex Dalton or not was not relevant for now. The issue was that this snake was like the multi-headed Hydra of lore. It was already sprouting new heads.
The elderly Senator who’d controlled Carson had committed suicide, thus breaking the chain from that end. It was obvious someone was still controlling both ends of the drug trade between the US and Afghanistan from the middle, and it wasn’t out of the question that Carson was in touch with that someone. If they could figure out who this was and monitor the person’s communications, it could also lead to Carson. But the first thing required to prove that hypothesis was a name—given the urgency, it was regarded as another dead end, for now.
They considered the next option—modern travel was such that one could usually track someone’s movements with enough money, coercion, or diplomacy. With everything else delegated, Josh and Marissa started on that. They knew Carson had flown to the Marshall Islands, and they knew why. The Marshall Islands, while enjoying a good relationship with the US, did not have an extradition treaty. He would have had time and the financial resources to move freely about the islands. Discovering where he’d gone from his initial destination would require that in-person search after all.
It didn’t take much to learn there were thirty airports on the various islands, excluding the three military airports they assumed he wouldn’t use. Carson’s flight had been bound for Marshall Islands International Airport on Majuro Atoll. From there, he could have puddle-jumped for as long as he wished, before leaving the tiny country of a little more than fifty-thousand people, bound for anywhere.
It could take weeks to get a fresher lead, but that was nothing new. They’d experienced that in Afghanistan and India, looking for Rex. They could only hope Carson hadn’t learned somewhere how to stay hidden. With backup of the combined skills of CRC and CIA Finint, Humint, and Sigint experts, their efforts this time would hopefully bear fruit. They departed for the Marshall Islands within a few days of getting the assignment.
***
SOMETIMES IT WAS Josh’s boyish good looks and charm, and sometimes it was Marissa’s beauty that opened the doors. In this case it could have been a combination of those factors that got them much more cooperation from local employees of the airlines and airports than any official channels had produced prior to their arrival. Carson had peculiar and specialized tastes in ‘entertainment’, as Marissa delicately called the pervert’s vulgar habits. Questioning the airline staff at the first airport, they were told some remembered him because he asked openly where he could find such entertainment.
The two of them followed his trail, from airport to private club or brothel to the next airport. It turned out he’d visited only three of the twenty-nine atolls, before departing for New Zealand about ten days after he’d arrived.
Josh and Marissa flew to Auckland, New Zealand and took up the search with the same methods as before. However, before they could get a bead on his travels, word from back home was the IT folks at Sigint had picked up the trail from there. Of all the stupid things he could have done, Carson was using his own identity and his passport to travel. Maybe he was in too much of a hurry to find a forger to change identities before he left the US. That was understandable—if John Brandt, the CEO of CRC, gives you twenty-four hours to disappear or die, you’d be in a hurry to pack and leave—unless you had a death wish.
Brandt checked with his CIA contact and verified that Carson hadn’t had access to any CIA-produced false papers. That made it easier. The trail led to Samoa, where it went cold temporarily. But Josh and Marissa managed to find the forger who’d supplied Carson’s new identity, and they followed that to Chile.
“Just like a damn Nazi war criminal.” Josh joked.
“Maybe not as directly responsible for millions of lives lost,” Marissa answered more soberly, “but still responsible for everyone who’s lost their life to drug overdose or the crap the street dealers cut the drugs with, since he became involved. Not to mention Rex’s team and maybe Rex himself. Let’s go get the son of a bitch.”
Josh shook his head. “Marissa, the guy knows you. I’d better go on my own.”
She started to protest but then realized that though she would have liked to take a piece of Carson’s hide out with her own two hands, it was far too important to risk their target spotting them and bolting.
She flew home from Samoa, while Josh continued to Santiago.
***
IT WAS THE first time they’d been apart in weeks. Josh wasn’t sure how Marissa felt about it, but he felt like he’d lost an arm or something. They worked so well together, and they completed each other in many ways. However, he had a job to do, and the sooner he did it, the sooner he could get home and resume the search for Rex Dalton—with Marissa.
Cooperation from back home helped him track Carson, now traveling as Barclay Cooper, from Santiago to Valparaiso, about sixty miles away. When Josh got there, he wished Marissa was still with him. The beautiful city was built upon dozens of steep hillsides. It had been declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO a dozen or so years before, which had led to preservation of the unique funicular system of public transport. National monuments of historical significance abounded among colorfully painted houses that lent a fresh and whimsical vibe to the city.
Marissa would have loved it.
With his new identity and his ill-gotten gains from the drug trade in the form of a mountain of cash, Carson had established a home in the penthouse of a luxury apartment building at the apex of one of the tallest hills. With surveillance, Josh learned that Carson evidently didn’t feel the need for bodyguards, probably because he lived in the illusion that he had pulled a David Seth Kotkin, better known by his stage name David Copperfield, on the CIA and the world.
What an idiot. He of all people should know better.
Josh didn’t feel the need to give him any advice on the matter. He simply rang the doorbell one afternoon after he’d spent a few days in observation. A pretty Chilean woman in an old-fashioned maid’s uniform opened the door. Her expression was carefully schooled to be pleasant, but under her makeup, Josh could see the shadow of a bruise around her left eye. Her demeanor was subservient.
Josh had to use a bit of schooling himself not to react to what he immediately assumed was abuse of this woman, probably by Carson himself, knowing his predilections. Without saying a word, he promised the woman her injuries would be avenged, but his voice didn’t betray it as he asked for Señor Cooper and was admitted to the house.
Josh cooled his heels but not his temperas h
e waited in the parlor while the maid summoned Carson. In only a few minutes, Carson appeared, affable and willing to entertain this drop-in guest. His demeanor didn’t last long.
“Mr. Carson, I’ve been sent to bring you back to the United States. Come along peacefully, and everything will be all right.” Josh let his jacket open just enough for Carson to see the Sig Sauer, courtesy of a CIA plant in the embassy in Santiago, thrust into his waistband.
At first, Carson tried to bluff. “I’m afraid you’re mistaken about my identity,” he said, trying with little success to appear calm.
“I’m afraid you’ve mistaken me for an idiot,” Josh said in a measured tone. “Have your help pack a suitcase for you, and we’ll be on our way.”
Emboldened by the fact that Josh hadn’t shown him a badge or anything to indicate official status, Carson did relax. His expression morphed from slightly nervous to supercilious.
“I don’t think so. You have no status, or you’d have arrested me. Get out.”
Josh smiled. “Here’s my status,” he said as he drew the Sig with the silencer fitted to the end. “Call the woman and tell her to pack your stuff.”
The blood had drained from Carson’s face and he slowly raised his hands.
Josh could see the wheels turning in Carson’s head. Anxious people can make stupid moves. He leveled the pistol at Carson’s head and hardened his gaze.
“You know I can’t return to the States. I don’t know who you are, or who sent you, but I’d guess you’re a bounty hunter. I can pay you. Name your price.”
Josh stayed silent, and Carson seemed to deflate, dropping the arrogance.
“Please. My life in the US is over, I can never set foot there again. My wife is divorcing me, my reputation is ruined. I can’t go to prison… they’ll… I’ll never… Why can’t you just be satisfied that I’m no longer in a position to do any damage?”
Josh’s hard demeanor cracked. His jaw dropped, and he felt fury overtake him. “No damage? No damage! You sanctimonious son of a bitch. You’ve gotten three good agents and several of their local assets killed. You’ve destroyed a couple of million dollars’ worth of operations that had to be dropped when you exposed them, and you’re directly responsible for killing a good friend of mine and his team in an ambush in Afghanistan. No damage. You say that one more time and I’ll shoot you where you stand.”
Carson had been impassive against the accusations until Josh mentioned his friend and his team. Then his face went ashen. “You’re CRC?”
“Damn straight and proud of it. Just an FYI about my brief, I’ve been ordered to take you back to the US alive but have been authorized to terminate you if that’s not possible. And one thing you might not know about me—I’ve never failed to complete an assignment.”
Carson’s shoulders slumped. “All right. Don’t shoot—I just need to call Maria on the intercom.” He gestured toward a corner of the room.
Josh nodded, keeping his weapon trained on Carson as he turned and took a step toward the table in the corner with what looked like a telephone on it. Josh had let his eyes stray toward the corner for half a second, so he missed it when Carson’s muscles bunched. He turned the gun and squeezed the trigger as Carson made a leap for the window, and he thought he saw the round hit home, but before he could process what he’d seen, Carson’s body had plummeted the ten stories to the steep hillside below.
In shock, Josh rushed to the window to try to spot the body. There was too much greenery below. He needed to get down there in case there was any way Carson had survived, finish him off, and get out of town. Already he could hear Maria screaming in another room. He dashed back to the passage from the parlor to the front door, passing her on the way. In hurried Spanish, he said there’d been an accident.
It was the best he could do for her. His quick observation of the broken window convinced him the death could be ruled suicide if he’d missed Carson and no bullet could be found. There was no blood on the window.
The next moment, the maid burst into the room, saw the broken window, and then her eyes darted around and found no Carson. She broke down in hysteria. Josh was sure she couldn’t have heard the shot, and she couldn’t have seen anything because she was in another room, but if the body showed a gunshot, he’d have to get rid of it, quickly.
What a snafu! Damn, I wish Marissa were here. I could use some help.
Twenty-four hours later, Josh and Marissa stood on the carpet in Brandt’s DC office. Josh had located Carson’s body, and it was battered and scratched from his fall through the trees and into the garden below. He hadn’t found a bullet wound, concluding that maybe one of the scratches on his neck and shoulders had been from a graze by his shot but would not be easy to pick up by the coroner—the cause of death was obviously not a bullet wound.
Josh firmly believed he couldn’t have missed altogether, but The Old Man was having a field day dressing him down for both Carson’s suicide and his wild shot.
“I can’t believe it. Shit, what did you learn during training? Rule number one about guns—CRC agents are not gangsters—we don’t go around brandishing guns and threatening people with them. CRC agents draw their guns for one reason and one reason only, to kill someone. Rule number two, a CRC agent never misses.”
In the silence that followed, the Old Man sighed and shrugged before he continued. “But I guess it could have been a lot worse, Farley. You were lucky to have missed or almost missed.”
But after saying that, he couldn’t help himself and continued his rant. “Damn, just listen to me, I can’t believe I am even saying it, ‘lucky that you missed or almost missed’.”
At that Josh started to relax.
Brandt saw it and started again, “Don’t you relax yet, boy. You could’ve done a lot better. You do realize that thanks to you falling asleep on the job we’re fresh out of leads now. He might have told us the name of the drug mastermind here in the US, if we could have questioned him. And he might have had an idea whether Rex is dead or alive.”
Josh hung his head. “Yes, sir. I’m sorry.”
“Yeah, yeah I know, and it won’t happen again and all that BS. Go get yourself something to eat and get some sleep. Be back here in the morning.”
Josh nodded and left without another word to either Brandt or Marissa. He just smiled as he left the office. They all knew the Old Man, he always had this hard-baked, bombastic way about him, but everyone knew he cared as much for his agents as he would’ve cared for his own children, if he had any.
***
MARISSA LAUGHED.
“Why are you laughing?” Brandt snapped.
“I’m wondering if Josh knows that all your ranting just now was actually not as serious as it sounded and that you’re actually kind of happy with the outcome?”
“Yeah well, my agents don’t have to know when I’m serious or not,” he grumbled.
“But I would’ve liked for us to have had a chance to interrogate Carson.”
“Leadership a la John Brandt style, I guess,” Marissa replied with a sweet smile.
“Okay, Josh is overdue for R and R. What about you? Do you need a break?”
She thought for a moment. “I don’t need one, but I wouldn’t object to one. What would you say if we took it together, Josh and me?”
“So that’s the way it is?”
“Maybe it is, maybe it’s not, who knows?” She grinned. “But we do enjoy each other’s company. If we’re not violating some rule you haven’t told me about.”
“So, if it’s against the rules, does that mean you’ll stop enjoying each other’s company?”
“Yeah, I guess if you want to issue an order to that effect, we’ll stop enjoying it.”
Brandt suppressed a smile when the thought crossed his mind that if he had a daughter, this is exactly what she would be like. “Okay, in that case you’re ordered to keep on enjoying each other’s company, so long as it doesn’t interfere with your performance. Is that clear?”
&n
bsp; “Yes, sir. Clear as mother’s milk, sir.” She smiled as she mock-saluted him.
“Okay – you two take a month and make sure you come back sharp.”
“Thanks, John. See you in a month,” she said as she got up and left to find Josh.
Chapter Thirteen
DESPITE THEIR AGREEMENT to just be friends, Rex missed Sunstra’s company during the following week. She’d gone to Phuket to visit her parents, and he’d spent the week doing day trips into the countryside around Bangkok, talking to old people he met about their memories of WWII. Those who remembered much were in their late eighties, and often they waved him away, saying they’d rather not talk about it.
Thailand’s position during the war had been that of a reluctant ally of Japan. They’d been invaded, and the prime minister had elected to cooperate rather than fight. Subsequent bombing raids by Allied forces on Bangkok had strengthened dissatisfaction with him, and his successor had continued a charade of collaboration while shielding the growing underground movement. The movement was preparing an assault on Japanese forces when Japan’s surrender occurred.
Everyone willing to talk to Rex claimed to be part of the underground, even those who would have been young teens at the time. He considered it a largely wasted week, and he was heartily looking forward to a pleasant weekend with Sunstra as he boarded a plane to Phuket on Thursday afternoon.
He’d considered driving. The journey would have taken him down the long peninsula on the west side of the Gulf of Thailand toward Malaysia, but there were few towns of interest to him along the five-hundred-mile journey. Almost eleven hours in the driver’s seat, and long stretches where there’d be nowhere to get something to eat or fill up the gas tank—not his favorite choice.