Massive Attack (A Guy Niava Thriller Book 1)

by Dana Arama

  Alex asked, “And what about the rifles? Are they here already?”

  “We stuffed them in a container of a family that should be arriving in the next few days.” I pushed my plate away, now empty, whereas a few moments ago it had been filled with eggs and salmon. I removed the white napkin that I’d tucked over my tie.

  I didn’t want to supply Alex with too many details yet. He was my personal bodyguard, a close friend and someone who was willing to put his life on the line for me, but I thought that the compartmentalization was good for him. I didn’t tell him that the father of the family was a specialist at a hospital in Philadelphia, that the mother was unimportant and that I chose them because they had three kids and the amount of boxes and bags one needs to bring all their things to the park is astounding. I was left thinking about how and with what could I compensate ‘my’ Arabs for their delivery of the goods, given that it was slightly late. According to their plan, an accurate timetable was the key to success. But that was their plan, and I had another problem that I had to take care of… the strange occurrence of the previous the evening. Who was the youngster with a laptop? How did he know to pack up just moments before security reached him and who had helped him escape the casino? And, more importantly, did he manage to breach the casino’s security and access its files? Or worse, my own?

  ***

  I entered the control room and as usual everyone tensed. One put out his cigarette, others sat up straighter in their chairs, their eyes glued to the screen. The room went silent. I stood on the staircase and studied them. They moved uncomfortably in their chairs. No one dared to take his eyes off the screen and return my stare. It gave me some of the feeling of power I had once had. The fear of those surrounding me was energizing.

  I savored the feeling a bit longer, then spoke in a low voice. “Attention, everybody!”

  Everyone stopped staring at their screens and, with curiosity and fear, looked at me. I assumed the news from yesterday had already been leaked.

  “Yesterday we had an unusual occurrence. We allowed a visitor with a fake ID to enter. First failure.” They exchanged glances. By the smiles of relief, I could tell who wasn’t on yesterday’s shift. I continued, “He arrived with a black backpack with a laptop inside it. At some point during the night, he took out his laptop and started surfing the web. No one here noticed it, even though we all know that it could be an opening to penetrate private files. Second failure.” I smiled for a moment and carried on with a tone of mock forgiveness. “Maybe because he stepped away from the tables and you were focused on them. One of the waitresses did notice and immediately notified the security guard. But before we could catch him, he packed up and ran away. Third failure.” I raised three fingers in the air. “It is a possibility that while he surfed undisturbed, he infiltrated my personal files… failure number four.” I paused intentionally, looking at each and every one of them. “I don’t know if one of you guided him in any way…” another pause. “Either way, everyone on yesterday’s shift is fired!” I allowed them to look around at one another, petrified, before I continued, “I want to know who this kid is, what he was looking for in my files and who helped him escape.” I glanced at my watch, “The time is eight fifteen. Today is a holiday, which means that you have less than two hours before the rush starts. Leave two people on the regular lookout and the rest of you start going over all the cameras from yesterday.” Another pause. And there was just a hint of a smile on my lips, “Whoever finds him and the person who helped him escape will receive a bonus.” I erased the smile off my face and added, “And when I talk about finding him, I mean his name, private address and whoever helped him on the way.”

  I bet on the fact that it would take them an hour, maybe an hour and a half, enough time to sniff something out before blood started to spill. At around noon the action would start, and I wouldn’t have time to deal with it.

  They were faster than I had expected. It made me wonder if someone from yesterday’s shift worked with her. If someone had recognized her and didn’t pass on the information. He should be a floating corpse in the river by now. On the low table before me was a mirrored surface with the remainder of white powder. I asked, “Who is she?”

  “A hooker the casino works with from time to time.”

  “So, do we have her telephone number?”

  “We do.”

  “And can we call and invite her to come over for a client without it looking strange?”

  “Yes. Or send a car and drive her to a client. We do that as well, sometimes.”

  “Excellent. Call her and tell her a car will pick her up in half an hour.”

  “Which of the drivers should I send to pick her up?”

  “I will send someone special. He has one of our cars and is always ready to take a drive.”

  He left and I pulled out my cell phone to make a call. The familiar raspy voice answered, “Yes, boss.” His intonation sent a shiver of fear down my spine, maybe because I knew what he was capable of.

  “Dubroshin, I need to investigate somebody.” I took a sip of my coffee and added, “And after you have gotten what you can out of her, she needs to be transferred to a very special client.”

  “Ten minutes,” was his very short answer, then the call disconnected. I almost felt sorry for the girl.

  Guy Niava,

  November 11, 2015, 9:25 a.m.

  The hour was still quite early when Jonathan peeked his head around the door. He signaled goodbye by waving his hand and was off. I shouted at him, “Hey! Where are you going?”

  “To Jeremy,” he answered from the top of the stairs. “He can help me find Ashley’s father.”

  “Come here a minute.”

  Jonathan returned and peeked once again into the room. I put my cell phone down for a moment and warned him, “Even if he manages to trace him, don’t go to her on your own, okay? They may have already tracked her down and could be waiting for you to show up.”

  “I spoke to her this morning. Everything is okay and she is on her way to work.” He stood there a second longer, as if wanting to say something but couldn’t bring himself to.

  “All the information you find you can pass on to her by phone. You know that you don’t have to be there, right? If they suspect you did something to them, they will track her down and wait for you. Don’t go there!” I repeated.

  Jonathan just murmured, “Yes… by phone,” and left. His black backpack hung on his shoulder. He never left the house without it. I knew his laptop was inside there as well. There was something about the look on his face that I didn’t like. Was he hoping to meet up with her again? Perhaps he thought of hiring her services? I went over the conversation I’d had earlier that morning, but my head was still wrapped around Jonathan. “Great information,” the man who was still officially my boss had said. He sounded satisfied, “I have already passed on the order to raise the level of alertness, but I ask you to please let this matter go. I have sent the information to the highest ranks, and it is distinctly in the Americans’ jurisdiction. The CIA and FBI definitely don’t need our help. You, on the other hand, have earned your vacation before you return to the office.” I heard Jonathan’s car drive away. “Understood and accepted,” I had answered my boss. “And have we done anything about the information I gathered in France? Something is cooking there, I’m sure of it.”

  “We passed it on to the French authorities…” He had sounded hesitant. “But you know them. If it’s not tangible information about a specific object they won’t bother to check into it.”

  “In a text that they sent me it was definitely said that there will be festivities in Paris at the end of the weekend. Huge amounts of the Captagon drug are flooding the markets, especially the black kind marked with Arabic. You know this means that ISIS is in the area,” I reminded him.

  “It is not enough to bring the French police or their security forces to
act on it. Apparently, it is not the first batch to hit the markets there. They relate the word ‘festivity’ to the excess use of the drugs.”

  “So… That is exactly the problem, it is not just any drug. Captagon fuels ISIS members, especially before they go out on missions.”

  “Yes. I know and you know, but they just passed on the information to the anti-drug division,” said my boss.

  “Like February in Marseille, before the shooting of the prime minister. At least then they put the whole neighborhood under siege. Not only did they find the terrorists but also twenty kilograms of weed and seven Kalashnikov rifles.”

  “They claimed it to have been an incidental shooting because of a drug war. According to them now, this warning is also concerning drugs so it will be handled as such.”

  “Weed and Captagon are not the same thing,” I stated, but my words were heard by the person who already knew that.

  “Don’t forget to spend some time in the sun. Make use of it before you start your office job. I am preparing your desk with your name on it.”

  I glanced outside. The skies were clouded over, hinting at the oncoming rain. “If I wasn’t slated to enter into an office job, maybe I wouldn’t think of retiring.”

  “Your retirement is not final ‘until the fat lady lies bleeding on the stage.’”

  I smiled. That was his combat opera, a soldier’s idea of a joke. “The fat lady doesn’t have to stop singing… I gather that I have no chance of continuing the same mission then?”

  “You can understand that you are on vacation and when you get back we will think what is the best thing to do. For now, I think returning to the same mission would be a great mistake.”

  “Yes, you would think?” I said, somewhat sarcastically. After three years, numerous warnings about predicted terrorist attacks and a big, successful mission, this vacation was necessary. The last mission had been a success, which was a good feeling, as if the situation in Iran would change for the better because of what I had done. I felt improved, that I had become once again a fighter who can be depended on, and not the wreck I had been after Hadas’ death. I loved my job, but I was not sure I would like to be an undercover agent, sitting under fluorescent lights at a desk, staring into a computer all day. I ended the conversation with a non-committal, “Talk to you later,” and then hung up.

  I approached Jonathan’s room. His computer was off. I switched it on, and it prompted me to enter a password. Damn it. There was no chance that I would be able to hack in and find out what he had been working on over the last few hours. I needed Ariel, the Mossad’s cyber expert, a man who had also become a good friend over the years. But Ariel was enrolled in another mission in another spot on Earth. I was afraid that if Jonathan managed to find Ashley’s father, and if I saw the signs that he had the hots for the girl, it would all point to my nephew being on his way over there now.

  I glanced around a bit more to see what more I could learn. Jonathan’s cell phone was on his bed, most likely forgotten. I turned it on. It had no passcode. As I had thought, his last conversation was at eight thirty in the morning, with Ashley. How did he make arrangements with Jeremy? I hoped he hadn’t made the same mistake as yesterday. Maybe he really was on his way to his friend.

  A few hours later, when the heavy clouds had subsided and the rare winter sun was shining, I sat with my brother on his patio, a glass of whiskey in my hand. That was when Jeremy called and asked to speak with Jonathan because he wasn’t answering his cell. Once again, I found myself grabbing my keys. This time I took my helmet. Once again, I mumbled something to my brother about a meeting and drove to the same address that was already saved in my head.

  When I arrived at Ashley’s apartment, I recognized Jonathan’s car parked near an adjacent building. The aggressive skid marks on the road near his car bothered me. I entered the building. Like yesterday, the door of the lobby was open, and the sharp scent of urine hung in the air. As opposed to yesterday, Ashley’s door stood wide open. I found Ashley lying unconscious on the floor. I touched her arm. She was ice cold. I knew it would be better to lay her down on her bed. How many hours had she been lying like that? I bent down again and checked her pulse. It was quick but faint, but there definitely was a pulse. That was the first good sign. Bruises had begun to show themselves on her pretty face. On the side of her jaw the skin was blackening and the left eye looked red, like soft meat pulp. It appeared as if they had hit her there several times.

  I thought that if they beat her in her face, there would be no reason not to beat her all over her body. I opened her robe and checked for internal or external bleeding. I passed my hand gently over her back. I didn’t see any bleeding, then I turned her over gently onto her side. Some reddening appeared there too, and it was possible there was internal bleeding as well. Damage to the kidneys could be very bad. Her black wig was still sitting askew on her head. I carefully took it off and laid it down on the floor. A wig can be a prostitute’s most important possession, and the accessory that separates her identity as a sex worker and her real identity. Was she on her way to a client or had she just come back from one? And Jonathan, was he with her? She moaned and began to cough. I stopped ruminating and watched her come to. She opened her blue eyes. I remembered them as beautiful, but in this moment they only radiated pain.

  “Everything hurts,” She murmured. I thought her jaw might be broken because her words were unintelligible.

  “I am going to pick you up and put you down on your bed, okay?”

  She said, “Okay,” or something to that effect, and I lifted her almost weightless body gently and laid her down onto the bed.

  Between moans she tried to say something.

  “Water?” I asked. She shook her head just once to indicate that she didn’t want any water.

  I glanced towards her. “Are you cold? Do you want a blanket?”

  She indicated “yes” by closing her eyelids. I pulled the covers over her and she remained with her eyes closed.

  “I have to call an ambulance. You can’t stay like this.”

  She didn’t answer. I pulled out my cell phone and dialed 911. I gave the address and hung up. I had a few minutes to coax her and try to find clues in her place.

  “Ashley, do you know who did this to you?”

  She turned her head and refused to look at me. I pressed on. “Did he take Jonathan with him? You have to answer me. Do you know who it was?”

  She raised one of her shoulders and added a shake of her aching head. A single tear fell down her cheek, and her small body wracked with sobs.

  “Soon they will come and take you away from here. You’ll be treated and feel better.” I wasn’t sure she had heard me, but I felt the need to comfort her.

  I quickly and quietly scanned her tiny apartment. Desperate, I even searched her closet, as if the miracle from yesterday would repeat itself, but Jonathan wasn’t there. Neither was his bag.

  Damn it, I thought, they’d managed to catch him. But who were ‘they’ and where had they taken my nephew? I had hoped that Ashley could help me with that, but Ashley had to get to the hospital immediately and I needed to track Jonathan. My starting point must be at the casino.

  ***

  I assumed that a police car would come along with the ambulance. So, until the rescue squad arrived I continued to search the apartment. My first instinct was to take Ashley’s cell phone, because it could be my first source of information, but I knew the police would want it too and my action would be seen as intrusive interference with a crime scene.

  I went outside and phoned my boss again. I didn’t know where he was in the world or if he went to sleep after our last conversation, but the hour wasn’t important.

  “I have a problem,” I said, by way of an opener.

  “What happened?”

  “My nephew, the one that decoded those lists, has been kidnapped.” Befor
e he managed to ask, I added, “I didn’t see the kidnapping happen, but the signs are there.”

  “How can I help?”

  “I am requesting direct access to all the information that the police and FBI gather here. Could you arrange that?”

  “I will pull some strings.”

  “To what extent and to whom can I divulge the subject of us?”

  “The information has been passed on. It isn’t a secret. Are you planning on paying the casino a visit?”

  “Yes,” I answered with certainty.

  “Is there any way I can deter you from doing it?”

  “Not really. Is there a chance of organizing a sketch of the structure?”

  “The gambling business is supposed to be legal in the United States. If you suspect something that smells like ‘mafia’... and it makes no difference which one, I request you to leave.”

  He hadn’t replied about the sketch, but I knew that if it was possible, I would receive it as soon as possible.

  “I can’t leave it be.”

  “You will have to, because we can’t allow ourselves to get involved with a case like this in the United States. In this case, leave and contact the office. If it comes to getting mixed up with the mafia, I will try and put you in contact with Zorro.”

  “Zorro?” I asked, surprised.

  “Alex Romanekov. Nicknamed ‘Zorro’. Unfortunately, not one of our forces anymore. A complex character because of their connections with the different cartels. The character who connects the different mafias there. With Alex, deals are sealed, that’s where everything is stored, firearms, drugs, until the deal is settled. One can launder money with Alex. And so on. Zorro owes me big time. This seems like a good time to collect the favor.”