by James Hunt
“Oh yeah?” Sutherland said. “And what school do you attend? Where do you live? How do you know all these ISIS creeps?”
“We only know each other. We live together. All of us. We have little money,” Mahmoud said.
“What’s your major?” Sutherland asked.
“There is no school!” Mahmoud shouted, cracking. “It was easier to get education visas than it was to apply for refugee status.”
Wary of all the back and forth, Thaxton stepped forward, pulled a digital recorder from her pocket, and pressed the stop button. Angela paused in her note taking and stared down at her efforts to keep up, wondering why she had even bothered.
“That’s enough,” Thaxton said. “We’re getting nowhere fast.”
“I don’t think that’s the case,” Angela said. As all eyes fell on her, she realized she had spoken out of turn. Thaxton stared back at her with near amusement on her face.
Having garnered their attention, Angela decided to continue. “I think all of this is pretty revealing.” She paused, trying to read Sutherland and Thaxton’s straight-faced expressions. “I mean, don’t you agree?”
Sutherland sighed and turned to Mahmoud. “I would if I didn’t think it was one-hundred percent bullshit.”
“I don’t lie…” Mahmoud said softly.
“What?” Sutherland asked, leaning in closer.
“I said I don’t lie. Are we here illegally? Yes. Are we Muslim? Yes. Are we Syrian? Yes.” He paused and took a deep breath. “Are we terrorists? No.”
Thaxton cut in, intrigued. “This ISIS mafia, as you referred to them. You know where they’re operating?”
Mahmoud shook his head. “Your agent, Martinez. He asked us the same thing.”
“Well?” Thaxton said, looking down the line of men. Their eyes remained averted from her deepening glare.
“Only I and Shakir speak English. And we met Captain Martinez outside a mosque service, trying to make new friends. Trying to weed out any ISIS who were after us.” He paused, staring ahead. “We think Martinez was there for the same reason.”
At the end of the bench, Shakir grunted in anger while shaking his head. Sutherland looked up, annoyed. “You have a problem there, Sha-kir? Something you wanna add to the conversation?”
Mahmoud raised a hand. “Please. He is only afraid. We are all afraid.”
Angela scanned the faces of the men. They were groomed and dressed as Americans, but she could see a hopelessness in their eyes, a despondent, vacant look that didn’t seemed bred in deception. They looked as though they had been through hell.
“Martinez…” Sutherland said. “Where is he?”
Mahmoud looked around reserved and nervous.
“Eyes up here, Mahmoud,” Sutherland continued, pointing at his own eyes with two fingers.
Mahmoud began rubbing his hands together nervously. “There is a place we know little about. One of our friends. He went there. He volunteered to join the Islamic State so that we would know where they were. So that, when the time came, we’d have… something to offer.”
“To offer who?” Sutherland asked.
“The U.S. government,” Mahmoud continued. “People like you.”
“Interesting,” Thaxton said, cutting in. “And what is this information worth to you?”
Mahmoud made direct eye contact with her for the first time, not hesitant in his response. “To put us somewhere where ISIS cannot find us.”
Sutherland tilted his head back and laughed. “Ah. Sort of like Witness Protection for foreign nationals.”
Angela’s hand began to hurt from writing so much. She then glanced at the mirror-like Plexiglas window, wondering about the reaction of her watching colleagues. The sound box had been turned off, preventing anyone outside from hearing what was being said in the room. She was certain that she’d be met with a barrage of questions when she left the room.
“You told Captain Martinez about this place? This ISIS hideout?” Thaxton asked.
“Yes,” Mahmoud answered. “He said he would help us.”
Thaxton turned around thinking to herself, holding one arm by the elbow as her hand rested on her chin. “His last known location was at your meeting place.” She then turned to Angela. “Did you get a call from him after that?”
Angela shook her head. “I didn’t even get a call about the first place. He just said that he was going to do some investigating.”
Thaxton turned to Mahmoud. “Why haven’t we heard from him since?”
Mahmoud shrugged, trying to come up with a good answer. “I-I don’t know. Maybe he got caught.”
Angered, Sutherland stepped forward. “And you better damn well hope that he didn’t and that nothing happened to him, or it’s your ass.” He glared down at the line of men. “All of you!”
Thaxton placed a hand on Sutherland’s shoulder, calming him. “That’s okay. We’re good here.” Her eyes traveled across the room to Angela. “I think our work is done here.”
Sutherland looked around, confused. “Ma’am? I’m sorry, I don’t know what you mean. They haven’t told us—”
“I think Agent Gannon can take it from here.” She then walked to Angela. “I want you to write down the location and description of this place they’re talking about and report to Chief Drake’s office when you’re done.”
Angela looked passed Thaxton to Sutherland with a confused expression. Her head went down, nodding. “Yes ma’am… I think I should be able to handle that.”
“Good,” Thaxton said, turning to Mahmoud. “You will tell her everything you know about this location, and I’ll see to it that you’re taken care of. Understand?”
After a long pause, Mahmoud said a faint “yes.”
“Because you and your friends aren’t going anywhere until we confirm every bit of information you give us. And once we have Captain Martinez back, then we can talk.”
She beckoned Sutherland to the door, but he didn’t look happy or convinced. He finally conceded, letting out a loud sigh, and left the room with Thaxton. The door shut again, and Angela felt a tinge of nervousness being left in the room with six men restrained only by their handcuffs.
Their reflections showed in the window, and Angela knew her every move was being watched, not just by her colleagues, but by the FBI duo who had just left the room. Her suspicion was confirmed the moment she noticed that the switch to the room mic, located right next to the door, had been turned on.
She turned to the men and tried to sound her most confident. Their festering disapproval made her uncomfortable, but she let out a deep breath, smiled slightly and began. “So, Mr. Mahmoud. I believe you have some information to share,” she said, pen in hand.
He said nothing and her heart started racing. Now what? A long silence followed. All the men looked away from her except Mahmoud. He slowly lifted his cuffed hands and pointed at her.
“You Martinez partner?”
She didn’t understand whether it was a question or a statement but answered nonetheless. “Yes. I am.”
“He told me about you. Said you were smart.”
Angela smiled slightly. “Well, that’s nice to hear. What can you tell me about this location?”
“El Paso, Texas,” Mahmoud said. “Never seen it, but our friend. He sent an email about two weeks ago. Brief. Only one line of GPS coordinates.”
Angela paused, fearing that whatever they gave her could turn out to be misleading, or a dead end. “Do you have those coordinates?” she asked.
“Yes,” he said, placing his index finger against his forehead.
Angela waited, but Mahmoud seemed in no rush to disclose the information. He crossed his legs and leaned forward with a more casual tone than before. “Martinez also said that you can be trusted. That you are loyal.”
Angela nodded. “To my partner, yes. To this job, absolutely.”
Mahmoud smiled, exposing a missing tooth in his top row. “He also said that you were naïve.”
Angela paused, u
nsure how to respond. “I don’t agree. But everyone is entitled to their opinion.”
“Yes,” Mahmoud said, smiling. “Yes they are.”
Shakir, however, seemed less than smitten with their exchange. “Quit flirting with this bitch and get us out of here!” he shouted, waving his hands in the air and jangling his cuffs.
Angela brought one hand to her side, hovering over her pistol.
Mahmoud’s face flushed as he began to shout at Shakir in Arabic. Shakir shouted back.
“Gentlemen!” Angela shouted. “Enough!”
The men calmed as they turned their heads in her direction. Angela shuffled on the bench and brought the pen back to the notepad, waiting. “The coordinates. Now, please.”
Mahmoud rubbed his tired eyes as he nodded. “Okay. Here you go.” He paused, thinking to himself, then spoke. “31761970…”
Angela wrote each digit down as Mahmoud paused again to think of the rest. “1062960792.”
“That’s the latitude and longitude, right?” she asked.
“Yes,” he said.
“And you’re sure about those numbers?”
“I am.”
Angela leaned back, studying him. “That’s impressive,” she said smiling. “I don’t think there would be any way I could have memorized all those digits.”
Mahmoud nodded with a nervous smile that quickly dropped. “When you fear for your life, you’ll memorize anything.”
Angela said nothing, rising from the bench. She went to the door and opened it, only to find a group of Border Patrol agents outside the room, waiting for her. Surprisingly, Thaxton and Sutherland weren’t among the agents. Angela quickly closed the door, locking it.
“What’s next?” Patrol Agent Bernasconi, a muscular tank of a man asked from the group.
Angela held the notepad close to her chest, nervous at all the unwanted attention.
“Come on, Agent Gannon,” Bernasconi continued. “You gotta bring us in on this thing.”
“I’m working on it,” she said, storming past them and trying to ignore their groans. As soon as she turned the corner, she nearly ran into Captain Reynolds, who was tossing her ponytail and standing directly in her way. She was holding a rolled-up newspaper.
“Here,” she said, handing it to Angela.
Angela took the paper and unrolled it, revealing the front page of the Del Rio Post. Agent Dawson’s official photo was in the side left corner under a headline that said, Terrorist Bombing Rocks Border Town, Kills Agent. Just seeing his boyish face nearly brought tears to her eyes. First Dawson, and now Martinez was missing. It was almost too much to take.
“They got it all wrong,” Reynolds said, brushing one side of her shoulder-length red hair back.
Angela scanned the article. She could see in the first paragraph that there was a lot of embellishment in the article. They spoke about the box truck as though it were a missile headed toward town, prematurely detonated while being intercepted by Border Patrol agents.
“That’s the media for you,” Angela said, reading. She then looked up at Reynolds, noticing her pained expression. “At least they make Dawson out to be a hero. That’s worth something, right?”
Captain Reynolds’s finger tracked across the article, pressing down. “It’s too much speculation. Did they call you or me or any of us to confirm this bullshit?”
“Not that I know of,” Angela said. “I mean, the chief gave his press conference earlier.”
Reynolds snatched the paper back and huffed. “Either they have a fiction writer on staff, or someone from this station is giving credence to this crap.” She turned and walked past Angela toward the lobby, while Angela remained standing there, stunned. She hoped that Reynolds wasn’t implying something with her comment.
What reason would Angela possibly have to lie? No one from the local media had tried to contact her yet, and for that she was grateful. Reynolds was upset, but instead of fuming around the station, Angela wished she would offer to help or just go home. There were terrorists out there, and now wasn’t the time to fall to pieces—or so Angela believed.
She continued to Chief Drake’s office at the end of the hall. The door and blinds were closed, and she wasn’t sure what game the FBI was playing. She knocked on the door and heard Drake’s voice call her in. As she opened the door, she could see him at his desk with the FBI team around him.
Thaxton turned around and welcomed Angela, asking her to close the door. Angela pushed the door shut and approached the desk, notepad in hand, as everyone watched her in silent hope.
“What’d you bring us?” Thaxton asked.
Angela stopped, ready to hand over the notebook, but it was clear something was troubling her. “Can I ask you a question, ma’am?”
Thaxton leaned back, surprised but agreeable, while Sutherland eyed her suspiciously. “Sure.”
“Why did you leave me in the holding room with those men? After all your work getting information from the suspect, it seemed strange that you and Agent Sutherland would just walk out.”
Thaxton crossed her arms and looked down, nodding. Her face then shot up, with her thin, straight hair swinging to the side and a slight smile on her face. “There are many moving parts to consider here, Agent Gannon. If we’re going to find your partner, we need to be able to trust each other and work together.” Not directly answering the question, she held her hand out for the notebook. “The coordinates, please.”
Angela slowly handed it over. Sutherland and the other agents watched from Drake’s desk as Thaxton pulled her digital recorder from her pocket and pressed play. Through its tiny speaker, Angela could hear Mahmoud’s faint voice.
“31761970… 1062960792.”
“Perfect match,” Thaxton said, turning the recorder off.
Angela looked at her in disbelief. “You… you recorded him. What is this, some kind of game to you?”
Chief Drake looked up at Angela, shocked by her tone. “Agent Gannon. Please.”
Thaxton waved his objection away smiling. “It’s quite all right, Chief. Agent Gannon is right to ask questions.” She stopped and then handed the notebook back to Angela. “I just wanted to make sure that we’re on the same page.”
“Have a seat,” Chief Drake said, indicating the chair in front of his desk.
Angela felt as though she had no choice. She sat down at the edge of the seat, hands on her knees, eager to go to the next step in finding her partner. “So we have the coordinates. What are we waiting for?”
Agent Lynch set a Toughbook laptop in the center of Drake’s desk and opened it as everyone gathered around, leaving a space for Angela to see the screen. A satellite image was displayed of lush green land, with spots of clear white all around it. There were numbered coordinates everywhere, listed in parallel and vertical lines like a graph.
“The numbers, please,” Lynch said, turning to Angela.
She handed the notepad to him, wondering why Thaxton had given it back to her in the first place. He took the pad and typed in the coordinates. The screen moved along and shifted to a new location. Lynch zoomed in closer with a scroll of the mouse as the image centered over a large desert area with a curvy line of mountains running through it.
“That’s El Paso, all right,” Lynch said with confidence. He typed some more, and the image moved in even closer to a largely uninhabited area far outside the city and close to the Mexican border.
“Starting to see a pattern here in how these guys operate,” Sutherland said. “Surprised they haven’t crossed paths with the cartels.”
“Who says they haven’t?” Lynch said. “Could be a mutually beneficial relationship.”
Everyone continued watching the screen as Lynch scrolled around, trying to get in close enough to see some kind of structure. But it was all desert.
“Keep in mind, it’s only a satellite image. Whatever is there might not show up.” He zoomed in closer on the hills and outlines of nearby roads. There was nothing that indicated a secret hide
out or gathering place, even as Lynch pin-pointed the exact coordinates.
“Well. I’m sure we’ll find something when we get out there,” Sutherland added, scratching his head.
“Wait a minute,” Lynch said urgently. He moved around the screen in deep concentration. “I can kind of make something out there.” He got in as close as he could get before the image began to get fuzzy and pixelated. “There!” he said, touching the screen with his index finger.
He was pointing to a lightly shaded area in the vast desert, barely noticeable. “They’ve got the place covered. Camouflaged,” Lynch said.
“Shit. Cartels do that all the time,” Sutherland said. “How do we know who we’re dealing with here?”
“Guess we’re going to have to go out there and find out,” Lynch replied.
Sutherland glanced at his watch. “That’s a six hour drive. Not exactly a hop, skip, and jump away you know.”
Thaxton backed away from the desk and walked to the window, staring out into the parking lot. It was already late afternoon of a very long day. Angela shuddered at the prospect of making that long trip.
“Who said anything about driving?” Lynch said.
“Ma’am?” Sutherland said, turning to the window where Thaxton was standing.
“I see a lot of red tape already.” She turned from the window and looked at her team, all dutifully prepared to follow her every whim. “We might have to bring in some other teams on this. Not sure if going it alone is the answer here.”
“Your call, ma’am,” Sutherland said.
“Our department would like to help,” Drake said, folding his hands. “But El Paso isn’t exactly our jurisdiction.”
Angela looked around the room, feeling helpless in trying to influence their decision. Or perhaps they were done with her. Either way, she wanted in. Nothing was going to settle right with her until they found Martinez. She had met with him just the night before; how far could he possibly have gone?
In a startling coincidence, Angela’s cell phone vibrated in her pocket. She took it out, expecting a call from Doug but saw Martinez’s name on the screen instead.
