Sudden Deception

by Judith Price

  “Jill,” Eric interrupted. “We have been working closely with the GSG 9 der Bundespolizei. You know, the counter-terrorism unit of the German Federal Police. You remember the unit over there?”

  “Yes, how could I not? They’re considered one of the best counter-terrorism units in the world. Karine said they think Petrovich is now in the US?”

  “Or still in Germany,” Eric said firmly. For a second Jill was quiet and so was Eric. “We don't know for sure, but I have a close acquaintance at GSG. Johan Rhein. I met him at an anti-money laundering conference in London a couple of months ago. He has a team working on the Petrovich file. I’ll get Johan on the private line and tell him I’ve got the agent following a lead on Petrovich on the line. That will get his attention. Jill, did you find anything out about Petrovich?” he queried. Then he interrupted with, “Standby, Jill.”

  “Guten Tag,” Eric said to Johan. “Yes, she’s on the other line now and Johan, she hasn’t briefed me why yet, but Jill has just landed in Hamburg. Yes. Okay, standby, Johan.” Eric resumed talking to Jill. “Jill, he said he wanted to debrief you regarding Petrovich. Johan said he could send a car to pick you up. Since it’s official business he also offered his department to foot the bill for a hotel.”

  “Danke,” Eric said thanking Johan and he hung up. The line muffled then Eric came back. “Jill?”

  “Yeah, I’m here,” she said wearily. “I didn’t really find out any information on Petrovich, Eric. But I'd appreciate any help on the ground here. This may sound over-the-top, but do you think they would let me use some of their resources?”

  “To locate David?” he asked. Jill told Eric about the ambush, about Zayed and his death.

  “I wonder why, when shown the picture of David, you got the name Petrovich?” he asked. “What makes you think David is in Hamburg?” He seemed perplexed, but still he considered the possibility when Jill told him about the written line in David’s notebook.

  “I think he was sending me a message,” she said full of hope.

  Suddenly Jill felt a bit uneasy and turned to look around. There were many people moving about the airport. She scanned more in-depth. Her eyes happened upon a man. He was standing, dressed in black pants and a black turtleneck. He stood void of purpose about one hundred feet away from Jill and stared at her, but there was something sinister in his stance. Jill stared back and the man looked away. “Eric, this isn’t a secure line. I’ll try and get one when I meet up with Johan to give you more details.”

  “Is everything okay, Jill?” he queried. She turned around to look at the man but he was gone.

  “Yeah, you’ll understand when I call you back.” Jill didn’t want to tell Eric she viewed. Well, not now anyway. She thought of the star she had drawn and the strange word below it. Karine and I will make this our little secret.

  Eric gave Jill the details of the driver who was coming to pick her up, “Johan said he had someone close by the airport. He should be there by now Jill.”

  “Thanks, I appreciate all the help I can get. Will they give me a security clearance?”

  Borderline annoyed, Eric said, “I’m sure they will give you what they can, within reason Jill. I’ll arrange clearance for you there. Who would have expected you to be back on the job, but in a different country?”

  Jill hung up. His last comment resonated with her. What the hell, back on the job? She did another scan—no sign of the staring man—and walked across the terminal out into the rain. The smell was fresh coolness. It wasn’t long before a car and driver pulled up and a sign saying “Oliver” was shoved under the windshield wiper.

  The man was dressed in slick charcoal Armani and guided her out of the rain and into a small black Audi sedan. A little chilled, Jill sat as the driver sped away from the airport. Looking past the rain-covered windshield and fast-moving wipers, she couldn’t help but feel she was somehow closer to David than she had been in the past week. The lump in her stomach had faded, or maybe she was just used to it now. She missed him immensely and she couldn't help but feel sad.

  Reading the note given to her from the driver, it had specific instructions to be ready, three hours from now, at nineteen hundred local, to give her briefing on Petrovich. Works both ways. Jill was thankful to hopefully find a shower and perhaps some clean clothes. The smell of airplane still permeated her skin and a hot shower would be like a long-awaited orgasm. She closed her tired eyes for only a brief moment and thought of the word Ochrana.

  Chapter Nineteen

  15:27 Zulu Time—HAMBURG, GERMANY

  The room at the hotel was sparsely decorated—small but clean, and it warmed her from the chill outside. The European walls were uniquely tailored in lines of teak with black and silver grout. The room doubled as a mini-office, well equipped with a computer and printer. The clock blinked 16:27. The bed was simpler than the beautiful comfy one in the obscure upscale Moroccan-style hotel in Kabul. This bed looked tightly made, and a smell of starch perked Jill’s nose when she sat on it and laid down her carry-on.

  She walked into the bathroom and sighed with elation. It was a stark difference from the dark room where the bed and office were. Baby-blue walls surrounded a large stainless steel Jacuzzi in one corner and an over-sized shower stall in the opposite corner. Stainless steel bowl sinks sat atop white marble. Fluffy towels were rolled up in tight tubes and piled neatly on the shelf that divided the shower from the tub. Jill glanced in the mirror and could clearly see the effects of sleep deprivation on her tired face.

  Back at the desk, Jill placed the German mobile phone which the driver had given her beside the computer, and lifted the side of the printer up. She was pleased to see a scanner. Undecided at first as to whether to take a shower or continue in her current condition, Jill knew she would not regret her decision.

  After twenty long minutes of hot rain massaging her muscles, she dressed in the thick cotton robe and headed over to the mini-office. On the way she stopped and opened the mini-bar. There was no scotch, just the usual beer, wine, and soft drinks; somehow she felt relieved. As the computer warmed to life, she called the hotel for express cleaning of her clothes.

  Jill unfolded the article she had taken from the abandoned house in the hills of Kushka. She stared again at the picture of Stan Brown. She had analyzed this several times since she recovered it, still asking the same questions: “What are you up to, Stan? Why is the article in the same place as David’s notebook? Why, in the middle of nowhere, was it in the same place as a lead to Petrovich? What are you up to, Mr. Brown?” She was determined to find the answers.

  Too restless to sleep, too hopeful to rest, she decided to open her laptop and feed it some juice. The desk was equipped with a wattage adapter for North America. Jill checked her e-mails then prepped the printer to scan. The brush of light scanned the article and the schematic drawing that she had found in the abandoned house, and she sent them off to Karine to have translated. No e-mails from David, but there was one from Leila:

  Where are you, Jill? Call me. L

  Jill glanced at the time, thinking of calling Leila. But she needed information about Stan Brown and she needed it now. She needed to understand what the hell was going on. Leila, my friend, you'll have to wait. Jill Googled the search term that had nagged her on this last leg of her trip:

  “Stan Brown Russia Afghanistan.” Putting these words in quotes would narrow down the search results.

  Most of what she found about Stan was small news clips and website content that reiterated what she already knew about him—an oil man from Texas. There were several articles about a fight he was having with regulatory bodies about standards increasing, which in turn would cost his business a significant amount of money; and how US companies were forbidden to hire slave labor. Even if the work was being done outside of the US.

  Jill leaned back in her chair, pulled the plush towel from her head and threw it onto the couch. She began to flick at her spiked hair as she mused on how Stan always seemed to find hi
mself in the thick of things. Narcissistic was his method, as a husband and a father. Jill remembered him bragging about a frivolous run-in he had with a waiter in a restaurant. The waiter accidentally spilled a glass of red wine all over David’s mother, who was wearing a crisp white pantsuit. David’s father took offense to such a strong degree that he had the waiter fired.

  David’s mother always backed up Stan’s ridiculous actions. She managed to imitate Stan’s pompous attitude, likely due to being married to a man of great wealth for so long. She did not care for basic humanity; well, that was Jill’s impression anyway. Her body and face displayed a woman trying to be much younger than she was. It was hard to be around either of them really, as the missing ingredient in any discussion was common sense. Or was it morality? Talk always revolved around money. For Jill, money was just a means to exist. Jill thrived on helping others, saving others. Ironically, Jill’s career ultimately would save David’s parents if there were any incidents in the US. If she did her job well, that is. Jill's and David’s family were like oil and water. She often wondered why David was so different from them.

  As she clicked fast through all of the propaganda, the secure mobile phone rang. “Jill, it’s Karine. I got that article translated, and am waiting on that drawing, but wanted to call you and let you know I sent it to your VPN account. Jill, it wasn’t in Russian as you had thought. The article was written in German. The schematics, though, are in Russian; that’s why it’s taking longer to translate. I am working on the logistics of you being over there assisting GSG and I think I can get your airfare covered too.”

  “Thanks, Karine,” Jill replied, but she wasn’t really interested in that right now. “Can you research any companies or groups that use the Star of David as a logo? Can you also correlate this with David’s name, and for that matter Stan Brown?” Jill said, all business. Karine would never get offended by this. She knew her job, she knew her place, and still they remained good friends.

  “What’s this Star of David?” Karine queried.

  “Just a hunch,” Jill replied, remembering her oath.

  “I don’t like when you get those types of hunches.”

  “Also, Karine, the name Ochrana. See what you can find on it. Cross-check everything with Petrovich. Okay?”

  “Ochrana, what the heck kind of name is Ochrana?”

  After a brief good-bye, Jill hung up, logged in, and downloaded the transcribed text. The article chronicled a contract awarded to Stan’s company, Marksman Oil, LLC. It was for an oil pipeline between Turkmenistan and Pakistan that ran through Afghanistan. There were many oil companies from the US involved in oil production in the Middle East. That would explain why he would be in this article. But why was it in German? She supposed, half-heartedly, that it would be news for Germany, given its political position on the US-occupied forces in Afghanistan. After all, the article was written from a negative point of view. “US contractor receives a reward while US forces continue to keep the peace in the country.” Yada, yada, yada.

  From Jill’s involvement in profiling, and with all the 9/11 terrorists coming from the Middle East, she knew parts of the area were very corrupt. Even the current trilateral meetings were frayed from the recent US drone attacks on deep tribal areas of Pakistan. Contracts were not just given without some under-the-table negotiations, not in today’s climate, anyway. There was also blood money, which exchanged hands regularly, and financed extortion of oil companies when their employees ended up in a desert jail for being drunk in public or flipping the bird.

  Stan would fit right into such a place, Jill mused. David sometimes would call him an ‘evil little ferret of a man’. Stan had left instructions that in the event of his death his own son was not welcome to attend his funeral. David didn't care, after all he did not want to be a puppet in Stan’s little show, and Jill had to agree. But she knew in the depths of her heart that Stan must love his son. Blood is thicker than water and all. And if he had any information about David, surely he would tell her. Surely?

  She typed “Star of David+David Brown” in quotes in Google. Nothing. She typed “Star of David+Stan Brown” into quotes. Nothing. “Shit.” She'd have to wait for Karine. She picked up her notebook and plopped herself down on the lime green couch. Germans, she thought, feeling how uncomfortable the hard couch was.

  When she opened her notebook, the Star of David was trying to speak but her sketch had no voice. Jill flipped through the tattered notebook and came across one of her mind maps and noticed the word ‘Family’ circled. Is the Star of David symbol a coincidence, even though David bore the same name? Jill jumped off the couch and headed to her laptop.

  Without further hesitation, she picked up her mobile phone and dialed. Voice-mail. “Stan, this is Jill. By now you must have heard the news about David. I need to speak to you urgently. I am in Hamburg, Germany.” She left the number to the hotel.

  She walked over to the bed and pulled the leather pouch from her bag then sat back down on the firm couch. Her heart was mixed with excitement and apprehension by the time she had the clay numbers displayed. “Star Gate,” Jill said aloud. It was the CIA Star Gate project, she had learned at her training at the RV department at the FBI. It was their attempt to teach Jill that her ability was more scientific than clairvoyant. With all intel gathered by the intelligence research department, the ones that spent countless hours sifting through endless streams of data and now with RV, data was to be verified by more than one source. While the SGP attempt to justify the science of RV was very real, all it really did was invoke what they called the “giggle factor.”

  But Jill knew different. From an early age with her grandparent’s teachings, she knew what she could do was very real, and most times there were no giggles involved. It sometimes would keep her awake at night. She remembered the time she saw herself walking in her town, deciding whether to cross a rocky desolate area where a dried up riverbank was. She was late that day and didn’t want Grandpapa to worry. He always worried too much.

  The day after her vision, Jill, all of twelve years old, was late for a play-date with her friend. She knew she could cross the dark shrubby area easily. She’d done it numerous times, but not at this late hour. So she stood at the edge. It was dark out and she was about to step into the abyss when she saw headlights. It was Grandpapa. Jill felt relieved that he had come to look for her. Then the very next day the news spread quickly all over town. A boy, eleven-years old, was stabbed to death in the exact place where Jill was headed. She didn’t quite understand her gift at that age, but she knew now that SGP was not going to change who she was and who she would become.

  The RV department had helped her to understand her gift, contain it. Now she was more determined than ever to use it again. If it took a hundred remote viewing sessions, she would do it. She was going to find David and she was going to do it now. She did not want to harness her gift in this remote viewing session. She was damn determined to let it all go. Fly.

  As a human, your brain thinks about petting a dog before you actually do it, the truth in pretty much everything that humans do. Now, as Jill sat, she swayed, she chanted. Her chant was simple. “Oooommmmm, David, oooommmmm, where are you, David?” More chanting and then without skipping a beat, deep in trance, Jill whispered out the word, “Ochrana.”

  Chapter Twenty

  The fat man stood in his long white gown in a circle of replicates of himself. His head was tilted downward as he stared at what appeared to be an ancient Star of David on the floor. The hum of low voices filled the dark room like an eerie men’s choir. The putrid smell of incense floated around them. The men did not exchange glances during this time, all were gazing upon the star carved into the old wooden floor. After a time, the chanting abruptly stopped and they mantra'd a word in unison: “Ochrana.”

  The arrogance in the room shifted from calmness to loud slapping on each other’s backs and odd handshaking. Voices began. Hellos, in a strange ‘Hail Mary’ sort of way. Robotic:


  “How are you? Good. How are you?”

  “How are you? Good. How are you?”

  Six men moved around each other, careful not to step on the symbol on the ground, and one by one they moved through a dark door and up several creaking wooden steps into a meeting area. Careful camaraderie bounced around as they disrobed and placed the white cloaks in six separate wooden boxes on the wall. The hinges scraped like fingernails on a chalkboard as they shut the doors.

  The elected leader, a fat man, took his spot at the head of a table. “Sit, please sit,” his gravelly voice commanded, moving his arms outwards in reception. The dark green room featured dim lights, that highlighted the dark pine wooden table. The chairs chirped as the fat man's colleagues took their places around the table. To the fat man’s right were two men who appeared to be of eastern European descent. Slavic, of some sort. To his left the first man was clearly of Arab descent, with his nose hooked down. The next, a wispy, grayed man, sat ramrod straight in his chair. At the very left of the table was a bald man with dark skin.

  “Gentlemen, we have our work cut out for us. As you know, Ochrana was set up to counter the Russian’s hold on the oil back in the early nineteen hundreds. Today, as the only members left of Ochrana, we must keep our focus on our target and ensure no one discovers our strength. NATO has found nothing during their visit to Chechnya. This is good.” He grunted as he flicked his cigar on with his Zippo. “We must keep it that way.” The American pulled another drag, sucking heartily on the cancer stick.

  The group nodded haphazardly. “My Arab brothers are in agreement,” the hook-nosed man lisped. The fat man looked around the room one by one. The thin man sitting next to the Arab appeared not to appreciate the stern look for agreement. “Agreed.” His German accent was strong. The bald man nodded an unrecognizable affirmation, and the two men on the right did the same.

  “They have not discovered anything more because of their incompetence?” the fat man croaked.