Threatcon Delta

by Andrew Britton

  His computer warbled, and without preamble, Danny Hernandez’s face filled the screen. He looked like a dad. Kealey was used to seeing faces that had been warped by lives of crime, whether frown lines cut into the forehead by shows of fierceness, or the sleek skin resulting from facials and grooming, sometimes plastic surgery, for the bosses. At times he wondered if a man’s face could be born looking criminal and therefore lead him to the illegal life, with everyone’s assumptions about him shaping and dictating his options and opportunities until only crime was left. This man, though, with streaks of gray in his black hair, cheerful eyes, and the slightly heavy cheeks of a fifty-year-old mostly in shape but a little loose in the middle, looked like the manager of a supermarket.

  He smiled. “You are my pieces of eight,” he said.

  Keep it short, Kealey thought beneath his neutral expression. Keep it brief and you won’t stray into the danger zone. “I’m Agent Adams,” he said, using one of his old standby identities. “And I’m sorry, I don’t get your reference?” Play dumb, play inferior.

  “I present the silver coins and swear there’s gold to follow, a pirate ship of treasure.” He could be reading a child a bedtime story.

  Kealey was in no mood to chatter but apparently Hernandez liked to feel companionable. “And only you can lead us to it,” Kealey said. “I’d say that’s about accurate.”

  The video feed was freezing and skipping a bit, probably caused by the underground parking garage. Hernandez looked like a string of photos, smiling like a Christmas portrait.

  “Do you know a man named Lukas Durst?” Kealey asked.

  “The name is not familiar.”

  “He could be associated with Ricardo Ramirez?”

  “Ay, papi,” Hernandez said. Now his smile had a burnt edge to it. “You want me to help you go after him? You trying to rape my quinceañera?”

  Kealey threw a blanket over his anger. Keep it short. “No, no,” he said. “We only want to talk to Lukas Durst.”

  “Sure, only talk to him. Maybe you can’t find his phone number, is your problem.”

  “We know where he is. We don’t know how much protection Ramirez has provided or would provide.”

  “You show up dressed like FedEx, you want to know if you’re going to get shot?”

  “We’d like to know we wouldn’t. He lives in Ramirez’s neighborhood.”

  “That is not an easy thing you’re asking. He would want to know why I’m making this request. Maybe I’ll just shoot this agent sitting next to me, drive to the ocean, and dump this computer there.”

  The DEA agent wasn’t visible on Kealey’s screen but Hernandez’s eyes slid to the left. The kid must have reacted involuntarily. The smile never changed. He had built his empire on the difference between his Best Dad Ever face and his Worst Nightmare words.

  “What neighborhood?” Hernandez returned his eyes to Kealey.

  “The Alto Hatillo in Caracas.”

  “Okay, I’ll do this for you. You call or visit this guy, you won’t be bothered.”

  “Without alerting Lukas Durst that we’re coming?”

  Hernandez shook his head no in a condescending way. Kealey realized that the gesture was a comment on Kealey himself. Hernandez wanted someone smart. He would only tolerate playing with the little boys for so long. Either Kealey had to put Harper on the call pronto, or Kealey had to be one of the big boys.

  “What did she use in San Antonio?” Kealey said smoothly.

  Hernandez started laughing and leaned into the laptop like he wanted to pat it. “To kill the mayor? I don’t have enough secrets of my own, you want me to tell hers? You’re more interested in her than me? You’re breaking my heart!” He was still laughing.

  “Why did you have the mayor killed?”

  “To get your attention.”

  “The attention of the government?”

  “So that when I contacted you, as I am now, that you would be listening.”

  “You didn’t have to assassinate a mayor to do that.”

  “Didn’t I? Mr. Adams, I brought an Iranian bad guy, a very bad guy, into the United States and showed him one of my routes, and you sent a solitary sniper. One man! I question your priorities.”

  “But judging by the movements of the Iranian, you had San Antonio planned before you discovered our sniper.”

  “Yes. I mention the sniper because it’s indicative of your choices for the last ten years or so. Either you are not taking my industry seriously or you are . . .” He pursed his lips and shrugged.

  Incompetent, Kealey finished his sentence. He dug one of his thumbnails into the quick of a fingernail. Play smart.

  “I think you’re just telling yourself that. I think the assassination was the Iranian’s idea.”

  “No, no, all mine. He was a nice little packaging—again, so you wouldn’t miss my message.” He laughed. “My message was shooting the messenger. Very compact. I am efficient that way. Agent Adams, I don’t expect you to understand this when I say I love my country. So I will say it another way. I love my business. I want it to continue without any wild shocks. A little bit of disruption is good for my business. A lot of disruption is not. The Iranians wanted a route for their extremely disruptive industry. If it had not been me, it would have been someone else, so I decided it would be better to exert what control I can. Which is why I am talking to you now. I will be your insurance and you will be mine.”

  Kealey put his thumb over the camera lens in his laptop. He knew he couldn’t control his reaction to this.

  A drug czar had smuggled a terrorist and killed a mayor because he knew—he knew without doubt— that the American government would play the game his way as soon as he offered them a chance. He was saying that the American government was so predictable, so reliable, that he could use them as a strategy. Not on a local level—on a national and international level. Danny Hernandez was saying that America was no longer a worthy adversary, and he was proving it.

  Kealey removed his thumb and said, “My superior would like to speak to you now.”

  “My pleasure,” said Danny Hernandez.

  Kealey exited the room. Harper entered. Kealey did not acknowledge him, or anyone he passed on his way to his office. He was moving and functioning by default, a state he had only ever experienced after severe physical pain.

  When he walked into his office James Phair, sitting and waiting, recognized the sea change. Kealey was no longer angry at God. He had decided that God did not exist.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  JEBEL MUSA, SINAI PENINSULA

  Concealed among the rocks, Lieutenant Adjo had become stone himself, peering down for more than an hour at the wide, arid plain and watching the size of the multitude grow. There were at least two thousand people camped at the base of the mountain, with more trickling in from all sides below the MFO checkpoint. As a Task Force agent, he was outraged by the intrusion. He also didn’t know what they would—or could—have done about it. You can’t stop a human flood with a helicopter and Jeeps. Rubber bullets and tear gas would only have caused panic and anger.

  Maybe it’s just as well things developed as they did, he thought. But the intrusion still caused him to bridle.

  Adjo used the last of his battery to send a picture of the crowd. Perhaps the photo-analysis team could find something useful in the image—pockets of people with organizers, or perhaps food and water that had been hidden days before. The question that bothered him most, however, was who was behind this? Anti-Arabs? Pro-Arabs? Anti-Egyptians? Were they jihadists or anti-jihadists, using snipers and the threat of violence to keep away anyone who challenged their activities?

  He spent a total of two hours watching the influx of people, most of whom came on foot. The arrivals stopped as the sun rose higher; people had obviously planned to travel when the day was coolest. When the sun afforded little shade or cover, Adjo marshaled his energies to explore the mountainside. He had come here to find a sniper and that was still, in his mind, hi
s prime objective. He would be exposed, but then so would anyone he was seeking.

  At first, Adjo’s overtaxed legs were unwilling participants in the resumed climb. But once he started moving in earnest, picking his way around wide boulders and along precipitous ledges, his body quickly readjusted. Fresh, warm perspiration was added to the musky film that already coated his body; he thought he smelled as a goat should, which would prove helpful if a sniper happened to be downwind. Of course, that could work both ways.

  I will beware of goat smell, he promised himself.

  But there was no one, as far as Adjo could tell. Cautiously, in an arcing transit across the face of the mountain, he made his way to the site where the sniper had been concealed. As he descended upon the site he would move a few meters, listen, then move a few more. The wind cooperated by being silent, blowing against the backside of the holy mountain.

  The absence of wind also helped him to see, since the desert sands remained where they belonged. He held his breath as he approached the perch. He didn’t want to miss a thing and once more turned to stone as he reached the site. He wasn’t sure a footprint would tell him much, but a shell casing might. That was where many manufacturers put their mark. That might help them to trace a militia, since different nations were known to provide arms to different groups.

  But there were no casings, candy wrappers, or other pieces of detritus. There was, however, something that caused Adjo some concern: ribbed markings in the sand that had blown through the day before.

  The impression of a prayer mat.

  The gunman was a Muslim who knew he would be here for several hours at least, Adjo thought. Of course, the conspiracy corner of his brain—they were trained never to take anything at face value—poked him with the notion that the evidence could also be a plant—the Israelis? Perhaps he’d been fired at to draw him out, to find the evidence, to blame his fellow Muslims. It wasn’t inconceivable.

  What would the Israelis gain?

  It could even create a schism, many Jews joining Muslims to welcome the prophet. Maybe that was the goal, Arabs framing the Israelis to cause a rift in the Jewish state—

  Enough. For now, it was just the impression of a prayer mat probably left by a Muslim. Adjo examined the imprint closely. There were four depressions in the midst of the woven design. Someone had been kneeling here, facing southeast—the direction of Mecca. Someone who was here long enough to pray at least twice, meaning at least seven or eight hours.

  Adjo decided to accept the evidence as it appeared. When the road in any investigation forked, or even potentially headed in other directions, Lieutenant General Samra did not like his men to waste time speculating. He preferred to take the most likely path—based on instinct, if nothing else presented itself—and be on the alert for additional information. That approach had been embraced by Adjo and the team.

  Right now, instinct told Adjo he was seeking a fellow Muslim.

  Finishing the last of the water, Adjo made a final scan of the site, looking under shrubs and finding nothing—not even a cigarette butt.

  The world is upside down when even terrorists are health conscious.

  It wasn’t that, of course. A struck match or a lit cigarette would burn like a streetlamp in night-vision glasses. But there was a time, not long ago, when smoking was a sign of manhood, the habit starting when a boy was eight or nine. Even Adjo had smoked until one of the team members was killed on a nighttime stakeout. When Sargent Samahi lit his cigarette, the anarchist in the house he was watching—who was also watching him—knew that he had set down his gun. The Syrian chose that moment to emerge and throw a hand grenade at the sergeant. Adjo stopped smoking the next morning.

  Adjo’s mind snapped to attention when he heard rocks crunching above. His limbered legs folded unwillingly now into a crouch as he retreated toward the slim shadow of a higher ledge. His heart was slamming against his throat but he forced himself to breathe as silently and shallowly as he was able. He had nowhere to move and nothing with which to defend himself. Yet a part of him welcomed whatever came. Knowledge, keenly desired, often came at a price.

  A man strode around the edge of the cliff. He was wearing a red beret and dressed in shorts and a shirt with brown and green leaflike designs. It was the uniform of an Egyptian desert corpsman. On his shoulder was the distinctive white dove on an orange field—the insignia of the MFO. On his shoulders was a backpack.

  The man stopped on the ledge, raised a pair of binoculars, and looked out at the plain filled with pilgrims.

  “Lieutenant Adjo?”

  The young officer held his breath. He was paralyzed and dumbstruck, the capacity to reason entirely gone.

  “Yes,” Adjo replied, for there was nothing else to do.

  The soldier let the binoculars drop around his neck, shucked off his backpack, and set it on the ground beside him. He turned. He had a wide, squarish face with small eyes. Adjo did not recognize him.

  “From the lieutenant general,” the man said, quickly withdrawing two packages and sliding them over. The newcomer took a swig from the canteen he had placed in the grip, a covering action in case anyone was watching.

  “Thanks,” Adjo said. “Any messages?”

  “Only this, from me,” the man said. He took another swallow, then replaced the canteen. “Don’t stay up here for very long.”

  “Why?”

  “We’re getting indications about a big event,” the man said.

  “Here or separate from this?”

  “Here. Something other than this rally. During the night, shepherds were told by voices at their windows to stay off the mountain.”

  “Someone doesn’t want collateral damage.”

  “We’re told that even the field mice are leaving.”

  “Mice?”

  The man nodded. “We don’t know what it’s about, but we’re going no closer than we are.”

  “Then I can’t leave,” Adjo said. “I’m here to collect intel—”

  “Collect it somewhere else, if you’re smart,” the man said, standing and turning. “Just friendly advice from a fellow soldier.”

  Adjo thanked the man, who took a last look through his binoculars before disappearing around the bend. It was as strange an encounter as the young officer had ever experienced, though he appreciated Samra’s farsightedness.

  Adjo pulled the packages toward him hungrily, like some mountain scavenger. He opened the largest one. There were clothes, a goatherder’s jalabiyya and ku-fiyya, along with a pair of leather-soled sandals. Adjo would have to rub the robe and headdress in the dirt to make them seem used. There were also baggy trousers and a fresh shirt. The markings were those of the Bani Rasheed—a smart acquisition. The tribe had a large population in Egypt and few of the members would know one another. Adjo was guessing that Samra intended for him to go down and mingle with the pilgrims. But he had other ideas.

  The second package contained a cell phone, a calfskin water pouch with warm water, and several wheels of soft bread and unpeeled carrots. There was no weapon, which seemed strange. On reflection, maybe Lieutenant General Samra was afraid that Adjo might be found and searched. There was nothing, not even the cell phone, which a man of his station would not normally possess.

  After burying the wrappings under a rock, he ate the vegetables hungrily and examined the cell phone. It bought him another twenty-four hours, maximum. He knew that Samra wouldn’t call him, lest the ringtone or vibration be overheard. Adjo decided to call later in the day; he hoped by then to have something to report. Conversely, if Samra didn’t hear from him he’d know that nothing was new.

  After finishing his modest meal, the lieutenant turned to the clothes. He broke twigs from shrubs and used their thorns to catch and rip the hem of his robe. He used sap to stain the cloth and rubbed his own perspiration on the underarms. Then he scrubbed the knees of the trousers hard with a rock to make them seem prayed in. After dressing, he edged around the slope. There was no point going out among the
pilgrims. Finding anyone who knew anything about a plot would be virtually impossible. But there was something else that interested him.

  Why would a sniper have been watching the compound? Perhaps it was just a coincidence that he had been fired upon. Perhaps the goal, all along, was to bring in the MFO to keep the tourists out.

  But what if someone had been told he was asking questions? What if the shot had been fired to scare him off? What if there was something going on in the monastery that related to this?

  Finding a nook under a large overhang, Adjo settled in with a mental apology.

  Sorry, sir. This is a fork that merits consideration.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  CARACAS, VENEZUELA

  Coming into the capital by air, the impression Phair had was that someone had opened a box full of pearls, with the brown velvet lid open on one side. The brown was the Avila, a 2,600-meter-high mountain, whose peak was hidden in clouds as the plane dropped below them. The pearls were the walls and windows and tile rooftops of the city, luminous despite the overcast day.

  It wasn’t the worst flight the major had ever endured. The C-130 that had ferried him to and from Iraq all those years apart—possibly the same plane, given the threadbare seat and rattling superstructure he’d endured on the ride home—was colder, louder, and bumpier.

  Kealey and Phair were traveling as Foreign Service Specialists with the State Department. That meant flying coach, row 33.

  “I thought high-ranking officials flew business class,” Phair had asked.

  “They do,” Kealey replied. “And the Dirección de Contrainteligencia Militar scans business class for government employees to harass when they disembark. I’d just as soon avoid the bugged hotel room and hookers who knock on the door with, ‘Oh! This isn’t my room! But, say, you’re cute!’ ”