Two Days in Caracas

by Luana Ehrlich

  In truth, Ira had wanted to fire me, but Carlton had intervened and negotiated a medical leave for me instead. However, my year off was cut short when Ahmed Al-Amin had murdered Simon Wassermann in a parking lot in Dallas.

  Having one of his own intelligence officers killed on American soil had caused the DDO to bring me back to active status.

  Whether I was being allowed to pursue Simon’s killer as part of my continuing punishment, or whether the DDO really felt I was the best person for the job, wasn’t all that clear to me yet.

  But, I intended to find out.

  * * * *

  Carlton acknowledged my presence on camera and requested the code numbers Marlow had given me when he’d set up the video link.

  The moment I supplied them, Carlton touched the recording button on an electronic console in front of him and said, “Titus Alan Ray, Level 1 Covert Intelligence Officer, initiating the OFU on Operation Clear Signal; Code 56415.”

  Carlton glanced down at the stack of papers in front of him and adjusted the corners of the pile, making sure they were perfectly aligned with each other.

  Once they appeared satisfactory to him, he looked up at me and said, “Proceed with your update.”

  Although I knew operational updates were a necessity, I still hated doing them. To me it was like being asked to describe a living human being, but then being restricted to describing only the skeletal frame.

  An OFU was like that; all bones and no flesh.

  I gave the group my OFU on Operation Clear Signal.

  “Approximately five hours ago, an elderly man was observed leaving the safe house and getting on a downtown bus. I have reason to believe that man was Ahmed Al-Amin. About two hours later, after hearing someone in distress inside the house, I made the decision to breach the back door. Ben Mitchell, along with his surveillance team, provided me with backup.

  “Once inside, I discovered Ernesto Montilla in a back bedroom. He was bleeding from a knife wound to his abdomen, and Mitchell and I drove him to a clinic in Heredia. On our way there, I managed to ask him a few questions before he passed out. He admitted Ahmed had stabbed him and left him to die. He also said Ahmed was headed to Venezuela and was in San José to pick up a passport. That’s all the intel I was able to get from him. He died shortly after we arrived at the clinic.

  “When Mitchell and I returned to the safe house, we retrieved several personal items, plus the passports the men had been using. We determined Ernesto was most likely murdered by Ahmed because he’d been using a cell phone without his knowledge. The cell phone itself was broken into several pieces, but no SIM card was recovered.

  “An additional piece of intel was discovered in Ernesto’s wallet. It was a newspaper clipping showing a photograph of Roberto Montilla. There’s a family resemblance in the photo, which leads me to believe Roberto could be Ernesto’s father, and the age difference would seem to indicate that possibility. The caption underneath the photograph identified Roberto as an assistant secretary in Venezuela’s Ministry of Trade and Commerce. The article noted he had recently received a commendation from the Venezuelan president for the work he’s done opening up markets in Syria.

  “The Dodge Durango remains parked at the safe house. However, I’m making plans to move it later today, so our forensics guys can examine it. My priority now is locating Ahmed.”

  Because Carlton always required it, I added, “End of update.”

  However, knowing I’d provided him with a clean copy of the OFU, I decided to take the opportunity to make a request of Carlton and have it on the official record.

  “Douglas, I know it’s going to be difficult for Ahmed to leave Costa Rica without obtaining another passport, so I’m asking for authorization to read Toby Bledsoe into this operation. He’s sure to know the passport players in this region, and we’re going to need him to represent the embassy when decisions have to be made about Ernesto’s body. He can also coordinate with the Agency’s forensics team on Ernesto’s vehicle.”

  Carlton didn’t say anything.

  The only sound I heard was the low hum of the noise-masking devices inside The Bubble.

  Since Carlton was a person who thoroughly processed things before making a decision, his lack of response didn’t surprise me.

  I didn’t necessarily like it though.

  Carlton turned to Katherine and said, “Proceed with your report.”

  Katherine tucked a strand of her long, honey-blond hair behind her ear and smiled at me.

  “Titus,” she said, tilting her head slightly toward the camera, “it’s good to see you again.”

  She glanced down at her laptop. “You’re right about Roberto Montilla. The data we’ve turned up on Ernesto shows Roberto is his father. As you read in the newspaper clipping, he holds one of the top positions in the Venezuelan Ministry of Trade and Commerce and handles their international trade division. On a more personal level, Roberto is married and has another child, a daughter, who’s living at home. We’re in the process of pulling up his financial records right now. What we have—”

  “See what you can find out about his travel itineraries,” Carlton said, interrupting her. “I’d be especially interested in knowing when and where he’s traveled outside of Venezuela.”

  Katherine nodded and continued. “At Ben Mitchell’s request, we initiated a data dig into Banco Nacional’s records trying to pin down the ownership of the house on Calle Alturas. In the end, there were no surprises. We discovered two brothers own it, and both have strong ties to the Zeta cartel.”

  Katherine looked up from her computer. “We believe this is further evidence Al-Amin has been under the cartel’s protection from the moment he landed in Mexico. What we haven’t been able to determine is the connection the cartel has ...” she paused and corrected herself, “or rather had to Ernesto.”

  She returned to her laptop. “Ernesto was enrolled at the University of Texas for two years, and his time there had been without incident. The FBI conducted a full background check on his girlfriend also. Her name is Charlotte Tedesco, but she goes by the name of Charlie. Nothing out of the ordinary turned up on her. There was no connection to the cartel there either. We still don’t have any idea why the cartel put Ahmed and Ernesto together as traveling companions. The data points just aren’t there right now, but we’re continuing to work on it.”

  When Katherine finished her report, Carlton turned to me and asked, “Do you have any questions for Katherine?”

  “Maybe we’re looking at Ernesto from the wrong angle,” I said. “Forget the cartel. See if you can find a connection between Ernesto and Hezbollah or Ernesto and Ahmed. We know Roberto Montilla has been traveling to Syria, and we know Damascus is Ahmed’s home base. Did Ernesto accompany his father on those trips to Syria? Did he get recruited by Hezbollah when he was over there? I’m fairly certain we’ll find some connection between Ahmed and Ernesto through Roberto’s visits to Syria.”

  “You’re wrong,” Salazar said.

  Both Carlton and Katherine looked startled at Salazar’s comment, but I knew it probably wasn’t what he’d said that surprised them. Instead, it was the fact he’d just violated Carlton’s strict protocol regarding meetings being documented for the official record.

  The rule he’d broken—participants must maintain silence at all times unless information is requested—was a rule Carlton strictly enforced. It didn’t matter who was seated around the conference table, everyone was required to obey The Rule.

  However, I was more concerned about Salazar’s negative comment than I was about maintaining Carlton’s protocol games.

  Before Carlton had a chance to cut him off, I asked, “Do you have another theory?”

  “It has to be the cartel,” Salazar said, “They have their tentacles everywhere, even in places you wouldn’t imagine.”

  Although C. J. Salazar used his initials as his first name, his first name was Carlos. Unbeknownst to him, everyone at the Agency called him Cartel Carlos. H
e’d been tagged with the nickname because he had a tendency to blame the drug cartels for any disreputable activity south of the border.

  “You heard Katherine,” I said. “There’s no obvious cartel connection with Ernesto.”

  Salazar looked at me as though he thought I needed a good scolding. He even pointed his finger at me. “The cartels have connections everywhere. They probably had something on this Montilla kid and threatened to harm his family unless he cooperated with them. It happens all the time.”

  “If Ernesto came in contact with Muslim extremists, he could have become radicalized. That happens all the time too.”

  “Latin America isn’t the Middle East, Titus.”

  His patronizing tone flew all over me.

  “There’s plenty of evidence Iran is pouring millions of dollars into Latin America. Why do you think they’re setting up cultural centers and mosques all over the place? They’re trying to establish a Muslim presence in our backyard, and the hopelessness of young Hispanics caught up in the endless cycle of poverty leaves the door wide open for their jihadist mentality.”

  “Ernesto Montilla wasn’t some poverty-stricken young person. His rich father was giving him a university education in America. Check his father out. He’s probably getting his money from the cartels too.”

  “It’s not a question of—”

  “Let’s save this discussion for another day,” Carlton said, cutting me off.

  He never tolerated arguments around his conference table for very long. I thought it was probably because he detested any disagreements being recorded on the official transcript, and I wondered if that’s why he had established The Rule in the first place.

  Carlton turned to Salazar, “I asked you here to give Titus a report on the rifle used to kill Simon Wassermann. You may proceed with that report now.”

  Salazar went into a tedious account of how his office—with the help of the Mexican government—had recovered the high-powered rifle used to murder Simon Wassermann. They’d done so after a shootout between two rival drug lords in Nuevo Laredo.

  I stopped listening after a few minutes.

  I didn’t care about the weapon. All I cared about was the man who’d used that weapon to kill Wassermann.

  Once the video conference was over and Salazar and Katherine had left the room, Carlton said, “I’ve decided to have you brief Toby Bledsoe into the operation. I’ll call him when I get the authorization from the DDO’s office, and I’ll be sending you down a forensics team to have a look at the Durango.”

  “Thanks. Douglas. Having Toby as one of the principals should make things easier for me.”

  “Am I right in thinking the two of you have a history together?”

  Carlton never missed an opportunity to let me know how much he knew about me.

  “That won’t be a factor.”

  “Make sure it isn’t,” he said. “We can’t let personal feelings get in the way of grabbing Ahmed before he leaves Costa Rica. The last thing we want is for him to make his way to Venezuela.”

  It didn’t happen often, but there were times when I disagreed with Carlton about operational objectives.

  I was beginning to wonder if this might be one of them.

  * * * *

  After leaving The Bubble, I found Bledsoe and Mitchell waiting for me in the station chief’s office. I wasn’t surprised to find the cramped workplace piled high with books and file folders. Bledsoe had never been a fastidious kind of guy, and his office reflected that aspect of his personality.

  As soon as I entered the room, Bledsoe gestured toward a wooden tea trolley in a corner of his office. It was reminiscent of an oxcart, and I immediately recognized it as a miniature version of the carreta, one of the symbols of the Costa Rican coffee trade. There were replicas of carretas in the marketplaces around the city and tourists snatched them up as souvenirs.

  On top of the carreta was a coffeemaker with an assortment of mugs beside it.

  “There’s coffee,” Bledsoe said. “Make yourself at home.” When I headed over to the coffeemaker, he added, “Use the Dallas Cowboys mug. I’m sure it’s cleaner than the rest of them.”

  Knowing he was setting me up, I still asked the question. “Why is that, Toby?”

  “Nobody ever uses it.”

  “Right.”

  When we’d worked together in Nicaragua, Bledsoe had continually harassed me about being a Dallas Cowboys football fan. I’d always admitted to being a fan, but never a fanatic. This was a term I had reserved for Bledsoe, who had an undying love for the Washington Redskins.

  Both Bledsoe and Mitchell were seated on a well-worn, brown leather sofa. Spread out on the coffee table in front of them were several documents with the word CLASSIFIED printed across the top. While Bledsoe was studying the classified papers, Mitchell was looking at a video on his iPad.

  I told Bledsoe, “Carlton said to read you into the operation. You’ll get official confirmation later tonight.”

  “Did you tell him I’d discussed the passport angle with you?”

  It bothered me that Bledsoe thought I might betray him to anyone at the Agency, but then I remembered my history with him and understood why he might have thought that.

  “I told you I wouldn’t say anything, didn’t I?”

  Even before I saw the look on his face, I realized my answer had come out sounding harsher than I had intended it to be.

  No one said anything.

  Mitchell kept his eyes on the video he was watching, and Bledsoe suddenly became interested in one of the classified documents on the coffee table. The strained silence went on for several seconds, and I tried to think of a way to diffuse it.

  I finally said, “Cartel Carlos sat in on the video conference with me just now.”

  “Oh, no,” they both said in unison.

  Bledsoe laughed and then shook his head back and forth. “Better you than me, my friend.”

  I grinned at him, taking his remark to mean we were both on the same page now, and the difficulties we’d had in the past were behind us.

  At least, that’s what I told myself he meant.

  Hoping to sustain the camaraderie, I spent the next several minutes telling the two of them about my discussion with Salazar.

  As I wrapped it up, Bledsoe admitted Salazar had been very supportive when he’d requested supplemental funding to recruit additional assets inside the drug ring, but he said the division chief had not been so helpful when he’d suggested the Zeta drug ring might be in league with some of the Middle Eastern terrorist groups.

  “He was extremely skeptical,” Bledsoe said, “and that’s putting it mildly.”

  “I’m convinced they’re working together, and once we’ve grabbed Ahmed, we can grill him on how Hezbollah is using the cartel to further its own interests.”

  Mitchell finally looked up from his iPad. “I think we may have caught a break with one of the surveillance cameras at the bus stop.”

  He turned his iPad around so I could take a look at the screen. “It could help us grab Ahmed before he takes off for Venezuela.”

  I tried to look happy about that.

  Chapter 8

  Mitchell pointed to the video on his iPad, which showed passengers getting off an El Central bus. The old man from Sonya’s photo shoot was the fifth passenger to disembark, and as he slowly made his way across the plaza to another bus, he was using the halting gait of a feeble old man.

  I asked, “Where did you get this?”

  “One of our tech guys here at the embassy hacked into a CCTV camera at a bank across the street from the bus hub.”

  “I can’t make out the name on the bus.”

  Mitchell said, “It’s La Periferica. It runs around the city’s outer perimeter.”

  Bledsoe said, “It’s unfortunate he took that particular bus because there are at least fifty stops along the way. Finding where he got off will take some time.”

  I said. “We believe the cartel is helping him get a pa
ssport, so you should narrow the search down to the neighborhoods where they operate.” I looked over at Bledsoe. “What about your contact inside the cartel?”

  “I’ve already left a message for Hernando, but sometimes it takes a few days before he’s able to get back to me.”

  I walked over to the coffeepot and refilled my mug. “I want to get Ernesto’s vehicle off the street and have a look inside. His car keys didn’t turn up at the house, so I’m assuming Ahmed took them with him. It shouldn’t be too hard for one of us to break inside and hotwire it, though. After that, we can move it to a location where our forensics guys can take a look at it. Carlton said they should be here by tomorrow.”

  Mitchell spoke up. “I’ll do it. I need to check in with my surveillance team anyway.”

  Bledsoe said, “Take the Durango over to the garage on Avenida Santa Cecilia. I’ll call Franco and tell him you’re coming.”

  Before Mitchell walked out the door, he turned around and addressed Bledsoe, “What’s going to happen to Ernesto’s body? I mean ... well ... he’s at that clinic all alone now.”

  The sadness in Mitchell’s voice surprised me, and I figured Bledsoe had heard it too, because he sounded empathetic when he answered him.

  “Yeah, son, that’s a tough one. And I’m sure it wasn’t easy seeing him tortured like that. I’ll get someone at the Venezuelan embassy to let his family know and—”

  “How difficult would it be for you to keep his death quiet for a few days?” I asked. “Most likely, Ahmed thought he would be out of the country before anyone discovered the body, so I’d like to see what he’s up to before someone contacts Ernesto’s family.”