Two Days in Caracas

by Luana Ehrlich

  However, sitting in the claustrophobic hotel room made me wish I were back in the house in Norman. There, I’d always had a spectacular view of the sun shining through the forest of trees surrounding the property.

  When Carlton had cancelled my medical leave and made me operational again, I’d ended up purchasing the farmhouse in Oklahoma, even though I’d only lived there for two months. Reflecting back on this impulsive decision a few days after signing the papers, I’d wondered if being cut off from the Agency had caused me to want to put roots down somewhere.

  I’m sure any of the Agency psychiatrists would see it that way.

  At the time I’d signed the papers, my rationale for buying the property was that I needed a place where Stormy could run free, or hunt squirrels, or do whatever dogs did in order to fulfill their purpose in life. But I didn’t kid myself; I also knew having a permanent base in Norman would also make it a lot easier for me to become better acquainted with Nikki Saxon.

  Nikki was a detective in the Norman Police Department. We’d met when she was assigned to investigate the homicide of a young Iranian woman. At the beginning of the investigation, I’d questioned whether Ahmed might have been involved in the murder.

  Because that was a possibility, I’d been forced to reveal my true identity to Nikki, and after that, Nikki and I had developed a close friendship.

  Such a relationship was foreign to me because I seldom allowed anyone to get very close to me. Nevertheless, when I’d been ordered back to Langley, I’d asked Nikki to be responsible for Stormy while I was gone, and she’d agreed to do so.

  Now, as I put away the Gideon Bible, I considered giving Nikki a call. But the moment I picked up my iPhone, I noticed the time and remembered she was usually at work by seven.

  I decided I would wait and call her later.

  Or not at all.

  Nikki knew I was away on an overseas assignment. I’d told her that much. I’d also told her I’d be returning to Norman between assignments.

  In reality, I wasn’t between assignments at the moment, and I wondered if calling her wouldn’t simply complicate my already complicated life.

  Besides that, I felt pretty conflicted about my feelings for her.

  I decided to put off making a decision about calling her.

  Instead, I pulled a toiletry kit out of my Agency suitcase and headed for the bathroom. As I cut the whiskers off my face, I remembered Uncle Harold’s words from the previous evening. With my dark complexion and thick black hair, I knew I resembled my father, but I very much doubted I looked “just like him,” as Uncle Harold had said.

  I’d always thought of myself as a good-looking guy, but knowing Uncle Harold, I didn’t think he meant his remark as a compliment.

  Uncle Harold was my father’s brother, and when my father had been alive, the two men had never gotten along with each other, nor had they appeared to like each other all that much. Consequently, I’d always felt Harold viewed me as a younger version of my father and hadn’t particularly cared for me either.

  Carla believed the two brothers hadn’t been able to stand each other because their personalities were so different. While my father had been aloof and unsociable, Harold had always been outgoing and talkative, engaging even strangers in long conversations.

  Besides their opposing personalities, their careers had gone off in two different directions. Even though both had started out in manufacturing—my dad at GM and my uncle at the Knoll Furniture Company in Grand Rapids—Harold had retired as Vice President of Sales, whereas my dad had never been promoted above the level of assembly line foreman.

  Although I felt Uncle Harold disliked me, he had a completely different relationship with my mother and Carla. He obviously adored both of them, and they had always returned his affection.

  The last time I’d talked to Carla, she’d mentioned Harold had continued to visit our mother, even though she was no longer able to recognize him.

  Now, as I stepped into the shower, I decided I would try and make a connection with Uncle Harold over the next couple of days. I wanted him to recognize that, unlike my father, I could be a friendly and winsome kind of guy.

  At least friendly.

  * * * *

  Before leaving the room to get some breakfast, I picked up my iPhone and called Nikki.

  “Hi, Nikki.”

  “Titus? I’m surprised to hear from you so soon!”

  She sounded excited, and I realized I was smiling.

  “I’m in the States for a couple of days, but I won’t be able to make it back to Norman this trip. How’s Stormy?”

  I immediately regretted asking her the question.

  Since I knew she was still recuperating from a gunshot wound, I should have at least inquired about her own welfare before asking about my dog’s well-being.

  “Stormy’s just fine,” she answered, seemingly unfazed by my insensitivity. “I love how happy he is to see me every day when I get in from work. I’m sure he misses you, though. Are you in Virginia?”

  Before I could answer her, she quickly added, “Oh, I probably shouldn’t have asked you that.”

  “You’re in law enforcement. I’ll make an exception.”

  She laughed.

  It was a beautiful sound.

  “I’m in Flint or, more precisely, Grand Blanc.”

  “Are you there to see your mother?”

  Nikki Saxon was an excellent detective. Within days of our meeting, she’d managed to pull my entire life history out of me. And, even for a detective, that was not an easy task.

  “In a way. My mother passed away yesterday morning. I was able to get away from my assignment to attend her funeral.”

  “Oh, Titus, I’m so sorry. She had Alzheimer’s, didn’t she?”

  “Yes, but the doctors said she died peacefully in her sleep.”

  “And the funeral? When will it be?”

  “Probably Friday. I just got in last night, but I’m headed over to my sister’s house in a few minutes. I should know more after I talk to her.”

  “Are you okay?”

  I suddenly found myself wanting to be open with her and not just give her a superficial answer. “To be honest, Nikki, I’m not looking forward to dealing with my family during the next couple of days.”

  She was quiet for a few minutes, and I pictured her running her fingers through her long brown hair, a gesture I’d seen her make before when she was on the phone and uncertain of what to say.

  She finally said, “Families are never easy, are they?”

  Nikki had grown up in a foster care environment. Her biological mother had been put in prison for armed robbery when she was three years old, but she’d never known her father. My family had been great compared with hers.

  “I guess I should be more grateful for the family I’ve had.”

  “I know you loved your mother very much,” she replied, “and I’m sure your sister is happy to have you there. Do you have many relatives in the area?”

  “Not that many,” I replied. “But you’ve asked enough questions about me, Detective. How are you? How’s your shoulder?”

  “I’m still doing some rehab on it, but it’s healing up nicely. I’m back at work fulltime now. In fact, just before you called, I was on my way over to interview a witness in a robbery investigation.”

  “I won’t keep you then.”

  “Hold on, Titus,” she said, “don’t hang up. I wasn’t telling you about the investigation to get you off the phone. The witness can wait.”

  “Okay.”

  There was an awkward silence between us, and I couldn’t think of anything to say.

  She laughed and said, “You don’t call many people just to chat with them, do you?”

  “No,” I admitted, “I never do.”

  “Well, there’s a knack to it, and I hope you’re not offended when I say you don’t have that knack.”

  Now, I was the one laughing. “I’m not offended.”

  “Why don
’t you call me again before you leave, and we’ll work on your technique.”

  “Okay, I might do that.”

  However, that phone call never happened, but something better did.

  * * * *

  There was no sign of Uncle Harold in the hotel’s breakfast bar, but I chose a table for four just in case he and Aunt Dorothy decided to show up later.

  While eating my scrambled eggs and cinnamon rolls, I surveyed the room—an occupational habit and totally unnecessary on a sunny morning in Michigan.

  But, I did it anyway.

  Two Hispanic men, seated on a couch in the center of the room, immediately got my attention.

  They were drinking coffee and watching a newscast on the big screen television set. The younger of the two reminded me of Ernesto; not my last bloodied image of him when he was dying from the wound to his abdomen, but of the photograph I’d seen of him from the Fadi Chehab passport.

  The guy triggered something in the subconscious part of my brain, and I stopped eating and tried to figure it out.

  Ernesto. Photograph. Passport.

  Suddenly, it came to me, and I immediately got up from the table, took out my sat phone, and moved toward the doorway.

  At that moment, Uncle Harold and Aunt Dorothy walked in the room.

  “Titus, how are you this morning? You look a lot better than you did yesterday. I don’t think travel agrees with you.”

  “Hi, Uncle Harold. I’ve saved us a table right over there.” I pointed to my table in a corner of the room. “Aunt Dorothy, it’s so nice to see you again. You haven’t changed a bit. In fact, I think you’re looking younger than the last time I saw you.”

  Aunt Dorothy, who seldom said a word, smiled at me; then, she reached up and patted my cheek.

  They both seemed surprised when I excused myself and headed out the door.

  When I reached the end of the hallway, I pushed opened the exit door and walked out onto the parking lot.

  From there, I called Carlton.

  After Communication Services put him on the line, he asked, “How’s your family?”

  “I’m going over to my sister’s house in a few minutes. Right now, I’m out in the hotel’s parking lot, so we’re cleared to talk.”

  Sounding slightly exasperated with me, he said, “You’ve wasted a phone call. I don’t have any new intel on Ahmed.”

  Carlton hated it when his operatives called him for updates.

  He would call me if he had something new to report; I had been told this repeatedly.

  He continued, “I believe Toby already informed you about his meeting with Hernando, but I still don’t have anything on the identities of the four men in the photographs. Toby has the airport covered, so we’re good there. I’ll call you the minute I have something definitive to tell you.”

  “I wasn’t calling for an update, Douglas. I just remembered something from our search of Ahmed’s safe house. I didn’t mention it the other day because I just now thought of it.”

  “Do I need to make this an official part of the record?”

  “You can decide that later.”

  “I see.”

  Carlton hated having anything on the official record that even hinted at incompetence on his part, so he probably already knew where I was going with this.

  “As I mentioned in the conference call yesterday, when Ben and I searched Ahmed’s safe house, we discovered two passports. Ahmed had been using one, which identified him as Adnan Chehab, while Ernesto was using another one in the name of Fadi Chehab.”

  “Yes,” he said, “Toby sent us all the information you collected from the safe house. We received it in the diplomatic pouch yesterday. Both passports were inside.”

  Since he still sounded like he was questioning the importance of my call, I hurried on. “When we searched the safe house, I only found Ernesto’s phony passport.”

  I waited a few seconds to see if he might say something.

  When he didn’t, I asked, “So, where’s his Venezuelan passport?”

  Carlton didn’t utter a word, but I did hear him sigh, and that usually meant he knew he’d missed an important detail, and he wasn’t happy about it.

  I couldn’t resist rubbing it in. “I’m talking about the one he used to enter the United States, the same passport he used outside of Austin to buy the Durango; the one identifying him as Ernesto Montilla.”

  “Okay. Okay. You’ve made your point. His Venezuelan passport is missing. It wasn’t in the safe house. Evidently, we both managed to overlook this important detail.”

  Shared responsibility for messing up—another one of Carlton’s endearing managerial techniques.

  I said, “I believe Ahmed took Ernesto’s Venezuelan passport with him when he left the safe house.”

  “Why?”

  “I’m not sure. I’ll have to think about it.”

  “Look, Titus, right now, you need to be with your family. Let me toss this around with the analysts here and see what they think.”

  “Have Katherine’s office take a look at it.”

  “That’s where I’ll start, of course. Now, quit stalling. Go see your family. I’ll call you when we come up with something.”

  I went back inside the hotel and entered the breakfast area. However, my table had been cleared off, and Uncle Harold and Aunt Dorothy were nowhere in sight.

  Maybe I should have been disappointed.

  I wasn’t.

  Chapter 14

  Carla and her family lived in a two-story red brick house with blue shutters about five miles west of my hotel. It was located at the end of a cul-de-sac in a subdivision called Chatham Hills.

  There was a basketball goal at the side of the driveway, and near the corner of the front lawn, there was an aluminum flagpole flying an American flag.

  As I looked at the recently mowed lawn and the petunias growing in the flowerbeds, the sight stirred something inside of me, and I parked on the street and stared at the picturesque setting for several seconds.

  For some reason, I wanted this idyllic snapshot to be seared on the frontal lobe of my brain forever.

  The longer I looked, the more I realized the scene could have been multiplied a million times over all across America. It represented the reason why I’d spent the best years of my life trying to make certain no jihadist, no drug lord, no maniac with access to nuclear weapons, no one, not one soul, would ever be able to destroy the land of the free and the home of the brave.

  That philosophy gave form and substance to my ideals and was the motivation for everything I did as a servant of my country.

  Granted, I didn’t do it alone, but, just like every citizen sent out to protect American interests on foreign soil, sometimes I felt very alone when I did it.

  * * * *

  There were several cars parked in the driveway, but I pegged the older model Lexus as belonging to Harold and Dorothy, because it had also been in the parking lot at the hotel.

  A Buick Enclave was parked in front of the Lexus, and as I walked past it, I noticed the back seat contained a variety of small boxes, brochures, and tinfoil packets. Carla’s husband, Eddie, was a sales representative for some type of pharmaceutical company, and I quickly decided the Enclave probably belonged to him.

  Next to the Enclave was a pickup truck with a University of Michigan decal prominently displayed in the back window. I knew Carla and Eddie’s son, Brian, was attending the university on a full football scholarship, so I figured the truck was his.

  Surveillance complete; I walked up to the front door and rang the doorbell.

  It took a few minutes, but Carla finally answered it.

  My sister had inherited my mother’s fair skin and blond hair, but, unlike my mother, she was short and stocky and closely resembled pictures I’d seen of my Polish grandmother.

  “Oh, Titus, I’m so glad you’re here,” she said, wiping her hands on a dishtowel. “Harold said he saw you at the hotel last night, but I thought you said you were fly
ing in this morning.”

  It was more an observation than an accusation, and I mumbled something about not being sure of my plans and gave her a hug. As we embraced, she clung to me for a few minutes.

  Moments later, she dried her eyes on the dishtowel and put a smile on her face. “Come on in. Everyone’s in the back.”

  As we walked through the living room, Carla immediately began apologizing for the way everything looked. But, despite Carla’s embarrassment, all I could see was the inevitable clutter caused by a very active family.

  “Carla, don’t worry about any of this,” I said. “Your house looks great.”

  She looked back at me and grinned. “So you’re not Mr. Clean anymore?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  Carla paused at the doorway of the dining room. Then, as if she were announcing the next circus act appearing under the Big Top, she said, “Here’s Titus, everyone.”

  All heads turned in my direction.

  “Hi,” I said in my best affable voice. “It’s good to see everyone.”

  A chorus of greetings followed, and then Carla looked over at her daughter and said, “Kayla, would you and Aunt Dorothy come out to the kitchen and give me a hand?”

  Kayla, Carla’s second child, was sixteen years old and the only member of the family with auburn hair. She reacted to her mother’s outrageous request by looking over at me and rolling her eyes.

  Despite the drama, she grabbed her cell phone from the table and left the room. A few seconds later, Aunt Dorothy got up from the table and followed Kayla out. As she squeezed past my chair, she patted me on the shoulder.

  Eddie grabbed a plate of raw hamburger patties from the kitchen bar. “Anyone care to come out to the deck and watch me burn these?”

  Eddie and I had known each other since we’d played football together in high school, but we’d never been close. Other than sports, we seemed to have difficulty finding any shared interests. This was probably because I wasn’t into sales conventions, the latest trends in pharmaceuticals, or discussing generic drugs.