Two Days in Caracas

by Luana Ehrlich

  “Give me the address. I’ll meet you there.”

  “You’re in Caracas?”

  “Yes, I caught the first flight out when Rehman told me you weren’t on the island. Where are you?”

  “I can’t meet with you tonight. My wife is too ill. I’ll call you in the morning.”

  “No, it would be better if we met tonight.”

  “I can’t do that. I’ll call you at nine o’clock tomorrow morning. We’ll meet then.”

  As per my directions, once Roberto delivered those instructions, he immediately hung up.

  After a few seconds of silence, he looked across the room at me and said, “That man killed my son.”

  * * * *

  Olivia was right about one thing. I was able to get Roberto refocused on something besides his family.

  I didn’t do this by pushing his buttons, though. I did it by telling him he wouldn’t be able to leave the house the next day until he’d given me a written account of everything he’d told me about Ahmed. I even provided him with a laptop computer to make the task easier for him.

  Of course, what I told him was a lie. Every word he’d spoken to me had been recorded and was already in the hands of Katherine’s analysts back at Langley.

  Roberto immediately agreed to write it all out for me.

  I’m a very believable liar.

  Sometimes, that’s a good thing.

  But not always.

  * * * *

  Olivia had arranged for several pizzas to be delivered to the house, and once we’d eaten, Roberto took the laptop and went to work typing out the details of his narrative.

  While he was pecking away at the keyboard, I had Buck keep an eye on him, and Mitchell and I went back to the master bedroom to have a conference call with Olivia.

  Because Olivia had planned Ahmed’s extraction down to the smallest detail of the operation, it took the three of us almost an hour to discuss the logistics of the POA.

  Mitchell said very little during the call, until Olivia told him how the scenario would play out the next morning.

  “Ben,” she said, “as soon as Roberto completes the call to Ahmed, I want you to take the van and transport Roberto over to the safe house so he can rejoin his family.”

  Mitchell immediately protested. “Why should I be the one to take Roberto over there? Why not have Buck or one of Sam’s other guys do it? If I leave the house, Titus will have to face Ahmed alone.”

  While I appreciated his concern, I suspected he was more distressed about missing out on the opportunity to see Ahmed taken down than he was worried about my welfare.

  Olivia said, “Titus won’t be at the house alone, but even if he were, he would be the first to tell you, he’s a big boy and can take care of himself. Sam will have two teams following Ahmed, and once he’s inside, Sam will move in with the extraction teams to help Titus secure him.”

  I said, “Olivia, why don’t you have Buck take Roberto over to the safe house instead of Ben taking him?”

  “No, that won’t work. He and Cindy need to be monitoring communications and recording what Ahmed has to say to you before you call in the troops. And, Titus, don’t delay too long in giving them the go-ahead. Just execute the plan.”

  “Got it.”

  “No funny stuff and no heroics.”

  “You know I never make guarantees, Olivia.”

  Chapter 43

  Tuesday, June 12

  It was a sleepless night. At least it was for me. I suspected Mitchell rested pretty well. He took the girl’s bedroom, while Roberto slept in the guest bedroom, and both of them awoke the next morning looking better than they had when they’d gone to bed.

  Not so for me. I spent most of my time in the master bedroom monitoring the listening devices in Zaidi’s apartment. I wanted to hear firsthand what was transpiring between Ahmed and Zaidi as they prepared to take out Roberto.

  Shortly after midnight, Zaidi received word he needed to catch the first flight to Margarita Island to deal with a full-blown rebellion among his young recruits at Campamento de la Juventud Laguna. I wondered how Olivia had been able to precipitate such action at the training camp, but I decided I would wait and ask her once the operation was over.

  When Zaidi heard this news, Ahmed assured him he would have no trouble taking care of Roberto by himself. In fact, I thought Ahmed sounded relieved to be rid of Zaidi, and that he was pleased to be left on his own.

  I might have been projecting my own feelings onto the situation, however.

  A few minutes after receiving the phone call, Ahmed discussed the weapons he planned to use to kill Roberto. It was because of this conversation, I learned Ahmed intended to have two different handguns on him when he met up with Roberto—his extra gun would be strapped inside an ankle holster—and besides the handguns, he also planned to have a high-powered rifle in the car with him.

  He told Zaidi he wanted the rifle just in case Roberto suggested meeting him at a location where it would be easier for him to make a long-distance shot rather than engage in close-in action.

  Since Ahmed would be meeting Roberto at The Missy Hacienda, I took the rifle out of the equation.

  That subtraction meant Ahmed would still have two handguns on him when he arrived, but I could deal with that.

  Later, Zaidi told Ahmed he’d made arrangements for one of his men to drive Ahmed to the meeting with Roberto. I wasn’t surprised to hear Ahmed remind him that he planned to arrive at the designated location long before Roberto was expecting him.

  That meant Ahmed could easily be on my doorstep within thirty minutes of Roberto’s call.

  I mentioned this to Olivia, and we both agreed Mitchell should get Roberto out of the house immediately after he made his phone call.

  I asked her what she planned to do about Ahmed’s driver, and she said Wylie had volunteered to take care of him.

  She said, “I believe Sam’s exact words were, ‘Ma’am, leave that stagecoach driver to me,’ or something to that effect.”

  “Very impressive Texas accent, Olivia.”

  “Oh, please, Titus. Don’t patronize me.”

  Once it was evident Ahmed and Zaidi had gone to bed, I said goodnight to Olivia—but not in a patronizing way—and turned the monitoring equipment back over to Buck and Cindy. Then, I went in search of a place to get a few hours of rest.

  Although I tried using the sofa in the living room for a bed, I finally gave up and stretched out on the floor.

  When my internal clock went off at six o’clock the next morning, I realized I’d been dreaming about Nikki. In the dream, she was trying to tell me something, but I was refusing to listen to her. As I was processing some of the fuzzy mental images in the dream, I suddenly realized I didn’t want to hear what Nikki had to say because I was afraid she was going to tell me she had cancer.

  I decided not to spend too much time analyzing that dream.

  * * * *

  By the time everyone woke up at seven o’clock, I had scrambled some eggs, fried some bacon, and toasted half a dozen slices of bread. Anyone wandering into the kitchen in search of coffee ended up grabbing a plate and gobbling down a few bites, but no one was in the mood for a sit-down meal.

  Mitchell was still fuming about having to deliver Roberto to his family and missing the moment Ahmed was finally captured. But, once I told him I would put in a request for him to accompany me to Gitmo in order to observe Ahmed’s interrogation, he seemed to be less agitated.

  When Roberto showed up in the kitchen, he barely spoke to anyone, nor did he eat anything. As the minutes ticked down for him to call Ahmed again, he became even more withdrawn. As a diversionary tactic, I suggested he sit down at the dining table and look over the statement he’d typed up for me on the computer.

  He did so without protesting.

  A few minutes later, I left Mitchell with him and went back to the master bedroom for a last-minute chat with Olivia.

  She informed me Wylie and the extraction teams we
re on standby a few blocks from my location, and the surveillance teams had their eyes on Ahmed, who was already inside a black SUV outside of Zaidi’s apartment, waiting for Roberto to call him and give him an address.

  Satisfied all the players were in position, I walked back to the dining room and gave Roberto a slip of paper with the address of The Missy Hacienda on it.

  “Here’s the address you need to give to Ahmed,” I said. “You can make the phone call to him now.”

  Roberto took the piece of paper from me, and then he lowered the lid on the computer. “I’ve made some corrections and added a few paragraphs to my statement. I believe you’ll find everything’s complete now.”

  “I’m sure it’s fine, “I said. “I’ll take a look at it later.”

  Roberto looked disappointed at my response, and in retrospect, I should have at least given his statement a cursory glance. In my defense, though, I was focused on capturing Ahmed and not on the details of what he may have revealed in his document.

  When I handed Roberto his cell phone, I noticed his fingers were trembling as he punched in the number.

  I tried to reassure him. “As soon as you make the call, you’ll be on your way to see your family.”

  “And Ahmed?” Roberto asked. “Where will he be going?”

  Before I could respond, Ahmed came on the line.

  Once Roberto had given him the address, Ahmed lied and said it would probably take him an hour to get to his location. Then, he immediately hung up.

  Roberto’s face was ashen and covered in sweat when he handed me back the phone. Seconds later, he bolted from the chair and headed for the bathroom.

  “Talking to Ahmed hasn’t been easy for him,” Mitchell said.

  “No, but keeping his family safe provided him with enough motivation to get it done.”

  “Family connections make great motivators, don’t they?”

  He had no idea.

  * * * *

  While we were waiting for Roberto, Buck came in the living room and handed Mitchell the van keys, along with the directions to the safe house.

  A few seconds later, Roberto walked back in the room.

  I noticed the color had returned to his face, and he no longer looked like the beaten man I’d interrogated the day before. Instead, there was an air of defiance about him, much like the fighting spirit he’d exhibited when Buck’s team had first abducted him.

  I handed him back the passports and the airline tickets the team had confiscated from him, and Buck counted out the cash they’d found in his suitcase.

  I said, “I’m keeping your cell phone just in case Ahmed tries to call you back.”

  I thought he was about to protest my decision, but instead, without saying a word, he turned and followed Mitchell out the door.

  Buck called out after him, “What? No goodbye hug?”

  * * * *

  As soon as Mitchell left the house with Roberto, I walked back to the master bedroom and talked with Buck and Cindy about how I wanted them to proceed once Ahmed showed up at the house.

  I gave them explicit instructions not to interrupt the conversation I was planning to have with Ahmed, and I told them not to give Wylie and his extraction teams the go-ahead to enter the house, until I had notified them to do so.

  When I returned to the living room, I rearranged the furniture in much the same configuration as when I’d been anticipating Roberto’s arrival the day before.

  While doing so, I found myself breathing a mini-prayer. It was one I’d read in the Bible a few days earlier.

  It mostly consisted of “Help, Lord.”

  Once everything was in place, I unlocked the front door, left it slightly ajar, and waited for Ahmed Al-Amin to arrive.

  My pulse rate was somewhat elevated.

  Chapter 44

  Buck notified me the moment he received word Ahmed’s vehicle had entered the neighborhood. After that, he and Cindy remained out of sight in the master bedroom.

  I waited for Ahmed in the shadows of the hallway, just around the corner from the living room. I had my gun trained on the doorway, and the front foyer was in my sightline.

  However, I was also aware of an alternative scenario in which Ahmed could skirt around the garage and enter the house from the backyard. There was a back door into the utility room from the patio, and I’d checked it to make sure it was unlocked, but, unlike the front door, I hadn’t left it ajar.

  It didn’t matter to me which door Ahmed decided to use.

  He would still have to cross the threshold into the living room, and that’s where I planned for us to have our first—and last—encounter.

  My theory was that if Ahmed truly believed Roberto simply wanted to meet with him in order to talk about the circumstances of his son’s death, then, he would enter the house through the front door. Otherwise, if Ahmed thought he was being set up, he would enter the house through the back door and try to surprise Roberto.

  I didn’t have long to wait before finding out which door Ahmed had chosen.

  Five minutes after I was told Ahmed’s vehicle had been seen, the assassin himself was at the front door.

  I watched him as he stood there, studying the open door, seemingly uncertain as to his next move.

  Finally, he stepped forward and knocked lightly on the doorframe. “Roberto,” he said, pushing the door aside slowly, “may I come in?”

  He widened the opening until he had a full view of the living room, and as he took a step inside the foyer, he called out again, “Roberto, are you here?”

  I was able to observe the exact second Ahmed realized something was off, and moments later, I saw him reaching for his gun.

  That’s when I stepped out of the shadows and leveled my Glock at him.

  “Roberto’s not here, Ahmed,” I said to him in Arabic.

  He froze and stared at me.

  “Yeah, you blew it,” I said, as he studied my face. “I’m not dead. Unfortunately, you killed my friend instead, and you’re going to have to pay for that.”

  I suddenly realized I’d never seen Ahmed’s eyes before. In the videos, he’d always been wearing sunglasses. Now, I saw his eyes were dark brown, almost black, and looked as lifeless as lumps of coal.

  I said, “Remove your weapon, do it slowly; then place it on the floor and move away.”

  He followed my instructions to the letter.

  I motioned for him to sit down in the chair in the center of the room.

  As he moved towards it, I knew he was trying to figure out the optimum moment to make a grab for the gun in his ankle holster. I could almost see the calculations going on in his head.

  However, I decided not to reveal I was aware of the gun—at least not yet.

  I realized it was a gamble, but I wanted him to think he had the upper hand. I figured if he thought he was about to kill me, he might be willing to answer my questions truthfully.

  I asked him, “Do you still have the knife you used to slice open Ernesto?”

  The scornful look on his face was one of pure hatred.

  “It was like cutting up a baby goat,” he said.

  The moment Ahmed opened his mouth, I felt a slight breeze, like a disturbance in the air around me. At first, I thought the sheer evil of the man had caused me to imagine the whiff of air.

  Then, I quickly realized someone had opened the back door and entered the house through the utility room.

  I looked at Ahmed, but his expression hadn’t changed.

  Was it Wylie? Had he decided I needed some extra backup?

  Was it Ahmed’s driver? Had Wylie failed to take him out?

  Friend or foe?

  Suddenly, Roberto Montilla entered the room, and I knew it was neither friend nor foe.

  It was a grieving father who’d lost his son to an assassin, and he had a gun pointed directly at the killer’s head.

  “You killed my son,” he shouted at Ahmed. “You killed Ernesto.”

  Ahmed used the distraction as the o
pportunity he’d been waiting for and went for his spare gun. Before he had a chance to retrieve it, Roberto stepped forward, steadied the gun with both hands, and shot Ahmed three times in the torso.

  Ahmed’s eyes widened when he realized he’d been shot. Then, in a slow-motion dance, he clutched at his chest and fell to the floor. As blood gushed from his wounds, he made a feeble attempt to get at his gun yet again.

  I pointed my weapon at Roberto. “Drop the gun, Roberto.”

  He ignored me and fired two more shots at Ahmed.

  Ahmed finally stopped moving.

  Seconds later, Wylie came through the front door, closely followed by Buck and Cindy, and all three of them had their weapons trained on Roberto.

  He flopped down on the sofa and dropped the gun beside him.

  As I picked it up, I immediately recognized it as the gun Mitchell had been carrying, and I leaned over and grabbed Roberto by the collar.

  “Roberto, where’s ...” I caught myself before calling him Ben, “Where’s Mark?” I asked. “What’s happened to him?”

  Roberto, who appeared to be in shock, shook his head.

  I didn’t know what that meant, and I tightened my grip on his throat.

  “Hold on, partner,” Wylie said, pulling me off Roberto. “We need to talk.”

  Wylie motioned for me to follow him out to the kitchen, but, before leaving the room, I walked over and looked down at Ahmed’s body.

  The assassin was dead.

  I felt certain his soul would not rest in peace.

  * * * *

  In the kitchen, I opened the refrigerator door and pulled out a couple of bottles of water. I tossed one over to Wylie and kept one for myself.

  After taking a long swig, I said, “You know what’s happened to Ben, don’t you? Is he dead? Did Roberto kill him too?”

  Wylie shook his head. “He has a bump on his head the size of a goose egg, but otherwise he’s fine. At least that’s what he said when he called me.”

  “Thank God,” I said, and I meant it. “I couldn’t have taken another dead soldier in this operation. So what happened? Where’s he now?”