Lone Wolf (6 page)

He listened again for a moment, and then smiled. “Excellent, yes. Let me know when it's ready, and I'll put our computer guy on it.” He ended the call and looked at Noah. “He'll get me the information I asked for, and send it to my phone as a multimedia message attachment.” He glanced over at Neil. “He'll be able to open it and read it, right?”

Noah nodded. “I guarantee it,” he said. “That kid's about the best there is with a computer, which is why he's with me. They gave me the best support team they had, and I've seen them all at work.”

Decker smiled. “I don't doubt you,” he said, but he was interrupted before he could say any more.

“
Bingo
!” Neil shouted. He snatched out his ear buds and unplugged them from the computer. “You guys gotta hear this,” he said. He tapped a couple of keys, and voices came from the speakers.

“
Marhabaan
?” That was the voice of President Habib. Neil whispered, “That means hello, in Arabic.”

Another voice spoke. “
Astamae li beinaya
,” it said. “
Hadha hu hawl abnatik!”

“Listen carefully,” Neil translated, “it's about your daughter.”

“Hold it, hold it,” Noah said, and Neil paused the playback. “Are you telling me you speak Arabic?”

Neil looked surprised at the question. “Do you know how many hackers are in the Middle East? If you don't speak Arabic, you don't ever talk to some of the best.”

Noah's eyebrows went up, but he shrugged. “Okay, go on, then.”

Neil resumed playing the recording, which was obviously of the call that told Habib about his daughter's abduction. There were a couple of moments of Arabic, wherein the president complained about the caller's accent, and then they switched to English.

“Yes,” said Habib, “I can understand you now. What is this about? Where is my daughter?”

“She's already out of the country,” said a man in what Noah would agree to be a Southern drawl. “She'll be perfectly safe, as long as you do what we want you to do.”

There was a moment's pause, before Habib spoke again. “And what is that?”

“Your Prime Minister is meeting with the leaders of Syria and Russia at a summit meeting in Geneva on the twenty-third. At that meeting, he will agree to and publicly announce a strategic alliance with both countries, an alliance that would include the construction of military bases within Mauritania, and the expulsion of Western military presence. If he does, then your daughter will be returned to you alive and in one piece. If not, then I'm afraid you'll be getting her back in several different packages. Do you understand?”

Habib hesitated, and in the brief pause they could hear a man in the background. He did indeed sound British, as he said, “...Too late, we can't go back for it now. Come on, then, we'll just have to get you a new one, that'll be right, won't it?”

“How do I know you truly have my daughter?” Habib asked at that point.

The caller chuckled. “Well, how else would I know about that little birthmark she's got on her left thigh, right on the back of it, just underneath her butt? You're her daddy, I'm sure you can remember when she was a baby, that little birthmark of hers? Sorta looks like a little bird, doesn't it?”

Another pause, and the man in the background said, “... No time for this, just no time! You should have made sure to get it before we left, we'll just...”

“How can I contact you? The Prime Minister may wish to...”

“You don't need to contact me,” the caller said. “All you want to do is tell the Russian ambassador that they've got a deal, that the alliance is a go. Then, once that goes public, she'll be dropped off safe and sound at your doorstep. Otherwise, her next ride will be to the butcher shop.”

“Why are you doing this? You don't sound like a Russian or Syrian?”

“Me? I'm neither one, I'm just an independent contractor. I got hired to do this because I've gotten results in the past. There's nothing like a proven track record to make you popular in this business, know what I mean? Like I said, do what I tell you and everything will be fine. You can count on that, but you can also count on the consequences if you don't.” The caller hung up, and a second later the line went dead.

Noah looked at Decker. “What do you make of it?”

Decker frowned. “That accent is definitely Deep South USA, but I don't think it's real. It sounded just a bit too forced, to me.”

Noah nodded. “I agree. Some of the drawl was held out just a little too long, the way an actor might do it to make sure people caught it. If you listen to the sibilants, the breathy consonants like
s, z, j
and the c
h
sound, they're very clearly pronounced. Southerners don't do that. The only place you're going to find carefully pronounced sibilants like that is New England.”

Decker looked at him, and his eyebrows rose. “Good point, I missed that. So we're probably looking for someone from the Northeast, then.”

Neil was tapping on his keyboard. “I'm running a snippet through the NSA's voice print database, now. If this guy is really a player on the international scene, they're likely to have him in their files, somewhere.”

Decker nodded. “If that doesn't turn anything up, try the FBI database. Ours is pretty good, too.”

“That's where I'll go next, if I need to, and after that I'll hit the Russian database. They've been doing that sort of voice print recognition longer than anybody, and they use it almost exclusively for their intelligence people.”

“Okay,” Noah said, “what about the guy in the background? Definitely sounded British to me.”

Decker was nodding again. “I agree, no doubt about it. And the background noises, if those weren't jet engines, I don't know what they were. I'd lay good odds that our girl was on one of the planes that we could hear taking off.”

“Maybe,” Noah said, “or maybe that's just what somebody wanted us to think. It seems a little convenient that we got good background noise and an identifiable British accent. Those lead us to the conclusion that the call came from the airport, which causes us to suspect that Selah was taken out of the country by air. What if this is nothing but a smokescreen?”

Decker shrugged. “That's certainly possible,” he said. “It does seem a little easy, these clues. Let's face it, the caller would have known he was being recorded. Why wouldn't he have gone into someplace quiet, why risk somebody overhearing him?”

“Because he's just plain cocky?” Neil asked. “I got a hit on the voice print. According to the NSA database, there is a 99.8 percent certainty that the caller is Jeremy Pendergrast. He’s originally from the Hamptons, son of a wealthy family who developed a bad streak during his college years. He worked briefly for the CIA in Italy, compiling information from Middle Eastern news sources, then apparently just decided to go out on his own. He's been linked to a number of abductions and extortions, but there's never been enough evidence to take any action against him.” He clicked the link on his monitor and scanned the page that appeared. “Seems the NSA keeps a close watch on this boy, monitoring all of his movements. Want to guess where he was the day Selah disappeared?”

“Right here in Nouakchott?” Noah asked.

“
Ding, ding, ding,
” Neil said. “We have a winner! He flew in two days before that and stayed in this very hotel, then flew out two hours after that call was made. He is, or was a half hour ago, in his apartment in London, where he lives alone. Look at the screen, that's a photo of him.” The image on the screen showed a stocky man with sandy hair and brown eyes.

Noah and Decker looked at the photo, then at one another. “Sounds like he must be our man,” Decker said. “Still seems way too easy, though.”

Noah nodded. “Yeah, we're being led on a wild goose chase. The trouble is, we can't afford not to chase the goose. Whether he's a decoy or not, this Pendergrast is somehow involved in all this, and I plan to find out how.” He took a phone out of his pocket and dialed a number, and waited for it to connect. Almost a minute later, he got an answer.

“This is Allison,” his boss said as she answered.

“It's Camelot,” Noah said. “We have a lead, and need to go to London.”

“Hang on a moment,” Allison said, and the line went silent as she placed him on hold. Noah waited for about three minutes, listening to Neil tapping on his keyboard and cursing under his breath, but he didn't want to ask questions while he was still on the phone.

“Okay, I'm back,” Allison said. “I'm sending a charter jet after you, but it won't get there until almost nine o'clock tonight, your time. I would suggest you get as much rest as you can, after the flight you just had.”

“That's what we'll do. Have we got a team in London at the moment? I'd like to keep tabs on someone until we get there.”

“We don't have a team there, but we do have an asset. Who do you want her to watch? I'll put her on it right away.”

“The guy's name is Jeremy Pendergrast,” Noah said, “and the address is...” Noah picked up a pencil that was lying on the nightstand beside his bed and threw it at Neil.

“Ow! I'm getting it, I'm getting it—okay, it's Number Fifteen Aberdare Gardens, Apartment 7B.”

“Number Fifteen Aberdare Gardens, Apartment 7B. Apparently the NSA is keeping an eye on him, too, but I'd be more comfortable if I had one of our own watching him.”

“I'll get her on it. It's almost noon in London, and you won't get there until nearly three AM. I'll have a car waiting for you with a driver, and reservations in your name in the Cavendish Hotel. Good work, Camelot, and good luck.”

The phone went dead, and Noah shoved it back into his pocket. “We get to rest up for a while, but we're flying out of here at nine o'clock tonight. Neil, go tell Moose and Sarah. I don't think any of us got any sleep on the plane coming here, and we're all worn out. Let's meet downstairs in the hotel restaurant for dinner at seven, and that should leave us plenty of time to get to the airport after we eat.”

Neil nodded, picked up his computer and walked out of the room. Decker stayed behind for a moment, and once the door had closed he looked up at Noah.

“You really think this is a wild goose chase?”

“I think there's a good chance of it,” Noah said. “I still feel like this was a little too easy, so I can't help but wonder if Mister Pendergrast wasn't hired just to be a decoy.”

Decker shrugged. “Neil says the NSA believes he's done this sort of thing before. Maybe he just got sloppy, this time.”

“People like him get sloppy only when it's to their advantage. I need to know what he knows, no matter how little it is.”

“True, and at least it's something to start with. I'll let you get some rest, while I go do the same.” He got up and walked out the door without another word.

Noah began stripping immediately, and headed for the shower. He stayed there for nearly 20 minutes, just letting the seemingly endless hot water run over him. When he felt that it was actually raising his body temperature slightly, he turned the temperature down and let it cool him, then got out and toweled off. He walked naked out of the bathroom, and wasn't surprised to find Sarah already in his bed, sound asleep. He slid under the covers as quietly as he could, and rolled onto his side. A moment later, he felt her spoon herself against him, and then he relaxed and let himself drift off.

M
oose, Neil and Decker were already seated in the restaurant when Noah and Sarah arrived, both of them freshly showered. Neil stifled a grin, but wiggled his eyebrows at Sarah, who flipped him the bird.

“Don't start with me, Neil,” she said, picking up a menu. “Anybody got any clue what's edible here?”

“They got a rotisserie chicken with vegetables, that's what I'm going for,” Moose said. He leaned over and pointed at a line on her menu. “It's this one,
Yassa poulet
. Hopefully, they can't do any harm to chicken.”

“I'm with you,” she said. “Chicken for me. Oh, look, they got Coke!”

“We've all decided on the chicken,” Decker said, grinning at Noah. “Are you gonna be the odd man out?”

“Not me, chicken sounds great.” He looked around. “Do we have a waitress?”

“Waiter,” Neil said. “Apparently, women don't work in restaurants here. All I've seen are men.”

“Okay, then where's the waiter?” Noah asked. Almost as if his question had signaled it, a waiter appeared and approached the table. The orders were taken, and they were surprised at how quickly the food arrived.

“Talk about fast food,” Neil said. “They must have a lot of this cooking back there. And did any of you know we were each getting a whole chicken? I figured it would be, you know, shredded or something.”

“You're complaining?” Sarah asked. “You forget, Neil, I've seen how you eat.”

“Complaining? I'm not complaining. But if any of you can't finish your chicken, just let me know. And I don't know what these vegetables are, but they're delicious.”

They ate casually, without rushing, and were finished well before eight o'clock. They each went to their rooms to get their bags, and met again in the lobby a few moments later. Two taxis took them to the airport, and they entered the private flight area to find a man standing there holding a sign that read “Alexander Colson.”

Noah stepped up to him. “I'm Colson,” he said.

The man was wearing what looked like a pilot's uniform, and he broke into a smile. “Good on yer, mate,” he said, in an obviously Australian accent. “We're all set to fly, soon's we get you all on board!”

“Then just lead the way,” Noah said. The man tossed his cardboard sign into the nearest trashcan as he led them through the building and out onto the tarmac. A Gulfstream IV sat awaiting them, and they all climbed aboard while another man took their bags and stowed them in the luggage compartment.

The airplane had only a dozen seats, each of which was as big as a comfortable easy chair and reclined so that the passengers could lie back and go to sleep. Everyone settled in as the pilot closed the doors, and then they heard the engines start up. The plane turned around and began to taxi toward the runway, and only a few moments later, they were in the air and on the way to England.