Time on the Wire (7 page)
Authors: Jay Giles
Gerhardt broke down and cried when Hanna told him about finding the ransom demand in the Mercedes. “It’s all my fault,” he wailed, “I talked him into meeting that woman, he would never have done it otherwise. I will never forgive myself for failing him.”
Hanna’s voice was comforting. “You didn’t fail him, Gerhardt.
You had no way of knowing this would happen. You can’t blame yourself.”
Gerhardt sniffed, dabbed at his eyes with a tissue.
“You have to pull yourself together, we need your help.”
Gerhardt took a couple of deep breaths, dabbed at his eyes, again. “Anything.”
“We need to inform the appropriate people at Mercedes, but we don’t know who those people are. Can you help us with that? Put us in touch with the right people?”
He nodded, sniffed a couple of times, broke back down sobbing.
“What if they won’t pay the ransom? What will happen then?”
“Let’s deal with that if and when it happens. What we have to focus on now is alerting the right people.”
The sobs became greater, his shoulders shook. Hanna waited.
Between sobs, he gasped out a word at a time. “They. Are. All. On.
Vacation. Hard. To. Reach.”
“They can’t all be on vacation,” Hanna said.
His head bobbed up and down. “Europeans vacation the month of August.”
Hanna knew of the custom. She’d heard companies literally closed, management and workers alike, going on holiday. Surely, they couldn’t shut down a company the size of the Mercedes’ parent, Daimler AG? “There has to be someone running the company.” She placed the phone directly in front of Gerhardt. “Time is of the essence. Find that person.”
He stared at the phone, pulled himself together, consulted his address book, began making calls. His first two went to voice mail. His third began a pin-ball game that bounced him from one Mercedes executive to another. Finally, his face lit-up, he conversed in German for over twenty minutes, hung up abruptly.
“Wait,” Hanna said hurriedly. “I need to talk to that person.”
Gerhardt seemed surprised. “There is no need,” he said defensively. “I have spoken with Dieter Albrecht, a senior executive director for Daimler AG, the person with responsibility for things like this.”
“Things like what? Kidnapping?”
“Yes. Threats against the company. Extortion. Blackmail.
Coercion. Kidnapping. I didn’t realize how often Mercedes has been the target of criminals. The threats became so significant, in fact, that some years ago, the board of directors authorized the creation of a shadow arm of the company to counter criminal activities. This is not widely known even within the company, but it exists. Thank goodness. Now that Albrecht has been informed about Jen’s disappearance, he will take forceful action.”
Hanna didn’t like the turn this had taken. “We don’t need Albrecht acting independently, we need coordination.”
Gerhardt’s gaze turned troubled, darted to the phone. “It’s too late.”
In the Ritz Carlton room Joanna Perlman had once occupied, Casper watched a tech, down on his hands and knees, use a piece of sticky paper to lift a blond hair off the carpet by the bed’s headboard.
He held it up for Casper to see. Casper peered at it closely, had the tech bag and label it. If the hair belonged to Perlman, it was the only trace of her that remained in the room.
The crime scene team had searched meticulously for fingerprints, found the room startlingly clean. The obvious items—door knobs, faucets or phones—Casper assumed Perlman would wipe. But he’d had hopes for the more obscure, overlooked places—closet hangers, shower curtain, curtain pulls. Nothing. The bathroom had been particularly pristine. They hadn’t found a single hair in either the shower or sink drains.
That could have been due to the diligence of the Ritz Carlton’s housekeeping staff. But more likely, it meant Perlman was a pro.
They’d had similar results with the Mercedes Perlman had driven. They’d found no prints, blood, hair, or foreign residue.
Walger had remarked to him he’d never seen a car so clean.
The cashier’s check Perlman had given Mercedes proved to be another dead end.
Casper had retrieved it from the check clearing system, found it had been issued by a New York bank on an account that had been opened three months earlier. The address, phone number, and social on file for the account turned out to be false. The balance in the account had been $100.
He’d run a background check on Gerhardt. Found nothing. His people had interviewed the parking meter police who had placed the tickets on the car. Learned zip.
His cell rang. He looked at the ID. Chance. Lifted the cell to his ear. “Give me some good news.”
“We’ve found the person at Daimler. His name is Dieter Albrecht.”
“Did you talk to him?”
“I didn’t. Mr. Gerhardt talked to him in German.”
“Give me the gist.”
“Albrecht won’t authorize paying the ransom. He’s sending someone to work with us, instead.”
Casper’s anger flared. “Work with us? As a liaison? A negotiator?
What?”
After returning from his session at the FBI, Miles had gone for a long run. It was now a little after 11:00 a.m. and he had less than a mile to go to get in his twenty. He wasn’t tired. His breathing was shallow, his stride long and loose. His mind was alert, active, focused on preparations for the trip he and three companions would be taking in two months to Machu Picchu, the lost Peruvian city of the Incas. It would be a long, strenuous climb over the Andean Plateau to reach the ruins in the Urumba Valley. In preparation, Miles was alternating long runs with long walks carrying a 60-lb. backpack.
He sprinted the last hundred yards to his front door, clicked his running watch to record his time, walked around the parking lot to cool down. Inside, he could hear his phone ringing. He ignored it, continued to walk. The machine must have picked it up, he didn’t hear the ringing on his next loop. But when he looped around again, it was ringing. Somebody was determined to talk to him. Curious, he used his key, unlocked the door, went inside, grabbed the phone.
“This is Miles.”
“Miles, it’s Larry,” he said in that voice that couldn’t possibly belong to anyone else. “How quickly can you get to the dealership?”
Miles looked at the LED readout on the phone. It told him he had six messages.
“Larry, did you call me earlier?”
“Yeah, bunch of times. Listen, Miles, it’s important you get here as fast as possible.”
“I’m not scheduled to work until—”
“Doesn’t matter. I need you here. Right now.”
“Sure, Larry. Quick shower and I’ll be there.” Miles hung up, stripped off his running clothes, headed for the shower. It had to be the Joanna Perlman business. That was the only thing out of the ordinary that had happened lately. The FBI must have leaned on Jarsman for some reason and he’d freaked.
Miles showered, dressed, drove in. He was met at the dealership’s door by Suzy Thane, a junior sales associate. “He’s waiting for you in his office. He said to send you right back.”
Miles knocked on the closed door, opened it, went in, closed the door behind him. Jarsman was alone. Pacing. His hair was disheveled, his shirt marked by patches of perspiration. “Good, you’re here. There’s a gentleman from Mercedes on the phone from Stuttgart, Dieter Albrecht. He wants to talk to both of us.” Jarsman walked over close to the phone and said, “Mr. Albrecht, he’s here.”
The voice that came from the speaker phone was formal, no nonsense. “Mr. Marin, this is Dieter Albrecht. I am a senior executive director with Daimler. More importantly, I am the person responsible for dealing with the Jens Beck’s kidnapping. It is my understanding that you are the salesman who had dealings with this woman who may have lured Beck away, is that correct?”
“Yes, sir. It is.”
“You would recognize this woman again if you saw her?”
“I believe so, yes.”
“Good. As of this moment, you no longer work for your dealership—”“What? That’s not—”“Listen to me carefully, Mr. Marin. You now work directly for me. I have need of your services for a time. During that period, you will be paid twice your normal salary as there will be some risk involved. If this matter concludes successfully, a bonus will be authorized.”
“I don’t under—”
“No, I’m certain you don’t, but you will, Mr. Marin. I have no intention of blindly paying a ransom to secure Jens Beck’s release. To do so, would encourage the kidnapping of company executives. I have no desire to set a precedent that would put our people at risk.That does not mean I will sit back and do nothing to free Mr. Beck.I am sending a man, Wernher Lohse, to take care of this matter. He has my authorization to do as he sees fit. Mr. Lohse is adept at matters such as this; however, he will require the assistance of someone who knows the local area. You, Mr. Marin, will fill that role, you will do whatever Mr. Lohse asks of you. Do you have questions?”
Miles was stunned.
“No. Well, Mr. Lohse’s plane arrives this afternoon. I suggest you meet it. Good day, Mr. Jarsman, Mr. Marin.”
Following the call from Dieter Albrecht, Miles busied himself transferring his work to other sales associates. Within an hour, his desk clean, his schedule clear, he headed for Jarsman’s office, knocked on the door frame. Jarsman looked up, waved him in.
“I just wanted to let you know all my stuff is taken care of,” Miles said. “I don’t know how long this thing with Lohse is going to last, but I wanted to make sure you’re okay with it.”
“I’m not okay with any of this, but it doesn’t matter.” Jarsman rolled his eyes. “This game is being played way over my head.”
“I just don’t want to lose my job be—”“Don’t worry about that. Your job will be here waiting for you when this is over. This isn’t your fault.”
“Thanks,” Miles said, relieved. He started to leave. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
He was out the door, down the hall, when Jarsman called after him. “Hey, Miles.”
Miles stopped, walked back to Jarsman standing in his doorway.
“I just thought you ought to know, this guy Lohse, Albrecht said he was some kind of special forces guy with the German Bundeswehr. Made it sound like he was one of those guys who knows how to kill eighteen different ways, all of them silently. Be careful, Miles.”
Wernher Lohse and his girlfriend, Alisa Shanke, were on the first week of a month’s vacation in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic.
Lohse had chosen Punta Cana for its white sand beach, the Riu Palace for its luxurious amenities. At the Palace, it was all gourmet dining, spa pampering, endless golf, bottomless drinks. Lohse considered this the appropriate antidote for the stresses he faced the rest of the year.
The two had just been seated in the open-air dining room for a late breakfast when the cell Lohse religiously carried with him starting ringing. Lohse, who had been relaxed and jovial, tensed. He pulled the cell from its belt holder, looked at the caller ID, frowned.
“I have to take this.” He stood and stepped away from the table.
Only when he was out of earshot, did he answer: “Lohse.”
The voice on the other end didn’t need to identify who he was.
He was one of a select few who had this number. He gave Lohse the known facts.
When the caller finished his briefing, Lohse responded, “I understand,” and ended the call.
He didn’t bother returning to the table. Didn’t bother saying good-bye to Alisa.
Didn’t bother returning to their room for his things. He walked directly to their rental car and drove to the airport.
Lohse gave the commercial airlines a perfunctory check. When nothing was immediately available, he walked to the charter building, where he booked a Gulfstream V to fly him to Miami. The cost was $3,000 an hour, minimum of three hours. Lohse’s only concern was how quickly the plane could be airborne.
“Less than an hour, Mr. Lohse,” the blue jacketed charter agent assured him. Lohse impatiently nodded acceptance, checked his watch, found a cup of coffee and a seat in the waiting room, began focusing on his plan of action.
Throughout Lohse’s career, this ability to focus had been a key factor in his success. As a special forces officer in the Bundeswehr, he visualized every detail of his missions. Whether it was diplomatic support, search-and-destroy, or asset extraction, each action and reaction was carefully thought through. Lohse played and replayed his visualizations until he instinctively knew every contingency, every potential response.
His meticulous preparations were carried out with ruthless efficiency. Lohse wasn’t deterred by collateral damage, causalities, even personal injury, as evidenced by the three bullet wounds in his left shoulder, the fourteen-inch shrapnel scar that ran down his right leg, and the chunk missing from the top of his right ear. Lohse’s personnel file read like an action thriller.
In 1992, Lohse led a special-forces team into Iran to rescue a German diplomat and his family abducted by terrorists. Every day, the terrorists paraded the family—each member wearing a vest of C4 explosive—around the town square. Lohse’s sharpshooters had their fingers on the triggers of their rifles, waiting for that one moment when the terrorist—wearing the detonator on his chest, held in place by a shoulder harness—didn’t have his thumb on the button. As each day passed, the tension ratcheted up. On the sixth day, the terrorists’ pattern changed. They lined the family up in the center of the square, backed away, began shouting, trying to draw a crowd. To Lohse, it had all the earmarks of an execution. Still, the terrorist’s thumb remained on the detonator.
Lohse had no choice. He gave his men the signal. They fired in unison. Lohse took the terrorist with the detonator, shot off the man’s hands. He waited the fraction of a second it took for the man to spin the needed way, put a bullet in his chest, knocking him to the ground on his back. The detonator, held in place by the shoulder harness, flopped harmlessly on the dead man’s stomach.
In 1995, Lohse was credited with saving the lives of three high-ranking Japanese government officials. The three Japanese and Lohse were riding in an armored limousine, part of a motorcade traveling thru Bonn to a treaty signing. Without warning, a garbage truck pulled out in front of the motorcade, running over the motorcycle escort. With the garbage truck blocking the motorcade’s forward progress and another garbage truck blocking them from behind, men wearing black hoods began planting explosives under each of the trapped cars.
Lohse forced the Japanese to the floor, lowered the side windows and shot anyone who approached his limo. Lohse’s was the only limo of the four in the motorcade that wasn’t blown up. Nine diplomats, three of Lohse’s peers, and three drivers died in the attack. The Japanese in his charge escaped without a scratch.
In 1999, Lohse made a clandestine night parachute drop into Turkey to find and free Joshua Kohl. Kohl, a Captain in the Bundeswehr, had been arrested by Turkish police during an off-duty vacation visit to the port of Istanbul. No charges were filed, but Kohl was held incommunicado, moved from prison to prison. When family and diplomatic efforts to secure his release failed, the Bundeswehr turned to Lohse.
After two months of fruitless searching, Lohse finally located Kohl at a remote prison facility near the Russian border. The old stone prison structure had a single reinforced steel door and small barred windows. It was surrounded by barbed wire, staffed by four guards during the day, two at night. For two days, Lohse hid in the brush studying the building, watching the guard’s patterns, trying to discern where the prisoners’ holding area might be.
At 3:00 a.m. on the third day, he staged his assault. Lohse cut through the wire, scaled the side of the building, blew a hole in the roof. Alarmed, frightened, and uncertain about the source of the attack, guards fired their rifles out the windows, through the hole in the roof. Lohse waited silently for two hours, letting the guards calm down. At 5:00, an hour before the shift change, he dropped through the hole in the roof, shot both guards dead. When the day shift guards arrived, he mowed them down then used their truck to drive a weakened, malnourished Joshua Kohl to safety.
Kohl’s father, a Daimler Benz executive, was one of the few who knew of Lohse’s involvement in the rescue. The older Kohl brought Lohse’s name to Dieter Albrecht’s attention. Albrecht made Lohse the kind of offer that made his decision to leave the military easy.
That had been seven years ago. Since then, there had been numerous matters as Albrecht referred to them, missions as Lohse thought of them. This mission, however, was somewhat different.
Albrecht had been almost cryptic on the phone. What little information he had conveyed to Lohse was certainly not enough to formulate a credible plan of attack.
“Mr. Lohse, your flight’s ready,” the charter agent said. “If you’ll just follow me.” He led Lohse outside to the plane, shook his hand in parting. “Have a good flight.”
Lohse boarded the plane, took his seat. As soon as they were airborne, he was on his cell phone. His first calls were to secure information about Jens Beck, put needed human resources on alert.
On later calls, he tried to secure something even more valuable—weapons.