4. Phae
Phae
“F irst impressions?” Priest asked, and I was glad he’d decided to lead this meeting rather than Emmy.
This virtual meeting. Emmy’s team and ours were on separate jets, heading for the airport at Sorong because there were no military airbases in that part of the country.
Our jet had been customised to our own specification, but it was still government property, so the fittings could best be described as “utilitarian.” Emmy, on the other hand, had reviewed the “optional extras” list from the manufacturer and checked every box.
If she had missiles on board, they were probably gold-plated.
Emmy’s advance team had already landed on Malati, along with a squad of ten men from Kopassus. The cops were there too—a pair of local officers who were way out of their depth, plus a team of detectives who asked plenty of questions but seemed at a loss as to what to do with the answers.
The Whispers in Willowbrook special was being filmed in a deserted village on the east side of the island.
Actually, “deserted” was the wrong word.
A US developer had bought up all the properties, and plans were underway to turn it into a luxury resort—think fancy restaurants, overwater bungalows, exclusive spa treatments, and the price tag to match.
But while negotiations were underway with the authorities and the requisite bribes were still making their way through the planning process, the place lay empty, and the owner figured they’d make a quick buck by renting it out as a movie location.
Just after eleven a.m., at least half a dozen gunmen had appeared and begun shooting, their faces covered, green sashes acting as an identifier.
Folks had run for cover, and when the noise finally stopped, nine people couldn’t be found, Marc and Serena Carlisle among them.
Despite all the gunfire, only one person had been treated for a bullet wound, so either there were bodies that hadn’t been found, or…
Fuck, I didn’t want to think about either of those options.
Malati wasn’t a big island, only two miles from end to end, and most residents lived in a small town on the western tip.
No hospital, only a doctor, so casualties had been transferred to a larger island nearby—the gunshot victim, a guy who’d tripped over stray equipment and broken his ankle, and a woman found unconscious who hadn’t woken up yet.
Access to the village was via boat or along one narrow dirt road.
Several witnesses reported hearing engines, but only after the shooting started.
So far, it was unclear how the raiders had escaped.
Had they fled the island? Or were they still there, hiding in the wild tangle of undergrowth that covered the hilly central region?
First responders had trampled over any tracks that might belong to the assholes who’d snatched Marc, so we were left fishing around in the dark.
Right now, I felt helpless, and I hated that.
We’d just watched the collection of footage that Mimi—Emmy’s APAC lead—had cobbled together, shaky phone scenes filmed from hiding places, interspersed with whispered messages to loved ones in case the victims didn’t make it home. I tried to block out those parts.
Had Marc tried to leave a message?
Who would he send it to?
He didn’t have my number anymore, I’d made sure of that, and I didn’t have his either.
Three years ago, he’d changed it, which meant I couldn’t drunk dial from a burner phone in the middle of the night just to listen to his voicemail anymore.
And I’d only done that a couple of times, okay? I wasn’t a total stalker.
Anyhow, we’d watched the videos, and Jez squeezed my hand under the table where nobody else could see.
Tulsa had stayed behind to deal with a homegrown crisis, but Sin was with us, and Storm, although Storm was flying the jet.
Priest was copilot, and he’d give her a break when she needed it.
After we offloaded in Sorong, Sin would carry on to Sentani to network because whoever was behind this plan, there was a good chance it hadn’t been hatched on Malati.
Making connections was her special skill, that and languages.
She spoke nine fluently and a handful more passably, and thanks to her upbringing—her father had travelled the world as a prosthetist, taking his family with him—she felt as at home in Europe or the Middle East as she did in the US.
Indonesia wasn’t a place she came often, but she still knew people here.
If Marc’s disappearance was related to political instability rather than the work of common or garden criminals, the root of the problem most likely lay to the west, where the West Papua Freedom Army aimed to separate West Papua from Indonesia and establish an independent state.
So that was where Sin would head while the rest of the team focused on Malati.
Mimi and her colleague Rix had begged, borrowed, and stolen—literally, in the case of one jackass who was holding back in the hope of making a few bucks from a media exclusive—every clip of the incident they could find and pulled them together into a macabre home movie.
And Priest wanted to know our first impressions?
Jez put my thoughts into words before I managed to articulate them.
“Where’s all the blood?”
This wasn’t our first rodeo. Or our first possible terrorist attack. And based on the amount of gunfire, we’d have expected significantly more casualties than we’d gotten. Either the attackers were shitty shots, or they’d missed deliberately.
But why would they miss deliberately? Six shooters in the clips, maybe more that weren’t on film, and they’d hit one person between them?
“How many bullet holes are we talking?” Emmy asked. “The occasional ding or Swiss cheese?”
Heath Carlisle was with her, and he looked faintly nauseated as the Kopassus team leader spoke up in heavily accented English. I leaned closer to read the name on his uniform. Sinaga.
“There are many holes.”
“Holes in what? I hate to say it, but those guys were making a movie, and the way shit went down was weird enough for it to be a PR stunt.”
Oh, please. “Are you kidding me? Marc would never cause an international incident to gain column inches.”
Jez kicked me under the table, and too late, I realised my mistake. Two mistakes, actually—emotion and familiarity.
“You know Marc?” Emmy asked.
Sin came to the rescue. “Just because you have half of Hollywood in your little black book doesn’t mean the rest of us hobnob with movie stars. But if Marc di Gregorio wants PR, all he has to do is take off his shirt.”
“There’s no way Serena would get involved in any bullshit publicity stunt,” Heath put in. “Or Marc. Away from the spotlight, he’s pretty down to earth.”
Curiosity got the better of me. “You know him personally?”
“He comes over for dinner whenever he’s in London.”
Oh. I hadn’t realised they were genuinely friends.
Emmy snapped her fingers. “Anyhow, back to the job. Marc and Serena might not do something that dumb, but what about the director? Producer? Anyone else looking for a big break?”
“The executive producer is a guy called Dylan Young,” Heath supplied.
“I’ve met him half a dozen times, and he’s dedicated and exacting when it comes to his work, but he’s not out for world domination.
Last I heard, he and his wife had adopted a little boy, and they’re renovating a house in the Cotswolds.
There are half a dozen regular directors on the show. ”
“Much equipment is broken,” Sinaga offered. “The cameras, the trucks, the lights, all smashed.”
“Unlikely they would’ve destroyed their own kit.”
“Unless it was an insurance scam,” Emmy pointed out, leaning back in her cream leather seat. “But that seems drastic.”
If she thought Marc would be impressed by the billionaire’s wife package—the expensive upholstery, the polished wood trim, real china plates, and water in a fancy crystal glass—she was dead wrong.
Even now, he was as happy fishing with Huck as he was schmoozing on the red carpet.
Kitty just loved to tell me these things.
“Let’s consider other options,” Priest suggested. “Who else has skin in the game?”
“The developer who owns the village. But ‘come for the sun, stay for the terrorist attack’ isn’t exactly the best ad for an upscale resort, is it?”
We stared at each other.
Who didn’t want that resort to be successful?
Nobody needed to tell Echo to find out. She was already eavesdropping on the call, tucked away in the Sierra Nevada foothills with a lightning-fast internet connection and search tools that would make the NSA weep.
Mainly because they’d developed the systems and Echo had backdoor access.
On screen, Emmy’s gaze dropped, and I knew she was messaging her own cyber team.
“We also need a list of those missing,” Priest said. “Who disappeared besides Marc and Serena?”
At least six shooters, plus nine probable hostages.
If the terrorists had guns, one tango could control several prisoners, but that ratio was still a risk.
The green sashes had been spread out. In the video footage, we hadn’t seen the hostages at all, and Marc would have hidden at the first sign of trouble. He wasn’t a dumbass.
I ran through scenarios in my head. Six men bursting from the trees and opening fire, then trying to round up fleeing civilians?
Nope. Green sashes jogging up the beach and marching actors and crew over the sand to a boat?
Possibly, but if they’d grabbed their prey at the start, there must have been more than six of them.
Two to maintain control, one more to drive the boat.
Eighteen people on a boat. A good-sized boat with a shallow enough draft to get close to the shore.
That would narrow the search a little. Unless they had multiple boats, which would have been the smarter option.
Would nine men have been enough? Marc was no fool, and he wasn’t a coward either.
If an opportunity had arisen, there was a reasonable chance he would have fought back.
I’d watched enough of his movies—secretly, in my room—to know he was in excellent shape, and he could handle a gun.
Plus he’d taken karate lessons with Booker for several years.
A video replayed in the corner of the screen, and this time, I focused on the footage instead of my rising panic.
A cameraman threw a mic at a green sash, and instead of firing back, the guy flinched, ducked, and fumbled his gun.
These men weren’t pros. And who might hire an incompetent amateur? A pretend terrorist?
Fuck.
We were back to the PR stunt.
“Okay, what if it was an inside job?”
“Run us through your thought process,” Priest said.
“We have nine missing people. Either a whole group of terrorists landed on the island and abducted them, or several terrorists were on the island already.”
“You think the background actors were involved?”
“I’m saying it’s possible that not all of the hostages are hostages. Do we have names? How did they get hired to work on this production?”
“The scenario makes sense,” Emmy said. “Someone had to control the hostages, right? And those idiots on the beach were too busy missing targets and tripping over their own fucking feet. Mack, can you get the names?” Mack was Blackwood’s version of Echo, and the answer must have been in the affirmative, because Emmy gave us a thumbs-up.
“The names haven’t been released, but she’s looking into it. ”
“Yes, an inside job,” Sinaga said, smiling for the first time as he realised the Indonesian tourism industry might not have been tanked by homegrown terrorists. “This is good news.”
Mimi gave him a “what the fuck?” look, and he shuffled down an inch in his seat.
“Good news will be when we get the hostages back,” Emmy told him. “Any sign of any actual intel from your lot yet?”
“Nothing happens here. The island is almost empty.”
“That’s a no, then? I’m missing the run-up to Thanksgiving for this.” Emmy exhaled sharply and closed her eyes for a moment. “So I guess it’s not all bad.”
“You don’t care for Thanksgiving?” I asked. It wasn’t as if she had to lift a finger to prepare for it.
“Food for five thousand and pumpkins everywhere? Oh, and gourds. Who can forget the ornamental fucking gourds? We’ve been using them for target practice, but the pile isn’t getting any smaller.”
“Bradley made another ordering mishap?” Priest asked.
Emmy’s assistant made Marcel look sane. Last year, we’d laughed our heads off when his typo led to a hundred turkeys running around Emmy’s home, but now who had a bird problem, huh? Maybe it was more karma.
“No, he grew them.”
“For a second there, I thought you said Bradley tried yard work.”
“Someone else did the actual digging. Bradley just watched a BuzzHub video on gardening and went full homestead. Apparently, he thought each seed grew one pumpkin, carrot-style.” Emmy rolled her eyes. “The jungle out back was a total surprise.”
“The video didn’t mention that part?”
“Bradley says not, but the channel’s called ‘The Shirtless Gardener.’ Nobody’s watching it for the horticulture tips.”
“Doesn’t Bradley have a long-term boyfriend?”
“Who do you think sent him the link?” Emmy glanced at her laptop at the same time my phone buzzed. “Ah, we have the names.”
We did. Time to work out who needed to suffer.