Chapter 16
I left the RV, answering the phone, “Hey, I was just thinking about you. I’ve got a mission for you out there. Did you get
to look at the burned luggage from Marley’s vehicle?”
“Yeah, I did. It’s nothing but charred clothes and a burned-up notebook. Nothing there, but that’s not why I’m calling. I
found the mole.”
That was surprising and could only mean one thing. “No shit? Did the sheriff’s department have a leak we didn’t know about?
Is that the insider threat?”
He paused, then said, “No. It’s the son.”
“What?” I didn’t think I’d heard him correctly.
“I was talking to the widow—Amy is her name—and while we were chatting the son pulled Brett aside, saying he needed to see
him. Turns out, the Ghost was giving him some tutoring in Arabic studies or Palestinian history or some shit for his high
school class. He let the Ghost use his cell phone as a Wi-Fi hotspot.”
“You have got to be shitting me. Did he leave it overnight? Give it to him for good? Why would he do that?”
“No, no, nothing like that. It was only while he was getting tutored. Only maybe two hours total a week. The Ghost tricked
him. Made him think it was just to get around the Taskforce firewall of approved sites. The kid swears he didn’t see anything
suspicious and that the Ghost only showed him historical sites. Most of them he had to translate from Arabic.”
“So the sites were in Arabic?”
“No. He just told the kid that. I uploaded his phone data to Creed. He did a scrub and the sites were in Farsi. They’re old IRGC websites from years ago. The Ghost was talking to Iran.”
Holy shit.
“Did Creed get anything from the sites? Could he see what was being said?”
“No. He’s pretty sure there was some backdoor password thing needed to get past the front page, but the IP addresses and ISPs
are all inside Iran. The Ghost was sending messages right in front of the kid and he didn’t even know it. And the Wi-Fi bypassed
any surveillance the Taskforce had on his computer.”
“Okay, okay, listen, don’t tell the kid what you found. I don’t want him thinking he was responsible for his dad’s death.
Tell him the Ghost’s computer stuff was just what he said it was. Benign history stuff.”
“Already ahead of you. Already done.”
“Good. Can we get the Ghost’s computer?”
“I’m working it. There are a couple of layers of bureaucracy I have to get through to access the detention site, but nothing
too bad. I should be cleared soon.”
I said, “Okay. Good work. Maybe it’ll show us something more than the kid’s phone.”
Knuckles said, “Wait, there’s more.”
“What?”
“Creed ran the sites by the intel analysts and they’ve seen something like it before, in Germany. They think it’s run by a
unit of the Quds Force. An assassination cell known as Unit 840. They’re the direct-action assholes who eliminate targets
for the regime.”
Which, given the Ghost’s past history, made absolute sense. It would be the one contact he knew to use, even if it was old.
That was a scary thought, but we were making progress.
“So we think the Ghost reached out to his old masters for help?”
“Yeah, but that’s not the best part. The German website Unit 840 used has been linked to assassinations of Iranian dissidents in England and all over the continent.
In each case, the Iranians hired criminals from Eastern Europe who could slip past the intel net in the host country.
They succeeded because the intel knew about the threats, but were looking at the wrong actors to execute. ”
“Okay, I get that. So what? What’s that got to do with the Ghost?”
“Unit 840 tried to assassinate an IRGC defector in Maryland awhile back, and they hired the Hells Angels from Canada to do
it.”
Bikers.
I said, “Canadian Hells Angels? Is that a thing? I thought everyone in Canada was nice.”
He laughed and said, “Not these dudes. They were paid three hundred and fifty K to cross the border and eliminate this guy.
The plot failed because Belgian and Dutch security services cracked the website, but I thought the link was pretty intriguing.
That wasn’t the only time, either. A Hells Angel was hired in Germany to do another hit in Europe. They have chapters everywhere.”
My mind was making connections at the speed of light. I said, “In Utah? They have a chapter in Utah?”
“Well, no. I already checked that. But the lead we have is a biker gang.”
I deflated a little bit. “Yeah, as far as that goes. But that’s like saying a pit bull mauled a kid in Oregon and when someone
else gets mauled in Texas, the cops suspect you because you have a golden doodle. We have a lead on some bikers, but that
doesn’t mean all bikers are working for Iran.”
“I know, I know, it’s just a thought. Pretty good one, if you ask me.”
I heard the door open behind me and Jennifer stuck her head out, saying, “Pike, you need to see this.”
“I got to go. Keep at it. Get that computer to Creed.”
I hung up and went back inside the RV, saying, “What’s up?”
Jennifer said, “The Ellingtons have a dash cam. We can see what they saw that night.”
I looked at Mosby and said, “No shit?”
He pointed at a tablet on the table and said, “Yeah. She’s already seen it, but I can show it again.”
Jennifer said, “The cops haven’t seen it.”
A little miffed at her comment, Mosby said, “I’d completely forgotten about it. It came with the rental of the RV and we never
use it. Wasn’t till we got to our next stop a day later that I remembered.”
“Let’s see it again.”
He hit play, saying, “This is right before we got to the truck.”
I saw a dark road, the single paint strips in the middle flashing by under the headlights. I said, “No audio?”
“No.”
Liz said, “Thank heavens, because we were going at each other.”
I chuckled, and Liz said, “I was driving.” She leaned in and said, “Here they come.”
The frame showed a curve with lights advancing. The RV went around it and an explosion of headlights appeared, at least from
three motorcycles. In the back was a van with one headlight working, looking exactly like a motorcycle right up until it almost
collided with the front of the RV. The camera swerved all over the road for a split second, then steadied before slowing,
the RV coming to a stop.
Mosby said, “We sat for a bit, collecting ourselves.”
I said, “I don’t blame you.”
He hit fast-forward until the vehicle was moving again. It went over a hill, and in the distance, I could see a glow. Liz
said, “That’s the truck.”
Two minutes of driving later and I could make out the flames. The RV rolled past the burning truck and then stopped. Mosby
said, “That’s all you can see. It just shows the road ahead for the rest of the tape. We were out doing what we told you about.”
I said, “Back it up to the bikers.”
He did so, and they came screaming past the RV in reverse. When the van appeared I said, “Freeze it.”
He punched the pause, and the RV’s headlights showed the front of the van, the driver’s side front quarter panel bashed in,
the headlight dangling by a loose wire. Below it, in the harsh glow, I could see a license plate.
“Can you screenshot that? Send it to my cell phone?”
He said, “Yeah, of course. In fact, I’ll send it to that fella I met in Utah too. He told me to call if I remembered anything.”
I said, “Don’t bother with that. I’ll make sure he gets it. We’re working the same case.”
Jennifer scrunched her eyes at my comment, but said nothing. Five minutes later, I had the picture and we were saying our
goodbyes. We left the Ellingtons to their remaining time in purgatory and I said, “Where’s the hotel?”
“Right here. We’re at the Circus Circus. I thought that would be convenient.”
I said, “No way. I’d rather sleep in the rental.”
She laughed and said, “The Bellagio. I can get MGM points.”
Of course. Jennifer had a travel point account with every hotel chain in existence.
I said, “Get that picture to Veep. Tell him I want all the information he can find on that van.”
She started working my phone and said, “Shouldn’t we be giving this to the Panguitch sheriff’s department? Let them have the
same lead we do?”
“I will, I will. I just want a first crack at it.”
We checked in and pulled our carry-ons the fourteen miles through the casino to the elevators—this space much more pristine
and elegant than my stay at Circus Circus—and went to our room. I hooked up my laptop, but saw no message from the Taskforce.
Jennifer said, “Waiting here isn’t going to make it come faster. Let’s go get some dinner.”
I agreed, and we went to a steakhouse on the ground floor. It was hellaciously expensive, but I was going to charge the Taskforce.
Over steaks, I told Jennifer everything Knuckles had found, and we finished mostly in silence, both thinking through the day’s
events.
When we got back to our room, I immediately checked my computer. I had a message:
Vehicle is a 2017 Chevrolet Express van. Reported stolen two weeks ago from a plumbing supply company in Salt Lake City. Located yesterday near Papago Farms, Arizona, on the Tohono O’odham Indian reservation. Van was destroyed by fire.
I googled the Tohono O’odham Indian reservation. I took one look at the location and sat back.
Jennifer said, “What is it?”
“The Ghost is in Mexico.”