Chapter 32
The Ghost filled a paper cup with hotel coffee, then returned to Sardar in the lobby. Sardar pointed next to him and the Ghost
took a seat on a couch, watching the hotel patrons come and go.
Sardar said, “You cleaned out the room? Nothing left in it?”
“Yes. Cyrus gave me the fake luggage and I scrubbed the room. Packed out the flight baggage tags and receipts from the trash.
It’s clean.”
Sardar held out his hand and said, “Room key?”
The Ghost handed him his plastic key card saying, “I thought you’d rented the place for three days?”
“I did, but you’re not coming back here. Only Cyrus is coming back, just for appearances. He’ll service the rooms, dirtying
up the beds and towels so that housekeeping still thinks all three are being used.”
The Ghost had grown to trust Cyrus and didn’t like the news. He said, “He’s not joining us for the execution of the mission?”
“No. His part of the mission is here. After the event I want to make it as hard as possible for the authorities to track us.
As far as Argentina will know, the Qataris stayed until the morning of the attack, then flew home.”
The Ghost nodded, saying, “I appreciate your attention to the mission details.”
A large SUV appeared in the drive out front and Sardar stood, saying, “I’ve learned that the little things are what breaks
a mission.”
The Ghost followed him to the door, saying, “So have I, so have I.”
Cyrus was behind the wheel, Omar and Ramzi sitting on a bench seat in the far back. Sardar took the passenger seat up front and the Ghost took a bucket seat behind him. They circled through the drive and exited the casino complex, this time turning north, away from the airport and the falls.
Within minutes they crossed the Iguazú River and approached what looked like a highway toll booth spanning four lanes. Signs
provided directions for buses, trucks, and cars. Cyrus pulled off and parked in the individual vehicle lot and Sardar turned
saying, “Give me your passports.”
The Ghost turned, gathered up the passports from the rear, added his, and passed them to Sardar. He exited the vehicle, saying,
“Follow me, but let me do the talking.”
They walked to a small office, a line of people snaking out of it, mostly Western visitors fanning their faces in the heat.
The Ghost said, “Should I be concerned?”
“No. Tourists travel back and forth across the border here daily. It’s perfunctory.”
“What about biometrics? Buenos Aires was bad enough. I don’t want to give them here as well, leaving a trail all over this
country.”
They reached the line and Sardar said, “They don’t take biometrics at land crossings. Trust me, I know what I’m doing.”
The Ghost nodded, and Sardar said, “Wait here. I’m going to the tour guide line. If they have any questions, I’ll come back
and get you. But I’m sure they won’t.”
He left and the Ghost remained with the rest of the men. He turned to Cyrus, saying, “Have you guys crossed before?”
“Yeah. It’s not an issue.”
“But it leaves a trail. They’ll have dates and times of us coming back and forth.”
Cyrus said, “They’ll have times for me, but not for the rest of you. You aren’t coming back through here. More smoke for the
inevitable investigation.”
“How am I getting back to Argentina?”
Before Cyrus could answer, Sardar returned, a smile on his face. “No issues. Let’s go.”
They went back to the vehicle and drove through the gates, the Ghost watching the Iguazú River fade away behind him.
I felt my Taskforce phone vibrate, saw it was Knuckles, and answered, “They have available rooms?”
Knuckles said, “Yeah, they do, but they’re not next to each other. You got a fix on the target rooms yet?”
“Stand by.” I put my hand over the mouthpiece and said to Jennifer, “How’s Creed doing on the hotel? He locate any rooms with
Lebanese passports?”
She looked up from her computer and said, “Not yet. No Lebanese that he can find.”
I returned to Knuckles and said, “Get rooms for yourself, Veep, and Brett. I’ll give you more information when I get it.”
“What about you?”
“I’m going to steal a room here, with Shoshana. I’ll explain it to her when she gets back.”
I heard him chuckle, then, “Good luck with that.”
I said, “No choice. Look, this is going to be your show. The Ghost knows both Jennifer and me on sight.”
He grew serious then, saying, “Roger that. No problem. You give me the breach and I’ll give you the Ghost.”
I said, “Will do. For now, just get a layout of the hotel. Do some macro pre-assault planning. When I get the target rooms,
we’ll do a final.”
As soon as Shoshana had left, I’d brought in the rest of my team and pulled up a satellite image of our location.
Sure enough, while we were on the outer edges of the Puerto Iguazú densely packed urban area, just across our street was the wall of the Iguazú Grand compound.
From an aerial view, it spread out with acres of space, a little oasis right next to the concrete and asphalt of the city.
I could see the back side of the property had a single entrance with a gate for servicing a restaurant, then a sprawling pool area with cabanas and outdoor bars, and finally the hotel-casino building itself.
To the north of the hotel was some sort of nature trail, with a section of unkempt jungle running up to the northern wall.
The south was all casino, with everything that entailed.
Multiple bars, restaurants, and the casino itself took up the entire southern sector.
Knuckles and the team had come in and I’d briefed them on what Shoshana had told me, saying, “This is the endgame. Shoshana
thinks they’re here for a hit on the Israeli prime minister, and she’s probably right, but we get the Ghost here and that
plan goes to shit.”
Brett said, “You want to hit him at the hotel? Or track him someplace and ambush him?”
“At the hotel.”
Veep said, “That’s risky. We’ll get one shot at him, and if he has friends, we won’t control the outcome. If there’s a shoot-out,
we won’t get out of here clean.”
“I know, but he’s one slippery mother fucker. If we pinpoint his room, that’s where we’ll take him. Clandestine hit, clandestine
exfil, avoiding any help he might have. That’s what I’m planning on now.”
Knuckles said, “Shoshana doesn’t know which room?”
“No. All she found was the bed-down. She’s over there now, waiting on them to leave.”
Brett said, “We’ll need some high fidelity for a clean hit even if we PID his room.”
“I know. That’s why I want you to get over there. You guys go check in and get a lay of the ground. Take a Flipper Max and
clone a key card. Shoshana’s going to tell me when they’re clear.”
Like a lot of things in the Taskforce, the Flipper Max was a bit of technology we’d stolen from the commercial market—in this
case, a device called a Flipper Zero. The original was basically a Swiss army knife of hacking tools that could read and manipulate
anything on the electromagnetic spectrum, from RFID, Bluetooth, and NFC to Wi-Fi and actual radio signals. It could execute
small events like opening a garage door, changing a television channel, duplicating a key fob, or reading a chip-enabled credit
card.
Ours was a little more robust, and could not only duplicate host devices but, using AI, could extrapolate encryption and predict master protocols.
In this case, if we got a key card from the hotel, we could not only duplicate it for our specific room—like the Flipper Zero—but could also create a housecleaning key that would open all the doors in the hotel.
Veep started making a list, saying, “You want button cams in the rooms?”
“No. Too much of a chance that’ll get discovered. Remember, we’re after the Ghost here, and he’ll probably smell them if we
install. Go with Pit Vipers. All we need to know is if he’s in there, not whether he’s taking a piss.”
A Wi-Fi camera would be the best for perfect planning, but it had an Achilles’ heel: in order for it to see the room, by default
one could see it. If we had the time for a deep install, I’d go that way, but just slapping one on a lampshade was asking
for compromise. The Pit Viper was a passive sensor that detected infrared heat put out by humans—just like the namesake reptile.
I only needed to know that he was in the room before we hit it. I didn’t care what he was doing.
They finished packing and made it over to the hotel while I had Jennifer call Creed, getting him to hack into the hotel registration.
I’d initially told him to look for anyone with a Lebanese passport but that hadn’t worked.
I hung up with Knuckles and said, “Still nothing from Creed?”
She said, “No. We know the Ghost has a Lebanese passport, and they take all passports at registration. If he checked in, he’d
be in the system. It’s not like they have a hidden file or something.”
I said, “So you don’t think he checked in? Shoshana saw him enter with two guys. He’s staying there, I’m sure.”
She tapped a finger to her lip and said, “Yeah, I think you’re right, but both can be true. He’s there, but didn’t check in.”
I nodded, saying, “Have Creed broaden the search. Ninety percent of the folks at the hotel are going to be from South or North
America. Tell him to look for something else.”
She started typing in the chat, and once again I thanked the gods that the Ghost had decided to travel to South America.
While the flight was long as hell, it was at least still in our time zone, meaning we didn’t have to deal with getting stateside help at four in the morning their time. At least not yet.
She said, “He’s come back saying he can’t search that way. Well, he can, but he would have to read through every single guest.
He wants something to type into a search queue.”
“Tell him anything from the Middle East.”
She typed, then said, “He’s saying the search doesn’t work that way either. He has to type a country, not ‘anything from the
Middle East.’ ”
Growing aggravated, I started stalking to the computer, snarling, “Damn it, tell him to pull out a map and start typing countries,
or I’m going to rip his head off.”
She glared at me, and I stopped. She pulled up a map on Google and started sending him countries, while I muttered, “You keep
babying him and he’ll never learn.”
She stopped and said, “You get more help with honey than you do vinegar.”
I started to say something else, when the phone Shoshana had given me vibrated. I answered, saying, “We can’t find his hotel
room. No Lebanese have checked in. Are you sure that’s him?”
“Nephilim, that’s him.” I felt a little coolness, not the least because she used my true name again. “We just picked up the
follow on a large SUV like you Americans love, and he’s in it. Maybe your information on passports is wrong, but the information
from my eyes is correct, I promise you.”
The fact that she was behind the Ghost right now made me want to jump in a vehicle and catch up, but I knew that was a nonstarter.
I said, “Okay, okay, sorry. So we’re clear to execute a B&E if we find his room? How much time do you think we have?”
“We just crossed the border into Brazil. You have plenty of time.”
“Good to go. Thanks Carrie.” A little jab to let her know I could give it as well as take it. Unfortunately, unlike Jennifer, she seemed to enjoy her callsign. She answered, “Any time, any time,” and I could almost see the smile.
I hung up and Jennifer turned to me, saying, “Three hotel rooms, all on the same floor, all rented by the same man, a guy
from Qatar.”
I relayed the information to my team in the hotel, thinking, This is almost too easy.