Chapter 25
Chapter 25
A riel continued, “Stop me if you’ve heard this. Fifteen hundred years ago a Franciscan monk followed a vision that ended here, and he and his brothers built what, five hundred years later, would become a thriving monastery where they would live in peace until the Crusaders adopted it as one of their outposts around AD 1000. This attracted the attention of the Moors, who then drove out the Crusaders, whereupon the grounds fell into disrepair and became the home of an eventual hermit. Around 1500, the Christians retook the citadel, refortifying it, and discovered that the rocky and fertile soil, along with the requisite sunshine, grew desirable grapes. A thriving church soon followed. Along with ‘entertainment’ for the priests seeking respite from the rigors of celibate life. Monastery, vineyards, retreat, and private conference center—priests from around the world would trek here, often walking the last fifty to hundred miles, making the destination a pilgrimage of sorts. Then they would spend weeks or months, each day confessing the sins that occurred in the dark world below.”
The satellite picture followed the narrow road that led from the mainland into the peninsula, traveling along the mile-wide plateau that fell off like a table to rocky, goat-strewn cliffs that descended a couple hundred feet into the turquoise waters of the Balearic Sea. Ariel shone a laser on the screen, circling the structures with its red light. “From a defensive standpoint, it’s easy to see why Frank liked it.” More laser. “One road in and surrounded by water on three sides. An inhospitable terrain inhabited by goats, burros, and short, stubby trees that look to be constantly bracing against the wind.” More keystrokes from the woman at the console and the picture zoomed in on a small resort village a few miles away, revealing bleached white sands and gin-clear water.
The pain in my stomach was piercing. The slideshow fast-forwarded itself across the back of my eyelids.
Ariel nodded to the woman.
More keystrokes. A prerecorded video began playing. We watched from an aerial view as a small Zodiac left a crowded marina, captained by a single man and a dog, and navigated the waters to the island’s edge. There the two disappeared underwater.
Ariel nodded again to the woman, who fast-forwarded several hours to when the man and his dog returned, climbed into the craft, and motored back to the marina, leaving a red trail along the gunnel of the boat.
Ariel nodded again to the woman and then looked at me. “Here’s what you didn’t know.” The video rewound to one hour prior to my leaving the marina. The perspective changed to a different satellite angle, moving to the northeastern corner of the island. It passed over an elegant sailboat under way to a moored megayacht in a protected cove. Maybe two hundred feet in length. The woman at the terminal split the screen; one half showed the sailboat sailing out of the screen, leaving only the megayacht sitting idly, while the other half showed me in the Zodiac leaving the marina. As I idled in from one side of the island, the yacht cranked her engines and began easing out into deeper water. More laser. “The Dark Profit —and don’t let the double entendre escape you—was rented to a shell company owned by a shell company tied to a parent shell company. Which is not unusual.”
I stepped closer. “Any idea who was aboard?”
“That’s the ten-million-dollar question.” Ariel moved closer to the TV. More laser. “Watch this tender. It leaves the island, approaches the Profit , those four men disembark, and then two of them return and hold umbrellas while this man walks beneath.”
Clay lifted his cane and motioned to the absence of clouds in the sky. “Only one problem. No rain. ”
Ariel studied the screen. “Exactly.”
I spoke next. “So mystery man knows somebody is staring down at him from fifty-five miles above the earth.”
Ariel nodded.
“Can you estimate the size of the man?”
The woman typed a few lines of code into the keyboard. Ariel again. “Maybe five feet eight to five feet ten. One-eighty to two hundred.”
“So he’s either jacked or portly.”
“Correct.” Ariel moved his laser. “His heat signature shows him entering here, and what’s worse, he never exits in port. Which means he got off somewhere en route and we missed him.”
“That means he was certain you were watching.”
Ariel nodded.
Me again. “So somebody, and not just Frank, hacked not only our system but yours.”
“Correct,” Camp chimed in. “And of the eight billion or so people on planet earth, it could be any one of them.”
Ariel acknowledged this. “Yes, except...” Ariel circled the man with his red laser. “Heat signature shows this man wearing a watch.” The video zoomed in with incredible clarity on what looked like an Apple watch. “We know it is transmitting on both cellular and satellite signals, but it’s not captured by any of them. It’s ‘piggybacking.’ Stealing bandwidth from whatever is available. But here’s the kicker: We’ve never seen it before. It’s not commercial. Not Apple. Not Google. Not Garmin. And it’s not military. Rather sophisticated stuff.”
I was pretty sure I knew where this was going. “Frank used the same thing with his bookkeeper, a guy named Bernie, and a runner named Guido we intercepted in New York City. Frank used it to keep close rein on those two. With it, he knew their location and eavesdropped.”
Ariel seemed surprised by this. “He could listen in?”
I nodded. “And he knew if and when they took it off.”
He pressed me. “And you know this how?”
“I took it off them.”