Lucas Kane searched one more news story just to be sure and read the same results with a sense of relief. The peace conference in Qatar was going ahead as scheduled. Which meant the money transfer would go ahead as well.
When he’d arrived yesterday afternoon the news had been full of reports about the “failure” of one of the Burj Khalifa’s elevators, with sensational stories about the excruciatingly protracted length of time the people floated inside, knowing they were going to die, screaming all the way down until they impacted at terminal velocity with the force of an out-of-control freight train.
The fact the sheikh of Dubai and the United States Middle East envoy were in the building made it that much more salacious, with newscasters breathlessly repeating what little they knew over and over again, adding nothing to the knowledge of what had occurred, but driving the story to a fever pitch. He’d assumed the worst, but finally, the Dubai government lifted its censorship blanket, and the news began reporting that both men had lived.
Not really caring about their corporeal status, Lucas focused on the political results of the attack, trying to find the standing of the envoy’s mission in Qatar. He’d checked back online several times during the day until he had finally found the story in front of him.
It made him both relieved and a little jealous. While all news outlets were reporting a simple mechanical failure, he knew for a fact what had happened. No wonder I had such trouble killing Pike. That guy’s a fucking predator. He couldn’t help but be impressed with the operation, precisely because it hadn’t made the news. With a pang of envy, Lucas realized that Pike and his team were better than anyone he had ever served with. He would have liked to recruit the man as a partner. We could really clean up.
He wondered if Pike had reflected on how he’d been able to prevent the deaths of the sheikh and the envoy. If he’d given a little thanks to Lucas for his help. Probably not, after talking to Jennifer.
He smiled at the memory, then reflexively moved his hand to his broken nose, the light touch bringing a stab of pain. Serves that bitch right.
Now sure his own mission hadn’t been sabotaged, he typed a different address into the computer. After it loaded, he typed in an administrator’s password, then began scrubbing the list.
He knew the envoy himself wouldn’t be trudging around the Middle East carrying a suitcase full of cash. No matter how much VIP treatment he got, it just didn’t make any sense. The risk of loss or discovery was simply too great, and he knew it wasn’t coming from the State Department’s budget in the first place.
If the envoy was truly transferring black cash, it would be coming from the CIA. Nobody else had the architecture or experience to bury a large sum of money from the scrutiny of Congress. Which meant a separate flight for the escorts, most likely ground branch case officers from the Special Activities Division.
Whoever was coming, he knew they’d be traveling as State Department employees. That being the case, they’d be using the State Department’s travel website to book their tickets in an attempt to blend in with the myriad other moves State did on a daily basis.
Before he’d had to flee the United States, he’d developed a solid business solving problems for various people, including a man named Harold Standish on the National Security Council. Standish had passed him administrative rights to the State travel website, and they had proven useful on several different operations. In the end, Lucas had ended up killing Standish, but had kept the administrative privileges.
He sorted the listing of travelers by date, then location, working backward from Qatar. He came up empty. The site listed nobody as traveling to Qatar from the State Department in the next four days. Probably because they’re all on that private jet the envoy’s using. But that didn’t explain the lack of the escorts. Surely they aren’t on the plane as well, flying all over the Middle East protecting a suitcase of wealth?
Don’t get panicked. Maybe they just haven’t bought a ticket yet. The conference was due to last for five days, starting from today, so they could be flying at any time. He decided to simply wait here in Frankfurt, checking back each day. At the end of five days, he’d just have to figure out something else to do for a living. Maybe the Far East. In the meantime there was plenty of female companionship one block from his hotel, in the Frankfurt red-light district near the Hauptbahnhof.