Ballistic Force(15)
Kurtzman nodded. “And I’ve got footage from Yongbyon and Kumho where they did the same thing, more or less.”
“In other words,” Price said, “they know we’re watching so they’re playing shell games with us.”
“Yep,” Kurtzman concluded. “I keep waiting to come up with a zoom shot where one of the drivers looks up and tweaks his nose at us and starts shouting ‘Nyah nyah…’”
“Meanwhile,” Brognola said, “somewhere down there, they’ve got those missiles tucked away someplace where we can’t see ’em.”
“I hear you,” Kurtzman said. “And I’ll keep sifting through everything from the sat-links, but somehow we gotta beef up our ground intel or we’re going nowhere.”
“CIA’s working on that,” Brognola assured him, “and the Army and Navy are both getting ready to insert covert op teams. If Phoenix Force wraps up its current assignment, we’ll probably want to throw them into this, too.”
“Probably a good idea,” Kurtzman said.
Before they could go on, Carmen Delahunt brought over a computer printout and cleared her throat to get everyone’s attention.
“Ready for my two cents’ worth?” she asked.
“By all means,” Brognola said.
“Okay. As far as these defectors go, we’ve got a bit of a mess on our hands,” Delahunt began. “For starters, one of the guys on that list just turned up dead in L.A. He was killed around the same time as the raid on that gang headquarters in Koreatown, so there was no way Mack could have gotten to him in time.”
“Killed?” Brognola murmured. “So much for my theory about them taking them alive.”
Price quickly scanned her notes, then asked, “Are we talking about Yong-Im Hyunsook?”
Delahunt nodded. “They got to him at his house in the suburbs. The place was ransacked to make it look like a botched home-invasion robbery, but we obviously know better. And from the looks of it, Yong-Im was tortured before they killed him.”
“Maybe he didn’t tell them what they wanted to hear,” Brognola suggested.
“That would be my guess,” Delahunt said. “Now, as for the others, the FBI moved in and took as many of them as they could find into protective custody. Unfortunately, they could only get to three out of the other five. One in Las Vegas, another in Chicago and a third here in D.C.”
“What about the other two?”
“One of them lives in Laughlin, Nevada,” Delahunt explained. “It’s a small casino town about two hours south of Vegas on the Colorado River. The guy wasn’t home when the Bureau showed up, so they’ve got the place staked out and are keeping an eye open for him.”
“How far is Laughlin from L.A.?” Brognola asked.
“About five hours,” Delahunt said.
Brognola checked his watch and calculated the time on the West Coast. “So there’s a chance the Koreans got to him after they whacked Yong-Im.”
Delahunt nodded. “That’s cutting it close, but, yeah, they might have beat us to him.”
“There’s also a chance REDI has more than one team out looking for these guys,” Price interjected. “Especially when you consider how spread out they are.”
“True,” Brognola conceded. He turned back to Delahunt. “What about the last guy?”
“His name’s Shinn Kam-Song,” Delahunt said. “And of the whole batch, he’s probably the most valuable. He was the point man on missile development and guidance systems, and he’s also the one who did the most tampering with the R&D data before he defected.”
“Meaning he’s the one they’d want to make sure they got all the bugs out when they moved ahead without him,” Brognola surmised.
Delahunt nodded. “Yeah, he’s the one they want alive more than the others combined.”
“Where is he?” Price queried.
“Well, that’s the problem,” Delahunt said. “Up until three months ago he was living with his wife in Phoenix. Then they both just up and disappeared.”
“How is that possible?” Brognola said. “Weren’t we keeping tabs on them?”
“Not close enough, obviously.”
“Maybe REDI already has their hands on him,” Price suggested.
“I don’t think so,” Delahunt said, “otherwise Shinn’s address would have been on that list Mack found in Koreatown.” Referring to her notes, she added, “And the thing is, Shinn and his wife didn’t leave everything behind. They took most of their belongings with them. According to the FBI, Shinn was getting tired of all the debriefings they kept putting him through. The feeling is he wanted to slip through the cracks and not be bothered anymore. Not that I’d blame him. I mean, if you risk your life fleeing a police state, the last thing you want is another Big Brother looking over your shoulder all the time.”