Crocker wanted time to sit back, process, heal, and think, but events were moving too quickly. Seconds after Ritchie was wheeled into surgery, he telephoned Neto to tell him the news about Alizadeh. Neto spoke to Melkasian at the station, and a meeting was set for midnight.
Crocker grabbed a few winks in the car. He woke up remembering that he had never had a chance to do his Christmas shopping—an iPad for Jenny, a crystal-and-amethyst necklace he’d picked out for Holly at a Virginia Beach jewelry store. He hated being late with presents but couldn’t help it this time.
As soon as they arrived at the office in the Banco Popular building, Neto ordered pizza with everything and sodas from an all-night fast food joint. They were chowing down when Rappaport and Melkasian walked in clutching briefcases and dressed in rumpled business clothes. It looked as though they’d been working all night.
Rappaport said, “You sure kicked up a shit storm, Crocker.”
“Couldn’t avoid it.”
“Who authorized you to go into the colonel’s house?”
Neto spoke up. “I did, sir.”
Crocker cut in, “That’s bullshit. I did. I take full responsibility. I felt that it was important to try to identify the Iranian, and I ordered my man to scale the wall. Unfortunately, he had an accident and was discovered and shot. I deeply regret that now. But I’m also pleased that we’ve established that it’s Alizadeh himself who is setting up the Unit 5000 operation here.”
“It often works that way, doesn’t it, Crocker?” Rappaport asked. “The good mixed with the bad.”
“Yes it does, sir,” Crocker replied, struck by the sincere tone in his voice.
Rappaport reached across, laid a hand on Crocker’s shoulder, and said, “I’m sorry about your teammate. I pray he recovers quickly.”
“I appreciate that, sir.” Maybe Rappaport wasn’t a total asshole.
“As far as pissing off the Venezuelans, I say: fuck them,” Rappaport growled. “They had it coming. And as far as the Falcon goes, I’m ready to go to war.”
Crocker liked Rappaport’s new attitude and nodded in agreement. “Me, too, sir. Let’s kick his ass.”
Briefcases clicked open, pizza boxes were cleared from the table, and a secure phone line was opened to Langley, where an analyst named Sue from the Crime and Narcotics Center (CNC) reported that the names of three of the individuals mentioned in the Xeroxed documents captured in Petare had been matched to a computer printout of recent arrivals to Mexico from Venezuela.
“What’s that mean?” Rappaport asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Do you have any idea where they are now?” Melkasian asked, using a device to project a map of Mexico on the screen at the front of the room.
“Mexican PFM has tracked them to the town of San Miguel de Allende, which is about a hundred and seventy miles north of Mexico City,” Sue said over the speakerphone. PFM was the Mexican version of the FBI.
At the mention of San Miguel de Allende, Crocker smiled inwardly. Before they married he and Holly had spent a romantic week in that village in an inn overlooking the lake.
“What are they doing there?” Rappaport asked.
“We’ve been treating them as potential drug traffickers,” Sue answered. “They claim to be Venezuelan financial advisors looking for business investments. Their behavior is suspicious because they stick together, spend a lot of time in their hotel room, eat at cheap restaurants, don’t drink alcohol, and are constantly looking over their shoulders to see if they’re being watched.”
“Potential drug traffickers?” Melkasian asked skeptically.
“Yes, our intelligent operational probabilities computer program gave that a probability of forty percent, which is high. But it’s possible they could be up to something else.”
“You mean some other sort of illegal activity?” Rappaport asked. “And you say Mexican PFM is keeping an eye on them?”
“That’s correct, sir.”
“Can they be trusted?”
“Not really, no. That’s why we’ve dispatched a two-person DEA team from Mexico City. They should be there within the hour.”
“Good,” Rappaport said, checking his watch. “We think these men might be Iranian members of the IRGC, so inform us immediately regarding their movements or anything else you learn.”
“I will, sir.”
“You have anything else?” he asked.
Sue said, “The names of two other individuals on the list you sent us—Jorge Alvarez Nazra and Raul Abaid Lopez—correspond to two men who recently passed the PPL and CPL exams in Venezuela.”