Crocker indicated to Akil to follow him to the left, to the rear of the main house. The back door was wide open, inviting entry.
Crocker was about to oblige when his cell phone lit up. He read the text from Mancini: “WTF. Dr. exited front of the h. Getting in a car.”
Crocker quickly typed back, “Follow him w/ the Sub. Let me know where he’s going.”
The two SEALs entered the dark house, stood in a vestibule, and listened. Heard some birds chirping inside; sounded like parakeets. Saw a collection of worn men’s sandals on the floor to their right, and big ceramic dog bowls filled with water and food. The air was cool and smelled of curry and exotic spices.
Crocker pointed down a dark hallway and entered first. He stopped at a little table with a tray that contained an empty teacup and a plate of cupcakes. They were small and decorated with what looked like candied rose petals.
Akil picked one up and smelled it.
“Persian love cakes,” he whispered.
“So what?”
“Salehi is a Persian name.”
That hadn’t occurred to Crocker. During the time of Alexander the Great, the First Persian Empire extended west all the way to Afghanistan and east along North Africa to Morocco, which meant that Persian names were still found there.
Continuing down the hall, they arrived at a big stairway on the right, opposite a dining room with a crystal chandelier. In front of that was a living room with a portrait of a severe-looking older man on the wall.
Every room was dark and filled with shadows. The only light filtered down the stairway and through the curtain in front. The dogs had stopped barking, replaced by the birds chirping aggressively in the front room.
Crocker turned to Akil and signaled “Go back and close the back door. Lock it.”
Akil nodded and left. When he returned, Crocker pointed to a door under the stairway. They carefully opened it and found it led into a library/office. The walls were lined with books, and a big wooden desk occupied one end of the room. On the carpeted floor were several dozen cardboard boxes, some half filled.
He’s leaving, Crocker thought.
Akil watched the door while Crocker searched the desk drawers, looking for laptops, cell phones, passports, bank account ledgers. All he found were photos of Salehi’s wife and daughter, medical records, a bottle of Johnnie Walker Red, an old .38 revolver, and letters written in Arabic.
Crocker pointed and gestured. They moved upstairs.
The TV in the master bedroom was on and tuned to Al Jazeera news, but the sound was off. Several DVD cases lay on the dresser, porn flicks with French titles. Akil held one up and smiled as if to say, “Maybe we should check these out.”
Crocker shook his finger. Focus!
A half-filled suitcase lay open on the bed. On the night table, beside a copy of the Koran, Crocker found a receipt for a money transfer to Banque Pasche in Geneva, Switzerland. No amount, no account number, just a transit code and the name Salehi.
“Looks like he’s been moving money,” Crocker whispered, sharing his discovery.
“Or he just hit the lottery.”
His cell phone lit up again. The text from Mancini read, “U’ll never guess where Dr S went.”
“A strip club?”
Akil whispered, “No strip clubs in Libya.”
The answer from Mancini: “The Bab al Sahr H.” This was the hotel the SEALs had stayed in when they first arrived. Crocker typed back, “WTF!”
“He went to 8th fl. Meeting some1.”
This confirmed Crocker’s hunch that Salehi was up to something. “Find out who.”
“Who what?”
“Who he’s meeting w/.”
“Roger.”
“Stay w/ him. We’ll meet u.”
Akil drew the dogs to the back of the house as Crocker exited out the front. Then Akil ran through the house, joined him on the street, and led him two blocks to a commercial boulevard where they flagged down a cab painted black and white, like a zebra.
The driver looked them over carefully before he let them in.
The Bab al Sahr appeared a whole lot better at night, but the sour smell in the lobby was the same—cherry-scented disinfectant mixed with nicotine and mildew. They found Mancini seated on a bench facing the elevators, leafing through an old issue of Newsweek with Sarah Palin on the cover.
“Where’s Salehi?” Crocker asked.
Mancini set the magazine aside. “Still upstairs attending to his business.”
Crocker abruptly shifted gears: “You talk to Davis recently?”
Mancini: “Texted him five minutes ago. Still no news.”
Crocker returned to the business at hand. “Salehi went up alone?” he asked.
“That’s correct.”
Maybe he wasn’t thinking clearly, but it was the only lead he had. “How long?”