Seal Team Six Hunt the Wolf(73)
Colonel Bahrami snapped, “Play it back.”
They reviewed the tape six more times, once so slowly that they were watching it one frame at a time, then viewed it again from 3 a.m. two mornings ago all the way to the present.
Two young women in burkas had gone up, but only one of them had come down, and that was Brigitte.
“What the hell happened to Malie?” Akil asked. “She couldn’t have just disappeared.”
Colonel Bahrami: “Maybe they took the second female down the stairway.”
The emergency stairway and all the exits were also monitored by security cameras. But none of them had captured the second woman either leaving the sixth floor or exiting the building.
All the men who had assembled looked perplexed.
“The suite was thoroughly searched?” Crocker asked.
“Yes. Of course.”
“And nothing was recovered?”
“Some articles of clothing. A pair of women’s shoes. Books, CDs. Mostly belongings of the sheik.”
“Anything else?”
“A suit wrapped in plastic. Some foodstuffs. A pair of sandals.”
“Where are these items now?” Crocker asked.
“They were locked in a room in the basement on orders from the sultan,” Waleed answered.
Crocker was reminded that the Sultan and Sheik Rastani were friends, both prominent members of the Ibadhi sect of Islam.
He suggested that they go up and inspect the suite again.
A scowling Colonel Bahrami gave his approval.
While Waleed went to fetch the electronic key that would let them in, Crocker recalled something else—the black pull suitcase he’d seen one of the men abandon as he was running out the door.
“There was also a large black suitcase,” the SEAL team leader said. “I passed it on my way out. It was to my left, near the door of the sixth-floor suite.”
“What suitcase?”
“A black pull suitcase. About this big,” the American said holding out his arms.
When Waleed returned, he admitted that he hadn’t personally seen the items that had been removed from the suite and locked downstairs.
The two Americans followed the Omanis to the lift. The experience of ascending in the elevator was strange for Crocker. So was retracing his bloody footprints on the carpet. But it wasn’t until they entered the suite and he was hit with the lingering smell that the muscles in Crocker’s neck and stomach tightened and he started to feel sick.
Leaning against the wall, the bitter taste of bile reached his mouth.
“Boss, you all right? You want to sit down?” Akil asked, noticing his leader’s discomfort.
“I’m good.”
Crocker lingered four paces inside, just far enough to scan the foyer/dining/living area and establish that the suitcase wasn’t there.
The other three men inspected the interior rooms of the suite and came out empty-handed.
“It’s completely clean,” Akil reported.
“Let’s go see the room in the basement.”
This required permission from the minister of interior, who was at his country club eating lunch. They waited in the lobby while Bahrami called.
The suitcase. The suitcase…
Pacing and looking at the clock, hoping that the items in the basement would provide some clue, Crocker sensed there was something else he should be remembering, but his mind was too exhausted and agitated to identify it.
Cups of coffee and tea were consumed and stories exchanged in the hour that passed before a black SUV stopped in the driveway and a tall functionary from the ministry jumped out and handed the colonel a set of keys.
“With the approval of the minister, who says we can look but not disturb anything.”
“Gentlemen, this way,” Waleed directed.
They descended in a service elevator to the belly of the hotel, the space thick with the smells of garbage and vinegar.
Four sets of footsteps resounded through hallways lit with buzzing fluorescent lights, Crocker praying that somehow Malie was alive.
They turned left at a locked cage stacked to the ceiling with cases of expensive wines and brandies, into a darker corridor, to a door on the right.
“Here it is,” Waleed announced.
Bahrami opened the door with a yellow-tabbed key and threw the switch.
Crocker’s heart started to leap in his chest.
In the left corner behind the door stood a metal footlocker and the black hard-shelled suitcase, which were chained together and secured with a brass lock. Signs in English, Arabic, and Farsi warned the curious not to touch without signed permission from Oman’s interior minister.
Bahrami opened the lock with a red-tabbed key. Crocker leaned over and pulled the chain free. He was so juiced he was having trouble breathing as he felt along the little holes that been punched in the smooth front of the hard plastic suitcase.