Disappearance (46 page)

CHAPTER 45

The only apparent insight gained from the anonymous phone call that came into Federal Plaza that morning was the caller being a woman with an accent typifying just about any country around the Mediterranean basin.  But with the investigation wobbling along at an unacceptable pace, special agent in charge, Marla Wilkins, could not afford to ignore even this remote development.

The investigation into the car bombing assassination of Great Neck resident George Eckert was almost at a dead end.  The Semtex had been traced back to a dozen or so potential explosive outfits.  The fusing mechanism was found to be handmade; the copper wires and half a dozen other components, all commercially available.

When the caller promised to shed the needed light on the affair, establishing credibility by offering a sample of material details that had been kept from the public, Marla intuitively decided to take up the challenge.

The instructions were clear.  Marla was to leave her office at five that evening, take the 6 train to 59th, switch to the N, get off at Times Square, exchange once more to the 3 train uptown, and get off at 72nd street.  She was to proceed on 72nd to West End Avenue where she was to wait at the corner.  She was to come alone.  No tails.  No surveillance equipment.

The caller was adamant and Marla instructed her team to keep their distance.

A woman in a gray parka overcoat, wearing a Yankees baseball cap, nudged her as she was getting ready to disembark at 72nd.

"Agent Wilkins," the woman said into her ear over the screeching noise of the braking train, "Get off at 86th if you want to hear more about George Eckert.”

The accent was familiar.  Marla looked at the woman, surprised.  The pair of lively dark eyes staring at her from under the oversized baseball cap were determined.

Marla remained stationary as the subway doors opened and the rush hour crowd poured out, and then poured in again, pushing her against the back doors.  She looked around, spotting the woman
sandwiched among the hoard of passengers, her back to her.

Two stops later the two women scrambled off the crammed train, stepping out of adjacent doors.   Marla, intent on following the mysterious woman's lead, watched for her cue, but the woman remained fixed on the spot where she had disembarked, letting the train leave and the ramp clear of people.  Finally, she proceeded up a flight of stairs and down another to the Downtown ramp.  As they waited for the train, the woman inched closer to Marla but remained aloof.  They boarded the next downtown train through the same cart door, but as the doors were closing, the woman quickly stepped through them back out onto the ramp, causing the doors to reopen for a split second, enough for Marla to follow suit.

Again they stood as the train left and the ramp cleared.  The woman turned to Marla: "Just checking," she said smiling then proceeded toward the exit.

They reached Riverside Park and were walking along the Hudson River, pleasantly secluded from the New York bedlam with New Jersey looming on the opposite side.

"My name is Sarah Price," Sarah began. "I'm a freelance reporter for various Israeli newspapers and what I'm about to tell you will not only help you solve the Eckert murder but also the recent Johnson murder at the Summit Hotel.  I will also tell you about a dreadfully forgotten affair of an American girl who was kidnapped in Israel three and a half years ago, and was never found.”

Sarah paused, glancing at the tall FBI agent for a reaction. Marla remained outwardly impassive.  Inside she was boiling with anticipation. The Johnson and Eckert murders linked? Now there's a twist, she thought.  The Johnson case, being worked in adjacent offices by fellow agents, was as baffling as
her own case.  Like the Eckert case, it was an assassination type killing that left no clues.  The assassins had wiped the room clean, leaving the poor man spread stark naked on the bed, his arms and legs tied to the bed posts, his belly and throat slashed.  Not a single fingerprint was found and all that remained were his clothes thrown about the room.  He was identified through his hotel registration card but so far, no one, including the wife, seemed to know what had gotten him killed.

"I would like for us to reach an understanding before I help you crack these cases," Sarah continued, her journalistic jargon becoming evident.  "I realize, now that I've said what I said, you can probably arrest me, but please hear me out before you take any action.”

They were passing a vacant wooden bench atop a small boat basin nestled on the near bank of the Hudson. Marla gestured for them to sit down and for the next half hour listened intently to Sarah's narrative of the events that led to their meeting.  Sarah, for her part, spoke only of the kidnapping, leaving out key names and material details needed to break the Eckert and Johnson cases.

"We believe that to keep Karen alive all these years took an exceptionally covert effort.  She's being held by extremely dangerous people who would not hesitate to dispose of her if she becomes a liability.   We know they've already used a contingency plan to block our efforts and if they as much as suspect we've involved the FBI, we'll never see her again.”

Marla considered what she had just heard.  It sounded fantastic.  The cluster of details seemed a blur but the main theme emerged quite clearly: an American girl kidnapped in Israel by her own father and held captive for three and a half years so his company could complete the development of a portable missile intended for terrorists in Southern Lebanon.

Right there were a heap of violations good for keeping the FBI and the courts busy for a full year.  But how could she verify this?  Who'd believe her?  Does she herself believe this bizarre story coming from this seemingly down to earth Israeli reporter who so far has not given her anything on Eckert or Johnson?

"I'll have a hard time convincing anyone to buy into this if you don't give me some hard evidence I can go verify," Marla finally said, sounding a touch skeptical.

"I'll give you what you need but you can't act on it until we've got Karen," Sarah insisted.  "Both Eckert and Johnson were killed to stop us from getting to Karen but if you act on it now, it'll be the end of her.”

"Why don't you tell me more about it, then I'll see what I can do."

"No deal," Sarah said and Marla noticed that determined look appearing once again.  "You must give me an assurance.  We're too damn close to throw it all away now.”

"Tell you what," Marla said after considering the matter a while longer, "you give me one name.  One person I can check out to corroborate the story without jeopardizing the program - and I'll give you that assurance.”

"OK, how about Paul Glass, Karen's dad," Sarah said with a triumphant grin. "He should be turning state's evidence by now.”

Caught off guard once again, Marla lowered her gaze and shook her head in wonderment.  "I guess you've already figured we'll cooperate," she stated, giving Sarah a suspicious stare.

"We have a plan," Sarah persisted, "but it won't work without you.”

-------

The rain came down in torrents, diminishing the sluggish wipers to petty gadgets against the flooded windshield.  Sollet strained to watch the cars in front as traffic slowed down almost to a halt forming two long twisting columns of red tail lights and yellow headlights on both sides of the Ventura freeway.  Herb Lance, in the passenger seat, was sticking his head out his window from time to time, getting his face wet trying to keep track with the red Toyota two cars ahead.

Finally, after a nerve wracking stop-and-go ride from the Calabasas pass all the way across the West Valley, they saw the Toyota inching its way toward the exit, and followed it down the Tampa Avenue ramp.

It was their sixth day keeping taps on the sister in the Los Angeles area.  Lance had joined Sollet a day after he and the sister had arrived from Orlando and the two had been keeping her in sight ever since, staying at a Best Western not far from her parents' house in Westlake, taking turns tailing her everywhere.

So far, they noted nothing unusual, causing Sollet to seriously question his role in the arrangement. The Frenchman was fed up.  Bored and tired with the tedious task, he wanted to go back to Miami and make good on his promise to the madame. He was beginning to feel the sinister effects of celibacy.  LA was getting on his nerves.  It was too big and too idle and he missed the excitement of South Beach.  If not for Lance, he would have already cornered the snotty bitch and beat the information out of her, maybe even alleviating himself in the process.

The red Toyota, driving north on Tampa, turned into a small shopping center at Saticoy, and they watched the sister hurrying into a Seven-Eleven.  She was back out a few minutes later, a red and green Styrofoam coffee cup in her hand.

The rain let up a little turning to an irritating drizzle as they continued after her, keeping a reasonable distance on the slippery surface.  Sollet was accelerating past a set of lights, when a stunning blow to his left side sent his car reeling across the intersection, tilted at an odd angle.  Vaulting on to the sidewalk, Sollet watched the windshield shatter, as the vehicle rammed into something solid, jamming the steering wheel into his gut.

The car cocked and coughed idle for a few seconds before the engine choked.   In the eerie silence that followed, only the radio could be heard, a KFWB traffic report about a sig alert on the Pasadena freeway.

Sollet thought he was going to die.  Propped at a strange angle, he glanced around wildly, unable to breathe.  Gasping for air, he tried to beckon to his partner, but his throat produced no sound.  Eyes bulging out of their sockets, his only recourse was opening and closing his mouth, like a marooned fish.  In horror, he clutched the steering wheel, and tried to yank it away from his midsection, feeling the sudden movement as the car toppled over, regaining its normal bearing.

Panting hoarsely, he began to regain a sense of balance, noticing his blood soaked hands for the first time.  Glancing around he saw his partner's body flung across the seat, unmoving.

Then voices began to filter in.   Sollet tried the door handle, but it was stuck.  A head appeared by his window, looking fearfully at him.

"Get me out," he whispered, but the face just kept staring.

Then a second head appeared and Sollet heard and felt the car door being coerced.  The door opened with a screech and he felt himself being dragged out of the twisted trap and lay on the wet ground, the rain spraying his face, cold streams of water running down his back and legs.  He tried to sit up but felt a sharp pain cut through his sides and upper back.

"You OK?" 
he heard a voice ask and was about to reply when a sudden wave of nausea gripped his body and he became lightheaded and dizzy.  He laid his head back and heard a siren approaching before everything turned black.

-------

"They lost her," Russo's matter-of-fact voice came crisp on the line, stating the inevitable.  "Some damn truck upended them, sending the both of them to the hospital and leaving the girl free to roam."

"Where is she now?"

"Couldn't tell you; I'm still with the boyfriend, but I got a man on the way as we speak. He should get there this evening.”

"She could be anywhere by then.”

"True, but there's nothing I can do about it."

"When did you find out?"

"A few hours ago; the guys were hit pretty bad.  One's got a concussion, the other broken ribs.   They are being treated since yesterday and called as soon as they could.”

"We've lost a whole fuckin' day?"

"It certainly looks that way," Russo said contemptuously, "I suggest we consider it a force major.”

"And I suggest you find the girl," Kumar exclaimed.

"We'll do our best," he heard Russo say, before he slammed the phone down.

Incompetent fools, he thought, mocking himself for hiring locals
he knew to be mediocre in time of crisis.  Schultz would have never lost her or the boyfriend on three different occasions.

He had an inclination to call Schultz right there and then, but held himself in check for just a while longer.  Sitting back against the pillows propped up on his bed he resumed leafing through a thick folder, inspecting each of its contents.

He had been researching Vitcon Partners since it became known they were in the market for portable laser guided missiles, the kind he and his associates were on the verge of supplying to several major customers. Accumulating data from various sources, Kumar was now leafing through old newspaper articles, annual reports, database lists, some of his own personal records, classified data from private research firms he employed, and Karl Stana's Greece file that had been Fed Exed to him overnight.

Vitcon Partners were a private holding firm that received little publicity, but held shares in various private and public companies which shed the needed light on their business dealings.  Most of their companies were in the defense business with enterprises ranging from ammunition depots to medium size fighter aircraft subcontractors.  One of Kumar's research firms estimated their accumulated holdings to surpass the two billion dollar mark and from the looks of it, it seemed they were being conservative.  They had no holdings in the US other than a joint venture with another holding company, Davidof Investments.