Fortunes Obsession (22 page)

luck. I'll call you the minute they leave.  If you get finished before I call you, take a cab back to my place and wait for my call there."

     Lance quickly paid the check and the pair left the luncheonette hurriedly.

     Now came the hard part....getting past the doorman.  They entered the lobby tentatively and the doorman looked up.

     " Hello miss, how are you tonight.?  Go right up please."

     Dara breathed a sigh of relief.  " This gentleman is with me."

     " Of course," said the doorman, " Have a nice evening."

     She knew that Fahd would enter through the garage and by the next time he saw the night doorman, their entrance wouldn't even be a topic of conversation.

     As they ascended in the elevator, they felt no trepidation at all.  The security of the cellular phone gave them supreme confidence.

     The lock fit perfectly in the key and Dara punched in the alarm code.  They were in and free to explore for clues to their heart's delight.  She knew that he had an impenetrable safe in his bedroom but felt that they could find other clues if they looked hard enough.  Dara felt a slight tightness in her stomach when she thought of the events of her last night here. Her blood veritably boiled with anger.  She knew that all of the possessions she thought were hers were now or soon to be in the hands of his new mistress.  What a fool she was.  The thought of

her  relationship with Fahd made her recoil with shame.

     She gathered her wits quickly and spoke to Lance.

     " The best place to start would be his desk."

     They moved to his desk, which was a massive Mahogany piece of furniture with three large draws on either side. They went through draw by draw and after finding nothing of consequence in two of them, came to a leather bound diary.  They put it aside and continued going through the draws, being careful to put everything back in it's proper place.  In the fourth draw, they found an address book, which they also put aside.  The next room they entered was his bedroom.  They tried the safe, but of course it was locked.  Secondly, they went through every one of his drawers and found nothing but shirts, socks and underwear.

     Dara tried not to think of some of the things she had done in this room.  The walls were mirrored and she had vivid memories of seeing herself perform the most perverse of sexual acts with Fahd.  She couldn't wait to get out of this room.  Would she ever be able to put that seamy life behind her?  She felt suddenly unworthy of Peter and lapsed into tears.  Lance turned to her angrily.

     " Forget it, Dara. This is no time to get emotional. We've got a job to do, so cut the crap.  What's done is done, so put it behind you and go forward."

     " I'm sorry," She said, and continued to carefully go through every drawer and closet. They had almost left the room when she remembered a beautiful walnut box on his dresser.

Inside the box were cuff links and collar stays.  Almost hidden on the bottom of the box was a small sheet of paper.  On the paper, written in pencil, were two addresses and phone numbers. They were those of Ali Bokaar and Ismael Bey.  They really had no significance to the pair.  They already knew the address in New Jersey.  Lance, ever mindful that the smallest item could be a clue, copied down the two addresses onto his pocket note pad, and replaced the original sheet in the box.

     The pair went from room to room and finally exhausted the possibilities.  The next step was to thoroughly peruse the diary and address book.  They sat down on the couch and went over each and every page.

              ************************************

     Yamashita and Clark were elated.  They had waited in the office well past their ordinary hours, hoping for a call from the Federal judge.  Millard had done his job well.  The judge agreed to issue a warrant for the arrest of Fahd's chauffeur, Mustafa, on the charge of attempted kidnaping.  It was a John Doe warrant, since no one knew his last name, or if his name was indeed Mustafa.  They would also have a warrant to search the house in New Jersey, since it was also implicated in the attempted kidnaping.  They would pick up the warrants in the morning.  It was decided that Clark would lead the search party and that Yamashita would arrest and interrogate the chauffeur.

They agreed to check in with each other the next afternoon in the FBI headquarters.

        ******************************************    

     Fahd sat across the table from his beautiful Sarita.  He yearned to run his hands over her naked body and make love to this caramel colored goddess.  He was a patient man, though, and decided to play this thing his usual way.  He would go slow and easy until she veritably asked him to have sex with her.  He took his hand in hers.

     " My sweet, I want to see you all of the time. I do not want any other woman in my life, only you.  I am yours, my darling, if you want me."  He kissed the long and sensuous fingers one by one and slid his tongue over all of them when he was finished.

     Her eyes sparkled. " Oh, Ibrahim, I feel the same way. I have thought of nothing but you for days."  She took his hand in hers and kissed his fingers.  In her mind, she thought of her phenomenal luck.  Here was a wealthy and urbane man, reasonably attractive, who was captivated by her.  He would shower her with gifts and affection and take her to the finest places.  How ironic, she thought, that a man who was nearly her father's age, would come out of nowhere and give her all of the things her father had denied her all of these years.  She could see herself married to this man and living the life of a princess.  At this point, she was ready to give him her body, her soul and anything else that would cement this unbelievable relationship.

     " Ibrahim, take me home with you tonight.  I want you. You know I haven't been to bed with a man since I broke up with my fiance.  I'll make you very happy."

     This was the hard part.  " No, my love.  I want our first time to be perfect.  I have access to a villa in Puerto Rico. It is in the mountains and quite isolated.  There is a staff of servants who will attend to our every need.  There is a magnificent pool with it's own waterfall, which we will have all to ourselves.  We will fly there as soon as you can get some time off."

     This man was so romantic she couldn't believe it.  " I have so much time coming to me.  I'm sure we can leave in a few days.

Why don't you make airline reservations for Friday?

     He kissed her hand again.  " Wonderful, my love. It is as good as done."

            ***************************************

     Peter sat in the Cadillac, fighting boredom.  He had brought a magazine but it was really too dark to read.  Aside from that, he had to keep his eye on the restaurant in case they left.

     He had been in touch with Lance and Dara several times and had learned that they had culled some interesting information from the search.  They found some addresses that might be relevant and some notations in his calendar diary that could be incriminating.  Unfortunately they could only copy things down, as no copying machine was available.  He knew that the FBI would be upset with their break in but he thought that unofficially, they would be happy with the findings.

     After what seemed like an interminable amount of time, the limo pulled up to the restaurant.  Peter assumed that Fahd had called the driver.  Sure enough, Fahd and the beautiful Indian girl walked out of the restaurant. She hung on Fahd’s arm and he kissed her lightly on the cheek as he escorted her to the back seat.  He followed her in and the chauffeur closed the door.

Peter called Lance and found that Lance and Dara were already in a cab heading for Peter’s apartment.  Lance would meet Peter downstairs and take the car.  There was no garage in Peter’s building and the last thing they wanted to ruin this very successful evening was a ticket and tow-away.

             ******************************

     Fahd told Mustafa to wait and escorted Sarita to her apartment.  He kissed her on the lips and as she clung to him passionately, he stopped her.  “ Friday my love.  On Friday we are off to the most wonderful experience of our lives.  I will be bringing you some very nice things to take on the trip.  You can spend the next few days anticipating your surprises.”

     After he had left, Sarita all but jumped into the air with delight.  She sat on the phone the best part of an hour, telling her friends of her phenomenal catch.

     When he entered the limo, he gave specific instructions to Mustafa.  “ Pick me up tomorrow morning at ten o clock.  I must go to the office and take care of some business.  Oh, and by the way, you can have from Friday morning to Wednesday morning off. I will need you to take me to the airport Friday and pick me up Wednesday afternoon.”

       *********************************************

     Millard, Yamashita and Clark sat in a small conference room.

It was seven thirty in the morning and the warrants would be in by nine.  Clark would take a team of four other agents and himself and break into the Paramus house or arrest the occupant and then search the house.  Yamashita would arrest Fahd’s chauffeur and bring him in for interrogation.  Millard and Yamashita would question the driver and probably release him afterward.  Millard had doubts that they would be able to pin anything on the driver that would enable them to hold him for any length of time.  When they found out his correct name, they would run a check on him. Millard knew from his experience that most of these people had contrived identities that were tailored for respectability.  He hoped that something would come of today’s operations.  He truly believed, just as Peter did, that something vital to national security was happening here.  Just after he dispatched the agents, his phone rang.  It was Peter Fortune. Peter related the events of the night before and just as he had predicted, Millard was angry.

     “ God damn it, Fortune.  I told you it was in our hands now. You civilians have to learn to butt out.  First of all, anything you have obtained, you have obtained illegally.  Secondly, and most important, you could have been hurt.....or worse. As long as you have something though, bring it down.  Better still, fax it to me immediately.”  Peter and Millard exchanged fax numbers and hung up.  Peter smiled.  He knew they had done well and that Millard was secretly happy to get any information they had.  He put the addresses and appointments into the fax and realized they had done all they could.  It was all in the hands of the professionals now.

     Peter and Dara had  agreed that it was best to go to her mother’s house in Pennsylvania for a few weeks, so that she did not have to live as a prisoner in Peter’s apartment.  He had put her on a plane for Pittsburgh this morning and he missed her already. He would phone her mother’s house this afternoon to check on her arrival.  Peter had arranged to fly there over the weekend and meet Dara’s mother.

     Peter and Lance, for the first time in many days, buckled down to their architectural work.  Their clients were getting upset at the lack of production lately.  Petr wondered whether the FBI people would keep him apprized of developments or whether he would have to push for the details.  He got to work and for a few hours at least, was tied up in something other than the case.

                 **********************************

     Michael Clark was big and burly and still looked like the middle linebacker he had been at Boston College.  He had been drafted in the twelfth round by the Carolina Panthers but wasn’t fast enough for the NFL and never survived training camp.  He entered law school after college and opted for the Bureau upon graduation.  He hadn’t been sorry.  He was an adventurer at heart and life in a law office wouldn’t have suited him. He had become expert in forensics and loved putting the little details together that eventually solved a case. He had been fortunate to hook up with Greg Millard, who was already a legend in the Bureau.  Millard had selected Clark and Yamashita as two up and coming agents that would be his proteges.  The two young men, thanks to Millard, were building themselves a solid reputation.

     The five agents pulled up to the house in Paramus in a station wagon and slipped on their navy blue windbreakers with large lettering on the back, which said FBI.  Most law enforcement agencies, in recent years, were putting their plain clothes operatives into these jackets for identification both by perpetrators and their own forces.

     After they were satisfied that no one was in residence at this point in time, the break in experts got to work on the lock.

The door was open in less than five minutes.

     When they entered the hous, they found a pervasive smell of cooked lamb dominating the atmosphere.  The furniture was sparse and institutional looking; typical for a leased residence. The finger print men were already dusting everything in sight and picking up prints for processing in the lab.  There was nothing in any drawer in the house.  The closets were completely empty. A search of the back yard was clueless.  When the agents were satisfied they had gone over every inch of the house, they returned to headquarters.  Clark spoke to a female clerk.

“ I want all of these prints processed and put through the computer.  I want you to send all of them to Interpol as soon as possible.”

     Clark knew that terrorism was relatively new to America and that extensive files of known terrorists were kept by the international police conglomerate.  In fact, most of the photos shown to Lance and Peter, were from Interpol files.