Target Deck - 02 (51 page)

Deckard wasn't about to let on that he wasn't sure what OBI was at first but it hit him with the reference to Mexico City. The Office of Bi-national Intelligence was in a building next to the US Embassy in the Mexican capitol city. It housed liaisons from the CISEN, the Mexican intelligence agency, along with the FBI, CIA, DEA, and Homeland Security.

“What kind of orders?”

“Like arbitrarily freezing our operational areas so that we can't conduct raids. Just shutting down large swaths of certain cities for specific times and letting the cartels run amuck. Then we have to go in and clean up the mess afterwards.”

“So you think OBI is intentionally sowing chaos and making the drug war worse than it has to be?”

“Well that is why I say, maybe not. I know some of the contractors working the CIA Case Officer's Personal Security Detail, some of them are former teammates. You guys probably know some of the former Army dudes working the detail. Anyway, when I give them a call they tell me that this Case Officer is as confused by these orders as we are. He doesn't get it but is being told to toe the line. He did, and that is probably why they are not yanking him out of country even though he has a bounty on his head. He is someone's lapdog now and they like him right where he is.”

“Where is he getting his orders from?”

“Not sure, but OBI answers to NORTHCOM.”

“What the hell is going on down here?” Pat asked.

“You got me brother,” Flakjacket said. “We just got another month working this joke of a mission and then we pop back over to Somalia to do some real work.”

“I hear you,” Deckard said. “I don't have a phone with me but why don't you hit me up with your number and I will let you know if I hear anything.”

“Right on,” Flakjacket went inside and came out a moment later with a piece of paper that he handed to Deckard.

“Thanks, I'll let you guys get back to business.”

“Take care Casper,” Dusty joked. “You two better get under overhead cover because I think the sun is coming out. You could burst into flames if caught in direct sunlight.”

Turning, Dusty slapped one of the girls on the ass on her way into the room and slammed the door behind him.

Dusty was right, it was almost dawn and none of them wanted to get caught skulking around AMIZ during the day when the base would be much more active.

Opening the sliding door on the van, Deckard and Pat climbed inside.

“Can you believe that shit?” Pat asked.

“Not really. It sounds like OBI is freezing down certain corridors at certain times.”

“Long enough for the drugs to head north and for the guns to head south?”

“Yeah, that and maybe something more.”

The door swung back open, causing them to start as Kurt Jager pushed someone into the van before getting inside. Nikita came in behind him and shut the door while Aghassi got in on the driver's side and took the wheel.

“Who is this?” Deckard demanded.

“Assistant S2 Officer,” Kurt replied, keeping his AK pointed at the prisoner. They had captured the assistant to the AMIZ intelligence officer. “He confirmed that the guns are coming through AMIZ and being handed over to the cartels. Not just the Zetas, but to all of them.”

“Were you compromised?”

“No, we convinced some of the police we ran into that we were American military advisers like you said but after we found this guy and interrogated him we figured we had to bring him with us.”

“We're running out of darkness,” Aghassi reminded them.

“Get us out of here.”

Aghassi fired up the engine and headed back towards the gate. When he got there, Kurt held his hand over the prisoner's mouth and held his Glock 19 to his temple to inspire him to keep quiet. Aghassi explained to the guards that he had a couple prostitutes in the back that he had to drive back home. After bullshitting for a minute about prices and services rendered, the gate guards laughed and let them pass.

Hitting the main road, Aghassi took a right.

“Which way are we going?” he asked.

“Our prisoner knows,” Kurt insisted.

“Where are the guns coming from,” Deckard asked him in Spanish.

“Militar No. 3,” the intelligence Officer said sheepishly. “Torreon.”

Deckard leaned back against the side of the van.

“North,” Deckard told Aghassi. “We're heading north.”

44

The ceiling fan slowly spun round and round, cooling nothing and no one in the sweltering heat. Flies buzzed around the corners of his eyes until he swatted them away. Outside, someone was honking their car's horn. Further away, someone else was popping off some shots, the sharp cracks distinct over the other background noise.

He began to fidget in his seat, rubbing his hands together. He never felt comfortable during long periods alone without a task or a distraction. Alone with his thoughts was alone with his nightmares. Times like this brought him back to another time and place.

A knock sounded at the hotel room door before his assistant entered.

“East Torreon has been shut down,” the assistant informed him. “The Marines are throwing up roadblocks to the south but we have a clear shot into the sector for the next few hours. Our contact says he will have OBI keep it open as long as we need.”

“This will be over before then,” The Arab replied. “Did you get what I asked you for.”

The assistant handed him a few packs of cigarettes from the local market. The Arab lit one up and took a drag.

“Thank you Abdullah,” The Arab said, patting the back of his assistant's head. “Let us go and do what we do.”

Grabbing his backpack for him, the assistant followed The Arab and locked the door behind them. The sun was just starting to peak and whores were beginning to stagger back to the hotel after working the streets all night. The Arab pushed several out of the way as they made their way down the stairs to the street.

Geographically, Torreon was right smack in the middle of the war between the drug cartels as a major way station between northern and southern Mexico. The war had been raging for months now as evident by the rotting corpses in the streets that The Arab's assistant had to avoid as he negotiated his way to their target.

The Arab lit another cigarette, took a puff and rubbed his eyes.

He had seen these streets before, grown up on streets just like them in Iraq. He was barely old enough to walk when his father came home from work and kicked his mother out of the house. He wanted to take another wife so she had to leave and the child with her. Rejected by her family they slept in filthy streets flooded with stagnant black water. He hadn't understood it at the time, but she had sold her body to men passing by just to keep them both fed with one meal a day.

Finally, with both of them starving, his mother rejected him as well and left him to die on the streets, hungry and alone. He had not yet reached maturity when he too was forced to turn to prostitution. In southern Iraq, it is easier to have a boyfriend than a girlfriend and there was never any shortage of clients.

As a teenager he had grown big enough to find additional ways of surviving. He learned how to fight and fought anyone and everyone he could find, taking what he pleased. For a time he ran with a gang of youths who would steal and run scams but most of the time he worked alone. After Saddam was captured by the Americans things only got worse as Iraq slid into chaos.

The next gang he worked with was mostly into kidnapping. There were no rules, they would drive into Baghdad and grab girls right out of the University campus. They would be raped for days on end until their family paid the ransom. If the family didn't pay up they would be killed or sold off to locals as sex slaves. There was no one to stop them and the Americans were busy going after foreign fighters and bomb makers.

If they needed a place to stay or a new hide out they would simply knock on the door of some rich person in the nice part of town and tell them that if they were not allowed in that they would rape his wife. If they refused, the gang would force their way in, if they complied they raped the wife and cut the heads off babies they found inside anyway simply because that was what they did.

Wandering the back alleys one night, stumbling over holes in the street big enough to swallow a tank, he finished a bottle of whiskey and decided he had had enough. Drunk and disoriented he flipped open the straight razor he always carried. The rusty knives were only used for the home invasions. Tearing off his shirt, he snarled, externalizing every moment of self hatred he had ever experienced.

The car came to a halt alongside a black sedan that was idling alongside the road.

The Arab was shaken back to reality, dropping his cigarette out of the window as he was about to burn his fingers. The driver's side window was lowered, revealing his Arab-to-Spanish translator.

“The local we hired has the house under surveillance. They are home.”

“The area will be clear of soldiers for several hours,” The Arab stated. “Plenty of time for us to get in there and do this.”

Motioning to Abdullah, the assistant took the lead, driving into the target neighborhood. The men in both vehicles pulled ski masks over their heads. Arriving on the correct street in the area that had been operationally frozen for the Mexican military, they met with a local who had been keeping tabs on the family living in the house they told him to watch.

A few words were exchanged before the money was handed over from the translator in the second sedan. The local informant walked off and both cars parked in front of the house they were interested in. The translator opened the trunk of his car and the other occupants of the vehicles retrieved their sledgehammers.

The Arab thumbed the scars running down his forearms as the death squad went to work on the door. The residents were just waking up as the door gave way. The killers drew pistols, moved inside, and quickly secured everyone they found, flexcuffing their hands behind their backs. Grabbing his bag, The Arab followed them in, lighting up another cancer stick as he walked inside.

It was a family of four, kicked down to their knees in the living room while Abdullah set up the digital video camera on its tripod. The biggest and baddest of the Sinaloa cartel assassination teams called themselves TT and their leader went by the name of Ghost Killer.

The death squad now had Ghost Killer's family hostage. His mother, his sister, his niece, and his cousin. Tears were streaming down their cheeks but no one said a word to them. None of the killers were interested in gathering information or holding them for ransom. When one of the prisoners began to whine or speak out, one of the death squad members would take a plastic bag and hold it over their head. Letting them squirm for a moment, it would give them reason to keep their mouths shut the next time.

The Arab reached into his bag and grabbed his rusty knife, sticking it down his front between his belt and his pants.