Ultimate Betrayal (4 page)

Despite the ravages of war and recent neglect, Kabul still showed some signs the English and Soviets had been in the country. The Brits had erected buildings to last and had designed a bit of style into them. The Soviets had destroyed more buildings than they’d built and the ones they’d constructed were ugly boxes that would crumble in a short period of time.

In a city that teemed with throngs of people and hundreds of thousands of cars, trucks, motorcycles, motor scooters, pedicabs, bicycles, donkeys, horses, and pedestrians, he had become accustomed to the way the locals ignored whatever traffic rules existed. Kabul traffic was anarchy in motion. The fatalistic philosophy of the drivers in this city was expressed in a word:
Inshallah
—God willing.

All in all, compared to his native California, it was a shitty country that hadn’t been made any better by Allied bombs and Taliban explosives.

The clouds suddenly opened up and snow fell in a dense curtain of huge flakes that obscured the dirt road and the warehouse complex. The Jeep’s windshield wipers helped a bit, but not enough to make a big difference. The vehicle’s canvas removable doors flapped in the wind and let snow in through gaps between the Jeep’s frame and the sides of the doors. King used the security lights on the fence around the warehouse complex to guide him to the entry gate. He showed his identification to the Afghan guard, who opened the gate. King drove one hundred yards to the parking lot, left the Jeep, and ran the twenty-five yards to the entrance.

Inside, he brushed snow off his uniform, removed his cap, and shook it a couple times. He stomped his feet on the concrete floor to knock the snow from his boots. For the millionth time since he’d arrived in Afghanistan, King cursed, “Fuckin’ country.”

It surprised him to find the warehouse entrance unguarded and the office vacant. He wandered around the enormous building. He called out, “Hello, anyone here?” In a land where anything not tied or nailed down would disappear, King knew there had to be at least two American guards on duty. Maybe they had come inside to get out of the snow. But King saw no one. He picked up a wall phone to call the military police, but put it down when he noticed the building’s rear personnel door slightly ajar. He recalled this door opened onto a large vacant lot surrounded by a ten-foot-high fence, with a padlocked gate, and topped with razor-sharp concertina wire. King walked to the far end of the warehouse, opened the rear door, and peered into the snowstorm. The shadowy forms of three two-and-a-half-ton trucks stood twenty feet from the back of the building. Men moved quickly around the vehicles, but snow prevented King from seeing how many were there.

Then the snowfall suddenly abated. Eight turbaned tribesmen, under the supervision of Master Sergeant Robert Campbell, loaded shipping crates into the trucks. The crate markings, printed in large black letters, indicated the boxes contained M-16 assault rifles, M-4 Carbines, and 5.56mm ammunition.

King turned to look at the end of the line of trucks and noticed four heavily armed tribesmen in a ragtag mix of military and civilian clothing. They looked like bandits.

Campbell suddenly yelled at the tribesmen, “
Yullah! Yullah!
We gotta load these trucks and get them out of here.”

King reached for the .45 pistol on his hip. Before he could clear the weapon from his holster, someone grabbed his arm and spun him around.

“What can I do for you, Captain?”

King jerked his arm free and drew his weapon before he realized he was about to draw down on his commander. He replaced the .45 in his holster.

“I . . . I came to track down the last shipment of rifles and ammo.” He could hold Colonel Bishop’s gaze—those implacable gray eyes; those damn scary eyes—for only a few seconds.

Bishop squinted at King and, in a gravelly voice said, “Go over there and wait for me, Captain.” He pointed at a room behind King. “I’ll be with you in a minute.”

“I need to get back—”

“Did you hear me, Captain King?”

“Yes, sir.”

Bishop walked to the rear door and went outside. King watched the door close behind the Colonel. He considered leaving the warehouse, disobeying Bishop’s order. His knees shook and sweat drenched his body. He was convinced he’d just observed thievery on a large scale. And Bishop must be involved. What the hell could he do about it? Maybe his old Infantry division commander could help. Brigadier General Walter Parks was now assigned to the Afghanistan Puzzle Palace. He’d try to see him as soon as he returned to headquarters.

He entered the room Bishop had indicated. Metal coffins were stacked on racks three high. Tags hung off wires attached to the coffin handles. King slid a hand over the smooth, cold top of the closest coffin. He lifted the tag and saw the box was destined for Innocenti Mortuary in Queens, New York. He moved to the next box when the room door burst open.

King whipped around. Bishop and Sergeant Campbell entered. The Colonel sat on a table a couple feet from the door. Campbell walked behind King and leaned against one of the coffins.

“What do you think you saw out there, Captain?”

“A bunch of men loading crates on trucks.”

Bishop lasered a look at King. “That’s what you saw. I didn’t ask you that. What do you
think
you saw?”

“Noth . . . nothing. I didn’t see a thing, Colonel.”

“Don’t bullshit me. You saw American weapons and ammo being loaded on trucks by bandits.”

Bishop paused as though he expected a response, but King just stood there and stared, and tried not to look scared.

“We’re pouring billions of dollars of weapons, equipment, clothing, supplies, and all kinds of other shit into this country so the Afghans can wage war after we’ve deserted the place. None of the crap in this warehouse, except the coffins, is meant to be used by American soldiers. All this stuff is dedicated to the Afghans. You already know that, right?”

King nodded.

“So, what do you think will to happen to all this stuff after we leave Afghanistan?” Bishop waved a hand to indicate the entire building. “I’ll tell you what will happen. The Afghan government will sell everything to the Taliban, or the mullahs in Iran, or some other rag head bandits who want to kill infidels.”

King found his voice. “That’s pure rationalization. You’re stealing.”

Bishop lowered his head and muttered, “Naïve asshole.” He raised his head enough to look out from under bushy eyebrows at Campbell. He nodded once.

King noticed the Colonel’s nod and turned his head toward Campbell. The sergeant held a 9 mm pistol pointed at his head. King only had enough time to think about his wife and the twenty-seven days left on his tour in Afghanistan. Campbell fired the pistol as King tried to say, “Oh, shit!”

Campbell knew his actions were necessary. Too much was at stake. Too much money. Too much risk. He and Bishop traded weapons and supplies to tribal bandits in exchange for heroin. They then sold the heroin to a mob connection back in the United States. Shipped the drugs in caskets of dead Americans to a mob-owned mortuary in New York. In only fourteen months, they’d earned an enormous amount of money from the sale of drugs.

He smiled and thought once again about Colonel Bishop’s genius. Those caskets were vital. Maybe King’s remains would be accompanied by a load of heroin. Campbell laughed at the irony. The introduction of Operation Harvest and the Colonel’s assignment to head up the SLSD had made their side business easier and more lucrative. He recalled Bishop’s words: “In the interest of ensuring that a new democratic Government of Afghanistan can defend itself, the U.S. has created opportunities for graft, thievery, smuggling, and myriad of other business activities.”

CHAPTER 6

Back at the SLSD vault, in Bishop’s office, Bishop asked Campbell, “Everything taken care of?”

Campbell nodded. “King won’t be a problem. I dumped his body in an alley in central Kabul. He’ll ultimately be found and turned over to us. We’ll ship him out on a bed of heroin. I’ll take care of the paperwork.”

“Sit down, Bob,” Bishop ordered. “We need to firm up plans.”

Campbell sat and waited while Bishop, seated in an armchair behind his desk, propped his artificial leg on an open drawer. Bishop stared down at the leg; a sickly look momentarily crossed his face.

Then Bishop raised his head and smiled. “Just one-and-a-half years from retirement, Bob. We’re set for life, with or without our Army pensions. I’d turn in my uniform right now if it wouldn’t raise questions.”

Campbell nodded.

“We rotate to the States on 14 February. I want you to meet with Zefferelli in Brooklyn on 16 February and coordinate delivery of the last shipment.”

Campbell nodded again. “Gonna be a shame to have to shut down our operation.”

Bishop shrugged. “I’ll go to Zurich for final disposition of the money while you’re in New York. When we’re out of the Army, you can buy your ranch in Wyoming—hell, you can buy three or four ranches!”

“New Mexico, Colonel.”

Bishop waved a dismissive hand. “Wherever.”

“What do you plan to do, Colonel, after you get out?”

“I haven’t decided yet. But whatever I decide, I’ll be in touch with you. You and I have been together a long time and we’ve watched one another’s backs in some tough situations. I want you by my side whatever I do.”

FEBRUARY 15, 2003

CHAPTER 7

Frankie “The Pump” Zefferelli sat at a small, scarred wooden table in the Bayside Social Club in Howard Beach and looked across at his two capos, Bruno Giordano and Joey Cataldo. This was their normal place to meet, at the same table near the back of the twenty-five-foot-wide, seventy-five-foot-long room. Their table was ten feet away from the next closest table. Zefferelli turned up the volume on the boom box radio on a built-in shelf above the table. The sounds of the aria from
La Boheme
filled the room.

“Can’t be too careful,” he said to Giordano and Cataldo, as he waggled a finger at them like a teacher might lecture two schoolboys.

Zefferelli glared at the two men and saw appropriate respect in their eyes. He was the
Capo di tutti Capi
for the New York mob and, like a Roman Emperor, demanded respect from every man in his organization. He knew his hold over the Family and its control over a significant part of the import of narcotics into New York depended on it.

At a mere five feet, five inches tall and weighing 210 pounds, he appeared almost simian with most of his weight concentrated in his torso, short legs, and long arms. An enormous hooked nose and a Hitler-like mustache completed an almost comedic appearance. But no one dared laugh at Frankie the Pump. He had scary eyes. Dark, fathomless, shark eyes. And he was ruthless.

When Frank Zefferelli was coming up in the organization, he was called Johnny Pump, the neighborhood name for a fire hydrant, which he resembled. As he made his bones, the nickname changed to Frankie Pump. When he became a made man, most referred to him as just “The Pump.” Now that he headed up the family, people called him Mr. Zefferelli, or just Mr. Z by his closest associates.

Zefferelli liked to have men around who towered over him—men like Giordano and Cataldo, who each exuded a Mediterranean sensuality and powerful physical presence. He figured when people saw these two bruisers take orders from him, they would fear him even more.

Zefferelli glared at his men until each one looked away. “I arranged for a new supplier, now that our guy in Afghanistan is closing down.” He paused. A habit he’d developed years ago. It was as though he felt his listeners needed breaks in order to process his words. “I need you guys to go down to Guadalajara with the
consigliere
to wrap up loose ends down there. But first, I got a job for you and I don’t want no screw ups.”

After a longer than usual fifteen-second pause, Zefferelli said, “You both know our Afghanistan supplier told us he could ship a minimum of two hundred keys of pure every month, on two conditions. One, we gotta agree to pay for the shipments with dollars put in a Swiss account. Two, we gotta set up a funeral parlor we can control. So he can deliver the “H” caskets.”

Zefferelli paused again, shot his French cuffs, sipped a bit of espresso.

“I asked him why he brought this proposition to me. He says, ‘Who else should I bring it to? You’re the head of the mob in New York, aren’t you?’ ” Zefferelli laughed. “Then I said, ‘Maybe you read the damn newspapers too much.’ He said, ‘You want the dope or not?’ ”

He pointed a finger at his temple and said, “I ain’t stupid. Fourteen months now, this guy does what he promised, and more. Over the past eight months, the shipments have come in at a faster rate—three, four hundred keys a week. Lots of bodies; lots of smack. I don’t know what’s changed, but I ain’t complaining. What I think, even though I’ve never met our supplier, we’ve been dealing with some of Uncle Sam’s finest. Hey, that’s okay with me. These guys are over there getting their asses shot at, so let them put a little away for the future.” He laughed again.

“You know this guy’s name?” Joey Cataldo asked.

“Nah. He told me to call him “The Priest”.” Zefferelli shrugged. “Maybe he’s a chaplain over there.

“Anyway, bodies come in with a cushion of heroin underneath them. We take the junk out of the caskets and send the bodies on their way. As I said, lately the shipments have been huge. Hell, we got caskets coming in with no bodies. Just sandbags and ‘H’.”

The
Capo
went silent again. Took another sip of espresso.

“The last shipment of caskets we’ll get from these guys should arrive tomorrow. Eight caskets. I want the stuff stepped on and out on the street by next Thursday. Our friend over there is sending his man, a guy named Robert Campbell. He’ll be here tomorrow. The brain behind this deal sends me a message yesterday. Gotta admire the guy. You know what he writes me?” Pause. “He says, ‘As a token of my esteem, I’ll discount the price of the last shipment by ten percent.’ And next he says, ‘It would be a big help to me if no one sees Robert Campbell again.’ ” Once again Zefferelli paused, a deadly serious cast to his eyes. “You think you guys can handle that?”