In Hot Pursuit Page 2

  “My guess is Syria. That’s where they seem to be taking a lot of the girls now. They must have recruited them to become jihadi brides for ISIS. Too bad we couldn’t stop them before they got to those girls, and many others like them already. A lot of them had made it out of the country and to their deaths.”

  “They lured them with promises of money and a better life. They preyed on

  confused, vulnerable girls, tricking them into believing that something good and

  better are waiting for them. This is a troubling pattern—some of the girls weren’t even radicalized or religious to begin with. In some cases, their parents had no idea what they were up to until they are gone or ended up dead. Two of them appeared

  to be Caucasian, the rest are North African and South Asian.”

  Bowles gave him a somber look. “Unfortunately, we weren’t able to save any of

  them. It’s possible they could have wanted out. They were probably murdered for

  that very reason.”

  “Get them out of there!” Dr. Bailey signaled the O’Neal brothers over.

  Both men had been personally chosen by Dr. Bailey himself. Conor and Sean O’Neal were trained coroners who had also operated a very successful crematorium in Berkshire, London where Dr. Bailey was from. Dr Bailey had lured them away from their day jobs to work for Homeland Security. The brothers were originally from Ireland, and were in their early and mid- forties, respectively. Both men had known Dr. Bailey for years. Their family had moved to Berkshire when they were boys. The brothers were in charge of disposal. They also cleaned up the crime scenes after. They were discreet, thorough, and indispensable to the team, especially to Dr. Bailey, who relied on them to assist with the autopsies as well.

  “We will find out who they are, and how they died when we get them back to

  autopsy.” Dr. Bailey was still visibly upset. He turned to Agents Earnes, and Bowles, and the other agents with them. “Turn this place upside down if you have to. There must be something here that we are missing. This seemed to be much, much bigger than it appeared.”

  And it was.

  An exhaustive and thorough search of the house and property turned up a

  fortified room at the back of the house. It had been concealed by three rows of floor

  to ceiling bookshelves that had been bolted to the wall. It took them twenty minutes to blow off the steel door. They went in, not knowing what to expect. Would there be more dead bodies inside, or worst? The space was unusually large. It had been extended to accommodate this one. Four large floodlights, an unnecessary excess for the size of the room, hanged at strategic angles.

  The room was clearly used for something. It was also equipped with security cameras mounted to observe every part of the house, including the back and front entrances and yards. The large monitoring screens were still on, recording every movement, both inside and outside of the house. Three state of the art machines, including a finger printing machine stood in the center, and a close distance from the wall.

  “Look at the sophisticated set up in here! They must have known we were coming.” Bowles went over and clicked a few buttons with her gloved finger. “My guess is—they weren’t in here when we busted through the front door. They didn’t have enough time to escape back up here. We wouldn’t have found them if they did.”

  “That explains why they off themselves,” Earnes told her. “They must have been

  carrying the cyanide with them at all times, as a precaution. They knew the drill.”

  Agent Bowles walked over to the finger printing machine. “I thought these weren’t easy to come by.” She ran her gloved hand across the surface.

  Dr. Bailey walked over to the machine and stooped to get a closer look at it. “If

  you have the money, and a couple good engineers, they can easily duplicate them,

  even the ones law enforcement use.”

  “Do you think that’s what the guy was doing?” Earnes asked him. “He has two engineering degrees in his country. He has worked for the governments of Pakistan, Iran and Saudi Arabia, both as a chemical and electrical engineer. He’s gifted, and clearly a major asset to the people who brought him into this country.”

  He skimped through the information they had pulled up on the guy again. They had sent his picture and finger print out to a couple agencies and a wealth of information had come flooding in about him. The CIA especially knew who he was.

  “He entered the country under false pretense, disguised as a student.” Bowles peered at the small screen and frowned.

  “He certainly doesn’t need an undergraduate degree from MIT or from any other university in the country from what I’m seeing here. He already has two of those, including a doctorate from Oxford. This guy knows his stuff!” Earnes gave her a nervous look.

  “Masquerading as a foreign student was an easy way for him to enter the country without the slightest suspicion. Student visas are assessed faster. It would’ve sped up his application by months if not years. It was the perfect way for

  him to slip under the radar, too,” Dr. Bailey told them. “Just as those devils

  disguised themselves as student pilots to carry out that heinous act on 9/11.”

  Earnes let out one of the loud whistles he was known for. “Let’s hope he hasn’t

  had the opportunity to do whatever they recruited him here for. We haven’t found any chemicals weapons or bomb making material so far. That in itself is a good sign!”

  “They were definitely doing something here.” Dr. Bailey walked around the

  room, inspecting the machines. “Perhaps counterfeit money, fake credit and bank cards. There are a bunch of electronic chips here.” He dug his gloved hand into the pile, grabbed some of the chips, and let them fall through his fingers.

  “I think I have found some of what they were doing here.” Bowles appeared with a large plastic container in her hands. “They were making these!” She opened the lid and dumped the contents on to the large table. “There are about a hundred of

  them there. There are two other boxes back there.” She pointed over her shoulders

  to a small door to her right.

  Dr. Bailey took up one of the passports in his hands and held it up to the light.

  He opened it and scanned through the pages. He did the same thing with a few more. “They look like the real thing to me. It’s almost impossible to tell if they are

  faked or not. They are all done with impeccable precision.”

  Earnes inspected the ones in his hands. “The names and nationalities are

  American. Those individuals probably had their identities stolen.”

  “Or they were killed for them,” Bowles told him. “It’s known to have happened.

  The only thing missing from these passports is the photograph. I assumed they were

  waiting for those to arrive.”

  “They probably have a selection process—someone decides whose photograph goes into that blank space.” Dr. Bailey interjected.

  “This is more dangerous than I thought.” Earnes took another look at the blank

  passports in his hand. “A terrorist can enter the country disguised as an American citizen, and we will have absolutely no way of knowing otherwise, until it is too late.” There was a troubled look on his face as he took another look at the

  documents on the table.

  Dr. Bailey moved forward and threw the empty passports back into the container. “We have to find whoever is behind this operation, and we have to find him, her or them fast. We have no idea how many of those are out there. There may be dozens, if not hundreds of them already, circulating in other countries as well. We have to find out if our system has been compromised, and if so, to what extent. This is clearly a breach of national security. This is so much bigger than we originally thought.”

  There was an urgent edge to Dr. Bailey’s voice. Bowles and Earnes exchanged furtive glances. They suspected Dr. Bailey knew more about thi
s than he was letting on. Homeland Security must have had this on their radar for some time too. The special task force had been specifically set up for that very purpose. It was their job to find and stop breaches in the system, and to weed out any moles from within.

  There had been talks of rogue ICE agents taking huge bribes, hundreds of thousands of dollars for classified information. A couple agents out in DC had been caught trying to sell that information, including passports to undercover FBI agents. It had sent off huge warning bells. Homeland Security had been out to find out how deep the problem was. This was definitely the tip of the iceberg. Bowles met Earnes’s eyes again. They knew there was more to this than it seemed.

  “Let’s start with the chap upstairs. He must know something,” Dr. Bailey told them, and led the way up the stairs.

  They re-entered the room where the man and the dead bodies were. The

  deceased men were already zipped in large black body bags waiting to be taken out. The man was just regaining consciousness. His eyes were shut, but they could hear him groaning. His eyes suddenly fluttered opened as they drew close, and he stared at them in wide-eyed wonder. He seemed disoriented, but hardly afraid. There was a curious look on his thin face as he glanced up at them.

  “Hoo…who, ar..rr you?” he strutted at them, barely getting the words out.

  “We are federal agents.” Dr. Bailey stepped forward and offered. “We will like

  to ask you a few questions.”

  “Fedd…derr…aall…agents?” He clearly had a hard time speaking. He gave

  them a weak smile, and his hand went up to stroke his moistened brow. Even that

  small action took an unusually long time for him.

  “Yes,” Dr. Bailey told him in a low voice. “We work for the US government.”

  A brief smile appeared on his face. He didn’t want to come across as being too aggressive. The man might feel threatened, get defensive and clammed up. He might refuse to say another word to them. He had seen it happened with a lot of prisoners. They needed his help. He was the only lead they had, so far. He preferred to leave the complicated interrogation tactics to Agents Bowles and Earnes, especially to Agent Bowles. She was known to be a tough, but effective interrogator. She got answers when none of them could.

  “Are you in pain?” He brought his head down to make eye contact with the man.

  The man’s eyes were vacant and cold. They lacked any sort of real emotion. It could be because of what he had been through. Being held captive here certainly hadn’t been a day in the park for him. “I can get you something to help with the pain, and make you comfortable. But first, you have to tell us everything, including how you got here.”

  The man lifted his head slightly off the floor to have a better look at them.

  “How can I be sure that you are who you say you are?” His voice was subdued,

  and cautious. “You could be one of his men for all I know. He could have sent you here to see what I know and then to finish what the others started.” There was an alarmed edge to his shaky voice.

  At least he was coherent. It was a good sign. They would be able to question him

  and find out what he knew.

  “I’m a federal agent,” Dr. Bailey told him again, in a firm voice. He produced his ID and held it up to the man’s face for him to see. He needed to gain the man’s trust to start with.

  The man leaned in to have a closer look. He glanced back at Dr. Bailey. “Are they agents too?” he asked in a wary voice, his eyes wandering over to Earnes and Bowles, and the two other agents standing close by.

  “Yes, we all are,” Dr Bailey assured him.

  He let out a deep sigh. “Okay, what do you want to know?” He fell back on his back, and stared up at the ceiling above. There was a defeated look on his drawn face. He seemed to have resigned himself to his fate, and what was going to happen to him after. And he might as well—he wasn’t going anywhere.

  “You can begin by telling us your name, why were you here, and who’s in charge. I know it’s not you.” Dr. Bailey cast a sympathetic look his way. “It’s clear you were a punching bag for those men. We can help you, but you have to cooperate fully with us.”

  The man let out a deep, small chuckle. “I don’t have much of a choice at this point, do I?” He glanced at them, and chuckled some more.

  “What’s your name?” Dr. Bailey pressed him gently.

  They knew that there was a huge possibility that the name he was carrying

  might not be his true one.

  “With the technology you have at your disposal now, I’m surprised you have not found that out already.”

  “Unfortunately, we haven’t arrived to the point where we can identify someone just by looking at them.” Dr. Bailey gave him a good natured smile. He was working on gaining his trust.

  Luckily, the man had been out cold when Agent Bowles had taken his finger print.

  “My name is Youssef Al-Bishi, and I’m a Saudi national,” he told them in an uninterested voice.

  Dr. Bailey gave him a guarded look and turned to exchange glances with Agent

  Bowles and Earnes. So he had been right all along about this chap not being who they really thought he was. He was surprised Homeland Security hadn’t pegged him as a Saudi national.

  “Saudi Arabia, you say?”

  “Yes.”

  “What’s your purpose for being in this country, and when did you arrive here?”

  He shut his eyes and took a deep breath. He was thinking what to say to them, Agent Bowles thought. He better come up with a good story. He opened his eyes again, and tried to get his lower body up in a sitting position. It proved to be too much for him. He started to tremble uncontrollably, and fell back down flat on his back. They looked on as his body convulsed into violent spasms.

  Dr. Bailey reached for the shaking man, and held him up in his arms against his chest, supporting his head with his left hand. He took a pen from his coat pocket and stuck it into the man’s mouth to prevent him from biting down on his tongue and choking to death. The other agents stood by and watched cautiously alarmed. They appeared baffled too.

  “Is he going to be okay?” Agent Bowles asked him in a low voice.

  “It’s hard to tell.”

  The man stopped shaking. Dr. Bailey lowered him back onto the floor, and reached for his hand to check his pulse. It was weak. He opened his eyes again and his blood shot eyes bore deep into Dr. Bailey’s worried ones. He had a fiend expression on his face. He reached up and gripped an end of Dr. Bailey’s coat and tried to mumble something to him, but he never got to say a word. His body suddenly went limp, and he lapsed back into unconsciousness.

  Earnes leaned in and looked down at his face. “Is he dead?”

  “Far from it. He’s frightened to death of someone or something, so much so that he can’t even speak about it.” Dr. Bailey turned around to look at Earnes and Bowles. “Someone certainly put the fear of god in him. Did he take anything?” he asked the agent who had been watching the man.

  The agent gave him a nervous shrug. “No. He was asleep the whole time. I

  never left the room or took my eyes off him.”

  Dr. Bailey checked his heartbeat and pulse again. “He’s fine. His system is just in shock. We need to get him to eat something, and away from here as soon as possible. I think he’s suffering from some sort of psychological trauma as well. I don’t think he will say anything to us as long as he remained in this house. We will take him back to the safe house and let him recover there.”

  He beckoned the O’Neal brothers over.

  “And the other bodies?” Sean O’Neal asked him.

  “You know the drill—we will do a quick and thorough autopsy on them, to try to find answers and determine who they are, and their cause of death, then they will be cremated and their ashes disposed of. No need to keep anything of them around! They will return to the rubbish heap, just like the rubbish they are!” Dr. Bailey explained. It w
as clear that he was still infuriated about the dead girls.

  “And the girls—do we dispose of them too?” Conor O’Neal, the older of the

  two brothers inquired.

  He had three young girls of his own. He was also an uncle and god father to five

  small girls. He couldn’t imagine any of the children in his life coming to such a tragic end. And as a good Catholic, he had taken the time and said a quick, silent prayer for the girls, praying that their troubled souls would finally find peace at last. It was all he could have done for them given the circumstances. They had been too late to rescue them from those monsters!

  “Every indication points to them being the hapless victims of those unscrupulous individuals. At least their parents will have the courtesy of claiming their bodies, and giving them a proper funeral as soon as we find out who they are. It is the most we can do for them.”

  “And the house? Do we leave it intact?”

  “Absolutely not! Make sure we have everything we need for the investigation, then burn it to the ground. Make sure it amounts to a pile of ashes too. Then place the usual anonymous call to the fire department. And do it quickly. I don’t want it standing around for another day! Enough evil has been committed here already. Our job now is to find out who’s responsible, and deal with him.”

  Dr. Bailey paused to sign a sheet of paper Conor held out to him. It was a consent form, giving the brothers the go ahead to cremate the bodies. It was standard procedure. A hard copy of everything they had found out about the dead men would be kept in a secured safe at the house. There would be no name or particulars about them, only a number. The files would be shredded after a year. Nothing was ever kept on the computer. It was a way to prevent anyone from hacking into their system, and exposing their work—although that seemed extremely unlikely.

  Their IT team was chosen from among the best in the country. And they didn’t

  come from outside contractions, either. They didn’t want to risk having another