Read Online Black Flagged Redux by Steven Konkoly - Free Book Online
Authors: Steven Konkoly
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Their hard work produced tangible results on February 8th of this year, when the system alerted Special Agent O'Reilly to the fact that Victor Almadez's grandfather, living in Santa Fe, New Mexico, had passed away unexpectedly from a heart attack. Based on the alert, Sharpe issued the highest level priority terrorist alert for Victor Almadez, providing enough imaging data for both TSA and Customs to effectively utilize their new facial recognition software systems.
Three days later, customs agents at the Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport seized Manuel Delreyo after debarking an American Airlines flight that originated in Buenos Aires and made a stop in Santiago, Chile. Almadez/Delreyo proved to be as difficult to read as the escape artist Jeffrey Munoz, and Sharpe couldn't shake the feeling that they were being played again.
He had been so badly burned by Sanderson's Munoz play that he felt tinges of paranoia as soon as he received the phone call from Customs. Two months later, they still had Almadez in custody, held under some very tenuous Homeland Security Act provisions that wouldn't hold up if put under any public scrutiny. Unfortunately for Almadez, he was a nameless prisoner stuffed away in an obscure detention facility designed and administered by the Hallister Corporation. Sharpe wasn't worried about Almadez.
"The capture kept me from being fired and resulted in my transfer to Domestic. The last nod from Director Shelby I can expect. Unfortunately, Almadez hasn't said anything substantive, other than a promise to 'take this personally' if he doesn't see a lawyer by the end of June."
"He's willing to wait four months?"
"He said, 'I'm a patient man, and I understand your predicament…I'm willing to wait four months,' and that was it," Sharpe said.
"You're going to let him go, right?"
"Not with the Navarre link. I'm going to start poking around down south. Argentina and Bolivia."
"You gonna bring the CIA in on this?"
"No. I don't trust the CIA after the Black Flag debacle. Too many aspects of that day didn't add up in the end. Jeremy Cummings is paid nearly two hundred thousand dollars to assemble an off the books team to kill Petrovich. All we get from the CIA is the suggestion that this might be a revenge play by Serbian nationalists. A little too convenient that they stumbled upon the same connection regarding Petrovich and Resja so quickly. The CIA liaison, Randy Keller, vanishes from the face of the planet after walking into a Georgetown residence that literally explodes minutes later. And the payment to Cummings came from an extremely sanitized money trail leading nowhere, deposited into his account after he was killed. The director himself told me to keep the CIA out of it. I'm going directly to our counterparts in Argentina and Bolivia. We have a good working relationship with Argentine Federal Police."
"Argentina's a big country…let me know how I can help. We're still shaking down the Navarre/Al Qaeda connection, but it doesn't appear to have any meat. Even a scumbag like Navarre kept his distance from that group."
"Thanks, Frank. Always a pleasure. We should grab a drink soon. My treat," Sharpe said.
"Damn straight. Good luck with this. It would be nice to nail Sanderson to the wall. He set the domestic Al Qaeda investigation back two years with his stunt," Mendoza said.
"I'm keeping my fingers crossed on this one. Catch you later, Frank."
"You too," he said and closed the door as he left.
Sharpe had enough confirmation to contact the FBI legal attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Buenos Aires, but he'd have to be careful. The embassy crawled with spooks, and the wrong conversation, at the wrong time, could bring the CIA into the fold. He desperately wanted to avoid this and needed to do a little more research into Dan Bailey and Susan Castaneda, resident legal attachés in Argentina.
Chapter 7
2:24 PM
Monchegorsk Water Treatment Plant (A District)
Monchegorsk, Murmansk
Their hard work produced tangible results on February 8th of this year, when the system alerted Special Agent O'Reilly to the fact that Victor Almadez's grandfather, living in Santa Fe, New Mexico, had passed away unexpectedly from a heart attack. Based on the alert, Sharpe issued the highest level priority terrorist alert for Victor Almadez, providing enough imaging data for both TSA and Customs to effectively utilize their new facial recognition software systems.
Three days later, customs agents at the Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport seized Manuel Delreyo after debarking an American Airlines flight that originated in Buenos Aires and made a stop in Santiago, Chile. Almadez/Delreyo proved to be as difficult to read as the escape artist Jeffrey Munoz, and Sharpe couldn't shake the feeling that they were being played again.
He had been so badly burned by Sanderson's Munoz play that he felt tinges of paranoia as soon as he received the phone call from Customs. Two months later, they still had Almadez in custody, held under some very tenuous Homeland Security Act provisions that wouldn't hold up if put under any public scrutiny. Unfortunately for Almadez, he was a nameless prisoner stuffed away in an obscure detention facility designed and administered by the Hallister Corporation. Sharpe wasn't worried about Almadez.
"The capture kept me from being fired and resulted in my transfer to Domestic. The last nod from Director Shelby I can expect. Unfortunately, Almadez hasn't said anything substantive, other than a promise to 'take this personally' if he doesn't see a lawyer by the end of June."
"He's willing to wait four months?"
"He said, 'I'm a patient man, and I understand your predicament…I'm willing to wait four months,' and that was it," Sharpe said.
"You're going to let him go, right?"
"Not with the Navarre link. I'm going to start poking around down south. Argentina and Bolivia."
"You gonna bring the CIA in on this?"
"No. I don't trust the CIA after the Black Flag debacle. Too many aspects of that day didn't add up in the end. Jeremy Cummings is paid nearly two hundred thousand dollars to assemble an off the books team to kill Petrovich. All we get from the CIA is the suggestion that this might be a revenge play by Serbian nationalists. A little too convenient that they stumbled upon the same connection regarding Petrovich and Resja so quickly. The CIA liaison, Randy Keller, vanishes from the face of the planet after walking into a Georgetown residence that literally explodes minutes later. And the payment to Cummings came from an extremely sanitized money trail leading nowhere, deposited into his account after he was killed. The director himself told me to keep the CIA out of it. I'm going directly to our counterparts in Argentina and Bolivia. We have a good working relationship with Argentine Federal Police."
"Argentina's a big country…let me know how I can help. We're still shaking down the Navarre/Al Qaeda connection, but it doesn't appear to have any meat. Even a scumbag like Navarre kept his distance from that group."
"Thanks, Frank. Always a pleasure. We should grab a drink soon. My treat," Sharpe said.
"Damn straight. Good luck with this. It would be nice to nail Sanderson to the wall. He set the domestic Al Qaeda investigation back two years with his stunt," Mendoza said.
"I'm keeping my fingers crossed on this one. Catch you later, Frank."
"You too," he said and closed the door as he left.
Sharpe had enough confirmation to contact the FBI legal attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Buenos Aires, but he'd have to be careful. The embassy crawled with spooks, and the wrong conversation, at the wrong time, could bring the CIA into the fold. He desperately wanted to avoid this and needed to do a little more research into Dan Bailey and Susan Castaneda, resident legal attachés in Argentina.
Chapter 7
2:24 PM
Monchegorsk Water Treatment Plant (A District)
Monchegorsk, Murmansk
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