The Venezuelan Read online

  To this day, the U.S. government has never publicly mentioned the nuclear component of the Dallas incident.

  “Well, if we’re looking for a high-level individual with contacts in the European criminal community, the Frenchman would be at the top of my suspect list.”

  “Unfortunately, there hasn’t been a confirmed sighting of him in nearly two years,” said Gonçalves, now working the squeeze ball hard enough for the veins in his forearm to become slightly more pronounced. “Everything since then has been second- and third-hand information.”

  “Well, if our information back then was correct—and I believe it was—he was the one who personally delivered the nuclear device up to the Mexican border, where Calderón picked it up. I wonder what those two are up to now?”

  “Given the nature of their last collaboration, I shudder to even think what it might be,” said the SSA.

  Neither of them said a word for a moment.

  “To be honest with you, it scares me even more to think that there may also be a CIA connection in this one,” said Cortez somberly. “In fact, that scares the bejesus out of me.”

  ◆◆◆

  Everything about Marco’s appearance made him easy to overlook, and even easier to forget. He was five-nine and on the chubby side. He favored loose-fitting cotton shirts that hung like a tent, enabling him to hide the Walther PPQ M2 9-millemeter pistol he always carried on his left hip, inside the waistband.

  His dark, overgrown mustache always seemed to be in desperate need of a trim, and he liked to keep a couple of days’ stubble on his face because that’s what most men did these days.

  “Welcome to Venezuela, Señor,” said the uniformed guard at the border crossing into Venezuela, handing him back the fake Brazilian passport.

  He was driving an old blue VW Passat he had rented in Boa Vista. Of course, he had answered no to the rental agency’s question of whether he planned to drive the car across any international borders.

  “How long will you be staying in Venezuela?” the guard asked.

  “Just a couple of days. I’m visiting a friend in Santa Elena.”

  “Doing some fishing?” the border guard asked, eager to finally have someone to talk to. He didn’t get much traffic entering Venezuela these days. Most of it was going the other way.

  “It’s not that kind of friend,” said Marco, giving the man a knowing wink.

  “Well then, enjoy your visit, señor,” said the guard, laughing as he waived Marco’s vehicle through the border checkpoint.

  The drive to the tiny Santa Elena airport, which is located midway between Pacaraima and the actual town of Santa Elena de Uairén, took him less than ten minutes. He pulled the car into one of the unused outdoor parking spaces in front of the terminal building. He grabbed his small leather bag from the back seat, locked the vehicle, and walked through the main door and into the terminal.

  It was stifling inside the terminal, even though a series of slow-moving ceiling fans drew the stale hot air up and circulated it out the small, rectangular ventilation windows on the upper walls, just below the ceiling.

  At the far end of the one-story building was an oval-shaped room with a long snack bar counter, much like you would find in any small airport. Three men were seated at the counter, their backs to him, drinking Coca-Cola from a bottle with a straw. They were watching a telenovela on the flat-screen television mounted on the wall behind the counter.

  “I’m looking for a pilot named Alberto,” said Marco, walking up to the three men and setting his leather bag down on the floor beside him.

  One of the men sitting at the counter, dressed in faded jeans and a light green polo short, swiveled around on his barstool and smiled.

  “I am Alberto,” he said as he stood up and extended his hand in greeting. “And you must be Señor de Souza.”

  Marco nodded his head slightly and said, “How soon can we be ready to go?”

  “Twenty minutes, more or less,” the pilot said, taking one final slurp of his Coke before setting the bottle back down on the counter. “Grab your bag and follow me.”

  Marco followed the pilot out the back door and onto the concrete parking apron behind the terminal building. Parked about a hundred feet away was a freshly washed white Piper Seneca V. The twin-engine aircraft had already undergone its preflight checks before the pilot had gone indoors to get out of the stifling mid-morning heat. The pilot handed some money to the young boy standing by the plane holding a blue bucket and sponge, giving him a pat on the shoulder.

  Ten minutes later, the plane was airborne. The pilot banked the small aircraft in a northeasterly direction and headed toward Georgetown, Guyana.

  “How long until we get there?” asked Marco.

  “A little more than an hour. There’s no weather or headwinds to slow us down.”

  “Are we going to land at the main airport?”

  The pilot laughed. “No, we’ll be putting down at a small private airfield about ten miles out of town. It’s much more convenient for this sort of trip, if you know what I mean.”

  “Good. I’d rather there not be a record of me being in Guyana.”

  Again, the pilot, a Venezuelan, laughed and said, “I understand completely, Señor. Even the Guyanese don’t want it widely known that they’ve been there, either.”

  ◆◆◆

  “Come in, Clarice,” said Ryan Carpenter, beckoning her into his office. She had taken the rest of the day off following their meeting with Margaret Donovan and they had not spoken since. “Close the door behind you.”

  Robideaux was reconciled to the fact that she wouldn’t be returning to the Amazon, at least not in search of the Venezuelan. She was now ready to move forward. She hoped Carpenter was, too.

  Unfortunately, he wasn’t.

  “Never in my almost two decades in the Agency have I felt so embarrassed,” he said disdainfully, not even waiting for her to sit down before laying into her. He was livid and his face, which was now beet red, showed it clearly.

  “What? Are you mad that Cortez and I weren’t killed in Santarém,” she said, barely able to control the anger in her voice, her chin trembling. It normally didn’t take much to set her off and he had blown way past whatever that threshold was. “Or perhaps you’d rather we’d let ourselves be kidnapped and tortured?”

  “Don’t you get smart with me, Robideaux,” he said, his eyes bulging from anger. “Your career is already teetering on the brink of extinction. All it would take would be one word from me and you are history with the Agency.”

  She realized this conversation was beginning to careen off the rails. I sure hope he doesn’t have a weapon handy, she thought to herself. She was secretly glad she didn’t because she probably would have already used it by now.

  “Look, Ryan, we can either sit here and scream at each other, or we can act like professionals and move on from here,” she said, taking a deep breath to calm herself. “You’re the chief of station, so you hold all the cards.”

  That slowed him down. He was silent for the next ten seconds or so, breathing deeply, in and out, trying to regain his composure.

  “Margaret and I spoke at great length after you left my office,” he said finally, his voice measured, his words carefully chosen.

  Now he’s calling her Margaret, she thought wryly. Probably trying to impress me. I’ll bet he doesn’t dare call her that to her face. Still, she didn’t want to provoke him again, so she held her tongue, not even smiling.

  “And what did you and Mrs. Donovan decide?” she asked, resisting the urge to refer to her as Margaret, as well.

  “Well, after the debacle with HIMILAYAN VULTURE—which really put the Agency behind the eight ball, I might add—we both think it would be a good idea if you took some vacation time back in the States while we try to settle down the folks at Langley.”

  “Just how, out of curiosity, did I make a debacle out of HIMILAYAN VULTURE? I wasn’t in charge of the secret compound. I wasn’t responsible for its
security. I didn’t let the man escape, losing almost a dozen lives in the process. My task was simply to track down the Venezuelan after he had been broken out…and I’m pretty sure I did that.”

  “Look, Clarice, I’m on your side,” he said in a calm, soothing voice, now trying his best to deflect her anger and appear empathetic. “It’s just that I’d hate to see you get swallowed up by this monumental fiasco.”

  She wasn’t sure what to make of him at this moment. He sounded sincere now, his attitude shifted one-eighty from just a couple of minutes earlier. Still, everything she knew about the man screamed for her to be wary.

  “I hate to leave here at a time like this,” she said finally, adopting a more neutral stance.

  “Look, it’s probably only for a week or so, two at the most. Stay out of the way while the elephants are thrashing about. Once they have selected and crucified their ritual sacrifice, then it’ll be safe for us little guys to pop our heads back out.”

  She knew for sure now that he was blowing smoke up her butt. People like Ryan Carpenter, with their oversized egos, don’t ever refer to themselves as little guys, not even in a clearly self-deprecating way.

  “Okay, Ryan. It’s not that I have any say in the matter anyway. When should I leave?”

  “Have embassy transportation book you a flight to New Orleans. That’s only about an hour from your home, right?”

  “Yeah, at least I should be there in time for Mardi Gras,” she said, trying to sound upbeat, even though she did not feel that way.

  “Yeah, have some fun while you’re there,” he said, a warm but unquestionably fake smile spread across his duplicitous face. “God knows, you’ve earned it.”

  She had no doubt that she had earned it, but having fun was the furthest thing from her mind. Nothing about this situation rang true to her and it was not in her nature to let things like this rest.

  No way was she going to just sit around and do nothing.

  ◆◆◆

  Chapter 12

  Houston, Texas

  Jack Gonçalves was startled by the sudden, jarring sound emanating from the telephone. He glanced down at the digital display and noted that it was coming from Portuguese Judicial Police.

  “You’ll have to excuse me,” he said to the FBI agent sitting in his office, who had only recently been assigned to the JTTF. “I need to take this.”

  The man dutifully got up from his chair, grabbed his notebook and headed for the door.

  “On your way out, can you ask George to have Pete Cortez come down to my office ASAP?” the SSA continued. George, whose desk just happened to be located closest to the door to Gonçalves’ office, was one of the special agents assigned to the JTTF. “Oh, and would you close the door on your way out?”

  As the agent was leaving, the SSA picked up the white phone handset and said, “Houston FBI, Jack Gonçalves speaking.”

  “Jack, it’s me, João,” said the voice on the other end. He sounded concerned.

  “Hopefully, you’re calling to tell me you have something new concerning the contract on Pete Cortez.”

  “Unfortunately, no,” said the Portuguese policeman. “But I do have something that may be related,”

  There was a single knock on the door and Cortez stuck his head through the opening. Gonçalves motioned for him to come in and sit down next to his desk. He mouthed the words, “Close the door, would you?”

  “Pete Cortez just walked in,” said the SSA to Carvalho. “I’m going to put you on speaker. He and I are the only two people in the room.”

  Gonçalves depressed the speaker button on the phone.

  “Things seem to be heating up down in Brazil,” said Carvalho, whose English was excellent, despite his noticeable accent.

  “In what way, João?”

  “We’ve been hearing rumors about a possible coup in Venezuela.”

  “That’s not surprising,” said Gonçalves. “In fact, as big a mess as that place is, it would be much more surprising if there were not any rumblings of a coup.”

  “This rumor has an interesting twist, though,” said the Portuguese policeman. “We’re hearing talk that some Brazilian military officers may be involved.”

  “Involved how?” said Gonçalves, bringing up a classified mapping application on his computer screen. He zoomed in on the border between Venezuela and Brazil.

  “On that point, we’re still not quite sure yet.”

  “Have you observed any suspicious troop movements by the Brazilians?”

  “Nothing besides the normal troop rotations up to the border with Venezuela to provide security and help control the flow of refugees streaming across the border into Brazil.”

  “What about Venezuelan troop movements? Anything provocative or unexpected?”

  “No, so far all we’re hearing is just talk…enough of it, though, to be concerning.”

  “Are you hearing anything about leadership, like who’s behind it?”

  “The name CORCOVADO keeps popping up on our radar,” said Carvalho.

  “As in the big Christ the Redeemer statue overlooking Rio de Janeiro?” asked Cortez.

  “Yes, except in this case, we’re unsure if it refers to a particular location, or to the nom de guerre for the overall leader of this movement.”

  “Any idea who the leader might be?”

  “No, we’re still working on that,” said the Portuguese policeman. “All we’ve come up with so far is an elderly priest who is retired and living in the slums of São Paulo. I seriously doubt he could be our man.”

  “Who knows? Maybe we’re reverting back to the Sixties?”

  “I suppose anything is possible,” said Carvalho, who was not sure whether the FBI agent was kidding. “Anyway, we still have a lot of resources and on-the-ground contacts in Brazil, so if there’s any substance to these rumors, we’ll soon get to the bottom of it. Of that, I am certain.”

  “Are there any specific military units you believe may be involved?”

  “We’re hearing rumblings throughout the 12th Military Region,” said the Portuguese policeman. “That’s the organization based in Manaus and includes the northern states of Amazonas and Roraima, both of which share a border with Venezuela.”

  “Makes sense,” said Gonçalves. “Are any Brazilian criminal organizations involved?”

  Even though he was using criminal activity from Brazil as a pretext for soliciting the help of Portuguese national police doesn’t mean that it couldn’t also be true.

  “It wouldn’t surprise me.”

  This just keeps getting worse by the day, thought Gonçalves.

  ◆◆◆

  After the white Piper Seneca V finally rolled to a stop less than thirty feet from a black Land Rover, the pilot cut off the engine. They had just landed at a private airstrip some fifteen miles outside of Georgetown, Guyana. Two men, both wearing white guayabera shirts, were leaning against the vehicle, their arms crossed, waiting.

  Marco climbed out of the cabin of the small plane and stepped down onto the wing. He braced himself against the plane with his left hand to maintain his balance and then hopped down onto the ground. He walked over to the Land Rover.

  “Sorry if I kept you fellas waiting,” he said in English, shaking hands with the two men. His accent sounded like a caricature of what Hollywood thought a Texas accent should sound like.

  “Welcome to Guyana,” said the taller of the two. He was at least six-three, in his late-thirties, and had the look of a military man. “I am Lieutenant Colonel Cedric Bostwick and my associate here is Rafael Perez. Major Perez is a member of Cuban intelligence and is attached to my staff in Georgetown.”

  Both men were dressed in civilian clothes and Perez, the Cuban, was wearing a white Panama hat pulled down low over his brow. Bostwick’s crisply pressed white linen shirt contrasted starkly with his dark skin. The loose-fitting shirt was untucked to conceal the handgun he was almost certainly carrying.

  “Thank you for meeting with me, gentleme
n,” said Marco. He had never before met either man, but the intelligence bios he’d received the day before made him feel as if he’d known them all his life.

  The Guyanese colonel smiled and nodded, motioning with his hand toward the vehicle.

  “We retain a small house a few minutes from here,” he said. “We’ll be more comfortable speaking there.”

  The driver of the black SUV spun the vehicle around and headed in the direction of the trees and away from the airstrip, kicking up dust and gravel in its wake. Three minutes later, the vehicle pulled up in front of a rambling, single-story white-stucco house. Marco noticed that several terracotta tiles appeared to be missing from the front side of the roof, most likely the result of a recent storm.

  Off in the distance, perhaps a hundred yards away, he also noticed a much larger, more substantial building that appeared to be an old plantation home. This was probably the plantation foreman’s house, thought Marco of the building they were about to enter.

  Two armed guards in military uniforms flanked either side of the front door to the smaller house. The driver quickly got out of the vehicle and walked around to open the passenger door for the colonel. The Cuban and Marco each opened their own doors.

  Both guards snapped to attention as the three men walked past them and into the house.

  A butler dressed in white met them in the large front hall and escorted them into a small, cozy room just off to the left. He was an older man, probably in his early sixties. Marco suspected he was most likely a retired soldier whose duties consisted of much more than merely household chores.

  The old man adjusted the sheer curtains covering the floor-to-ceiling windows to help filter the bright sun while allowing the light into the room.

  “So, Mr. Marco—that name works for me, since I realize that whatever name you choose to go by is probably just a pseudonym anyway—tell us about your proposal,” said Bostwick, removing a Dunhill cigarette from the wood-lined silver box on the table and lighting it.