Lethal Agent (Mitch Rapp #18)(94)
“Kind of weird,” Coleman said. “But why risk setting it on fire and attracting attention? Are we sure it’s not just a coincidence?”
“It’s not a coincidence,” Rapp said, running a finger along a map hanging on the wall. “The one thing we have going for us is that Halabi fucking despises the United States. I know this asshole better than he knows himself. This isn’t about God. It’s about him. He doesn’t want to infect a bunch of coyotes with YARS and have them running around Mexico randomly spreading it. He burned that warehouse for the same reason he told Esparza to keep his men at a distance. Because he wants this to come from America. He wants everyone to think Allah himself slapped down on us. That we brought this on the world. Not Mexico.”
“If you’re right, then things might be finally moving in our direction,” Claudia said. “The coyotes that operated out of that warehouse were a boutique organization specializing in smuggling contraband in refrigerator trucks. Flawless paperwork and hidden compartments that are almost impossible to detect without cutting the trailer apart.”
“They’re moving slower than we thought,” Rapp said, continuing to study the map. “I’m guessing they stuck to back roads on their way to Mexico City and then hit traffic. After that, they had to load their people and fill the trailer with frozen food. Claudia, if we figure they rolled out of there around the time it burned, where could they be now?”
“Likely somewhere just to the east of Mexico City.”
Rapp used a pencil to create an arc centered on that area of the map. Then he traced multiple similar lines above at roughly fifty-mile intervals, labeling each with a time.
He pointed to the gap between lines marked 12 a.m. and 1 a.m. “The way I see it, we have a fully loaded refrigerator truck somewhere in this band. Claudia, tell the Agency to create a map that’ll give us real-time animation of the sections of road we need to focus on.”
“That shouldn’t be a problem,” she said.
“Scott—what about the people you told me we have in-country?”
“I’ll get Bruno, Wick, and Mas moving south. Two prop planes can be in the air in forty minutes searching the roads in your target area. And we’ve got around another twenty people spread out across the roads from the U.S. to Guatemala. Like I said, no one special, but all perfectly capable of looking for a truck. We’ve also got clear skies and some satellite coverage. But someone’s going to have to tell us how to differentiate a refrigerated truck from a regular one.”
Rapp nodded. “Claudia. Have Irene pull together all her Spanish speakers. If we spot a truck that looks like a good candidate, we’ll phone in a plate number and description. Then Irene’s people can call the company that owns it, confirm it’s theirs, get a final destination, and make sure it’s where it’s supposed to be. How much time do we have?”
“If you’re right about where they are now, it’ll take them at least ten hours to cross into the U.S.”
Rapp finally turned away from the map. There weren’t many things that could make the sweat running down his back turn cold, but this was it. They were trying to cover thousands of square miles in a country where they’d never operated with a team made up of people who had little or no operational experience. No military support. No support from local law enforcement. And a Mexican government that vacillated between useless and openly hostile.
“Should we be putting U.S. authorities on alert that they might have to close the border?” Coleman asked.
Rapp thought about it for a moment and then shook his head. “Once that word goes out, how long until the press gets hold of it? We’ve already had one leak and we know how Halabi reacted. If he gets spooked and turns those people loose in Mexico, we’re screwed.”
“What about additional inspections for refrigerator trucks?” Claudia suggested.
“Same problem,” Rapp said. “There’s no way ISIS doesn’t have people watching the border crossings, and it’s hard to imagine they’d miss our guys going over every refrigerated truck with a fine-toothed comb. Halabi desperately wants to believe this is working. All we have to do is not convince him otherwise.”
“So let’s say we get lucky and find that truck,” Coleman said. “We’ve got RPGs, but that’s going to make a mess. We’ll have half-burned bodies and thawing frozen food all over the place. There’ll be civilians, cops, maybe army. Can we control that?”
Rapp didn’t answer. He’d had a number of strategy sessions with Kennedy on his drive, and neither one of them had come up with a workable plan to keep this in Mexico. It went against every instinct he had, but he’d finally had to resign himself to the fact that the border was just a meaningless line on a map. Attia and the six terrorists he was transporting weren’t the enemy. It was the billions of germs they carried.
“No,” Rapp said finally. “We can’t control it. And that’s why we’re going to let them through.”
“Repeat that?” Claudia said, obviously thinking her less than perfect English had failed her.
“Gary Statham’s got a team standing by in New Mexico. We need that truck to roll across the border without any fireworks. He’ll be waiting for it on the other side.”