Incitement (4 page)

Pulling his gaze from the view out the rear window, he removed a laptop from its case and powered it up. He opened the browser, logged on and accessed a free e-mail account, the name and
password of which corresponded to the day’s date. He found the message he was looking for, opened it and copied the text into the buffer. He then deleted the message and closed the browser.
After firing up a specially written decryption program, Wallace pasted the text he had copied into the decryption editor and clicked on an icon. The gibberish was immediately translated into an
intelligible message, which Wallace quickly scanned.

As he read, a smile spread across his face. The progress report could not have been more encouraging. After what had seemed an eternity spent on getting things up-and-running, it was now well on
schedule. Again, this was a testament to identifying the best personnel and stopping at nothing to secure their services. When he had finished reading, he closed the decryption program and ran a
custom-written program to delete all history files. After powering the laptop off, he ejected the disk-drive and, after removing a Swiss Army knife from his inside pocket, he opened the screwdriver
tool and placed the head of it close to the spindle. Driving down hard he punctured a hole in the disk-drive and after repeating the manoeuvre twice, he reinserted the disk-drive and put the laptop
back in its case.

After a few seconds mulling over what he had read, Wallace reached for the intercom and buzzed the chauffeur. “Greg, any word on the plane?”

“Fuelled up and waiting, Mr Wallace.”

“Excellent. After you’ve dropped me off, there’s a laptop that needs to be disposed of in the usual fashion.”

“Very good, Mr Wallace.”

Mesi had spent most of the day working in the sweltering heat and reckoned there was only a couple more hours of good light left. She and the others working on the search were
hoping to find signs of the attackers’ movements or ideally the site of a base camp. Over time, she had steadily worked her way further and further from the refinery. She stopped to take a
drink from her canteen and tie back her hair from her face. Pulling out a handkerchief to wipe away some of the sweat, she turned to look back in the direction from which she had come. Her view of
the refinery was now blocked by the hills she had walked over. A childhood memory sprang to mind, of being so absorbed in a treasure hunt at a friend’s birthday party that the parents had to
send out search parties when she had not returned.

Before they had split, Ruben had spent some time showing her and the other two team members how he conducted his search. He had explained what he was doing as he went and the logic he was using.
As was often the case, it all seemed straightforward once it had been broken down. In the short time they had been with him, he had managed to identify three possible sniper points, two of which
had almost certainly been the shooters’ locations. Given her lack of experience she found herself doubting her ability to replicate his success but she was determined to give it her best
shot.

Ruben had asked her to concentrate on a particular area, and rather than mechanically working her way over that entire section, she had decided to approach this as she would any other task.
First, she needed a way to narrow the criteria. Studying a map of the area, she drew a circle with a seven-mile radius around the refinery. Given the terrain and the dangerous nature of the attack,
this was surely the maximum reasonable distance the attackers would have wanted to march. Then she highlighted the part which fell into her search area. From there, she had tried to split the
remainder into smaller parts, sorted in order of the security they would have afforded the attackers. She eliminated a section that lay toward Conchillo and another that lay alongside the
compound’s entrance route. This had left about fifteen degrees of the original circle, mostly to the north and west of the compound. Ruben had told them not to try to cover every square foot,
to scan and look for disturbances, but even so, it was time-consuming work and she could see that she was unlikely to finish before dark. Putting the canteen away, she resumed the search.

While Mesi had been performing the repetitive work, she thought about what lay ahead in her new role. One of the things that impressed her most about Campas and his men was how well developed
their sense of team spirit was. Individuals took pride in their abilities but there were no overbearing egos putting their own advancement before the larger objective. She had taken some courses in
organisational behaviour at college and read quite a lot on motivational theory. The success of any team depended on more than just assembling a number of talented individuals. One of her primary
tasks would be giving her team something they could be proud to belong to.

As the light started to dim, she began to question herself. Had she been wrong in her estimate of how far the soldiers could have marched? Had her process of elimination been flawed? Had she
already missed the signs?

She was just about to stop when she saw the tyre tracks. There was no mistaking the relatively fresh imprints of the heavy tyre thread belonging to some kind of four-wheel-drive vehicle. It
looked like more than one vehicle had intersected her search pattern. She decided to follow the tracks back towards the compound. After twenty minutes of tantalising pacing, the tracks converged
near a slight rise. She was sure she had discovered the general location of the campsite. She quartered the area and began searching. Occasionally she would lie down close to the ground in a
press-up position as Ruben had demonstrated and tried to spot any signs of an unnatural lie to the earth. She knew professionals would take care to cover any disturbance they made, but maybe ...
However, each time she thought she had something, she was disappointed.

The light had deteriorated significantly and while Mesi was confident that this was the campsite, she would have to return tomorrow with the others. She had just got out her walkie-talkie to
radio back when something caught her eye. She walked toward it and as she got closer she realised there was more than one. She bent down and broke into a smile, before picking up one of the items
with a tweezers and examining it. She placed it carefully in a zip-lock evidence bag.

While the noisy humming of the dilapidated air-conditioning units drove many of the hotel’s guests to distraction, there was no complaint from this room. The occupant lay
on top of the bedspread, clad in shorts with a damp towel draped across his face. He had expected the lethargy. For as long as he could remember, the aftermath of any operation or manoeuvre had
always been accompanied by this strong feeling of anticlimax.

Larsen thought of his earliest days in the Corps, coming back after completing the diving to the wrecks scattered around the torpedo station at Kongsøre. The exercise involved the
recruits being subjected to gunfire while explosives were set off all around. Most of them were elated to successfully negotiate it the first time. The adrenaline firing through their systems
manifested in raised voices and boisterous horseplay. Larsen had smiled and played along with his comrades, joining them later for copious amounts of beer, but even then he had always felt somehow
apart, removed.

He could understand what most other people went through before, during and after such an experience, the tension and release, but it was not like that for him. He had found that his release, his
‘high’, came during rather than afterwards. For a long time, the sense of purpose he felt during an operation had provided him with everything he needed. He trained to a fine edge and
then applied that training. When the mission was over, the mood would recede rapidly and he would feel himself coming down. It was different now of course; action in itself had long ceased to be
enough but the familiar descent afterwards still ensued.

A few hours passed before he removed the towel to stand and idly perform a series of gentle stretches as he assembled his thoughts. The refinery at Conchillo had constituted a major step up as
far as the scale of target was concerned and everything was in place for the next phase. It was dangerous to linger in Mexico City after the attack but he wanted to monitor the cartel’s
reaction, to ensure it played out as predicted. Their targets should be aware of the incident by now and Larsen anticipated a flurry of activity; the early beginnings of a slow process of
deterioration. Nothing too obvious yet, though. One attack, even one as significant as Conchillo, would not be enough to push them all the way. Moving through to the bathroom, he showered quickly
then dressed. He grabbed the keys for the rental car and headed out.

“Cigarette butts?” Albert Sandoval repeated in puzzlement. “I don’t understand.”

Minister for the Interior Richard Mayorga expanded on exactly what had been found so that his chief political advisor might grasp the significance. “The ends of a particular brand of
cigarette, Classic, manufactured by ...” Looking at the report in front of him, he mangled the pronunciation, “... by Duvanska Industrija Nis. It’s a company based in the former
Yugoslavia. The brand is popular in the region but rare elsewhere.”

“So what, one of the gunmen smoked some foreign cigarettes?”

“Campas thinks it’s relevant, based on a discussion he had at a conference in Europe a few months ago. He was told that Kosovar organised crime figures weren’t happy that they
were getting a fair share of the proceeds from their joint venture with the South Americans. That was the term that was used: South Americans. He didn’t attach any significance to it at the
time but with this ...”

“What would their unhappiness have to do with Conchillo?” Sandoval asked.

“The Alliance: Zaragosa and Madrigal, the Colombian, have been working together closely for the past few years. To hostile eyes, there might be no distinction between Mexican or Colombian
targets.”

“Has Campas got anything else?”

“The investigation indicates a mercenary-style attack, and mercenaries are in abundant supply in the Balkans. That’s about it so far. Needless to say, this is speculative and highly
confidential but we need to be prepared should more corroborating evidence be found.”

“Surely no one’s crazy enough to directly challenge the cartels or the Colombians? It would be suicide.”

“My reaction exactly but according to Campas, the Kosovar mafia are an explosive cocktail of traditional gangsters, Islamic fundamentalists and ex-military. They’ve emerged as the
dominant force in Europe, pushing out the Italian, Pakistani and Lebanese gangs. He says they’re renowned for their savagery.”

“Well, if he’s correct, we’ll certainly need to keep an eye on things.” Sandoval rose from his chair. “Anyway, I think we’ve covered all of the topics on the
agenda. Would it be okay if I finish a little early today? Millie’s parents are coming over and I’ve been told to be home on time for once.”

“Of course, please say hello from me and that I’m glad we can accommodate your in-laws.”

Albert’s laughter quickly disappeared once he had left the minister’s office. He climbed into his car and, instead of heading home, pointed the car towards the upscale Colonia Roma
area. Soon he was driving down the wide tree-lined streets, flanked on both sides by vast mansions. He pulled the car up outside the gates of a classic Barragán residence, pressed the
intercom and announced himself, looking up into the closed circuit camera. The high gates swept open and a familiar feeling of unease suffused him.

After the frisking from the guards, he was shown into the drawing room where Caesar Rodriguez waited. Unease gave way to palpable discomfort when he came face-to-face with one of the most
powerful figures of the Mexican drug scene. It was not just the man’s position but also the coiled tension he exuded. After his meetings with Rodriguez, Albert would feel drained and grateful
to have just gotten through. How he had come to be in the service of this barbarian tormented him. It was unfair that a few gambling debts should jeopardise the career he had worked so hard at for
the past fifteen years. True, he continued to gamble and accept further credit, but now that he was committed anyway, who could fault him for making the best of a bad situation?

“Albert, you have news?” asked Rodriguez, whose physical characteristics – tall and powerfully built with a leonine head – complimented a naturally imperious manner.

“Yes, I think so ... I mean maybe ... if Campas is correct.” He hated how he always lost his composure in Rodriguez’s presence. Damn it, he had handled foreign heads of state
better.

“Continue.” Caesar indicated for Albert to take a seat on the deep leather couch, while he remained standing.

“They found cigarette butts at the campsite of the raiders, foreign cigarettes not sold here. Apparently they’re a Balkan brand.”

Rodriguez said nothing and when Albert lifted his gaze, it looked as if the drug lord had entered a trance. He stood frozen, gazing into mid-distance. The silence was uncomfortable and Albert
was unsure whether he should break it, terrified that whatever he did would be wrong. One of the few times he had talked with Salvador Campas, the policeman had observed that being head of a cartel
required intelligence, organisational skills and personal charisma. To think of their adversaries as mindless savages was to woefully underestimate them. Already in Rodriguez’s grip at that
point, Albert had enquired about his blackmailer specifically, wanting the investigator’s opinion. Campas smiled and said Rodriguez was an exception, in that he was an equal blend of
intelligence, charisma and mindless savagery.

“Albert, is there anything else?”

“Anything else?” he repeated, startled by Rodriguez’s return to the land of the living.

“Regarding the raid?”

“No, no, nothing else.”

“Okay,” he said, nodding to the door.

Albert levered himself out of the deep couch onto unsteady legs and exited quickly.

They preferred to communicate using a dedicated secure satellite link, purchased and maintained at great cost. However, on rare occasions, when one of them felt it was
warranted, they would meet face-to-face at Madrigal’s island fortress. It was an assembly of the most powerful figures in the world of international narcotics production and trafficking. The
meeting had been going on for an hour now and most of them were content to look on silently as the conversation between their leader and the agitated Rodriguez grew more heated. It had been
difficult for Madrigal. Rodriguez, who was even more volatile than usual, was resisting all measured and logical argument.