CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

Kelly pulled into the main NSA complex at ten on Saturday morning. The security guard recognized him and smiled. He still double-checked the picture ID. Nothing to chance at the nation’s most clandestine spy agency. Kelly parked and made his way to his office, his mind already alive with some of the options he could use to build the file for Brent Hawkins.

The recent death of Brian Palmer, the CIA agent who had succumbed to a hail of bullets in an alley in La Paz, Bolivia, was a tragedy. It was one that he could use to their advantage. The Central Intelligence Agency was keeping the entire affair under wraps. Nothing had been released to the press, and according to the files he had managed to dredge up, Palmer’s family was being paid to keep quiet. Kelly suspected the CIA had stuck their fingers in a politically incorrect pie, and now they were scrambling about trying to keep a lid on it. What they had done was a complete unknown, but that didn’t matter. What did matter was that by using Brian Palmer as the source for the information on the undiscovered tomb at Monte Alban, he was using a source that could not be substantiated.

The space around his office was empty, the computer screens dark. Some departments of the NSA were nine-to-five on the weekdays, and his was one of them. Not a bad thing—it gave him privacy and a quiet space to work. He hit the power button on his computer, then headed to the coffee room and brewed a fresh pot of medium roast. When he returned to his office, his system had cleared the internal security checks and was online. He sat at the desk, sipping the coffee.

The first thing he did was check the status of Taylor’s bank account in the Bahamas. With the account number and password, he was inside the bank’s mainframe in under two minutes. Her account was active with a balance of just over twenty-three thousand dollars. That was good—it gave them a legitimate account to deposit the money into once they had transferred it out of Edward Brand’s. He closed the link and returned to the NSA prompt. Kelly unlocked his drawer and pulled out a file. Inside was the information on Brian Palmer he had sent to the printer the previous evening. He reread the file.

Palmer had been stationed out of Mexico City for three years. He was single but dating another operative, a distinct no-no but something that the field office had chosen to overlook. Most of the time he had spent in the field was drug related—Bolivia, Columbia and Mexico. On three occasions, he had traveled to Oaxaca City. The most recent trip to the central Mexican city was six months ago, but Kelly figured he could work with that. He highlighted a few passages, got his dates straight, then started to type.

An hour later he printed the file and reviewed it. The format was standard for a field operative, but classified. Very few eyes would be privy to the contents. The gist of the report was that Palmer had met with a Mexican late at night on June 15, but the meet had gone wrong from minute one. The man had insisted he found a cache of treasure atop the plateau at Monte Alban. He wanted the CIA to get the treasure out and protect him from the Mexican authorities and an entire list of corrupt and violent locals who would want in on the find. Palmer had refused. The next night the man had been found in a field bordering the city with his throat sliced open and his eyes gouged out. That sparked Palmer to look at the validity of the man’s claim.

He then visited Monte Alban and from what the Mexican had told him, managed to locate the cave. Inside were gold artifacts, many encrusted with precious stones. The find was just off the north end of the plateau, along a narrow and dangerous path. It was set into the side of the mountain, the entrance concealed by large rocks that appeared to be part of the natural landscape. Palmer had reported the find to his immediate superior, who had in turn taken the report directly to the deputy director of the CIA. In a two-hour meeting that involved only the three men, it had been decided that there was no upside to the agency getting involved. A Mexican citizen had been murdered, and any hint of CIA activity in the area would only end up in a lot of unnecessary finger pointing. The report was closed and buried in with the other dead case files. Six months later, Brian Palmer had been murdered in Bolivia. End of story.

Kelly reviewed the text a few times, correcting it so the writing wasn’t too polished and ensuring it read like a real field file. Then he accessed the CIA database and looked for somewhere to plant it. Covert personnel were employed under the Directorate of Operations, so he immediately went to that section. His status with the NSA allowed him to bypass a couple of firewalls, but there were additional security measures in place that attempted to stop his progress as he ventured deeper into the system.

He skirted the secondary firewalls and found a spot he thought would work well. It was a section of the hard drive dedicated to reports by field operatives working Central and South America. Mexico was close enough. The file had Monte Alban as a keyword, and anyone searching for information on the Mexican ruins would find it. Even the FBI.

Kelly powered off the computer and leaned back in his chair. The bait was in place. He called Taylor and gave her the story he had concocted. And got the good news. Ricardo had checked in with her. He had found Carlos Valendez, and the doors to Edward Brand were beginning to open. Pieces of the puzzle were fitting together.

Taylor and Adolfo would be getting the treasure in place, and if things went well, Ricardo would be meeting with Edward Brand inside the next twenty-four to forty-eight hours. The bank account they needed for the transfer was verified and ready for the deposit. The satellite phone Brand would use to make the call from atop the mountain was operational. Because he and Taylor had set up the phone account, Kelly knew the number and the password. That enabled him to trace and monitor the call without being seen. Everything ready to go. The details taken care of. Now there were only two questions that remained to be answered.

Would Alan Bestwick be there when Ricardo met with Edward Brand?

And would Edward Brand take the bait?