State of Emergency

CHAPTER 6


Palmer leaned back, stretching as if he’d not slept in days. “Sources put a Venezuelan arms dealer named Valentine Zamora in Uzbekistan eleven days ago,” Palmer said. “That’s less than a week before Cooper sent the texts. Look up ‘sick bastard’ in the dictionary and you’ll find this guy’s photo.”

“Why don’t we just pick him up?” Quinn asked the obvious.

“We’re playing a little waiting game. Special Purpose Islamic Regiment of Chechnya has claimed responsibility for the St. Petersburg bombing. So far, no one is taking credit for San Francisco.”

Quinn nodded. More than a few jihadi groups would jump at the chance to work in concert with the Chechens toward a common goal. SPIR had no qualms about killing dozens of Russian schoolchildren if it furthered their purposes. It was well within reason to think they would move to dirty bombs if given the opportunity. If they couldn’t get their hands on a weapon of mass destruction, a weapon of mass distraction would do.

“First reports are saying the bombs in both California and Russia detonated near or in ATMs. They went off within minutes of each other, presumably loaded with the nuclear material smuggled in by the dead college students.”

“SPIR and al-Qaeda have plenty of ties to each other.” Thibodaux shrugged.

“They do,” Palmer said, “but the methods here suggest a high level of sophistication we’ve not seen from these organizations. We’re talking about groups who both hate us but can’t agree among themselves over their own brand of dogma. Someone with a certain amount of control over both is running the show here.”

“And you believe that person is Zamora?” Quinn mused, half to himself. Palmer wasn’t the type to blame organizations for bad behavior. He believed all terrorist acts could generally be traced back to a single despot pulling the strings. So far, he’d been proven correct.

“The Bureau suits have their eyes on a couple of Hezbollah possibles their agents followed out of Bishkek the day after Cooper was killed. One is an Iranian student named Naseer al-Karradi. His uncle is a nuclear scientist for the regime. Langley likes a Saudi merchant they tagged in Tashkent shortly after Cooper’s murder. They link him to a plan to get a Soviet man-portable antiaircraft missile into Manhattan.”

“They still got eyes on their suspects?” Quinn asked.

“Both Karradi and the Saudi are in the wind,” Palmer said. “Every asset in Asia and Europe is looking for these guys. We don’t know who’s allied with who or, more importantly, who has the bomb.”

“Why doesn’t the Bureau like Zamora as the coordinator?” Quinn asked.

“Profilers at Quantico believe he’s too unstable to carry out this kind of orchestrated action.” Palmer leaned back, looking skyward to stretch his neck. “To be honest, it’s hard to disagree. Everyone who’s met him says he bounces all over the place—erratic and flighty like a BB in a boxcar. But he was in Uzbekistan and he’s a killer. I don’t care what the Feebs say, this is too important to rule him out just yet.”

“Let’s go get him then,” Thibodaux said.

“I’d like nothing more than to have you jerk a knot in this guy’s ass, Jacques,” Palmer said. “But that wouldn’t get us very far. Interrogation won’t do us any good at all if the bomb is moved. If he does have it, chances are his people would move it the moment we pick him up. NSA is up on all the phones we know about, but he’s got access to some pretty sophisticated technology so who knows what we’re missing. We need to watch for a few days, see what we can learn. The FBI can look for their boy from Bishkek. Langley can follow theirs. I want you two to check out Zamora.”

Palmer reached into his jacket pocket to produce a folded piece of computer paper.

“I’ll send an encrypted file with what we have to each of your phones. But the small screen won’t do justice to the twisted sort of man we’re dealing with. Zamora supplies heavy weapons to the Zetas Cartel in Mexico, among others.” He handed the document to Quinn, who held it so Thibodaux could look as well.

Palmer looked away, apparently having seen enough.

“The dead girl was a student from the University of Matamoros. She wrote a thesis indicting the cartel’s cruelty toward regular citizens, so they kidnapped her and made a gift of her to Zamora.” He nodded at the photograph. “Informants in the cartel say he did this for no particular reason but to impress a sadistic girlfriend.”

In another venue the girl in the picture would have been pretty. The stark whiteness of naked flesh under the flash of the crime scene photo made even Quinn, who had seen more than his share of carnage, flinch in disgust. She was stripped of her clothing and bound to a wooden bedframe on a blood-soaked mattress. Someone had traced a sloppy outline of her body with gunfire, stitching the bed with a dotted line of bullet holes. Zamora hadn’t been any too careful with his aim, taking bits of flesh and shards of bone every few shots. One of the poor girl’s elbows was completely gone. Her left ear, the opposite knee, and right shoulder suffered the same grisly fate. A single gunshot to the center of her chest had finally ended her agony—presumably when Zamora and his girlfriend had grown bored with their game.

Quinn’s gut turned. The sight of any woman in pain made him associate the victim with his own daughter or ex-wife, so much so that he had to check himself when he was around them or become maniacally overprotective.

“I think I might throw up,” the big Cajun groaned. “I’m really gonna enjoy gettin’ my hands on this shithead.”

“Good to hear,” Palmer said, “because I want you in Florida in three days. Zamora likes to present himself as the globetrotting playboy—extravagant parties dripping with women and booze, expensive cars, ski getaways to the Alps on a whim. He hosts a track day in Homestead twice a year.” Palmer looked at Quinn. “Fancies himself quite the motorcycle racer, so this should be right up your alley. I’d like you both to try and get close to him. See if you catch anything that would indicate he’s got the bomb. If you don’t get anywhere, then we’ll pick him up as a last resort and . . . talk to him.”

Thibodaux bounced on his feet. Even his flattop seemed to stand a little taller. “Hang on now, sir,” he said. “You mean I actually get to follow Chair Force on a mission?”

During the last two major operations, the mountainous Cajun had been forced to stay behind while Quinn traveled overseas. He made no secret of the fact that as a Marine used to being the tip of the spear, he’d been more than chapped over such an arrangement.

Palmer chuckled. “Mrs. Miyagi says it’s about time you earned your keep.”

The Cajun darkened. “She would say something like that.”

Since they’d been recruited to work for Palmer, Emiko Miyagi had become the men’s official trainer and quartermaster. A more enigmatic woman Quinn had never met. Perhaps it was because Japanese was one of the five languages he spoke, but she’d seemed to have an instant affection for him. For whatever reason, Thibodaux brought little more than a resigned sigh of barely hidden disdain.

“Chin up, Jacques,” Quinn said. “She’ll eventually warm to you.”

Palmer rose from the marble bench to brush off the front of his suit.

“One thing,” Quinn said, standing along with him. He reached in the pocket of his leather jacket and took out a crumpled blue bandana. “Regarding that little roadblock I was telling you about in Old Town. If you could have these identified it might lead us to who the Speaker is working with.”

Palmer looked inside the bandana. “I certainly pick the right sort of man for these jobs.” He smirked. “But this is the last time you’re allowed to give me the finger.” He rolled up the bandana and slipped it inside the pocket of his suit coat, apparently unbothered that it contained severed human body parts. “Mrs. Miyagi will set you up with a race bike to help you cozy up to Zamora. I think you could use a little female help down there.”

Thibodaux’s head snapped around. “You mean to tell me she’s coming with us? Oh, this should be rich—”

“You misunderstand me, Jacques.” Palmer winked. “Not Mrs. Miyagi. I have someone else in mind. This one’s a killer, though—make no mistake about that.”

Quinn groaned. He knew full well who the boss would send. His gut tightened at the thought. Sadistic, gunrunning terrorists notwithstanding, it was this woman who was likely to get him killed.