Exposure (Jackson Chase Novella Book 1) (6 page)

T
he long halls
of the US Embassy in Bangkok were busy, with clusters of State Department workers moving from, room to room, meeting to meeting. The black and white marble floor magnified the din of conversations being held in English, with a smattering of Thai.

“Here you are, gentlemen,” said our escort from the Military Attaché’s office as she opened the tall door to a conference room.

Sterba and I nodded our thanks and entered.

Seated at the table were Lt. Commander Haley Chen and a man I assumed to be our CIA contact in the hunt for Slater. They rose and came around the table to greet us.

“Commander Chen,” I said, shaking her hand. While she was one step senior in rank, we did not salute, as we were both in civilian clothes.

“Hello, Lieutenant,” she said, and then turned to Sterba. “Chief.”

She wore slacks with a blouse and jacket. And while the jacket was loose, I could see why Joe mentioned that Naval uniforms had been hiding something there.

The CIA man extended his hand. “Nice to meet you, Lieutenant. My name is Landon Clark. Station Chief.”

As Station Chief, Clark would be the head spook here. Both Sterba and I regarded him carefully. I put him near sixty, with thinning hair more gray than brown. His suit was well cut, but also well worn. He exuded a level of comfort, or, more accurately, confidence without arrogance.

“Nice to meet you as well. Expected your title to be Agricultural Attaché or something silly like that,” I said with a smile.

He chuckled. “Only on occasion. I’m too old for those games any longer.”

I gestured to Sterba, “Chief Joe Sterba.”

He reached to shake Sterba’s hand, his face turning from a amused to serious instantly. “Chief, please know that I am very sorry to hear about the men you lost on the mission in Afghanistan.”

His sincerity was genuine. You could tell he had lost men in the field before, and understood the burden Sterba carried.

“Thank you, sir. They were good men,” Sterba replied.

“So let’s talk about getting the asshole that killed them,” said Clark.

And with that, the concerns Sterba and I had that we’d get the bureaucratic runaround washed away.

“Let’s do that,” I said, and we all took a seat.

C
lark took
it upon himself to bring us up to speed.

“Caleb Slater joined the agency about 25 years ago. He worked the Eastern Bloc, and then spent some time handling Central America before moving to the Middle East.”

“Lot of stations,” Sterba observed.

“He’s from the old guard, like me. We went where we were needed,” Clark said.

He folded his hands together and continued. “A lot of the kids the Agency hires now call us dinosaurs. Makes us laugh to a certain degree. But we know that while our actions may have strayed outside the lines somewhat, we always did what was right for the country.

“I say this to make the point that while Slater was older, we don’t consider him one of the dinosaurs. My sense on the guy was that he was always a bit slippery. Like a snake.”

“You worked together?” Sterba asked.

“Not directly, no. But we came across each other here and there. Always gave me the feeling he was up to something.”

“As our present situation has shown,” I said. “What have you both come up with?”

Chen picked up the baton.

“The hit we picked up here was accessing a cloud storage site,” she began.

“Once Slater was identified as the shooter in Afghanistan, his aliases were flagged. This usually means passports and credit cards in cover names. Nothing popped up.

“But over the past year, the Agency has been going back over aliases to add online identities associated with the cover names. Our best guess is that Slater didn’t know that the Agency was back-filling these data.”

“Could you get a location?”

“That’s what we’ve been working on. I was, ah,” she said hesitating, “trying to go through proper channels, and, Mr. Clark had to give me a little help.”

Clark laughed. “I’ll tell you, the Lieutenant here is smart. But she’s a little too nice. I gave her a hand busting some chops.”

Chen smiled. “Mr. Clark does have a colorful way about him. And it’s effective.”

I was beginning to like this guy.

“So what have you got?” asked Sterba.

“We were able to get the IP address,” Chen continued. “An Internet café by Wat Pho.”

“Which one is that?” asked Sterba. Fair enough. Most of us think of the temples by the various poses of Buddha.

“The one with the reclining Buddha, Joe,” I said.

“Have you sent someone over?” Sterba asked.

Clark nodded. “I’ve had someone on the place since the commander figured it out yesterday. No joy.”

“You guys talk to the owner?” Joe asked.

“No. Don’t think it would help. Place is mostly automated for the computers, and you could go in and out without ever talking to the staff.”

“So it’s a waiting game,” I said.

“Maybe,” Clark said. “More likely he got what he needed and won’t use the card or the café again.”

I looked over at Sterba, and he looked how I felt. Like someone just served us a shit sandwich.

“The commander has been working another angle,” he said, turning the stage over to Chen.

“Mr. Clark explained to me how cover identities are created and used. It occurred to me that there would be unused identities as well.”

“Do you mean identities he was issued that he hadn’t used?” asked Joe.

“Those were already in the net, but same idea,” Chen replied. “I abstracted out one degree.” Seeing the confused look on our faces, she put it into simpler terms.

“Say your own cover IDs were blown,” she said to me. “And Joe is your friend, also in the CIA.”

“I’d say, ‘Hey Joe, do you have an ID without that big, ugly face of yours on it that I could use?’”

Sterba shot me the finger.

Chen carried on, ignoring him. “Exactly. Mr. Clark has been going through all of Slater’s operations since he’s been in Afghanistan. We’ve pulled the names of every agent along with their known cover IDs and added them to the mix.”

“Nice solution,” I said. “No hits yet?”

“Plenty of them,” she said. “But none in Thailand. So by all appearances, they’re being used legitimately. That search query is active, though, just in case. We’ll be pinged if the names pop.”

Clark picked up the conversation. “This morning, I was explaining to the commander that Agency-issued IDs are only part of the search. Us dinosaurs used to have some backups in place,” Clark said.

“You had your own false identities created without the Agency knowing,” I said.

He nodded. “Sad fact is your fears about getting burned can get the best of you, and you begin seeing shadows in every corner. There’s a point that every operative reaches when you know you have to look out for number one. So you purchase some paper and create an identity or two that the watchers at Langley don’t know about.”

Chen continued, “Mr. Clark explained that while readily available, these identities are just that. Passport, credit card good for a short term, and sometimes a social security number. As Mr. Clark explains it, that’s the difference between a legend and an identity. Legends, such as the ones the CIA creates for case officers, have depth and real-world backstops. The phone number on a business card is answered. A search of a university’s database will show name, grades, and even test scores. IDs from the street generally don’t have that depth.”

“But since they’re bought on the streets, they’re still untraceable, right?” I asked.

“Yes,” Chen answered. “For the most part.”

I leaned forward and put my arms on the table, gesturing with my hands for her to continue.

“Some have mismatches. The social security number has already been assigned to a different name, typically someone deceased. Sometimes, just a random number. That’s one identifying factor.”

“Another identifier,” she continued, “is that by their very nature, they’re thin. The name or social has never popped up on a credit check. Or there’s only one credit card. One card is a red flag, since most people in the Western world tend to have at least two.”

“So,” I recapped, “you have mismatches and ‘thin’ IDs. Even if you could see them all, there would be millions, I would guess.”

“Yes,” she replied. “But those data points are a start. I’ve been working on writing some queries that map those factors against a narrowed geography and time range. I can then narrow the vectors by eliminating top tourist hotels and attractions.”

Sterba chimed in, “Commander, I only understood about half of what you said. But it sounds like you’re trying to pull information from a lot different sources.”

Chen nodded. “Yes, I’m running these strings against several databases that typically don’t interface. It hasn’t been easy.”

“What can we do to help?” I asked.

“Not much right now,” she said. “Unless you know how to write database queries?” She smiled. I realized that it was the first time I’d seen her smile. It was nice, warm, without being condescending, considering she’d just pointed out that I had little by way of computer skills.

“Afraid I can’t,” I said.

“Well, thanks to Mr. Clark, I have the access I need. Now I just need a little more time to finish writing the code.”

Her eyebrows raised, and we knew she was looking for a little more time to complete her work.

Clark read the signal, too, “Gentlemen, how about I show you around while we give Commander Chen some time?”

O
utside the embassy
, Clark turned to Sterba and I. “I imagine that despite the cold trail, you’d like to see the Internet café?”

“You read my mind, Mr. Clark,” I said.

“Call me Landon, please.”

“Call me hungry,” said Joe.

Clark laughed. “I’ll take care of you, Chief. There’s a great place for curry across the street from the café.”

“It’s Joe, Landon. And the last time someone said he would take care of my needs, he took me to see a bunch of little old ladies!”

I laughed. “Yeah, but you loved it.”

“I did,” he admitted with a smile. “Let’s eat.”

We could have taken an embassy car, but elected to pile into a tuk-tuk instead. When in Rome ... .

S
eated
at the small restaurant across from the Internet café, it was clear that Slater had chosen the place well. The street was busy, and the odd sizes and shapes of the buildings around the café provided cover and the maze of alleys offered opportunities for counter surveillance. It was also a dump of a place, with an assortment of dirty tourists coming in and out. Dressed the right way, he could easily come and go completely unnoticed.

“Think he’s staying in this neighborhood?” Joe asked.

“Hmmm,” Clark started, “tradecraft in this sort of a situation varies. You can stay on this side of the street and watch the café for surveillance before or after using the facility. But better, I think, to put a little distance between you and any footprint you may have left.”

“I think you’re right that he’s not coming back,” I said.

Clark simply nodded.

A waitress came to the table and asked to take our order.

“You mind?” Clark asked.

“Go right ahead.”

Clark proceeded to order in rapid Thai. But it quickly became more of a dialog than simply ordering lunch.

I had passed through here a few times when I was young, and knew only a small amount of the language.

But enough to gather that only a part of that conversation had to do with food.

The waitress left. I raised my eyebrows at Clark, not saying a thing.

Joe looked puzzled, and Clark turned to address him. “The Lieutenant here seems to know a bit of Thai,” he said with a smile.

He then turned to me. “You’re very observant, Jackson. That was Kong. She is one of the locals that help me out from time to time.”

“You just happen to have an asset working across the street from that particular café?” Joe asked suspiciously.

Clark smiled. “No, Joe. Not that convenient, I’m afraid. Kong is a bit of a freelancer. She’s pretty resourceful, and can really be placed anywhere she might be needed. The Thai people are extremely kind and accommodating. She simply asked the owner of the restaurant for a job for a few days. Wanted to earn enough to buy her mum a nice gift, the story may have been. Works more often than you’d think.”

Joe and I relaxed. I was really starting to like this guy.

“Did she have an update?” I asked.

“No joy,” he said. “And to be honest, I told her that she could drop the assignment after today. I think we’ve covered this base.”

“Agreed.”

And with that, Kong reappeared with three Singha beers.

“Korp kun krap, Kong,” I said as she set them on the table.

With barely an accent she said, “You’re welcome.” She had a nice, hearty smile.

“Cheers,” Joe said, raising his glass.

In the warm, humid air of the city, the sweating beer bottle felt almost as good as that first sip tasted.

“Have you worked with Commander Chen long?” Clark asked.

I shook my head. “Came across her twice on the
Stennis
, and then had a few debriefings with her after the mission in Afghanistan. That’s about it, until today.”

“Well, Jackson, I have to say that I’ve been around military and government employees for the better part of forty years, and my impression from the past day is that she’s quite unique.”

Sterba, showing himself to be the one with even less tact and discipline than myself, couldn’t help himself. “You mean that unique wrapping of hotness around complete nerdiness? Or the fact that her legs are a mile long?”

Clark let out a roar of a laugh. “Not exactly what I meant, Joe. She has what one might call ‘command-reluctance’. She’s a little unsure of her place, despite the clearly defined command structure of government service.”

I nodded. “She does seem a little shy. But when the talk turns to tech, she hits her stride.”

“Exactly,” Clark said. “I have to tell you that from what I’ve seen over the past day, she would run circles around the analysts at the Agency.”

Joe and I looked at each other. Given Clark’s experience, that was a pretty big statement.

Clark went on, “Her conceptual thinking, paired with some amazing technical skills are very impressive. She was hitting some databases that it would take me a week’s worth of requests to get information from - if we could have accessed them at all. Please don’t take this the wrong way, but I am really surprised the NSA or a big tech company didn’t grab her out of school.”

I could tell that Joe was as surprised to hear this as I was.

“Sounds like our sexy nerd’s got some skills,” Sterba observed.

She’s also got something that isn’t quite adding up. But my thoughts were cut short by our food arriving.

O
f all the
places I’ve been over the course of a life spent in sailing and in war, the food in Thailand will always hold a place at the top. If the culture here is centered first around Buddhism, the second thing held closest to the Thai heart is the food.

Our lunch showed just that. Clark had ordered well, and while the dishes were simple, the flavors were beautifully complex. Before us were a papaya salad, a green ginger chicken curry, and a red prawn curry. And while each of us knew that we should keep an eye on the café across the street, I don’t think Joe’s left the table for a second.

As Clark and I watched him deftly scoop out the last of the red curry with a spoonful of rice, my cell phone buzzed. A number I didn’t recognize, but showing the Thai country code.

“Chase.”

“Lieutenant, it’s Commander Chen.”

“How are things going, Commander?” I asked.

“Things are going well. I have a decent data set. I should be able to narrow it to just a few by the time you get back.”

“Excellent. Want us to bring you anything?”

“No, thank you. Embassy service took care of me. Hope you tried the papaya salad there.”

“It was fantastic. How did you ... ”

“See you here shortly, Lieutenant,” she said and disconnected the call.