Wilkes said, “It’s not like it is here in the US. The cartels control huge swaths of territory in Mexico. Many Mexican institutions, like the police and military, aren’t as well respected or well run as their American counterparts. Imagine you’re a twenty-something Mexican kid who’s been in the military for a few years, getting low pay and being treated like shit, and then you get approached by an old soldier buddy who’ll give you a huge salary increase, women, respect. The Zetas, one of Mexico’s most notorious cartels, started off as a group of bodyguards for another cartel’s leader. Then they were used as a death squad — assassins who killed off rival gang leaders and middlemen, law enforcement or reporters. They began recruiting more and more former military. They had their own training centers and ran the outfit like a professional fighting force. Except for the drugs, booze, and prostitutes, of course.”
Renee’s eyes widened.
Max looked at Wilkes. “I’ve heard that some of the cartels are upgrading their intelligence operations as well.”
Wilkes nodded. “You heard correctly. About a year ago, we began getting intel reports that the Sinaloa cartel had hired a foreign national to run their security and intelligence operations. That’s unheard of among the cartels. Loyalty being at such a premium in that line of business, they like to keep the important jobs to a few key families within each organization.”
“Let me guess, they hired someone from Pakistani ISI?”
“Not exactly. But we think the ISI may be in touch with the person they hired.”
Wilkes took out his phone and tapped the screen a few times, then held it out. Max could see a tall Caucasian man sitting by a pool. The resolution was poor, and it was hard to make out facial features.
“You’re right. He doesn’t look Pakistani.”
Wilkes said, “The name we’ve heard the Sinaloa cartel calling him is Juan Blanco.”
“Blanco?”
Wilkes nodded. “We assume it’s an alias. This is the only photo we have, taken from a satellite while he was at a cartel mansion in Durango. We’ve been unable to intercept any communications with his voice in them. Although we suspect he’s using an echo talker.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s where you have someone else standing next to you by the phone while you write out messages for them to read. As long as you keep changing hardware and locations, it makes it pretty tough for the NSA to find you — no voice ID to run analysis on. An effective technique, if done properly. Some of our analysts peg him as Russian, based on his contacts overseas — the contractors he uses are some of the same ones the Russian mafia uses. But we’ve yet to have one of our agents see him in person.” He shrugged. “It’s only a matter of time. We’ll get better information eventually, but right now he’s a mystery.”
“What makes this mystery man so special, aside from being foreign?”
“In short, he’s good. Hence why we think he’s got experience from a top-level intel organization. He travels almost exclusively in the Durango region, where we don’t have a big footprint. He only deals with the cartel bosses, a few lieutenants, and his own trusted team of sicarios.
“Señor Blanco has professionalized the Sinaloa cartel’s security and countersurveillance operations to a level normally seen only in well-funded national intelligence agencies. The Russians, the Chinese, the Israelis. Within weeks of his arrival, DEA and Mexican counternarcotics programs months in the planning were quickly discovered and rendered useless.
“He’s got them outsourcing cyber help now. The cartel’s communications procedures and cyber-security became much better, making it brutally difficult for law enforcement to eavesdrop and track them. And he’s taken a page out of Los Zetas’ playbook — hiring away Mexican special forces soldiers and professionalizing their hit teams.”
Max said, “So how does this relate to Syed and the dead man… what’s his name?”
“Dahlman.”
“Yes, him.” Max slurped through his straw as he ran out of iced coffee. Renee shot him a look.
Wilkes said, “The man who placed the signal on the bench at Wolf Trap last night was Abdul Syed, a Pakistani intelligence officer. He works out of the embassy in D.C., and the FBI has been surveilling him as long as he’s been in the US.”
Renee said, “Well, then, why did we have to—”
“And he’s been trying to lose the FBI every night for the past several weeks,” Wilkes finished. “Sometimes he succeeded in that endeavor. Other times we only let him think he did. But last night was different. I knew he was going to meet with someone.”
“How did you know?” Renee asked.
“Miss LaFrancois, as much as I am grateful for your participation, there are some things that I do not wish to share. That is one of them.”
Renee folded her arms.
Max said, “So you called the FBI off because… you didn’t want to spook him?”
“Precisely. It was my hope that you, with your exceptional skills, would know what to look for. And unlike the federal agents whose faces Mr. Syed probably knows by heart now, he does not know your handsome mug.”
“You really think I’m handsome? Why, thank you, Caleb.”
Renee rolled her eyes.
“And the FBI counterintelligence guys were okay with this?”
Wilkes didn’t answer the question, which was an answer in itself. Instead, he said, “In using Max, I was able to lull Syed into a false sense of security. I was not aware, however, that Mr. Syed intended to cause harm to his own agent. If I had known that, I would have done things differently. Please accept my sincere apology, both of you, for putting you at risk. I assure you it was not my intention. I only wished to ascertain the identity of Mr. Syed’s agent. Your following him and seeing where he went after receiving his signal was an added bonus.”
Max said, “So Syed dropped off a message to one of his agents, Dahlman. And then the agent gets shot? Who fired the shot? Syed?”
“I doubt it. He wouldn’t pull the trigger. Syed’s a pro. He wouldn’t take that risk. He would hire out for that.”
“That makes sense.”
“That reminds me — from our phone conversation last night, I understand that you didn’t find anything at the scene other than the phone? I can take that now.”
Max slid over the phone he’d picked up.
Wilkes pocketed the phone. “I’ll bring this to the lab.”
Max knew that Wilkes would take it to Langley, and that he might or might not bring this piece of evidence to the attention of the FBI, depending on what he found.
Renee said, “So the question is, why would Syed want his own agent killed? And I’m sorry — what does this have to do with Mexico?”
Wilkes said, “I have an asset in Mexico. She’s close to one of the Sinaloa cartel’s higher-ups — a man by the name of Hector Rojas. Rojas handles all financial matters for the cartel. He travels to Mexico City sporadically, for business. My agent spends time with him when he’s there. A few days ago, Rojas made one of these trips, and my agent was able to alert us to a meeting between Rojas and a known Pakistani intelligence operative who works in Mexico City. We were able to eavesdrop on parts of that conversation.”
Wilkes paused, shaking ice from his cup into his mouth and cracking it in his teeth.
“Rojas implied that our mystery man would be taking part in a meeting later this month. This meeting would include a high-level ISI representative. I assume Syed. The meeting will also include other, unnamed VIPs. They emphasized security measures and some pre-meeting requirements that had to be fulfilled. Hector Rojas indicated that our mystery man approved of an imminent operation that would meet one of these requirements. Then, the next day, an unrelated intelligence source told me that Syed is meeting with one of his American agents. A man we’ve been trying to identify for months.”