Massive Attack (A Guy Niava Thriller Book 1) by Dana Arama (diy ebook reader TXT) 📕

Laura Ashton,

November 15, 2015, 3:25 a.m.

The fact that my boss was hoping to throw me to the hungry dogs, but still allowing me the freedom to choose my own team to work with, showed the importance of the mission. Gordon had told me in secret that he had heard the boss say that I had managed to get the Israelis to cooperate in such a way that he had never seen before and he was “waiting to see when this collaboration turned into extortion.” It was possible he meant the information we received from Guy’s investigation, which had taken us in a completely new direction. It was possible that this collaboration had saved me, forcing him to trust me more than ever, at least for the time being.

The operations room, which had started out with a limited team, had expanded, and was now filled with Marine Corps and the Coast Guard, together with economists, cyber experts, cryptographic personnel and social media experts. The information was flowing from the computers to them and from them to me. I reviewed the information received, then sent it on to the different teams.

On the wall was a huge screen with a map of US shoreline, including a radius of ten kilometers beyond the territorial waters. The map was marked with little green lights, which symbolized ships that could match the description; but the ownership of these ships left no doubt that they were not the ship that Yassin was on. The blue lights marked all the sea vessels which were too small and didn’t match the description. The red lights were vessels which we had not finished investigating.

“I don’t understand.” I was upset with the officer in charge of finding the ship. He now stood frustrated, in front of me. I said, “A helicopter left a certain airstrip on American land and flew beyond our maritime jurisdiction and we don’t know who the aircraft belongs to, where they were flying to and when they will be back?”

As if in response, an officer walked into the room and said, “Ma’am, I think we have identified the flight.”

“And?” I focused on him.

“The helicopter is a private helicopter and belongs to our subject.” He glanced at me, and said, “Not directly, but it does belong to one of his companies. We can connect it to him.”

“Where was he flying to?” his commander inquired.

“According to the flight plan he submitted it was a routine flight along the shoreline.

“And when did he deviate from the flight plan?” I asked.

“He deviated a number of times. The border is not drawn there.” He smiled shyly. “It was a very windy day and so the deviations were accepted.”

“And every time he deviated…?”

“We didn’t send out fighter aircrafts to get him back on track.”

“Not fighter aircrafts, but information? A signal?”

“We will have to go back three days and track the helicopter. We will have to see exactly when he disappeared and who was at the disappearance point, because it didn’t disappear to a stationary target, but to another moving target… Which is most probably since then has been rocking alongside the shore.”

“Do it,” I ordered. And even though it was unnecessary, I added, “Please.”

On my way to the other room I deliberated who I should give the mission of investigating the pilot. To Ross Barkley’s team, which was trying to locate Murat Lenika, or to Musstafa Allimi’s team, which was trying to locate the terrorist cell. I decided that Ross might make use of the information more immediately and so I requested that Linda, whom I had chosen as my personal assistant for this mission, contact Ross Barkley and give him the information we had about the flight, as well as the name of the pilot. I added, “I want to bring him in for questioning as soon as possible.”

“Right away,” she said and turned to her station. Linda had paved her way out of the poverty-stricken neighborhood she’d grown up in, using a program for gifted adolescents. She was barely an adult, and yet was the most efficient person I knew. She had a bright future ahead of her. I’d been impressed with her from the first time we were introduced.

I walked into the next room and checked on their findings. In this room, the economists sat next to the computers, which regurgitated large amounts of paper lined with information on the finances of the extended Graham family. On a large white board was a summary of all the papers, and it didn’t look good. London, New York, Stockholm, Paris and Dubai were listed, along with Mosul and Teheran.

Who are you Yassin Graham?

“If I had more manpower, I could’ve done things much quicker.” Melissa’s black, almond-shaped eyes glittered with excitement. “You have no idea how much property this family has and how many holding companies they have as well.”

“I actually do have a clue. You must try to focus on anything that concerns their marine property. Which company is connected with marine transportation? Which of the companies may have needed to buy a ship like that?

“That is not an answer I can give at a drop of the hat.” She took off her glasses and pointed with them at the map on the computer screen and then over to the bigger map on the wall. “Look at this… And this is only the beginning. We have been working just under two hours.” Her eyes, usually so full of laughter, showed only concern and frustration. As if to hide that, she put her glasses back on. “There are ownerships and cross-ownerships, as well as common ownerships and companies which have been bought and merged with one another…. Think about it as the human body, with each limb dependent on the other, influenced and being influenced by.”

“But the body is not trying to hide…”

“Exactly. It is not a body; it is a global business meant to