I came to see you, I paid a visit to Wazir Ibrahim. Do you remember what you told Wazir you thought was in the canisters?”
The engineering student nodded.
“We explained to you what our project is, so why would you think any different?” asked Cheng.
“Because the canisters we trained with were too heavy.”
The intelligence officer smiled. “Did you share this concern with the others?”
Mirsab shook his head.
“Good,” replied Cheng.
Pulling the suppressed M&P pistol from his briefcase, he then shot the Emirati right between the eyes.
CHAPTER 37
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Normally when it came to surveillance, you were left trying to make lemonade out of truckloads of lemons. In this case, though, they had caught a partial break right off the bat.
Harvath’s first goal had been to isolate Deng’s room. He didn’t want any hotel guests above, below, or on either side. Fortunately, only the rooms above and below were occupied. Offering those guests upgrades, the manager moved them to another part of the hotel. She then blocked out the rooms on either side of Deng in the computer so that they’d remain empty.
The room across the hall was also unoccupied and that’s the one Harvath wanted. When he and Sloane entered the lobby with their bags, the manager met them at the front desk and checked them in. Despite the fugitive drama unfolding in her hotel, she remained calm and professional.
She provided Sloane with key cards to their room and then handed Harvath an envelope with an override card that would open any guest room or other key-card-controlled door on the property.
Harvath thanked her and he and Sloane headed toward the elevator. As they did, Chase entered the hotel and approached the front desk. The manager met him there and led him back to her office where he could watch the CCTV feeds unseen. For as big a building as it was, they could have done with a lot more cameras, but the limited number they had was better than nothing.
Harvath and Sloane got off the elevator on the third floor and followed the signs to their room. They appeared to pay no attention to Deng’s door, though they paused long enough for Harvath to listen while Sloane pretended to look for the room key. All he could hear was the television. The Do Not Disturb sign was still hung from the handle. There was no telling if Deng was inside. That was the first issue Harvath planned to address.
When Sloane finally produced their key card, she opened the door and Harvath followed her in.
He quietly reminded her not to turn on the lights. Sloane understood. They would be using the peephole to watch Deng’s door. If their room was backlit and one of them stepped up to the hole, they might give themselves away.
Setting her bag down, Sloane stepped into the kitchen area and turned on the small light under the microwave above the stove. Then, walking into each bedroom, she turned on the en suite bathroom light. It would give them enough light to operate by, but not enough to indicate when one of them was standing at the door.
Harvath unpacked his gear and handed a radio and earpiece to Sloane. Once he had his set up, he walked into one of the bedrooms and hailed Chase down in the manager’s office.
“All clear here,” he replied.
Harvath told him to stay alert and tucked his radio in his pocket. Returning to the living room, he set his phone on vibrate, made his LaRue hot, and propped it near the door. Sloane readied her Glock and then stepped into the bedroom to rack a round into the shotgun. There was no other sound like it in the world. The last thing she wanted to do was give away their presence with a loud schik-schak.
The FBI had had the hotel under surveillance for only a matter of hours. Before Harvath had asked them to pull back, they had paid a visit to the manager and gone through all of the CCTV footage. They had seen Bao Deng check in and get on an elevator up to his room, but he hadn’t appeared on camera again after that. As far as they knew, he was still in his room. If so, What was he waiting for? Who was he waiting for? Those were the questions on everyone’s minds.
The list of possible answers was endless—he was waiting for someone to make contact with him, he had a meeting but it wasn’t until well after