“We have increased highway patrols and asked our officers to be aware of young women who appear distressed.”
Whereas normally, we’d just ignore them…
“We have also moved extra officers to Carabanchel.” Carabanchel was a slum in southwestern Madrid. Phone records showed the kidnappers had sent the text with the ransom demand from there. “But we don’t think your daughter is there. Mainly North Africans there. The photos from the bar suggest your daughter’s kidnappers are European.”
Rebecca found herself increasingly annoyed he wouldn’t say Kira’s name.
“They would stand out, and someone would give them up. Anyway, they knew we could trace the phone to there. They are careful, these ones. Why make the obvious mistake of sending a text from their own location?”
As much as Rebecca disliked the guy, he did have a point on Carabanchel. The phone was probably a dead end. It had vanished from the networks after the message was sent. No doubt it was already destroyed, the pieces scattered.
Further, Kira had been holding a paper from Sunday in the photo, so the picture could have been taken at any time Sunday. Then a kidnapper could have driven or taken a train to Madrid, sent the picture, and left.
As for the photo itself, Brian’s NSA buddies had torn it apart, looking for geolocation tags or other information about the phone that had taken it. But whoever had sent it had expected that response. The text was actually a photo of a photo. The secondary picture had been taken in Carabanchel, without doubt on the now-trashed phone used to send the text. As long as the kidnappers didn’t mind using a new phone for every new text, they could repeat that process indefinitely and frustrate the NSA.
The kidnappers had also been careful to make sure the photo itself would offer no clues. The wall behind Kira was covered with generic plywood. No light or electrical fixtures were visible, nothing that might narrow the location. The CIA and Special Forces taught their operatives to make subtle hand gestures if they had any idea where they were being held and who had them. Too bad Kira wasn’t a CIA operative.
About all the NSA could say for certain was that the photo didn’t appear to have been altered. Meaning Kira had been holding the paper. Meaning she was alive. Or had been yesterday, anyway.
* * *
Meanwhile, Fernandes was still talking. “As well as additional officers in Carabanchel, we are reviewing license plate readers for the Camry’s plate. Examining records from similar cases. But primarily supporting our Catalan colleagues. Ready to respond to any request.”
In other words, doing nothing. Rebecca understood the cool logic here, This isn’t our mess; the Catalans are so big on independence, let the Mossos deal with it. Even so, she wished she could shave off the guy’s Just For Men upper lip, make him spend a month with Barraza learning to be a real cop.
She didn’t say a word, but Rob Wilkerson seemed to read her mind. He nodded at her, I get it, let me handle this.
“Thanks for that,” he said, as smoothly as if Fernandes had promised house-to-house searches. “And this is Colonel Garza, from the Grupo Especial. I’ve had the pleasure of working with him, so I can tell you firsthand his men are superb.”
“Thank you, Rob,” Garza said. “As to new information, unfortunately, I do not have much. We focus on Islamists. Nothing suggests these are the people who took your daughter. Further, we have penetration into cells in Barcelona. We believe we would have heard of an operation this complex. We’ve gone back to our informants here and elsewhere, Madrid, Seville, to make sure they know the urgency.”
Garza cleared his throat.
“In the meantime, we have put response teams here and in Madrid on what we call active standby. These are nine-person squads with tactical equipment. Access to helicopters with a fifteen-minute scramble. They can be almost anywhere in Spain in four hours.”
“Thank you,” Brian said. “Question.”
Rebecca felt a flicker of irritation. Her business. He should let her take the lead.
“Have we decided what to do when the media calls? Those posters on La Rambla, it’s only a matter of time.”
“Perhaps better to take those posters down—” Barraza said.
“Oh, no bad publicity for Barcelona.”
“Not at all. My officers do their jobs better if they don’t have reporters chasing them. It may make the kidnappers nervous too. They’re negotiating. They want ransom. I think we are all better off keeping this quiet