Solomon's Gold

CHAPTER 46

Elizabeth was on the phone with Hood.

"Four agents dead?" Elizabeth said. "What happened?"

"One of them was looking through video recordings from parking garages and found the van. The four of them went to the garage to check it out. The van was booby trapped. It blew up when they opened a door."

"What about forensics? Can they get anything from what's left?"

"They won't find much," Hood said. "The explosion started a fire. It took six hours to put it out. Everything was soaked by sprinklers and buried in foam by the fire department."

"If anyone had doubts about the seriousness of this threat, that should put an end to them," Elizabeth said.

"There's one piece of good news. The video from the garage showed the sign on the side of the van. It was for a heating and air conditioning company. The phone number and the address don't exist, and the contractor's number turned out to belong to a plumber in Yonkers. The poor bastard had a SWAT team show up at his door. Of course, he isn't involved."

"Has anyone talked to the people at the hotel who would deal with a contractor like that?"

"They have. The chief engineer is a guy named Dawson. He was conveniently out sick. He's being questioned as we speak, but my feeling is that he wasn't involved. His assistant is Kowalski. Kowalski is the one who dealt with the terrorists. There were three of them. They told him they were there to inspect the heating and cooling system and showed him paperwork signed by Dawson. No surprise, he never signed anything like that."

"How long were they there?"

"Kowalski says not very long. Forty-five minutes, more or less."

"Did he see what they were doing?"

"Nope. He was up on the twelfth floor, fixing an electrical problem."

"So the bad guys were in the hotel, unsupervised, for most of an hour."

"Correct."

"Whatever they did, it has to be something simple. Did Kowalski see anything unusual when he talked with them?"

"All he saw was the usual contractor stuff. They had a couple of toolboxes and a cylinder on a dolly."

"A cylinder? What kind of cylinder?"

"Kowalski says he's seen one like it before. The HVAC people use them to test the cooling system."

"But these weren't HVAC people. What would they be doing with a cylinder like that?"

"That's what I was wondering. Kowalski showed the terrorists where everything was and then went away. Federal agents searched the basement where Kowalski left them, but nothing has turned up. The dogs haven't sensed anything. There doesn't seem to be anything out of the ordinary in the area where the terrorists were supposed to be working. No odd packages, no out of place trash, nothing."

"I'm getting a bad feeling about this," Elizabeth said. "A cylinder could be a bomb."

"Kowalski says they took everything they had with them when they left, including the cylinder."

"Then there must have been something in the toolboxes. The cylinder could have been for show, to give them a look of legitimacy."

"I was wondering if you could send your team to the hotel and take a look," Hood said. "Nick and the others have been dealing with things like this for a long time. They're used to finding things that can kill you that look innocent. The Bureau is good, but the mindset is different. They don't have the same kind of experience."

"Nick's been chomping at the bit to do something since they came back from Israel. I'll send them up. If there's anything there, they'll find it."

"That's what I wanted to hear. That was quite a find they made over there."

"It's unfortunate that they didn't find it in Israel," Elizabeth said. "The Egyptians are determined to claim it for themselves. So far, it's a standoff."

"Too bad Solomon isn't around to pass judgment."

"I don't believe you said that," Elizabeth said.

"I have my moments."

"When this conference is over, let's head for the Caribbean."

"It's a date," Hood said.