Billy nodded several times, as if Malichai was only confirming what he believed. “Thanks for the coffee, little darlin’,” he said to Amaryllis and went off, whistling off-key down the hall back toward his room.
12
I think we need to explore the very real possibility that an unknown faction of terrorists may try to bomb the Ideas for Peace conference,” Ezekiel said. “We don’t have a lot of evidence. The police have done a well check on Miss Crystal from the magic shop and spoken with a woman they believe is her from the cruise ship. Her passport and ID have checked out. That’s a dead end for now, until she returns.”
“That doesn’t negate what Anna and Burnell thought they overheard,” Malichai pointed out. “If we just ignore it, and it turns out they were talking about the maximum number of people they could kill, the convention center would be the place to do it.”
“Exactly,” Ezekiel agreed. “I’ve got this nagging feeling. Malichai’s got it. Mordichai’s got it as well. In the past, whenever the three of us had that same feeling, something was very wrong. And we have the hit man going around over a two-year period doing in people all connected to the convention center.”
“How did Miss Crystal pay for her cruise?” Malichai asked.
“She ‘won’ the trip,” Ezekiel said. “She did enter every contest known to man, according to all of her friends, so it is a possibility that she actually won a legit contest.”
Rubin was silent as he studied the board Ezekiel had made. He didn’t have the radar they did, but he was very good at puzzles. Right now, Malichai could see he was moving those names around like chess pieces on a board. They needed new insights, because he was fresh out of them. What would be the reasoning of targeting the peace conference? Malichai had told the truth to Billy when he said he doubted the conference would come up with anything that would change the world and the way it thought. Nations could talk to one another, but in the end, it all seemed to come down to who could gain what.
“Are there any politicians or world leaders of significance going?” Mordichai asked.
Ezekiel shook his head. “They were deliberately not invited. This conference is for the people and it’s all about ideas. Things to contribute to change the way people of various nations think about one another, their customs, religion and governments. Simply put, to shift world opinion in every nation toward tolerance.”
“It’s a very lofty idea,” Mordichai said.
“True, and it isn’t going to solve the world’s problems, but they’re hoping they can just shift the tolerance level so people can come together first before igniting into terrorism and hatred,” Ezekiel said. “We’re not about judging whether something works or not. We don’t have to agree or disagree. We’re soldiers and we protect people and those unable to protect themselves.”
Malichai shook his head, trying to puzzle it out. Politics aside, he needed to look at the bigger picture. There would be no reason to try to destroy the conference . . .
Thinking aloud sometimes helped him. “We’re trying to find a reason. Suppose Anna and Burnell overheard the one thing that holds true. Whoever is behind this wants the largest body count possible. It doesn’t matter if they think the conference is a threat or not. They simply want the notoriety of killing as many people as possible. It doesn’t even matter if they’re Americans, just simply a body count.”
“They could get that at a football game,” Mordichai said.
Rubin shook his head. “Not like this. These are buildings. If the exits were blocked, thousands could be trapped inside. Have you seen what happens at Comic-Con? It’s insane.”
There was a brief silence while the Fortunes brothers exchanged amused glances.
“Rubin? You’ve been to Comic-Con? You actually know what that is?” Ezekiel asked, trying to keep a straight face and failing.
“Get any autographs?” Mordichai teased.
“He does like Harley Quinn,” Malichai told them. “He would stand in line for a couple of hours to get her autograph.”
Rubin scowled at them. “I just said I wouldn’t mind a girlfriend like her, not that I’d stand in line anywhere to get an autograph. For that matter, if I really wanted one, I’d just bypass her security and wait for her in her living room.”
“You do realize she’s a fictional character,” Ezekiel said. “An actress played her.”
Rubin gave them all the finger, the standard answer when they were at their worst with one another. “I’m just saying, that many people filling up that big of a convention center, that would take out more than a football stadium.”
“We might have to return to the subject of whether or not you attended one or more of those events,” Ezekiel said, “but you’re right, the San Diego Convention Center is enormous and holds thousands. I’ll see about getting us in there and taking a look at security.”
“What about Henry Shevfield and his attack on Malichai? All the people he killed had something to do with the convention center. And this big diversion he’s supposed to run, we didn’t get the exact timing of that.” Mordichai didn’t look at Ezekiel when he pointed that out.
“Joe contacted Major General,” Ezekiel said. “Joe said to keep Shevfield’s death under wraps for the moment and then the body will turn up. Rubin will go undercover as a suspected hit man. He’ll be questioned and released and then set up at the bed-and-breakfast. We’ll hope he gets contacted. They won’t have a lot of time to choose who they’re going to use to create their diversion and he’ll already be in place.”
Malichai knew that wasn’t Major General’s idea. Ezekiel had already told Malichai that was the plan. He must have informed Joe and Joe sold the plan to Major General.
“How much have you let the detectives in on?” Malichai asked.
“Not much yet. We didn’t have a lot to give them. Nothing on who murdered Anna and Bryon Cooper. It wasn’t Shevfield. Looking at his work, he had to be telling the truth. If he had created that scenario, there would have been nothing for the detectives to question. As it was, they had Bryon shooting himself with the wrong gun hand,” Ezekiel said.
“When is the rest of the team arriving?” Malichai asked.
“They’re on the way. The potential for this is big and we’re only leaving a skeleton crew behind to protect Pepper and the kids, although a few of the other teams are offering to cover for us,” Ezekiel continued.
“I’d like to have a couple of our people staying at Marie’s,” Malichai said. “Unfortunately, it isn’t as if we can boot anyone from their room. I can double up with Amaryllis, which leaves my room free.”
“I thought we could take this to Marie, see if she’d let us get Jacy to safety, maybe even her. In the meantime, she might be able to get creative. There’re two rooms she doesn’t use for guests because they don’t have bathrooms that even are shared. She was planning on adding them but hasn’t had the time. There’s the attic room, hot as hell, and there’s the basement,” Ezekiel said. “I’ve looked at the blueprints. We can get some of our people inside the basement for certain and the two rooms without shared bathrooms. They’ll have to use Amaryllis’s private one. If we get the cops to release the Coopers’ room, that will be another room we’ll have available.”