The Terrorist Next Door (19 page)

Chapter
41

“HE ISN’T HERE”

They didn’t wait.

Gold and Battle called Commander Roman Kuliniak at Logan Square, who confirmed that there had been suspicions about Salaam Printing for several years. Kuliniak helped them lead a full frontal assault on the print shop. Six squad cars and two SWAT units pulled up in front of the nondescript one-story building on Pulaski Road between Johnny and Tina’s Hair Salon and Polski Skelp, the Chicago Polish Store. Four more units filled the alley. The raid was over in minutes. It was hard to hear above the high-tech printers, but eight terrified employees and two customers obeyed Gold’s orders to lie down on the floor. Tariq wasn’t among them. The SWAT team found stolen computers, cell phones, and HD TVs in the basement.

The owner of Salaam Printing was a middle-aged man with a thick mustache and flowing gray hair who identified himself as Yousef Al-Issawi. Gold and Battle sat him down on a stool behind the counter, his hands cuffed behind him.

“This is outrageous,” he insisted. “I want to talk to my attorney.”

Gold pointed at the ceiling. “You hear those copters? You’re the proud owner of the most famous print shop in the world, Yousef. If you cooperate, we might take you out the back door and drive you downtown in an unmarked car. Otherwise, we’ll walk you out the front and tell everybody you’ve been harboring a terrorist.”

This got Al-Issawi’s attention. “What are you talking about?”

“Where’s Tariq?”

“I don’t know. He isn’t here.”

“He’s been setting off bombs since yesterday.”

“That’s impossible.”

“He’s killed twenty-six people. That makes you an accessory to murder.”

The bravado left Al-Issawi’s voice. “I don’t know anything about it. I swear.”

“When was the last time you saw him?”

“He left about ten minutes ago.”

“Which way did he go?”

“Out the back door. I don’t know where he was going.”

Gold got into his face. “We already have you for felony theft, Yousef. Next we’re going to up the ante to accessory to murder. If that doesn’t get your attention, we’ll throw in a terrorism charge. That’s a
federal
crime. If you think dealing with us is no fun, wait until you get a load of the feds.”

The owner was now sweating through his dark blue work shirt. “His name is Tariq Abdullah. He lives around the corner: 3250 North Harding.”

Gold was about to call it in when he heard a voice crackling over his radio.

“All units! We have visual contact with suspect! He came out of the gangway of the currency exchange two doors north of Salaam Printing. Suspect is running south in the alley. Repeat: suspect is on foot heading south through the alley toward Belmont.”

Gold answered immediately. “In pursuit. Suspect is armed and dangerous. Approach with caution.” Gold turned to Battle. “You stay here. I’m going after him.”

“Let the uniforms handle it, Dave.”

“No way.” Gold sprinted behind the counter and out the rear door, followed by two uniforms. He pounded through the cluttered gangway past a storage shed. He was already drenched in perspiration when he got to the alley, where he caught a glimpse of a young man sprinting south with four uniforms in pursuit.

Gold drew his weapon and chased Abdullah for about fifty feet. The deliveryman’s path was blocked by a patrol car coming north from Belmont. Abdullah stopped abruptly, made a sharp right turn, opened the gate to the backyard of a three-story apartment building, and ran inside. He overturned the trash cans behind him to slow down Gold. He ran through the litter-strewn yard and ducked into the gangway, which dead-ended into a locked door. He banged on it in frustration, then retraced his steps, where he came face-to-face with Gold, who ordered him to stop. Abdullah lowered his shoulder into Gold’s chest, knocking him backward. He tried to scale the rotting wooden fence, but Gold recovered in time to pull him back. He landed awkwardly on Gold’s left shoulder, and Gold writhed in pain.

Abdullah pulled himself up, kicked Gold in the thigh, and tried again to jump the fence. Gold scrambled to his feet and dove for his legs. It was enough to upset Abdullah’s balance, and Gold wrestled him to the ground. Gold grabbed his collar with his left hand, and used his right fist to land a solid punch to the solar plexus. Abdullah crumpled to the ground, and two uniforms piled on to subdue him. They flipped him onto his stomach, where Gold put a knee in the middle of his back, and helped the cops cuff him. They found a knife in his pocket, but no gun.

The cops lifted Abdullah to his feet and propped him up against the brick wall. His beard was caked with dirt; his soiled Cubs shirt was torn. He glared at Gold through seething black eyes. “Asshole,” he spat, blood coming from his lip.

“What’s your name?” Gold asked.

“None of your business.”

Gold kneed him in the stomach. “Tell us your name.”

The young man gasped for air. “Tariq Abdullah.”

For the first time in a day and a half, Gold felt a modicum of relief.

A uniform pulled a wallet out of Abdullah’s back pocket, where she found his driver’s license and a dozen hundred-dollar bills. “License confirms the name.”

“Call it in. Make sure.” Gold turned back to Abdullah. “You’re lucky you didn’t get shot.”

“Fuck you.”

Nice
. “Where’d you get the money, Tariq?”

“I have a job, man.”

“They pay you in hundred dollar bills?”

“It’s a cash business.”

“Bullshit.” Gold grabbed him by the shirt. “Who’s paying you?”

“Fuck you.”

Gold was drenched in sweat and his shoulder was on fire. “Why have you been setting off bombs?”

“I want to talk to a lawyer.”

“You’ll get to talk to your lawyer down at 26th and Cal.”

Chapter
42

“HE’LL ONLY TALK TO YOU”

“You got him,” Battle said.

Gold corrected him. “
We
got him.”

Sirens blared and helicopters hovered as Gold sat on the hood of a squad car in the alley behind Salaam Printing. His powder blue dress shirt was caked in dirt. An EMT was removing shards of glass from his bloodied right knee.

Battle pointed at the reporters behind a wall of uniforms at the entrance to the alley. “What are you going to tell them?”

“Nothing. We did our job. The chief can take the glory.” He gestured at the print shop. “What else did you find inside?”

“Cell phones, TVs, iPads, and cameras. About a hundred grand in unmarked bills. Twenty assault rifles and enough ammo to take out a battalion of cops.”

“Explosives?”

“None.”

“What about the owner?”

“He came to the U.S. from Saudi when he was a kid. He started the business in the eighties. No criminal record.”

“That’s about to change. What about the other employees?”

“Mostly extended family of the owner. A couple have shoplifting and small-time drug convictions. Tariq Abdullah is a friend of the owner’s nephew. Dropped out of Chicago State. He has a couple of stolen cars on his sheet.”

“Terrorist connections?”

“We’re checking. As far as we can tell, no military experience or training in explosives. We checked his apartment. No bomb-making equipment. We confiscated his computer and his cell phone. We’re looking at his bank accounts.”

“Does the FBI know anything about him?”

“We’re waiting to hear from Fong.”

A clean-cut young cop approached them. His name plate read “Lozowicki.” “Detective Gold,” he said, “the suspect wants to talk to you.”

“Detective Battle and I will be there in a minute.”

“He’ll only talk to you.”

* * *

“You have something to tell me?” Gold said.

“Yes.” Abdullah’s beard was caked with dried blood. The anger in his voice had been replaced by resignation. He spoke calmly. “I’m sorry for hitting you, Detective Gold.”

It’s a little late for an apology
. “I’ll be fine.” Sociopathic killers could be charming.

“Seriously, Detective.”

Right
. Gold was sitting in the front seat of a unit parked in the alley. Six uniforms had formed a cordon around the car. The ignition was off, and the windows were rolled up.

Abdullah was in the back, hands cuffed behind him, blood trickling from his nose. He struggled to improve the circulation to his hands. “How’d you find me?”

“Somebody saw you go inside the Shrine of Heaven last night. That’s where you stole the detonator phone used at Riverview. It wasn’t hard to put the pieces together.”

Abdullah tried to wipe his nose on his shoulder. “I’m an idiot.”

“And a killer. Who’s bankrolling you?”

“Nobody. I haven’t been setting off bombs. I didn’t steal a cell phone at the Shrine of Heaven.”

“This will go down a lot easier if you just tell the truth.”

“I am.”

“What were you doing at the mosque?”

Abdullah cleared his throat. “The stated reason was to drop off some flyers for a fund-raiser. In reality, I was trying to see who was inside the mosque last night.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m not a terrorist, Detective Gold. I’m an FBI agent. Call George Fong. I’ve been working undercover at Salaam Printing for three years. You just blew up our most successful undercover operation since Nine-Eleven.”

Chapter
43

“YOU SHOULD HAVE CALLED”

Fong’s face was bright red. “You should have called,” he snapped.

Gold fired back. “You should have told us Abdullah worked for you.”

Fong was doing most of the talking at a tense post-mortem with Gold, Battle, Kuliniak, and Maloney in an airless conference room in the basement of the intake center at 26th and Cal. “You didn’t need to know,” he said to Gold.

“Yes, we did. We could have avoided this disaster if you’d told us about it. The bomber is still out there, and we’re going to look like idiots.”

“It was a sensitive operation, Detective Gold.”

“Catching a terrorist trumps sensitivity, Special Agent Fong.”

“Not when the life of one of my best agents is on the line.”

Gold was sitting between Battle and the chief in a tiny room reeking of Fong’s aftershave. Gold had ridden with Abdullah to 26th and Cal, where the undercover agent was whisked into the bowels of the processing center to give the appearance that he’d been arrested. In reality, he was debriefing a dozen FBI agents and homicide cops in an air-conditioned office. Abdullah had made it clear that there wasn’t a shred of evidence connecting anybody at Salaam Printing to the bombings. The chief quickly issued a terse statement that the investigation remained open, and that charges against Abdullah would be announced later.

Fong continued lecturing. “Not only did you not catch a
terrorist, but you compromised three years of excellent undercover work, and you put one of our best agents in danger. Tariq was assembling an airtight case against Yousef Al-Issawi for grand theft, money laundering, and weapons smuggling.”

“Why haven’t you arrested him?”

“Because he’s a guppy in a much larger pond. Salaam Printing works for every major Islamic institution in the Chicago area. You burned our best operative in the Islamic community, and you put the rest of our undercovers at risk. Nice going, Detective.”

Dammit.

Fong wasn’t finished. “Why in God’s name didn’t you call me?”

“There wasn’t time.”

“Sure there was. One phone call could have avoided this disaster.”

“One phone call about Al-Shahid could have saved Paulie’s life.”

“The circumstances were different.”

“Bullshit. Your people knew we were at the Shrine of Heaven last night. You knew we’d questioned Jafar. Your people knew that Abdullah was there, but you didn’t mention it to us. You put Tariq at risk by not telling us that he worked for you.”

“We don’t share information about our undercovers unless they’re in imminent danger or there’s an emergency.”

“You didn’t think this was an emergency?”

“Not involving Tariq.”

“Why did he resist?”

“To make it look like a real arrest.”

“He could have been shot.”

“That’s a risk of undercover work.” Fong turned and spoke to the chief. “The press is waiting for an update. Are you planning to tell them you arrested an FBI agent?”

Maloney waved him off. “I’ll tell them we arrested the owner of Salaam Printing after we found a million dollars of stolen goods and an arsenal of stolen weapons.”

“They’ll want to know why you diverted resources from a terrorism investigation to raid a print shop.”

The chief pushed out an impatient sigh. “We got a tip. We made several arrests.”

“They have footage of Tariq’s arrest. What do you say about that?”

“I say, ‘No comment.’” Maloney glared at Fong. “After we catch the bomber, we’ll announce that Tariq has been released for lack of evidence.”

“You’re going to look like an asshole, Chief Maloney.”

“It’ll blow over, Special Agent Fong.”

* * *

Maloney pointed a chubby index finger at Gold. “You screwed up.”

Yes, I did.
“They should have told us about Abdullah.”

“I know, but they didn’t. Either way, you should have coordinated with the feds.”

“There wasn’t time.”

“Yes, there was. You had time to call Roman Kuliniak. You should have called Fong—and me—on your way to the print shop. You wanted to collar this guy yourself.”

“Chief—”

Maloney stopped him. “I don’t want to hear it, Gold. I’d pull you off this case right now if I had any other options.”

“That would be a mistake,” Battle said.

“Would it?” Maloney’s eyes lit up. “Twenty-six people are dead, Detective Battle. The El, the buses, and the trains are down. O’Hare and Midway are closed. So are the museums. And Wrigley Field. And Millennium Park. The cell phones and
the payphones are out. National Guard troops are watching our gas stations. Downtown is empty. People are barricading themselves inside their houses. The feds are about to shut down government offices. And what do I have to show for it? My top homicide team just arrested an FBI agent. Nice work, guys.”

* * *

The young man tried to contain his glee as he watched footage of the raid at Salaam Printing on CNN for the fourth time. Maloney had issued a cryptic statement that the investigation was continuing, and that Chicagoans should remain vigilant. The uncertainty in his tone had generated even greater anxiety for a city with already frayed nerves.

Thank you, Detective Gold. Thank you
.

The red dot showed that Gold and Battle were still at 26th and Cal. He wondered if they realized the magnitude of their blunder.

Time to tweak them again
.

* * *

Gold opened the new e-mail. It read, “We’ve run out of patience, Detective Gold. You aren’t taking us seriously. We will set off another bomb in ten minutes. We will continue to set off a bomb every hour thereafter until you free Hassan. You’ve been warned. IFF.”