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“He must have been weighed down and tossed overboard,” Hanley noted. “The only thing was that the killers didn’t know that the bottom of the ocean around here is littered with geothermal vents. The hot water caused the bodies to quickly bloat and overcome the weight. If it weren’t for that, we’d have never found them.”
“Have you ID’d the others?” Cabrillo asked.
“I haven’t found any records yet,” Hanley said, “plus there are more surfacing as we speak. Probably just Al-Khalifa’s minions.”
“Not minions,” Cabrillo said, “madmen.”
“Now the question is…” Hanley said.
“Who is crazy enough,” Cabrillo said, “to steal from other crazies.”
22
LANGSTON OVERHOLT IV was sitting in his office, bouncing a red rubber ball off a wooden paddle. The telephone receiver was cradled to his ear. The time was barely 8 A.M. but he’d already been at work for more than two hours.
“I left a pair of my engineers on board,” Cabrillo said to Overholt. “We’re claiming salvage rights.”
“Nice prize,” Overholt said.
“I’m sure we can use it somehow,” Cabrillo agreed.
“What’s your current location?” Overholt asked.
“We are north of Iceland heading east. We’re trying to track the bugs on the meteorite. Whoever killed Al-Khalifa and stole the meteorite must be aboard another ship.”
“You’re sure the body you recovered is Al-Khalifa?” Overholt asked.
“We’re faxing you fingerprints and digital photographs of the corpse,” Cabrillo said, “so your people can make a positive identification. But I’m ninety-nine percent sure.”
“After you woke me up this morning, I ordered some of my men to try to check out the ID on the passenger aboard the Eurocopter. We got nothing. I’m sending a team to Greenland to recover the bodies, then hopefully we’ll know more.”
“Sorry about the midnight call, but I thought you should receive the news as soon as possible.”
“No problem, I probably got more sleep than you.”
“I managed to grab a few hours once we left the Akbar,” Cabrillo admitted.
“What’s your gut feeling, old friend?” Overholt asked. “If Al-Khalifa is dead, then the threat of the dirty bomb seems diminished. The meteorite is radioactive, but without a catalyst the danger is a lot less.”
“True,” Cabrillo said slowly, “but the missing Ukrainian nuclear bomb is still out there somewhere, and we don’t know that several of Al-Khalifa’s own people didn’t kill him and will now try to mount the mission themselves.”
“That would explain a lot,” Overholt said, “like how the killers accessed the Akbar so easily.”
“If it wasn’t some of Al-Khalifa’s own people, then we have another group to contend with. If that’s the case, we should be wary. Whoever made the assault on the Akbar were highly trained and as deadly as vipers.”
“Another terrorist group?”
“I doubt it,” Cabrillo said. “The operation had none of the earmarks of religious fanatics. It was more like a military operation. No emotion or fuss—just a surgical and flawless elimination of the opposition.”
“I’ll dig around,” Overholt said, “and see what I can find out.”
“I’d appreciate that.”
“Good thing you managed to bug the meteorite,” Overholt added.
“The only card up our sleeve,” Cabrillo agreed.
“Anything else?”
