Savage Recruit (Ryan Savage Thriller Series Book 8), стр. 10

My .45 was on my hip. It was all I needed. “That would be fine, thank you.” We exited the vehicle and I followed him up the front steps and into the base’s headquarters. Ambrosia removed his beret as we stepped inside and acknowledged a soldier behind the front desk. We took an elevator to the third floor and entered a wide room. Over a dozen people were working at their computers, on phones, or in a conference with a colleague. Clearly, Greece wanted to get out in front of what could end up becoming a major diplomatic disaster.

A distinguished man in military dress greens noticed us and made his way over from across the room. His peppered mustache was perfectly groomed and his brown, hawkish eyes were piercing. He presented a perfectly curated bureaucrat's smile.

Ambrosia snapped a salute that was immediately returned, albeit with less enthusiasm. Ambrosia said, “Agent Savage, this is General Diakos. General, allow me to introduce you to Special Agent Ryan Savage with Homeland Security.”

“Ah, yes.” Diakos offered his hand, and we shook. “You just missed your ambassador. He came to personally review the command center we have established.”

“Lieutenant Ambrosia suggested that there hasn’t been any progress in the search?” I asked, getting right to the point.

Diakos grimaced slightly. “I am afraid not. But please be assured that we are working on it. I have been commissioned to lead the domestic task force in charge of finding Ms. Rose. She went missing in our country, and Greece is committed to taking whatever steps are necessary to find her.” He gestured across the room. “Over there is a technical unit with our Military Police, and over here is an agent with Greece’s National Intelligence Service—our version of your CIA. And the Hellenic Police Service is using those desks. All of them will be sharing any and all information. For the duration of this investigation, they all report to me.”

“What do we have so far? I was told that some video footage at the port appeared suspicious.”

“That has been cleared up. Unfortunately, it does not apply to Ms. Rose’s disappearance.”

“What does it apply to?” I asked.

“A woman was kidnapped at the port last night, just three commercial slips from where Ms. Rose’s cruise ship was. A prostitute. She was found alive early this morning, and the men who took her have been apprehended. They know nothing about Ms. Rose’s disappearance, and their alibis from before they took the young woman have checked out. My team has thoroughly vetted them and their known associates regarding this incident.”

“What did Kathleen visit after disembarking in Athens?”

“Come with me.” Lieutenant Ambrosia dismissed himself, and General Diakos led me through a maze of desks to the rear wall of the room where a large map of Greek’s largest city hung. Three red-tipped pins and a solitary blue one were placed on the map. Diakos pointed to a red pin. “Ms. Rose disembarked at 1008 and took a taxi to the Acropolis, where she remained for nearly two hours.”

Kathleen had been to Athens numerous times during her CIA days. But in all her visits, she had never made it to the Acropolis, one of the most enduring symbols of Western Civilization. Kathleen’s brief visits to the city had always been business related, often undercover, and a pleasure trip to the hill of the gods had never been in the cards. Even now, a framed picture of the Acropolis hung on the wall of her office back home. Kathleen had always been a lover of the ancient Greeks, their ideas, and their art. Many a weekend evening, while the rest of us were night fishing the Florida backwater or nursing beers at The Reef, Kathleen could be found at home with a glass of wine and, if not reviewing a stack of ongoing case files, most likely reading a Greek or Roman philosopher. She particularly enjoyed Plato’s Socratic dialogues and the stoicism of Marcus Aurelius. She claimed that forcing her mind through exercises in virtue, politics, and concepts of the ideal society made her better at her job, serving to remind her why she did what she did. That she had made a beeline straight to the Acropolis was not surprising in the least.

Diakos continued. “After leaving the Acropolis, her cell phone’s GPS shows her walking down the hill to the Acropolis Museum. She was there for nearly three hours before”—he placed a finger on the third and final red pin—“taking a taxi to the Agora.” The Agora had been the marketplace and the center of everyday life in ancient Athens. “This blue pin was the last location her cell phone sent a signal. From the Agora, she went to Central Municipal Market, the busiest market in the city. Based on her phone’s GPS, she worked her way through the market for over an hour before her phone stopped issuing a signal, about fifteen meters away from the north entrance. This is her last known location.”

“What time was that?” I asked.

“1636. Her cruise was scheduled to leave port at 1800. From this location, it would have taken her no more than thirty minutes to return to the ship.”

“Any cameras in that area?”

“None, unfortunately. Not in the immediate area. The nearest one is here, at the corner of Marta and Selucide. That, unfortunately, is fifty meters away from where she went missing.”

“Have your analysts examined the footage?”

“Yes. Earlier this morning. I am afraid they did not find anything. There are several closed circuit cameras on the street that belong to shop owners. Since those are privately owned, we are still tracking down the owners who placed them there. It may be that we can get a judge to sign off on our analysts forcing their way into their private servers. But first we are required to try to work with the owners.”

I had half a mind to call Spam back at the office in Key Largo and give him the