The Blacklist

Chapter 348: Kerry Surprises His Companions
Early Thursday morning, Donald and his team, accompanied by MI6 agent Liam Gladstone, went to Leeds to inspect the chemical plant where the explosion occurred.

On the way, Donald informed Liam that someone must have impersonated Surkov to commit the crime, but the other party disagreed and insisted that it must be the work of Ilyas Surkov!

After arriving at the chemical plant and looking at the messy scene, Donald changed the subject and asked the other party if they had found any clues.
Agent Liam said, "We at MI6 have been working with your CIA Surkov Task Force and have been tracking the source of the explosives he used for several months. Based on the identification of explosive tracers (chemical markers embedded in explosives at the source of production), the tracers in the explosive residues of this explosion point to a demolition and construction company in Belgrade called Future Line. We believe that they provided Surkov with the legally purchased C4 explosives!"

Donald asked, "Have you identified the suspect who provided the explosives?"

“Lakaya Gaffari.” Liam handed him a document. “He’s the foreman of Future Line Demolition and Construction Company. He’s in charge of the demolition business and has the authority to use explosives!”

Because of the independence of the Kosovo region in 2008, the relationship between major Western countries and the Serbian government was tense and they withdrew their embassies and consulates from each other, so MI6 could not get official help from Serbia; compared with the United Kingdom, the United States reached a normalization agreement with Serbia in 2016, so MI6 hoped that the United States could send people to Belgrade to conduct actual investigations, so it attached great importance to the visit of Donald and others and fully cooperated.

After reporting to Cooper, the CTU headquarters in China applied to the Serbian government through the State Department for a cooperative investigation and obtained the law enforcement authority against terrorists in Serbia. So Donald took everyone to Belgrade directly from the UK to prepare to investigate and arrest Lakaya Gaffari.
-
At around five o'clock in the afternoon, when Donald and others arrived at Nikola Tesla Airport in Belgrade, the capital of Serbia, they had just got off the plane when they saw two large black SUVs parked by the runway. Two people standing next to the cars and eating ice cream stunned them - they were Carrie and Gina!
The four of them broke away from the large group of people getting off the plane and ran over. Elizabeth stepped forward and grabbed the ice cream from Carrie's hand. Carrie let her take it and said to the others with a smile, "Everyone get on the bus. There's ice cream in the small refrigerator and coffee in the kettle. Plenty of it!"

Everyone was amused by the two of them, joking that Elizabeth had only snatched half of the ice cream. It was obvious that Carrie was being mean on purpose by not telling them in advance that there was a new one in the car - however, no one pointed out the meaning behind this!
Then everyone got into two cars and drove out of the airport one after the other without going through security check at all.

Gina drove the front car, with Carrie and Donald sitting in the back; Dembe drove the back car with Elizabeth and Nawabi.

In the car, Donald asked, "Lee, why are you here?"

"We also found out the intelligence that MI6 found out," Carrie said, "so we left early and flew here to wait for you!"

Donald suddenly reacted at this moment and realized that Carrie was worried about them carrying out the mission in a hostile foreign country, so he came personally to escort them. He was deeply moved.

Two cars drove into the city and went straight to the most upscale Vizier Hotel in the city center. The rooms were ready. Carrie asked everyone to go to the room to put down their belongings, wash up, and then go downstairs to the restaurant to eat. He had already booked a private room.

Serbian barbecue and beer are very special. As agents, they basically love meat, so they naturally feasted on it this time. Even Dembe, who seldom drank alcohol before, drank several bottles of beer with the barbecue.

In such a public place, even in a private room, they did not discuss business. This was basic confidentiality. After eating and drinking, they went to Kerry's suite. After checking the room again, they made a pot of tea and started to talk about the investigation. Donald first told them what he had found in the UK, and then said, "Our purpose this time is to find Gaffari who provided explosives to Surkov..."

Kerry nodded and said, "I've already done some research. Jafar is a Moroccan immigrant who speaks French and Arabic and has a very regular lifestyle. He has lunch at the Brutka Club every Friday - well, that place is not far from this hotel. So, we can have a good rest tonight and take action at noon tomorrow."

Donald and the others were very surprised. They didn't expect that Kerry had done so much work in advance and had found out everything about the target of the investigation. However, they had also come up with a plan before...

Elizabeth said, "Lee, our previous assumption was that Nawabi has Middle Eastern ancestry and can pretend to be Surkov's contact, meet with Jafari alone, and then arrest him..."

"No need to go through so much trouble!" Kerry waved his hand and said, "Lao Lei's informant provided a special intelligence: - There is a group of people who are also eyeing Jafar, and they should also want to catch him. It is estimated that they will take action at noon tomorrow. We just need to follow them and then we will catch them all at once!"

Donald wondered, “Who are those people?”

"We don't know yet, but these people are well-trained. I suspect they are field agents of some intelligence organization!" Carrie said, "Well, there's no need to think too much. Just catch them all tomorrow and interrogate them slowly!"

When everyone heard him say this, they all relaxed. The boss had already thought it through. All they had to do tomorrow was execute the orders. They didn't have to think too much. This was great! Disband now, and have a rest. We will take action tomorrow! -
The next day at noon, Carrie led everyone to have lunch half an hour early and drove to the Brutka Club two streets away. Carrie, Gina, and Elizabeth were in one car, outside the front door; Donald, Nawabi, and Demby were in another car, at the exit of the parking lot, and began to wait.

At half past one, Donald, who was sitting in the passenger seat, saw a car driving out. The driver was Ghafari. He informed Carrie, who was outside the front door, of the situation, waited for half a minute, and asked Dembe to drive after it.

Dembe's driving tracking skills were extremely superb. He kept a distance from Gaffari's car and followed it towards the industrial area in the west...

After entering the industrial zone, Jafari turned onto a side road and drove towards the factory building in the distance...

In the car that was following from a distance, Donald saw a van suddenly come out from a factory, stop Ghafari's car, drag him out of the car, stuff it into the van, and then drive quickly in another direction!
(End of this chapter)