working for law enforcement. Klaussen saw the choice as simple, binary: He could go to the condo and step into the fictional role he had been crafting for months, or he could get on a plane and re- turn to his old life. Anything in between was a waste of time. He called Stouch and Cindric, who told him that the decision was up to him. "Fuck it," he said. "I'm going in."

A few days later, on May 11, he was standing at the entry to the Waterways Condominiums in Barra de Tijuca. He turned the screw on a wristwatch the DEA had given him, activating its hidden camera. Then he stepped through the doors and took the elevator to the fifth floor. Outside of apartment 505 there were none of the Israeli guards that had once surrounded Le Roux in Manila. His boss opened the door and ushered him inside with minimal pleasant- ries, looking fatter than Klaussen remembered. From what Klaussen could gather, the only other occupants of the apartment appeared to be one of Le Roux's girlfriends and a baby. Le Roux suggested they talk on the balcony.

He spoke softly, as if to avoid being overheard. "The Americans are watching," he said. "We have to be careful." Klaussen glanced down to the street below them and saw the Brazilian agents' vans-too easily identified, he thought. He tried to parse Le Roux's expression for hints that he knew something more.

They walked through the details of the supposed deal with the Colombians: their planned headquarters in Liberia, their desire to build a clean room as part of their own meth lab, and the sugges- tion that there could be more business down the road. The Colom- bians planned to ship the drugs to New York City for sale, Klaussen reminded Le Roux, but they would first need a sample of the meth. Le Roux told Klaussen it would come out of a batch manufactured in North Korea that he had already moved to the Philippines.

Sitting on the balcony across from Le Roux, Klaussen was re- minded of how his boss seemed to discuss the most extraordinary aspects of his business in the most casual tones. "He is just so re- laxed and so calm, talking about death, about murder, about weapons, about wars," he recalled later. "Like talking about buy-