9:04 A.M. Tehran Time, September 28th
The Ayatollah’s Residence
Qom, Iran
The dining room of the Supreme Ayatollah’s house was spartan in its furnishings, which was as it should have been. The centuries of Persian decadence had been swept away by the rising tide of the Islamic Republic, and the rich ornamentation once considered traditional had gone with it.
Isfahani sighed, sipping his cup of coffee slowly. Their deception had survived the night, at the very least. And there was no reason why it shouldn’t have. His servants were loyal to him and him alone.
Those that had not been were no longer. They were in Allah’s hands now…
“You slept well, Major?” he asked, without turning to face the man who had just entered the room.
Farshid Hossein responded with a short laugh. “As well as could be expected. For a man supposed to be dead.”
“To be sure. Coffee?”
Hossein nodded. After the events of the preceding twenty-four hours, he would have preferred something stronger-but he had the suspicion that alcohol was not to be found on Isfahani’s premises. And his greatest safety lay in being the best Muslim possible.
The Ayatollah spoke again after pouring Hossein’s coffee into a plain earthenware cup. “You will be leaving today,” he said, calmly announcing the major’s fate as though giving the time of day. “I will provide you with the clothes we give out to supplicants and send you to my home town of Isfahan.”
“And I’m to do what?” Hossein asked, once again surprising the older man with his boldness.
“That will be explained presently. Do you play chess, major?”
An affirmative nod answered the question and the Ayatollah continued, “It is Shirazi’s move. My spies will tell me when he makes it. And then I will know how to instruct you.”
“I will not be acting alone?”
“No. Even in these days, Allah has ordained that I should have my followers. And they will support us when the time comes.”
Hossein shot a skeptical look across the table. “I don’t need religious zealots. I served with enough of them in Iraq to know their limitations. I need trained soldiers, men with experience carrying out this type of operation if we’re to have a prayer of stopping them. A detachment of your bodyguards would be most desirable.”
“I’m afraid that is impossible-my bodyguards are known to Shirazi and under surveillance themselves.” Isfahani pursed his lips together tightly. “Allah will guide our hands, major. We need not fear that he would side with those who would desecrate his shrine.”
He held up a hand for silence as Hossein started to interrupt him. “Howbeit, I did not recruit you with the intention of blithely disregarding your advice. You shall have your soldiers. Do you have any other questions?”
There was a long, awkward pause, then the major spoke. “In 2006, my men and I planted explosives in the Askariya shrine of Samarra, Iraq. Six separate bombs planted in one of the holiest of all Shiite shrines. Yet you sanctioned my operation.”
For a moment, the expression on the old man’s face was as if he had been struck a physical blow. “Times change,” he replied, recovering at long last, “times change, and we are shown the more perfect will of Allah.”
9:25 A.M.
The foot of the Alborz Mountains
The Russian-built Mi-8 transport was in its fiftieth year of service as it swept over the foothills of the Alborz, its engines rattling as though threatening to fall apart.
Colonel Harun Larijani glanced out the door of the chopper, a strut clutched tightly in his white-knuckled grasp as the ground flew by beneath them. Twenty men squatted on the metal deck of the Mi-8, all of them dressed in Iranian army fatigues.
He flashed them a smile that was meant to be reassuring, but his gaze flickered back to the two stainless-steel canisters secured in the back of the aircraft and the smile vanished as quickly as it had come. Memories of the previous night’s audience with his uncle flashed back through his mind and he dropped to his knees there by the door, nearly overcome by a wave of nausea. Bile rose in his throat and he choked it back, pale with the effort.
He could not, no, he would not, vomit in front of his men.
Forcing his mind back to the practicalities of their mission, he bent over his map. They couldn’t be far now. Larijani reached for the biological mask at his side and faced his men.
“You have been instructed in the proper use of these masks. Make sure you follow those instructions to the letter. The bacteria is ingested through the lungs-breathing in even the smallest amount may result in your death. Am I understood?”
He could see in their eyes that they did-several of the men looked well-nigh as sick as he, but he was too far gone to take pleasure in the fact.
He took a deep breath in an effort to stabilize himself before going on. “Secure your masks now. We’re coming up on the target.”
1:19 A.M. Eastern Time
Cypress, Virginia
The jarring vibration of the TACSAT in his ribs woke Harry from a sound sleep. “Nichols,” he answered, awake in an instant. He had trained himself that way.
“Harry, it’s Hamid.”
“Do you know what time it is?” Harry demanded, glancing at the luminous display of his digital clock to assure himself he wasn’t dreaming.
“Yeah, I do. I just got in.”
“What kept you?” Harry asked, feeling unusually sarcastic. “A hot date?”
“You might call it that,” came the unamused reply. “The usual fence-mending after deployment. You know the drill. That’s not why I called.”
“It better not be. There are few things I hate worse than hearing about another man’s love life at oh-one hundred.”
“Could you be serious for a moment, Harry? Someone burgled my apartment.”
“Seriously?” Harry responded, suddenly alert. He swung his feet out of bed and reached for his pants. “Have you called the police?”
“Negative. Nothing was taken, Harry. Nothing at all. But someone was here, maybe more than one person-and they tossed the place good. A pro job-everything just about back where I left it.”
Harry didn’t bother asking what had triggered his suspicions. Every agent had his “tells,” little objects left in places where they would certainly be moved by a searcher-a paper-clip at right angles to the edge of a desk, a piece of thin string near an entrance, an electric cord coiled haphazardly at the foot of a bed, it could have been anything.
“Whoever they were,” Hamid continued, “they had some computer experience. They got through the Level-3 Omega firewall-probably mirrored my drives.”
“Anything critical?”
“I know better than that. Thomas left his laptop in the locker at Langley, so they didn’t get that.”
Harry nodded. “Good. Tell you what-I’ll be over at seven hundred hours and have a look around myself. Not much we can do tonight.”
“Agreed.”
Harry thumbed the kill-button on the TACSAT, laying it on the nightstand as he buckled his pants. It wouldn’t hurt to have a look around, he reflected, reaching under the pillow for his Colt…
7:25 A.M. Eastern Time
CIA Headquarters
Langley, Virginia
Over the years since becoming the DCIA, David Lay had begun organizing his workdays into three categories. There were “bed” days, “garage” days, and “office” days. On a “bed” day, fresh trouble started brewing before he had even awoken. A “garage” day started off with one or more of his analysts meeting him the moment he stepped out of his car in the parking garage. So far, today was shaping up to be an “office” day, in that he had been seated at his desk for twenty minutes with no further issues rearing their ugly heads. Knock on wood.
Not that the issues of the previous day weren’t sufficiently worrisome. And not that Saturday was supposed to be his day off. He had been at the office till eleven o’clock last night, videoconferencing with FBI director Eric Haskel on protocols for a biological attack.
There were no other constructions that could be placed upon what Nichols and the field team had located. The Iranians were prepping for something. Something big. With the known fragility of y. pestis there was the hope that the demolition of the base camp had blown their biological project to kingdom come, but Lay was too old a hand to be willing to count on it.
The phone on his desk rang and he picked it up. “Lay speaking.”
“Sir,” came the voice of his secretary, “I have General Avi ben Shoham on Line Four.”
What does the chief of Mossad want at this time of morning? Lay asked himself. He sighed. So much for a better day. “Put him through, Margaret.”
2:27 P.M. Local Time
Mossad Headquarters
Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel
“Hold one for the DCIA.” Shoham acknowledged the information briefly, drumming his fingers on the wooden desktop as he waited for the scrambler to connect. It was moments like this he hated-moments of painful indecision. Mercifully, he hadn’t long to wait.
“Good afternoon, Avi.” Shoham smiled at the familiar voice of the CIA director.
“Good morning, David,” he replied, hesitating before he went on. The two men went back a long way-back to the ‘90s when Lay had been CIA chief of station in Tel Aviv and Shoham had been a liaison between their two intelligence agencies. The friendship had become steadily more distant over the years, as the two men climbed the ladder in their respective countries and the number of secrets to be kept grew.
But he was still a man Shoham called “friend”, and there were few of those. Precious few.
“How are things in Israel, Avi?” Lay asked, an innocent pleasantry designed to fill the suddenly awkward silence.
“As usual, David. Challenging. That’s not why I called. There’s been a matter which has come up in the last few days-a matter I believe you could shed some light upon.”
“I’ll do what I can, Avi. You know that.” The general smiled grimly, hearing the edge of reserve come into his friend’s voice.
“It’s not the kind of thing that can truly be discussed over the phone. I would like to set up a face-to-face meeting.”
He could almost hear the American flip open a schedule. “I’m sorry, Avi, but I don’t know when I could do that. My schedule is pretty much set for the next month, and that doesn’t allow for the crises that might demand my presence here.”
“I understand, and anticipated your dilemma. Neither can I leave Israel at this point in time. What I would instead propose is a meeting between our subordinates. In Eilat.”
“When?”
“As soon as possible.”
“I’ll see what I can do. Let me check with Shapiro, my Deputy Director, and I will get back to you.”
“No,” Shoham interjected, abrupt as usual. “I have no interest in a meeting with Shapiro. Here in Israel we prefer to work with people we’ve worked with before, people with an understanding of the situation in the field. People we trust.”
“Who then?”
“Harold Nichols.”
“An NCS team leader? Why?”
“He will be meeting with Lieutenant Gideon Laner, one of my leading operators. A meeting of equals, you might say. He and Nichols worked together in the Bekaa Valley four years ago. I believe you remember the particulars.”
There was a momentary silence on the other end of the line. “Tell me, Avi. Why should I accede to your request?”
“We are like children, David. Each holding pieces of the other’s puzzle. To give the picture meaning we must put our pieces together. Need I say more?”
“No. I will have to determine Nichols’ status, but we will arrange a meeting.”
“Thank you, David. And a good day to you.”
General Shoham hung up the phone with a heavy sigh, glancing across the room and out the window at the deep blue of the Mediterranean. The die had been cast…
7:38 A.M. Eastern Time
A mosque
Falls Church, Virginia
The door to the mosque was unlocked as always. Davood Sarami opened the door and slipped into the foyer, kneeling to remove his shoes. The mosque was a purpose-built structure, replacing the warehouse that had served as the local Islamic community’s house of worship when Davood had first visited two years before. He paused for a moment, taking in the beauty of the architecture. His heritage.
From within, he could hear the sound of a man sweeping and he walked forward, his bare feet padding noiselessly against the rugs. “Peace be upon you and the mercies of Allah. You have returned, my son,” the imam said, without looking up from his dustpan.
Davood just stood there, amused as always by the old man’s perception. “Yes, I have. You knew I would?”
“It is not in you, to depart from the faith of your fathers,” the imam stated, his voice calm and unequivocal.
The young agent leaned against one of the pillars, unsure of what to say. Faithful? He hardly felt that way. Yet perhaps the imam was right. The faith of one’s fathers…
“You are not in trouble, are you, my son?”
A shake of the head was Davood’s reply. “Why?”
The imam glanced up. “There were men here, about noon yesterday. Asking for you. They wished to ascertain what I knew of your past.”
“And you told them?”
“No, my son,” the old man replied slowly. “It is not a sin to lie to the infidel, but rather an act blessed of Allah. I told them nothing of pertinence.”
Davood stood there for a moment, seemingly rooted to the ground, his face pale in the glow of the candles. “Who were these men?”
“They did not identify themselves, my son. Their leader was of average height, dark-haired-of Italian descent, by the looks of him, swarthy, but not as dark as you or I.”
“How were they dressed?”
“Casually enough, the leader wore jeans and a light jacket.”
“A black jacket with the letters VT emblazoned on the back?”
The imam hesitated for a moment, looking up at the domed roof of the mosque as though he expected to find the answer written there. “Yes, I believe so. Why, do you know them?”
He turned back to find Davood gone, the sound of a door opening down the hallway the only sign of the agent’s departure. The old man sighed and went back to sweeping, checking his watch. It was almost time to broadcast the new recording of the call to prayer he had downloaded the previous day…
8:08 A.M.
The apartment
Manassas, Virginia
“Still no sign of anything missing, I guess?” Harry asked, standing outside the apartment that Hamid shared with Thomas.
Hamid shook his head. “I made a thorough inventory last night. It was a standard toss job, everything put back into place-very professional.”
“So, we’ve got no idea what they were after.”
“Or who they were,” Hamid acknowledged with a frown.
“Oh, let’s see,” Harry grinned, “who have we upset lately?”
“That’s a long list.”
“I know. You want to stop up the road and grab a cup of coffee before heading into work?”
“Sounds like a good idea. Let me lock up.”
Harry turned to walk back toward his car, aware suddenly of the TACSAT buzzing in his jacket pocket.
“Nichols here.” He was still listening three minutes later when Hamid reemerged from the apartment, his government-issued Glock riding easily on his hip.
“Yes, sir,” Harry said finally. “I’ll be there as soon as possible. Yes, I understand, sir. Goodbye.”
“Who was that?” Hamid asked.
“Kranemeyer,” Harry replied. “Looks like I’m going to have to miss our coffee.”
“Oh?”
“Wants me in the office ASAP. I’d better hit the road.”
“I’ll drink a cup in your honor.”
Harry grinned. “Really appreciate that, man. I really do.”
7:45 P.M. Tehran Time
Alborz Mountains
Iran
“Provided nothing goes wrong, we should reach this village by noon time,” Azad Badir stated, swivelling his laptop around so that both Sirvan and Thomas could see the screen. The modern technology looked strangely out of place in the shepherd’s hands, but it had gotten to the point where he wasn’t surprised by anything.
“We are moving eastward?”
The rebel leader looked up from the screen and nodded. “Yes.” He stabbed at the screen with a long, bony finger. “There is an Iranian airbase here. In two days we will strike-teams with explosives through the wire after dark, the rest setting up ambush outside once the charges are blown. I will expect you and Estere to provide sniper support.”
Thomas nodded. The old man was a tactician, all right. “I would be honored to serve as your granddaughter’s spotter again.”
“No, no,” Badir interrupted him. “You will have your own rifle, to be sure. We can do all the better with two teams.”
Thomas accepted the news in respectful silence, knowing no answer was expected. The orders had been given. And they surprised him to an extent. In days he had gone from being a virtual prisoner to an integral part of the fighters’ battle plans. Although grateful for their confidence, he found their latest move unsettling. They were moving east, farther into Iran, farther from the safety of the Iraqi border.
He stood, his part of the conference over, and walked away, leaving Badir to instruct his grandson on their strategy for attacking the camp.
Sentries had already been posted for the night, the group’s pack animals securely hobbled. Thomas sat down by the fire, leaning against a boulder as he gazed up at the sky. The flames flickered and leapt into the sky, casting bizarre shadows against the cliff behind him. The view was mesmerizing.
“Tired?” A voice asked.
He jumped, turning to find Estere standing there watching him. How long she had been there, he had no idea.
“Yeah,” he replied sheepishly. “They ought to hold SERE classes in these mountains.”
“SERE?” she asked, a puzzled look on her face as she took a seat beside him.
“Survive, Escape, Resist, Evade,” Thomas explained. “It’s one of the training courses we go through.”
She nodded her understanding, taking another sip from the cup of tea nestled in her hands. “I’ve always wanted to go to America.”
He looked at her there in the firelight and it seemed as though he was seeing her for the first time, her hair undone and flowing in dark waves around her face. He started to speak, then thought better of it, his legendary eloquence deserting him.
The thousand pick-up lines that had worked so well for him in the nightclubs and dinner parties of Manhattan seemed strangely empty now. There was something different about her-something he had never seen in a woman.
“Have you?” he asked in an attempt to keep the conversation flowing. Lame, Thomas, lame.
Fortunately, she seemed not to notice. “Oh, yes. Ever since I was a little girl,” she continued, her dark eyes shining in the firelight. “American movies, American music, anything American. Freedom, mostly, I think. To be able to live free, without fighting every step of the way.”
He smiled, his powers of speech returning into what seemed like the perfect comeback. “Where do you suppose I come in?”
It took Estere a moment to discern his meaning, and then she frowned. “You know what I mean. You fight so that your people do not have to. We have no one to do our fighting for us. Which is as it should be,” she went on after a reflective pause. “America has grown soft.”
Thomas could think of no suitable reply to that, and changed the subject. “So, what type of American music do you like?”
“Country, mostly. Keith Urban, Toby Keith-”
“You just have a thing for guys named Keith,” he chuckled. She reached over and punched him playfully in the ribs, laughing with him. “Oh, be quiet!”
“You like country?” she asked a moment later.
“Not particularly,” Thomas replied honestly, watching for her reaction. “I’m more of an oldies fan myself. Ames, Sinatra, the Rat Pack, all that jazz.”
“A romantic.” Estere stated, a speculative glint in her dark eyes.
A crooked grin tugged at the corners of Thomas’s mouth. “Feeling that way tonight, yes.”
Something in her eyes changed and she looked away from him, into the dancing flames of the campfire. An awkward silence. What did I say? Thomas thought, baffled by her reaction.
She turned toward him after a long moment. “Thomas, I know that-”
Whatever she knew was destined to remain a mystery, for at that moment a shout from one of the sentries brought both of them to their feet, Thomas’s hand reaching out for his AK-47. “What’s going on?”
11:04 A.M. Eastern Time
NCS Operations Center
Langley, Virginia
“Here’s the meeting place,” Kranemeyer stated, pressing the screen with one finger. The satellite image expanded, zooming in on the resort city of Eilat, Israel.
“We have 3-D imaging?” Harry asked, gazing thoughtfully at the image.
The DCS pushed a couple more buttons and the image on-screen was replaced by a three-dimensional landscape.
“They’ll have surveillance here-and here, at the very least,” Tex observed, indicating a couple of the taller buildings with a long finger.
Harry nodded in agreement. “Probably a back-up team along the marina here-that’s the way I would do it if I were them. Maybe laser mic the area if it’s feasible. I doubt they’ll send Laner in with a wire, that’s too obvious.”
“You’ve worked with the lieutenant in the past, Harry,” Kranemeyer began. “What is your assessment? Is the guy an honest broker?”
Harry gave him an Are you serious? look. “Are any of us?” he asked. “Gideon’s a good guy, a decorated veteran operator-the son of a rabbi. He’s Blue Team as far as it goes. But he’s going to follow his orders, no matter what.”
“And we don’t know what those orders are,” the DCS observed, stating the obvious. “Today’s Saturday. We’ve set up the meeting for Monday at noon. Don’t want to appear too accommodating. Harry, you’ll fly to Israel under a diplomatic visa. It’s an official visit, low-key, but hardly clandestine. Your flight leaves Dulles at seventeen hundred tomorrow. Tex, you’ll be leaving for Jerusalem tonight.”
Richards nodded his understanding, his natural economy with words once again asserting itself. Kranemeyer continued, “Marcus is working up your papers as we speak. Ever had the ambition to go into aid work?”
8:05 P.M. Tehran Time
The Alborz Mountains
Iran
“Do you understand him?” Thomas asked, down on one knee at Estere’s side. The intruder was a Kurdish boy of fifteen or sixteen, dressed in the rude clothing of a villager. He hadn’t spoken a coherent word in the ten minutes since he had been grabbed by the sentries, his breath still coming in ragged sobs.
She shook her head, putting a comforting hand against the boy’s tear-stained cheek. “Shhh,” she whispered, speaking to him in their native tongue.
In that moment, Thomas was struck by the tenderness of her touch, the almost maternal compassion in her eyes as she gazed down into the boy’s face. The boy seemed to relax under her hands, his breathing gradually slowing into normality.
She spoke to him once again, still in the same gentle tones. He shook his head and the words seemed to pour forth.
Thomas sat there, unable to understand the words being spoken, his only intimation of their content coming from the expression on the faces of the Kurds gathered round.
Something had happened. That much he knew. And it wasn’t good.
Azad Badir spoke rapidly to his grandson and Sirvan rose, disappearing into the darkness. After a moment, Estere stood as well and strode back toward the campfire where the two of them had talked.
“What’s going on?” Thomas demanded, hurrying to catch up to her. She slung the M-85 over her shoulder as she turned to face him.
“Another Iranian attack,” she replied, her face an emotionless blank. “The village we were to arrive at tomorrow. Everyone there is dying.”
There was something about her words that gave Thomas pause. “Dying?”
“Of disease, Thomas,” she responded flatly. “It’s not the first time we Kurds have been the victims of an experiment.”
She knelt down to retrieve her pack. “We have to see what we can do for them.”
Thomas stood there, his mind racing back to the briefings he and the team had gone through before launching TALON. Specifically, the Russian-made laboratory trailers that had dotted the Iranian base camp. An experiment?
9:06 P.M.
A compound
Isfahan, Iran
The two-and-a-half-ton truck rolled to a gentle halt in front of a chain-link and barbed-wire fence, the driver handing his papers to an armed sentry who materialized out of the small guard shack. Smoke rose idly from the guard’s glowing cigarette as he looked through the papers, then handed them back. He turned and began barking orders.
The driver glanced over as the gate swung open. “We’re here, Major.”
Hossein nodded tensely. The drive from Qom had been nerve-wracking, security forces a larger presence than normal on the roads. Almost as though they were preparing for something. And the smell of the guard’s cigarette had done nothing to ease his nicotine craving.
He thought of the nearly-full carton of Marlboros back in his quarters at the base camp and nearly groaned aloud-no doubt that stupid Larijani had helped himself to them by now. He found the thought sickening.
Houses lined both sides of the dusty street they drove down. The buildings were similar if not uniform, reminding him of barracks. The street broadened into a plaza, flanked on one side by the imposing structure of a mosque. Men were drawn up before the mosque, standing like soldiers at attention.
He exited the truck and walked toward them, casting a critical glance at their ranks as he approached. Fifty men in all, the chosen of the Ayatollah.
None of that mattered. Within the week, they would be his chosen. Or fail, as he had no doubt many would.
Hossein reached the center of the line and wheeled, clearing his throat as he prepared to address his men for the first time. He watched their faces in the harsh artificial light of the street lamps as he spoke, searching for the early signs. Who would fail. Who would survive.
And as he continued, the question continued to ring in his head.
Who?
6:37 P.M. Eastern Time
Dulles International Airport
“Identification, please?”
Tex watched the face of the TSA security guard as he casually scanned over the passport and ID. The perusal took thirty seconds, maybe forty, no longer. The expression in the man’s eyes was one of boredom.
The CIA paramilitary had seen it before. Prohibited from actively scanning for threats by an anti-discrimination manual thicker than the concrete of the presidential bunker, the man had become a drone, concerned with nothing more than getting through the monotony of the day. Clock in, clock out.
No way he was going to stop a potential terrorist with that attitude. Tex accepted his papers back with a forced smile and a murmured “Good day” as the line moved forward, resisting the temptation to rudely wake the security officer by slamming him against the wall. Locking down the terminal was not going to get him anywhere.
Things would be different on the other end of the line. Israeli airport security was among the best in the world, and with good reason. As the country at the top of every raghead’s hit list, they had been born of fire and learned their lessons in that crucible.
Still, he had no fears. He had spent the entire afternoon memorizing his new identity. And his papers were solid, put together by some of the best forgers in the world. His legend was firmly back-stopped by Langley. No reason to think things shouldn’t go as planned-except that they never did.
The Texan looked at his watch as he boarded the plane along with his fellow passengers. Time was going to be critical from the moment he landed in Israel. He would have just over twenty-four hours…