Jihad (16 page)

“I wouldn’t think any officer needs to be told to avoid using a weapon whenever possible,” said Rubens.

“Point taken. But they are good people. They have good track records. It won’t happen again.”

“I appreciate that,” said Rubens, still wondering what she was really after. He gave her a brief update, mentioning the German connection and then saying that Bing had suggested bringing Asad in immediately.

“That makes no sense,” said Collins. “I hope you told her that.”

She sounded sincere, but Collins was a master at political grappling, and Rubens didn’t trust her.

“She made it clear we could proceed,” Rubens said, remaining neutral, or at least as neutral as possible. Then he changed the subject. “You’ve heard what happened to George Hadash?”

“Yes,” said Collins. “It was a shock. We knew the operation had risks, but still. It was a shock.”

“Yes, it was,” said Rubens, though he resented the ‘we.’ Collins and Hadash had never been close.

“Are they planning a state funeral?”

“Yes, though his daughter would prefer something more private. She called the president last night. It’s been arranged for tomorrow already.”

“So soon.”

“Yes.”

“What did the president say?”

It occurred to Rubens that this might be an elaborate plot by Bing to see if Rubens was using his connections to confer privately with the president. The idea galled him, and instantly he decided he was being too paranoid.

And yet, given Collins’ history, such a possibility could not be entirely ruled out.

“I don’t know,” Rubens told her. “Irena spoke to him herself.”

“George deserves a state funeral.”

“Surely,” said Rubens. “Surely.”

CHAPTER 43

LIA SPENT THE next two hours tailing Asad as the al-Qaeda leader zigzagged around Istanbul’s old city, having lunch in a restaurant a few blocks from the Blue Mosque, then visiting the Tomb of Sultan Ahmet I and the Haghia Sophia. She changed her clothes twice, following along dutifully, making sure that what the Art Room was hearing jibed with what he was doing.

“Don’t get too close,” her runner Sandy Chafetz told her as she tagged along into the Haghia Sophia. “We have everything under control.”

Right, thought Lia. You have everything under control. She liked Chafetz better than Rockman, but even she succumbed to Art Room Ego, thinking she knew all and controlled all just because she had a half-dozen computer screens in front of her.

When the Haghia Sophia—“the church of holy wisdom”—was built in the sixth century as a Christian church, it was one of the wonders of the world, its walls glittering with gold and elaborate mosaics of Christ and the saints. Sacked during the Crusades, it was turned into a mosque during the fifteenth century, and the mosaics and other art were removed or plastered over. Some of the plaster had been removed from the walls in the western gallery, and a mosaic of Christ and the Emperor Constantine IX peeked out from the whitewash. Raised as a Roman Catholic by her parents, the desecration sent a vicious shock through Lia when she walked onto the second floor, and for a few seconds she remained fixed to the spot, absorbed by the image and the violence it implied.

When she lowered her gaze, she realized Asad stood less than ten feet away, a smirk on his face.

Lia was dressed as a tourist now, and Asad had been doped when he saw her yesterday. Still, she had gotten closer than she wanted. She’d let her emotions interfere with her actions.

Slowly, she turned to the side and wandered off to a group of schoolchildren who were inspecting some of the recent restoration work. When she looked back in Asad’s direction, she saw that he was heading for the stairway.

“He’s outside,” said Rockman a few minutes later.

She kept her distance after that.

AROUND FIVE, ASAD went to a house on the northern outskirts of the city, apparently abandoning the one he had used earlier. Lia set up another surveillance net and then moved back, the intercepts indicating that Asad had no plans to go out. The Art Room decided it was a good time for a conference and Lia began trolling the area, looking for a place where she could talk to herself without seeming out of place or being overheard. Finally she settled on a small park, taking out her satphone to pretend to talk to it. Lia had changed again, donning another conservative jilbab. This proved to be out of step with the neighborhood, as she realized when a middle-aged woman passed by and gave her an odd, disapproving glance.

“We’re all comfortable?” asked Telach.

“I’m not,” said Karr. “I’m starving.”

“You’re always hungry,” said Dean. Lia could hear the helicopter in the background when he spoke; he’d changed places with Karr.

“The operation has been quite successful,” said Rubens, coming onto the line. “You’ve all done very well.”

“But,” said Lia.

“There is no
but,
Lia.”

Baloney, thought Lia. There was
always
a “but” with Rubens. No matter how perfectly a mission went, he found something to object to.

A young woman with a double stroller passed nearby. Lia watched as she stooped to fuss over the two children, lifting one out of the carriage and then the other. Wearing jeans and a blouse, the woman could have been anywhere in Europe, or America for that matter.

“The man Red Lion met with last night is an al-Qaeda operative who was previously believed to be dead,” said Rubens. “He took a flight to Germany a few hours ago and we now believe he heads a network of terrorists there. Mr. Karr will travel to Germany to work with German intelligence.”

“Bundesnachrichtendienst,” said Karr brightly in a mock German accent.

“Thank you, Mr. Karr,” said Rubens. “I’m sure we’re all well aware of the proper name for German intelligence.”

“How’s my accent?”

Rubens, who could be very indulgent with Karr, ignored him. “In the meantime, Lia and Mr. Dean will continue tracking Red Lion. The CIA teams will take up any slack—”

“Not either of the clowns who ‘helped’ us yesterday,” said Dean.

“We have to work with the assets available,” said Rubens, his voice even more priggish than usual. “Unless, Mr. Dean, you have additional information about what happened.”

“I already told Marie what happened.”

“Lia?” said Rubens.

“They thought he was escaping,” Lia said. “It wasn’t the best decision. They did fine in the hospital.”

“I don’t trust them,” said Dean. “They’re not under control.”

Was Dean right? Or was she?

Why was she defending Pinchon?

Did she still feel something for him?

God help her.

No, she didn’t. She couldn’t. But she had to be fair. Fair.

“I believe your judgment may be a little harsh, Mr. Dean,” said Rubens. “But if you don’t believe you can work with them, I will request that they make reassignments.”

Dean didn’t answer. Lia pictured him in her mind, his jaw set, debating. But instead of his face, she saw Pinchon’s.

“Whoever we work with has to understand they work for us, not the other way around,” said Dean. “We don’t need no cowboys.”

“Yee-ha!” shouted Karr. “Not even me, pardner?”

“Not even you, Tommy,” snapped Dean. “Just make sure they understand that.”

CHAPTER 44

THE GAME WAS a Pac-Man rip-off, a vintage video machine rigged to play without coins. When he first found it in the small lounge at the back of the hotel lobby, Dr. Ramil thought it would relax him. But he soon realized that it was only making him more tense, revving his anxiety. Still, he couldn’t seem to push himself away from it, hypnotized by the balls he had to sweep up and the monsters buzzing along behind him. He spent more than an hour pushing the joystick back and forth, convincing himself that he had a strategy to win.

He finally broke away when the call to evening prayers wafted into the back room. For most people in the city—Muslims as well as those of other faiths—the taped broadcasts were background noise; the vast majority went about their business without interrupting what they did. Until today, Ramil had always done the same. But now he left the hotel and walked up the street toward the Blue Mosque, compelled to go there by some force within him.

His heart was jumping in his chest, and his head felt as if he were covered with cushions, constricting his vision and hearing. As a doctor, he knew he must be close to having a panic attack, or even a nervous breakdown. The stress of the mission had unnerved him, but he wasn’t sure what to do about it. Praying probably made as much sense as anything.

Even well-trained young men like Tommy Karr reacted to the extreme stress of covert ops. What else was his careless accident and relentless joking but a byproduct of the mission?

How much more fragile was a middle-aged man?

More than middle-aged, to be honest.

Ramil’s legs began to slow, his heels scraping on the cobblestones. He was in good health and had completed the most dangerous part of the assignment. To get help, all he had to do was push two buttons on the satphone. Support teams were scattered around the city. He’d been in far more dangerous situations and survived. There was no reason to be nervous, much less panic.

He
had
heard a voice in the New Mosque earlier—a real voice, probably from someone who could tell by his clothes that he was American, and disliked Americans. He wasn’t losing his mind.

What if it had been God who called him a traitor and coward? What then?

Ramil took a deep breath. He certainly believed in God. But he also knew that God did not talk to people, or at least not to him. He was a doctor and scientist, not a seer.

Was he afraid of the mosque? If not, why was he standing here, glued to the small strip of sidewalk below its grounds?

Ramil crossed the street just ahead of a taxi, then turned the comer and walked up the hill. The outdoor cafe opposite the mosque was packed with tourists. A group of dervish performers were on the stage, spinning and dancing.

The immense mosque felt more like a museum than a house of worship. The vastness of the space, emphasized by the streaks of light flooding down from the windows at the top of the building, calmed him—everyone was insignificant here, not just Dr. Saed Ramil.

Ramil walked past the tourists admiring the blue tiled ceiling that had given the mosque its name, passing into the prayer area reserved for the faithful. The stained glass threw a glorious hue of light all around the interior. Ramil felt as if he were walking into a rose.

He was on his knees in the middle of prayer when he heard the voice in his head again.

They are cowards and traitors to the Word of God They must be brought to justice. Why have you not done more to stop them?

Hands trembling, Ramil fled back to his hotel.

CHAPTER 45

WITH ASAD APPARENTLY bedded down for the night and electronic sensors in place to keep close track of him, Charlie Dean found himself bored. He went to a restaurant about a mile from the terror leader’s safehouse, a fancy place that catered primarily to European tourists and the occasional businessman. The pace was slow, which suited Dean perfectly; he sipped sparkling water while watching the other guests. The wait staff were making a fuss over a six-year-old Italian boy who was sitting with his parents two tables away, treating the boy as if he were the reincarnation of Turkey’s national hero and founder, Atatürk. Extra desserts appeared, waitresses and even waiters stole kisses. The father, roughly Dean’s age, looked on with a bemused smile, while the mother—closer to Lia’s—beamed.

They hadn’t talked about kids during their time in Pennsylvania. Maybe they should have.

Funny to be thinking about kids at this point in my life, Dean thought.

“No change, Charlie,” said Sandy Chafetz, the runner on duty back in the Art Room.

“Yeah,” muttered Dean.

“How’s dinner?”

“Not bad,” said Dean.

A waiter approached to take his plate. Dean asked to see a dessert menu.

“I feel like I’m living vicariously,” said Chafetz. “Try something chocolate.”

He ended up with an Italian cheesecake—Lia’s favorite.

CHAPTER 46

TOMMY KARR HAD worked with Bundesnachrichtendienst, the German intelligence service also known by the abbreviation BND, in the past, but even if he hadn’t, he would have had no trouble spotting the two agents waiting for him near the customs gate when he landed in Munich. In their thirties, they were recruiting-poster types, tall, straight, and impeccable in black suits that looked custom made. They were the best dressed men in the terminal, and probably the city.

“Hey there, guys,” said Karr, walking up to them, “lookin’ for little ol’ me?”

The agents blinked in unison.

“Kjartan Magnor-Karr from America. You can call me Tommy. Do I have to go through these lines or what?”

“No” was the answer, and Karr was whisked through a side door to a Mercedes sedan for the drive to BND headquarters in Pullach. The building was probably the cleanest Karr had ever been in. He could see his reflection in the floor as he walked across the reception area, and the hallways gleamed so brightly he considered putting on his sunglasses.

Waiting in the secure conference room was Heda Hess, an Abteilung 5 supervisor who had investigated al-Qaeda for several years. Accompanying her were half a dozen other officers from Abteilung 5—Section 5 in English, it was the antiterror group. Two men from the Federal Bureau for the Protection of the Constitution (generally known by its German initials, BfV), which also investigated extremist groups, had also been invited and came in a few minutes after Karr.

“Herr Magnor-Karr, welcome,” said Hess.

The way she put out her hand made Karr think she expected him to kiss it. He resisted the impulse to click his heels—no German he had ever met had anything approaching a sense of humor—and introduced himself to the others.

Desk Three had forwarded information on Marid Dabir to the Bundesnachrichtendienst already; Karr’s job was to put the information into perspective and then help in any way he could. Referring to Red Lion only as an ongoing operation, he told the Germans that Dabir had resurfaced in Turkey. There he had met with another top al-Qaeda official, who had probably ordered Dabir to proceed on a European operation that was part of a planned fall offensive. The targets were believed to be economic, possibly related in some way to petroleum or energy assets, but they had yet to be identified.