by Brad Thor
“No,” Wu replied, “but I know you. What I’m telling you is what they think. They wanted the attack to take place over Chinese New Year. You argued for September. Suddenly, they’re being forced to accept your position. Wouldn’t you be suspicious?”
“I’m paid to be suspicious,” Shi said. “They’re paid to be politicians.”
“But they are in charge and they have decided.”
“So do we launch the attack now?”
“No,” the general replied.
“No? Don’t they understand what’s at stake? We’ve lost contact with a cell member. We have to assume that his cover has been blown and that the Americans are wringing every ounce of intelligence out of him that they can.”
“None of which will point to us.”
Shi threw up his hands in disbelief. “All six cells trained together. They know how the attack is to be carried out.”
Wu nodded. “They know the delivery method, but not the means.”
“From just one cell member, a skilled interrogator could paint a bigger picture.”
“With broad brushstrokes,” Wu clarified, “anyone can paint a big picture. But without the details, the Americans have nothing.”
“They will have enough. That’s why we need to strike. If we don’t do it now, we’re going to lose our chance. And if the Americans figure out what is happening, they will have cause to strike us. We have to move first.”
Wu took a deep drag on his cigarette and, exhaling a whorl of smoke, replied, “The PSC agrees.”
Shi’s eyes widened and his mouth was agape. He was being whipsawed. “I don’t understand. They agree, but they don’t want to launch the attack? That doesn’t make any sense.”
“The have suggested a different path.”
“A different path? What different path? There is no different path. There is either attack or wait to be attacked.”
“They want to be absolutely sure that the missing cell member has been compromised before agreeing to launch the attack.”
Shi shook his head. Politicians. “He has missed four communication windows. He has not accessed his email and he is not answering his cell phone. We have no way of knowing what has happened to him. We have to assume that—”
“The PSC wants us to send Cheng,” the general interrupted.
Shi’s eyes widened once again. “How does the Politburo Standing Committee even know about Cheng?”
“From the General Secretary. He quietly likes to refer to Cheng as China’s James Bond.”
“He’s not James Bond,” Shi replied angrily, “and the General Secretary shouldn’t be referring to him at all—quietly or otherwise.”
“I agree with you, but what’s done is done. The General Secretary and the PSC want us to use Cheng.”
“Even after what happened?”
“Don’t be so dramatic,” Wu insisted. “They have no idea what happened. As far as they’re concerned, it was an accident.”
“But you and I know better. We know a Communist Party official blackmailed Cheng’s wife into bed and when Cheng found out, he killed him. He only made it look like an accident.”
“Has Cheng ever confessed this to you?”
“No,” Shi replied. “But when I put it to him directly, he didn’t deny it either.”
“We should never ask questions we don’t want the answers to.”
“Regardless, he’s not ready to go back out.”
“Do we have another operative as familiar with America and with such a well-backstopped cover?” asked Wu.
It was a rhetorical question. Shi answered it anyway. “We have several.”
The general looked at him and smiled. “None of them are as good as Cheng. He will get the information we need and he will do what needs to be done. Which brings me to this,” he said, removing a slip of paper from his pocket and sliding it across his subordinate’s desk.
As soon as Shi began to read it, he shook his head. “Impossible. No way.”
Wu had anticipated this reaction. Orders were orders. He pressed on. “Of the nine Politburo Standing Committee members, five have a child or grandchild currently attending school in the United States. All of whom would have been home for Chinese New Year.”
“Princelings,” Shi said with contempt. It was the derogatory term used for offspring of influential Communist Party leaders.
Wu ignored his sarcasm. “They are willing to sacrifice the Chinese diplomatic corps and the other Chinese VIPs within the United States. Their children, though, are another matter. If Cheng confirms that Snow Dragon has been compromised, you may launch the attack, but only after the names on that list are safe.”
“Define safe.”
The general paused for a moment before responding. “Their relatives would like them immediately brought home. Obviously, we can’t do that.”
“Obviously,” Shi stated. “The Americans would know something was afoot. How are we supposed to round up all five when—”
Wu had his answer ready. “The Americans have them under intermittent physical surveillance. Their FBI doesn’t have the manpower to watch them 24/7. We assume there are informants in their social circles and that their electronics are being monitored. None of this, though, will prevent Cheng from getting to them.”
“Wait. They want Cheng used for this operation, too?”
“Nothing is more important to them than the safety of their children,” Wu replied. “They want the best. That means Cheng.”
Shi and his wife had never been able to have children. With the hours he worked, he had always looked upon that as a blessing. Even so, he understood the human urge to protect one’s children. It was one of the few human traits he was willing to cede to China’s politicians, even though far too many lavishly spoiled their offspring while publicly espousing Mao’s revolution and the glories of communism.
“Assuming Cheng is able to locate all of them—” Shi began.
“Once Cheng has located all of them,” Wu corrected.
“Okay, once Cheng has located all of them, then what? The doubles program doesn’t exist anymore.”
The general took a slow drag off his cigarette. It was well known that the Americans tracked the visas of all Chinese nationals who entered the United States, especially those connected to the higher-ups in the Chinese Communist Party. Because the U.S. put special flags on these visas, China had created a doubles program.
At every university a princeling attended, the MSS enrolled a similar-enough-looking Chinese national. When princelings needed to be recalled for disciplinary action or any other reason that China wanted hidden from the U.S., a princeling borrowed the travel documents of his or her double, while the double stepped into the princeling’s shoes at school until the princeling returned. The adoption of sophisticated biometric devices by America’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement had rendered the doubles program obsolete.
If the five princelings tried to leave the country on one airplane, or even five different airplanes, the United States was not only going to know about it, they were going to start connecting the dots and soon thereafter questions would begin. China couldn’t risk that. The Second Department would have to come up with another way.
After a couple more moments of thought, Wu said, “What about Medusa?”
Medusa was the codename of an asset the PLA maintained in the southeastern United States.
Shi thought about it. “We’d use him to get them out of the country to the plantation?”
The plantation was China’s intelligence division based in Havana.
Wu nodded. “We could have a plane waiting for them there.”
It was an interesting plan, except for one thing. “Medusa has disappointed us in the past. If any of this goes wrong, the PSC and the General Secretary will hold you and me responsible.”
“That’s why we need Cheng. He will not disappoint us. He’ll make sure nothing goes wrong.”
Shi wasn’t as confident. There was not just
the question of whether Cheng could handle the assignments; if the Americans did have the missing Somali and they had broken him, they would have a two-day head start.
Tasking Cheng with both operations was wasteful and it was Shi who ultimately would be held responsible if Cheng failed. Looking at his boss, he said, “You are placing a lot of confidence in one man.”
“No,” the general replied. “I am placing my confidence in two men—you and Cheng.”
“If this fails, and the PSC also uncovers what we know about Cheng, you and I are both dead men.”
“Then you had better make sure this doesn’t fail, and that you complete your assignment before the Americans have any idea what’s going on.”
CHAPTER 14
* * *
* * *
DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES
It was after five o’clock and the dusty Bur Dubai neighborhood was still crowded with tourists. Businessmen were headed home or out for drinks. Taxicab drivers, immune to the heat, drove with their windows rolled down, picking up and dropping off customers in front of shops emblazoned with brightly colored Arabic script. Clothing, jewelry, and electronics competed alongside prayer rugs, hookah pipes, and antique furniture for buyers’ attention. The scent of the Gulf mingled with the aromas wafting out of restaurants up and down the neighborhood streets.
One of the first things Harvath had noticed about Bur Dubai was that it wasn’t as security-conscious as other parts of the city. There weren’t cameras on every single building and street corner. He was glad. It would make his job a lot easier.
He had gone around and around in his mind as to the best way to grab Khuram Hanjour. What about an invitation from Fahad? Would he respond to something like that? Would he respond on short notice? From what Harvath had seen over his career, particularly in his training with the Secret Service, people who engaged in risky behavior were extremely compulsive. The risk alone delivered its own high, and they were constantly trying to top the last time. It was a reasonable bet that if Hanjour was in town, he’d drop everything to come PnP with Fahad.
Based on Fahad’s Grindr account, as well as the questions Levy’s colleague had asked him in the prison, Fahad and Hanjour had had no contact for over a week. All Harvath had to do was properly bait the trap.
He and Levy studied the previous messages back and forth between the men. After a brief discussion, Levy crafted a short but seductive invitation. All they had to do was wait. Hours passed.
They had held off until after arriving in Dubai, sweeping the safe house, and checking into a room at the Arabian Courtyard, before attempting to contact Hanjour. If he was anxious to meet and they were still on the road from Abu Dhabi, they might have blown their opportunity. There was too great a chance that if Hanjour wanted to play, but Fahad was hours away, he’d simply scroll through Grindr and find someone else.
Despite that possibility, there was something about their communications that suggested the fifty-seven-year-old Hanjour had an affinity for the twenty-six-year-old-Fahad. Harvath assumed it was akin to older straight men who got their kicks dating women half their age. He couldn’t be sure, but he hoped that if there was something there, it would work to their advantage.
When the chime sounded on the cloned phone, Harvath and Levy immediately stopped what they were doing and read the message. Hanjour wanted to meet. “SR@1800,” he typed.
“Silk Route at 1800?” asked Levy.
Harvath nodded, “Six p.m. at the Silk Route.”
It was on. Hanjour had taken the bait, but now the real work would begin. The biggest problem with Bur Dubai, next to the traffic, was the fact that there was no parking. The Arabian Courtyard offered a valet service, but there was no way Harvath was going to place his operation at the mercy of how quickly valets could bring a car around.
Being able to devote someone from their team to remain with a vehicle was a big advantage. Harvath was reminded once more of the advantages of not always going it alone. Levy and her resources were worth their weight in gold.
In addition to leaving a man with the BMW, she placed a couple of spotters outside the hotel on Al Fahidi Street to watch for Hanjour. Once they saw him, their job was to figure out whether he was alone. Levy also put a man and a woman in the restaurant to have a long, leisurely dinner at a table where they could observe everyone who came and went.
It wasn’t exactly the light footprint Harvath had envisioned, but it was the right thing to do and Levy more than knew her stuff.
Their biggest challenge was where and how to actually grab Hanjour. Bur Dubai was a lot like being in the French Quarter in New Orleans, but with three times the people. It was going to be impossible to pull up, stuff him in the trunk, and take off without anyone noticing. Even if they could slip him a drug like Rohypnol, it would be a tightrope act getting him out of the restaurant and through the hotel without attracting attention.
What they needed was for Hanjour to do their work for them. He needed to walk right into their arms, and that gave Harvath an idea.
When he presented it to Levy, the first thing she said was, “What’s Plan B?” It wasn’t exactly a vote of confidence.
But as Harvath explained how it could play out, Levy came around to his way of thinking. That didn’t mean they didn’t need a Plan B. Harvath and Levy assembled one, as well as Plans C, D, and E. If all else failed, they’d go to Plan F—universally known as Fuck it, we’ll do it live. Sometimes, no matter how hard you tried to anticipate and plan for all eventualities, things just went south. When that happened, it usually happened fast. At that point, you relied upon your training and did everything possible to secure the objective. A lot of times it got messy. Very messy. Harvath was hoping this wouldn’t be one of those times.
• • •
At seven minutes to six, the call came in that a man fitting Khuram Hanjour’s description had just pulled up in front of the hotel. He valet-parked his white Mercedes and walked inside. There was no one else with him.
As the spotter relayed what the man was wearing, Anne Levy told the rest of her team, particularly the couple she had sitting in the restaurant, that the target had arrived.
Turning to Harvath she said, “Now what?”
“Now we wait,” he replied.
The Arabian Courtyard Hotel was built around a grand atrium with glass elevators you could watch ascend. That allowed Cowles, who was seated in the ground-floor lounge, to watch Hanjour cross the marble lobby, get into one of the elevators, and take it up to the Silk Route level. After relaying the target’s movements, he sat back and pretended to enjoy a coffee as he continued to scan the lobby and the front door for any unwanted guests.
“We’ve got him,” the female CIA operative said over her Bluetooth earpiece when Hanjour entered the restaurant. She watched him speak with the hostess and then be shown to a table near the windows.
Hanjour was a balding man of medium height with a thin build. He wore an obviously dyed, tightly cropped black beard and a pair of stylish, frameless glasses. He had paired his khaki trousers with a white, short-sleeved silk dress shirt and a pair of soft leather driving shoes. On his right wrist was a large gold Rolex and on his left pinky finger was a gold signet ring. He wore no other jewelry and carried nothing in his hands that they could see.
He ordered a gin and tonic and surveyed the room as he sipped, waiting for his companion to arrive. The young CIA couple kept him in their peripheral vision, pretending to be more into each other than anything else. The last thing they needed was for him to know he was under surveillance.
When the clock on his phone read two minutes past six o’clock, Harvath texted Hanjour a picture. It showed a pillow on a turned-down bed. Propped up against the pillow were two small plastic bags. One was filled with what looked like meth and the other with what looked like synthetic marijuana. There was a box of condoms and a red rose. The only text that accompanied the picture was the room number, 501.
Hanjour slid the phone from
his pocket and read the message. Taking out his wallet, he left some money for the waitress and walked over to the hostess. He said a few words to her and she smiled as he tipped her. Then he exited the restaurant.
The female CIA operative rang Levy. “He just left.”
Levy pinged Cowles down in the lobby and told him to watch the elevators. Raising his coffee cup to his mouth, Cowles turned his attention to the elevators and gave a play-by-play of what he saw, ending with, “The elevator is stopping on five. He’s getting off. Headed in your direction.”
Levy looked at Harvath and said, “Here he comes.”
The door had been propped open using the swing guard lock. When Hanjour entered, he would walk down a short hallway with the darkened bathroom to his right. The bedside table lamps were on, but had been covered with pieces of red fabric to dim their brightness and add to the mood. A small amount of incense had been burned so that it would appear that perhaps Fahad was trying to cover up that he had already started partying and was ready to go right to play mode. The bedspread had been kicked off and dropped on the floor at the foot of the bed. The radio was playing softly.
Dim lights, a little bit of incense, the bedspread on the floor, and music. It was all designed to throw Hanjour off balance; to reinforce in his mind what he wanted to see.
All they needed now was for him to walk through the door, which was exactly what he did next.
CHAPTER 15
* * *
* * *
Khuram Hanjour gently pushed the door open and slipped inside room 501. He saw the bedspread up ahead on the floor. Turning, he locked the door behind him.
He spoke in hushed Arabic as he kicked off his shoes and began unbuttoning his shirt. He had dropped it to the floor and was just unbuttoning his pants when he stepped into the bedroom and saw Anne Levy standing there. In her hands was a suppressed, Elite Dark SIG Sauer P226, the same weapon carried by a lot of Texas Rangers and Navy SEALs. It was pointed right at him.
