Twelve Days

by Alex Berenson

  It was morning in Jerusalem. Duto was tempted to call Rudi. Four days since their meeting, and the Israeli hadn’t called. Maybe he had decided that he could serve his country best by keeping his mouth shut. Maybe he was too sick to help. Maybe he had asked and found nothing. Whatever the answer, Duto had made his best case back at Ben Gurion Airport. Pushing would be counterproductive. Duto shoved his phone away and waited.

  Downtime.

  —

  Green’s motorcade showed up fifteen minutes later. Duto was surprised to see it was only three SUVs—two black Suburbans, one blue Jeep Grand Cherokee with the distinctive long antenna of a coms vehicle. The detail parked nose-to-tail about twenty feet from his Tahoe. Two men stepped out of each Suburban, surveyed the empty asphalt, fanned out toward the corners of the lot, muttering to each other on their shoulder-mounted TAC radios.

  Only then did the real convoy arrive. Two more Suburbans, two Explorers, and another Cherokee for coms. Eight trucks in all, at least twenty guards. Like Green was going to Baghdad, not suburban Virginia. Though Duto could hardly complain. He had traveled in similar style as DCI.

  The wind came straight from the Appalachians, chilling Duto through his overcoat. Green was dressed for the weather, in wool-lined boots and a green down jacket that plumped around her like she’d shoplifted it from a Salvation Army. Whatever the President saw in her, it wasn’t her fashion sense.

  Duto extended a hand. “Donna.”

  “Vinny. I’d say it’s good to see you, but that would be a lie. And I’m planning to keep the lies to a minimum tonight.”

  “The pleasure’s mine, then. Mind if we walk?”

  “I’d prefer if you stayed close,” the guard nearest Green said.

  “I think we’ll be okay,” Duto said.

  “I’d prefer if you stayed close.” Like Duto hadn’t spoken at all.

  “I trust you to protect us from fifty feet, Kyle,” Green said.

  The guard nodded. His master’s voice. They strolled side by side toward the Home Depot.

  “I’m here, Senator. So talk.” She spoke straight ahead, not looking at him.

  “Whatever you have planned for Iran, it needs to wait.”

  “Because?”

  “The HEU wasn’t Iranian. Someone’s setting you up.”

  “That possibility has been considered and rejected.”

  “You saw what you wanted to see.”

  She stopped. Looked at him. “Okay, Vinny. Say it’s not Iranian. Whose, then?”

  “I don’t know who enriched it. But I can tell you a private team working for Aaron Duberman put it there.”

  Every time Duto made the accusation, it sounded crazier. He knew he was right, yet he felt like a nutty conspiracy theorist. Green seemed to sense his embarrassment. She looked at him, let him see her smirking.

  “So I’m clear. We’re talking about the guy who spent two hundred million dollars to elect my boss.”

  Duto nodded.

  “Are you saying that we’re conspiring with him to produce false evidence to invade Iran? Because that sounds like treason. And I’ll need to double-check the Constitution I keep in my office, but I do believe treason is punishable by death.”

  “I’m not saying you knew.”

  “What exactly are you saying, then?”

  “This is the best false-flag op I’ve ever seen.”

  “Oh, false flag. So we didn’t know. I’m so relieved.” Every word more sarcastic than the last. “Is this where you hand me a thumb drive that proves we have aliens at Roswell?”

  Her disregard finally got to him. He grabbed her arm. Unfortunately, or maybe not, the down kept him from getting a grip. Kyle ran at them, his feet pounding the asphalt. He hadn’t drawn his pistol, but his hand was inside his jacket.

  “Everything okay?”

  “Fine.” Duto dropped her arm.

  Green let the question hang for a couple long seconds before she finally nodded.

  “You sure, Ms. Green?”

  “Your boss and I are having a full and frank exchange of views. Run along, now.”

  “I wasn’t asking you, Senator.”

  Green nodded again, and they watched Kyle retreat.

  “It’ll take more than that. I hope you’re properly humiliated,” Green said under her breath.

  “I’ll tell you a secret, Vinny. You probably wonder why POTUS wanted you gone so bad. It was me. I remember Fred Whitby.”

  The chill in Duto’s bones didn’t come from the wind. Whitby had been Director of National Intelligence when Duto was DCI. They’d fought to control the agency and the entire intel community. Duto won. Through Wells and Shafer, he used Whitby’s involvement in the death of a detainee at a secret prison to force Whitby to resign. Wells quit the agency in protest when he realized what Duto had done. At the time, Duto hardly cared. Losing Wells was a small price to pay to control all of American intelligence.

  “They called it ‘The Midnight House,’ right? Neatest knifing I ever saw. Your boys got rid of him, it didn’t even touch you.”

  Duto didn’t bother to ask how she knew the details. She knew because knowing was her job. At least now he saw why everyone called her the smartest person in the White House.

  “You’re missing the point of that story.”

  “Enlighten me.”

  “I was right. He was dirty.”

  “You were, too. Up to your neck in rendition. But he went down.”

  “And Duberman’s dirty, too. If you could stop trying to destroy me for a minute, you’d see I’m helping you.”

  “The President’s biggest donor is behind all this?”

  “Yes.”

  “And I’m guessing it’s because he hates Iran, thinks it’s a threat to Israel, doesn’t trust the deal we made.”

  “I haven’t asked him, Donna, but yes. I’m sure he’s said as much to you.”

  “Not since this started, though. Man hasn’t called me once.”

  “Because you’re doing exactly what he wants.”

  “So it doesn’t matter what Duberman does or doesn’t do at this point. He calls, he doesn’t call, it’s all evidence.”

  “Ask yourself why I would tell you this if it isn’t true. Or at least if I didn’t believe it.”

  “Because you hate the Senate already. Think you’re too good for it. But you know there’s no way you’re ever going to be more than the junior senator from Pennsylvania unless lightning strikes. And this feels like lightning. Your friends inside Langley, and you still have a few, have told you the evidence isn’t as airtight as we’d like. You know we still can’t find the colonel who tipped us.”

  News to Duto, valuable news, not that he was about to tell Green the mistake she’d made in revealing it. “All true.”

  “Now you’re making the same mistake as Tehran. Underestimating POTUS, thinking that he doesn’t have the stones to attack. You know if I listen to you and we back down, we’ll owe you the kind of favor that will give you a whole new career. State. Defense. Whatever.”

  “And John Wells is helping me with this?”

  “Probably he doesn’t have the full picture. Just like you did with Whitby.”

  “It’s a good theory, Donna.” Duto raised his right hand. “Only problem is it’s wrong. I’ll swear on whatever you like. I’ll swear on Home Depot.”

  She shook her head. “I want evidence. Any at all.”

  Duto realized he’d misplayed his hand terribly. He’d figured his time as DCI would count for something. And it had. The opposite of the way he’d hoped. He should have held off on calling the White House until he had something tangible.

  Donna Green was even more cynical than he was. An impossible feat.

  “I don’t have anything concrete to show you.”

  “That’s no, then.”


  Duto hadn’t planned to go into details, but he felt the need to explain. “A former case officer named Mason was running the op, but if you ask Hebley about him, he’ll say the guy died four years ago in Thailand.”

  “But this Mason is actually alive.”

  “No. He’s dead.” Duto remembered now why he hadn’t planned to go into details. “Last week. Wells killed him.”

  “Where’s the body?”

  Duto opened his mouth, but no words came out. Alarm flashed in Green’s eyes. Like she couldn’t decide if he was playing her or simply losing his mind.

  “Gone. I know it sounds far-fetched. But it’s not like you have a ton of evidence tying the uranium to Iran either.”

  “If it’s not Iranian, where’d Duberman get it?”

  “We’re looking.”

  “You must at least have a working theory.”

  “We have several.”

  Duto realized that as DCI, he would have fired any deputy who made a presentation this bad.

  Green turned back to the convoy, giving him no choice but to follow. A signal that the conversation was over. “Vinny. Let me tell you something you won’t want to hear. If you don’t mind.” Her tone had a new breeziness that didn’t comfort Duto. She sounded like a cop trying to talk down a jumper. “The Indians found the guys who shot down United 49. We took ’em six hours ago. Predawn in Mumbai. A Delta team.”

  “Delhi signed off on the Deltas?”

  “We didn’t give them a choice. POTUS wanted to be sure we brought them in alive. And the Indians are embarrassed. We warned them about Chhatrapati. Years ago.”

  “I know.” Duto had been DCI at the time. The Federal Aviation Administration had even considered banning American carriers from flying to Mumbai. But the Indian government protested and promised to improve security, and the FAA backed down. “So who has the shooters now?”

  “They’re in the bath.” Meaning the Navy was holding them offshore. “They’re Lebanese. And we’re a hundred percent sure they’re Hezbollah.”

  “They’re talking?”

  “They’re bragging.”

  For the first time, Duto wondered if he and Wells and Shafer had made a mistake. Maybe they couldn’t connect Mason to Duberman because the connection didn’t exist. But no. The thread they’d followed was real.

  “If Tehran thinks we’re going to invade on false evidence, they’d have every reason to shoot down our planes. Doesn’t it strike you as odd that they haven’t even hinted at making a deal since we hit them? That they went straight to the wall?”

  “Interesting theory, Senator.” The chill was back in her voice. As much as saying: I tried to make you see reason. And I failed. We’re done. “Two choices here. I go back to POTUS, tell him you’ve accused his largest campaign donor of treason without evidence. Get it in the record. When we hit Iran, find all that HEU you say doesn’t exist, that file magically finds air.”

  “WikiLeaks?”

  “Call me old-fashioned, but I just love the idea of it on the front page of the Times. Terrible way for a distinguished public servant like you to end his career. Second choice, we pretend this was a bad orange-flavored dream.”

  The threat snapped Duto’s shoulders back, puffed his chest. Fight or flight. The amazing part was that for once his conscience was clear. He’d told the truth. He’d tried to warn her.

  Last time he made that mistake.

  “Do what you like, Donna. But I promise I’m gonna figure out where Duberman scored that uranium.” Duto raised his voice. “Then I’m going to call you and tell you. Just you and me, face-to-face. Then I’m gonna turn you around and bend you over so hard you won’t sit for a month. Like I did to Whitby.”

  All the guards, hers and his, were listening openly, not even pretending they hadn’t heard. Kyle trotted toward them.

  “Get that, buddy? Do I need to repeat it?”

  “Enough, Senator.” Kyle inserted himself between Duto and Green, close enough for Duto to see what was left of the spinach Kyle had eaten for dinner. Duto hoped beyond hope that the guard would put a hand on him. He still worked the heavy bag four days a week.

  Green guided Kyle aside. “No worries. We’re done here.”

  Duto stepped back as Kyle hurried Green to her Tahoe. The rest of her guards followed. Doors slammed. Forty-five seconds later, the last of the SUVs crunched out of the parking lot and turned onto the turnpike, running lights flashing, no sirens.

  Duto watched in silence, replaying snatches of the conversation, his adrenaline fading. Had he really threatened to quote-unquote bend over the National Security Advisor? In front of two dozen witnesses?

  They better find that uranium.

  12

  VOLGOGRAD

  The woman who called herself Salome wasn’t alone. A man stood beside the bed. His face was faintly asymmetrical, the left side wider than the right, like he’d had an accident that surgery hadn’t fully fixed. His right hand hovered over his hip. His eyes stuck to Wells’s hands.

  A pro.

  Wells stepped toward the bed.

  “Close enough,” Salome said.

  “All friends here.”

  A smile spread from Salome’s lips up her cheeks to her eyes. North like a warm front. While it lasted, she was pretty. Alive. Then it was gone. She looked at him as coolly as a research scientist checking out a chimp. Don’t mind this old needle, Mr. Chips. Won’t hurt a bit . . .

  In happier news, they’d left the window curtains open. So they didn’t plan to kill him. Not here, anyway. A tour bus idled in the parking lot below. As Wells watched, an old couple tottered toward it, hand in hand. He thought of Anne and all the lives he’d left behind.

  “Mason told me you were trouble,” Salome said. Her English was measured, almost too perfect, a hint of eastern Mediterranean. She could have passed for first-generation American, the accent left over from her native-speaking parents. She wore only a wedding ring, no nail polish or makeup. All business.

  Except the smile.

  “You come see me in person, I guess I’m moving up the ladder.” Wells figured he’d take his best shot first. “You work for Aaron Duberman.”

  She shook her head, not so much denying what he’d said as declaring it irrelevant.

  “For money, or because you’re crazy?”

  She muttered in Hebrew and a pistol appeared in the guard’s right hand. That fast. Too bad. At least now Wells knew what he was up against.

  “Be more polite,” Salome said. “Who looks out for you? A broken-down CIA man and a senator no one trusts.”

  “I’ll worry when I see you throw carrots on the carpet to distract me.”

  Wells saw she didn’t get the reference. So she hadn’t been at Buvchenko’s.

  “I didn’t think I’d have the pleasure of seeing you again,” Wells said. “Salome? That’s your name?” A biblical reference, but Wells couldn’t remember the details. “Your real name?”

  “As real as any.”

  Ask a stupid question . . . Still, Wells was content to joust for the moment.

  “And you’re Israeli?”

  “Why do you keep bothering me about this?”

  “You’re asking why I’m trying to stop a war?”

  “I don’t want war.” She winked.

  Wells couldn’t read her at all. She was playing with him like a cat batting a mouse. “If you’re worried about bugs, I never got here last night.”

  “I’m not worried. You know, my friend here thinks I shouldn’t talk to you at all. He wants to shoot you in the face and be done with it.”

  “Lucky for me you’re in charge.”

  “It seems so.”

  They looked steadily at each other, the only sound the rumbling of the bus outside. Wells couldn’t deny the truth: He felt connected to this woman
. They were both endless travelers, perpetual outsiders who had spent their lives in crummy hotel rooms, giving fake names to anyone who asked. They both knew how easy lying became after you’d done it too much, how boring the simplicity of truth became.

  “You came all the way to Volgograd to tell me you weren’t going to shoot me in the face?”

  “And see you for myself, the man who killed five of mine. But mainly I came to tell you it’s over.”

  The fact that she felt the need to say so suggested otherwise. “Buvchenko told you I was here.”

  “Of course.”

  Had the Russian supplied the uranium, then? Wells thought not. Then he would be a prisoner at the mansion, or more likely another target on the firing range. No, Salome had asked Buvchenko to watch out for Wells, and if he appeared to find out what he knew. No matter which direction he went, she was a step ahead.

  “Last night, after dinner, he called you, told you I was asking about you. You said, hold me overnight, you’d come to Russia.”

  “I appreciate your”—she hesitated, trying to remember the word—“perseverance, yes? But understand, you only make trouble for yourself and your family.”

  Family. The magic word. What she had come to say. Wells stepped toward her. The guard lifted his pistol.

  “Listen,” she said. “You promise Buvchenko a million dollars? I pay ten. You don’t know anything. Not even my name. You think these men in Washington look after you, but if Mason hadn’t been a fool, you would be dead already.”

  “Concrete shoes.”

  “A joke to prove your bravery. What I tell you, bravery doesn’t matter.”

  “Maybe I came here knowing you’d come for me. Maybe there’s a Delta squad one room over.”

  She smiled, but this time her eyes stayed cold. “You’re not that clever. You run here and there, hoping for a clue. How does the song go? Know when to hold ’em, know when to fold ’em—”

  “If you’re so confident, why threaten my family?”

  “Don’t you see they mean nothing to me?” Her voice was level, a teacher trying to stay patient with a not-very-bright student. “A whole country is in danger if Iran gets the bomb. I mention Evan and Heather only to remind you that you have something to risk, too. Because I know your life doesn’t matter to you. Only the mission.”