Propose a bigger deal.
Ashani had arrived at this conclusion fairly quickly and had spent the remainder of the flight strategizing over how to structure this new deal. After the Kennedy kidnapping debacle, he’d done his best to demonstrate to both the CIA director and her top assassin that the horrors perpetrated against her were the work of a few rogue operatives rather than a reflection of official Iranian policy. Ashani had established a back-channel relationship with Kennedy prior to her kidnapping, and he’d redoubled his efforts after the incident.
In addition to the intelligence on Hezbollah and other regional bad actors, Ashani had tried to shape the American assessment of the Iranian leadership through a series of carefully curated leaks. Leaks detailing deliberations between the Guardian Council and Iranian elected officials. While his superiors would certainly not have approved of his actions, Ashani did not consider his leaks traitorous but rather an influence campaign. He loved his country and believed that its best chance of survival lay with convincing the Americans that the Persian people were not a threat.
Ashani was no traitor.
And this was the source of his difficulties.
As head of the MOIS, Ashani possessed many secrets the Americans would love to have. Secrets that would expose his country and make it vulnerable on the world stage. Ashani might detest Quds Force operatives like Ruyintan and the officer’s enablers in the Iranian ruling class, but he loved his fellow countrymen. Ashani needed to offer something that would tantalize the CIA without harming his nation in the process. Ashani had but one piece of information that would satisfy these diametrically opposite criteria.
One secret to trade in exchange for his family’s safety.
Hopefully, it would be enough.
Where are you?
The text from Ruyintan only underscored Ashani’s urgency.
Ashani was at the Serena Hotel and not the Iranian embassy in Islamabad with Ruyintan for one reason—Mike Nash. The CIA assistant director and his retinue were guests at the Serena, but Ashani was not about to place the entirety of his hopes in Nash’s hands. The assistant director was no doubt a capable clandestine officer, but he did not have the authority to broker the deal Ashani was seeking. Ashani would spill his secret to Nash, but only if his terms were first met.
On my way, Ashani texted to Ruyintan.
Then he dialed a new number.
CHAPTER 71
ABBOTTABAD, PAKISTAN
“WHAT’S your assessment?”
Rapp eyed the card table on the other side of the safehouse’s living room as he considered his answer. He had long ago come to terms with the notion that he did not have a normal job. In fact, what he did for a living wasn’t even in the same universe with the nine-to-fivers who made up the majority of his countrymen. Still, there was something unnerving about trying to answer a question of this magnitude while eyeball to eyeball with a greasy carton of takeout, a day-old newspaper, and a Mark Greaney paperback.
Even CIA officers loved The Gray Man.
“He’s in there, Irene,” Rapp said. “I could feel him.”
Rapp answered without filtering his thoughts, as was his custom when speaking with his longtime boss and friend. Nor did he pause to consider how odd his response would sound. Taylor Moore stopped pecking on his laptop long enough to give Rapp a strange look, but that was fine. From anyone else on the planet the notion of being able to sense the location of Al Qaeda’s leader would sound ridiculous.
Not from Rapp.
“Other than your intuition, is there anything I can take to the president?” Irene said.
Rapp turned to face the window.
Though he couldn’t see the compound from where he was standing, Rapp could have pointed to it through the wall. It was as if the structure were a magnetic pole and his finger a compass needle. His pause wasn’t driven by offense at Irene’s question. At times she lent greater credence to his instincts than he did. Irene had authorized operations solely on his gut before and if she had been the deciding authority on this one, Rapp knew she would again.
But Irene wasn’t the deciding voice.
That honor resided with President Alexander.
“No,” Rapp said, replaying the events at the compound in his mind. “I pressed as far as I could, but I couldn’t make it happen. Not in a way that would have allowed me to walk out afterward. For a moment, I thought I had a window to prosecute the target. It didn’t pan out.”
If Irene was surprised to hear that Rapp had been considering punching bin Laden’s ticket, she didn’t say. Irene knew Rapp as well as his own mother did. Maybe better. You don’t turn a wolf loose in a henhouse and then act surprised when he comes out with feathers in his mouth.
“What about STORMRIDER?” Irene said.
Even though the phone connection was routed through three encryption devices and therefore considered secure, Kennedy was still using the randomly generated cypher referring to Noreen. Irene shared Rapp’s paranoia when it came to secure communications not because she was ill-informed but because she was a former agent runner. There was something to be said for staffing the leadership of the world’s premier intelligence organization with case officers who knew what it was like to operate in the field one step ahead of people who wanted to kill you.
As if she knew she was the topic of conversation, Noreen looked up from where she’d been composing her after-action review on another of the safehouse’s secure laptops. After leaving the compound, Rapp had made the decision to rendezvous with Noreen and bring her in from the cold. Her performance in the compound had impressed him, and Rapp judged her to be more valuable as a potential team member than as a solo operative still maintaining her NOC cover.
“It was a bust,” Rapp said. “STORMRIDER played it perfectly, but FLACO and GORDO are pretty wily customers. “If I’m wrong and CRANKSHAFT isn’t in that compound, we should kill whoever they’re protecting. How are things on your end?”
“Alexander isn’t budging. No proof of life, no mission.”
This pronouncement irritated Rapp for all the usual reasons, but there was something in Kennedy’s tone he didn’t like. “What aren’t you telling me, boss?”
A sigh echoed through the phone.
“We’re on borrowed time with CRANKSHAFT. Illumination conditions are only conducive for a mission for the next couple of nights. After that, we’ll need to push the operation a minimum of thirty days. I don’t think we can wait that long.”
“Why?” Rapp said. He understood the concerns about illumination. The helicopters carrying the bin Laden assault team would be flying blacked out. Between the phases of the moon and the overhead cloud coverage, environmental conditions dictated a very narrow window in which the ambient light would be strong enough for the pilot’s night-vision goggles, but not so bright as to spotlight the helicopters. But he thought Irene had concerns beyond just the weather.
“I have a feeling of my own. I think CRANKSHAFT is about to slip through our fingers.”
“Agreed,” Rapp said. “And not just because I want to shoot the shitbag in the face. The couriers were on edge. Beyond just operational paranoia. Either the strain of living in close quarters while confined to that compound is wearing on them, or they have operational intelligence that we’re getting close, or maybe both. STORMRIDER did a great job, but these guys learned a long time ago that safe is better than sorry.”
His answer was met by a long, unbroken silence.
