20

Brooklyn, New York

“Is Rahim really dead?”

Eva looked up from the magazine she was reading as she sat patiently in a wooden chair on the other side of the cell. It had been quiet for too long. She was beginning to think Navid Yazidi wasn’t going to take the bait. But now he was nibbling, and Eva was determined to hook him and reel him all the way in.

“I beg your pardon?” she asked, though she had heard every word.

“Rahim? Is he . . . is he really dead?”

Eva nodded. “I’m afraid so. Didn’t anyone tell you when they first brought you in?”

“No.”

“I thought they did.”

“They didn’t.”

“I’m very sorry, Navid,” Eva said gently. “It’s hard to lose a brother, I know. My older brother died four years ago next week. Drunk driver. Never saw it coming.”

It was a lie. Eva had three sisters, all younger, but not a single brother. But she certainly sounded convincing and empathetic. Navid nodded and hung his head. It was working. The ice was beginning to crack.

“May I have some water?” he asked, his tone subdued but his eyes pleading with her for mercy.

“Of course, Navid. Would you like something to eat as well? Have they fed you yet? You must be famished.”

“No, no, just some water, please.”

This was a good sign. She got up, knocked three times on the steel door, and stepped out for a few minutes. While she was gone, guards gave the prisoner several sips of water and a few bites of warm pita bread dipped in freshly made hummus, then led the man to the facilities to allow him to relieve himself. Only when Navid was locked down again and given a bit more water and pita did Eva return.

“How are you feeling?” she asked.

“A little better,” he said softly, his voice hoarse, his spirit nearly broken.

“Good,” she said and then went back to her reading, knowing all the while that he was staring at her, sizing her up, trying to understand who she was and whether he could really trust her.

After several minutes, she lowered her magazine, looked him in the eye, and asked, “What did you love most about Rahim?”

The question seemed to take Navid completely by surprise. He quickly turned away and closed his eyes. So Eva went back to reading. But after another few minutes, it seemed Navid couldn’t help himself.

“Rahim was always more devout than I.”

“Son of a . . .” Taylor said in Eva’s earpiece. “He’s desperate for human contact, just like you said.”

Eva resisted the temptation to nod or glance at the video camera. But she was glad Taylor and his colleagues were taking notice.

“What do you mean?” Eva asked Navid.

“Rahim was always the strong one, always the one who submitted to Allah faster and more faithfully than I. He memorized all of the Qur’an by the age of ten. I still haven’t done it. He got straight As in the madrassa. I got Cs and Ds. When it was time to get up for morning prayers, Rahim would hear the muezzin call and jump right out of bed. Most of the time, I slept in . . . or wanted to.”

“What was his favorite passage?”

“In the Qur’an?”

Eva nodded.

Navid hesitated for a moment as if trying to determine whether she was sincere or not. He must have finally concluded that she was because all of a sudden he said, “He really loved Sura 3, verses 185 and 186.”

“What do those say?”

“‘Every soul is bound to taste death. So you will be repaid in full on the Day of Resurrection for whatever you have done in the world. Whoever is spared the Fire and admitted to Paradise has indeed prospered and triumphed, if you are patient, steadfast, and keep within the limits of piety.’”

“Is your brother in paradise now, Navid?”

“I hope so.”

“And you?” Eva asked, pushing the envelope. “Will you see him when it’s your time?”

There was a long pause. “I don’t know.” Another long pause. “I hope so. I miss him.”

“I’m sure you do,” Eva said. “Were you always close?”

“No,” Navid said, staring off into space.

“Why not?” she asked, trying to bring him back.

He shrugged his shoulders and stared down at the floor. “Rahim was four years older than I. So when I began junior high school, he was already in high school. When I was a freshman in high school, he was already done and in the army. When I was drafted, he was in college. It was only about six months ago that we began to connect again after so much time.”

“What happened?”

“I . . .”

“What?”

“I shouldn’t be telling you this.”

“Why not?”

“They told me not to say anything.”

“Who did?”

“The commander. He said if we were caught, we shouldn’t say anything, just keep our mouths shut.”

“Does it really matter now what he said, Navid?” Eva asked. “You’re never going to see that commander again. He can’t hurt you. He’s half a world away.”

“He will kill my family.”

“You mean your parents?”

Navid nodded, his eyes glassy and fatigued.

“They still live in Tehran, in the apartment on Ghazaeri Street, right?” Eva asked.

Navid nodded again.

“It’s okay, Navid. I told you. We’ve already sent people to make sure they’re okay and to let them know that you’re safe. No one can hurt them now. No one.”

It was another lie. But it seemed to work.

“Really?” Navid asked.

“I promise,” Eva said.

Navid closed his eyes for several minutes. His breathing was light and shallow. She wondered if he had actually dozed off, but then he opened his eyes again and resumed staring at her.

“You look a lot like her.”

“Like who?”

“His sister.”

“Whose?”

“Firouz’s sister.”

“I do?”

“Except her hair is dark brown, almost black, not blonde. And her eyes are brown, not blue. But your face, your hands, your smile, your mannerisms . . . you look so much like Shirin. She is very beautiful.”

Eva didn’t know what to say. He was, after all, a prisoner, a terrorist, a murderer.

“Is she around my age?”

“No.”

“Younger or older?”

“Younger. Much younger.”

“Younger than Firouz, too?”

He nodded.

“How much younger?”

“At least ten years.”

“So how old does that make her?”

“She’ll be eighteen in July.”

“Pay dirt,” Agent Taylor exclaimed. “Now we need a last name.”

Eva ignored the request. It was a distraction. She knew what she had to do, and she knew how to get it done. She wasn’t interested in being coached by novices.

“Is she married?” she asked.

“Shirin?”

“Yes.”

“Not yet.”

“So there’s hope.”

“What do you mean?” Navid asked.

“For you,” Eva said. “There’s hope for you, right?”

He shook his head and looked back at his feet. “No.”

“Why not?”

“I could never win the heart of a girl like her. Not now.”

“Why not?” Eva said. “Does she know you?”

“A little.”

“How does she know you?”

“Rahim was engaged to her sister.”

“Really?”

“And if he had come back from this mission, they were going to marry.”

“And now?”

“There will be great joy in that family, and ours, over Rahim. He is a martyr. His name will be praised forever. Everyone will be so proud of him.”

“And you?”

“I will be cursed.”

“Why?”

“I am a failure. You said so yourself. And Mr. Nouri will agree with you. He will say, ‘Rahim was killed, but you were caught. Rahim gave his life to Allah. But you betrayed the regime, betrayed the Mahdi.’”

“Who is Mr. Nouri?”

“Mohammed Nouri, Shirin’s father. He will never let me see his daughter again or even set foot in his home. He is a mullah in Qom. He is a very hard man. He is devoted to the Mahdi. It’s all he can think about, all he can talk about. He will not allow an infidel like me to marry his daughter.”

Firouz Nouri.

There it was. Now she had the suspect’s name, his father’s name, his father’s profession, and the city of his birth. She had something to research, facts to check, leads to follow. It was all good, and it was a lot more than they’d had before she got there. But something wasn’t right. Something about that name bothered her, and she couldn’t figure out why.

* * *

Arlington, Virginia

Marseille got up from her knees and stared out the window.

She looked out over Washington and wondered what the president was thinking. She wondered what his advisors were thinking. What were they going to do? So many of her friends were in awe of President Jackson. They’d voted for him. They supported him enthusiastically. They couldn’t be more excited about where he was leading their country. But Marseille wasn’t one of them.

She wasn’t especially political, but she didn’t trust Jackson. She sensed weakness in him or, more precisely, an odd combination of arrogance and indecisiveness. He acted like he understood the Muslim world, but did he really? He said he would never let US national security interests in the Middle East be threatened, but was that really true? Why wasn’t he doing anything to stop the rise of the Twelfth Imam? Why wasn’t he doing something decisive to stop the rise of this new Caliphate? Why hadn’t he done more to stop Iran from getting the Bomb? Now that they did have the Bomb, was he going to do something? Anything? Now that he’d almost been killed—presumably by Mideast terrorists, if the early media reports were accurate—was he going to retaliate?

She didn’t want another war in the Middle East. Nobody she knew did. But America was under attack and being run out of the region. America’s leaders looked weak and feckless. That didn’t strike Marseille as a formula for peace. It struck her as blood in the water, and she was certain the enemies of the United States could smell it and were preparing to strike again. Was there any doubt that the Iranians were going to use the Bomb now that they had it? Not in her mind. At the very least, she figured they would give some of their nukes to Hamas or Hezbollah or al Qaeda or some other terrorist group to attack Israel and the United States. It was just a matter of time. Why wasn’t the president doing anything to stop that?

She suddenly realized she was thinking like her father—like both of her parents, actually. That’s how they used to talk around the dinner table when she was growing up, she recalled. They were always interested in her classes and her plays and musicals and the boys that caught her eye. They always seemed to have time to listen to her, and they loved to encourage her and came to every school event or activity to which she invited them. But their world was geopolitics and economics. They were always quizzing her on the names of countries, the names of their leaders, the names of their currencies. They were forever teaching her obscure little tidbits of history. Who was the head of the KGB under Brezhnev? Yuri Andropov. Yasser Arafat claimed to be born in Jerusalem, but he wasn’t. Where was he really born? Cairo. What was another name by which Arafat was known? Abu Ammar. What world leader was recorded in the Guinness Book of World Records for having the largest funeral in history? The Ayatollah Khomeini, with nearly twelve million people attending. Where was he buried? In Qom, the religious capital of Iran. What’s the Turkish currency called? The lira. What’s the Iraqi currency called? The dinar. What’s the largest country in Africa? Sudan. What’s the most beautiful city in France? Paris, she would always say, but her parents always said Marseille.

She wondered what her father would have been thinking if he were still alive, and she felt a lump forming in her throat. What would he have advised the president to do about the Twelfth Imam? What would he have advised the president to say to Israel? Had he ever had that chance? she wondered. Had he ever met an American president while working for the CIA under the guise of working for the State Department?

Shifting gears, she checked her watch, then set up her laptop, logged on to the hotel’s wireless network, and clicked over to the Weather Channel’s website. The lead headline did not bode well: “Monster Storm Rips through Midwest, Northwest: 125 Million Americans Affected, 10,000 Domestic Flights Canceled, Governors of 16 States Declare Emergencies.” Portland, she read, had been hit with more than a foot and a half of snow overnight. Winds were gusting up to fifty and sixty miles an hour, making temperatures feel subzero and bringing the city to a complete standstill. Denver had more than two feet of snow, as did Chicago. Forecasters said more was coming over the next twenty-four to forty-eight hours. She wasn’t getting home. That much was clear.

So was her next step. It was now a few minutes after 9:00 a.m. So she picked up the phone in her room, dialed nine, and then dialed Langley.

“CIA switchboard. How may I direct your call?”

“Yes, I’m trying to track down a gentleman who works there by the name of Jack Zalinsky.”

“One moment, please.”

Marseille’s pulse quickened. Was she really about to talk to the man who had saved her parents’ life? She had so many questions for him. Would he be willing to give her answers? Would he even be allowed to?

The receptionist came back on the line. “I’m sorry, but we have no one by that name.”

Caught off guard, Marseille tried to keep the woman on the line. “How about John Zalinsky or possibly James?”

“I’m sorry, nothing.”

“Could I have the personnel department?”

“Sure, one moment and I’ll transfer you.”

That, however, was a dead end as well. She explained who she was and how her family knew Mr. Zalinsky, but the young man in the personnel office said he was looking in the Agency’s database, and there had never been anyone there by that name.