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  “Perhaps. But some of your overlords in the Outfit will suggest you’re turning boredom into fantasy.”

  This was true, Brooke understood. “Still, look at what the parties stand to gain. The military and the ISI can pursue their enmity with India, strengthening LET. The Taliban gets control of huge swaths of Pakistan without having to fight the army. Al Qaeda’s haven becomes much safer. But there’s far more. A lot of Pakistanis loathe their civilian government, not least for its incompetence in the face of last year’s floods. And for al Qaeda, a coup in Pakistan would be the global game changer they’re looking for—a jihadist state. The prize is access to its nuclear arsenal.”

  For a long time, Grey thought, motionless. “We can be sure about one thing,” he said at last. “Nuclear weapons make Pakistan the most dangerous place on earth.”

  SIX

  Waiting in the moonlit foothills, Al Zaroor saw a shadow moving toward him, then another, until they became a line of men moving single file, their bodies and weapons outlined against the night sky. Either they were allies or General Ayub had betrayed him. He reached for his Luger, prepared to kill himself or die.

  Pausing perhaps thirty feet away, the leader raised one hand. In a quiet but resonant voice, Sharif said in passable Arabic, “Shalom aleichem.”

  Peace be with you.

  The younger fighter, Al Zaroor realized, had a certain dark humor. He wiped the sweat off his forehead; even at night, the humid air was searing. “You have the trucks?” he asked Sharif.

  “Of course,” he answered tersely. “They’re waiting near the road.”

  The men with Sharif formed a semicircle. Turning from side to side, Sharif gave several curt orders. Then his men broke into groups, filtering silently down the grassy slopes toward the road—some carrying rifles, rocket launchers, or pickaxes, others burlap bags filled with claymore mines or plastic explosives. Scanning the hillside, Al Zaroor counted the fifty fighters Sharif had promised.

  Now it will happen, he told himself—a kind of prayer, a homage to Osama Bin Laden.

  In the dim light, the road was a dark ribbon on a ridge defined by an irrigation canal and, on the other side, the ditch dug to elevate the road above the farmlands. Men with RPGs and rifles hid in the canal; crossing the road, others vanished in the ditch. Two figures scrambled onto the road with pickaxes, perhaps two hundred feet from each other, and began pounding holes. The blows of metal on asphalt echoed up to Sharif and Al Zaroor.

  Toward the bottom of the slope, a tier of men deployed claymore mines at ten-foot intervals. “We tried them on mud walls,” Sharif remarked. “Placed in this formation, they should be far more deadly than machine guns.”

  The men with the pickaxes finished their work. Kneeling, they hastily planted plastique, smoothing the road before stringing wire that ran to the irrigation canal. Al Zaroor’s cell phone vibrated in his pocket.

  “Is it ready?” he asked.

  Ayub answered rapidly, as though not trusting the untraceable cell phone Al Zaroor had provided for this call alone. “The package should reach you just before midnight. The earlier delivery is not for you.”

  “Will there also be a party?” Al Zaroor asked. Meaning a state of war.

  For a moment Ayub was silent. “That is unclear,” he finally said, then added in a lower voice, “The sky above you will be quiet; with so much commerce, we have no planes to spare. Receiving the delivery is your sole concern.”

  The phone went dead. Turning to Sharif, Al Zaroor said, “They’re sending a decoy, but no air cover. Darkness will be our friend.”

  Wincing, Carter Grey approached the shooting station behind his home. He set down the rifle, bending backward to relieve the spinal pain that shortened his useful hours.

  “Why not concede now,” Brooke said, “and spare yourself the humiliation?”

  The jibe—intended as an offer unpoisoned by sympathy—produced a grunt from his mentor. “When I’m dead,” Grey said between gritted teeth. “Maybe not then.”

  Brooke understood. To watch a crisis deepened Grey’s loathing of passivity and the injuries that had compelled it; to forfeit their annual shooting match would sharpen his sense of defeat. The hour Grey had chosen, ten in the morning, exposed the diminishing time wherein he continued to function well. “First or last?” Grey inquired.

  “Last. That way I’ll know how hard to try.”

  Grey picked up the M-14 that he had acquired during the Vietnam War, scrupulously maintained ever since. Then he turned and aimed at a target stretched over an armor plate sixty yards away. His shot—punctuated by the ping of metal—was three inches from the bull’s-eye. Silent, he peered through the scope at the bullet hole, then gave the weapon to Brooke.

  Feeling its weight, Brooke wondered how many lives had ended with a twitch of this trigger. The Outfit had taught him many ways to kill, including with weapons like this. But he had saved his own life by crushing an assassin with the door of his car. A pointless end to a mission cut short by a stupid order.

  Aiming, Brooke pulled the trigger, placing the shot just inside Grey’s.

  Eyeing the bullet hole, Grey said, “I passed on our musings to Noah Brustein—attributed to you, of course. I didn’t want him to think it resulted from an overdose of morphine.”

  “Gracious of you, Carter.”

  “Nonetheless, I’ve been thinking about this. With respect to nuclear proliferation, the U.S. and Israel worry about Iran. When Iran gets the bomb, the result will be dangerous: a crisscrossing pattern of nuclear armament among unstable Arab governments—some of which collaborate with, or are threatened by, jihadists.” Grey took back the rifle. “But Iran itself won’t use the bomb. They have a return address, and Israel would annihilate them. The real problem is nonstate actors.”

  Turning, Grey squeezed off a shot just inside Brooke’s. “And that brings you back to Pakistan,” Brooke said.

  “Inevitably.” Grey passed Brooke the rifle. “There’s no country with more terrorists per square inch, and its nuclear program has always been a sieve. For twenty years, the founder of its nuclear program, A. Q. Khan, ran a clandestine supersale of technology to the Libyans, North Koreans, and Iranians—to the worst regimes he could choose. At the same time Khan gave Pakistan an arsenal designed for delivery to India by F-16s and intermediate-range missiles, concealed in secret locations—”

  “Secret from us,” Brooke interjected, “with some exceptions. As you pointed out, the only people who do know where the weapons are hidden, the military and ISI, are riddled with mercenaries and jihadists. Worse, some believe in sharing nuclear technology with their Muslim brothers. One of the reports I read quotes a former head of the ISI as saying, ‘The same nuclear capacity that can destroy Madras, India, can destroy Tel Aviv.’” Brooke faced the target. “We know al Qaeda is rebuilding their capacity to carry out operations around the world. That’s why I was ferreting out Qaeda sympathizers in Lebanon, at least until Lorber blew my cover. Once they have a target and the means of delivery, all that’s left is to acquire a weapon. They only need one.”

  Brooke aimed the rifle, sighting with greater care. Again his shot was just inside Grey’s, the last of four horizontal holes that ended two inches off center.

  Grey turned, eyes narrowing as he regarded the target. Then he picked up the rifle, flinching a little before aiming with such stillness he appeared not to breathe. Squinting with the ping of the bullet, Brooke saw the near-perfect bull’s-eye. It was a measure of Grey’s satisfaction that he made no comment. Instead he asked, “What kind of weapon?”

  “A bomb, not a warhead. Stealing or buying a missile powerful enough to deliver a warhead creates too big a problem in technology and logistics. A bomb is easier to smuggle.”

  Grey looked at him keenly. “So how does al Qaeda lay hands on it? One way, I suppose, is a mutiny—a rogue general takes over an air base with an underground facility, claiming that he’s securing it in the face of some crisis. Then the general gives
a bomb to al Qaeda.”

  “Depending on who’s in power,” Brooke observed, “they’d hang him. No doubt they’d torture him first. He’d have to be truly committed.” Holding out his hand, he said, “Care to give me the rifle? Or are you conceding?”

  “What’s the other scenario?” Grey asked.

  “The one we seem to have now—a state of nuclear readiness. The maximum danger of theft is when weapons are convoyed to an air base through a countryside filled with armed jihadists.”

  “The Pakistani air bases are in the Punjab,” Grey noted. “Al Qaeda and the Taliban are concentrated in Baluchistan and the North West Frontier Province. The last thing the army would do is move bombs in either area.”

  “They won’t try. They would only move bombs in Punjab. Which makes the kind of operation we’re talking about risky and complex. But not impossible for al Qaeda. And consider what al Qaeda could do if they succeeded.” Brooke took the rifle from Grey’s hand. “You might suggest to Brustein that we comb whatever scraps of intelligence we’re getting for signs of anything suspicious. No way the Pakistanis will tell us a bomb has gone missing.”

  Again, Brooke faced the target, clearing his mind. No mercy, he decided; anything less would show disrespect for a man he cared for deeply. He aimed and fired with the same deliberation Carter Grey had shown.

  Again, the bullet pinged off metal. Taking the rifle, Grey peered through its scope at the target. “Where’s the hole?”

  “There is none. I put it right through yours.” Brooke handed Grey the gun. “Call it a draw, Carter. We’ve got a nightmare to watch on CNN.”

  Grey placed a hand on Brooke’s shoulder. They walked toward the house in companionable silence.

  Suddenly a brief vivid memory flickered through Brooke’s mind: the first time he had fired a rifle, years before. The place was a rifle range in Connecticut; his instructor had not been a CIA trainer but the one woman, Brooke realized, whom he had ever truly loved. She had beaten him; smiling, she acknowledged that the Israeli military had taught her well, and that their contest was unfair. But that had been a different time, and Brooke Chandler a different man.

  SEVEN

  The convoy appeared as dark shapes in the night, their headlights doused—four trucks, led and followed by land cruisers with machine guns mounted on their hoods. Kneeling with Sharif on the grassy hillside above the road, Amer Al Zaroor murmured, “This is not the one.”

  Through his radio, Sharif said a few words in Pashto.

  Below them the vehicles sped past, their drivers oblivious to the men hidden on both sides. Al Zaroor noted with satisfaction that the front and rear of the convoy fit within the stretch of asphalt bounded by the two lines of plastic explosives. Glancing at his watch, he said, “Perhaps twenty minutes. Our target will look much the same.”

  He knew this from General Ayub. A larger formation, Ayub had explained, would draw too much attention, and their resources were spread too thin. The target convoy would be identical. The land cruisers that led and trailed would be manned by three Pakistani soldiers, a driver, and two machine gunners. The first two trucks were empty, serving as decoys and spares; the last carried twenty rangers from an elite fighting unit founded by the CIA. The third truck concealed the bomb, guarded by ten more rangers. In all, thirty-six skilled soldiers in a convoy moving at maximum speed.

  Al Zaroor’s mouth felt dry. The attackers’ timing must be exact, their discipline flawless. Only on paper were such plans perfect.

  Sharif’s profile betrayed nothing. Perhaps when young Al Zaroor had been this calm; now he only hoped to appear so. Leadership began with self-discipline.

  Sharif cocked his head. “Listen.”

  Al Zaroor heard the faint snarl of motors, the whisper of rubber on asphalt. At a bend in the road, moonlight caught the shadow of a land cruiser, then a truck behind it. Reflexively Al Zaroor checked his watch: 11:56.

  “Yes,” he said.

  In a clipped tone, Sharif transmitted instructions. His fighters were invisible in the night; Al Zaroor could not tell if they had heard. A prayer formed in his mind.

  The entire convoy appeared now, moving at sixty miles an hour. The vehicles were spaced too far apart, Al Zaroor realized with alarm. Taut, he counted the seconds until the lead land cruiser crossed the first line of plastic explosives. He willed the trailing cruiser to cross this line before the leader reached the last one.

  The first cruiser sped on. Thirty yards, then twenty—

  “Now,” Al Zaroor urged.

  As the trailing vehicle neared the first line of plastique, Sharif spoke a single word. Somewhere below, a fighter pressed a detonator.

  A loud explosion lifted the lead cruiser upward, toppling it onto its side as soldiers fell to the asphalt. A split second later the next detonation caught the front wheels of the last cruiser, swallowing it whole. With a metallic crunch, the first truck drove headfirst into the smoking crater left by the plastique. The truck behind it squealed to a stop.

  Their quarry was trapped.

  Cries came from the road. The rear panel of the last truck flew open. Soldiers spilled from the inside, bent low, scurrying with weapons pointed to surround the truck holding the bomb. The trucks on both sides of it shuddered with direct hits from RPGs. Their gas tanks exploded; caught by flames, a burning, writhing figure emitted a wail that pierced the babel of shouted orders. Placing the radio to his lips, Sharif said, “Claymores.”

  From the hillside thirty mines detonated at once, each expelling three hundred lethal pellets across a five-foot range. The men facing the hillside crumpled like prisoners at an execution. The one soldier not decimated fell to his knees, blindly returning fire before he pitched forward. In the light of the burning wreckage, Al Zaroor saw the heads of Sharif’s fighters appear above the ditch on the far side of the truck, their fusillade cutting down the soldiers who faced them. Dying, a wounded ranger staggered into a wall of flames.

  The gunfire trailed off. There was a single shot, a fighter putting a bullet through the skull of a man writhing on his back. Then Sharif began loping down the hill, Al Zaroor at his shoulder.

  Fighters poured from both ditches, surrounding the only truck that survived. “Take it,” Sharif snapped into his radio.

  Launched from the shadows, an RPG blew open the rear panel. At once a mass of fighters fired semiautomatic weapons into the truck, the sound of the bullets pinging off metal mingling with the cries of the soldiers inside.

  As the firing ceased, Sharif and Al Zaroor climbed onto the road.

  Al Zaroor glanced around them. The only word for this carnage, he decided, was “biblical.” The rangers decimated by the mines were doughy masses of ruined flesh and khaki, illuminated by the flames of burning vehicles. Al Zaroor stood over a man with no face.

  Turning, he followed Sharif to the rear of the truck. With the same eerie calm, Sharif raised a flashlight to inspect its contents. Ten Pakistani soldiers lay around a gray steel container like sacrifices at an altar. The container was shaped like a coffin.

  Softly, Sharif asked, “What is this?”

  Al Zaroor stifled his awe. “Gold, as I said. With this we wage jihad.”

  His tone brooked no more questions. Walking away from the truck, he spotted two black vans waiting on the far side of the blast hole. “Carry it there,” he called to Sharif. “Quickly.”

  On Sharif’s orders, four fighters scurried into the truck. Within seconds, they had borne the heavy steel box into the irrigation ditch, hurrying along the side of the road. Sharif and Al Zaroor followed, watching them as they labored up the slope toward the vans. “The second one,” Al Zaroor instructed.

  The men opened its rear panel and shoved the box inside. The first van sped into the darkness, a decoy. As Sharif’s fighters began filtering into the night, Al Zaroor looked into the young man’s face. “You are a warrior,” he said. “But far more.”

  Sharif’s eyes glinted. “Peace be with you,” he said. This time wi
thout irony.

  Al Zaroor jumped into the remaining van beside a nameless stranger half his age. “Go,” he directed.

  The operation had taken nine minutes.

  Two swift miles later, they swerved onto a rutted dirt path. In the shadow of a tree sat a Pakistani van, its surface festooned with the intricate colors favored by freelance truckers.

  A squat bearded man got out. He adjusted his turban, then helped Al Zaroor’s driver move the box from one van to the other. The first man did not know where the box was going; the second where it had come from. Wheels spinning, the van headed for the highway.

  For once, Al Zaroor thought, perfection.

  For forty minutes Al Zaroor and his companion drove without speaking, moving at a clip impossible on such a road unless the driver knew it well. The truck slowed to a stop on the banks of the Indus River.

  Its broad waters were peaceful. On its far side lay deserts and mountains, the harsh land of Baluchistan; beyond that Afghanistan. The powerboat that would cross the river was moored near its reedy banks.

  Two men waded ashore, their pants legs rolled up. Silent, Al Zaroor pointed them to the van. As his driver opened the rear door, they slid the metal coffin from the truck. Al Zaroor thanked the driver, the first words of their journey. Then he drove off, severing another link in the chain.

  “We must hurry,” Al Zaroor told his new companions.

  Helping them lift the container, he felt its weight for the first time. A sharp pain shot from his spine through his leg. Too many battles; too many jolts from horses or pitted roads. Clamping his jaw, he moved with the others.

  Knees bent, they descended the bank, then waded into the waist-deep waters, container hoisted like a casket. With a grunt of relief, Al Zaroor helped push it inside the powerboat. One man helped pull him up; the other fired up the motor.

  At half-speed, the pilot steered them toward the far bank. But for the thrum of the engine in their wake, the waters were silent and still.