The Enemy Within (50 page)

Thorn frowned. He hated the prospect of more wasted time. Delay only benefited the enemy. “Damn it.”

“Too true,” Flynn agreed. “Look, Colonel, don’t sweat it. Thanks to you and this Maestro of yours, we’ve finally got a shot at what may be a real target. So if my people pick up even a whiff of something bad at this place, I’ll get a search warrant and send an
HRT
section in on the double. Any terrorists inside that house will be dead or behind bars before they wake up.”

DECEMBER
4

Near Kerman, Iran

(D
MINUS
11)

Hamir Pahesh looked hack, toward the campfires and the road beyond. He cursed the half moon, but in the next second was grateful for the hints it gave him about the ground under his feet. After fourteen hours of driving in convoy, all he wanted to do was join his countrymen at the fire, eat, drink a little sweet, hot tea, and go to bed.

Instead, here he was picking his way across a pitch-black, rocky ground looking for something, anything, that would give him cover. The treeless landscape held nothing higher than a weed or two, and he needed more.

The bundle he had smuggled out of his truck cab was small enough so that it could be tucked under his coat. But the rest of the drivers thought Pahesh had left the convoy to attend to nature’s needs, so he could not afford to be gone too long.

There. A low rise, little more than a fold in the ground, seemed to offer an acceptable solution.

Kneeling on the cold, stony ground, the Afghan ignored the lumps under him, hoping none of them would start moving. He unzipped a small case and fumbled in the darkness with the unfamiliar device it contained.

The antenna was easy enough, but there was a small lead that had to be plugged into the case, and for a moment he could not remember which side it went into.

In the quiet darkness every click and scrape seemed deafening. He paused for a moment, listening for the crunch of a footfall in the sand, or some more ominous sign, but all he heard was singing and faint chatter from the roadside several hundred meters away.

Ah. Pahesh found the socket for the antenna cable, then the rocker switch for the power, and turned the machine on. He typed in a series of digits he had computed earlier, based on the date, and hit the start button. While the transmitter sent out its signal, he slipped on a set of earphones and picked up the microphone.

A small indicator on the front told him the transmitter had found a satellite, that it had acknowledged his signal, and that he had entered the proper code. Only a moment later, a voice answered, “Watch officer.”

Pahesh hoped this man knew what to do. “This is Stone,” he started. Trying to speak clearly and whisper at the same time was difficult but he dared not speak louder. “I have a flash message for Granite.”

His own code name was Stone. He’d never met his controller, Granite. Indeed, the Afghan didn’t know if Granite was one man or more, or where this signal was being received.

All he knew was that the Americans couldn’t wait until the end of the week to hear what he’d learned. He’d gathered more information at the noontime break, and still more just now, with the convoy stopped for the day.

“Roger, Stone, ready to copy.”

Pahesh recited his message composed, changed, and polished a hundred times as he drove. “Iranian 12th Infantry Division left barracks in Zahedan zero six hundred hours today, 4 December, with all elements and extra fuel and ammunition. Another unit, identity unknown, may be arriving in Zahedan to take over its duties. Convoy passed through Kerman in the afternoon and is now headed for Shiraz. Ultimate destination is unknown. Message ends.”

The American voice at the other end read back the message, then said, “Received and understood. Please stand by.”

“Stand by?” wondered Pahesh. He looked around nervously, but could see nothing in the darkness.

“Stone, this is Granite.” The voice was different, more purposeful.

“Could this simply be a routine redeployment?”

The Afghan shook his head in reflex before he remembered they could not see him. “No. The Iranians have an urgent deadline. Two officers have already been punished for not meeting their schedules.”

There was what seemed a long pause before the American replied. “All right. Can you give us an update in twelve hours?”

“Yes.” Then Pahesh corrected himself. “I will try. I must go now.”

“Understood.”

Pahesh turned off the machine and hurriedly repacked it.

He was late. He hadn’t counted on an extended conversation. The others would be looking for him.

Tucking the satellite radio pack under his coat again, he strolled as quickly as possible back to his truck. As soon as there was enough light, he checked his watch. Only twelve minutes had passed since he’d left the roadside. He felt the tension ease.

Fatigue replaced the tension, and he quickly unrolled his pallet near one of the fires. Pahesh crawled in, reasonably sure the Komite, Iran’s hated secret police, were not going to arrest him before dawn. Before he dropped off to sleep, he found himself going over and over his brief communication with the Americans. It was good to know they were taking him seriously. Instincts honed by years of war told him this long road march was the first stirring of an evil wind.

DECEMBER
4

Washington, D.C.

Outside the Hoover Building, the capital city’s streets were filling up with rush-hour traffic. Even in the present crisis, the hundreds of thousands of workers employed by the various government agencies, businesses, and law firms seemed to be determined to carry on as much of their daily routine as possible. For all the outward show of normalcy, however, the unpredictable, ever more frequent, and apparently unstoppable terrorist attacks were striking nerves already worn raw.

False alarms were triggered more and more often, with less and less provocation. Whole buildings emptied into the streets at the sight of a package without a return address. Phoned-in threats prompted widespread closures of the Metro or the region’s major highways. Entire neighborhoods, from wealthy, trendy Georgetown to the hopelessly poor northeast sections of the city, barricaded themselves in by day and by night, desperately hoping they could seal themselves off from the terrorist contagion. The drab, olivegreen Army Humvees arid Bradley armored fighting vehicles posted to cover the capital’s major intersections and traffic circles only increased the sense of crisis.

London had been bombed flat during the Blitz and periodically targeted by the
IRA
, but Washington, D.C., had existed in relative peace for many years. Not since the riots following Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s assassination had racial tensions been so high. And not since Jubal Early’s tattered Rebels fell back toward the Shenandoah Valley in 1864 had so many in the American capital felt the oppressive dread of knowing that a deadly enemy lurked close at hand.

Around-the-clock television coverage fed the public’s barely controlled panic. The first pictures of each new terrorist outrage were played over and over again on every news channel, magnifying their scope and impact. In the fiercely competitive war for exclusives, every wild rumor found a reporter to repeat it, deny it, and then repeat it afresh often the same reporter and often within the same hour.

Even the headquarters of the Federal Bureau of Investigation was not immune to the general paranoia gathering force across the country. The security detachments manning its entrances had been reinforced by U.S. Army Rangers. Razorwire entanglements surrounded the building, keeping pedestrians, the press, and potential terrorists at a distance.

Deeply worried by the signs of widespread, almost crippling fear he saw all around him, Peter Thorn followed Helen Gray into the conference room adjoining Special Agent Mike Flynn’s office.

His Metro ride over from the Pentagon had been instructive. Uniformed D.C. policemen were posted on every train coming into Washington. They were backed by heavily armed
SWAT
contingents conspicuously stationed at every subway stop. Passengers embarking and disembarking were subject to identity checks and random searches. While the heavy security presence provided some deterrence against terrorist attack, it also reinforced the overwhelming feeling of entering a city under siege.

Thorn frowned. The nation’s capital seemed to be nearing a breaking point. They were running out of time.

There were only two men waiting for them inside Mike Flynn and his deputy, Tommy Koenig. Both looked exhausted. That was understandable. They had worked straight through the night trying to follow the lead he and Rossini had given them.

“Thanks for coming, Pete. I’m glad you could make it,” the head of the
FBI
task force said quietly. “You have any trouble getting through our watchdogs?”

Thorn shook his head, inwardly noting with some amusement the other man’s decision to use his first name. Evidently, he’d been promoted from nosy, Pentagon pain in the ass to helpful, fellow investigator overnight. Interesting. Well, better late than never. He took the chair next to Helen and set his uniform cap aside.

“What’s the skinny, Mike?” she asked.

“We’ve got a preliminary read on the CompuNet address,” Flynn answered. “Andy Quinlan’s team checked in an hour ago.”

Helen leaned forward, her eagerness apparent. “And?”

“I think we have a target.”

Thorn felt himself relax slightly. More than anything, more than he had wanted to admit to himself, he had feared that he and Rossini were only stumbling down the wrong path and dragging everyone else along with them. But they had been right. Their instincts were on target.

Helen, though, appeared unsatisfied. “You think? Or you know?” she pressed.

Flynn shrugged. “Let’s say the evidence Quinlan and his people have assembled is mighty suggestive, but it’s not conclusive.” He glanced at his deputy. “Tommy can take you through it piece by piece. He rode herd on the investigative team every step of the way.”

Koenig nodded. “Mike made it clear that we didn’t want to spook these people prematurely whoever they are. So Quinlan’s been working around the edges for the last twenty four hours.”

He flipped open a file. “Basically, what we’ve got is this: The phone number CompuNet gave us belongs to a house in Arlington just off the Columbia Pike. The place was rented nine weeks ago by a blond-haired man with a slight, but discernible, European accent. He told the Realtor his name was Bernard Nielsen and that he worked for a Danish import-export firm a company called Jutland Trading, Limited. Apparently, this guy Nielsen told her his bosses wanted him to explore business opportunities in the U.S. and that he needed a home base to come back to between trips. He signed a six-month lease and paid his security deposit in traveler’s checks. Since then, he’s paid one time by mail using personal checks drawn on a local bank.”

“Not from his business or from a Danish bank?” Thorn asked.

“Nope. Curious, isn’t it?” Koenig looked up from the file. “One of our guys took a little walk through Nielsen’s account records. There’s been a steady movement of cash money in and out but the balance has always been over five thousand dollars and always under ten thousand.”

Thorn heard the shorter
FBI
agent’s emphasis on those figures and nodded slowly. Again, that made sense. Five thousand dollars in a checking account made bank managers smile at you and generally kept them from asking too many inconvenient questions. On the other hand, ten thousand in cash triggered an automatic report to the
IRS
. It certainly looked like this Bernard Nielsen liked cruising in a comfortable financial zone that guaranteed him both flexibility and relative anonymity.

Helen frowned. “Does this Jutland Trading company even exist?”

Koenig shrugged. “We’re still working with the Danish authorities on that. The phone number our blond friend gave the Realtor only connects to an answering service. The Danes are trying to follow the trail further, but it’ll take some time to generate results.” He smiled grimly. “I can tell you this. I spent the morning breathing down some necks in the Commerce Department. And Commerce sure as heck doesn’t have any record of a Jutland Trading company registered to do business here in the States.”

“What a surprise,” Thorn said flatly.

Flynn nodded. “After I heard that, I gave Quinlan the go ahead to dig deeper near the house itself.”

Thorn looked at Koenig. “And what did they find?”

The shorter man’s grim smile faded. “That’s the inconclusive part,” he admitted. “It’s a transient neighborhood. Lots of rentals. Lots of people moving in and out on temporary assignments with the Pentagon or other government agencies. Lots of people who go to work early, come home late, and go right to sleep. Nobody really knows much about any of their neighbors.”

“Nobody’s noticed anything?” Helen asked, surprised. “Nothing odd at all?”

Koenig spread his hands. “We did find one reared couple who said they’d seen several suspicious men coming and going from the house at odd hours…” His voice trailed off.

“But?” she prompted.

“But this Mr. and Mrs. Abbot are both a little blind and hard of hearing. Plus, we checked with the Arlington police. They say the Abbots average reporting one prowler, rapist, or drug dealer a week. The cops don’t usually bother investigating their calls anymore.”

Thorn grimaced. Perfect. If this rented house in Arlington was a terrorist safe house, whoever had picked it had done a brilliant job. He turned to Flynn. “So what’s the next step? Surveillance?”

- That would be the standard procedure, he knew. Find a house nearby, move the occupants out, and put in a stakeout team to monitor the suspect’s comings and goings, phone conversations, and associates. Once enough evidence of possible wrongdoing had been collected, the
FBI
would obtain a search warrant from a sympathetic judge and move in. For a by-the-book guy like Flynn, that would be the best and safest way to proceed. But it would also gobble up hours and days he wasn’t sure they could afford.