Dead drop, p.36
Dead Drop, page 36
“Yes. According to Werner.”
“Our jailer?”
“Shh. It’s not like that. You know we both need to stay off the grid for a while. This place works.”
“People already think I’m a Mossad asset. This ought to really clear things up.”
Meredith coughed into her hand, shattering the peace. “Just tell me how Kahlidi was when you saw him in Tel Aviv. Pretend you’re his case officer and I’m your boss. I am still your boss. Technically.”
Dale leaned forward, elbows on knees, sighing. “You saw Kasem. You saw how fucked up he was.”
“Yes. And he’s still my agent, my responsibility. I’m trying to assess his capability. Do you think Mossad ruined him? It looked like they nearly beat him to death.”
“I’m the one that fucked up his face,” said Dale. “I pounded his head against the steps. I had him in cuffs—until your good friends here tased me.” He nodded his head toward the lights of Werner’s house. “Before we were forced to endure the longest wine tasting in history, did they mention that to you?”
“They said they used nonlethal means on you,” she whispered.
“That’s rich.”
“I thought Mossad wounded Kahlidi. During his interrogation.”
“Maybe. But Mossad’s a little too slick to leave marks,” said Dale quietly. “You’ll notice they didn’t leave any on me either. Wind’s picking up. We’re drifting in.”
She nodded. Dale rowed the boat farther out into the lake.
“What about the London egress?” Meredith asked when he’d boated the oars again. “Tell me about it. How’d they get you up here?”
“A van showed up at the Kensington Marriott,” said Dale. “Before I knew it, Maya was handing out Israeli passports, briefing us on our new legends, just in case something went wrong. I couldn’t tell where the airport was. They put hoods over our heads clamped by tight earmuffs. Kasra was crying, worried about ending up in Evin Prison. She thought it all a MOIS trick.”
“How much time did you have alone with Kahlidi in Tel Aviv?”
“About an hour. They spirited us over to a hospital on base to treat our wounds. I’m fine, by the way.”
“What was Kahlidi’s reunion with Kasra like? I asked Werner to give them plenty of alone time.”
“He cried. She cried. They hugged. Et cetera. I left the room.”
“Did Kahlidi say anything to you when he saw her? He must have been shocked.”
“He couldn’t stop thanking me for bringing her in. One of the reasons I left.”
“Anything about me?”
“He doesn’t like you.”
“Right.”
“Meth,” said Dale. “I see where you’re going. But if you’re still thinking of running him as an agent, I’m not sure it’ll work. He’s an emotional train wreck.”
A sudden gust flung Meredith’s hair forward. “It was stupid of you to go for him in London. On your own,” she said, taming her hair.
“Did it without thinking.” He gave her his lopsided grin.
She looked away from it.
Leaning far over the thwart, he said, “Have you talked to Grace yet? I’m worried about my last conversation with her.”
“Yes. She’s fine. I took care of it.”
“And the FBI? She freaked about that?”
“I told her not to worry, to just tell them she hadn’t heard from us. I backed up your story. Used my special code with her, where she knows not to ask anything else.”
“Special code.”
“I’m sure you have something similar with her.”
He shrugged.
Meredith looked back at the dim shore. She gathered the loose strands of her hair again, replacing them behind her head. “John,” she whispered, “did you get a chance to meet the girl, Dil? We spent the day together. Maya’s niece. I think.”
Dale shrugged. “I saw her go off down the hall with Werner’s wife. But it’s not like I made conversation with a five-year-old.”
“Seven.”
“Whatever. No, I didn’t talk to her. As you might imagine, Maya and I aren’t the best of friends since her fellow kidons tasered the shit out of me.”
Meredith nodded. The wind twirled the boat.
“Let’s get the hell out of here,” said Dale. “I’m glad we all made nice with Mossad again. It’s been real. Now what time’s our flight tomorrow?”
“John,” she said, squeezing his knee. “I still need to run Kahlidi, get him back into Iran.”
They both listened to the glop of the waves against the hull. “That’s not going to happen,” Dale finally said.
“He’s my recruit. It’s my job to get him back in the field.”
Dale put the oars back in the water, rowing silently, looking over his shoulder toward the center of the lake. After a few more pulls, he stopped and sighed. “I heard the nuclear deal with Iran is about done. You shouldn’t even need Kahlidi now.”
“It’s precisely because of the nuclear deal that I need Kahlidi now,” said Meredith.
“Of course,” said Dale, shaking his head.
Meredith leaned farther forward, lowering her voice. “The deal doesn’t cover Hezbollah. And it allows for uranium enrichment to certain levels. Our official US policy is to—”
Dale held up a hand. “Meth. Stop. Let’s just go home. Please.”
“John,” she whispered. “Hezbollah has built a set of very scary missiles. They’re radiological-capable. They could use nuclear material that’s legal in the new Iran deal, easier to smuggle in. That would turn these missiles into Hezbollah dirty bombs—targeted at Israel, right now.”
“So? I’m sure Kahlidi will be happy to tell you about them. Give his intel over to Mossad. They can send people in to take the damn things out before anyone knows anything. It’s their stock and trade.”
“Kahlidi knows about the weapons—but that’s it. He’s been out of the game too long to know their plans. Quds has a new man in charge. It’s why I need to get him back inside. To keep ahead of this.”
“You’re not the only section chief, Meth. Let your bosses take care of this.”
“My reputation is shot in Langley. And they’ll want ‘observable data.’ I don’t have that. But I do have an idea how to get Kahlidi back over the wall. It means I need to go back to Beirut. Tomorrow.”
Dale picked up the oars again. “No.”
“What do you mean, no?”
He stroked the oars twice, then stopped. “I’m not letting you go back to Beirut. I came all this way to get you out of there. It’s why I went for Kahlidi.”
Meredith put her hands on his forearms. “I appreciate that. But—”
“Let’s get out of here, Meth. Dorsey trusts your instincts. Always has. He put you in the job. Tell him. Let him prosecute it.”
She waited a few seconds before responding, then pointed toward Werner’s home. “You see all those lights up there at the house?”
He nodded.
“They’re going to go to war based on what they know so far. Werner’s one click away from going full scorched earth.”
“Maybe he should.”
“John. If Israel goes after Hezbollah, they’ll hit back with this thing. Then what? Israel uses their own nukes on them in Lebanon. Iran goes berserk, hits targets all over the Gulf. That drags us in . . . along with the Syrians, Russians, Chinese. This can’t happen.”
Dale listened to the wind hitting the water, thinking about what she was saying, meeting her eye. It was a few seconds before he spoke. “Well . . . still. Mossad can handle it.”
“Kahlidi is my agent. He’s only going to operate because of my deal with him.”
Dale sighed and looked up at the stars. “Fuck,” he said.
“I know. But hear me out. I’ve talked Werner into something that can head this off, long term, a joint CIA-Mossad op. But it’s highly unconventional.”
“Not like the rest of this.”
“You see them all up there at the house? They’re here for me, for us. Werner promised me he’d go along with my idea.”
“A promise from Werner. He’s really done a number on you. On us.”
“For what it’s worth,” said Meredith. “He’s worried about your reaction to my proposal. He thinks you’re a loose cannon.”
“Good.”
“And before we get back to shore, I swore to Werner I could get you on board.”
“On board.”
“Yes.”
“With what?”
“Our new op.”
CHAPTER 41
Despite a mild hangover, Ed Rance had risen early on Wednesday morning for his daily run around Augarten, the elegant old baroque park at Vienna’s urban core.
It was, for him, a mandatory ritual, the fulfilment of a personal pledge. On his fiftieth birthday the CIA division chief had sworn to himself that he’d complete three miles in under thirty minutes, every day, unconditionally, no matter where he found himself in the world until the day he took his pension. That ten-minute-mile pace was to be his redline, the Rubicon at which the advancing legions of age would go no further.
That had been two years ago—and the defensive line, sadly, had begun to show cracks.
Why, just twenty-four hours ago, sluggish from a late-night brandy with the State boys after a long day, Rance had scared himself with a dangerously slow time through the park. Technically, he knew, he had missed the ten-minute pace—but the ambiguities of a loose shoelace and unexpected tram-crossing had left him with a veneer of denial.
No more of that. This morning, on this run, the CIA man was determined to set things right. Now, pushing himself, feet pounding on a bucolic Victorian avenue lined with chestnut trees, he stole a rapid glance at his smartwatch. Much to his satisfaction he saw that he was performing at a surprisingly strong clip—a near nine-minute pace, one he hadn’t seen in at least five years. Incredulous, he checked again. But it was true.
And not far to go either. Up ahead, looming in the early morning mist, he could now make out the fifty-foot World War II former gun mount called—with Teutonic practicality—der Flakturm, the Flak Tower. The ugly concrete stack was Rance’s finish line in Vienna, the end of the three miles. If he could reach it in less than thirty seconds, he realized now, then the nine-minute pace was his. It would be like turning back time.
With glory so close, he pumped his arms wildly and clenched his toes for an extra inch of stride. For this last fleeting Flakturm dash, Edward Ronald Rance gave it everything he had. And once finished, heaving, spitting, bent over, his smartwatch confirmed the tally: nine-minute pace. He raised one fist in celebration while the other stayed pegged to a knee.
I’m back, he thought, bent, spitting, fist swaying overhead.
Gasping, he looked up at the misty sky and watched a triangular flock of geese fly over. They were headed east. An augury? He smiled. His true destiny had always lay, he believed, in the East.
After all, it was the Near East Division as a clandestine nonofficial-cover officer where he’d begun his career. From there, he’d gone on to a chief of base assignment in Tashkent, where he’d helped lay the groundwork for the Afghanistan invasion under Jeff Dorsey. Staying east, he’d become deputy chief of station in Baghdad until Dorsey had picked him to run the Counterproliferation desk with its focus on Iran. Rance had always managed to be in the middle of the action and always emerged the stronger for it. And the action had always been in the East.
Surfing this pleasant wave of nostalgic achievement, watching the birds disappear into the low morning sun, he thought of the latest Eastern success. His Iran deal.
For, though it might not make the papers, it was his back-channel contact that had been the deal’s real clincher. He’d been the one to midwife the relationship with Walid Zafir, the shadowy Iranian intelligence man who’d helped inform the American policymakers.
True, the Iranian wasn’t an official agent or even asset of CIA just yet. But Rance had made the initial moves to recruit this murky peer into a vital contact, a liaison, someone high enough in the Iranian government who could relay signals, say the things that couldn’t be said by diplomats—just like the old Russia hands had done in the Cold War. And the approach had been his very own idea. The credit would all go to him.
What an unlikely turn, he thought now, getting his breath under control, stretching a hamstring. The Zafir op had been started as a defensive move, a bulwark against the Atlas mess. Rance, Dorsey, and especially the director had all feared Meredith’s botched Atlas recruitment might somehow infect the nuclear negotiation. But with Zafir, Rance had assured them, they’d have a back-channel relationship that might cushion that blow, offer amends—quietly among peer intelligence services, an insurance policy of sorts.
But so much more than that now. Even though Rance’s secret Zafir meetings had dragged on with endless circumlocutions, the Iranian had eventually come to a startling point. Just five nights ago in a Krugerstrasse hookah bar, he’d dropped, “There are those of us within the Republic who are ready to turn the page.” He’d then gone on to tell Rance—in so many words—that the Supreme Council was ready to sign, that any further negotiation points were just bluster for the rabid pasdaran back home. The Iranians wanted the deal. It was just as Rance had said weeks ago: For every Lenin, there awaits a Gorbachev.
Walid’s pronouncement was just a signal. They’d all known that. “Hell,” Vorhees had countered, “it might even be a deliberate deception.” But that’s when Rance had taken center stage with the State people. They were in his world now, and he wanted them to know it. This is what I do, he’d said. And I’m telling you, this is real.
Hopkins had agreed. Eventually they all had agreed. And then, just yesterday, having weighed all the factors of intelligence—Meredith’s and Mossad’s included—Dorsey had allowed Rance’s signature to grace the final NIE endorsement. With that, the National Clandestine Service’s official position could be summarized by its concluding sentence: We assess that the inspection regime specified in the Joint United Nuclear Cooperation Agreement sufficiently contains the Iranian ballistic missile threat.
And now, at der Flakturm, still trying to get his lungs to behave, Rance stood upright. Finally, he was thinking as his breathing returned to normal. Finally, he’d found the way to put the mess that had been his career for the past eight months behind him. Thanks to his big win with Zafir, he could now sweep away that dreaded Russian honeypot business, the embarrassing exile to babysit the State negotiators, Meredith’s unforgivable loss of Atlas . . . even his own failed marriage. All of it would be replaced by his pivotal world-beating role in Vienna. He was back. In the East. Back, baby!
Energized, he stood and slapped der Flakturm in a one-way high-five.
But just as his hand touched the concrete, he heard wheels grinding on gravel, the roar of an engine. Surprised to hear a car in the pedestrian park, he turned and saw a black Audi with lights flashing in its grill. It came straight toward him. Rance recognized the man behind the wheel from the embassy—DSS security. The agent’s hand remained in his jacket as he got out of the vehicle. He’d drawn a machine pistol. Why the fuck is—
“Mr. Pine,” the DSS agent called, using Rance’s diplomatic cover. “I have orders to bring you in. Now, sir. CRITIC level two.”
* * *
—
“Oh my God,” Rance moaned in the embassy conference room thirty minutes later. Blowing against his still damp shirt, the air-conditioning accentuated the icy pit he felt in his stomach. He had to turn away. He could no longer look at the horrid image Dorsey was sharing on the videoconference screen. He let his face collapse into his cradled hands, then took one more glance through his fingers.
There, on the screen, was Meredith Morris-Dale—slumped, bruised, pale, staring defiantly up at the camera with one bruised eye, the other hidden behind a dirty hijab. Her kidnappers had draped a dark cloth across her body, one bare knee poking out. Her arm wore a metal shackle at the wrist, a chain that disappeared somewhere off to the side. Beside her was a folded newspaper, the French-language Beirut daily called L’Orient-Le Jour, dated two days earlier.
“How?” was all Rance managed to say.
“Exactly,” responded Dorsey on the left side of the split screen now that the image had gone. It was three a.m. in DC and the head of the National Clandestine Service looked morose—tie gone, chin stubbled, shirt rumpled. On the right side of the split screen was Cowles, the Beirut chief of station. At ten a.m. local, Cowles wore a brightly colored golf shirt.
“Like I told Jeff,” Cowles said. “Her last report was six days ago. She was due in today. We don’t know when exactly she was snatched.”
“Snatched,” Rance repeated dumbly. His hands had yet to leave the sides of his head. How often had he feared just such a thing for himself? Though he didn’t like Meredith Morris-Dale—at all—he nonetheless harbored a grudging respect. And here was this tough, feisty, fearless officer reduced to . . .
“But how?” asked Rance. “How did we get this photo?”
“I think you know, Ed,” said Dorsey, “that her NOC was as a French freelance journo. She wanted to poke around the ports, work our agents in Beirut, look for nuclear smuggling loopholes as part of the NIE vet. Am I missing anything, Dave?”
“No,” said Cowles. “You have it right. She wanted to stay in nonofficial cover since she didn’t want the Israelis or Lebanese Intelligence to see what she was doing.”
“Yeah,” said Dorsey. “I personally approved the op . . . urged her to keep it quiet . . .” The spy boss looked down and shook his head, shutting himself up. Rance had never seen the chief like this. Never.
“Her kidnappers,” the spy boss said after a moment, eyes pink, “call themselves Août Noir.”
