Drone

51

Dearborn, Michigan

Pearce’s tablet flashed. Skype was ringing in.

“Anything?” Pearce asked, knowing the answer.

“Nothing. The poor bastard hasn’t even left the house since your visit. Even has his groceries delivered now.”

“No calls? No contacts?”

“Zip, zilch, nada,” Stella said.

Pearce believed her. She was his best drone pilot, and he’d put her on drone surveillance over Babak Ghorbani’s house since the day he and Johnny had paid the writer a visit. Stella had cut her teeth on surveillance missions. After getting arrested for shoplifting in her junior year at USC, Stella was hauled before a judge. Noting she was a major in video-game design, he gave her the old “army or jail” offer. She took the army offer and six months later was flying Israeli-built RQ-7 Shadows over Afghanistan, eventually logging over two hundred combat missions before her hitch was up.

“You want me to stay on him?” she asked.

“Go ahead and shut it down. It’s a bust,” Pearce said, logging off of Skype.

Washington, D.C.

Jeffers scratched his head, frustrated. “You’ve got to give them something, Margaret. The midterm elections are just three months away and your congressional supporters are really feeling the heat.”

“Give them something? How about a backbone? I can lend them mine, I suppose.” Myers was frustrated, to say the least.

The “Day Without a Mexican” strike had stretched into an entire week, and it was just one more hurricane in the storm of chaos that had enveloped the nation. Myers thought it would be helpful if someone in her own party would stand beside her during the current debacle, but she was out of luck. Many had privately assured her that they were in complete support of her policies, even though publicly they were being forced to say something different, or nothing at all. That kind of self-serving duplicity was almost more painful than the outright betrayal that Diele and others had openly displayed. At least Diele was completely honest in his contempt for her and her ideas.

“We’re several months away from building an efficient technical solution for border crossing. Why not ease up a little until the technology falls into place? Take a little pressure off, build up a little goodwill?” Jeffers asked.

“That’s a great suggestion. Tell me, how many more Bravos do we need to let cross before you think La Raza will invite me to their annual gala?”

“That’s not fair, Margaret. Consensus is how democratic governments work.” Jeffers was frustrated, too. Myers had no idea of what he had to put up with to keep her shielded from the long knives slashing all around her. The only good news lately was that there hadn’t been any more airport attacks.

“Consensus? How about the national interest? Just once, let Congress rally around what’s best for the country instead of what’s most likely to get them reelected. That’s the only kind of ‘consensus’ I can actually support.”

Jeffers took a deep breath to calm down. “Everything’s a damn mess right now. Like a slow-motion car wreck.”

“The ‘mess’ we’re in is proof we’re doing the right thing. The ‘mess’ we’re in is exactly why my predecessors haven’t tried to tackle these issues before—too difficult, too complicated, too costly, too hard. But doing the right thing is always harder and more complicated than doing nothing.”

“You know, they’re calling you La Bruja Mala in the Hispanic media because you make good people disappear.”

“I’ve been called worse than a witch before. If they’re reduced to calling me names, it means they’re out of political arguments.”

“Or they’ve moved beyond them.” Jeffers sighed. He knew he couldn’t win this battle with her.

“We’re only a few weeks into this. Tell our ‘supporters’ to man up a little. Casualties have been relatively light, and our law enforcement resources are just now fully deployed and focused. With any luck, the worst is over.”

Jeffers knew she was right. She’d made a gutsy call, and it took even more guts to stick with it. That’s why he threw in his lot with her to begin with—she had a bigger nut sack than any man he knew in politics, himself included. “If luck is what you’re counting on, Madame President, you better get on your pointy hat and broom, and conjure some up for yourself. This thing isn’t over yet.”

Myers chuckled. “I’ll do my best. Just make sure you keep your ruby slippers in the closet. I can’t afford to have you disappearing on me right now.”

“I’m not going anywhere. Diele’s out there just waiting for the first chance to drop a great big old farmhouse on your head and I want to be there to pick up the pieces when it hits.”

They wouldn’t have long to wait.

52

Baku, Azerbaijan

The Azeri Spring the previous year had been mostly a nonviolent revolution that drove out a relatively benign but utterly corrupt government and replaced it with a coalition of parties committed to complete secularization, Western modernization, and integration into both the EU and NATO. The government itself put up virtually no fight at all and dissolved within days without firing a shot. All of the battle casualties had been between forces within the Azeri Spring uprising and the radical Shia elements demanding the implementation of sharia law. Poorly organized and equipped, the Shia radicals were quickly suppressed.

The new president of the Republic of Azerbaijan, a Harvard-educated MBA and former oil industry executive, was the first Azeri woman to serve in that office. Her government had recently signed Memoranda of Understanding with the appropriate European agencies to begin the long process of full economic and military integration with the EU and NATO. The Azerbaijanis needed both if they hoped to escape absorption by either Russia to the north or Iran to the south. New discoveries of vast offshore gas and oil reserves promised Azerbaijan a new century of untold prosperity for the entire nation if the new reserves were managed carefully and honestly. Azerbaijan was the world’s oldest known oil producer, transporting oil to neighboring countries 2,500 years before the first American oil well was drilled in Titusville, Pennsylvania, in 1859.

Azerbaijan’s future looked as bright as the dawn until the morning that waves of Russian fighter bombers and radar-controlled naval guns unleashed their fury, destroying Azerbaijan’s air force jets on the ground, army tanks in their storage sheds, and navy ships in their piers within minutes. Cruise missiles blasted communications facilities, including the nation’s only broadcast television station, and decimated several government buildings, including the Ministry of National Security, Parliament, the Government House, and the presidential residence.

Russian paratroopers dropped into the nation’s capital seven minutes after the final air assault and Russian tanks and armored personnel carriers streamed across the border moments after the first jets had taken off.

Russian forces also deployed a half dozen unarmed Searcher II surveillance drones, recently purchased from Israel Aerospace Industries. Their own drone program was in a shambles.

By noon, oil-rich Azerbaijan had once again become a Russian possession.

Washington, D.C.

As chairman of the Armed Services Committee, Senator Diele was entitled to the most up-to-date global security information available. He was duly summoned to the White House just before 11:30 a.m. for an emergency briefing, the subject of which had not been disclosed on his unsecured line.

When he arrived at the Cabinet Room, the secretaries of state, commerce, energy, and defense were already present, along with the DNI and select congressional leaders. Diele found his customary seat just as Myers and Early entered the room.

“It’s a briefing, General, so please, cut to the chase,” Myers said.

“Yes, ma’am.” General Winchell, the air force chief of staff and Diele’s close ally, was presenting the facts.

Lights darkened and the digital projector flashed satellite imagery that had recorded the Russian invasion. Winchell filled in the details. When he finished, he asked, “Questions?”

“Let’s start with the most obvious. Why?” Myers asked.

“They claim they were responding to repeated terrorist incursions on their homeland by Azeri and Shia radicals,” Winchell explained. “And cited the Myers Doctrine as precedent for their actions.” He said it like a slur rather than a fact.

“Why now?”

“They probably believe we’re distracted at the moment,” Diele answered. “Which I’d say we are, wouldn’t you?”

Myers glared at him, then turned her gaze back to the general. “How does this affect our security?”

“Say good-bye to Azeri NATO membership, for one,” Tom Eddleston said.

“And how does that affect us? I mean, directly?” Myers countered.

The secretary of defense laid out Azerbaijan’s previously helpful, though not decisive, contribution to the War on Terror, which was winding down anyway. A future NATO military base, to be built by an American contractor, had been in the works, along with defense purchases of American military equipment for the Azeri armed forces.

Myers turned to the commerce secretary. “What about oil?”

“Another price shock, to be expected. Don’t know how many more of these the markets will tolerate. Might keep the price of oil inordinately high for some time.”

“Good for OPEC, good for the Russians, the Iranians,” the energy secretary threw in.

“And good for us,” Myers countered. “We sell oil, too, remember? But does this hurt our energy supplies in any way?”

“No. The Azeri oil and gas pipelines service the European markets exclusively. If anyone will have a problem, it’s them.”

“That makes it a NATO problem, which makes it a strategic problem, which still makes it our problem,” Diele said.

All eyes turned to Myers.

“It’s a market problem, not a NATO problem. The Russians or the Azerbaijanis or the Inuits for that matter can’t sell oil or gas or anything else for more than the Europeans are willing to pay for it. If the Europeans want a cheaper source of energy, they can shop around, or they can find alternatives.”

“The European economies are already on life support. This might just pull the plug. They’re still our primary trading partners. If Europe goes down, we go down.” Diele’s eyes were daggers.

“The European economies are on life support because they’re highly unionized socialist economies with low birthrates and thirty-hour workweeks. They’ve spent themselves into oblivion on social programs while we bore the primary costs of their defense for the past six decades. I’ll not shed American blood to keep the cost of European vacations down.”

The room went silent. Everyone saw the blood flushing Diele’s face as he stared thoughtfully at his hands clasped in his lap. He was famously ill-tempered. Eyewitnesses swear he cussed out Bush 41 to his face in a PDB one time, and even threw a punch at Alexander Haig when the retired general was President Ford’s chief of staff.

But instead of the expected tirade, Diele surprised everyone.

He simply smiled.

“As you say, Madame President.”

Jeffers knew full well what was behind that withered, grinning mask. Diele had just declared war on Myers.

53

I-30 East, Arkansas

Traffic was backed up for miles.

The Arkansas State Police had set up a sobriety checkpoint about halfway between Hope and Arkadelphia, stopping every car in both eastbound lanes for inspections. Of course, they were actually looking for possible terrorists and their weapons.

A federal judge had recently blocked the governor’s antiterror stop-and-frisk policy, but no court had ever held against sobriety checkpoints, given the scourge that drunken driving had become, taking thousands of innocent lives every year. The governor, a huge Myers supporter, had suddenly become “quite concerned” about drunk driving in his state, particularly on I-30, one of the most heavily traveled highways in the nation.

The Arkansas state troopers required drivers and passengers to exit their stopped vehicles and perform sobriety tests, the famous finger-to-nose exercise among them. Of course, the real reason why people were forced to exit was in order to get them out from behind the metal shield of their cars and trucks. Using recently acquired terahertz imaging detectors, technicians were able to measure the natural radiation emitted by people and detect when the energy flow was impeded by an object, such as a gun. State troopers also ran sniffer dogs and handheld Geiger counters around the vehicles while the drunk tests were being performed. Vehicles occupied by Hispanics were given special attention.

An unmarked panel van was racing along eastbound I-30 at 12:05 a.m. when the driver caught sight of a ten-mile-long string of red brake lights shining in the midst of a great curtain of pines. Traffic was already beginning to slow. The Spanish-language news station broadcasting out of Little Rock announced the traffic delay due to the fact that state troopers were stopping all eastbound vehicles at a sobriety checkpoint.

The Spanish-speaking driver tapped his brakes and eased left into the broad grassy median strip, then made a sharp U-turn and bounded back on the westbound side.

That was exactly the kind of maneuver someone wanting to hide something would do. Two Arkansas State Police officers on big Harley bikes who were lurking in the dark on the westbound shoulder blasted their lights and roared after the van as soon as it had made the illegal median crossing.

When the two motorcycles had pulled within a hundred yards of the van, the two panel doors in back flung open and an AK-47 flashed from inside. The blistering 7.62 rounds shattered the windshield of the first bike and the trooper slid his Harley into the grassy median. The other trooper broke off the chase with bullets gouging the asphalt around her, and threw her body and her bike between the fleeing van and her downed partner to protect him from any more gunfire.

She instantly called in the attack and within minutes a helicopter-based sniper was putting rounds through the van’s roof as a dozen squad cars joined the chase. More gunfire erupted from the van, but a second later it ran over a police spike strip that blew out all four tires. The two men in the back of the van were tossed onto the pavement and skidded like hockey pucks across the asphalt, skinning them alive while the van cartwheeled end over end until it slammed into a pine tree just off the shoulder and erupted in flames.

The Arkansas State Police had just killed three Bravos and the fiery explosion had destroyed the weapons they’d been carrying. The identity of the fourth man couldn’t be determined, but if they could have run an instant DNA test or found fingerprints on the charred remains, they might have been able to identify him as Hamid Nezhat, Ali’s most senior Quds Force commando.

One by one, the Bravos were getting picked off by the relentless efforts of courageous LEOs all over the country. Good police work was winning the day. Broken fingers, cracked skulls, and a couple of unauthorized waterboarding incidents loosened up a few tongues, too, along with the vigilance of ordinary citizens. Even the Russian mob helped out a time or two when it suited their interests.

The Arkansas incident confirmed Donovan’s suspicion that the Bravos had broken up into smaller groups, though how many was still unknown. The attacks also were growing less frequent, probably because of the full-court press the DHS was putting on, or so Donovan hoped.

Known Bravo and Castillo drug houses were raided and then later staked out, sometimes by citizen volunteers because there weren’t enough uniforms to cover them all. Two Bravos were killed that way, and three more were wounded before they escaped.

There were a few setbacks. A Claymore mine exploded on a popular camping trail in Yosemite, killing a newlywed couple. An empty one-hundred-pound bag of rat poison had been found adjacent to a water reservoir near Birmingham, Alabama. A car racing past Temple Emanuel in St. Louis, Missouri, fired an RPG and hit the building, but fortunately it did little damage and no one was inside at the time of the attack. However, a U.S. Marine private at home on leave from active duty in Afghanistan saw the attack and chased the vehicle as it raced up I-270. St. Louis police units joined the chase and shot out the tires, slamming the car into the guardrail. The three Bravos inside came out shooting and were killed by a river of lead.

The LEO community began to suspect that a significant corner had been turned in the hunt. They didn’t know how right they were. But Ali Abdi knew. His rogue teams were required to report in on a regular basis by means of a covert encrypted cell-phone network that the Iranians had deployed throughout the United States. Fewer and fewer teams reported in, and fewer and fewer media reports about terror acts were going out. That was all Ali needed to know. His latest plan to provoke an American invasion of Mexico had failed.

The Iranian commando had just two more cards to play, then he’d have to resort to last-ditch measures. He prayed it wouldn’t come to that, but he was more than willing to pay that price since the reward would be his triumphant entrance into heaven.

Washington, D.C.

Senator Diele hung up the phone, fighting the desire to shout for joy. His Democrat counterpart, Cleeve Gormer from Ohio, the Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, had eagerly agreed to Diele’s proposal and guaranteed he could deliver a majority vote on the Democrat-controlled House Judiciary Committee if they acted quickly.

Gormer hated Myers’s guts. She had sided with the Pentagon when the army requested the Lima Army Tank Plant to temporarily quit manufacturing M-1 Abrams tanks that it said it no longer needed for wars it had no intention of fighting anytime soon. Gormer was furious. It didn’t matter to him that the army estimated it would save the taxpayers over $3 billion to shutter the facility for just three years. The LATP provided hundreds of highly paid jobs in Gormer’s district. Like most politicians, he viewed military spending as another source of constituent employment and, hence, his own source of job security. Luckily, he’d managed to defeat the generals on this issue, but he swore retribution on Myers if he ever got the chance and Diele had just offered it to him.

There was a soft knock on his door.

“Come.”

Diele’s personal assistant, a pretty young freshman intern from Brown, entered with a tray larded with fried eggs, bacon, hash browns, and coffee, and set it in front of him at his desk. She was a beautiful girl and his eyes raked over the curves of her body. But the era of incriminating Facebook and Twitter posts had curbed Diele’s animal appetites for volunteer staff. Instead, he thanked her politely and she left.

Diele’s mouth watered. This was a real workingman’s breakfast. Not like the prison fare of oatmeal mush and tepid green tea his haggard wife served him at home these days.

Dolores Hidalgo, Mexico

It was a warm September evening in the provincial city, and the night was exceptionally special. September 15 was the eve of Mexico’s Independence Day, the night on which the warrior-priest Father Hidalgo uttered the grito from his pulpit, declaring Mexico’s independence from Spain. Father Hidalgo had called for the abolition of slavery and led a peasant army to its first victories against the ruling Spanish government. He was the George Washington of Mexico, “the Father who fathered a nation.”

But tonight President Barraza—ever the showman—would be the one to utter the cry from the pulpit of the Hidalgo church instead of the local priest. The symbolism was as subtle as a telenovela romance, but perfect-ly effective for the bold young president to project his growing defiance and contempt toward the colonial aspirations of los norteamericanos. At Hernán’s urging, he’d been stoking Mexican nationalism ever since the Aztec Dream attack and promoting the conspiracy theory that the Bravo attacks in the U.S. were part of an elaborate plan to justify an American invasion of Mexico.

Antonio was just as glad that Hernán had elected to stay home in Mexico City to enjoy the festivities with his own family this evening. Lately, his brother had become increasingly grim and too unpleasant to be around. The president was thankful, however, that his wise and efficient sibling had arranged for a live national television broadcast of the event tonight.

Traditionally, the president of Mexico uttered the grito from the balcony of the National Palace at 11 p.m. on September 15, as would mayors all over Mexico in their respective towns. But this year, instead of occupying the National Palace, President Barraza wanted to stand in the symbolic heart of his people.

Father Hidalgo’s church, along with the giant statue and monument towering out front commemorating him, was a big tourist draw, and the town plaza was always crowded on the holiday. But this year, the nation’s patriotic fervor had been stoked to a fever pitch by perceived American injustices and carefully orchestrated Barraza jingoism. The spirit of revolution was in the air.

For security reasons, the crowds had been kept far back from the entrance of the church, though there was a standing-room-only audience inside. President Barraza’s image was projected on a giant portable JumboTron erected in the plaza for the event, and stacks of Marshall speakers thundered with his voice as he delivered his patriotic sermon. The plaza rang with the noise of the liquored-up crowd, hundreds of popping firecrackers, blaring patriotic music, and Barraza’s ear-busting harangue.

And then the screams.

Two rockets whooshed out of the sky, smashing into the crowd like the fists of an angry god, tearing flesh, shattering bone.

The cries were drowned out by the roar of the Reaper’s turbofan engine as it swooped in low over the treetops and dove toward the wide-open doors of the church.

The drone’s wide, fragile wings were clipped off as they slammed against the heavy wooden door frame, but the large bulbous nose and slender fuselage shot through like a spear into the sanctuary. The big four-bladed prop sliced into skulls, torsos, and limbs as it raked over a line of pews. The blades finally stopped spinning when the drone ran out of fuel, but the scalding-hot engine pinned a keening middle-aged German tourist to the floor who later died of severe burns on her upper body and face.

Miraculously, the president wasn’t killed or even injured when one of the wheels from the landing gear broke loose and slammed against the pulpit where he had been standing seconds before. The members of the audience who hadn’t fared as well were wailing with pain. Medics rushed in to treat the wounded. Dozens of cell-phone cameras recorded the carnage, most of them focused on the American flag still visible on the wrecked fuselage. The big television cameras inside the church caught everything in glorious 1080p HD broadcast quality.

Hernán watched the live breaking newscast with keen interest. It was on every channel; the attack was played over and over again. With any luck, he thought, this would become Mexico’s Twin Towers moment. Then the people would rally around his brother.

But that wasn’t the plan.

Hernán wondered why the missiles weren’t fired at the church. If they had been, the church would have exploded in flames and Antonio would have been crushed beneath the smoking rubble.

That was the plan. And then the people would rally around him.

Hernán picked up his cell phone to find out what went wrong. He’d give Ali one more chance to kill heaven’s favored son.

Ali’s phone rang. He answered it with a question.

“What went wrong?”

Mo Mirza was on the other end. “It was the cheap Chinese crap. Missiles wouldn’t lock on. Had to improvise. I’m sorry.”

Ali shrugged. “It was already written in the Book.” He clicked off.

54

Gulf of Mexico

The looming shadow of a Cuban fishing trawler rose and fell in the swelling sea. It was just after midnight.

The ARM Joaquín approached cautiously. The Mexican skipper of the Azteca-class patrol boat had spotted the stranded trawler on his radar thirty minutes earlier. No distress signals were flashing on his radio. Lights out on the vessel meant no electricity. But not even a backup battery? His radioman tried to raise them, but got no response.

The dark outline of the ship looked familiar through his night-vision binoculars. It was a sturdy East German design built back in the ’70s. A limp Cuban flag hung off the stern. His radar man confirmed they were the only vessel within a reasonable distance of the stranded trawler.

A moment later, a red distress flare arced from the trawler deck. That was a good sign. He had been worried he was going to find a murdered crew or an abandoned ship that would be hell to deal with in these conditions.

The skipper gave orders to the radioman to report back to their base at Veracruz that he was lending assistance to the Cuban boat and that he would let them know when the fishing vessel was either secured or the crew rescued.

That was the last time the authorities in Veracruz heard from the captain or crew of the Joaquín.

Coronado, California

Pearce was running on the beach. Sunrise wasn’t for another twenty minutes. Keeping in shape was one of the few things he had any control of at the moment. His cell phone rang. He clicked on the earpiece but kept running.

“We found Ali.” Ian was on the other end.

Pearce stopped in his tracks. “Where?”

“Greyhound bus depot in Stockton, California. Caught him on camera at the ticket counter. Purchased a one-way ride to L.A. just under two hours ago. Bus pulled out at four-twenty this morning. Scheduled to arrive at twelve-thirty.”

Pearce marveled at Ali’s ingenuity. Security would be lax at a bus terminal compared to the airports.

“Anybody else know about this?”

“No, sir. Not that I can tell.” Myers and her team were focused on the Bravos and at this point they had too much information to keep track of even if they wanted to keep tabs on the Iranian. Ian had to create his own data-mining software package in order to sift through the tsunami of intel coming out of the Utah Data Center.

“And he definitely got on the bus?”

“Yes. And the bus is sold out. Packed like a tin of sardines, I’m sure.”

Pearce heard the concern in Ian’s voice. “Don’t worry. He’s not going to blow it up. He would’ve just planted a bomb or ambushed it along the way if that was his target.”

“Want me to contact the local gendarmes? Pull him off?”

“No. Can’t take the chance they’ll lock him away and we won’t get a crack at him. Besides, if he gets cornered, he might shoot it out and then there really will be a massacre. Let him come all the way to Los Angeles, and we’ll see what he’s up to. Good work, Ian.”

Pearce clicked off, turned around, then jogged toward his condo two miles back on the beachfront. His mind began racing through checklists, preparing for a showdown with the Iranian.

But a nagging thought dogged his steps. Why did Ali suddenly appear out of nowhere? He was too careful to let himself get caught on a ticket-counter camera, even at a bus station. It was too damn convenient. Ambush? Feint? Or something else?

Washington, D.C.

Congressman Gorman gaveled the House Armed Services Committee hearing into session. The gallery was full. A parade of expert witnesses handpicked by Diele appeared one after another all morning.

Each of the witnesses had impeccable defense and intelligence credentials with prior government service, and each of them currently occupied a prominent position in the defense industry or academia. And each scripted answer they gave was designed to draw the inevitable conclusion that President Myers was incompetent, negligent, and quite possibly dangerous—charges that could easily rise to the standard of “high crimes and misdemeanors.”

Myers’s defenders on the committee offered up the best arguments they could before the hearing was gaveled to a close, but it was the damning quotes of the anti-Myers experts that lit up the news cycle all day.

No one in the mainstream media either noted or cared that the experts who testified against Myers all had skin in the game if she suddenly found herself impeached.

Gulf of Mexico

In 1950, the American merchant marine fleet comprised nearly half of all shipping vessels at sea, but in the twenty-first century that number fell to the low single digits. The U.S. merchant fleet was probably the first great American industry completely outsourced in the twentieth century.

In 2013, there were fewer than three hundred American-flagged cargo ships, and one of them was the Star Louisiana, a fifty-one-thousand-ton Panamax containership hauling Pennsylvania-built high-tech power-generation and transmission equipment destined for Shanghai, China.

The captain of the Star Louisiana, Angela Costa, was a third-generation merchant mariner, the child of a Portuguese sailing family with roots in Massachusetts and, generations before that, the Azores. Fifteen minutes earlier, she’d greeted a new day standing on the outer bridge wing sipping hot coffee while watching the great silver disk of the sun rise out of the gray gloom. The long, white foamy trail churning behind her vessel reached straight toward the eastern horizon. Sunrises and coffee were her morning ritual, and she’d performed it on every ocean she’d ever sailed. She savored this morning’s sunrise ritual especially. There wouldn’t be many more for a while. When she got back to home port, she would inform her husband that she was, indeed, finally pregnant. It was time to exchange the chart table for a changing table, at least until the little skipper started school.

Captain Costa was in the galley securing another cup of freshly brewed dark roast when she was summoned on the intercom by her anxious first mate. A Mexican Azteca-class naval patrol boat was closing fast at twenty-five knots.

The big radar-controlled 40mm Bofors deck gun on the Joaquín began firing just as Captain Costa reached the bridge. The first round tore into the thin steel skin of the six-hundred-foot-long freighter ten feet above the waterline. The whole ship shuddered with the strike. Another shell followed five seconds later, slamming into one of the big stacked containers on deck. It tumbled overboard with twenty tons of diesel motor parts inside. The splash leaped thirty feet into the air.

The captain bellowed orders to the radio operator to send out a Mayday to the naval air station in New Orleans and report they were under attack.

Minutes later, a pair of F/A-18 Hornets flown by the River Rattler squadron scrambled into action.

Captain Costa ordered the helmsman hard to port, trying to turn her big ship’s bow toward the Mexican warship to reduce her target profile. It was a completely futile gesture on her part, but it was better than doing nothing.

The Joaquín, traveling at more than twice the speed of the freighter, turned to starboard, drawing out into a wider circle to improve its angle of attack. For a brief moment, the two ships actually were bow on, but the radar-controlled gun continued to fire. The armor-piercing round struck the topmost container on the bow and blew it to pieces, turning the machine parts inside to shrapnel that sprayed the surface of the water like shot pellets.

The two ships were now only a thousand yards apart as their bows separated on the point of axis, and the patrol boat’s L70 Oerlikon 20mm cannon opened up, raking the Star Louisiana’s superstructure with withering fire at the rate of five rounds per second. The 20mm rounds shattered the thick marine window glass and shredded the bridge like tissue paper. The helmsman standing at his post took a round square in his broad chest. His upper torso disintegrated in a spray of blood and bone as shards of glass and steel pinged around the cabin.

The captain and the first mate had instinctively hit the deck, both barely escaping decapitation by the molten lead scythe roaring above their heads. They were safe for the time being. The Mexican warship was low in the water relative to their position on the deck inside the high bridge superstructure. But that would last only until the Mexicans came full around and could fire on her exposed port side.

Right now, though, Captain Costa’s ship was drifting to a halt. Man-size wooden ship wheels and brass-plated engine-order telegraphs had disappeared decades ago, replaced by an array of computer monitors, control sticks, and track balls that looked more like the bridge of a spaceship than a merchant vessel. Now that the helmsman’s torso was sprayed over the back wall of the bridge and his station smashed, the engines were cycling down and the ship’s rudder returned to neutral position.

Costa belly-crawled toward the helmsman’s station. She had to find a way to switch the systems back to manual and get the ship under way. Her elbows bled as they scraped across the razor-sharp glass and metal fragments on the rubberized deck.

Another 40mm round slammed into the sky-blue hull of the Star Louisiana and the ship shuddered again. The chief engineering officer’s voice shouted over the loudspeakers that the number one engine had just been destroyed. Costa knew that the chief was shouting because the engine room was so damn loud, not because the old salt was panicked. She kept crawling, and wondered what the adrenaline dump into her bloodstream was doing to her baby.

The bridge of the Joaquín was in significantly better shape than the bridge of the Star Lousisiana, though the dried blood from the slaughtered Mexican crew on the steel deck wouldn’t have passed the lieutenant’s inspection under normal circumstances.

“Two aircraft, closing fast, six hundred knots, lieutenant,” said the radar operator in Farsi.

“That’s it, then. Helmsman, come hard to starboard. Let’s ram the great fat bitch,” the lieutenant ordered.

The young Iranian naval officer was surprisingly calm for his first action, the senior helmsman noted. Under normal circumstances, he would have nominated him for a hero’s medal. But there was no need now. Martyrs received their rewards from the hand of Allah himself.

“Coming hard to starboard, Lieutenant.”

The Iranian naval crew had been brought in for just such a mission. They had been stationed in Cuba for over three months waiting for an opportunity for naval jihad against the Great Satan and had spent their time studying Mexican naval operations and Spanish. Operating the vessel was simple enough; ship controls were universal in design and function these days. All of the enlisted men selected were veteran sailors and eager for martyrdom.

The ship’s bow turned surprisingly fast and soon pointed directly at the giant white letters painted along the side of the enormous hull.

“All ahead flank.”

“All ahead flank,” the helmsman repeated.

With any luck, the lieutenant hoped, they’d rip the containership in half and sink her before the American fighter bombers pinging on his radar scope could stop them.

The two automatic deck guns continued to boom and roar as they fired their shells. The noise was fearsome even inside the sealed bridge. The air bore the faint copper smell of the explosives despite the air scrubbers. The big white letters on the containership were quickly pockmarked with giant shell holes and the big steel containers on deck practically melted under the stream of lead from the 20mm gun.

“One minute to target, sir!” the helmsman shouted proudly.

“Inshallah!” the lieutenant shouted back with a joyous smile.

But the lieutenant had made a tactical error. By maneuvering the Joaquín into ramming position, he put himself between the two F/A-18 Hornets and the Star Louisiana. That gave the Hornets a clear line of sight to the Joaquín. They acquired radar lock on their target, then fired four antiship missiles from twenty miles away.

Too late.

Ten seconds later, the bow of the Joaquín tore into the starboard side of the big containership, ripping a twenty-foot-tall hole in the hull and fatally snapping the ship’s steel spine.

The Iranians cheered as they were thrown against the bulkheads with the force of impact, but their victory cries caught in their throats as the four inbound missiles struck the Joaquín, vaporizing the warship in a cloud of fire and steel.

Thirteen minutes later, the Star Louisiana sank with all hands on board.

Inshallah.

55

San Diego, California

The news about the Mexican patrol boat attack on the American freighter and its subsequent sinking by U.S. Navy aircraft jammed the radio and television news broadcasts all day, but Pearce couldn’t pay attention to any of it. Pearce knew Myers would have her hands full and she’d be lucky to get out of a full-blown shooting war with Mexico before the day was over.

But that was her problem. Pearce and his team were laser-focused on tracking Ali and hell-bent on setting up a capture with zero civilian casualties, which was growing increasingly unlikely.

After arriving at L.A.’s Union Station by bus, Ali grabbed a couple of cabrito tacos from a nearby food truck and washed them down with a grape soda before purchasing a ticket with cash for a shared Prime Time Shuttle ride to the San Diego airport. What made Pearce nervous was that Ali wore a beige windbreaker that he kept zipped up at all times.

Judy Hopper flew Pearce in a company helicopter to the San Diego airport where Pearce Systems maintained a private hangar. The Eurocopter AS350 she was flying was decked out with Pearce Systems corporate logos, which wasn’t ideal, but there weren’t any other options at the moment.

Pearce grabbed the company car—an unmarked sterling gray 2013 Ford Mustang Shelby GT 500—out of its designated parking spot and took up station at the shuttle drop-off ten minutes before the shuttle was due while Hopper waited for him to radio her.

At the San Diego shuttle drop-off, Ali grabbed a taxi that jumped on southbound I-5. Pearce trailed Ali in his Mustang as Judy kept tabs on both of them by helicopter. A few minutes into the ride, she called Pearce.

“He’s heading for Petco Park. That’s got to be his target.”

“Agreed,” Pearce said.

“We’d better grab him before he gets in. The Padres game is sold out. I heard it on the radio.”

Pearce knew that if Ali really did have access to a bomb or some other WMD, Petco Park would be the perfect venue to set it off—live on national television. Pearce weighed the arguments raging in his head. Ali was probably wearing a suicide vest under that zippered jacket and was probably smart enough to load it up with glass marbles and some kind of detonator that kept him from being caught by any of the metal detectors he’d already passed through. If the Iranian had booked his reservation for the seventy-two-virgin hotel, a mass murder at Petco Park was the perfect place to check in.

But something still didn’t add up. Ali had practically begged to be discovered and followed. He made no attempt to hide his face with either a hat or sunglasses, let alone engage in the tricks every junior field operative employs to avoid detection by electronic surveillance. Ali wanted to be discovered and followed. Why?

“Stay close, Judy. I might need you. How far away are Johnny and Stella?” Pearce had had Judy contact them as soon as Ali hit the freeway.

“Twelve minutes, tops.”

Ali’s cab dropped him off at Petco Park just in time for the start of the second inning. The sellout crowd of over forty-five thousand people roared as some sort of a play was made inside. He picked up a ticket at the will-call booth for the sold-out game against the Los Angeles Dodgers and dashed inside.

Pearce dropped his car off at the valet service and ran up to the only open ticket window, desperate to find a way into the sold-out game without setting off alarm bells. Before he could concoct a cover story, the ticket seller asked, “You Troy Pearce?”

“Yeah.”

“Some guy just left this for you.”

The ticket seller slid a ticket under the glass. Pearce snatched it up. The Iranian had style.

Pearce raced through the casual stadium security with a flash of a fake CIA identity card and made his way to a third-floor Premier Club suite right behind home plate. He pushed through the unlocked door.

Ali stood at the bar and poured himself a club soda. His windbreaker was off. No suicide vest. Not even a gun or a knife.

Pearce unholstered his .45 caliber Glock and marched straight at the Iranian, shoving the muzzle tip against the side of Ali’s head.

Ali didn’t flinch. He held up the glass with the fizzy water and said, “Cheers,” lifting the drink to his mouth. Pearce batted it away.

“You Americans. No manners.”

“I’m two heartbeats away from blasting your brains against the wall. Tell me why I shouldn’t?”

“Because if it was a good idea, you would have already done so. Why haven’t you, Pearce?”

Hearing the Iranian pronounce his name chilled him. The Quds Force was a serious organization with world-class intelligence-gathering capabilities, but it was more likely that Ali had gotten his name through the torture he’d put Udi through. Pearce’s grip tightened on the pistol.

“No answer? Let me help you. Is it A, because you don’t know why I went to all the trouble to arrange this little meeting? Or is it B, because you don’t know what might happen if I don’t come out of this suite alive? Or is it C, because you sense there is something else at work behind the scenes that you still have not figured out?”

“All of the above, ass wipe.”

Ali smiled. “Honestly, I’m surprised. Now lower your weapon, or I will signal my man to fire his SA-7 at your helicopter and kill your friend Judy.”

Pearce’s eyes narrowed. How does he know about Judy?

“I’ve been monitoring your comms since Union Station.” Ali pointed at his Bluetooth earpiece. “We have scanners, too.”

The SA-7 was the Russian version of an American shoulder-fired Redeye antiaircraft missile, perfectly capable of taking out a thin-skinned civilian helicopter. When Libya fell, dozens of SA-7s fell into Iranian hands, though they had plenty in their arsenal already.

Pearce lowered his pistol. “Start talking.”

Ali tapped his earpiece, shutting down the comm link. He didn’t want his associates to hear the proposal he was about to make to the American.

“You are a businessman, so let me get down to business.” Ali motioned to a chair. Pearce refused. Ali took a seat anyway, putting his feet up on a nearby table.

“I need safe transportation to Tehran.”

Pearce laughed. “Oh, really? Well, I have a need, too. A powerful need to throw your ass through that plate-glass window and watch you break your scrawny neck on the dugout railing. You tortured and murdered one of my friends and I mean to pay you back with interest.”

“You mean the Israeli spy who came to Mexico to capture me? Don’t be such a child. His duty was to capture me; my duty was to kill him. I did my duty, he failed his. For soldiers such as ourselves, it is as simple as that, is it not?”

Pearce clenched his fists. He was definitely going to enjoy beating this cold-blooded bastard to death with his bare hands.

Ali leaped to his feet and kicked his chair aside.

“If you think you have what it takes to kill me, I welcome the battle. In fairness, I should warn you: if I don’t win and you emerge from this suite without me, a thousand people will be killed in this stadium by explosive charges. Is that price too high to pay for you to get your vengeance?”

Pearce inwardly raged. There was no question he could take the Iranian out. But Ali had beaten him at every turn so far. Better let this thing play out.

“Why don’t you let the Mexicans ship you out?”

“We are no longer on friendly terms.”

“Because you were the one behind the Bravo attacks here in the States.” Pearce grinned. “The Mexican government must be pretty pissed off at you.”

“You have a gift for stating the obvious. They are as eager to kill me as you are.”

“What do I get in exchange for transporting you in one piece to Tehran?”

“Information of the highest order. Information that affects the vital national security of your country. It’s far more valuable than my worthless skin.”

“What’s the information?”

“Do we have a deal?”

“If the information is solid.”

“It is, I assure you.”

“And if I don’t agree to this deal?”

“Then I walk out of here, and when I am in a secure position, I will remotely disarm the wireless detonators, and no one need die today, and I will find another way home.”

“How do I know you’ll actually disarm them?”

“You don’t. The only thing you can be certain of is that if I don’t leave here under my own power, the explosives will be detonated.”

What would Myers say? Should he try to contact her first? Pearce was completely off the reservation now—maybe too far off. Letting Ali go posed significant security risks that he wasn’t authorized to incur. But Pearce was the one who had boarded this runaway train. It was up to him now to decide when and where to get off.

“We have a deal. Now quit jawing me to death and tell me what you know.”

Ali nodded, satisfied that he’d finally set the hook. He crossed back over to the bar, opened up the fridge, and found another cold club soda and poured himself one over ice. As he poured, he nodded at Pearce. “You might want to pour yourself a whiskey. You’re going to need it.”

Pearce finally holstered his gun, then poured himself a drink.

Ali laid everything out. Iran and Russia had forged a secret alliance to dominate their relative spheres of influence—the Middle East and Western Europe. The Russians had engaged the Iranians to provoke the Americans into a ground war in Mexico in order to keep them distracted while the Russians secured the rich oil fields of the Caucasus. A second Mexican-American war would also drive up oil and gas prices, which benefitted both Iran and Russia.

“And who was the brain behind the plan?” Pearce asked.

“Ambassador Britnev formulated the original plan.”

Or at least he thought he had, Ali mused.

“Of course, his Kremlin masters had to approve it, and Titov himself signed off on it. The only problem with the plan is that we could never get Myers to comply with it. She is a woman of remarkable resolve, quite unlike any other woman I have ever known. I have had to improvise quite a bit.”

“And the Mexican government had no part in this?”

“Did I say that?”

“What role did they play in your scheme?”

“Since you killed both Castillo and Bravo, the Barrazas accepted my offer of protection against your government and the civil war that is about to erupt beneath their feet.”

“Then why did you attack the president at the Hidalgo church?”

“Hernán Barraza ordered the attack on his brother.”

“Why would he want you to attack his brother?”

“He wanted his brother to think that you Americans were trying to assassinate him.”

“But that drone could easily have killed the president.”

Ali shrugged. “Hernán wants to be president. He is already making plans for another attempt.”

“What proof do I have that you aren’t just making all of this up to get your dick out of the wood chipper?”

“It is normal in a business transaction to secure a contract with a deposit in good faith, particularly when one is doing business with a new partner.”

Ali reached into his pocket and pulled out a slip of paper and set it on the bar. Pearce read it.

“I don’t believe it. The navy would have picked this thing up a long time ago.”

“Believe it. There are several Russian subs that operate with impunity in the Gulf of Mexico. You Americans are not as clever as you think you are. This submarine has been assigned exclusively to my unit for supply and transport.”

“Then why not use it to get back to Tehran?”

“I made that request. The Russians refused to allow me to ‘abandon my post,’ as they put it.” Ali was lying.

The Iranian pointed at the paper. “GPS coordinates and radio codes are valid for the next seventy-two hours, then they change again. I will not provide new ones.” He picked up his windbreaker and pulled it on as he headed for the door.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Pearce asked.

“I’m leaving.” He pointed at the stadium. “Baseball bores me. I prefer American football. You are welcome to stay, of course. There is excellent room service that has already been paid for.”

“You aren’t going anywhere.” Pearce’s hand drifted toward his pistol.

“Of course I am. I told you, if I don’t leave here under my own terms, a thousand people will die. Maybe more. If you don’t find what I promise on that paper, then you have no need to fulfill your agreement with me. But if you do find that submarine, then you contact me with the cell number also on that paper and we will agree to a meeting place and time.”

And with that, Ali left.

The Quds Force officer had him by the short hairs and they both knew it.

Pearce’s face darkened.

The Iranian was still running the show.

56

Mexico City, Mexico

U.S. Ambassador Romero sat in the office of his Mexican counterpart, the secretary of foreign affairs, along with the Mexican secretary of defense, a retired general. Heated accusations on both sides finally simmered down to a low boil.

After the meeting, Romero reported back to Myers that he was convinced that the Mexican government had, in fact, not ordered the attack on the Star Louisiana and that he accepted the Mexican theory that a rogue naval officer had foolishly taken matters into his own hands. Romero further suggested that the matter now be handled by lawyers, insurance companies, and high-level bureaucrats, rather than generals and admirals if war was to be avoided. Myers thanked him.

An emergency cabinet meeting affirmed Romero’s recommendation despite Early’s concern that it was a Bravo operation. The chief of naval operations, a four-star admiral, assured Myers that operating a modern combat vessel was beyond the skill sets of street thugs. “So is hijacking a Reaper,” Early protested. It would be weeks before salvage operations could recover any bodies for identification—if any bodies were still intact. For Myers, the question of identity was academic. All that mattered to her at the moment was that the United States and Mexico had just avoided a shooting war.

But she wasn’t out of the woods yet. Myers knew that the House Armed Services Committee hearings would find a way to forge the tragedy into a weapon against her administration.

Gulf of Mexico

The Russian nuclear attack submarine Vepr was cruising at a leisurely five knots nearly three hundred meters below the surface of the gulf on a mapping exercise. No American warships were in the area. The nearest vessel was a small civilian pleasure boat on the surface four hundred meters away, according to its radar signature.

The young but professional crew was performing its duties with affable efficiency when a heavy metallic clang sounded against the Vepr’s outer hull. Everybody suddenly shut up, as if a switch had been thrown. The captain ordered all stop, fearing they’d struck something. According to their charts, an abandoned explosives and ordnance dumping ground the Americans had used for decades was several kilometers north of their position, but radar and sonar both indicated nothing of the kind close by.

Moments later, a puzzled radioman called the captain to his station and handed him the headphones.

“Hello, Captain!” Yamada’s voice blasted in the Russian’s ears.

“What’s going on? Who are you?” the captain demanded.

“Doesn’t matter who I am, moke. What matters is that I know who you are.”

The captain frowned in confusion. “What do you want?”

Yamada explained to the sub captain that an underwater drone had just successfully attached an explosive device to the Akula-class submarine’s outer hull and—clang—was attaching yet others. There was no reason to worry, Yamada assured the captain, at least not yet.

The Russian captain at first expressed doubts, but a visual confirmation by an external video camera confirmed Yamada’s claims. Both the stealth UUV and the magnetic limpet mines attached to the Vepr’s hull were visually confirmed.

Clang.

The captain resorted to vile threats, but within moments he succumbed to his worst fears as Yamada explained the captain’s dire situation.

“The Vepr must immediately withdraw from the gulf at full speed and return to the fleet base in Severomorsk or face certain destruction.” The Vepr was part of the great Northern Fleet that operated out of Murmansk Oblast near the Finnish and Norwegian borders.

“This is an act of war,” the captain declared.

“I am a private citizen representing no government. Private citizens cannot wage war,” Yamada countered. Pearce had instructed him to use this precise legal language.

“You are a liar. You are an American.”

“Actually, I’m your worst nightmare. I’m a Japanese with a long memory.”

The captain shuddered. “A terrorist, then?”

“More like a contractor, terrorizing you at the moment. I am tracking your position by satellite. Failure to set course for Severomorsk and follow it immediately will result in detonation of the limpet mines attached to your hull. Once I see that the Vepr has returned to Severomorsk, I will contact your base commander, he will arrange to have a great deal of money transferred to an account of my designation, and then I will deactivate the mines.”

“I don’t trust you.”

“Good!” Yamada laughed. “That would be a mistake. My ancestors have been killing Russians since the Battle of Tsushima. So, yes, I want you to worry about the fact that I might change my mind and blow your pig boat to pieces just for the fun of it, and I want you to sweat as you think about my finger on the button for every minute of every kilometer it takes you to get back to Severomorsk.”

Yamada laughed again and cut the link.

Sixty seconds later, the Vepr powered up to full speed and set a direct course for home.

But Yamada had lied. The robotic arm on his stealthy research UUV had only attached large magnets to the submarine’s hull. Pearce promised Yamada that his UUV would never be deployed in a military operation, so it took a while to convince his friend that scaring the Russians with magnets was not the same as blowing them out of the water with mines. Yamada finally yielded the point on the promise of lavish funding for his next round of whale research. Yamada was actually glad to screw with the Russians. He knew that the Soviets had killed whales illegally for over forty years, slaughtering nearly two hundred thousand of them globally and causing several population crashes. Making a Russian sub captain piss his pants seemed like a good start on payback to the idealistic pacifist.

Pearce was just as glad they were only magnets attached to the Vepr’s hull. If World War III was about to begin, he preferred it was someone else who started it. But he made sure that one of the magnets featured a GPS tracker with a signal that he would pass on to the U.S. Navy.

Ali had kept his side of the bargain. Galling as it was, now it was Pearce’s turn to ante up.

San Diego, California

Two days later, Ali appeared at the Pearce Systems hangar at the San Diego airport, as per Pearce’s instructions. One of Pearce’s private jets, a Bombardier Global 8000, sat in the cavernous space. Ali could see the two pilots in the cockpit window prepping for takeoff.

Pearce escorted the Iranian up the stairs into the luxurious cabin. On the back end of the passenger compartment was a sliding cantilevered door for privacy. The door was locked open. A rolling medical/surgical bed was in the separate space, along with a heart monitor and IV pump.

“What is that?” Ali asked.

A clean-shaven thirty-year-old Pakistani man in a sport coat and tie stepped into the cabin, carrying a doctor’s satchel and a small roll-on travel case. He was out of breath. “Sorry I’m late.”

Pearce shook the Pakistani’s hand with a smile. “You’re fine, Doctor. Take a seat, please.”

“Who is that?” Ali asked.

“I promised you safe delivery to Tehran. I didn’t promise to reveal my underground network to you so we’re going to have to knock you out with drugs.”

Ali’s eyes narrowed with suspicion.

“Dr. Khan is a professor of anesthesiology at the USC Medical Center. He’s also a Muslim.”

“Sunni Muslim,” Khan corrected.

Ali bristled. “A heretic.” The Iranian was a devout Shia.

“That’s the best I could do on short notice,” Pearce said.

“This was not part of our deal,” Ali said.

“If I was going to kill you, you little shit, I promise you I wouldn’t do it with tranquilizers.”

“And if I leave right now?”

“It means our deal is off. Then I’ll put a bullet in your stomach before you reach the exit door, and then the fun times can really begin.”

Ali was trapped. Without the threat of the explosives at Petco Park, he didn’t have any more leverage.

“I am trusting your honor to deliver me safely,” Ali reminded Pearce, mustering as much ferocity as he could.

“You’re lucky I value my honor.”

“I am surprised you do. Infidel mercenaries have no loyalty to anyone but themselves, and there is no honor in that. Perhaps Allah will indeed be merciful to you on the Day of Judgment.”

“I’m curious. Why did you reveal the location of the Petco Park explosives to us? I thought you people enjoyed slaughtering helpless civilians.”

Bravos had posed as installers two weeks before and replaced the foam bumper guards that wrapped around the support poles throughout the stadium, but instead of using styrofoam in the replacement job, they had used tubes packed with C4 and steel fléchettes, then reattached the advertising sleeves that covered the bumpers. After Pearce had confirmed the Russian submarine with Ali, the Iranian revealed the location of the bombs. An FBI demolition squad took care of the rest.

“New American civilian deaths would have served no purpose, but they would have incurred the wrath of the United States upon my government. And for the record, I did not install those devices. It was Bravo’s men who did it. So, technically, I and my government have assisted the United States in defeating a terrorist attack by the Bravos upon your nation.”

“And we’re supposed to be grateful?”

“No. That would be presumptuous.”

Pearce marveled. Like most Eastern cultures, Iranians had no sense of irony.

Ali continued. “I just want the record to be clear. There must be no false pretext for hostilities between your government and mine.”

“We don’t need a false pretext to wipe your maniac government off the face of the earth. You’ve given us plenty of real ones.” Pearce checked his watch. “Time to get rolling. Dr. Khan is going to put you to sleep, and when you wake up, you will be in Tehran, alive and safe. The rest is up to you.”

“I must warn you that the anesthesia I will be using is quite potent. You will probably have a slight headache when you wake up, but it’s nothing to worry about,” Khan added.

“And it goes without saying, once you arrive in Tehran, all bets are off. My promise is to deliver you alive and well today. My one goal in life is to make sure you have very few tomorrows. Understood?”

“Understood.”

Pearce stepped closer to the smiling Iranian.

“When this mess finally gets cleaned up, don’t be surprised if you find me knocking on your door.”

Ali didn’t flinch. “I shall be waiting with a cup of hot tea.”

“Dr. Khan will take care of you from here. And the two pilots up front? Both are armed, and both know who you are.”

Dr. Khan slipped back his sport coat, revealing a pistol on his hip. “Don’t worry, Mr. Pearce. There won’t be any trouble.” He glared at Ali.

“One more thing.” Pearce held out his smartphone for Ali to read. It had a text message on it for Ali from President Myers to Mehdi Sadr, the volatile president of the Iranian regime.

“Have you memorized her message?”

Ali nodded.

“It’s for President Sadr’s ears only. If he doesn’t contact her within twenty-four hours after your arrival, her offer is withdrawn. Understood?”

Ali nodded again. “I will deliver it as soon as I arrive.”

“Roll up your sleeve,” Khan ordered.

Pearce remained in the cabin until Ali was safely knocked out and tucked into bed with an IV drip in his arm.

“Thanks, Doc. I owe you one.”

“I’m just paying it forward, Mr. Pearce. My family owes you everything.”

Pearce stepped off the jet stairs just as a van rolled up to the hangar. Three men and two women swiftly exited the vehicle and began unloading the crates of high-tech gear they’d brought with them for the long flight to Tehran.

Washington, D.C.

After several days of testimony by experts hostile to the president’s agenda, the House Armed Services Committee hearing finally invited a Myers ally: Mike Early. As the president’s special assistant on security affairs, he was both appropriate and relevant to the hearing’s subject matter.

“Invited” was a term of art; the administration intended to fight any sort of summons on the grounds of separation of powers. But Early eagerly agreed to answer any questions put to him. He wasn’t even sworn in.

The first questions from the committee Republicans were personal, detailing Early’s extensive and heroic national service, and the next questions they asked were pure softballs that allowed him the chance to crow about the great successes of the national security structure in the past few weeks rounding up drug kingpins and wiping out the Bravo terrorists.

Representative Gormer let them ask all of the questions they needed to. Early’s smile got wider and wider as the morning went on, Gormer noted. Early relaxed, dropping his guard. He even cracked a few jokes.

Until Gormer dropped the bomb.

Gormer pulled his microphone closer. “Tell us, Mr. Early, exactly who is Troy Pearce?”

Early was caught short. In a million years, he wouldn’t have guessed that Gormer had any clue about Troy, let alone the balls to ask about him in the middle of an ongoing classified operation. The more he thought about the question, the angrier he became, but also the more confused. He hadn’t been briefed for this possibility.

“Troy Pearce is a friend of mine, and the CEO of Pearce Systems, a registered federal defense contractor.”

“And is it true that President Myers hired Mr. Pearce and Pearce Systems to conduct the targeted assassination of Mr. Aquiles Castillo, a private citizen of Mexico?”

Early couldn’t hear himself think as dozens of digital cameras whirred and flashed in front of him. A crowd of news photographers was squatting directly in front of his table, blasting away with their cameras like frenzied paparazzi.

“No comment, Mr. Chairman,” Early finally blurted out.

“Is it true this administration hired Mr. Pearce to murder other foreign nationals and to carry out its other clandestine foreign-policy objectives?”

“No comment.”

“Is it true that this administration has engaged the services of Pearce Systems to perform espionage operations against foreign governments, including Mexico, a respected ally?”

“No comment.”

And so it went.

The shit storm had begun and Early had forgotten to bring his umbrella.

The chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Sandra Quinn (D-GA), watched the live hearings seated on a couch in Senator Diele’s office. In the chair next to her was Vice President Greyhill.

“Just like I promised,” Diele said. He wanted to see her reaction when Gormer dropped the bomb.

“Too bad Early’s not under oath,” Quinn said.

“The next time he’s on camera, he will be,” Greyhill assured her. “Just let him try and hide behind ‘executive privilege.’”

“I trust this means you’ll be moving forward with the impeachment resolution?” Diele asked.

“He delivered the goods, didn’t he?” Quinn was referring to the fact that Diele had spilled the beans to Gormer about Pearce and his operation.

“He sure did. And wrapped it all up in a pink bow.”

Quinn hoped that the Pearce revelation would be enough to throw Myers out of office and, with any luck, straight into a federal prison. During her election campaign, Myers ran a humiliating campaign ad featuring a Quinn quote that “Guam would capsize if too many U.S. Marines were stationed there” as proof of the idiocy of Congress. Quinn had barely won reelection and privately vowed revenge at the first possible opportunity.

What neither Quinn nor Greyhill realized was that Diele’s source for the Pearce revelation was Ambassador Britnev, and Britnev’s source was Ali, who had tortured it out of Udi just before feeding him to the pigs while he was still alive.