Countdown to Midnight

Eighteen

Flynn wheeled his motorbike into a narrow alley that ran behind Navid Daneshvar’s house and the others along his street. Piles of garbage sacks, worn-out tires, and broken pieces of furniture showed that it was used more as a dumping ground than anything else. Flies and other winged insects buzzed lazily in the still, fetid air.

Counting off houses under his breath, he stopped in the rear of the one belonging to Daneshvar. Two small windows showed high up on a mudbrick wall. Both were barred. And just like all of the other buildings backing onto this alley, the small house lacked a rear entrance. In this part of Bandar Abbas, security against potential thieves apparently mattered more than convenience or fire safety.

Nose wrinkling against the horrible smell, Flynn squeezed his bike in between two nearly head-high mounds of trash. It wasn’t exactly hidden, but it still couldn’t be seen by anyone more than a few feet away. With a bit of luck the parked motorbike should pass unnoticed, especially once it got dark. As a further deterrent against possible theft, he’d thought seriously about removing its spark plugs. In the end, though, he’d decided against doing anything so drastic. After all, if he needed the bike, he was probably going to need it in a tearing hurry — without any time to blow replacing parts.

Flynn left the alley without looking backward. The fastest way to draw unwanted attention was to act nervous. As he’d planned, the street out front was deserted. At this time of day, the local men were away at work or somewhere else hanging out with their friends. The older children were in school. The younger ones were napping. And all of the neighborhood women were either busy indoors with chores or off doing the day’s shopping.

Acting as though he had every right to be there, he strode right up to Daneshvar’s front door. He’d noticed the previous day that the house didn’t have an electronic security system. Now he could see the keyhole of what appeared to be a simple pin tumbler lock set above the knob. That wasn’t surprising, since pin tumbler types were some of the most common keyed locks in the world. But it was still a lucky break, because they were also among the easiest locks to pick.

Working quickly, Flynn slid one thin, L-shaped metal tool, the kind locksmiths called a tension wrench, into the base of the keyhole. He put a little pressure on it, not much, just a pound or two, to start turning the lock clockwise. Then he worked a rake pick in at the top of the keyhole, going all the way to the back. He exhaled slightly, carefully tapping at the tumblers inside with the pick until he felt them move up one by one. Just… about… there, he thought, concentrating entirely on the tiny vibrations relayed through his two small tools. Still completely centered on the feelings from his fingers, he slightly increased his pressure on the tension wrench. He was so focused that when the lock suddenly spun smoothly all the way around and clicked open, it took him by surprise.

A lopsided grin creased his face. Nick Flynn, Junior Burglar, had a nice ring to it, he decided. Maybe if Four ever let him go, he could explore other career options — like busting into kids’ piggy banks. More complicated locks would probably defeat his limited skills and land him in the slammer.

He pushed the door open and stepped inside Daneshvar’s darkened house, quietly closing the door behind him. He found himself in a front room with a sofa, a couple of armchairs, a low coffee table, and several bookcases. Patterned Persian rugs covered a tiled floor. The blinds were tightly drawn against the sun. An arch at one end of the room opened into what looked like a tiny kitchen. Another at the opposite end led into a narrow hallway that ran the length of the house, presumably leading to bedrooms and a bathroom.

Carefully, Flynn slid the lockpicks back into his pocket and drew his pistol. He stood poised for several moments — listening intently for any sounds that might signal the presence of someone else in this small home. Apart from the faint, metronome-like ticking of an old-fashioned clock mounted on the far wall, there was only silence.

Keeping his pistol out for now, he moved deeper into the house. Over the next hour, he systematically searched every single room — first to look for any concealed listening devices or cameras, and second, to get a better sense of Daneshvar as a person. Apart from his name, occupation, and apparent age, he knew almost nothing about the Iranian. By any sensible standard, this near-total ignorance about a potential source was a violation of all the hard-learned rules of the intelligence game, Flynn knew. In the espionage business, ideally you wanted to know as much as possible about a contact’s background, motivations, and real intentions before you went anywhere near them. But here he was, nevertheless, reduced to poking through the other man’s clothing, personal possessions, and photos in an effort to scope out even the simplest and most basic facts. If nothing else, he thought wryly, while rummaging through a set of drawers, this situation was a pointed reminder that the real world of spying wasn’t much like that depicted in the movies — where the fictional hero could always count on receiving an incredibly detailed background briefing before jetting off into danger.

One thing was clear right away. Daneshvar was a widower. And, judging by the mourning band still draped across the photo of a pleasant-faced woman with graying hair, his wife had died relatively recently, certainly no more than a few years ago. There were also framed portraits of three adult children, two boys and a girl. One of the young men wore the uniform of an officer in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards. That, at least, strongly suggested that the older man had been able to keep his opposition to Tehran’s radical regime a closely guarded secret, even from his own family. If so, there was some reason to hope that he’d also been discreet and clever enough to escape detection in the internal security frenzy that would have followed his friend Khavari’s exposure as a traitor and subsequent murder.

The entire house was also neatly kept and extremely tidy, which added to the image of a careful, precise man who paid close attention to every detail. Nor were there any listening devices or hidden cameras that Flynn could find. And that, in turn, greatly reduced the odds that Daneshvar was still free only because he was being dangled as bait for Western intelligence agents probing the mysteries of the Bandar Abbas shipyards.

Satisfied that he’d learned all there was to learn for now, Flynn moved back to the front room. After a moment’s thought, he sat down to wait in one of the armchairs. As a vantage point, it was almost perfect, positioned just far enough off to the side of the little room to be out of the line of sight of anyone coming through the door. Calmly, he fitted a suppressor to the threaded muzzle of his Glock 19 and then forced himself to relax. Judging by the events of yesterday evening, it would be some hours yet before he could reasonably expect Daneshvar to return home.

Near sundown, the sound of a car pulling up outside brought Flynn to full alertness. He leaned forward slightly in the chair, with his pistol at the ready. A key turned in the front door and it opened, sending a shaft of orange-red sunlight slanting across the darkened room. Still cloaked in shadow off to the side, he sat motionless, waiting.

Navid Daneshvar came inside and shut the door behind him. With a heavy, tired-sounding sigh, he reached toward the light switch.

Flynn cleared his throat quietly. “Please, don’t do that,” he said in carefully pronounced Persian.

Startled, the Iranian swung toward him and froze. His face paled at the sight of a stranger sitting comfortably in one of his own chairs… and aiming a pistol straight at him.

Flynn twitched the muzzle of the Glock slightly, indicating the sofa. “I’d appreciate it if you’d take a seat over there, sir,” he said politely. “But slowly. Very slowly, if you don’t mind.”

Swallowing hard, Daneshvar obeyed. He kept his hands open and in full view as he edged over to the sofa and sat down. “Who are you?” he asked nervously. “Do you plan to kill me?”

Flynn shook his head with a wry smile. “On the contrary, Mr. Daneshvar, I’ve come a long way just to talk to you.” He nodded at the pistol in his hand. “This weapon is just a precaution against unwelcome intruders.”

“What sort of… intruders?” the older man said, with a note of caution plain in his voice.

“Oh, thugs from your Revolutionary Guards. Or maybe some of those Russian hired guns, like the pair in that black SUV keeping an eye on you from down the street,” Flynn said with a grin, deliberately dropping into English. “Folks who, I think, neither of us would be especially happy to see crash through that door.”

Daneshvar kept a tight rein on his expression. “And you claim that you are not one of them?” he asked in the same language.

“I do,” Flynn agreed.

“Then who are you exactly, Mr. — ?” the Iranian prodded.

Flynn shrugged. “You can call me Duarte. As to who I work for, which is far more important, I’m a member of the organization your friend Arif Khavari contacted some weeks ago.”

Daneshvar frowned. “And if I said I have no idea of what you’re talking about, Mr. Duarte?”

“You’d be wasting valuable time,” Flynn said flatly. He shrugged his shoulders. “The proof of who I am comes in two parts. First, if I’m not who I say I am, what do I have to gain by coming here like this? If I’m only lying, and I really work for your government or its Russian allies, why wouldn’t I just have you arrested? It would sure as shit be a whole lot faster and easier to haul you off for questioning elsewhere — in far less pleasant surroundings.”

The older man nodded slightly. His eyes were still wary. “And the second part of your proof?”

“It’s this,” Flynn said quietly. He carefully removed the magazine from his Glock and dropped it off to the side of the chair. Then he locked the pistol’s slide to the rear, ejecting the remaining live 9mm round from its chamber. Finally, he leaned forward and put the empty weapon down on the rug at his feet. He sat back and looked straight across at Daneshvar. “Now, if you still don’t trust me, all you have to do is bolt straight out that door over there. I can’t stop you. Not before you can call for help from those Russians parked outside your house, anyway.”

The Iranian smiled dryly. “You’re taking a rather significant risk, Mr. Duarte,” he pointed out. “Since turning you in would certainly prove my loyalty to the regime.”

“Maybe so,” Flynn acknowledged. “But based on what Arif Khavari told us before he was killed, I don’t have time to play it safe.”

Daneshvar nodded slowly. He sat back against the sofa. His face sagged in grief. “Poor Arif,” he said softly. “The information I sent led him to his death. I am at fault.”

Impatiently, Flynn shook his head. “You’ve got that wrong,” he said.

“How so?” the older man asked.

“The regime in Tehran and its foreign allies are the ones who murdered your friend, not you,” Flynn said bluntly. “And why did they kill him? Simply because he was a man of honor who wanted to warn the world that something very dangerous was happening here.”

Daneshvar sat without speaking for a few moments. Finally, he sighed. “What you say is true.” He lifted his chin. “Which, I suppose, now leaves that same task to me.” He met the American’s gaze. “What more do you need to know about the Gulf Venture?”

“Pretty much everything,” Flynn confessed frankly. “Khavari was shot before he could give us more than a brief outline of the work being done on this tanker. He wasn’t able to pass on enough information for us to figure out what your government and the Russians really plan to do with the ship once her retrofit is complete.”

“It is complete now,” Daneshvar told him quietly. “Our yards finished the remaining modifications three days ago.”

“Hell and damnation,” Flynn muttered under his breath. Whatever it turned out to be, Operation MIDNIGHT was even closer to kicking off than he’d thought.

The Iranian nodded. “An apt choice of words, Mr. Duarte.” His expression darkened. “Unfortunately, I cannot tell you precisely what the evil men in Tehran and Moscow intend. But I now believe it may well be far worse than anything I could have imagined.”

Flynn felt his jaw tighten. “Worse how?”

“Today I learned that the secret cargo intended for Gulf Venture is on its way,” Daneshvar said. “Trucks carrying its key components are expected to arrive at our shipyards late tomorrow evening. Once those components are fully assembled by specialist crews coming with this same truck convoy, our own workers will stow it aboard the tanker.” He looked worried. “When that is done and Gulf Venture fills its remaining tanks with crude oil, it could sail at a moment’s notice.”

“So what is this cargo?” Flynn demanded.

The Iranian sighed. “I don’t know for sure,” he confessed. “But judging by the fact that it is being trucked in from Shahrud, I am very afraid.” His mouth tightened. “My government has long been in the grip of madmen. Now I fear that their madness may be reaching its peak… and that it could easily consume us all.”

Flynn felt cold. Shahrud was the site of Iran’s most advanced ballistic missile facility. Whatever MIDNIGHT involved, it sure as hell wasn’t anything straightforward like smuggling small arms, explosives, or drugs to some terrorist group. Not even close. Suddenly unable to sit still any longer, he jumped up from the chair and started to prowl around the small room — feeling a lot like a tiger caged in a zoo… and just as helpless.

The Iranian watched him for a few moments before asking, “So what will you do now, Mr. Duarte?”

Flynn grimaced. “I’m damned if I know just yet,” he grudgingly admitted. The one downside of his oh-so-clever plan to contact Daneshvar covertly was that it had meant effectively putting himself in a box. With that Raven Syndicate surveillance team parked just outside the house, he was stuck here until the Iranian went back to work the next morning — dragging his watchers with him.

He frowned. Sure, once the older man left, he’d regain his freedom of movement. But to what end? Everything he’d learned to this point was still just hearsay, the unsupported word of a single Iranian dissident. To have any hope of triggering real action by the U.S. or by some other friendly government, the Quartet Directorate needed solid evidence. Which still left the job of digging up that proof solidly planted on his shoulders.

The Shahid Darvishi shipyards themselves were definitely a no-go area. Especially now that MIDNIGHT was so close to its start date, security would be tighter than ever, with every vehicle that entered the security zone undoubtedly searched from top to bottom. Even if Daneshvar was willing to risk his own neck, it would be impossible for him to smuggle Flynn in for a closer look at the Gulf Venture and its secret cargo.

So what alternative was left?

He turned to Daneshvar. “Do you know which route this truck convoy is taking from the Shahrud missile site?”

The older man frowned. “For certain? No.” He stroked his beard reflectively for a moment. “But given the tonnages involved, there are only so many roads which can safely handle loads of such magnitude. And once the convoy gets closer to Bandar Abbas, there is really only one highway it can use.” He turned to one of his bookcases in growing excitement and pulled out a thin paperbound volume. “I have a road atlas here.”

“Show me,” Flynn said tersely. He followed Daneshvar’s finger as he traced a route along the network of roads connecting northeastern Iran with the Persian Gulf coast. The other man was right, he realized, seeing the single major highway connecting Bandar Abbas with that part of Iran’s interior.

The rough contours of a plan began to take shape in his mind. His eyes narrowed while he calculated the distances involved and tried to get some sense of the terrain he might encounter. He shook his head as the difficulty of what he’d have to do became clearer. What he had in mind could work, he decided, but pulling it off without getting killed was going to take both luck and a willingness to improvise on the fly when his “plan” fell apart — as it inevitably would.

Given the odds against success, Flynn realized, he’d better report first to Fox in Florida and to Laura Van Horn and the rest of the ops team waiting anxiously in Afghanistan. He sat down again, took out his cell phone, and started composing the message needed to fill them in on what he’d learned so far — and what he planned to do next.

His report, written in Spanish, was camouflaged as a chatty personal note about his travels in Iran. Sent to an email address registered in Venezuela, it would be automatically forwarded from there. “Querida madre y padre, he llegado a la encantadora ciudad de Bandar Abbas y he recibido una cálida bienvenida de mi anfitrión,” he typed slowly, silently cursing the phone’s tiny virtual keyboard. “Dear Mother and Father, I have arrived here in the delightful city of Bandar Abbas and received a warm welcome from my host—”

Once Flynn finished, he sat back, placing bets with himself on how long it would take to hear back from anyone. Not long, as it turned out. His phone pinged once just a few minutes later, signaling the arrival of a text message, also in Spanish, from Fox. Translated, it strongly recommended against his planned course of action, arguing that it was far too dangerous and unlikely to yield usable data. But the message ended, as he’d known it would, with Fox’s grudging permission to go ahead if he still thought it best. Much as he probably would have liked to do so, the Quartet Directorate’s American head of station knew better than to second-guess an agent in the field.

Van Horn’s reply showed up just after he finished confirming his intent to Fox. It was short and to the point: “Solo dime dónde y cuándo.” “Just tell me where and when.” Flynn grinned. She was a woman after his own heart.