Critical Error

As they approached the I-95, the sniper watched as they selected the I-95 S Trenton. They were heading somewhat surprisingly towards Washington. As the toll booths approached, he slowed down. At this time of night, the roads were quiet and the potential for being spotted increased dramatically. Washington was good. He made a call, a little more firepower was required.

Chapter 35

The Knesset Building

West Jerusalem

6.00 a.m. local

Ben Meir closed the report and glared at the men in front of him. The chief of Mossad, Shin Bet and the Unit bowed their heads as if back at school and they had been called to the headmaster’s office.

“You’ve just given me a 5,000 word report that could have been written in five, We. Don’t. Have. A. Fucking. Clue.”

Nobody dared point out that that was technically six words.

The chiefs of Mossad and Shin Bet both looked at Daniel Rosenberg, the head of the Unit and the man whose men were responsible for watching and losing the weapons.

Ben didn’t miss the subtlety of their attempt. “Don’t look at him to take the blame, you’re all bloody useless. Now get out of here and find those weapons before those Arab fucks destroy us!”

As the chiefs left through a side door, Ben pressed the intercom bottom and screamed “Next!”

The day had started badly and he had no misconceptions that it was only going to get worse.

“Good morning, Mr Meir,” said the head architect of the Jerusalem building project as he entered Ben’s office.

“I’m not so sure you’ll think it’s that good a morning,” offered Ben as a greeting.

The architect was responsible for a key component of Project Ararat, although of course he had no idea that was the case. As far as he was concerned, he was responsible for the building of a major new airport and a number of key government buildings. World renowned, he had dropped everything to take on the project for his spiritual homeland and holy city.

“With two months to go, everything is on target. The sun is shining on another beautiful day and I’m not sure there is anything you can say that will spoil it.”

Ben looked at the architect and almost felt sorry for him.

“Well, try this,” he offered, straight-faced. “You don’t have two months, you have twelve days.”

The architect initially laughed but on seeing Ben’s face, he stopped and looked questioningly at Ben who simply nodded in return.

The Architect slumped a little in his seat.

“Well that certainly did it,” he said, resigned to the enormity of the task that lay before him. “Resources?”

“Whatever I can spare but at least a thousand engineers are on their way to your sites as we speak.”

Ben pressed the intercom button. “Next!” he screamed. The architect took that as his cue to leave and quietly left through the side door, contemplating exactly how to get sixty days of work completed in twelve.

Ben looked up as the next cheery “Good morning” made its naive way towards him.

This was going to be a particularly nasty one, thought Ben. Logistics for project Ararat were a nightmare already. The head of the group had argued he needed a hundred days not sixty. Now he was about to find out that he only had twelve.

Ben caught sight of the anteroom to his office. There were at least another three waiting beyond logistics and many more were scheduled to arrive throughout the morning. It really was going to be a particularly horrible day.

Chapter 36

Rebecca had called Ben as she left the Howard Johnson. There was no link to the terrorists but the cover up of the attempt on the potential presidential candidate was not something she could ignore. The receptionist was not sure but the guy who had checked into the room ‘looked like that handsome Senator, the one that could be President’. As there were only really two contenders, the Vice President and Senator Baker, Rebecca had to assume it was the latter. This revelation, combined with the obvious high level cover up by a senior member of Homeland Security, was intriguing. Two calls to contacts alerted her to even more bizarre goings on earlier in the day and before she knew it, two plus two made a mind blowing political conspiracy. Ben was as interested as she was as to what was going on and promised to get back to her. In the meantime, she was to use all her guile to find Senator Baker and report back if and when she did.

Rebecca had not been to America since the birth of Josh. However, it had been her favorite assignment. She loved America. Everything about it excited her, the vastness, the buildings, the power. The freedom to go wherever you wanted, no checkpoints, no looking over your shoulder, no worrying whether the man who looked Arab had a backpack loaded with explosives and nails or a heavy jacket to cover the explosives strapped around his waist. Freedom. She began to think how Josh would have loved America and before she knew it, the what if crept in. What if she had moved to America to raise Josh and then the why, why had she not…

Her phone rang and interrupted her thoughts. “Hi, the car is where you wanted.”

It was the Sayanim who worked at Hertz. He had secured a car for her, off the books and completely untraceable to her. She ended the call and stepped out from behind the dumpster at the back of the Howard Johnson. The Sayanim had parked the car exactly as instructed; the keys would be under the wheel arch. By the time Rebecca got to the car, the Sayanim was already half way back to the airport terminal. He had delivered many cars in his time and had prided himself on never once bumping into any of the operatives. Deniability was key and if he didn’t see them, he could deny everything about them.

As she arranged her driving position, she switched on one of the extras that most Hertz customers never knew was an option, the police scanner. The other was a Sig Sauer P228, complete with silencer, two spare mags and a box of 9mm shells. Of course, both were an option but only if you happened to work for an Israeli intelligence agency and knew a particular Sayanim. She knew that the Senator had escaped. What she didn’t know was if anybody was in pursuit. With little or no leads, she would just have to work with what she had at her disposal which was very little. She had contacts across America and of course the Sayanim if required but her role was to remain under the radar which is exactly where she planned to be. She pulled out of the lot and headed in the direction the Senator was reported to have gone in, which was left! Nothing to go on would have been an understatement.

The murder of a young couple came over the scanner. It was ten miles away and from what she could glean from the radio chatter, professional and without motive. She had her lead. Rebecca input the address mentioned and accelerated towards Edison, N.J.

“Hello?” she answered her phone on the first ring.

“Hi, it’s Ben,” said Ben unnecessarily. “I’m sending through everything we have on Senator Charles Baker and his brother Sam.”

“Brother?”

“From what we can gather, his brother has become embroiled. In any event, see what you can do. But,” he emphasized. “Finding the nuclear device is the priority, OK?”

“OK.”

Rebecca replaced the phone on the seat next to her and heard the tell tale ping of information being delivered. As soon as she got to Edison, she’d have a look. Something was not sitting right. Ben’s interest, the