IN NORTH CAROLINA the skies darkened. Rain broke against the windshield in sheets, and the traffic crawled forward through foot-deep puddles. Outside Durham Wells stopped at a giant Mobil station. As the Ranger’s tank filled he punched Exley’s number into his cellphone. He should tell her about the message from Khadri. He could hear the purr of her voice as he dialed. But before the call went through he canceled it. Khadri’s message was too vague to be useful. The hotel could be a dead drop. As he had for their Atlanta meeting, Khadri would surely take precautions to make sure Wells wasn’t being trailed.
Wells didn’t want to involve the agency until he had something concrete, like the package — or, even better, Khadri. In any case no one at Langley would believe him. Even Exley would just tell him to come in, give himself up. No. To redeem himself he needed the package, whatever it was. He slipped the phone back into his pocket.
The rest of the drive went quietly. South of Washington, Wells turned east on 495, the route that would give him the widest possible berth around Langley. Again he fought down the urge to call Exley. He would have time later to tell her everything he wanted…if he lived.
THEN, FOR THE first time in weeks, Wells thought of his son. He squeezed the wheel as he remembered again that day almost six months before when his ex-wife forbade him to see Evan. Heather had been right. Wells had chosen to forsake his family, and nothing he said or did could salve that wound. For a moment he closed his eyes. When he opened them he had pushed his family out of his mind and resolved to think only of the job ahead.
He drove on, escaping the storm behind him, his little white truck passing silently through the night. When he reached the George Washington Bridge the Ranger’s digital clock read 2:47 and the air outside was cool and moist. Wells was tired and sore from the hours on the pickup’s hard bench seat, but he knew that if he needed to he could go at least one more day without sleeping. In Afghanistan he had once stayed up sixty-five hours straight. Though he had been younger then.
The girders of the giant steel bridge glowed white in the night. To his right, to the south, the towers of Manhattan shone over the Hudson River. In the distance he could just see the Statue of Liberty. Wells understood why Khadri had called the city beautiful. He did not doubt that Qaeda would do everything possible to destroy it.
He turned north on I-87, following the signs for Albany. A few minutes later, he reached the Tappan Zee Bridge, stretching across the Hudson like a snake floating on the water. Wells smiled to himself as he recrossed the river, realizing he could have stayed on the Hudson’s west bank all along. Well. He would remember that shortcut the next time Khadri sent him from Atlanta to Montreal to pick up a secret package.
NORTH. THE EXITS came farther and farther apart. Wells rubbed his eyes and fought the temptation to speed. After Albany, the highway had an eerie, postapocalyptic emptiness. Wells turned up the Ranger’s radio to fill the void, smiling to himself as he found a Springsteen song playing low on the FM dial:
But as the miles flowed on, the static worsened until Wells could no longer understand the voices he heard and finally he flicked off the radio and rode in silence.
The sun rose, revealing the Adirondacks, low mountains covered with the thick forests he remembered from his years at Dartmouth. By January these hills would be as cold and cruel as the eleven-thousand-foot peaks in Montana. But for now they looked gentle, easily manageable. Like so much else in the world, they were a trap for the unwary. At Chestertown, a hundred miles south of the border, Wells pulled off and found a no-name motel whose red neon light flashed VACANCY. He had made good time, and he wanted to nap before the border crossing. He paid for a room for four days up front, then flopped on the bed and slept a black sleep for three hours, until the alarm woke him. He showered, shaved, and dressed, then shoved the bag holding the.45 inside the room’s cheap wooden bureau.
On his way out he hung the DO NOT DISTURB sign on the door. The gun would be safe until he got back. Even if a housekeeper did look inside, Wells was sure she wouldn’t do more than change the towels.
HE PASSED CHAMPLAIN, the last exit on I-87 before the U.S.-Canada border. The highway divided, and Wells slowed as he approached the border checkpoint. He looked at his watch: eleven-fifteen. The sun gleamed in the clear blue sky. A perfect warm September day, a reminder that summer hadn’t ended quite yet. He felt fresh and strong and ready.
The Canadian border doesn’t require a passport. Wells handed over his driver’s license.
The guard glanced at it, then looked him over idly. “From Georgia? Long drive.”
“Don’t I know it.”
“Is the purpose of your trip business or pleasure?”
“Pleasure, I hope.” Wells smiled. “Meeting a woman I been e-mailing. Jennifer’s her name. In Quebec City. Hope she’s as pretty as the pictures she’s been sending.”
The guard nodded. “How long do you plan to stay?”
“A couple days. It’ll depend on how things go.”
“Do you have a hotel?”
“I’m hoping I won’t need one.”
“Well, good luck. Have fun.” The guard handed back Wells’s driver’s license and waved him through.
WELLS’S PHONE RANG as he piloted his Ranger across the Champlain Bridge and over the Saint Lawrence River, closing in on the skyscrapers of Montreal’s downtown. He clicked on the phone.
“This is Richard.” The man’s voice quivered. But he had the right name, the one that Khadri had e-mailed Wells to expect.
“Karl,” Wells said.
“Yes. Good. Are you close?” Wells couldn’t place the accent.
“Yes.”
“Good. It’s a new plan.”
No surprise there.
The man coughed lightly. “Drive on to Quebec City. Next to the Hotel de Ville, the city hall, is a big parking garage. You shall find it easily. Meet me there on the second level at four o’clock. I have a white minivan.”
The words were proper, but the phrases were off. English wasn’t this guy’s first language, or his second. “I’ll find it. I’ve got a pickup truck. Also white.”
Click. An amateur, Wells thought. Or a pro playing an odd game.
TARIK WAITED FOR his hands to stop shaking, then slid the phone into his pocket. Jalal had come, just as Khadri had promised. Now Tarik needed to keep his own promise and deliver his package.
He had taken care of his wife, sealing her body in thick plastic bags and leaving her in the basement of the gray house. A temporary solution, sure, but Tarik was thinking short-term these days. The police had knocked on his door again this morning. He hadn’t answered, but they knew he was home. They wouldn’t wait much longer before they came back with a warrant.
But by then Jalal would have his package. The plan should work, Tarik thought. Technically, the delivery mechanism was simple. The germs were ready. Yes, the plan should work. As long as he could keep his nerve.
SO MY LIE at the border about Quebec City turned out to be true, Wells thought. He stopped for gas, picked up a map, and sighed as he saw that his new destination was another 150 miles away. Well, another couple of hours of driving hardly mattered. “Giddyup,” he said as he turned the Ranger’s ignition.
The garage in Quebec City was huge, and mostly empty. Wells drove through it slowly, doubling back twice.
