The Faithful Spy

a simple padlock. He twisted the lock’s dial and opened the box. There it was. The gift of God. Two sealed jars, the first holding a half dozen pieces of gray metal, the second filled with a dirty yellow powder.

“That’s it?” Ghazi said. He sounded disappointed, Khadri thought.

“It will be enough.”

In truth, before his recent setbacks, Khadri had hoped to add to this stash of plutonium and highly enriched uranium. Perhaps even to accumulate enough material to meet his dream of a nuclear weapon. Then Dmitri the Russian scientist had died. Farouk had disappeared. And now the kafirs were closing in. Best to use what Allah had offered before the opportunity disappeared.

Khadri locked the box and returned it to the trunk, where even the most sensitive radiation detectors could not find it. When the C-4 blew, the explosion would vaporize the trunk, scattering plutonium and uranium for miles. A very dirty bomb. In the middle of Manhattan.

“Lift,” he said. The two men lugged the trunk into the Yellow, where it fit nicely among the crates of C- 4.

“Allahu akbar,” Ghazi said quietly. God is great.

“Allahu akbar.” Khadri was pleased with their work today. The first half of his plan was ready. The rest would fall into place when Wells delivered his package. Khadri thought briefly of the fate that awaited the American. If Wells’s allegiance to al Qaeda was genuine, he would die a martyr, Khadri thought. If not…he would simply die. Either way, Wells would soon be in Allah’s all-powerful grasp. He should be pleased.

CUT OFF FROM the rest of Washington by river and highway, the Kenilworth housing projects are a world unto themselves, a gravity well of addiction and poverty. The gleaming dome of the Capitol is barely two miles from the low-rise apartments of Kenilworth. It might as well be in another galaxy.

Yet a most unlikely oasis is tucked beside the projects. Created in 1882, the Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens are a lush, swampy forest thick with salamanders and snapping turtles and even the occasional armadillo. Wells would have liked to pretend that he’d chosen the gardens for his rendezvous with Exley because of their beauty. In fact he’d picked them because they were the most secluded place in Washington. If Exley planned to turn him in, the agency’s surveillance would be hard to hide.

But as he steered the Ranger down Washington’s Highway 295, closing in on the gardens, Wells felt sure that Exley would be alone. He had believed in her unconditionally since that night in the Jeep. Maybe even since the day they met at the Farm so many years ago, when they were both young and married.

In the end he supposed he had kept his faith after all. Not in the agency or in Allah or even in America, but in her.

HE DROVE UNDER a pedestrian bridge covered with a steel mesh fence, there to protect drivers from the neighborhood kids, who had a habit of dropping rocks onto the road. This was Kenilworth. He pulled the.45 out of his bag, unscrewed the silencer, slipped both inside his jacket. His phone trilled. He pulled it from his pocket, expecting Exley. Instead the number was a 914 area code. Westchester. Just outside New York City.

“Jalal.” Khadri.

“Nam.”

“Where are you?”

“Our nation’s capital.”

“Just so.” Khadri laughed.

“I’ll be home tonight.”

“Unfortunately not. I need you in New York. As soon as possible.”

Wells felt as he had during his first few weeks in the army, buffeted by orders that seemed nonsensical. Khadri surely had a decent idea of his schedule. Why hadn’t he called earlier, before Wells got to New York? But there was no point in arguing.

“New York City?”

“The Bronx.” Khadri named an address.

“See you there,” Wells said. He hung up, and as he did he realized something strange. Khadri hadn’t asked about the package. Hadn’t even hinted at it.

* * *

TEN MINUTES LATER he turned into the gardens’ parking lot. There were no signs of surveillance. He saw her immediately, leaning against a green minivan, arms crossed. She was wearing a navy blue shirt and gray pants that showed off her slim hips.

He parked beside her. She didn’t smile, but when he got out of the truck she stepped toward him and hugged him tightly. “John,” she said. She stepped back to look at him. He pushed her up against the minivan and kissed her, his arms around her. Their mouths locked as easily as two clouds merging and he felt the weight of her body against his, her breasts against his chest. Finally she pushed him away.

“You didn’t come here for this,” she said.

“Not just for this.”

He took her hand and led her into the park. The forest and swamp surrounded them. The sounds of the city disappeared, and the air turned moist and rich. They walked silently toward the Anacostia River, not quite touching, content to be beside each other. Finally the path ended at the edge of the mud-brown river.

“How’d you know about this?” Exley said, watching the water roll lazily south. “I’ve never heard of it.”

“I came here a couple times after the Farm. When I was getting my language training.”

“With Heather.”

“Jealous?”

She smiled. “Now why would I be jealous?”

He shivered as a breeze came off the river.

“You all right, John? You look tired.”

“Too much driving,” he said. “Khadri sent me to Montreal for a briefcase.” He told her what had happened with Tarik the day before, and his suspicions of another courier.

“You don’t know what it is?”

“It’s locked. I haven’t tried to open it.”

“And you’re meeting Khadri here? In D.C.?”

“No. I was heading south, but he just called. Changed the plan. Told me to turn around, go to New York. Something’s about to happen. It’s happening already.”

“Shafer thinks so too.”

He looked at her, then out at the river. “Care to share?”

She half smiled. “I was sort of hoping you would know.”

“It’s like we’re in ancient Rome, sacrificing sheep, reading the entrails. Trying to figure out what catastrophe the gods have planned for us next.”

“They’re not gods.”

“They want to be,” he said. “Angry pagan gods who throw thunderbolts because they can.”

“Do you believe in God, John? Not little-g gods but the big one?”

The question stopped him. He found himself looking at the sparrows flying over the river, thinking about the Koran in his truck, the men he had killed. “Yes,” he said finally. “But I’m not sure he believes in me.”

“I’m serious—”

“So am I. Can you do everything I’ve done and still feel grace? Still feel peace? And that’s God to me. I’m afraid I’ve left Him a long way behind.”

“When I was a kid I believed,” Exley said. “Then my brother went crazy and I stopped. It seemed too cruel, to take someone’s mind away that way. I remember one time, when his meds were working, joking around with him: ‘How come God never just tells you to go shopping? How come it’s always “The water’s poisoned, there’s a chip in your brain, the aliens are coming”?’ He laughed, really laughed, and I did too. It just seemed so futile. But now that I have kids I want to believe again, if not for my sake then for theirs, believe that there’s something more than this.”

“I know what you mean.” Wells touched her arm. “Jenny. Does anybody know I’m here?”

“Back to work, huh? No. Not even Shafer. You’re toxic, John. Worse than toxic. I’m ending my career right