“Major! Major Hossein!” He turned to find a sergeant running across the plateau toward him, a satellite phone in his hand.
“Who is it?” Hossein asked, reaching out his hand.
The soldier’s eyes were wide as he handed the phone over. “It-it is the Supreme Leader himself…”
The major stiffened, his mouth suddenly dry. “Give it here,” he whispered. The Ayatollah Isfahani was the last person he had wanted to hear from this morning.
“Good morning, sir.”
“Is it?” the elderly voice on the other end of the phone asked skeptically. “Major Hossein, I need you to come to Qom immediately.”
Hossein paused, but only for a moment. Despite the rise to power of the IRGC and Mahmoud Shirazi, the Ayatollah was still a man to be feared. And obeyed. “Of course.”
“There is a Colonel Harun Larijani there at your base. I am authorizing you to requisition his helicopter for you to fly here.”
“Where do I meet you?”
“Fly directly to my home. You are to go dark, major. I want you to discuss this call with no one, is that understood? As far as anyone knows, you are flying to your execution.”
“Sir?”
“The Americans have escaped, major. The President will be looking for a scapegoat, and believe me when I say his gaze will not settle upon the incompetence of his nephew.”
“You mean-Larijani?”
The voice that replied was heavily laced with sarcasm. “Surely, major, you did not believe that he earned his rank through his skills as a tactician? Now, we must hurry-I will expect you at my residence by noon. Any questions?”
There were many, but none that Hossein believed diplomatic or safe to ask. “No.”
“Good. And remember, major, not a word to anyone. You’re a condemned man. Act the part.”
Hossein thumbed the “end” button on the phone and shook his head. Very little of what he had just been told made any sense. Or perhaps it did, in the twisted corridors of power that the Ayatollah inhabited. He would be there soon enough…
The salt breeze rippled through Avi’s hair as he jogged along the nearly deserted beach. It was a morning ritual for the Mossad chief, an iron refusal to bow to the increasing demands of his aging body.
“So, what is the latest after-action report from RAHAB?” he asked of the aide panting at his side. Shoham suppressed a quiet smile as the young man struggled to catch his breath sufficiently to reply. He might be getting older, but he could still set a pace that would put young men to the test.
Some young men, he reflected, casting a critical eye on the bodyguard flanking him on his right, matching his stride effortlessly. There were a full score of Mossad agents spread along the narrow beach, deployed to ensure his safety.
“We-we’re getting the first daytime sat shots now,” the aide gasped out. “It would appear that the Iranians are still cleaning up the damage.”
“We knew that-any indication as to who caused it?”
“No. Another of our satellites picked up abnormal activity at the American base at Q-West late last night.”
“Such as?”
“An MH-53J took off from the airfield at approx twenty hundred hours local time last night, flying north, then turning west before disappearing off the edge of our sat coverage. It returned at a little over two hours later.”
Avi kept jogging, slowly turning over the information in his mind. The MH-53J was a Special Forces helicopter-but the Americans had a large Special Forces presence in Iraq, so that by itself was indicative of nothing.
“Did it show up elsewhere?” The aide ducked his head, gulping in air, then gasped a “no”.
“Th-there is one other thing, sir. SIGINT assets reported a spike in activity at the helicopter base south of the Iranian base camp at 2200 Tehran time, followed by more activity at the airfield in Tabriz.”
“What type of activity?” Shoham asked. SIGINT, which stood for SIGnals INTelligence, monitored Iranian communications.
“Units were being scrambled and sent airborne-gunships, fighters-our photoanalysts are trying to determine whether they may have even scrambled their F-14s.”
Avi chuckled in disbelief. Given to the Shah in the ‘70s by the American government, the once state-of-the-art F-14 “Tomcat” fighter planes were barely flyable now, shoddy maintenance and lack of replacement parts taking an inevitable toll. His mind returned to the matter at hand.
“They were reacting to a penetration of their airspace,” he observed coolly, slowing as he made the turn of the beach to head back to their SUV.
“The Americans?”
“Perhaps,” Shoham whispered, his mind occupied with other thoughts. If it
“We getting anything actionable from SCHLIEMANN?”
The aide shook his head. “No. Nothing at all.”
“I see,” was the Mossad chief’s only reply. Roll the dice…
Thomas blinked as the morning sun struck him full in the face. Sirvan stepped aside, leading him out of the mouth of what Thomas slowly realized had been a cave.
The PJAK camp was nestled in a valley of one sort or another, perhaps a mile in breadth at the widest point, clumps of trees and scrub brush breaking the monotony of the arid terrain. Steep, craggy mountains of sheer-faced rock towered on both sides of the valley, shielding them from effective aerial assault. At the foot of the cliff, off to his right, a small herd of six or seven donkeys were tethered to a leafy bush that they were in the process of devouring.
The smell of smoke reached his nostrils and Thomas turned to see a cooking fire not ten meters away.
“Good morning, Mr. Patterson.” It was Azad Badir, kneeling by the fire, a half-eaten plate of rice in his hands. He scooped the last few bites into his mouth and rose. “We march in fifteen minutes,” he announced, addressing Thomas. “Make sure you’re ready.”
A grin tugged at the corner of Thomas’s mouth. “I’m not sure I can do that, boss. Your men have left me with
Azad Badir threw back his head and laughed, clapping Thomas on the shoulder. “A man with a sense of humor. I like you, Mr. Patterson-life leaves us with little to laugh at here in Kurdistan.”
Thomas’s eyebrows went up. “But I take it my likeability would not spare me should I choose to part company with your people at this point?”
Badir smiled. “That is correct. I will not demean you by binding your hands, but I must assure you that if you stray from the line of march, you will be shot out of hand. My people rarely miss.”
“A comforting thought.” Thomas’s gaze shifted, caught by an object resting beside a nearby fire. It was a British-made Parker-Hale M-85 sniper rifle. He hurried over to it before either man could stop him.
“Where did you get one of these?” he asked, picking up the rifle and looking back toward them. Neither one was smiling.
